Starting Life From Zero: Far From Home

Chapter Thirty

The study door inched open with a loud creak, mana lantern light from the hallway spilled through the cracked door and across the floor almost making its way to Roswaal's desk. By the time that Ram had stepped onto the plush carpet the Margrave was already turning to face her.

Even through the shadow she could see a subtle hint of his his smile, the way the corners of his mouth lifted and his yellow eye twinkled. Even though he wasn't looking at her yet. Ram shut the door behind her back with both hands, leaning her weight onto it for a moment. The mechanism clicking into the wall seemed to echo through the halls, disrupting the still air. The moon was absent from the sky and the only light that trickled in through the windows behind the Margrave came from the stars.

Ram watched him, sitting at his desk with his legs cross and his body turned toward her now, but his eyes were still locked on the black leather bound book that he was reading. Her gripped the wooden door frame for several seconds before she decided to step forward and say something.

"Ram," Roswaal said in that subdued way he had of speaking at times. He closed to book, with his thumb jammed between its pages to hold his place and held the smile as locked eyes with her. "I guess I did leave you here alone, it's been some time since I could attend to you," he said.

Roswaal placed the book on his desk and motioned for her, patting the cover with a kind of reverence. He lifted his hand and motioned for her to come over. Then he patted his thigh. Ram moved across the room quietly and took her seat in his lap, curling up to rest her head against Roswaal's chest.

She let her ear flatten against the warmth of his chest, listened to the thud of his heard muffled under the layers of fabric, skin, and bone.

He reached up, brushing the bangs back from her forehead. His fingers barely grazed her skin. "In a few days everything will begin in earnest," Roswaal said in the same quiet tone.

"I know." Ram answered.

His other arm curled around, catching her at the waist but leaving her arms free. The hand that was still on her forehead, the hand that he had raised up to brush her bangs away, moved with a deliberate familiarity across her skin until it fount the spot in the center.

The place where her horn had once been.

As his finger circled the spot, it began to glow and Ram stirred, but didn't dare lift her head.

"In the meantime we must be sure that everything is ready," Roswaal said.

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A breakfast made by Rem, Steve practicing throughout the morning with Wilhelm to perfect his use of the sword in conjunction with the shield he now carries, and many of the others dig through old tomes and ancient texts to find anything at all that they can about the White Whale.

Though Peter's reading isn't the best yet, he can still look over what they find and compare it to the things that they have seen elsewhere. Some of the information seems to have no basis in anything else that they see and most often that stuff is treated as questionable at best. Other than the fog accompanying the creature having strange abilities, one of the things that keeps coming up is that magic seems to have a lessened effect on the Whale.

Peter takes that into account and tries to figure out what could make magic work differently on something. He remembered back when they fought Elsa her cloak had done something to the spells sent at her. Though, in that case she had to discard the cloak after the fact. Surely, the Whale couldn't just shed its skin.