AO 7 Ch 23

Chapter 23

"I still don't know what you're complaining about, Emlyn," I said four days later as we got to the other side of the bog. I rode calmly on Cyam's back. For the last several days, he had simply insisted that I don't get myself too messy. 

"Why are you on Cyam, yet we couldn't fly over or anything?" Emlyn grumbled. 

"You know the answer to that just as well as I do," I wagged a finger at her. "We've had two assassination attempts on Eva, and Zenovia is full of powerful mages, not to mention lovely Vel'shae like Lord Valken himself. He said the bog is regularly monitored for powerful magic."

"And Cyam doesn't count?" Emlyn waved a hand towards the horse built entirely by magic.

"Cyam, by himself, doesn't use a whole lot of magic. It's really only if we fly or attach a big cart to him that he becomes a massive beacon of magic in the night," I explained with a smile on my face. 

Emlyn squinted at me like she wanted to toss me into the muck and likely ride Cyam instead. 

"There, there," Ditzy waved a finger, and water and dirt fell off Emlyn.

Emlyn’s frown turned into a smile as she danced around a little before moving over towards Ditzy. "You know, Ditzy, it's a pleasure to have you around. When all this is done, do you think you'll stick around?" 

Ditzy laughed, then turned a heated gaze towards me. "I don't know. We'll have to see." 

Emlyn pointed at me. "Don't mess this up, idiot." Apparently she was too happy to have someone able to magically clean us. Then again, it was very pleasant for travel, but we wouldn’t be traveling this much in the future.

I held my hands up in surrender. "What am I even messing up, Emlyn?"

There was a resounding set of sighs and scoffs from the women around me.

I ignored them, happy to be riding on my best boy through the muck around us. If they wanted to see Ditzy’s harmless flirting as something else, that was their choice. Until she showed interest, that was all it was to me and I refused to think anything else that would make life more complicated. I had enough I was dealing with on a daily basis.

"If you guys are done complaining about the same thing you have been for the last two days…" I began. “Let's go ahead and find the closest village.”

“Perhaps then we can get an actual cart on the way to the palace.” Emlyn added. “By the way, how is your magic?" she asked, glancing towards me and the goddesses. 

"Fine," Ditzy wobbled her hand in the air. 

"So that means that it is still not working?" Eva asked. 

"We've gotten a little used to whatever suppression Freya has put in place, and we can use our magic. It's just going to be very slow," Missy explained. 

Emlyn glanced in my direction. "Ard's the only one whose godly magic seems to have returned to a normal level." 

I flashed her and the others a big smile. "Apparently chaos is everywhere, or at least, here enough that whatever she's done doesn't bother me. It's still interesting that Missy is borrowing her magic back from me, yet that doesn't seem to help her much." 

Missy shrugged. "We can figure out the intricate details to it later. Right now I just want to be able to defend myself.”

“This is really why you should do more than play with magic," Ditzy smirked. 

Somewhere along the way, she had demanded I make her a sword, and of course, I did. I couldn't deny her the way she had pleaded with big soulful eyes. But now Ditzy had a sword belted to her hip that she drew and slashed through the air to prove a point. 

"Yes, yes," I said to her demonstration. "You're a fearsome goddess of war." 

"Damn right," she beamed. "And I will not let anyone forget it." 

"Oh, trust me, you're anything but forgettable, Ditzy," I winked, smiling bigger as she winked back. I was having a great influence on the goddesses.

"Seriously, Ard, I need you for at least a short while to do more than flirt," Emlyn said.

"Hey now, that wasn't just a flirt. I'm also encouraging a key member of our party to keep her spirits up," I reasoned. “Zuri is always telling us how moral wins battles.”

"Village, this way," Eva's tone was clipped. She began ushering our group further away from the bog, a strategic territory that both Avente and Zenovia guarded on their sides. It was probably for the best.

Now that we were out of the muck, Cyam sank back into my shadow.

"So, friends, family, where are we going first?" I took a few quick steps to fall into stride with Eva.

"My family is all in the capital. It's beautiful. You'll love it when you see it." Eva’s expression was complex. She smiled, but her eyes still held a sadness in them likely from all the assassination attempts and what she knew wasn’t going to be a happy family reunion.

"Well, if it makes you smile, then I'm certain it must be incredible, just like you." I emphasized wink.

She gave me a look out of the corner of her eye. “Really?”

