Chapter 17
“She’s-she’s gone?” came a voice from a few feet away. Aimerik had sat up and was looking around frantically. “You…got rid of her?” As the hapless man clambered to his feet, Rasha let go of my hand and stepped away. I threw him a questioning look. He still looked pale, and now he looked winded, too, like he’d just sprinted at top speed for a few moments.
“We can talk later,” he panted. “I’ll tell you what I can.”
“Are you alright?” I asked. He nodded.
“Yeah. That took a lot more than I was expecting, that’s all,” he said. I opened my mouth to question him, but snapped it shut. He’d said it himself - we could talk later. Besides, Aimerik was making a beeline for me at the moment, and I didn’t need him overhearing.
“You, Milady, are the brave and valiant hero that vanquished that detestable Witch?” he asked as he approached. I barely stopped myself from rolling my eyes.
“That was me, yes,” I replied. He reached down and grabbed my hands, and I wasn’t quite fast enough to pull away before he did. He looked down at me with big, green, watery eyes.
“Thank you. Thank you! From the bottom of my heart, I thank you!” he exclaimed. He was quite a bit taller than me, which was saying something because I’m not exactly short. Wild, golden-brown hair framed a face that was actually pretty dang handsome, even when he looked like he was on the verge of tears. He was dressed in a way that screamed ‘rich’ — his garments were fitted to him in a very flattering way, the construction was flawless, the materials were visibly of very high quality, and the man was covered in all sorts of jewelry and baubles and trinkets. Who was this guy, a prince?
He was currently shaking my hands with great enthusiasm. I plastered on a fake smile and used the opportunity to try to look around. The clouds were already starting to thin and both light and noise were starting to return to the area. Every window on the train was full of onlookers. Several people were approaching from the direction of the front of the train. Koreo and Souta were still near the train, and Rasha had only taken a couple of steps away from me, so at least he was nearby if this guy tried anything. Not that he would — he’d just seen me blast a Witch into literal oblivion, and as far as he knew I could cast that spell at will.
“My name is Aimerik,” the stranger introduced as he finally let go of my hands. “I am a Prince of Astor, fourth in the line of succession. You have done a great service to me and my family this day, Miss…?”
"Milina," I answered.
“Milina,” he breathed. “A fine name for a wonderful young lady. How fortunate of me to run into someone capable of vanquishing a Witch right in my time of need! Surely, this is destiny at work!”
“I…don’t know about that,” I tried to interject, but the prince barrelled on with his speech, heedless of my objections.
“I must simply procure your services as a bodyguard. Name your price and I can and will match it! Nay, double it!” he pleaded. I blinked. There were a number of reasons that I should have said no right away. So many. But if this guy actually was who he was claiming to be, him owing us a favor could be very useful to our immediate goals. And also money. Money was definitely a factor.
“You need to answer some questions first,” I said, extracting my hands. He nodded very aggressively.
“Yes, absolutely! Ask away, milady!” he said. I cast a glance at the people approaching and looked back at the train. The two people that had pursued Aimerik into our room were watching from the window, but didn’t look like they were about to jump out.
“For starters, this isn’t the best place for this kind of conversation,” I said, gesturing at the approaching people. Aimerik’s eyes widened and he looked around, nodding. “And also, please forgive me, but I’ll need to be sure that you’re actually telling the truth before I agree to anything.”
“Yes, yes, of course! Whatever you need,” he said. “If you can keep me safe from that Witch, I will do whatever you need of me.”
“Well, she won’t be back for a while. It takes them a lot of time and effort to get back out of the Abyss when they get sent there that way,” I said. Aimerik heaved a very audible sigh of relief. His posture, which had been very rigid up until now, relaxed a bit. He reached up and rubbed absentmindedly at his throat. He was wearing a high collared shirt, but what skin I could see looked very much irritated. I turned to Koreo.
“Koreo, I think this guy could use some healing, if you don’t mind?” I asked. She nodded and came over, Souta trailing behind her looking pretty bewildered.
“I thought you said you’d die if you cast something like that?” he asked. I shrugged.
“Yeah, I should have,” I replied. Koreo started the chant for her healing spell, and the two people from the front of the train finally made it to us. Judging from how they were dressed, one was certainly the conductor, but I couldn’t tell much about the other guy. He was decently tall and had short dark hair, and he was wearing nondescript clothes. He was, unsurprisingly, Astorian, but so were most people here.
“Aimerik, are you unharmed?” the nondescript man asked as he approached.
