94 - Sera
Perched on the highest branch of an old oak tree, Sera watched as Alexandra stepped off the path, too absorbed in her journal, and sighed. Why couldn’t the Magus assign someone else to the task?
If only Lelan wasn’t such a prick. The girl would have stayed at the base camp, and Sera would have been able to relax. Instead, she was forced to tail her in the darkness of the forest, lest she never come back.
Her blue robes fluttered in the wind as she jumped onto the next tree. She landed in total silence.
It took ten long minutes for Alexandra to realize her mistake. Sera winced as she watched her try to trace her steps back and head even deeper into the forest. She could hear the girl curse at herself, and she was half-tempted to join in.
But she couldn’t. Her orders were clear. She wasn’t to reveal herself unless the situation required it.
Being lost in the forest at night was annoying, but it didn’t warrant more than distant monitoring.
Unlike the students and Lelan Magister, despite the act he put up, Sera always believed that Alexandra could clear the Troll Cave. She knew Dark Bolt would be quite effective against the trolls, and her training with Kashin gave her confidence in her martial abilities. She hadn’t expected to see her come out in a better state than she’d entered.
Perhaps there would be a chance for her to ask how she did it. But not now. Now, she was sentenced to watch Alexandra pick the wrong direction at every turn.
It was impressive in its own twisted kind of way. She wasn’t under the impression that her sense of orientation was that bad. But, somehow, at each tree, she paused and decided to press deeper into the forest.
If Sera couldn’t hear her curse, she would have thought Alexandra was doing it on purpose.
Sera jumped over to the next tree, lazily keeping pace with her ward.
Sera tracked her from above, branch to branch, as Alexandra committed to a northwestern heading that would take her nowhere useful.
At least she was consistent. Consistently going in the wrong direction, but consistent.
She paused on a thick elm, watching Alexandra push through a curtain of low branches, emerging on the other side with twigs in her hair. Her hesitation was gone. No attempt to read the stars or listen for a river which would take her to the sea. Just forward.
The ground began to slope. Gradually at first, and then with intent.
Sera paused, and looked into the distance. They’d reached the foot of a hill.
Alexandra didn't slow. She was heading straight for it.
Sera crouched on her branch.
No one accidentally climbed a hill. Alexandra had to remember she didn’t cross any hill when coming from Kator.
Sera's eyes moved to the tree line above the hill's crest, then back down to the figure below.
What is she doing?
She followed, keeping to the top of the canopy, never making a sound Alexandra could hear.
Sera frowned. Alexandra had stopped complaining about being lost. Now she seemed wholeheartedly committed to advancing.
Was she not as lost as she seemed?
Sera dropped to a lower branch.
Below, Alexandra crested a ridge and paused, scanning the darkness ahead. Behind the hill, the flatter plains around Kator gave way to more hills. They extended north, getting taller and taller until they turned into the Kustar Mountain Range.
Alexandra moved again, angling north, away from the dungeon, away from Kator.
Sera’s stomach dropped.
Could it be?
She knew better than to underestimate a heroine. The gods had chosen her for a reason. If her naive exterior was just a facade…
Perhaps Alexandra wasn’t lost. Perhaps she was headed to the Kushtar Range, following after Louis. Did she figure out why he’d been sent to the conclave?
She frowned. It shouldn’t be possible. The Magus was more careful than that. This information wouldn’t leak.
She watched Alexandra get further and further away.
There was her friendship with Willow Dumries. But she was far from the core of her family, and she couldn’t see what benefits the Goodpeak elders would gain by betraying the Magus. Not like that.
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It was too early.
She jumped to the next tree, keeping pace with Alexandra, considering what she should do.
If Alexandra had figured it out, the operation needed to be called off.
Sera took an enchanted bead out of her spatial storage and activated it. “Sera. Requesting urgent communication with the Magus. Potential breach.”
*
Alexandra watched the dark shapes of hills in the distance. She’d hoped that, with some altitude, she’d figure out the way back to Kator thanks to a distant light, or the sea, but she couldn’t see anything.
She walked along the hillside. She’d been walking for a while now, and knew damn well that the camp wasn't this way. She was just looking for something, anything, that would help orient her back home.
She stopped at the base of a broad oak. Old. The bark was thick, the trunk wider than her arm span. She pressed a hand flat against it to support herself.
Did trees have lifeforce too? Once the question crossed her mind, she couldn’t let it go. They were alive, so they should. She activated Drain Life and, sure enough, felt a vast pool of lifeforce hidden deep within the oak.
