Summoner 19, page 12
part #19 of Summoner Series
Crystyn and I awkwardly stood there for a moment, unsure of what else to say, but I figured the Guardian was waiting for me to turn in with the rest of my team, so I decided to start heading toward the stairs. I offered my aunt another smile, but just as I was about to turn, Crystyn cleared her throat.
“A while ago, I told you you weren’t half the man your father was,” Crystyn brought up. “But today you’ve proved me wrong. I can say with the utmost certainty that Relaude would be so proud of the man and mage you’ve grown up to be. And I am, too.”
“Thank you,” I replied softly, and then I quietly headed up the stairs. When I entered the small bedroom area Crystyn had designated for us, I was unsurprised to see that Varleth, Gawain, Orenn, and Almasy were all fast asleep, but I was surprised to see Braden was still awake.
The ox-like summoner gave me a wide smile as I entered the room.
“You were awesome today, Gryff,” Braden whispered to me as I carefully maneuvered over the sleeping bodies of our friends to join him.
I managed to do so without disrupting their slumber, and I sat down on an empty area beside my former roommate. Once I did, Braden passed me a crudely-woven blanket, which I accepted with a gracious nod.
“Thanks, Braden.” I smiled at the summoner. “I couldn’t have made it happen if it weren’t for your encouragement.
“Sure you would have,” Braden contradicted me. “You always find a way to prevail, even when the odds seem stacked against you. That’s one of the things I admire about you the most.”
“You’re going to make me blush,” I laughed quietly, and as I did, heat rose to my cheeks.
“I’m serious, Gryff,” the other summoner insisted, and he reached out and grasped my shoulder with his large hand. “It’s not like I’ve ever underestimated you or anything, but you were really impressive today. Going up against a Guardian who’s lived in the Shadowscape for who knows how long… it was a big risk. But you handled it like a pro. I couldn’t have done something like that.”
“Nonsense.” I shook my head. “Braden, back when we first met, you were so timid and afraid to battle, but just look at you now. You’ve been an integral part of our missions, not to mention the fact you’re the Summoning professor at the Academy. Don’t discredit yourself, my friend. I appreciate the praise, but you have to admit you’re pretty damn awesome yourself.”
“Aww, thanks, man.” Braden blushed.
“Hey, can you ladies keep it down over there?” Varleth drawled, and the banisher’s voice was slightly gravelly with sleep. “Some of us are fucking exhausted.”
“Don’t be jealous, Varleth,” I snorted at the surly gypsy. “We love you, too.”
“Trust me, I know,” Varleth countered. “I’m fucking adorable.”
“Prost, quit your blabbering,” Gawain groaned from across the room. “Some of us are actually trying to get a good night’s sleep.”
“Yeah, Varleth, keep it down,” I teased. “Gawain needs all the beauty sleep he can get.”
I barely managed to duck out of the way as a pillow hurtled toward my head. All attempts at silence were futile at that point, and I nearly collapsed into a fit of laughter as I threw the pillow into the dark abyss, and soon, an all-out war ensued. Orenn and Almasy soon roused from the commotion, but Mur remained conked out as our pillows and belongings sailed over his head.
I half-expected Crystyn to pop her head in and tell us to keep it down, but the Guardian was nowhere to be found.
After a short battle, the pillows stopped flying, and we all scrambled around to reclaim our bedding. Once I had a pillow of my own, I settled into my sleeping bag. After such a long day of battle and travel, the soft material felt almost as luxurious as my own bed back home in Varle, and my aching muscles had a moment of respite.
I stared up at the ceiling and completed my ritual of sending a mental goodnight to all of my women and children back in the Enclave. I already missed them all terribly, but I reminded myself I would see them soon enough, and if all went according to plan, I would return to them victorious. I was ready to end this battle against the Archons, and defeating Carth would finally bring this war to a close. No more worries about permanent rifts or world domination.
Maker, the idea almost seemed too good to be true, but I had to have hope we were fighting toward a blissful victory.