“Thank you for your concern, Sir Reginald, but I am mostly unharmed,” Aimerik said as Koreo’s healing spell started to wash over him. “Thanks to these wonderful people.” He gestured toward me in particular. Both the nondescript man and the conductor turned to look at me. While the conductor was looking at me with gratitude on his face, the other man was looking at me very critically. I nodded to both.
“Thank you for vanquishing the Witch,” the conductor began. “You’ve saved my train and all of the passengers. We are in great debt to you.”
“It was nothing,” I lied, waving my hand dismissively. “All in a day’s work.” I smiled widely. The other man continued to look at me with remarkably piercing steel gray eyes.
“And to whom do we owe such a great thanks on this day?” he finally asked. I grinned at him and approached, sticking out my hand for him to shake.
“Milina Faustus, at your service,” I said. He nodded and shook my hand.
“I am Reginald Highwater, His Highness Prince Aimerik Astor’s personal bodyguard,” he greeted. So either he was in on the ruse or this guy actually was a prince of Astor. I still wasn’t fully convinced of it, but I really had no reason not to hear them out.
“Reg, I was actually just inquiring about hiring Miss Milina for protection from the Witch,” Aimerik said, excited. Reginald let go of my hand and turned a stern look toward Aimerik.
“Milord, we’ve talked about this, please do not make decisions like that without consulting at least me first—” he started, but Aimerik waved a hand dismissively at him.
“Yes, yes, I know—” he interjected, but Reginald took a very menacing step toward the supposed prince with a severe frown on his face.
“Need I remind you, your highness, that it was this same rash behavior that landed you in such a predicament with the Witch in the first place?” he asked.
I got the sense that I was watching a very rehashed argument playing out in front of me. I cleared my throat, and both men turned to look at me. Aimerik looked sheepish, and Reginald looked like he might have been embarrassed if he weren’t so weary.
“We can discuss this matter further once we’re back on the train,” I suggested. They both nodded.
“Ah, yes,” the conductor spoke up, and we all turned to him. “You are quite welcome to board and return to your rooms, however… well, it may be quite a while before we can get the train moving.”
“Oh,” I said. I looked past him to the front of the train. “The golems.” The conductor nodded.
“Unfortunately, they did not disappear with the Witch,” he said. I frowned. There were some spells that I might be able to use to get them out of the way, but they were more big spells. I looked at Rasha, and he still looked like he was recovering. I didn’t want to drain him of all his mana, and I certainly couldn’t do it myself—
“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll take care of those,” Aimerik piped up. We all turned to look at him in surprise. “They need only move to the sides and off of the tracks, correct? That will be simple.”
There was a beat of absolute silence as we all stared.
“...how—” I started to ask, but Aimerik interjected. He was standing straight again, chin up and a proud look on his face as he preened for a moment.
“Golems are a specialty of mine!” he said. Reginald sighed, and I looked at him.
“And that is precisely the reason that the Witch is after you now,” he grumbled. Aimerik ignored him. “Might as well use your ill-gotten talents for good use then, Milord.”
“Well…if you can really move the golems, then we should be able to get the train up and running in about half an hour,” the conductor said. He turned back to me. “And are you sure you don’t want anything for defeating the Witch?”
“Well… I suppose some snacks and booze couldn’t hurt!” I exclaimed with a big grin. He nodded.
“I’ll have menus sent to your room,” he said. “Any and all refreshments that you desire will be on the house for the rest of your trip with us.”
“We’re going all the way to Nixian, is that okay?” I asked. He nodded.
“Of course,” he said. He turned to Aimerik. “If I could get your help with those golems then, your highness?”
“Yes, of course,” he said. He turned to me. “And once I’ve moved the golems, shall I come to your room for that discussion?”
“Sure,” I said. He nodded and started off for the front of the train. The conductor and Reginald fell in step with him. I turned back to the rest.
“I don’t think we can get back in through the window, so we might as well follow them,” I said. Koreo and Souta nodded and started heading for the front of the train as well. Rasha, predictably, held out a hand to stop me from following them.
“We should talk while we have the chance to not be overheard,” he said. I nodded and turned to face him.
“I’m guessing there’s not a lot you can tell me, though,” I said. He nodded, looking frustrated. “What you did should be impossible,” I pointed out. I lifted the hand that he’d held to pass mana to me. “I don’t know how you did it, but thank you.” He nodded. “No, really. Thank you, Rasha. I…” I had to stop and take a breath, collect my thoughts. “I haven’t been able to cast like that in a long time. I haven’t been so full of mana like this in such a long time. I forgot how it felt.” He smiled in response, and I felt the breath catch in my throat. It was a very warm smile. A fond smile. It hit me, all of a sudden, just how handsome he actually was.
