Path to the Void [Points of Light 1 - RPG fantasy]

2.01

In the week down the river that followed, I learned a great deal about my new companions. I learned that Jack couldn't sing but could whistle quite well, that Diana was snobbish about her food, and that neither of them was a particularly quiet sleeper.

It was on one of those nights aboard the ship, with the only sounds being the creak of wood in water and Diana mumbling into her dreams, that I sat up from my bed, recalling so suddenly the sounds of boots on high metal walkways. Jack rolled in their sleep as I curled up and pulled my blankets closer, fighting off that strange feeling of emptiness seated deep in my chest.

That is all I learned of who I was before the forest and Min; just the sound of footsteps, clanking the metal above my head, and the thought that I had heard it many times in my life, so many that it wasn't even a sounds worth commenting on.

On the sixth day, we arrived in the small port town of Engel, to make our way by foot over the mountains that divided the country of Averli in two. On this side, the kingdom didn't have much impact on people's lives; a few taxes and the rare member of the nobility who preferred to live away from the eyes of the court. Across the mountains, Diana had told us, it was very different.

For now, though, we had to get to those mountains in the first place. It was still a warm enough season that we had no worries about snow in the pass, so we didn't spend too long gathering supplies in Engel. The town was not so different from the one we had left - a small merchant village, really, with bricked streets and an open square for markets and whatever other gatherings of the townsfolk. The feeling of the town was changed, however, by the addition of guards from the royal military - guards that Jack eyed warily from across every street corner.

Our group didn't pass without notice, either. It was actually something of a relief to me, although I would never admit it; traveling with a paladin in full armor and Jack, who now drew the eyes of every magically sensitive prison in town, kept the attention off me. Jack, for their part, seemed to thoroughly detest the attention and complained about it at every step.

"If I'd known being the sideshow of every town we went into was part of the bargain, I'd've reconsidered," Jack grumbled to me as we were exiting the town.

"It's only to be expected," said Diana, a few steps ahead of us. "Most people will never encounter one of the great spirits, so they have nothing to measure by. Send one waltzing through town, and of course it will be noticed."

Ignoring Jack's muttered reply, ("I don't even know how to waltz."), I took a wish step to catch up with Diana, intent on the question forming in my mind. The pack on my back, now laden with trail food and a tinderbox, rattled at my every step. "Have you ever seen one of the spirits before?"

"Only once," she replied, "at my investiture. The layfolk don't have access to that portion of the temple, so sightings are rare, even if Luxali is built around the temple."

I nodded. If the other temples had sanctums anywhere as deep as the one I had visited, then it made sense that most people would never see the inside of one. Behind me, Jack perked up, "When does Luzumen appear at the temple? I know Vayesao only made residence during thunderstorms..."

"At dawn," Diana said, then added, "When the power of light overtakes the world," as though we needed clarification. Dawn seemed a perfectly reasonable time for a spirit of light to appear, to me. "It is my understanding that Demezel likewise appears at sundown."

I nodded, and we slipped into silence again, as the houses along the roadside became farms - hardier crops, here, at the beginning of the mountains, and more goats than cattle, in constrast to the flatter lands further to the north. As it had when we were all aboard the ship, quiet dominated our journey, save for Jack sometimes whistling a few cheery notes as we went.