The Wilds of Ilsylvania. Day -23.
Aliyah looked over her map while Rhoda kept her hands on the horses’ reins. Her two daughters, Alyx and Lynn, ranged around the carriage on their horses while Aliyah’s own helped draw the carriage with Rhoda’s three.
Alyx and Lynn had a habit of testing the boundaries Aliyah and Tyree pressed upon them and, within reason, they were allowed to. It was important for them to explore and understand the world around them, and yes, even experience the consequences of that exploration. And so, as they strayed further beyond the sight of the carriage, Aliyah listened with her keen hearing.
Through listening to her children, Aliyah realized something was off. The roads were emptier than she expected and the forest unusually quiet, save for the soft plotting of the horses on the cobblestone trail.
We should have seen at least a half dozen guardians by now. The warriors and spell-slingers who made up their kind often patrolled the lands outside Castera in numbers that made them hard to ignore.
Like the combined might of Diurne and Nocturne’s high and low tides, the guardians’ numbers could swell and shrink at the slightest whim. A shrinking of their number typically meant the discovery of a new magic dungeon somewhere on the continent. They would congregate near it and adventurers would also be drawn to them for a chance to claim whatever new loot awaited inside.
Aliyah would be kidding herself if she believed that to be the case now. What had happened last night with Diurne and this apparent absence of Guardians was too much of a coincidence to be unrelated.
Storing her map, Aliyah turned to Rhoda. “Would you mind scouting ahead?”
Rhoda glanced about the carriage and nodded. “Sure, take the reins.”
If there was one thing Aliyah liked about Rhoda, it was their shared kinship as Serethi. Rhoda was Aliyah’s junior by twenty-four years, but she had still been raised by parents who were old enough to remember a time before the Guardians.
That was a time when adventuring was more akin to monster hunting than exploration and dungeon diving. The Guardians had been around for over two decades when Aliyah was born, but her parents had instilled within her the need to pay attention for monsters and to be ready to defend her tiny village at a moment’s notice from swarms of goblins or other monsters that called the wildlands between the Serethi City-states and human cities their home.
Rhoda had had that same instruction drilled into her. And so, when asked to scout ahead on what should have been a safe road, she did so without question.
Like Aliyah and Tyree, Rhoda was a Master mage. She excelled in the craft of stealth and elegantly weaved the ambient mana around her into a shroud of concealment that barely gave the slightest hint of distortion as she leapt from the carriage.
Gone only a short while, two screams quickly followed by yells and laughter from three voices preceded Rhoda’s return to Aliyah’s side. Alyx and Lynn likewise appeared back alongside the carriage.
Aliyah glanced at Rhoda, but the rogue only shrugged. “I figured you wanted me to reign them in.”
Aliyah shook her head and laughed. “Not quite what I meant. Did you notice how quiet things are?”
“I did,” Rhoda answered. “That’s why I pulled your daughter’s back. I didn’t see any guardians ahead of us. Just the other day, there were dozens along this route. Right down eerie, if you ask me.”
“I think we should take the old adventurers’ route north. Just to be safe.”
The adventurers’ route ran roughly parallel to the main routes between Castera and her surrounding villages, but deviated to capture known safe houses and other areas to avoid night spawns and rest while travelling. They were kept up much more regularly than the kingdom’s outposts, which as far as Aliyah knew, hadn’t been cared for in nearly a century.
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Rhoda glanced at Aliyah. “Do you think that’s necessary?”
“No, but I would rather be safe and wrong than staring down a goblin swarm at night. Stop here, I want to leave a note to let Tyree know we’ve changed course.”
When the carriage came to a stop, Aliyah hopped down and knelt. The old adventurers’ path was hardly even noticeable compared to the well maintained cobbles. The only indication that there even was a fork here was the way the tree branches didn’t spread out below the height of a standard carriage. Aliyah weaved her hands in the pattern of a spell and a single orange carnation bloomed from the ground. The flower had been a symbol of their old adventuring party and was also Tyree’s favorite. When she and Felt came up this way, she would know what it meant.
“Why’d we stop, mom?” Lynn asked.
“We’re taking a different way north,” Aliyah answered. “Come. Do you remember that spell Tyree and I taught you?”
“An adventure?” Alyx asked with sudden interest. She had definitely noticed the fork in the road.
“Something like that,” Aliyah confirmed. “Come on, then, add your flowers to mine.”
The twin girls did so, a yellow carnation for Lynn and a red one for Alyx.
Rhoda looked over from her seat on the carriage. “I’m surprised you even remember that old spell.”
“It still has its uses. I know you remember it. Come on and add your own!” Aliyah said.
Rhoda jumped down and began imitating Aliyah’s spell gestures, albeit roughly. But a dark blue, almost indigo carnation sprung up beside the other three.
Rhoda cocked her head slightly. “Not quite the color I was going for.”
“You still did good.” Aliyah patted Rhoda on the back. “Alright, let’s go.”
In addition to better maintenance, the adventurers’ safehouses had far better accommodations for the variety of types of people that used them. The nearest one to Aliyah’s group had been carved out of a cliff face by an earth mage two or three centuries ago. In that time, it had been expanded several times and even had rudimentary facilities for horses to be kept safe and away from any prowling night spawns. Someone adept with earth or water magic was required to keep those areas clean, but it was better than nothing. Upon inspection, Aliyah was pleased to see those in her former profession still kept up the courtesy of keeping the area clean.
The ground was hard earth, but that mattered little thanks to the bag of holding Aliyah always kept with her. She pulled out three bedrolls and the tools to set up an equal number of hammocks, the bed choice of adventurers the continent over.
Alyx and Lynn put the horses into the stalls and fed them while Rhoda prepared the fire and meals.
Aliyah watched Rhoda struggle with her worn out flint to start the fire before walking over to the rogue.
“Rhoda, you know I could just…” Aliyah wagged her fingers, making a small flame dance above her hand.
The tinder Rhoda used suddenly ignited into a small fire that popped and cracked. Rhoda glanced up with a smile of satisfaction. “And what if you weren’t here, oh mighty sorceress?” She drew her words out in a strong drawl that would have made an Orleanan dock worker blush.
“You’d probably be cold tonight,” Aliyah said, pressing her mana upon the fire, causing it to burn brighter and hotter before she released her control over it.
Dinner came and went and Aliyah had taken the first watch by the cave's entrance. She moved the earth and stone into a series of overlapping walls too tight to allow anything to pass through, but still large enough to allow for the draw of fresh air.
Aliyah sat quietly on a blanket, meditating and listening. With her ears, she listened to the slow rhythm of Alyx and Lynn’s sleeping breaths. With her mana, she listened through the earth. She wasn't as sharp with the skill as a dedicated earth mage, but it was enough to let her know if anyone, or anything, was nearby.
Rhoda was beside her, meditating as well, but she was using a more restorative variant than the technique Aliyah was using. It involved a great control of mana to allow a portion of one’s brain to sleep at a time, cycling between which part was awake and which was asleep in a slow and steady manner to allow each part to get as much rest without also jarring oneself awake in the process.
It was a uniquely Serethi skill. Some humans could learn it, Tyree was one, but they never seemed to get the full benefits she or Rhoda could get. Namely, that perfect balance between being able to stay partially awake while still coming out of the meditation well rested.
As Aliyah continued to listen, she heard it. The faint footsteps of goblins. Lots of goblins. They weren’t close, but Aliyah was glad they had detoured.
As their footsteps passed, Aliyah relaxed a bit, allowing the tension in her muscles to ease. She resumed her silent vigil, hoping she was worrying for nothing.
