Firelight & Shadows

AISLING AND Lucien continued through the narrow corridor that was lit by another yellow orb of light Sirius manifested to guide them.

“Wow, mana sure is fascinating!” the Pawn remarked, passing her hand through the orb. “Can you cast spells like this too, Lucien?”

“Not like that,” he answered, glancing down at her while continuing to walk. “As a Knight, the mana would travel through my sword and glow. The orb Sirius cast is more convenient and long-ranged.”

“Ah, gotcha. I wonder if I’ll be able to cast spells too. Are they difficult?”

He shrugged. “It varies by person.”

Halfway through the walk, Aisling lifted her forearm to her nose and sniffed. She then sniffed her other arm, and then the top portion of her gown.

Lucien quietly observed her behavior, before being compelled to ask her what she was doing.

“Ugh, I stink,” she bluntly stated. “When we get out of here, I’m seriously gonna need a bath.”

“Uh, okay,” he responded, scratching his head in bewilderment.

“Oh.” She looked over. “Sorry, Lucien. I didn’t mean to think out loud like that. I do that a lot… I hope I didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“Doesn’t bother me, but it’s just weird that your first thoughts were about hygiene and not our current situation,” he assured her.

Aisling tilted her head slightly and crossed her arms. “Well, I kinda figured there’s nothing much we can do when we have all these questions to answer,” she responded. “And then who knows how many questions arise from those answers. So, I figured I would just not worry about them for now and just focus on the things I could do… like taking a bath.”

Lucien chuckled. “Fair enough. But you wouldn’t be able to do any of that unless we figure out how to leave this place first.”

She answered with a giggle, “Oh right, that’s true.”

They later arrived at the door and the Knight sighed, “Well, here we are. Brute force isn’t gonna open it, I’ve tried that.”

Aisling placed her hand by her chin in thought and skimmed the complex crevices. “What opened it before?”

“We had these four tablets, but they’re on the other side.”

“Oh,” she replied, disappointed. “Well, what’d they look like?”

Gesturing with his hands, Lucien explained that when they were pieced together, it formed a rose. “Just like the one on your coffin.”

“I see.”

They pondered, then searched for any kind of mechanism the door was hinged upon, but the crevice it slid into earlier was much too thin to wedge anything.

While investigating, Lucien glanced at Aisling, who squatted in the corner to examine the door. ‘Kinda thought it would’ve opened now that she’s here,’ he thought. ‘We’ll probably have to end up casting a powerful spell, but that may give away our position. Sirius may say there are no soul feeders nearby, but I guarantee they’ll come flocking like moths to a flame if we follow through.’

Aisling stood up and scratched her head before clearing her hair behind her left ear, revealing a single black-studded earring.

“Find anything?” Lucien wondered.

She shook her head. “Hm, I feel like we’re making it more complex than it actually is, but I may have an idea.”

“Oh, you do? What is it?”

“It involves the rose design you mentioned, but I wanna wait until Sirius gets here first. If what you said about how he casts his spells are true, then it may be possible.”

“What’s that now?” a voice echoed from some distance behind them.

Lucien quickly stared through the dark corridor. “Sirius? Is that you?”

“I don’t know who else it could be, dude,” he answered with a chuckle.

“Oh, haha. Anyway, you got that rose sketch? Aisling thinks it could help us get out.”

“Hang on, I’m close by.”

Aisling fixated on the intricate crosshatchings on the door, muttering, “I’m not entirely sure it’ll work, but it’s worth looking into.”

Shortly after, Sirius arrived and remarked, “Everyone playing nicely?”

Lucien chortled. “Shut up! Where’s your book?”

He revealed it from his belt, flipped to the rose sketch, and handed it to Aisling. “What do you think?”

She took the book and held it in front of her while she stood in front of the door. “It seems like the strokes on each petal corresponds to a line on the door,” she analyzed. “I’m thinking if you can trace them somehow, it’ll unlock for us.”

“Hm, sounds like a complex way to leave a room,” Sirius replied. “But then again, it’s not a normal chamber.”

“It’s worth trying,” Lucien encouraged. “I don’t know what else we could do right now.”

