62 - The Blue Orb
Arielle was learning swiftly to compartmentalize every new piece of information she received.
Her mind was constantly juggling different issues at the same time, and she often had to exchange them back and forth between her mental boxes of Worry About Later and Think About Now.
After her brief but enlightening meeting with Telip, she put the issue of the runes and the handwriting into the Worry About Later box, while pulling out the foreign orb problem, and pushing it back to the forefront of her mind.
She needed to get to North Base tonight, before the orb moved farther away.
Or worse, got stuck suspended over the sea. What if it were there now? How would she get to it?
She would probably have to borrow the boat to get there. Where did Rava keep the boat? Also, how did she work the boat? There were several buttons that Rava had used to activate its rapid propelling mechanism, and Arielle hadn’t been paying enough attention to know which ones.
Not to mention, stealing the boat increased the chances of her getting caught.
Unless… there was another way. Like flying.
Hmm.
She’d used [Levitate] to get her around in the elven forest and in Khor, but would it be able to get her all the way to the North Base? It was a forty-five-minute boat ride, which would not be a long flight by any means, but it would be the longest continuous flight she'd ever taken, and if she ran out of essences or messed up the spell in the middle, she would end up in the sea.
Of course, she wasn't in danger of running out of orbs. She still had at least a thousand of each left. However, that still didn't make it a good idea to waste them on a long-term flight, especially since she wasn't sure when or if she could get this many again.
[Levitation] also required constant focus from her, which made it less than ideal for long distances.
Was there an easier, faster way?
After Ari got back to her room and murmured a greeting to a sleeping Lyra, she went straight to her desk. She perused her spellbook as the thoughts developed in her mind.
What if she flew at a higher altitude? That way, she wouldn’t have to expend as much essence to counteract the drag.
Following that, what if she worked backwards? What if, instead of making herself float above the water, she simply made herself unable to sink?
She could walk on water.
She would eliminate her own body weight, the way Selena had done it, but in a simpler manner that didn’t require as much spell shifting to adjust her speed in real time. At least she assumed that was what the shifting was for.
Arielle opened her scroll and crafted what she recalled about Selena’s spell form. Most of it was convoluted beyond her understanding, but she managed to isolate the part of the spell that she believed handled Selena’s weightlessness.
Selena’s feet had touched the ground but only lightly, only enough to give her the boost. It wouldn’t have mattered if the ground were made of water or foam because her movements would have been the same regardless. She only needed bare surface contact to keep going.
That was what Ari needed.
Arielle crafted that portion of the spell, and isolated from the rest of it, it would likely be a lower adept tier.
When she was done, she tried the spell on an ant.
NEW SPELL DETECTED.
Name: Unknown
Tier: Adept
Experience Points: 3
Would you like to name spell?
Arielle would incorporate it later. Right now, she had to go rather than think up a name.
Ari knew she likely wouldn’t be as fast as Selena, but she didn’t need to be.
She only needed to get there and back by daybreak, and this way would be faster and less conspicuous than flying.
Arielle glanced behind her. Lyra was already fast asleep. She typically woke once at night to use the privy, and Arielle was a light sleeper, so she would often wake up too and take that opportunity to ease herself as well.
She would wait outside the door for Lyra to finish and only go in after Lyra stumbled out, mumbling, barely taking any notice of her as she got back into bed, not stirring for the rest of the night.
If Arielle left right now and came back soon, Lyra would not know she was gone.
If she did wake up at some point and realize, Arielle would come up with an excuse.
I couldn’t sleep, she would say, so I went on a walk.
And why couldn’t you sleep? Lyra might ask next.
Because I was thinking about too many things.
You mean you were thinking about what I told you? About being a priestess? Is it bothering you?
If she said yes, then Lyra would feel worried and guilty, and Arielle didn’t want that.
So she would tell her that she was bothered by what she’d discussed with Telip, about how hard learning runes would be, and so she’d decided to go out to walk down the halls.
If Lyra asked for proof, she would tell her that she had gone down to the first floor and trekked the path by the garden. The breeze had brought the scent of daffodils through the arched window. The full moon hung at a seventy-nine-degree angle, and there were six, no seven, bird calls while she was there.
Arielle kept going, giving herself more details until she had an airtight defense.
Then she went to her bed and did something that her sister used to do when she would sneak out.
She tucked a pillow underneath the blanket, fluffing and pushing until it was vaguely human-shaped.
