Chapter 31: The Way Out is Through

Chapter 31: The Way Out is Through

Ber, Day 25 of Melia

Solar Eclipse

Year 602

Who first described rain as the tears of the Divines? It’s apt.

—From the private journals of Bricot Camdetch,

Master Alchemist at Craestor University from 600 to 604

In the great library, a cluster of perhaps eight students had assembled and was talking gently amongst themselves. There were a number of small wooden study tables and chairs—Evin remembered this area well from when she’d taken her aptitude test. The cat that had lounged about then was nowhere to be seen now.

A tall-ish master with brawny arms, thick hair, and a dark beard peppered with grey entered the library not long after they’d all taken their seats.

The group around Evin seemed largely happy to be there. They were all bright-eyed and alert. Some of them carried blank books, pots of kohl ink, and quills for taking notes. She hadn’t bought anything and felt embarrassed by her lack of foresight. Everyone wore what pleased and suited them, though it seemed the Masters were uniformly garbed in long robes to differentiate them from their students.

“Morning,” said the bearded man. “Nice to see some of you—Bela, Deryk…”

Evin’s suitemate gave his master a grin.

“And I see some new faces as well,” he continued. “I know we had some arrivals this week, and I commend you on attending this special bonus lecture. Welcome to Craestor.”

Evin’s heart sped a little at this, and there was a general murmur of response and a sleepy smattering of applause from her fellow students.

“I know,” he said, indicating that he had not missed the paltry nature of their reaction. “It’s early.”

They all laughed.

“I’m Master Bomardier Ola. As many of you know, I conduct research on all manner of topics here at the University of Craestor, as do my colleagues. New students—so you know—these extra curricular studies do not have to be within our specific teaching areas.”

His eye lighted on Evin.

“Hello,” he said warmly, offering her his arm, which she clasped. “You’re new. You are—”

“Evin,” she said, then added, “Sacande.” Her voice sounded strange in her ears.

But Master Ola smiled. “Sacande. To ascend. Let’s hope so.” Then he moved on to the other new student. “And you?”

“Trina,” a girl with dark blonde braids replied softly.

He clasped her arm as well. “Welcome.”

Ola left them seated at the study tables and took a spot in an open space where they could all see him. In his arm, he clutched a large textbook bound in black.

“Now,” he said. “As some of you know already and the rest of you are about to find out, I have been researching Imbuements. Who can tell me what this is?”

For a moment, no one moved. Evin glanced surrepticiously around before hesitantly raising her hand.

“Yes?” asked Ola.

Before she knew it, Evin was quoting the definition from the book Arcane Herbs and Their Uses—the one Stacia had given her. “To imbue is to suffuse a substance with one’s will and intention—in this case, a tonic, infusion, potion, philter, or elixir.”

There was a general mutter from the small group and the man’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “From Arcane Herbs and Their Uses. I’m impressed.”

Evin’s face coloured and she tried not to look around herself at the expressions on the other students’ faces, but from the corner of her eye she caught a competitive glance or two.

“It’s a good definition,” said Master Ola. “And technically, absolutely correct. But I have one I like a little better, and this one comes from The Art of Imbuing by Karren Keene. It’s poetic. It reads, Imbuement is an act of conscious Naming that has the power to change a brew’s very makeup and thus its purpose.”

A sea of heads nodded approvingly at him.

“I like this one,” he went on. “Because it gets me excited about my own potential. And in brewing, that’s very important. When making a potion, confidence in one’s own skill where imbuing in concerned can be paramount and often makes the difference between the mere suggestion of a tonic and the potency of a full elixir. When I say naming, what do you supposed I mean?”

This time, no one answered.

“If I say to you,” and he looked at Evin lazily, saying, “You. Stand up if you like.”

There was a moment of confusion and hesitation, and Evin slowly climbed to her feet, a frown of uncertainty on her face. She looked at her classmates, who appeared as lost as she was.

“Right,” said Ola. “You stood. That’s great.” And he waved vaguely at her. “Have a seat. But if I say,” and now he pointed emphatically at Bela and cried commandingly, “Bela Lausta! Get up!”

The girl jumped to her feet, eyes wide in panic, and the rest of the assembled students giggled. She broke into nervous laughter herself and then sat back down.

Ola grinned. “The effect is very different, as you can see. I named you. I called you by name, and I also used shock and intimidation to move you as I willed it. Materials that we brew with behave in the same way.”

The class began to settle.

“We’ve known for centuries,” continued Ola, “That imbuements are extremely important, and our forbears thought of this as mystical and perhaps even divine—but they did not understand it. Now, we have the technology to conduct tests and experiments and see the actual changes to a substance based on how we’ve named it. Mystical it still may be, but mystifying— it is not. I have these sketches I’ve made,” he said, opening the large black book he held, “Of substances I’ve named and then observed under a set of magnifiers. Look at the forms they take on.”

