Millennial Mage

Tala was being a bit decadent, but she found that she didn’t much care.

Her tea set was out and brewing a smooth chamomile.

A honey panna cotta ready and waiting for her and her companion. They’d brought it with them from the restaurant. The sweet and creamy notes would be a perfect counterpoint to the tea.

Tala and Rane sat on a public observation deck that was connected to the inn Rane was staying in, but they’d claimed the outdoor space for themselves.

To be fair, no one else seemed much interested in this specific overlook. It might have to do with Terry sleeping just in front of the door, about as large as a truly terrifying dog, but Tala wasn’t sure.

Could be almost anything really.

They were at a two-person table, one of three, and sat closer together than usual so they could both watch the sun as it continued to slip below the horizon.

They looked out to the southwest, towards the winter sunset, looking over the forest, over the plains beyond, and to mountains beyond even that. There was the hint of reflections or lights in the plain near the mountain, but they were only barely visible to Tala’s enhanced sight with the direct glare of the sun before them.

“The world is so much larger than humanity's little corner.” Tala didn’t speak loudly, her voice barely above a whisper.

Rane responded in kind. “True words, Mistress.”

They continued in silence for a long moment before Rane spoke again.

“One day, I’d love to see an arcane city. See our enemy and decide for myself how I feel about them.”

She smiled, patting his shoulder. “You’re surprisingly contemplative for a rage monster.”

Rane gave her a side-eyed glare. “You know, I don’t really like that about myself.”

“But it is who you are.”

He snorted. “We are what we choose to be.”

She felt some of her contentment bleed away. “I never chose to be a Mage.”

Rane glanced her way again. “I call rusting slag on that.”

She frowned. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me. That’s a lie.”

Tala felt rage bubbling up within her chest. “My parents-”

He cut across her. “No. Mistress Tala. You are not a Mage because of your parents.” He turned his full gaze on her.

She had been in process of summoning up words to lash out at him, but they died in her throat, when she saw the intensity in his eyes.

“I’ve been trying to find a way of saying this to you for weeks, and now is as good a time as any.” He took a deep breath then continued in a rush, clearly desperate to get it out. “You’re an idiot, but you can’t see it. You’re fantastic but keep treating that like something that needs to be blamed on others.”

“I’m a fantastic idiot?” A smile lifted one side of her mouth.

Rane nodded enthusiastically, seeming glad that she was understanding him. “Yes!” Then, his mind seemed to actually catch what she’d said. “No! No.” He shook his head. “That came out all backwards. You’re a fantastic Mage, and you’re being an idiot.”

She lifted one eyebrow. “Explain.”

He swallowed, but he must have decided that he was committed now, so he plunged ahead. “Your parents dumped their debt on you, true and unfair, but you went to the Academy, and you chose your inscriptions. You chose to work at the classes, to learn, to excel, and to earn your certifications. The only reason you are a Mage is because you chose to be.” He huffed, looking back out towards the spectacular view. “Your family gave you a shove, but you turned the unexpected stumble into a sprint at greatness.”

Tala found herself glowering at the teapot.

“I told you that I’ve been trying to find a way of telling you this for weeks. I’ve had a long time to consider.”

“That doesn’t mean you’re right.”

He huffed a grunt of irritation, turning away. “I chose the restaurant this afternoon, yes?”

“Yes.” She looked his way, curious where he was going with this, despite herself.

He didn’t look her way. “So, am I the reason we ate there?”

“Yes.”

“The only reason?”

She considered. No. Whenever he’s suggested a place, if I’m uninterested, we go elsewhere. “No.”

“So, did you choose to eat there?”

She wrinkled her nose in irritation. “Yes.”

“Even though I choose it for us?”

She grimaced. “Fine. I see your point.”

“This is important, Mistress.” He glanced her way. “What your family did isn’t unheard of, but it was distasteful, at least to me. I’m not trying to justify their choice, but you are not that choice. You are what you have done since that moment.” He smiled. “There are always things we cannot control. We are what we do with those few things we can.” His gaze returned to the landscape.

Tala hunkered in on herself, angry at how right he sounded. That’s pretty silly, Tala.

She took calming breaths.

I’m not mad at him. I’m mad at them. She straightened.

The tea is well steeped, now. Tala took the moment to pour the tea for them both, setting Rane’s cup in easy reach.

He glanced to her, tentatively. “Thank you.”

She shrugged, taking a bite of the dessert. “Oh…oh rust that’s good.”

