ARC 1 Interlude/Epilogue- Manifesting power

  Stella POV

  Stella sat in an inn room, sulking as she lay exhausted from another hard day of walking. She wasn’t happy. The obstinate ranger had kept her tied up all the way back to the mainland. A full day of being tied and gagged. She fumed at the memory of it. She was of elven nobility; her father was a war hero! He should be made to grovel at her feet. Just the memory lit a fire in her core. Unable to do anything, she stoked it with thoughts of what she would do later.

  Despite her elevated status, she was broke, young for a mage, and her family’s connections were far from the coast. Losing her master was a major setback. Still, such things happened, especially with a war with humans going on. Her own family had lost many family members in humanity’s maniacal zeal. Once she contacted her family, she could apprentice to another. Once she was elevated to full mage, she would have the power to seek revenge on all those who wronged her in her ascent.

  After they had arrived back on the main coast, her captor had cut her loose. Not because he wanted to, but because he was forced to by the constabulary, which promptly kicked her to the curb. To add insult to injury, the ranger walked out, gave her a bag of coppers to help her get on her feet, then disappeared into the local military outpost.

  At first, she was tempted to storm after him, but she wasn’t part of the elven military hierarchy yet. Not wanting to give him another chance, she fled into the city and was gone the next day. The copper coins barely covered the inns and meager bread she had so far. It would take another week at this rate, but another three days’ travel, and she would be in familiar land, where she could use her family name with some weight.

  She had originally tried to send a message home; however, the recent war had diminished their communication network as humans began striking in the middle of their empire. The butcher had truly diminished their great empire. It was like the old saying, all it took was one feral mutt to ruin a masterpiece.

  She could send a message to her house to call for aid and wait, but it would take twice as long with no way to know if the message was received, while she quickly burned through her meager coins. She couldn’t even go to a bank to pull money. The family had pulled favors for her apprenticeship, but didn’t give her any money.

  She would need to be a full mage to be considered capable of handling her own finances, and her house didn’t have the spare funds to sit around in a bank account until then. Besides, it was common knowledge that a master would provide for the needs of their student. Elven guardianship was a key virtue of elven society, and nothing was a better model of this than the student-teacher relationship in mage apprenticeships.

  Sitting on her bed, chewing on her fingernails, Stella was so deep in her reflection she didn’t hear the heavy knock until the second time. She began to wonder who was trying to enter her room at this time of night.

  Thoughts of robbers or thugs seeing a helpless apprentice weighed down by her master’s gold flitted through her head. She felt her heart speed up as she slowly crept forward to investigate. The knocking stopped, but she heard muffled words through the door. Straining her hearing, she began to make out words.

  “You are sure this is her room?” a deeply masculine voice asked. She didn’t hear the reply before the wooden door burst open.

  Stella screamed, wondering if her kidnapper had come back in force to take her away. To her astonishment, when the dust cleared, she saw knights in gleaming mithril and white rune cloaks. Her face morphed from fear to hope. Had her family pulled connections? She was a minor noble, but why else would one of the famous arcane knights, the apex among elven knights, be sent for her? She looked up to see the knight standing stoically, taking in the room until his eyes landed on her.

  He pointed at her with an almost accusing manner, “Grab her.”

  No, no, not again! A bag went over her head, and her sight faded to black.

  She woke up right as the bag was removed from her head. It felt like only moments ago she was in her inn, but now she was somewhere else entirely. She frantically looked around the open marble hall. The bag had a strong sleep spell woven into the fabric. The arcane knights, the use of incredibly powerful artifice, and kidnapping a noble meant whoever she was dealing with was way outside what she or her family could handle.

  “Relax, child, there is no need for fear.” The melodic words infused with magic caused her speeding heart to calm.

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  A sense of trust and safety permeated her. Despite the manipulation, her mind was trained in the magical arts. She recognized the magic even though she knew there was nothing she could do. In a way, the enchanted feelings were right.

  This woman’s power was enough that she was safe because the woman across from her wanted it. She didn’t even need to use magic, for she was one of the few and powerful high priests of the elven empire, second only to the queen, and then only on certain matters.

  “Holy matron,” the words come automatically as she drops to a knee.

  “Child, there is no need for that. I know you had a rough journey back from the island.” Her mind whirled into overdrive. Was she here about the island? Of course, she would know- What should she say?