My eyelids began to grow heavy, so I rolled over, curled up inside my sleeping bag, and finally gave in to my exhaustion.
Before my eyes opened the next morning, I could hear the sound of many voices surrounding me.
“Is he okay?”
“He’s been out for a while, should we shake him?”
“Guys, Gryff’s been through a lot lately. Let him sleep.”
“Yeah, shut up, Gawain!”
“Shh!”
“I can hear you,” I muttered groggily without opening my eyes.
“Damn it, guys, we were supposed to let him sleep,” Orenn sighed.
“It’s okay,” I protested, and I finally blinked my eyes open and tried to adjust to my surroundings. For a moment, I’d completely forgotten where we were, but the soreness of my back reminded me we were on Crystyn’s floor. Seconds later, the light odor of the Shadowscape flooded into my nostrils, and I scrunched up my nose in response.
The rest of my team sat around me on the floor, but none of them were yawning or blinking the sleep from their eyes, so I could only assume I’d overslept.
“You good, Gryff?” Almasy asked me.
“As good as I can be,” I replied to the earth mage as I stretched out my back. I felt a good crack, and suddenly, the tension left my muscles. “How long have I been out?”
“Hard to say,” Braden admitted from his spot beside me. “We don’t really have clocks or anything, and there’s no sunlight, so it’s hard to gauge.”
The ox-like summoner’s gray eyes were underscored with dark circles, which told me he hadn’t slept nearly as much as I had.
“Have you been up for a while?” I asked my teammates, and they all shared guilty reactions, like they didn’t want me to know.
“Yes,” Orenn admitted. “But that’s okay. You seemed like you really needed some sleep, so we just let you. Well, except for Gawain.”
“This constant teasing is getting old,” Gawain grumbled, and even after a night on the floor, the fire mage’s golden locks looked neat and polished. How the elementalist managed to look so aristocratic all the time never ceased to amaze me.
“Have you seen Crystyn yet?” I asked after I let out another yawn.
“She came to check in on us earlier,” Almasy answered in a casual tone.
“She’s very nice,” Mur added. “She gave us some food.”
“Food?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Crystyn said to bring you downstairs when you woke up,” Braden replied. “I think she’s waiting for you in the kitchen.”
I straightened up and ran a hand through my hair. “Well, I’ve probably kept her waiting long enough.”
I rose up from my sleeping pack, straightened out my clothing, and took a deep breath. Then I stepped over my friends’ sleeping bags and made my way over to her small bathroom. All I wanted was a hot shower, but there was no way Crystyn would have that kind of accommodation in the Shadowscape, so I would have to do with a quick splash of water to the face. Luckily for me, the Guardian had a functioning sink, so I moistened my face, gave my reflection a quick glance in the dirty mirror, and then made my way to the lower level.
“I was wondering when you’d join us,” Crystyn noted with a small smile when I entered the kitchen. “I made sure to save you some food.”
My aunt pushed up the sleeves of her thickly-woven black sweater and then gestured to the table, where a plate of thick-crusted bread sat beside a small container full of amber liquid that looked like honey.
“Where--” I began to ask as I eyed the food skeptically, but the Guardian waved me off.
“Don’t worry yourself with that,” she interrupted me. “Just know it’s fresher than it looks.”
I opened my mouth to question further, but my stomach let out a low growl that made me change my mind, so I gladly sat down at Crystyn’s table, ladled some of the honey onto the bread, and took a huge bite. The bread was slightly warm and had a tanginess that was balanced well by the sweet honey, and I let out a soft groan as I tucked into the meal gratefully. All sense of decency vanished as I polished off the plate. After the battle against my aunt the day before, I was famished, and the warm meal was so much more than I’d expected from a Shadowscape dwelling.
“Feeling better?” Crystyn asked once I finished eating.
“Definitely.” I nodded as I wiped away a stray bit of honey from the corner of my mouth. “Thank you for the food.”
“You’re welcome.” My aunt nodded back, and then her expression softened even further as she leaned against the doorway. “I’ve got a fire going in the front room. I figured we could move in there to talk, whenever you’re ready.”
