Put back together

22. And then there were four

"No."

"Please! We need someone who knows the Islands if we want to have any chance of survival!", Roman exclaimed.

"That's true," Virgil said crossing his arms over his chest. "But I'm not coming."

"Why not?," Logan asked.

"Because I don't want to go on a most likely impossible quest with a group of people who I hardly know and who broke into my house."

Logan had to admit that that was a very good argument.

"How about we make a deal?," he suggested after a beat of silence. "We will leave this place and not some back if you lead us to the teronan border. From then on you can go wherever you want to and we continue our search. Does that sound satisfactory?"

"And what would I get from that?," Virgil scowled. "I can make you stay away from here if I really want to. If we're gonna make a deal I want to benefit from it aswell. That's kinda how deals are supposed to work."

Logan didn't miss the underlying threat, despite of how casual it had sounded.
He didn't doubt that Virgil could do a lot to them if he wanted.
Out of the corner of his eye he could see Patton grab Roman's gloved hand.

"You'd have company for a while," he said.

Virgil frowned at him.

"And what the hell makes you think I want that?"

"You've enchanted a skull to talk to you and you let us stay here for the night without much complaint. I think, deep down, you're just lonely and can't admit it."

Logan pushed up his glasses and hoped that he hadn't gone too far. He barely knew Virgil. He had no idea where the lines were and no idea whether or not he had just crossed one. Or maybe more.

Virgil's glare told him that it were most likely more.

"I'm fine with being alone," the mage gritted out.

"There's a difference between being alone and being lonely."

"I'm not lonely."

"Yes, you are."

Logan felt a static in the air. It smelled like smoke all of a sudden.

Magic.

Angry magic.

The small closed pot by his feet shattered, as if something had blown it up from the inside.

Logan stumbled backwards.

He had gone too far, far too far.

Patton was now pressed against Roman's chest and Logan couldn't explain the weird feeling at the sight.

Now was not the time for feelings.

He turned back towards Virgil.

To his suprise the mage didn't look angry anymore. Rather like was actively trying to calm down. Eyes scrunched closed, taking deep breaths.

The static in the air disappeared.

After a beat of tense silence Virgil opened his eyes again. He didn't look at any of them, only the pot he had shattered.

"Fine."

It sounded resigned.

"But after that you leave me alone."

"Deal," Logan managed to say. He couldn't name the whirlwind of feelings in his chest. Not like he actually wanted to. He just pushed it back and tried to forget it.

"So, you won't kill us," Roman said. It sounded like a question.

"I won't."

The silence returned, much less tense this time.

"If we want to encounter as little creatures as possible, we should head out at sunset. Most of them don't like the night. Depending on which route we take the way to Terona should take about five to twenty days," Virgil said.

"That's quite a difference," Logan noted.

Virgil shrugged.

"I wouldn't suggest the twenty-day route."

"We barely have enough food and water left for seven days," Roman remarked.

"That won't be a problem," Virgil said. "I know where to find both. You can fill up your water right here in the cave. And food can be found everywhere if you know how to cook it."

"Like the foot last night?," Roman asked.

"Exactly."

They spent the rest of the day with preparations. Filling up bottles with water and soup, since there was still a lot left over from the night before, switching out the saddle pockets for actual bags, which Logan was pretty sure were both enchanted judging by how much fit into them without making them any heavier. When his own bag, stuffed to the brim with books, suddenly became significantly lighter he decided not to question it.

Virgil didn't have any kind of map, only two star maps, one with constellations Logan recognised, one with ones that resembled the ones on the curtain.

The skull, that apparently was called Alfred, didn't try to steal their names again but switched to a foreign language at some point, Logan assumed was English.

There were a lot of curious things in Virgil's cave.

A violet glowing lantern - walking stick hybrid, a collection of bones and stones, a thing that - according to Roman - made a beverage called 'coffee' and a stack of shiny cylinder that Virgil referred to as 'energy drinks' when asked.

They left as soon as the sun disappeared behind the trees, leaving the warm cave behind. They left the fire burning behind them, but soon the only light source was Virgil's lantern.

"They don't like it," he had said when Patton had hesitantly asked if that wouldn't attract unwanted monster attention.
He didn't explain and they didn't ask again.

If Logan had felt uneasy being on this Island in the day, then that was nothing compared to now.

Occasionally there was a rustling in the bushes or a clawing at the trees above them and the fact that he had no idea what could possibly be hiding in the shadows only made it worse.

"What if the lantern goes out?," Patton whispered into the silence between them.

"It won't. To extinguish this flame you'd need to kill a man," Virgil said.

Logan had a feeling that he didn't mean it as a metaphor.

After a few hours Logan began to regret staying up the entire day.
He was tired and had to fight a jawn. The by now blue light of the lantern wasn't helping much either.

He had spent plenty of nights awake reading but walking the entire time was a lot more exhausting.

Next to him Roman jawned.

At least he wasn't the only one then.

"Do you want to take a break?," Virgil asked, looking back to them.

Patton nodded.

"Is it safe to just rest here?," Logan asked but sat down anyway.

"Don't worry," Virgil told him, leaning against a tree. "That's my job."

Logan fell asleep before he could wonder whether Virgil meant that he'd keep them safe or that the worrying was his job.