  She did her best to keep her face neutral as they stood at the priestess’s motion.

  “How may I serve, holy matron?” She asked in a shaky voice.

  A light laugh echoed off the marble. “So dutiful. You have done enough, though I have had trouble hearing what happened on the island. How did you come to be in such a state?”

  Before she could restrain herself, words flowed from her lips, from the botched ritual to her fleeing the island. By the time she had finished her story, she was panting from how fast she had been speaking. The matron motioned to her right, and as if by manifestation, a cup with water sat in front of her to quench her dry throat. She eagerly drank the cup and waited for the priestess’s pronouncement.

  “My, my, quite the trip you have been on. I thank you for your words. You must be missing your family dearly. Sir Lassador will escort you home to your family.” Stella looked across the room to see one of the arcane knights and flinched.

  “Sometimes the young and scared can do great harm in their ignorance. They used the bag at my command so you would not harm yourself. I promise you that your trip home to your family will be much smoother, and I think this time we can do without the bag.”

  Stella nodded as she stood up. Slowly, she made her way over to the waiting knight, who escorted her to the courtyard where a pair of horses awaited them.

  Priestess POV

  The priestess of diligence, for that was the name she had received when she gave her name up for Hera and the elven empire, watched the young elf leave. Finding what they summoned had been much harder than they expected. The creature had a natural resistance to scrying. They still picked up clues at scrying where it had been, but it was a maddeningly slow way to track.

  One of her attendants bowed beside her, “Holy matron, was it wise to let her go? She might suffer an accident on her way home?”

  She clicks her tongue at her attendant’s questions, “always so zealous that you never see the easier path. She is the only one to have seen him and is now masterless. We do not need to dispose of a useful tool. If she were to find a master that were going after our renegade summoned ward, then would it not be more beneficial for all?”

  “Brilliant as always, I will find a new master for her and make the arrangements.” Her attendant replied, making her way from the room and leaving the priestess with her thoughts.

  It was quite puzzling hearing the story and the report from the elven commander of the fort. It was fortunate he was so much easier to grab. Both witnesses had described him as a lone human of barely any power. Despite this, the human had not only taken on a fortified position, however lightly, and escaped the island, but also killed a master mage with his summoning. She idly touched the orb while scrying the island again.

  Luck, fortune, and elven incompetence could explain much. For a moment she had thought maybe it was true that they had summoned a lone human with some error of the magical ritual. The aftermath of the battle showed none of the raw devastation that a god would bring to bear.

  Had they succeeded, the island most likely would have shown magical craters as the god devastated any who opposed them. She had convinced herself that the summoning had truly failed until her scrying had come across a newly forged dungeon on the island. She eyed the dungeon hungrily. The creature had willed a dungeon into being and then left it on the island without care. Not even the abominable Hercules with all his power could summon forth a dungeon.

  With a creature capable of summoning dungeons, they could churn out mage lords to devastate the humans. The power might even be enough to bring humans to heel once and for all. Still, why would a creature of such power bend reality with such ease, then show such signs of struggle in the fortress? Maybe it had been weakened after summoning the dungeon? If so, why do it in the first place?

  Questions abounded, but she was sure she would have her answers soon enough because she was diligent.

  Demeter POV

  Demeter, goddess of the harvest, peered through the trees as her eyes pierced the earth and stone to find her quarry. She was not the goddess of the hunt, and the city was antithetical to her domain. She could waltz into the town; she was not bound to her power so completely that she could not wade into the shallows of her power, but her siblings could be vexatious. If she strode out of her domain, another god or goddess might play a “prank” like kidnapping her for a couple of years.

  She doubted that would happen here. Not when her domain was so pervasive. Her domain was the glue that held this crumbling rock together and kept the world eater contained. If that creature were freed, it would devour everything, ruining their carefully manicured paradise. A few days ago, it had started to wake, right about the time the traveler came. Nothing she needed to worry about; it was well contained, but a subtle reminder to the other gods what should happen should they get up to their usual antics. Sha had other things to focus on than her siblings’ bouts of fancy.

  She didn’t need to stay any longer. She had fulfilled Hera’s request to find him. She had planted a few seeds that might snare the traveler; she would leave the rest to her servants.