Mimic Arcanist [Chapter 10]

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Shami

CHAPTER TEN

GATE FRAGMENTS

“We need to take this gate fragment to Professor Helmith,” I said.

Ashlyn glanced at the small silver object and then back to me. “You want someone to touch that thing? That’s a terrible idea. What if it teleports us to the abyssal hells?”

“We can’t leave it here. What if some random person touches it? They have no idea how dangerous it is.”

Ecrib snorted and then shook his head. “The professors—or some other master arcanists—can handle this. We don’t need to do anything.”

Twain, who hadn’t moved since I set him down in the swamp waters, glanced up at Ecrib with a smile. In a tone bordering on a condescending purr, he said, “Aww! Is the big, powerful dragon scared of the little silver piece?”

“Quiet, kitten.” The typhoon dragon flashed his fangs and growled at Twain, but he didn’t move any closer. That would’ve put him near the gate fragment.

Arguing was pointless. Either we were going to risk the danger and pick up the fragment, or we were going to be cowards and wait until someone else handled the problem. Both were viable choices, but for some reason—it was irrational, but still—I felt responsible for the gate fragment’s presence.

It wouldn’t have been out here if it weren’t for me.

Well, technically it was Professor Zahn’s fault. He was the one who built the gate to get into the abyssal hells… But still. I was the one who exploded it.

I grabbed the hem of my robe and ripped off a small line of fabric. The others watched me in silence as I created a tiny hammock and then used it to cradle the silver sliver of the gate. Without ever touching the fragment myself, I wrapped it in the cloth and then lifted it from the water. With quick movements, I tied the cloth in a knot and held the very top with just my pointer finger and thumb.

Although I couldn’t see it, I feltthe gate piece as though it were a burning piece of coal radiating heat. Something about this object disturbed me. Probably the abyssal hells part, but I couldn’t be any more specific than that.

“Okay, nothing happened,” I said with a smile. “Step one of my master plan worked. Let’s go take this to Professor Helmith.”

“We should probably take it to Captain Leon.” Ashlyn eyed the cloth. “And you’re sure that’ll be okay? You’re not going to drop it?”

I glanced at the blood on my shoulder. The injury still stung. “I think I’ll be fine.” Then I shrugged, and pain shot through my arm. After I grimaced, I returned my attention to Ashlyn. “I trust Professor Helmith. And she knows lots about magic. I’d rather give it to her.”

Ashlyn didn’t offer any more protests. We walked away from the swamp around the tree as a group. Twain didn’t trudge from the water, though. As soon as Ecrib turned around, my mimic jumped onto the typhoon dragon’s tail. Ecrib growled, but Twain just clung to the scaled tail, his claws practically digging into the dragon’s flesh.

“I hate the water,” he said with a mew.

Ecrib snorted. Without another word, he stomped forward, carrying Twain until we were out of the swampy mess. Then he shook his funned tail and flung Twain onto a nearby patch of grass. “I’m not your horse,” Ecrib muttered.

With all the grace of a baby rabbit, Twain hopped to his feet. He walked off as though he owned his whole forest, his nose in the air, his ears rested back against his head.

I walked after him, trying to keep my focus on the gate fragment. The cloth wasn’t teleporting away… That was a good sign.

“Gray.”

I stopped and turned. Ashlyn stood close. She reached into a poach on her belt and withdrew white bandages. Then she motioned for me to turn. I did as she silently instructed, wondering if she knew anything about medicine.

“I packed extra,” she said as she tugged at the collar of my shirt and robes. With some effort, Ashlyn managed to expose most of my injury. “Lift this arm.”

“Good thing you came prepared,” I said. I kept the fragment held in my other hand as I lifted my arm.

“Ha, ha.” Ashlyn rolled her eyes. “Your sarcasm gets old sometimes.”

“I wasn’t being sarcastic. I’m really glad you packed extra. Thank you.”

Ashlyn wrapped her bandages around my shoulder, but she kept her eyes narrowed in suspicion. When she tightened the bindings, I flinched. She frowned and loosened everything. “You’re welcome.”