Oh no.
“You’re right, though,” he said, his look turning serious. “It should be impossible. I can’t tell you anything about how I’m able to do it.”
“Do you think it’s something Lucien can do, too?” I asked. He shrugged, and I sighed. “Right, right, I don’t know what I was expecting, asking that.” Rasha at least looked apologetic.
“As you are well aware, I’m an Accumulate, Spikora. I have quite a bit more mana than your average person. If you need it, I can share it with you, but I’ll have to be touching you to do so,” he said. I nodded.
“But it takes a lot out of you,” I said. He nodded.
“Well, sort of. That spell you cast was a real doozy. I’m actually very impressed that you can cast it at all without it going haywire,” he said. I couldn’t help grinning in response to the praise. “And it wasn’t just the mana for that spell. Since your body was mostly empty of mana, you pulled out enough to, I guess, fill your reserves? And that was quite a lot, too. I think you would naturally have more mana reserves than the average person if you were still capable of filling them.”
“Are you okay now?” I asked. He had at least stopped breathing heavily, but he still looked pale and was still sweating, despite the cool temperature. It was starting to warm up just a little with the clouds dispersing, but only a little. He nodded.
“I’ll be fine. Nothing a nice long nap can’t fix. We should get back on the train,” he said. I nodded.
At the front of the train, Aimerik pulled some kind of wand out of a satchel he was wearing at his waist. Then, in a way very reminiscent of how a conductor would give signals to their orchestra, he started waving the wand and his hand as he chanted something in a language I couldn’t parse. The front row of golems seemed to come to life, lights shimmering inside of them as they animated and started to move off of the tracks to the right and left. As we watched, the second row started to move, and then the third. The rows of golems stretched on for a ridiculous length, though, so it did seem like it might be a while.
We made it back to our compartment to find the two men that had chased Aimerik nowhere to be found, and the window was back to the way it had been before Rasha’s spell, too. All we could really do was wait, so we sat down and pondered over the menu. We had ample time to order snacks and drinks and have them delivered to us before an exhausted-looking Aimerik and a weary-looking Reginald finally arrived at the door to our compartment. From the sounds of it, train personnel were scrambling to get the train moving again now that the golems were all presumably gone.
We had asked for two extra chairs when we ordered our food, and Aimerik gratefully slumped into one, while Reginald opted to stand just inside the door, which he firmly shut. I offered both of them a drink of water, which predictably Aimerik slugged down with gusto and Reginald declined.
“Thank you so much,” Aimerik said as he finished his drink. “Even I didn’t know how exhausting it would be to move that many golems! I’ll be retiring to my own private compartment to have a nap once we’ve finished our discussion!” He leaned over the table now, eyes bright. “And we have much to discuss!”
“Sure,” I said, nodding. “Can we start with proof that you are who you claim to be?” Aimerick laughed in response.
“Straight to the point. I like it! An invaluable quality in a bodyguard.” He leaned back in his chair and looked over his shoulder at Reginald. “Reg, before I show them proof of my royal lineage, would you be so kind?”
“Thank you for asking this time, my liege,” Reginald grumbled, even as he nodded at the supposed prince. His eyes flashed a little brighter for a moment and he muttered something under his breath, gazing over at the four of us. “They harbor no ill intent toward you or anyone else on this train. As near as I can tell, none of them had ever met the Witch before today.” He turned to look directly at Rasha now, who was sitting across from me. “That man has something unusual about him, but I cannot divine what it could be. And that woman,” and here he turned to me, “Is not only lying about her name, but she has something Abyssal in her lineage.”
That threw me so off-guard that all I could do was let my jaw drop and gape at him. Aimerick turned to me, literally pouting.
“Aww, so Milina isn’t really your name? What a shame, it’s a very pretty one,” he said. I blinked at him, and then went back to staring at Reginald in shock.
“How did you know — what do you mean Abyssal — who are you?” I finally managed to blurt out.
“I am Sir Reginald Highwater, one of the Order of Cathara, a High Paladin of Astor,” he introduced himself.
“Order of Cathara?” Koreo asked from beside me.
“A High Paladin?!” Souta exclaimed, nearly at the same time.
“Well,” I finally managed to say, eyes wide. “No fucking wonder you knew I was lying about my name.”
The Order of Cathara are a very exclusive bunch of paladins, clerics and all-around holy people that are the cream of the crop in terms of both holy devotion and also holy abilities. They are all very powerful and all very in-tune with the beings that live in Mithrand. He probably wasn’t kidding when he said he could tell our intentions, but also that he could definitely tell I was lying.