"What? If I only flirted with Ditzy, it would be a waste. She clearly lives to flirt, and while it is fun, I don't always enjoy being outclassed in that regard." I told Eva.

Eva smirked. "Oh, Ard, even Ditzy knows that you have everyone beat when it comes to wagging your tongue. Why do you think she flirts back so hard? To the rest of us, it looks like you two are in a competition."

"Oh," I said, taken aback before buffing my nails on my shirt. “Well, I’m glad she understands who’s really the god of tongue wagging.”

“You do realize that we can all hear you," Ditzy said with crossed arms behind me, a little upset.

"You know, it's just across the bog, but it's a lot more humid here." I quickly changed the subject, everyone loved to talk about the weather.

Eva looked at me like I was an idiot. "We're by the bog, Ard. Of course it's humid."

"No, but I mean a lot more humid." I told her, pleading with my eyes for her to keep this going.

"Yes, because..." she hesitated. "Are you screwing with me?"

"No," I said slowly as she wasn’t catching onto the change in subject very well.

"You do realize bogs are filled with water, and it's humid because that water is also in the air." She offered.

"Yeah, of course, that makes sense," I said as she squinted at me suspiciously. "What?" I asked, only for Maribelle to answer.

"You have some rather odd gaps in your knowledge and understanding, Sir." Maribelle told me.

"Oh, so because I don't know which fork I'm supposed to eat the salad with means I don't understand how the weather works? Jeez, guys, I lived in a farming community. Of course I know how weather works. Every now and then, you have to do the special dance and throw the offerings in the fire, and you get rain." I stated with a sad shake of my head.

"He's joking," Emlyn ruined it.

"I should hope so," Eva chuckled. "But it doesn't make it any less amusing to watch him make a fool of himself."

"Yeah, that is fun, isn't it?" Emlyn smiled.

"Har har. If we're done playing 'Let's Make Fun of Ard the Bumpkin', can we move on with how exactly we're going to enter the royal palace, you know, with people trying to kill Eva?" I added.

"They wouldn't dare make a move on me if we can get to any of the big cities and make myself known," Eva said. “I may not be the royal heir, but as a princess, no one gets to cause me too much trouble without significant repercussions.” She hooked her thumb at Uncle Valken. "And he's traveling with me. We'll get all the respect we could ever need.”

“I like the sound of that," I said. "Really people need to learn to respect me more. But now that we're successfully in the country, when can I use magic and just zip us there?" The question was directed more at Uncle Valken, who answered quickly.

"Once we are about two days inside, you are free to do so. They're more likely to assume you're a Vel'shae or a mage of Zenovia moving about that far inside. Though do be prepared for people to swoop down once we enter the city," he said. “It would be best to prevent any ‘misunderstandings’ where they could take Eva from you before she can announce herself.”

I shot a pair of finger guns at him and Eva. "But with you two, once we're in the city, we get all the respect we need, right? Which means, there won't be a problem," I shrugged, letting an easy smile cross my face even though I was admittedly a little nervous for what would happen. I would prefer if people were not constantly trying to kill Eva.

"There shouldn't be," Eva said. But she glanced at her guardian. "I don't know exactly what might be happening if my royal siblings are fighting heavily for the throne."

"Ah, right. Because, you know, they might just want to," rather than say the words, I drew my thumb over my neck. 

"Yes, Ard, they will want to kill me. That was fairly obvious, given the assassins." Eva rolled her eyes.

"Well, yeah," I said, frowning. "But miming it rather than saying it added a little je ne sais quoi that I thought we could really use in the moment."

My opinion didn't seem to be mirrored in the rest of the group who just stared at me like I'm an idiot, which was to say, like normal. I accepted the fact that the perception between genius and idiocy was paper thin, and, frankly, too profound for most people to know which side I rested on. Which was to say, of course, the side of genius. 

The banter was mostly to kill time as we spent the next several hours moving through fields of tall reeds. I poked at some of them, unfamiliar with the plant that was so clearly being cultivated in even rows.

"Edible grass," Eva said. "Cheap, decently nutritious food. But they're terribly bitter." Eva made a face. "No matter how much they keep trying to dress it up as a flavor of Zenovia, it's still quite harsh."