As Ashlyn delicately finished the wrapping, I wondered if I should tell her she was beautiful. She was, obviously. Even after fighting a monster—with mud splashed on her white pants, and her blonde hair tangled in her ponytail—she still had this youthful confidence and athletic poise. But was now the right time? Would she think I was being sarcastic again?

Ashlyn stepped away from me. “Done. You can put your arm down.”

I did so.

And the moment to compliment her was gone. I turned away, cursing myself for not just going for it.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

I rotated my shoulder. “Yeah. Why?”

“Your face is red.”

I huffed and hurried to catch up with Twain and Ecrib. “It’s just hot out here, and I’m tired. We should get back to Professor Helmith. C’mon.”

Ashlyn easily kept my pace as we hurried back to our camp spot.

***

The field for our campsite had been completely transformed.

Five tents had been erected while we were gone, all positioned in a circle around a large firepit. Sticks, Leon’s faithful cerberus, gathered wood for the fire like it were a game. The giant three-headed dog bounded from the campsite, into the woods, and then returned with two logs and a mouthful of twigs.

Sticks then dropped everything off next to the stone firepit, wagged his tail, counted all the log in the pile, and then bounded away again. It was as if the dog lived for this task.

Leon knelt next to the fire pit, slowly arranging the stones in a perfect circle. He even went out of his way to make a spit for roasting meat and vegetables. Everything was in its place. Everything had a place. The man was so focused on his work, he didn’t even notice me or Ashlyn as we exited the trees.

The tents kept my attention as I walked toward the firepit.

Two of the tents were black, two of the tents were dark brown, and one tent had a white tarp over the top. They were grouped together according to color, and each one was large enough to comfortably fit eight people. A pole kept the middle of the tent propped up, and I wondered who had gone through the effort of hammering each pole into the ground.

Ecrib stomped into camp, but slowed his pace when he spotted Sticks bounding away into the trees. Twain walked over and watched the cerberus as well, his ears straight up.

Before I could call out for Professor Helmith, she emerged from the tent with the white tarp. She smiled when she spotted me, her lavender eyes bright with the afternoon sunlight. But then her expression hardened.

“Gray?” she asked. “What’s wrong?”

I hurried over to her, still holding the cloth with the fragment in two fingers. “Professor Helmith—something terrible has happened. We were out gathering the ore and I found this. It’s a piece from one of the Gates of Crossing. The one Zahn created.” With a quick thrust, I handed over the fragment.

Professor Helmith took the cloth in her palm and undid my knot. The silver fragment glittered in the light, but the cloth around it was wet with fresh ocean water. Somehow, the little fragment was moving things from the abyssal hells to this location.

But how?

“I see,” Helmith whispered.

I nodded once. “There was a corpse out in the woods. Ashlyn and I fought it and then it just disappeared.” I spoke so quickly, I practically tripped over my words in my haste to speak. “It was trying to get me. Specifically. It lunged, and we fought it, and it cut my shoulder. Right here. Ashlyn bandaged it because it wouldn’t stop bleeding, and—”

“Everything will be okay,” Professor Helmith said, cutting me off. She wrapped the fragment back in the cloth and smiled. “You’re safe now. Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I’ll take it to the headmaster straight away, and we’ll get this all sorted.”

“Really?” I stood a little taller. “You’re not… worried?”

“I can be worried and still think everything will turn out all right.” Helmith smiled a little wider. With a gentle motion, she brushed some of her silky black hair behind her ear. “Please don’t fret. You’ve been through a lot, and the last thing you should do is dwell on this.”

“The gate fragment is dangerous, though.”

“The arcanists of Astra Academy will handle it. All you need to do is focus on your magic and studies. We’re here to learn, remember?”

Professor Helmith closed her hand around the cloth and then tucked her hand into the pocket of her feathery white dress. I wished she wouldn’t hold it so tightly. What if something happened to her? She had said not to fret, but her disregard for the danger was causing me more panic than before.

