A heroic envoy

Jin

After the magically charged traditional meal, the bond between Erinara and I had grown stronger still.
There existed not even a shadow of doubt that she would do anything for me, and I would do anything for her.
We spent the night in each other’s company, resting peacefully in her bed next to each other.
I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to be Erinara’s partner.

For two weeks, our days followed the usual routine of preparing ourselves for the coming conflict. Erinara increased her skill in her new innate magic and I readied myself with training and sparring, as well as continued studies of runes.
As always, we found serenity in the time we spent together, having turned more affectionate to each other.

In the evening of the last day of the second week, a heavy metallic clang resounded throughout the entire citadel.
Erinara and I moved away from our respective work in the study to investigate the noise together.
The metallic clang repeated itself three times.
We walked to the citadel’s main gate, only to find Kayon and Ebiron already there.

They were talking to three armored individuals.
One, fully clad in enormous amounts of dark steel, towered a head and a half taller than both Erinara and I. Taking her heavy helmet off, she revealed a battle-hardened face full of scars. Her hair reached almost all the way down to the floor, being heavily braided into one thick bundle.
On the other side of the gate stood a man covered from head to toe in golden armor that reflected the sunlight into a dazzling display. His face guard was currently drawn low, covering his features. His armor had massive shoulder pauldrons that were adorned with ridges.
Both of these people had an emblem branded into their armor.
“These two must be the heroes”, I said out loud, looking at the person between them.
In that location stood my mentor, Fyor Eaglecrest.
Erinara and I walked down the hallway, joining this entourage.

“Allow me to introduce you as well. That there is Jin the warrior who inherited my name”, Fyor said, pointing at me with his hand, “and beside him is Erinara, the executive of change’s disciple.”
Fyor then raised a hand in front of the giant woman, continuing:
“This is Sera Bisoncrest.”
She gave us a curt nod, seemingly inspecting us. Finally, Fyor motioned to the man clad in gold, “And this is Leptarus Lioncrest.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you! Please do call me Leptarus! As members of my pride, I will take it upon myself to protect you!”, Lioncrest shouted with utmost vigor.
Erinara shot me a questioning gaze, to which I simply shrugged, looking equally confused.
“He calls his allies his pride, which is also why he got his crested name, don’t mind it”, Fyor simply explained.

Footsteps appeared from behind, followed up by Lazzal rushing around the corner.
“Hey! What’s with the commotion?”, she spotted the heroes ahead of us, addressing them in her usual quick fashion: “Oh! You’ve arrived! Say, how are you? I haven’t seen you since the day of the treaty! You look good! Did you keep training? Come in, come in! Why are we all standing in the entryway?”
Vorial entered after her. He stood still in his tracks for a moment, before taking bounding, heavy steps forward.
“My rival!”, he exclaimed.
Sera Bisoncrest spoke for the first time in response:
“You are still kicking? Good, I was afraid I’d get bored here!”
She approached Vorial with equally powerful strides. A palpable tension filled the air.
Both of them reeled back with their right arm. A maniacal grin spread across Sera’s face.
Planting their left foot firmly in the ground, both of them launched their fists forward.
The impact of their punches slamming together unleashed a light shockwave reverberating through the citadel
“Finally, someone worthy to scrap with!”, Bisoncrest exclaimed.
“Welcome”, Vorial said, a slight happiness in his voice.

Only Erinara and I seemed to recognize this interaction.
“Is nobody bothered by what just happened?”, I asked.
“Huh? Oh! Right!”, Lazzal began, “You two never saw that before! Let’s see, where to begin? Is that even important? Hmm. Let’s just say that these two really like hand-to-hand combat! They have some kind of respect for each other because of it.”
“But why would they just attack each other right now then?”, I asked.
“Fun!”, Vorial called from behind us with excitement.
“What he said”, Bisoncrest confirmed.
Apparently satisfied with this brief exchange, they returned to the group.

“I take it the plan to get Sera Bisoncrest out of the prison was a resounding success then?”, Erinara asked.
“Quite. Though the goal of subtlety was lost on us after”, Fyor said.
“But what a mission that was!”, Lioncrest burst into powerful laughter, “they seriously thought they could stop us, did they not?”
Sera grunted in amusement, a small grin on her face.
I looked at my mentor with a confused expression.
He sighed deeply.
“Leptarus took the lead, using his reputation to simply walk into the prison. He broke the gate to Sera’s holding cell and then just as nonchalantly walked out. They tried to stop of us, of course. While I had swiftly used an escape route, it took both of them two hours as they quite simply walked through the guards, unbothered by their attempts to restrain them. At least I didn’t need to find a different way to get the council’s attention.”
Lioncrest’s laughter grew ever stronger.
“They could use more training!”
“It was like walking through a sea of puppies”, Sera recounted.
It appears like two more very unique personalities have joined us.

All of us walked through the citadel, arriving at the war room.
The executives quickly explained their plan of using shadow’s eye.
“We are saturating the runes with enough mana to upkeep the spell autonomously. Once we leave, a timer of an hour will start before the spell ceases functionality”, Ebiron explained.
“That’s more time than I expected”, Fyor said, “Very good. That will be plenty. How much longer will you need until the system is complete?”
“Week”, Vorial responded.
“How great to have capable allies!”, Leptarus almost yelled again, “This pride will certainly acquire the peace our nations should have had years ago already!”
“Speaking of, do I get to hear the plan now? Having to slow down to let the enforcers stay close to us was a real pain”, Sera asked monotonously.
“We needed them to follow us. Knowing their tactics, they will wait at the three quarters of the way to the land of warlocks for precisely one week in order to try to ambush us if we turned around. After that, they will return to the kingdom. The trip back will take them five days”, Fyor said, with a calculating glint in his eyes.

“It is late already. Let us reconvene tomorrow to discuss the operation”, Ebiron suggested.
Sera shrugged. She let herself be shown to her room alongside Fyor and Leptarus.

Erinara and I found ourselves in my room once again. While we were talking, I was tending to my equipment. Erinara sat beside me, training with her light magic. At this point she managed to create threads of light similar to her shadow tendrils, although the threads’ effective range was much reduced.

“It looks like the time for combat is fast approaching”, she said.
“It certainly is”, I agreed.
“Do you feel prepared?”, she asked.
“Thanks to sparring with you, most definitely.”
I recalled the sparring matches I held with Erinara. Over the last weeks we had considerably increased their intensity. In one of the most recent ones, the executives even came to spectate because they caught a glimpse of our battle by chance. Ebiron himself had commented that the battle, which we were calling a friendly spar, would be qualified as equal to one of the three disastrous duels during the war.
Laughing quietly, I added:
“Considering our battle managed to shock Ebiron, I think it’s safe to say we have both improved massively.”
“You’re right”, Erinara responded, “Vorial and Lazzal also mentioned that battle to me when I was talking to them the other day.”
After a few seconds, she asked:
“How powerful are the enforcers?”
“From my encounters with them, they are troublesome, but far beneath our current ability. Their strength lies in overwhelming an enemy with numbers and different attacking angles. As long as we aren’t reckless, and don’t let ourselves be surrounded, I don’t think we will have any issue with them.”
Erinara nodded her head with understanding.

“What about after the council has been removed from power?”, she asked, looking at my eyes.
“I’m seeing this mission as a one-time job. After that I intend to renounce my status a knight of the kingdom officially.”
“But you will still be ‘my’ knight?”, Erinara giggled slightly.
“Most definitely”, I pulled her closer to me. Making sure to avoid her horns, I softly planted a kiss on her forehead.
“Everything for you, Erinara.”