“If you’ve got someone from the Order of Cathara as your bodyguard,” I said, turning to Aimerick, “I believe you about being a Prince of Astor.” I sighed. “And yeah, I was lying about my name. But for all I knew you two were con men or criminals or something.” I shot a glance at Reginald. “I’ll tell you my real name, but you’ve gotta tell me something first. What did you mean by Abyssal lineage?”
“You mean you don’t know?” he asked, looking about as shocked as I was. I shook my head. He frowned. “Forgive me if this is too personal a question, but have you met both of your parents?”
I was young when my folks abandoned me with Lucien. Really young. According to him, my dad was just some deadbeat not even worth talking about. A completely average loser human, who I have no memories of at all. My mother is where all of my talents came from. She was a very powerful mage who simply hadn’t wanted the burden of trying to raise a child while she was honing her abilities. She studied under Lucien for a few years and, evidently, she learned all she needed to from him and just left one day without me. I don’t remember much about her, but I do at least have some memories of her, unlike my dad. She was a very serious woman, very stern. She wasn’t very affectionate with me, but there were some moments, I remember, where she would soften up with me. Mostly, though, I remember her vibrant purple hair, the same shade as mine. But despite the hair she was human, there is no doubt in my mind about that.
“What are you trying to say?” I asked. Reginald looked like he was steeling himself for some backlash. I can’t say I blamed him, because of the next words out of his mouth.
“One of them, or maybe both, were very clearly not human,” he said. “Or at least not fully human. Based on your hair, a Witchborn or Witchborn descendant. Or perhaps a Demon? Or your grandparents, what about them?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, truthfully. I must have looked super uncomfortable, because Rasha of all people butted in.
“Is her supposed Abyssal heritage going to be a problem for you, gentlemen?” he asked. Reginald’s eyebrows shot up, but Aimerik merely shook his head.
“No, no, not at all! As long as she can protect me from the Witch, I’m glad to hire her!” he exclaimed, turning a pleading look at Reginald. Reginald just sighed.
“Although I must object to you once again allying yourself with a Descendant of Parn, Milord, I suppose I have no direct quarrel with…” He trailed off and looked at me, expectantly.
“Oh no, I’m not giving you my actual name just yet,” I replied with a firm shake of my head. “I need to know why that Witch has it out for you first, so I can decide whether or not it’s worth it to get mixed up in your business. I mean, I’ve already made an enemy out of her by blasting her back to the Abyss with that spell, but…” I sighed and put a hand to my forehead. Two separate Witches hated me… and supposedly, I was somehow connected to a third? And now this guy was saying that one of my parents was Abyssal somehow? Probably that deadbeat no-good dad of mine. Things were starting to get complicated.
Aimerik looked at Reginald. Reginald sighed and gestured to the Orb of Silence that was conspicuously sitting on the table but not yet activated.
“Would you mind activating that for this conversation?” he asked me. I nodded.
“If you can promise me that no matter what gets said in this room, it will not leave this room,” I replied. Both men nodded, I nodded, and when we looked around the room expectantly, Rasha, Koreo and Souta all nodded as well. I put my hand on the Orb and muttered the activation word, and the Orb came to life. It felt nice to activate it without using a battery. Nostalgic, almost.
“Right,” Aimerik said with a grin that looked a little bit guilty. “Well as I have said, I am an Astorian prince. I’ve almost no shot at ever taking the throne, so I’m largely allowed to do whatever I want with my life and marry whoever I want, and have kids with whoever I want. I promise this is relevant,” he said, when I undoubtedly started to look confused. “So, I set out to make a name for myself unconnected to my Astorian royal blood. I’ve traveled all over the world looking for my purpose in life, apprenticing under many different masters of different types of magic, martial arts, professions, trades… I’ve tried it all. I’m just not naturally good at anything.” He gave a self-deprecating laugh here. “I’d all but given up on ever finding something to be good at until I met…her.” He gave a dreamy sigh. I saw Reginald roll his eyes. Koreo leaned forward, clearly interested in the tale. “She was everything. Beautiful, charming, brave, wicked smart, and so talented. And she liked me even before she found out about my royal lineage. She was an apprentice herself, studying a very specific type of magic, the kind that lets you animate and control golems and other constructs.”
Now, that was interesting. Animata magic was insanely rare. So rare, in fact, that there was only one known true master of the magic. Even though I’d never had much interest in Animata magic myself, I’d still heard the stories about Kyros, the legendary hermit of Avalize. He was actually something of a local legend where I’d grown up on Lucien’s mountain.