Master Ola turned to one of the pages and then held the book up. “This,” he said, “is a Reduce Inflammation philter. I spoke the words calm, easy, slow, free, rest, and relax over this brew after I made it. After a day or so, I looked at it through my magnifiers and saw this formation.”

He pointed to one of the sketches. It was rough, but Evin got the gist. There was a series of sparse shapes, almost circular, but with angles to them. The page looked empty and calming.

He turned to the next illustration and said, “Now, this is a martial material I brewed—I am a master bombardier, after all. I wanted to make a cold blast that spanned about two gerds square. We’ve stored this in the armory for safekeeping, of course, but if detonated, it would be enough to harm someone’s outer layer of skin with the cryo contained here. I imbued this brew with the words shock, freeze, burn, harm, cold, chilling, hurt, and pain. And look what happened.”

Pointing to the page he offered, Ola looked back at his students with a gentle smile. It was covered in sharp, dangerous-looking spikes that he’d drawn in with some force; the lines were dark. It was so different from the page he’d just shown that Evin shook her head in amazement.

“Words have power,” Ola told them simply.

* * *

It was day three of her downriver trip on the Grey, and Craix was water-weary and sunburnt. She’d eaten well, slept soundly, and made good time, so she couldn’t be too upset about it. A glance into the still shallows on a particularly clear evening told her the skin on her nose was peeling, and the whites of her eyes were reddened along that horizontal stretch in the center where the sun could reach while she was awake.

She’d shrugged and kept going. Her vision wasn’t suffering. The trip on the river would be over soon anyway, and then she’d need to travel another couple of days on foot to reach Tief.

Today, she was moving lazily along, standing on the raft and using her pole to push herself along. She’d wrapped her palms in fabric once more to protect herself from blisters and the sticky sap of the trimmed tree she now borrowed to traverse the river.

This day had begun early. She’d awoken with the dawn and taken it as a sign to keep moving—leaving in the chill of the morning. Now her stomach was beginning to gurgle and she felt the urge to stop and eat again. In general, Craix loved to eat. Best thing about being alive, her father used to say laughingly to her. But when it meant stalling her journey and taking the trouble to pull over on a selected bank to hunt and forage, it seemed an inconvenience. She tried not to eat if she wasn’t unmistakably in need of food—and she’d experimented with taking foodstuffs with her on the river, but they usually just got wet or fell out into the water. She needed her hands to steer.

At that moment, her stomach growled again. Annoyed, she started to punt herself over to the right bank, looking for a comfortable spot to land.

She dismounted and then peered up ahead at the stretch of river before her. There were rocks ahead, and she could hear the distant but obvious sssshhhhhhing sounds of rapids. So there would be that to contend with.

The woods on this side of the river were sparse and acidic, with plenty of evergreen specimens standing staunchly. The openness of the forest floor was carpeted with bright red pine needles. She moved quietly through them, looking about hungrily for lunch.

After some time, she came upon a large rock formation that thundered up from the ground and rose to the height of four men or so. At first, Craix thought it was naturally occurring, but when she made her way around the pillar-like stone she could tell it was an ancient ruin. There were shapes carved into it at one point, but the stone had so denatured that she couldn’t tell what they were meant to represent. Very faint now, the round shapes and lines were barely more than sketchings.

There were others near her in this same clearing, but they were smaller and shorter.

Her curiosity at the ruins gave way to an uneasiness that it took her a moment to identify. At one point, there had been others on this side of the forest. Probably long ago, true. But Craix did not like the idea of running into anyone else during her journey. Not at all, she thought. Her experience with Krup had left her shaky and mistrusting of strangers she happened to meet in the wild.

In spite of the growing pit of worry in her stomach, she kept on, continuing to look for food. She was moving up a steeply-sloped hill under a slew of pine trees when she realized her error.

Three things happened at the exact same moment. As she crested the hill, she saw two men in dark clothing leaning silently against a tumble-down shed, ostensibly in quiet conversation. Their heads snapped straight up at the motion of her approach, and she cursed as she saw their heavy clubbed weapons. Simultaneously, she smelled the woodsmoke denoting a potential small enclave of people and heard the ring of a chopping axe on a cut of dry wood. It was all instant and out of her control, and Craix knew what she had to do.

She ran.

A panicked shout followed her, and she cursed silently. The ruins had given everything away and she hadn’t even noticed.

Tree trunks flashed past as she careened back through the wooded area, slipping and sliding on the pine needles underfoot. One hill gave way quickly beneath her and she caught hold of a skinny sapling to try and slow her fall. The tree bent with her and Craix swung about wildly, folding one knee beneath her body so she could slide the rest of the way down.

The two men still pursued her. She could hear them shouting, but dared not look behind her to check.

Climbing to her feet, she considered hastily; she hadn’t come inland that far. When she reached the raft—in just a few heartbeats no doubt, she’d need a weapon of some sort. Or at least a plan. They’d be on top of her, and the raft would take some time to launch because it moved so slowly.