When she was satisfied, she took off her robes, grabbed her darkest cloak, and drew it over her smock.
It was past curfew, after which the custodians, mostly Garrick, did rounds.
Rava had described his route to Ari before, calling him a predictable bore and saying, "Back in my student days, I would have run circles around him. I could have probably gotten past him with no trouble whatsoever. He's lucky these cohorts are relatively tame, despite being spoiled brats. No offense, Arielle.”
“None taken,” Ari replied with a dutiful nod.
According to Rava, Garrick first checked the academic buildings to find stragglers. Following that, he would move on to the first-year dorms, then the second year, then the third, then the fourth. Then he doubled back to the academic buildings, but this time he took the longer route, circling the premises and investigating the outer forest.
He used spells to do it, sending out pulses of magic that would alert him to a presence on the ground.
So, Arielle would take to the sky.
But that way wasn't free from detection either. Rava had once mentioned that there was a sky detection spell that activated after curfew, and it would notice and identify any strange movements from that time forward.
Arielle could see it now, multiple Luxa-Massa arcs separated from the rest of the leylines, moving along an axis that created domes over the campus. The spell would also detect any attempt at tampering, and an alarm would be activated if there wasn’t constant feedback to the custodian's quarters. So it wasn't like Ari could simply pause the scanning movements of the orbs either.
She would simply have to avoid its path, weaving around it until she got to the forest. That would give her the cover of night and the trees until she approached the water.
Arielle took a breath, planned out her path.
Then she approached the window and crept out, throwing herself into the sky while she activated [Levitate].
As she flew, she avoided windows and stayed close to the dark walls, hoping her cloak blended in well.
Avoiding the moving arcs was the trickiest part, and she had to hold on at several points and dip close to the ground to prevent it from passing through her. At one point, the wind blew her hair out of her hood, and a single strand nearly touched the scanning orbs before Arielle swept back, right on time.
She spotted Garrick in the third-year dorms, but his back was turned to her at that time.
Thankfully, she made it to the forest without incident, and once there, she cast the [Mind Glamour] to disguise herself once more. Just in case she got caught.
Then, as she let her feet touch the water, she activated the second spell and began running forward.
It was a strange sensation.
She was going a lot faster than it felt, because it was like the world had slowed down for her.
Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
Everything was slow, from the sounds of the ocean and the wind to the rolling waves underneath her feet that felt as solid as the ground.
She knew it wasn't because the water soaked the edges of her boot with each pounce.
But it never went any further than that.
Her senses were also heightened by her speed, and she was overwhelmed by the salty smell of the night, accompanied by the chilling breeze and the sound of the wind.
It took her a minute and thirty seconds to get to North Base. Her speed wasn't as fast as Selena's, but that was okay. It had managed to get her here, which was all that mattered.
She released the weightless spell, and it felt like a boulder had been dropped on her back.
She almost fell to her knees.
It was jarring, going from weightless to solid once more. Like her body had forgotten what it was like to be of mass and weighed down by reality, and it resented that it could no longer move as quickly and easily as it did.
Her muscles shook as she braced herself on the ground, waiting till the dissonance subsided.
That was an interesting side effect to spell. She would have to explore more about how to eliminate it.
Once it had reduced enough for her to walk again, she activated the [Sensate] combo that enabled her to find the orb. It led her to the cave where she'd met the manalings in the first place.
She paused at the mouth of the cave, as a rush of essences swept out to greet her.
"Hello," she said, giggling at their excited buzzing.
However, her happiness ceased when she located her target. Even in the darkness, she could see it hovering in a twisted mass with other broken essences, its movement more frantic, and its buzzing louder thanks to the pain.
"Oh, poor thing." Arielle hurried into the cave, ignorant and uncaring of the darkness and the frostiness of the air. "I'm sorry, little one. I didn't mean to hurt you."
The blue orb didn't recognize her, although the other essences did. Some of them had been liberated by her in the past, and they knew she was here to do it again.
Without talking, Arielle quickly used Elric's spell to sever the link, fixing them before the essence could utter more than a cry of distress.
The blue orb's buzzing reduced in volume with the awareness that it was no longer in pain.
Its movement went from darting to a more gentle glide, like the waves of the ocean.
"Hello,” Arielle said. “I’m Arielle Blacksoil.”
