In a strange world as a Doppelganger

Chapter 48 - The Words we don't speak

The day after returning I go to the garden to look for Vera. I find her on her knees in the mud tending to some sprouts and plucking weeds. I'm no expert when it comes to gardening but I'm quite convinced that it takes longer for things to grow than the few days it's been.

Vera looks up at me, mud and sweat caking her face. 

"Oh, you're back?" she stands up and wipes her face, only smearing more mud across it. "You look like you haven't eaten well. You're normally pretty gaunt but this takes the prize." Her bushy hair has been pulled back into a poofy, tangled, ponytail.

"I've had better days. I'm fine though." I get down on my knees as well and while we tend the garden I recount what happened.

Vera waits till I finish the story before she turns to me.

"They think the blight was caused by the hag coven or the goblins?" she asks this with a tone of disbelief.

"Yes, they seemed quite convinced. I'm hoping that the hunter can sow some seeds of truth though. If they just paid some attention it would be made apparent to them that it wasn't us", the last word I say with hesitation. Do I consider myself part of the goblin tribe? "Any way it might buy us some time. What do you think we should do?"

Vera stops pulling weeds and squats down, hugging her own legs. She looks northward, toward where her old coven resides. Then she looks at me.

"I could go talk to them?"

"The coven?! Did you not get exiled?"

"The humans..." her gaze drops. I think my assumption stung. "I could try to go and talk to them. I did spend my early years in a small village, so there's a chance I could pass for just someone living in the woods." She is obviously not liking this idea herself.

"I wouldn't ask anything like that of you. You have no reason to get that far involved."

"Then what do you suggest? If the actual hags get involved then there will be an actual blight coming for the humans", she stands up again and starts pacing the edge of the garden. "What if they harm the heart-tree?"

"The heart-tree?" I stand up myself and tilt my head slightly.

"It's an important tree to the coven. It helps them stay connected to nature and not get corrupted by the dark magics."

"Oh, and if the tree is harmed?"

"Whether by this blight or by humans, if the heart-tree is damaged, it could send the coven on a rampage. And let me tell you, their magic is no joke as it is but if they decide to draw from darker sources, the entire woodlands would feel the ripples of consequence."

Vera steps toward me with resolute footfalls.

"It would be devastating."

Her words hang in the air for a moment. Then two.

"There might be a way", she squints and looks all over the place, scrunching her nose as she thinks. "I've been told by the hags to never venture too far south from here, more than a fortnight that is. Apparently there is a clan of moontouched that sometimes have contact with the fortress of Krist."

There are multiple things that I want to ask her; about these moontouched and the fortress. However I don't want to interrupt her thinking. She knows more than I do and I really don't think I'd give much input on these subjects.

Then she suddenly snaps around, turning on her heel to face me squarely.

"Can you take any form you deign fit? I have never met a doppelganger before but the tomes state that they can be anyone." I am slightly taken aback, not expecting this progress of her previous thought pattern.

"I- uh- maybe? I have not tried too many forms."

"How many shapes can you take? Is there a set amount? Do you need to remember them? How does it feel to change? I can only change through illusory magic, maybe some slight alterations through transmutation magic", she starts going off on topics of magical theory and at some point it turns to static in my ears.

How much do I know about this ability? I look at my hands, turning them over and observing them intently. I look back up at Vera and focus. I note the texture of her hair, the slight freckles on her nose, the scar she has on her wrist, the alignment of her teeth. I find myself vexed by the minute details of her being. I watch her gate and stride, her gestures and her intonations and inflections of words. I notice her vibrant green eyes that shift to a deeper fir green. How the whites of her eyes are more like a grey as she stares widely at me.

She's staring at me...

"You- how- wow..." she takes several tentative steps toward me. "Marvelous. Magnificent. Incredible."

She grabs the sides of my face with her hands and turns me slowly from the right to the left.

"Did it wor-", before I can finish the sentence it's blatantly obvious that my voice has also mimicked hers. "Whoa", is all I can manage at that point.

"Indeed", she steps back, trailing her hands down my shoulders and grasp my hands, scrutinizing the detail of dirt under the finger nails. "You really became me, down to the details. What about the things that you could not see? You did not create any new clothes, which is to be expected but nonetheless. Show me your back." Without any quarter she turns me around and lifts my fur tunic up over my shoulders. I can feel her fingers tracing something. A delicate but determined touch. "Incredible."

She lets the tunic back down. "Now if you wouldn't mind turning back? It's a bit eerie to look at myself like this."

I slowly revert to my usual elongated and pale self. She asks me to meet her again tomorrow, she wants to do some thinking and she needs to tend her boars. Vera leaves after a hasty goodbye and leave me standing there among the saplings in the garden.

As I sleep that night I am met by familiar dreams. Images of variations of myself. I can tell by the swell of power within me that I have gained a new level. A lot faster than expected. The slew of new experiences might be the cause of that. As I observe the visions of other 'me' I can tell that I must make a choice.

The first form is me, but with a strange artifact in hand, similar to the last choice this image holds a crossbow without the actual bow and runes cover the length of it and sparks of lightning and fire shoot from the end of it, a weapon of untold destructive force, fueled by my magic.

The second form is a leaner version of me, clad in dark cloths. Most of my guise covered up or hidden. Part of my body obscured by illusions and in my hand is a knife that glows with eerie magics. A silent blade that strikes and vanishes.

The third and last form shows me as now, but more. It shows me surrounded by magical water that swirls around me and forms a being made of the cascade tide itself. And it bows to my whim.

--

Hi there dear readers!
As of writing this I am just about to reach 25k views on this story and I am so thankful and appreciative of all of you!

As you might be able to tell from the format I wrote up here above, it is now time to choose!
Doppie has the chance to multi-class. Now I won't say outright what the options are but I bet you can put 2 and 2 together!
Just let me know in the comment below what you think would be the coolest or most interesting development!

Thanks again for reading!
Love, Jocey~