“Alright, give me some time.”

“How do you plan to trace it?”

Sirius responded, “With mana, of course.”

The Knight clenched his jaw. “How big of a spell is this gonna be?”

“It’s not a big spell, but it’s gonna last longer because I have to maintain my focus until the design is traced.”

He sighed heavily. “So it’s unavoidable after all,” he replied gloomily, then stood beside Aisling.

She frowned and whispered, “What’s wrong with casting spells now? He was doing it earlier.”

Lucien explained to her the problem of using large, complex spells, which allowed the soul feeders to spawn out of nowhere in a remote area like this.

Aisling held her arms, muttering, “They… sound terrifying. How could something like that actually exist?”

“They’ve been here since the beginning, but they’re supposed to embody the world’s moral decay and sin.”

She shivered. “Definitely terrifying. What can defeat them?”

“Fighting them with mana. That’s why every Chesslandiyan is taught from a young age to harness it.

Meticulously observing the potential patterns on the door, Sirius lifted his left hand, and his tome appeared and glowed an amethyst purple in front of him. It flipped its pages further in after he uttered, “Electric Scribe,” where a quill of pure mana was brought forth.

Purple sparks traveled through it, with its jagged outline distorting as it approached the door.

Before he followed through with the spell, he warned his companions, “Cover your eyes, this is gonna be bright.”

They looked away while obscuring their faces but couldn’t help peeping through their fingers to see the movement of the quill.

It traced the crevices, imbuing it with mana. As it continued through the entirety of the drawing, the rose was prevalent, and it was scarlet red at the flower and emerald green at its thorns and stem, just like on the front. The only difference was that this flower was backwards, but it wasn’t disclosed to be that way until Sirius informed them that it was.

“Well, I’m glad that worked,” Aisling exhaled with relief, “because I honestly wouldn’t know what else to try.”

“At first I couldn’t see what you were talking about,” he explained as the door creeped open from the middle, “but noticed that the upper section was backwards like the other three.”

“Like a mirror,” muttered Lucien as he exited last. After emerging in the nighttime, he stretched his limbs, exhaling with relief, “Ah, looks like we’re in the clear after all. Thanks for getting us out, Aisling.”

She giggled. “I’m sure you guys would’ve figured it out without me, but I’m happy to help!”

“Yeah, sometimes the biggest problems can have the simplest solutions,” Sirius acknowledged. “Knaht uoy.”

Aisling blushed and nodded. “Er’uoy emoclew.”

“Hey, don’t go speaking another language behind my back,” Lucien playfully scolded. “You two could be conspiring against me.”

The two exchanged looks and chuckled.

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Lucien,” Aisling assured him. “I just met you.”

“I could,” Sirius joked, throwing an arm over his friend’s shoulder. “Just kidding.”
Before they continued forward, a cool breeze blew, rustling the leaves and kicking up the cloaks of the young men and Aisling’s gown. The latter shivered from being more underdressed than her companions, so Sirius removed his cloak and draped it over her.

“When we travel to New Warryn, we’ll get you some new clothes,” he added as Lucien also covered her with his cloak, which had a silver wolf mantle of fur around the collar. “Or maybe Henrietta could lend her a dress at the apothecary,” he suggested.

“Thank you,” she exhaled, drawing the hood from Sirius’s cloak over her veil, then gripping the fabrics closer together.

“Unseal some socks too,” Sirius advised, retrieving a scroll from his pouch, and tossing it to his friend. “I’ll get a fire going.”

“What about the promotion?” Aisling asked, performing some knee rises so she didn’t have to stand on the cold stones.

“Let’s get you warmed up first,” Sirius stated, outstretching his left hand towards a bundle of premade kindling he revealed from another scroll. “Besides, it’s kinda late already. We’ll have to save it for tomorrow.” He cast a small fireball from his index finger into the bundle, which burned slowly at first.

Aisling drew closer to it, and knelt while Sirius procured some sticks and dead leaves that littered the area. Lucien helped her with the socks, and although they were meant for bigger feet, it still worked out the more layers she put on. They extended up to her knees, providing just enough coverage for now.