It drifted closer to her out of curiosity. She reached out, and it touched the tip of her finger.
Arielle thought she felt an answering tingle within, but it might just be her imagination. It was too minuscule to even notice anyway.
“Can you tell me what you are?" Arielle asked, as it simply bounced on the tip of her finger again, giving out what she thought were happy sounds.
When she was younger, the way she'd learned about orbs, apart from reading Elric’s manual, was to meditate with them.Perhaps she should try that now.
She sat cross-legged on the cold ground and closed her eyes, inhaling and exhaling. The rush of the orbs surrounding her, filling up her cores, was pleasant, though she could not utilize them. She also sensed the hesitancy of the blue orb. It did not know what was going on, as it stood apart from her, but she called to it, with her breath, humming her mother's song, as she did, telling it she was a friend.
She noticed it shifting closer and closer.
She felt that tingle again within her core, but once more, it was still too small to really notice. But it would get bigger. She would meditate more tomorrow and the day after that, coming here as many times as she needed.
She opened her eyes now and, for some time, watched the blue orb interact with the others. Typically, negatively charged orbs preferred to drift close to positively charged ones and vice versa, even when they weren't activated.
The blue orb seemed to show no preference, gliding close to both the Calor and Massa particles with ease.
"Zero," she murmured. "Your charge is zero. Like Vitae."
There were very few Vitae particles in the cave, as there were very few Vitae users. But while Vitae was a bit antisocial by nature, the blue orb seemed to like interacting with the rest, bouncing from clique to clique, making friends.
Arielle smiled, then got to her feet and dusted off her cloak.
“I will be back tomorrow," she asked. "Will you still be here?”
The orb kept bouncing, as though to portray that it was comfortable where it was. That wasn't entirely an affirmative, but it would do for now.
As she moved, it followed her, but stopped at the edge of the cave.
She tried to call it to her, but it did not move any further. It seemed to like its current abode.
"Okay," she nodded. "Staying here is good also. I'll be back."
The essence likely did not understand, but she waved goodbye and got on her way back.
Arielle was relieved when she reached Erynwall's forest once more.
She was happy, in fact, because everything had gone smoothly and she had managed to learn something about the blue orb.
The question was, could she actually develop a core from it?
She was hoping she could.
“Hello Arielle.”
Arielle nearly jumped out of her skin. She hadn't been paying attention to the collection of essences that surrounded Dean Octavius as he bled out of the shadows.
Her heart raced as he looked at her.
“I thought that might be you,” he said, and Arielle belatedly remembered that she was in disguise.
“No, it’s not me. I mean, I’m not, Arielle.”
The Dean grinned. “Come now. No need for the lies. I know it’s you. In the same way, I know it’s you who fought those trolls in Khor."
Arielle's throat got tight. He walked towards her and asked, “Did you sincerely think that the only surveillance on campus was Garrick and Rava? You believe they were the only things that kept us safe from outsiders and prevented students from running away?”
Well, truly, she hadn’t thought too much about it.
She’d been so hyper-focused on getting to the orb that she hadn’t taken time to think about the extensive nature of the campus’s security system.
"If you wanted to go to North Base, you should have come to me first. I'm disappointed you didn't. I thought I made it clear that I was willing to help you and keep your secrets."
"I'm sorry," she said before it occurred to her. "You know I went to North Base?"
"I debated whether or not to follow you, but I would not leave my campus unprotected at night. However, I did send someone in my stead.”
“Who?”
He held out a hand, and a tiny black paper bird appeared flapping its wings.
Had that followed her to North Base? Had it kept up with her speed and everything?
Wait...what did it see?
A tiny bit of panic scoured her mind until she realized that it would only have seen her meditating and perhaps talking to nothing. It would not know that she'd used Elric's spell to fix manalings, nor would it know about the blue essence she'd met.
“So,” the Dean said, sounding far too casual for the occasion. “Did you get what you needed?”
Was that sincere or sarcastic? “Yes”
“I’m glad. Let’s return to the dorms and keep these late-night rendezvous to a minimum. Next time you want to visit North Base and talk to the ghosts there, have Rava take you instead.”
I wasn't talking to ghosts, she almost said automatically, but she knew this was an easier way out. It was better they thought she had been talking to ghosts than she had been talking to essences.
"Okay," she responded, and it made the Dean smile.
"You know, they say Vacu-dominants tend to go mad. I didn't think it would happen so quickly with you, given how balanced your cores are."