“I’m ready,” I decided. There was no sense in delaying this conversation any further.
“I figured that’s what you would say,” Crystyn chuckled to herself. “Alright. Let’s go.”
I rose up from my seat, tucked it in behind me, and then followed Crystyn into her living room area. True to her word, a fire blazed inside the fireplace, and the smell of embers and smoke effectively drowned out the light Shadowscape odor that hung in the air.
I inhaled the scent as if it were a luxurious perfume.
“Sit.” Crystyn gestured at an empty chair, gracefully sat down in the seat across from it, and then crossed her legs elegantly once she was situated.
I tried to mimic her fluid movement, but soon abandoned any idea of trying to be graceful. It was just a chair, and I was past the point of needing to impress the Guardian.
“Are you warm enough?” she asked me. “I can fetch a blanket if it’s too cold for you.”
“No, I’m fine.” I shook my head and rubbed the palms of my hands against my thighs. “Soooo…”
“So,” Crystyn echoed. “Shall we begin?”
My heart raced inside my chest. I was finally going to get the answers I’d so desperately sought over the past few years, and maybe even some knowledge I hadn’t even considered before.
Crystyn fidgeted in her chair, and I was surprised by the slightly nervous expression that painted her soft features. Then her hazel eyes studied the fire as she waited for me to get settled into my own chair.
I heard a knock behind me, and I turned around to see my teammates had gathered in the kitchen.
“Gryff, do you want us to stick around?” Varleth asked me. “If you’d like us to disappear, we won’t mind--”
“As I said last night, I’d prefer it if you guys could stay,” I admitted to him, and the banisher nodded.
“Then we’ll be right here for you.” The banisher inclined his head to the right, and once he did, the rest of my team filed into the room.
“Everyone go ahead and take a seat,” Crystyn advised the team. “Make yourselves comfortable. There’s no reason for you to stand there all stoically when there’s plenty of space.”
Each of my team members blushed as the Guardian called them out, and one by one, they all found seats around the room. Mur’s eyes studied Crystyn with fascination, and I had an inkling he was a bit enamored with the Guardian. Not that I could blame him, of course. Crystyn was definitely a badass.
“So, where to begin…” Crystyn mused, and she tucked a lock of wavy caramel hair behind her ear. “There’s a lot I want to mention, but at the same time, I don’t want to keep you for too much longer. I know there’s a bit of a time element involved here.”
“Sort of,” I laughed. “We need to get going as soon as we can, but we sort of need to know our destination first.”
“Where would you like me to begin?” the Guardian prompted me. “Perhaps that would be a better way to approach it.”
“Okay, so I guess above everything else, where is Carth’s castle located?” I asked. “When Sera teleported us here into the Shadowscape, she brought us to where she believed the castle to be, but she must have gotten mixed up or something.”
“It hasn’t moved,” Crystyn frowned, and her brown eyebrows knitted together. “It’s in the same location as it usually is.”
“We went there already.” I shook my head. “The palace was nowhere to be found. It’s almost like it vanished. Xanrith and Sera couldn’t even find it, and they knew its location pretty intimately.”
“That particular palace has existed longer than any other structure in the Shadowscape I know of,” Crystyn explained. “I can’t speak to its exact origins, but from what I know, its existence predates the split between the two realms. As such, its location has remained the same.”
“Then why couldn’t we find it?” I wondered, and I pinched the bridge of my nose between my thumb and index finger. This was all so confusing. “I don’t understand how it could just mysteriously vanish.”
“I’m not certain,” my aunt replied. “My only guess is Carth placed some kind of cloaking over it, some sort of enchantment that could hide its location from trespassers.”
Magic.
Of course.
“That has to be a pretty strong spell if it fooled even the Archons.” Varleth let out a low whistle.
“I suddenly feel a lot better for being so confused,” Orenn muttered.
“Definitely,” Braden agreed with raised eyebrows. “That’s kind of crazy.”