After everyone was settled, she expressed her gratitude to the pair.

“It’s the least we could do for helping us get out of that chamber,” Lucien joked.

While they sat by the fire warming up, Sirius brought up, “Let’s start setting up camp while we get some food cooking.”

“Potatoes!” Aisling joyfully announced, but clasped her hand over her mouth. She lowered her head, concealing her embarrassment from her outburst.

Sirius and Lucien exchanged looks with one another, simultaneously thrown off by her request.

There was a brief awkward silence, which the former broke. “Potatoes you say?”

After another brief pause, Aisling revealed her cherry red face, responding, “Y-Yes… I must really enjoy them… to blurt it out so suddenly.”

“We have some we haven’t used yet,” Lucien informed, pointing them out within the seal scroll.

“And we still have some beef jerky to eat in the meantime,” added Sirius. “But we can whip something up real quick. We can dice a few, boil them, then pan fry.”

“I call dicing them!” Aisling volunteered, reinvigorated as she extended her arm in the air.

“Then Lucien and I will prepare the pots and grate.”

When Sirius and Lucien were traveling, they had to enhance their abilities to cook while in the field. Not once did they have to worry about food in the past six years because of the seal scrolls. Thanks to their convenience, ingredients they procured in the markets remained fresh. It’s like they were sealed in time, and this also applied to the food they cooked.

The water in the pot began heating up on the grate Sirius placed on some rocks. He revealed the abundance of jerky from the seal scroll to share with Aisling. He and Lucien normally kept some in a pouch on their belts for easy access, alongside a mix of nuts, dried fruit, and chocolate.

Aisling took her time cutting the potatoes with a slight tremble in her hands and unrefined technique. Despite the length of time it took, she was still getting them ready. But although they could’ve easily been cut using a spell, the men refrained from interrupting her concentration.

A meal that consisted of manual labor always tasted better than one that was magically influenced.

The water started boiling when Aisling placed the irregular cubes of potatoes into the water. As she sat near the fire with outstretched hands to continue staying warm, she remarked with a nervous grin, “Sorry for taking so long, you guys. It’s definitely been awhile.”

Sirius quickly replied, “How long would that be?”

“Hm, not sure, but it must’ve been a long one based on my cutting.”

He nodded, then handed her a pouch of beef jerky and trail mix. “Appetizer while we wait.”

She gratefully accepted and examined the contents inside. Then she started sniffing it.

Sirius grinned, intrigued by her curiosity.

“Smells good!” Aisling gleefully responded, taking hold of one of the jerky rips, and biting into it. She fidgeted from chomping on the tough texture.

Lucien explained that it’s better if she let it sit in the corner of her mouth to soften. “But however you wanna eat it, there’s no wrong way,” he concluded.

Sirius also handed her a canteen of water to drink from before he stirred the pot of boiling potato cubes.

After taking a swig of the refreshing beverage, Aisling asked about the journey the two men were on, and what the plan was for tomorrow.

Sirius and Lucien exchanged looks with one another, both thinking the same way in answering with caution. The former articulated, “We’ll have to see what happens when we go to the Dais of Promotion, but essentially our plan is to backtrack to the capital—Throne’s Edge.”

She nodded. “I see. It sounds like a long journey, but I’m sure we’ll each get something out of it! I’d like to believe our meeting was more than just a coincidence.”

Sirius simply nodded, but internalized, ‘More than a coincidence, perhaps, but too convenient if you ask me.’

“The potatoes should be ready!” Aisling pointed out. She used the spoon to scoop out a cube in order to test its texture. “Yup, they’re ready to fry, got any seasoning?”

Lucien revealed them from another scroll, and the young woman started sifting through the small jars of powders. He kept an eye on her cooking while Sirius started preparing the tents.

She didn’t pay mind to his monitoring, focusing solely on the potatoes.

And after a few successful batches, he joined his friend to set up the second tent, conferring quietly. “So, what do you think now?” he asked, guiding the tent poles through the loop while Sirius fed them.

“I’m still not detecting anything,” he replied under his breath. “She just seems like a normal girl.”

“Well, we know she’s not,” Lucien corrected. “She has black marks like us.”