“So, you managed to find Kyros, the master mage of Animata,” I said. Both Aimerik and Reginald looked taken aback by that.
“Yes,” Aimerik said, eyebrows practically in his hairline. “Do you know Master Kyros?”
“Only by reputation,” I said, and gestured for him to continue. He nodded.
“I was trying to convince Master Kyros to teach me the Animata when I met Silya. He refused, but she took an interest in me and offered to teach me what she knew. I wasn’t very good at it, no matter how much I practiced. I just don’t have the aptitude for it. Not naturally, anyway.” He took a second here to take a deep breath, and started to look a little despondent. “I studied with her for months but made very little progress. According to Master Kyros, I just don’t have the right kind of mana for it. Or the right kind of brain. But Silya never gave up on me. Well, one thing led to another and she… ended up getting pregnant. I fully intended to wed her and take her with me back to Astor once she had finished her apprenticeship. Things were going well! She kept up her studies and I kept up with mine. I stayed with her through all of it. She had the baby, a little girl that we named Ayla. Not long after, she was able to master the Animata. And that’s… when everything changed.” Aimerik hesitated here, looking at the Orb of Silence and then back to me.
“I need you to understand that Silya was a wonderful woman. And human, very human. Even Reginald was never suspicious of her. But once she mastered the Animata, she…” he fretted for a second. “She revealed her true form. She is that yellow Witch.”
I’m sure my jaw hit the floor.
“How is that possible?” I asked. “I mean, people that have never been into the Abyss can still tell there’s something wrong with a Witch and… a Paladin of the Order of Cathara should be able to sense a Witch from at least a mile away, disguise or no.”
Reginald nodded, looking grave.
“There were never any signs. I don’t know how she did it, but her human disguise was so complete that none of us ever suspected a thing. Even Master Kyros, who had been working with her for years before she revealed herself.”
“So the Witch disguised herself as a human in order to study Animata magic,” I said. I could feel panic starting to creep up on me as I spoke. “And had a child with you.” Aimerik nodded. “And the child, is she…?”
“She is only five months old,” Reginald answered. “She is healthy and appears to be perfectly normal, but to my divine senses she does have Abyssal ancestry.”
He didn’t say “like you”, but he didn’t have to. I filled in the gaps for him. My mind was spinning. I turned my attention back to Aimerik and swallowed down my trepidation to ask one, simple question.
“Silya, in her human disguise, were her hair and eyes kind of unnaturally bright yellow?”
Aimerik nodded and I sat back in my chair, absolutely stunned. A memory of my mother casting magic flashed through my head, her hair and eyes glowing bright purple against the backdrop of a stormy sky. Lucien had told me that just happened sometimes if you cast powerful enough magic. What reason would I have had to think otherwise? Pacted magic users had glowing hair and eyes when they cast, after all.
“So…what happened after that?” Koreo asked.
“Well I was of course quite shocked at the revelation that she was a Witch, but she was the love of my life, the mother of my child, I couldn’t just leave her. And, well, she offered me a deal.” He closed his eyes and heaved a sigh. “And it was a very good deal. She gave me the ability to use the Animata. She changed my actual physical body and mind in order to make it so that I could learn it and cast it. All I had to do was devote my life to her. It was an easy deal to make, I was already planning on doing that anyway. I wanted her to be my wife, I wanted to raise Ayla with her. If only I had known…”
“I’m guessing you started to get sick, just being around her,” I suggested. He nodded.
“Yes, but it wasn’t just that. The personality she had as Silya was just…gone. The Yellow Witch is… well, you saw how she is. Cruel and awful and terrifying, among other things. I tried to make it work with her, I really, really did, but it was just too awful. I sent Ayla away and escaped with Reginald’s help. She has been chasing us ever since… well, until you vanquished her.” Aimerik reached over and took my hands in his. “Thank you, thank you, thank you so much. Even if you don’t agree to be my bodyguard, thanks to you I’ll be able to make it to Nixian and one day maybe I’ll even see my daughter again.”
“Out of curiosity, why Nixian and not Astor?” Rasha asked. Aimerik let go of my hands and turned to him.
“Well, it’s true that there are people powerful enough to protect me from the Witch in Astor, but we agreed that it would be a bad idea to lead her somewhere with so many people in it, especially when Astor is on the verge of war. So instead we decided to seek the protection of the person most famous for being able to drive away Witches,” he explained.
“Obsidia the Whirlwind,” I said. Aimerik and Reginald both nodded. I shared a knowing look with Rasha.
“Alright, I guess I can tell you who we are now,” I said.