Arielle didn't know what to say to that either, so she simply responded soberly. "I apologize for my madness."
That made him chuckle.
As he left and she returned to her room, she thought about how strange Dean Octavius' reaction was
She had broken a school rule, a major one, and she hadn't gotten in trouble for it.
Why not?
Was it because she was an asset?
Also, what did that mean for her exactly?
***
The next day, Professor Graham visited Dean Octavius’ office early in the morning.
“Dean,” he said, walking in to find the man seated behind his desk but gazing out the window. “We had an incident yesterday that I wanted to report.”
“What is it?” The dean didn’t take his eyes from the window. Another person might have been daydreaming, but he was far too focused for that. He was deep in thought about something on that shore.
Graham didn't waste time wondering what. “It has to do with Selena Gregor and Arielle Blacksoil.”
That got the dean's attention, although Graham wasn’t sure which one of the names in particular got him to turn around with that curious look in his eyes.
“Yes, what happened?”
“I left the duelling halls temporarily, and returned to find them in the middle of a duel. Selena had an air dagger in her hand, and Arielle had blocked it with an [Air Shield]. Selena insisted she was simply practicing her stealth skill, but that does not explain why she had the dagger."
“What was her excuse for that?”
“She said that she wanted to give Arielle a sense of danger. She claimed Arielle was lacking in that department."
It was hard to tell what the Dean was thinking. A report like this certainly put him in a tough position because Selena was one of the academy’s strongest assets. Arielle was likely another.
However, the rules were the rules.
“There will be a demerit attached to her folder," he said.
“It won’t affect her much.”
“She's a master from a powerful family who has nearly graduated. There aren't a lot of things we can do that will affect her much, short of reporting her to the council, which I will do as well. But you know how they are with her. The most painful thing for her will be to exclude her from taking part in the next tournament.”
Graham bit back his protest. He'd known this was a possibility coming in here, which was what made this whole thing so annoying.
Selena was their hope for winning the tournament. Now it all hinged on Arielle, and that was if she even wanted to take part.
The dean must have noticed the look on his face, because he smirked.
“Will that be a problem?”
Yes, but he was trying to be okay with it because it was the right thing to do.
“No. It won't be a problem." His voice cracked on the last word. It simply meant that the entire reputation of the school hinged on Arielle Blacksoil, and he had to hope that she would want to be in the tournament.
“Was she right?” Dean Octavius asked, distracting him from his thoughts.
“Who?”
“Selena. Was she right about Arielle?”
Graham thought about it. Truthfully, Selena did have a point. Arielle always fought like she was bored with the act, or like she was running calculations in her head and didn’t care much if she got hurt or not. However, it was only the first year, and most of the other students also didn’t have an adequate sense of danger yet. They would soon enough.
“It’s the first year," Graham responded.
“Arielle isn’t like other first years,” he said. “She has the capacity for far more, and that puts her in grave danger as well. Were she to get herself in trouble or face an opponent, she needs to understand that there are consequences for a loss. Is there a way you can impart that knowledge safely?"
He thought about it. "Well, I already have something in the works. We'll see if that will do the trick."
***
By her next combat class, Arielle had learned a few more Vitae-dominant spells.
She had told Lyra she would test them out today to see if these were spells that Lyra could use for combat comfortably.
If she were called up for a duel, she planned on dragging it out so she could adequately do that.
As they settled in, Graham called out, reading off a scroll, “Riorke. Lacey. To the circle.”
“Yes!“ Lacey bounced to his feet. "Finally.”
“Also, Byron, James, Ria, Olivier."
The other students appeared confused as they rose to their feet and also made their way into the duelling circles.
Finally, Graham's eyes zeroed in on Aire.
"Arielle. You too."
"Is this a free-for-all professor?” Lacey asked as Ari joined them.
“No. It’s a six versus one," Graham said. "Arielle, I know you haven't been challenged enough in this class, and it has made you a little complacent. Hopefully, today wakes you up a bit." He glanced at the rest. "Whoever gets Arielle out of the circle gets an automatic pass in this class, plus extra credit."
A murmur went around the observers, some saying how unfair it was for Arielle and others saying that they wouldn't mind a deal like that.
Meanwhile, the opponents, some of whom were her friends, turned to eye her with particular greed.
She saw their eyes glow and felt a slight bit of apprehension.