“Now that you’re aware of its existence, though, you might be able to find a way around it,” Crystyn proposed, and she tapped her finger against her lip. “I don’t know what type of magic it would take to clear the veil, but between you, your Archons, and your fellow mages, I don’t see any reason why you couldn’t break it.”
“We do enjoy a challenge,” I laughed. I didn’t have a single clue how we were going to break the spell, but I wasn’t lying. My team was made up of some of the most powerful mages I knew, and Crystyn was right. If there was some sort of cloaking, we’d find a way to lift it.
“You’ll figure it out,” my aunt agreed. “Just be cautious in your approach. If there’s a veil, it’s likely to be powerful, and I’d be wary about the ways it could harm you if you attack it.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” I said. “So, now that that’s settled, I guess the next thing we need to address is the, uh, obvious. Which would be everything you were so vague about in Dassian’s Keep. Why have you been following me?”
“The explanation, I’m afraid, is much longer,” Crystyn sighed.
My aunt bit her lower lip and fiddled with a silver ring around her finger. If she’d worn it before, this was the first time I’d noticed it. The band was simple and thin, which allowed the obsidian stone in the center to truly stand out. The gem was multi-faceted and glittered in the firelight, and she studied the ring for another moment before she cleared her throat.
“Gryff, from the moment you were born, everyone knew you were special,” Crystyn began, and there was a strange glint in her hazel eyes as she spoke. “For multiple reasons, of course, the first of which being that you were the son of two of our best Guardians. The second was you were the first child born to our group. Now, your parents weren’t the only couple within our ranks, there were also the Brenns and the Abernathys, but Relaude and Genevieve were the only ones among us who chose to have children.”
“None of the other Guardians had kids?” I frowned. “Why is that? Was it against the rules or something?”
My aunt shook her head. “For us, our duties to Mistral were of the utmost importance. There were no rules barring us from reproduction per se, but with the perils that loomed over us, it was ill-advised to procreate. There was too much to risk, whether it be birthing complications, battle complications, or the vulnerabilities that came with having a little one to take care of when there were constant threats to the civilians of Mistral. We would often be gone for long stretches of time, and every time we ran the risk of not returning home, so our superiors made sure we understood what was necessary to be a Guardian so we would make informed choices.”
“Wow,” I breathed. “That’s a pretty big sacrifice for you all to make.”
“It was,” Crystyn admitted. “I won’t lie and say it was an easy decision for everyone, but for the most part, we knew what we were getting ourselves into. Being a Guardian was the highest achievement a mage could attain, and it was a privilege to be chosen as one of the twelve. For most of us, giving up a family suited us fine, because within our team, we were a family all our own.”
The sentiment warmed my heart a little bit, and as I looked around at my teammates, I felt the same way about them. Sure, we may have been brought together for military purposes, but I’d come to love every single one of the mages as if they were my own flesh and blood.
“But my parents decided to do it anyways,” I clarified. “Not that I’m obviously ungrateful they had me, but if there was such a great risk and disapproval involved with having children, what made them decide to become parents? Why would they go against the group?”
“From what I understand, you’ve recently become a father yourself, have you not?” Crystyn asked me with a raised eyebrow, and while I wasn’t surprised my aunt knew about my children, it was odd to hear her mention it herself. “You may not be a Guardian, but you’re currently in the Shadowscape, preparing to take on three powerful goddesses. Surely, you know your choices and duties are risky, and yet you decided you wanted to have offspring of your own.”
“I guess you’re right,” I agreed with a light laugh. “I knew things were going to be difficult, but the moment I found out I was going to be a father, everything changed. I didn’t want to give that chance up.”
“Neither did your mother and father.” Crystyn smiled at me. “Relaude and Genevieve had bonded with one another early on, and even before we became Guardians, they always knew they wanted to have a child. Getting appointed to their positions didn’t stop them. They loved each other more than anything and desperately wanted to create a family. Though motherhood wasn’t what I wanted for myself, I was supportive of my twin and his wife, and I was genuinely looking forward to being your aunt. ”
