Memories and Manipulation

Elowen stared at the tiny bird hovering before her, effortlessly carrying two grown men wrapped in a thick bundle of vines. Nilly watched her mother's expression shift from astonishment to disbelief, although she couldn't understand what was so extraordinary about the creature. She had been waiting for some acknowledgment of her rather impressive accomplishment, but unfortunately, Elowen seemed far more interested in the bird than in the daughter who had brought it home.

Nilly folded her arms across her chest.

"Staring is rude, Mom, and you're making her uncomfortable."

"Huh... what?" Elowen finally snapped out of her thoughts, although her eyes remained fixed on the bird. "Cedric... Ced, honey, come here, please. Maddox, you as well."

As the two men approached, Elowen studied the creature more closely, her astonishment gradually giving way to recognition.

"Are my eyes deceiving me, or is that bird a mythical Centurion Salifax Veltimora?"

"The what now?" Cedric asked, looking thoroughly bewildered, though the sight before him seemed to amuse him.

Elowen glanced toward Maddox, apparently expecting an answer from the veteran warrior. To Nilly's surprise, even the bear man appeared to be at a loss.

"Let go of these idiots," Nilly instructed.

The little bird chirped obediently before releasing the bundle onto the ground, leaving the three adults watching the demonstration with renewed astonishment.

"A familiar?" they exclaimed in unison.

"What are the terms of the contract?"

Nilly regarded the three adults with undisguised sarcasm. Somehow, they had become so fascinated by her new companion that they had almost forgotten the two suspicious men lying at their feet.

"Don't you want to interrogate these two first? They are spies, and they know about you—all of you."

That finally redirected their attention. Maddox hoisted one of the unconscious prisoners onto his shoulder, while Cedric collected the other. Without another word, the two men headed toward the shed, leaving Elowen alone with her daughter.

Nilly watched them go, gradually becoming aware of the uncomfortable silence behind her. When she turned, her mother's expression made it perfectly clear that the interrogation would not be limited to the intruders.

There was no escaping her eventual fury.

"Eleanor..." Elowen's voice trembled between anger and relief. "Where were you? First Aaron... now you. Haven't I been through enough already?"

Nilly blinked innocently, doing her absolute best to appear entirely undeserving of such an accusation.

It failed spectacularly.

And so began the lecture.

For the first few minutes, Nilly genuinely tried to pay attention. Unfortunately, as her mother continued, the sentences gradually dissolved into scattered words that occasionally managed to reach her.

"...disappointing..."

"...don't care about the consequences..."

"...your mother and father..."

"...responsibility..."

Nilly's eyes drifted toward a thin crack running along the cottage wall.

Huh. Was that always there?

It curved strangely near the window, almost like a tiny bolt of lightning. She wondered whether rainwater could seep through it.

"...composure..."

"...sick and tired of these constant scares..."

Nilly quickly nodded, hoping she hadn't missed a question.

Her stomach chose that moment to growl.

Is the last slice of cake still in the pantry? Or did I eat it last night?

Nilly frowned thoughtfully.

I honestly can't remember. I'll have to check.

Then another possibility occurred to her.

Oh, and Mom made that stew she always makes on Fridays. There might still be some left!

"...I can't take this anymore..."

"...the fear of losing you..."

"...cried for hours..."

Those words brought Nilly's attention back to her mother. For the first time since the lecture began, she properly noticed the exhaustion beneath Elowen's anger.

"What if something had happened to you? Those men looked strong. If it hadn't been for her..." Elowen's gaze shifted toward the bird. "...things could have been so much worse."

As though sensing Nilly's predicament, the little bird fluttered onto her shoulder and nestled against her neck, offering what Nilly chose to interpret as silent moral support.

By the time Elowen finally paused, what had felt like an eternity had passed.

"Mom, calm down, okay? Relax a little. I'm okay." Nilly hesitated before adding in a considerably quieter voice, "The one you should be angry at is... Aaron..."

The final word emerged almost reluctantly, and she knew immediately that she had touched a nerve.

Elowen's gaze lingered on her daughter's torn clothes, mud-streaked face, and the faint tear tracks upon her cheeks. Something in her expression changed, and Nilly wondered whether her mother recognized a little of herself in her.

Whatever Elowen was about to say remained unspoken, and Nilly wisely decided not to test her luck. Taking advantage of the silence, she made her escape posthaste.

Once inside Aaron's room, Nilly gently cupped the little bird in her palms. The creature regarded her expectantly as she considered the rather important matter of choosing a name.

"River?..."

The bird tilted her tiny head.

"No."

Nilly thought for another moment.

"Silver?... Definitely not. Besides..." She chuckled softly. "That reminds me too much of Aaron."

The little bird chirped impatiently, apparently unimpressed with the delay.

Nilly laughed.

"Nah... Frey."