"Not as bad as it used to be," Lord Valken said. "When I was younger, they were more bitter. It was only when I became involved with several parts of the Royal Commissioner did I learn that we are actively cultivating them to be less bitter. It's actually one of the defining traits we look for as long as we can maintain the nutrition."

"How do you," I waved my hand, "you know, know that you're maintaining nutrition?" 

Lord Valken smiled. "You raise rats purely on Gadava reed. And the longer they can survive on the reed only without healing, the more nutrition must be inside."

I squinted at that method. "So there's some place in the kingdom where there's just a bunch of rats eating reeds?"

"Yes, it's called research. Everything that the kingdom has to offer, everything that the kingdom has become, is largely due to the endless pursuit of knowledge. It is what made your ancestors the rulers of the entire continent once upon a time. Though, that time is long gone, it is good to remember how they managed to remain so far ahead of other cultures, like the Northmen." He said with regal poise.

"So you're saying the difference between living like a Northman and living like someone in Avente or Zenovia is entirely due to the research?" I squinted my eyes. That seemed a little too far-fetched, even for him.

"Well, if you don't believe me, then I'll have to take you to the laboratories of the royal palace." He offered.

I scowl at him. "No, you're going to trick me and study me, or worse, you're going to make me read."

"Yes, Ard, that's the normal order of concern," Emlyn ran a hand over her face.

"Don't look at me like that. Reading is horrifying. It's not something we should take lightly. I can't believe we make children do it." I said, raising hell.

But thankfully, my banter came to an end as we reached the village. Several of those around began to take interest in our conversation.

“Oh lovely, I bet we are going to have bitter reed.” I said softly to the group.

“Please don’t call it that.” Eva grumbled.

“Vel’shae!” Someone shouted and suddenly everyone within earshot was rushing from the fields to get a look at Uncle Valken.

Uncle Valken suddenly puffed up his chest and walked proudly in front with his hood down.

The villagers were going absolutely wild as they cheered, cried and clapped for him.

“Wow. Okay, I’ve changed my mind. I want to be a Vel’shae, this is the kind of greeting I was supposed to get when I came back from the war.” I said.

“Don’t be jealous.” Emlyn poked me in the side. “He did lots of work too. Also he’s ancient. I bet he’s done more for Zenovia than you could do in the next few decades.”

I crossed my arms and watched with interest as the workers moved between the reeds and quickly began handing off their harvest or whatever valuables they had on them to Uncle Valken.

Of course, he was politely refusing and handing everything back along with touching them and providing a small trickle of life magic.

Cyam took this as a challenge and reared up out of my shadow, picking me up onto his back with it. He had good intentions, but it was a little mistimed to look like jealousy.

“Down Cyam.” I said and he melted into my shadow, depositing me back on my feet.

The notice of my shadow horse had drawn plenty of attention towards me. Not all of it great.

There was a way to fix that.

“Healing, for all.” I said having far more life magic to spare. I walked into the villagers and shook their muddy hands with a smile on my face as I pumped them full of enough life magic, not only to ease aches and pains for a moment, but to repair strained muscles and injuries that had been bothering them in the field for years.

Their faces went from confused to grateful moments after I stepped onto the next person.

Eva trailed behind me. “You don’t have to do this, they aren’t your people.”

“So what if they aren’t mine? They are people and that’s what matters most.” I huffed and moved onto the next person.

Zenovian’s were a blush darker skinned and these farmers heavily tanned on top of that, but it didn’t matter. I felt a connection with a farming village more than I did some arbitrary line that someone drew across a bog to divide two wealthy families’ territory.

I understood farmers.

Simon, the drunk that he was, was tolerated so much because everyone knew that for him to still be farming at his age it was tough as nails. Not to mention, he’d done it successfully for so long and fed so many.

People respected what he’d gone through, but could still glare at him for being a drunk. Some chastised him in hopes that he would stop. But some looked at him with concern, wondering if they would become similar over time.

“Thank you sir mage.” One of the farmers grabbed my hand firmly.

“No, thank you. Without the strain you’ve put on your back and knees, I wouldn’t have food in the cities.” I said with a smile of my own and I meant it.

Going back through my village and seeing the Zenovian side had reminded me of where I came from and who really kept the kingdom running.

“Please come join us for dinner tonight?” A woman that hovered near the first invited our group.

“Well, with an offer like that, how could I not?” I smiled at them and the other farmers who, between my healing and the presence of Uncle Valken, were clearly about to put together one heck of a village party.