“There’s no need to cause a panic,” she said.

I shook my head. “I won’t.”

But what if Death Lord from the abyssal hells showed up here? Who was going to handle that? But I didn’t voice any of those concerns. No Death Lords would be showing up here.

Definitely not.

Definitely.

“Did you find any occult ore?” Helmith asked, drawing me out of my dark thoughts.

“Yeah,” I said.

Ashlyn nodded once. “We found some before the corpse attacked.”

“Were you the two to use the fire?”

With a grimace, I nodded. “Uh. Yes. Sorry about that.”

Helmith shook her head—somehow gracefully, like her hair was flutter of black butterflies. “This is an opportunity to learn, actually. But first we need to wait for the others. Give your ore to Leon, and then have a seat by the firepit. I’ll take this fragment to the Academy straight away, and when I return, we’ll learn all about cultivating the land.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but I was excited enough that some of my anxiety bled away. If Professor Helmith was confident the gate fragment wasn’t a problem, it probably wasn’t.

I hoped.

Ashlyn and I bowed our heads once before turning away from Helmith. As we walked over to the firepit, I took the three ore I had gathered out of my pocket and slipped it into Ashlyn’s belt pack as slyly as I could managed.

She didn’t seem to notice. Her eyes remained focused on the ground in front of her. The intensity of her stare practically drilled a hole in the dirt. What was she thinking about?

When we arrived at the firepit, Captain Leon stood straight. He wiped sweat from his tanned skin, and then combed his white hair back with his fingers.

“Are you two okay?” His eyes went to the blood on my shoulder. Before I could respond, he leapt over the stone firepit and stood in front of me. “What happened? How were you injured?”

“Ashlyn and I ran into some difficulties, but we told Professor Helmith all about it, and she said she would handle everything.” I shrugged, the pain less than before. “I’m an arcanist, remember? I’ll heal up. Nothing is wrong here.”

My calm act must’ve been enough, because Leon stroked his beard as he took a step backward. He examined me for only half a second before sighing. “Very well. And the occult ore?”

Ashlyn reached into her pouch and withdrew four ore, her eyes wide. She shot me a quick glance.

“Very good!” Leon took the four ore. “And you found this so quickly. No one else has even returned yet.” He chuckled as he pocketed the magical material. “Ashlyn, my star student, you are the one that everyone will look to when they’re measuring themselves.”

She said nothing.

When Captain Leon turned to me, I just shrugged again. “Sorry. I didn’t find any.”

“Really? That’s… strange.” Leon glared. “I’ll let it slide, since you obviously found yourself in a bit of a scuffle, but in the future, you should take these tasks seriously, young man. Life will always be filled with unexpected hardship, and you can’t allow that to stop you from achieving your goals.”

“I understand.”

When I said nothing else, Leon just frowned. He turned on his heel and returned to his work with the firepit. With each piece he placed, he glanced back at me, as though he wanted to say more—or berate me for not taking his wise words more seriously.

Four tree trunks had been placed around the pit. I took a seat on the closet one, and Ashlyn sat next to me. Our eldrin stood near the far trees, watching Sticks but never helping.

“Why did you give me your ore?” Ashlyn whispered. She kept her gaze on her typhoon dragon, away from me.

In an equally quiet voice, I said, “You bandaged me up. I thought it was only fair.”

“I didn’t need your help.”

“Finding the most ore was a competition slapped onto a lesson to motivate us to try harder,” I muttered. “We both know you don’t need any help in the motivation category. I just wanted to be nice.”

Ashlyn didn’t reply to that.

She didn’t even look at me.

Was she mad? Because I gave her ore? Why? It didn’t make any sense. I thought she would’ve been happy. But perhaps I didn’t know women that well. This reaction was far outside of my predictable range.

The branches of nearby trees rustled.

I stood from the tree trunk, hoping to catch sight of my brother. Professor Helmith had said not to cause a panic, but I had to tell him what was happening. I never kept anything from Sorin, after all. And I could trust him to keep it secret.