She didn’t take anything. Instead, she moved to a younger tree and tried again. This time, the pool was smaller.
Alexandra frowned. This somewhat went against what she knew about lifeforce. Older beings should have less lifeforce. Then again, those were trees, not humans. Were trees able to rank up? Animals could. Plant monsters could. So she didn’t see why not. Adding to that, the lifespan of a tree was different. Trees didn’t die from the same reasons humans did. As long as they were not cut down, a healthy tree could keep growing until it collapsed under its own weight.
Maybe Kam knows something.
She’d have to ask him when she got back. For now, her curiosity led her to absorb a little bit of lifeforce from the old oak. Not much, as she didn’t want to hurt it. She fed it straight into Aggressive Assimilation.
Her thoughts changed. They spread. She became aware of the ground beneath her feet: the exact angle of the slope, the moisture in the soil, the root of this tree intersecting with another twenty feet east.
She also, suddenly, felt the urge to stay exactly where she was.
Alexandra lifted her hand from the bark and pushed past the urge to walk around. The change of perception was mesmerising. Was this how trees perceived the world, or was this just how her skill interpreted the lifeforce?
With each step, her mind spread through the ground around her. Leaves. Weeds. A bush. The ground dipped without warning into a hollow she hadn't seen from above.
She stepped inside.
Then her human sense took over, and the animal smell filling her nostrils told her that something lived here.
She stopped. The smell was warm.
Red eyes snapped open in the darkness.
She took a step back, reaching for her belt.
Fuck.
No weapon. Her spear had broken in the dungeon.
She jumped out of the hole.
She heard panting, the wet slap of jaws. She looked behind her as the beast crashed through the undergrowth. A dog. Shoulder height to her waist. It stood with its weight forward, watching her.
Then the growl started.
She reached for its lifeforce and felt her skill slide off the beast’s mana. It wasn’t like the trolls. She couldn’t even take a look. She let go.
Dark Bolt. She didn’t hesitate. Didn’t hold back. She knew she couldn’t afford to. She’d deal with a sickness if she had to. This dog was at least Gold.
The needle pierced into the dog’s skin. It didn’t react. As if her spell had no effect.
Alexandra couldn’t tell how she’d been cursed. She took a step back. Tried Inflict Weakness. It didn’t work.
Shit.
The dog growled louder.
Then it pounced. She tried dodging, but it pinned her to the ground, its jaws snapping once, close to her ear. She drove an elbow into its ribs. It didn't move.
Then something landed onto the dog’s side, sending it crashing against a tree.
Alexandra lay on her back. Chest heaving.
She heard movement. Looked up.
A woman stood between her and the dog, which had backed against the tree, hackles raised. The woman hadn't drawn any weapon. She was simply standing there.
The dog turned with a whimper and disappeared into the trees.
“Sera?” Alexandra asked.
The Keeper looked down at Alexandra. She wasn’t smiling.
“You’re lucky I was passing by,” she said. “That was a Platinum beast.”
“Passing by?”
Sera nodded slowly. “Passing by. What are you doing here?”
“I got lost after leaving the Troll Cave. You know, the dungeon,” Alexandra said, standing up.
“You shouldn’t wander in the wilderness like that,” Sera said.
Alexandra brushed bark and soil from her robes. Her heart was still racing. She looked at Sera, then at the trees where the dog had gone. The Keeper hadn't moved from her spot. Hadn't looked at where the dog disappeared. Wasn't tracking it.
"You're not worried it'll come back?"
"No."
Alexandra looked at her hands. A small cut on her left palm from the fall. She closed it into a fist.
"What were you doing out here?" she asked.
"I told you. I was passing by."
“Why?”
The forest at night, this far from anything.
“We Keepers need to hone our skills too.” Sera gestured in the direction the dog had fled. “This area happens to have a few Platinum beasts.”
“And you just happened to find me.”
"You're fortunate that I did."
That was true. She wasn't going to argue with it. The dog's weight on her chest was still fresh, the snap of its jaw near her ear. Platinum rank, and she didn’t have a demonic ritual to help her this time. She wouldn't have walked away from that.
“How long have you been following me?”
A pause. “Not long. I wanted to see if you could find your way back by yourself.”
Alexandra nodded slowly. That was a reasonable answer. Clean. Almost too clean. How did she know she was lost?
"Right," she said. "Can you take me back to Kator?"
"Of course." Sera turned east without hesitation.
Alexandra fell into step behind her and said nothing. The Keeper moved through the dark without a torch, picking the path with ease.
She'd said not long.
Alexandra wasn’t sure she believed that.