A new beginning

Jin

Kayon had left to continue his work, while Erinara showed me to my quarters.
“Usually, I’d ask if our guests needed extra storage, but”, she gestured at me, “I think you’ll have plenty space to keep one set of armor and two weapons here.”
The room was crazily spacious. I had thought the housing upgrade from farmhand to hero-in-training was huge, but this surpassed it by a long shot. To be frank I was baffled at how anyone could need any extra storage room. Erinara placed a tiny parcel into one of the shelves that stood at the sides of the room.
“This is a pre-portioned amount of spell components for a healing spell. I have one in my room and another one around me at all times as well”, she explained, tapping her mantle at chest height, “if you’re starting to feel worse don’t hesitate to tell me, okay? You won’t feel too great during a poison surge, now will you?”
“Thank you, I will.”
“Do you want me to help you out of your armor?”, she asked.
“Is it okay if I keep wearing it? It was part of my training to get used to the weight by having it equipped a long time, it’s somewhat comforting”, I explained.
“I don’t see why not. Besides, who am I to judge when it comes to peculiar fashion choices”, she waved a hand in front of her face, which was, as always, shrouded in darkness. I stifled a laugh. She appeared to be trying to make me feel more comfortable here, a fact that I majorly appreciated right now in particular.
“I guess not. Thank you”, I said, smiling.

Despite her efforts, a weight in my chest has been growing heavier the entire time. I wanted to read through the letter Fyor left me again, but also wasn’t willing to talk about it openly. Until now, between being attacked, then poisoned and only slowly regenerating, I didn’t allow myself to even think about the letter. Questions were racing through my mind. The council wasn’t loyal to its people, enforcers directly under their jurisdiction weren’t just a myth to scare children, and to top it all off, apparently the war didn’t even exist anymore. How I wished I could talk to Fyor Eaglecrest, I was certain I could make sense of this situation if he spoke to me.
I knew my master for a year, how could the council of crests see him as an enemy, when he exclusively wanted to help the kingdom’s people. Fyor even willingly gave up any free time he had to train recruits in the barracks, if they only asked him to.
“…crest. Hey, Eaglecrest!”, I heard Erinara say, “Are you alright? Did the poison get to you again already?”
She moved closer to me.
“I’m sorry, I was lost in thought. It has nothing to do with the poison.”
Her gaze seemed to linger on me for a moment.
“I see. As I was saying then, are you okay with staying near me as I work on some projects?”, she asked, “I need to make progress on a glyph, but the study is decently far from our rooms.”
“Of course. Lead the way, please”, I simply said.

We arrived at the room I first appeared in when she teleported me earlier. Erinara scattered notes around the table and began meticulously drawing illegible symbols into a rune, making sure to copy them correctly from the paper. I sat down at the side of the table, so as to not get in her way and inspected my surroundings. The walls were lined with shelves, all of them packed with books or loosely lying around notes. Apart from the table Erinara and I sat at, nine more stood in this room. Some were empty, some had stacks of paper lying on them, one carried open books with additional, oversized papers, all scrawled on from top to bottom, hanging between the pages.
The entire room was lit by chandeliers that bore no flame, instead, runes emanated silver light from where candles should have been.

I glanced over at what Erinara was working on. By now she had fully filled out two rings of the runes that floated before her. She kept looking between her notes and the runes a few times before changing one of the tiny symbols in the rune first and on paper second.
“If you want to talk, go ahead”, she said, without even turning to look at me, “I can chat while doing this much without issue.”
“Right. What are you working on there?”, I asked.
“A new glyph to help with the simulacrum spellcasting process.”
“I wanted to ask that earlier already. What is a glyph?”
She halted in thought for a moment.
“Oh, right. The kingdom solely armed you with ignorance. Let’s see… You can think of a glyph as runes being interlocked together to have a greater effect combined than alone”, she explained.
“As in, one rune gathers mana for the second rune to have stronger output?”, I tried making sense of her words, by comparing it with what she taught me the last time we met.
“That’s one of the most basic ones, but in essence yes.”

Silence befell us, while Erinara continued to work on the glyph, every now and so often adding new notes to her papers. My mind panned to the letter hidden under my chestplate. I thought about its contents for a bit, tempted to ask Erinara about the war from the point of view of the warlocks.
Instead, what I mouthed was: “Can I ask what an executive is?”
“An executive? You aren’t taught that either, huh? I double my previous statement, you truly weren’t given any information at all. Executives are the peak of warlock society, the most powerful mages in the entire land. Why do you ask?”
I shifted in my seat slightly.
“I was just trying to understand what you and Kayon meant with the executive’s meeting. Ebiron is one of them I assume?”
Deciding that I wouldn’t mention the letter, I shifted the conversation slightly.
“Indeed he is.”

Erinara raised her head, looking directly at me.
“Hey, knight, listen. I know you’re hiding something, and I’m not going to force you to lay it bare. But I do ask you to tell me honestly, is the land of warlocks, are we your enemy?”
So she saw right through me. Well then.
“In full honesty, I am not certain what my choices should be currently. It feels like I’m facing an entirely new world, and I have to learn of it as it’s springing up around me”, I paused briefly, weighing my next words.
“However, on my honor, I do not see you as enemies. You have helped me without so much as a single second of hesitation earlier. From my standpoint, we are allies.”
Erinara tilted her head slightly, but seemed content with my answer.
“Then I will continue to treat you as such, Eaglecrest.”
Her voice sounded unusually soft. She continued to work on the glyph.

Was she seriously happy with an answer like that? Not even five days ago I was openly calling them enemies to their faces. She herself even said she considered me a potential enemy. This situation didn’t add up in my mind.

“Wait, just like that?”, I couldn’t help but ask, dumbfounded.
“Yup. Just like that.”
“Why though?”
“You strike me as someone who is honest to a fault, you know, given the entire knightlihood style”, she chuckled, “Besides”, her tone became more serious, “all things considered, some drastic things must have happened for you to activated a magic item that you know would teleport you into the ‘hostile’ land of warlocks. As I said, I won’t pry. I will also be honest though, and say that I personally think there’s more going on than just some enforcers being on your heel.”

She had no idea how right she was.