The tiny bird chirped again, this time with unmistakable excitement.

"I like it too," Frey said.

"I'm Nilly..." Nilly said with a warm smile, gently stroking the bird's soft feathers. "...and you're Frey."

***

Elowen was a bundle of nerves when Cedric and Maddox finally returned. She had spent the past hour considering everything that had happened, yet each unanswered question seemed to lead toward another, considerably more troubling one. The moment Cedric entered, she turned toward him.

"The Covenant... what do we do now? They were not supposed to be here."

"And they are not here, Lowney," Cedric replied calmly. "They're in the custody of the Veilkeepers now. The Order will handle their interrogation."

"Yes. Those two wandered away from the main group. I'm certain there were more of them."

Elowen released a slow breath, some of the tension finally leaving her shoulders.

"I'm relieved they're gone."

"And what happens to them afterward?" Elowen asked.

"Memory alteration, most likely. Once they've told us everything they know, their memories can be modified before they're released."

"And if that doesn't work?"

Maddox glanced at Cedric before answering.

"Then they won't be going back to the Covenant. You know how these things work, Lowney."

Elowen fell silent for a moment.

"Did you get any information?"

"Not much, to be honest," Cedric admitted. "One of them was clearly a lieutenant. The other was only an initiate."

"An initiate?" Elowen repeated.

Cedric nodded, his expression growing serious.

"That is exactly what worries me. The Covenant was supposed to be nothing more than scattered remnants hiding in the dark. But initiates mean recruitment. Training. Structure."

His gaze moved between them.

"They are rebuilding."

Maddox's expression grew serious as Cedric continued.

"There was something else. Something we learned from the lieutenant."

Elowen straightened, waiting for him to continue.

"He claimed the masters behind the ritual had been searching for years. They sensed one of the cores was still alive, but its location remained hidden."

Cedric paused.

"Until today."

Elowen frowned.

"Until it was destroyed."

Cedric lowered his gaze, remembering the lieutenant's repeated words.

"But that wasn't what stayed with me. Even after the interrogation was over... even when there was nothing left to hide... he kept repeating the same words."

Cedric closed his eyes briefly before repeating them.

"Find the others."

A heartbeat passed.

"Protect the others."

The room fell quiet as Maddox repeated the words under his breath.

"Protect the others..."

He walked toward the window, absently stroking his beard while considering what the lieutenant might have meant.

"The phrase is suspicious," Elowen said quietly. "But vague. Who was he talking about? People? Dungeons?"

Maddox remained silent, his attention fixed upon the forest beyond the glass. Outside, the evening breeze stirred the leaves, but he barely seemed to notice. Then, as though something had finally fallen into place, his hand stopped.

"Cores."

Both Cedric and Elowen turned toward him.

"He wasn't talking about people," Maddox said quietly. "He was talking about the cores."

He paused before looking directly at Elowen.

"What was so important about the broken core that it brought them all here?"

Elowen considered the question, recalling the devastation surrounding the cave. The black miasma had spread through the region, corrupting the forest and transforming once-ordinary creatures into monstrous versions of themselves.

"It started the degradation of an entire region," she finally said. "The black miasma... the horrid transfigurations... all of it originated from a single core. What started as nothing more than a cave became an entire dungeon, twisting everything within its reach."

"The mass grave of the fallen army surrounding the cave became a dark, twisted resting place, its dead forced to rise once more. The waterfall was poisoned, the vines became corrupted, and the entire ecosystem was consumed."

She lowered her voice.

"It was as though it had developed a will of its own."

"...A will of its own," Maddox murmured, a faint smile devoid of humor crossing his face. "It was alive, all right. You should have seen the way it fought against its own death."

Elowen fell silent, recalling how the corruption had continued spreading despite the barriers she had maintained for years. The core's emergence eighteen years earlier had already raised troubling questions, and the information Cedric had uncovered only strengthened her suspicions.

"A core that emerged eighteen years ago," she continued softly. "Just as we suspected... it was connected to the ritual."

Her voice fell almost to a whisper.

"The same ritual that led Aaron to us."

The revelation left them silent for a long moment before Maddox finally spoke.

"After all," he said quietly, "we know who currently presides over the Covenant from the shadows."

Neither Cedric nor Elowen answered. They didn't need to, for some names were never meant to be spoken aloud.

Elowen lowered her gaze toward her folded hands. The world beyond their peaceful home was changing, and she could no longer dismiss the danger gathering outside their forest.

Cedric watched her quietly before speaking.

"Lowney…" Cedric said softly. "We must resume the duties we abandoned once. The Covenant is no longer a whisper hiding at the edges of the kingdom. It is gathering shape, and if we wait until it stands fully before us, the Veilkeepers may not have enough left to answer it."

For a moment, Elowen said nothing.

"About time, Ced," Maddox roared, breaking through the heaviness of the room.