“Agreed. Plus, the manner in which we found her.”

He nodded subtly, then glanced over his shoulder to see Aisling wafting the aroma of the cubed potatoes, before tossing them.

“But,” Sirius continued, also quickly glancing over at her, then to his friend again, “it seems she recalls a number of things when confronted with the situation.”

“Yeah, like when I told you about the door.”

“And what to make for dinner…”

“Hm.” Lucien glanced to the side. “They seem pretty trivial right now. But maybe by the time we reach Throne’s Edge, or hopefully during her promotion ceremony, her memories will come back.”

“Mana willing,” he remarked, grimly nodding.

They soon finished up by setting available blocks on the extending ropes on each side, since there was no soil to drive the stakes through.

Not long after the second tent was erected did Aisling announce the fried potato dish was done. Using a wooden bowl from the inventory of kitchen utensils, she divided the portions into thirds and handed it to the men when they regrouped by the fire. “Eat up!” she joyously encouraged, handing each of them a bowl. “Please let me know what you think.”

They intentionally took their time to settle down to let Aisling take the first bite, which she did without acknowledging their cautionary behavior. And when they finally partook of the food, they were impressed.

“Whoa!” gasped Sirius and proceeded to scarf down another forkful.

“This is very savory,” Lucien concurred. “Well done, Aisling!”

She smiled. “Thanks, I’m glad you like them! I’m sure there are dishes you can teach me too.”

“Is there anything else you know how to cook?”

After twisting her lips in thought, she answered, “Not off the top of my head, but if I have the ingredients, I should be able to put something together.”

‘Trivial,’ Sirius confirmed internally. ‘But if we steer the conversation, maybe we’ll uncover more.’

“What do you think, Sirius?” Aisling asked, scooching closer to him and gazing into his eyes.

“Huh?” he exhaled.

“Sorry, I… You didn’t actually give your opinion on my cooking,” she anxiously stated. “Just wanna know if it’s to your liking.”

“Oh,” he chuckled nervously. “It tastes great! I’ve actually never cooked potatoes by themselves before unless they were mashed. So this definitely inspires me to learn more dishes.”

She smiled warmly. “I’m glad. I know another potato recipe, but it’s a bit more time-consuming.”

“Well,” he sighed, recalling his and Lucien’s exile from Pallethorpe Village, “time is pretty much all we have these days, so we’ll definitely be able to experiment.”

The trio continued eating and soon finished their meal.

Sirius proceeded to cast a small cleaning spell using water and a soapy solution from another scroll on all of the utensils.

Once they were clean, Lucien sealed them away, then volunteered, “I’ll take the first watch tonight.”

Sirius nodded, then turned to Aisling and gestured to the tents. “Which one would you like?”

“Oh, um, what’s the difference?”

“Nothing, they each have a sleeping bag inside. Just wanted to give you the first pick.”

She glanced between the two dark abodes and selected the one on the right since it was closest to the fire. Before turning in for the night, she proceeded to hand the cloaks back to the young men, but they insisted she keep them for the time being. Aisling smiled and remarked, “Thanks again. Goodnight, Sirius. Goodnight, Lucien. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Goodnight,” they replied simultaneously.

Sirius looked at his watch, which read that it was quarter to midnight. “We’ll take a later departure tomorrow, so wake me up in four hours.”

“Gotcha. Just don’t get too comfortable with my sleeping bag,” Lucien playfully remarked. His friend chuckled and went his way, while he added some more dry sticks to the fire.

Inside the tent, Sirius stripped off his black kurta, revealing a defined physique underneath the sleeveless gray undershirt that clung to him. He neatly folded it before placing it to the side. The dark red burns on his right forearm from six years ago still branded his skin. They extended up to just beneath his shoulder muscles, having permanently scorched the hair from his arm. Although healed completely with time and magic, some scars from the past still remained. It cursed Sirius from having pleasant dreams, replacing them with memories of the crusade over and over again. And on the rare occasions he didn’t dream of that, he dreamt of the trial. The trial that condemned him and Lucien. And it felt like no one could pull him out of it.

No one.