Breath coming fast now, she continued to pump her arms and lengthen her stride. She could not be caught. She absolutely could not be caught.

The river came into view, jumping about wildly with her jarring footfalls. Over this crest, and she’d see the shore.

Craix decided she’d mount the raft and lead the men on, then duck and trip them, forcing one or both over into the water. Her hatchet was on board. She could use that to… bile rose up into her throat at that. Suddenly considering hacking two grown men to death when she’d forced herself to move this quickly made her feel ill.

There.

There was her raft, waiting for her. Half of it had been pulled up onto the grassy shore while the other half still dandled in the water.

Craix’s blood froze in her veins. There were three figures there, all in dark clothing. One stood on her raft and appeared to be sifting through her things. Two others stood on patrol nearby, and one had a hand to his brow, presumably searching—for her. A quick glance told her they were all armed.

No, no, no.

The feeling of known defeat without being able to influence her fate in any significant way was terrible.

Craix attempted to redirect. The moment she’d spied the figures on the shore, she was upon them. They all noticed her instantly.

She swerved crazily off to her right, telling herself to run. Keep running, she told herself. No matter what, you must not stop. Stumbling on a tuft of dense grass, she let out a breath that might have been a sob and caught herself, attempting desperately to pick up more speed.

There was a cacophony of shouts, and then something caught at her ankles, hard.

She went down. Like a crazed animal, she rolled herself over and immediately began kicking at whatever might be near her. Her right foot connected with one of their faces and the young woman whose nose she’d bloodied stumbled back, screaming. The others were men. One of them caught her flailing legs and another straddled her. He’d lined his eyes in kohl and had a patchy beard. His hand darted out to grip her chin and inspect her.

Craix let out a strangled cry.

They all wore blacks, greys, and dark blues.

“Hold her,” one of them muttered. “She’s not that strong.”

The man got off of her. She was forcibly flipped over and gasped as the air left her body. The muddy grass tasted tangy in her mouth. The strangers wrenched both of her arms behind her and tied them with a length of cord that bit into her wrists.

“Stop resisting,” someone said near her ear.

Craix obeyed her impulse and jerked her head back, connecting satisfyingly with the speaker’s. There was a wild cry and her body immediately punished her for the violent action with twinges of pain coursing through her lower back.

“That’s enough,” someone said. “Take her out.”

There was the shock of impact, and then a searing pain bit into the back of her head. The edges of her vision darkened and her grasp on reality weakened. There was another sharp hit, insistently cruel, and Craix whimpered before losing herself to the blackness.

* * *

Bricot gritted his teeth against the horrible pitching of the ship. The Gallant was caught in a storm.

The hold stank now, like old clothing and moldy food and unwashed bodies. There were retching sounds in the dark as those unused to sea travel emptied the contents of their stomachs.

He’d dealt with this many times before. It was rare not to encounter a storm of this magnitude if one traveled often.

Muffled shouts reached the hold from overhead as the sailors did their best to weather the wind and rain. As the Gallant cut through one especially steep billow, a shower of rain and seawater splashed in through the edges around the catch, wetting the rungs of its ladder and frightening everyone.

There were squeals of alarm, and Bricot sighed as he sat up in his cramped bunk, which was bolted to the wall. Instinctively, his hands grasped at the edges of the bed.

He remembered his first voyage to Urda from his home in Boradîn when he was a younger man. He’d been terrified, even to weeping. A song came to him, an old folk tune that he’d learned as a child. A little shakily, he raised his voice and began, hoping it would serve as a welcome distraction for the other passengers.

Listen, friends! Do you not hear—

Pouring from the atmosphere—

Sheets of rain and and wind as we’re

Sailing on the ocean!

On the sea we’re fiercely rolled,

Like our forefathers of old!

In a dark and dreary hold,

Caught up in the motion!

A few other weak voices joined his. It would be strange if most people on the ship did not know every verse, so prevalent was the ditty. It had been devised to still the fears of young children during sea voyages or storms in general. The tune was jolly and friendly.

Easy then, we wait below,

With the rest of the cargo,

While the gusts and tempests blow,

So cold and so dreary!

Not to worry though, my dears

Calm your thoughts and still your fears,

Dry your eyes from frightened tears,

Though your soul be weary!

Wait you will and wait you must,

Meantime, hear my words and trust,

Driving drops of rain are just—

Tears of the Divines!

Gods, as us, can fear and feel,

Like us, they must rest and heal,

Patient then, wait out their zeal,

Until the warm sun shines!

Before the song was over, several passengers had joined in. Bricot found himself wondering as they all finished how many of those in the hold had been sung to as babies during thunderstorms. The thought made him miss his mother intensely—well, he’d see her soon enough.

After a short silence, another passenger struck up a new song and the sniffles and cries in the hold began to diminish. Plenty of puking continued to punctuate the singing however, as it would until the sea calmed.