Rane took a bite of his own panna cotta. “Wow! You’re not lying.” He sipped the tea. “This is a great addition. Thank you for suggesting and providing it.”

She smiled, enjoying a sip from her own cup.

The sounds of the city of Makinaven were evident behind and below them, especially to her enhanced ears. Even so, the sounds of the forest at night were beginning to rise from before her, the forest already having lost the sunlight.

Bird song and calls, the hoots of owls, and the barks, yaps, and roars of various predators echoed in the far distant forest. None really overlapping, and none too close to any other, but together they added a pleasant background to the repast.

Tala let out a long breath. “You aren’t wrong, you know.”

Some tension seemed to bleed from Rane as he took another bite of the cooked cream. “You are an amazing Mage, more dedicated to improvement than almost any I’ve seen. That is not your parents’ doing. You’ve made that choice.”

She sighed in releasing frustration. “I’ve heard you, Rane. Can we drop it for now?”

He stiffened, then nodded, turning back to his dessert.

After a moment to collect her thoughts, she placed her hand on his arm. “You know. There’s been something I’ve wanted to talk with you about, too.”

He huffed a laugh. “It seems the time for such things.” He glanced down at her hand, then to her face. “Is everything alright?”

She nodded.

“Then, might as well hear you out. What’s on your mind?”

Tala smiled sadly. “How are you doing with the deaths of the guards on the trip, here?”

His hand clenched in involuntary frustration, causing his forearm to tense and bunch, the strong, toned fibers obvious to her enhanced touch, even through his thin sleeve.

She patted his arm and withdrew her hand.

“I’m…not great. I know they made their choices, and I made mine. I know that in this line of work, even if I do my job perfectly, many people will die under my protection, and I have to come to terms with that. It is my job to make that number as small as I can. I won’t let each death be a tragedy, dragging me down. I can’t.” He smiled her way.

“No. I don’t think that’s true.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “Oh? Do tell.”

“Every death must be a tragedy, or we will become flippant.”

He snorted, but he turned away, her words clearly hurting him.

She smacked his arm, forcing his attention back to her. “Let me finish.” She waited a moment, giving him a fake glare until she was sure he wouldn’t interrupt or ignore her. “It must be a tragedy, but it can’t be our tragedy. We work to mitigate it, but that is all we can do, just like you said. We protect those we can and trust those in our care to make their own choices.”

After it was clear she wasn’t going to say anything else, Rane quirked a smile. “That sounds like parenting.”

Tala laughed. “Probably a bit, I suppose.”

“And, I’ll point out, it sounds almost exactly like what I said.”

“Subtle shifts can make a big difference in the long haul.”

“Truer words, Ta- Mistress.”

They both looked out once again, the last sliver of the sun dropping below the far-distant mountains. Dim lights had come on behind them, but they were subdued enough to not spoil the scenery.

At a great distance, probably two-thirds of the distance across the far plains to the mountains, the lights of a city became incredibly evident, now that the sun wasn’t backlighting them. So, they were lights, not just odd reflections of some water.

“That’s one of them.” Rane had leaned forward. “That’s an arcane city.” He looked her way, clearly waiting for her reaction.

“So it is.” She drank her tea and took another bite of panna cotta.

He glanced to her again, took another bite, and smiled. “Thank you.” His eyes flicked back towards the city. “Aren’t you more surprised? Curious?”

“Arcanes…they are just people, right?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, it’s not like there’s only a few dozen, who all enslaved ancient humans, and are now plotting our downfall.”

“True.” He gave her an odd look.

“I’ll bet that in that far city, two arcanes are looking this way, seeing our lights in this tree, and thinking ‘There’s the humans. They took that city from the Mezzannis before killing them all.’ ”

“That’s not true!”

“I mean, sure? I don’t actually know there are arcanes looking this way.”

He shook his head. “No, I mean we didn’t kill all the Mazzannis.”

“Ahh, but we aren’t told the whole truth, why should they be?”

Rane didn’t seem to have an answer for that. “So… you don’t think that most of them hate us?”

“Oh, I’ve no idea. They might all be horrible creatures of torture and spite, but like you said, we don’t actually know them.”

“I said that?”

“Implied it, I suppose. You said you wanted to judge them for yourself.”

“Ah, yeah.” He smiled. “It probably won’t actually happen, though.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, either I’m too weak, and I’d be in too much danger there, or if I wait long enough, I’ll be too strong, and they’ll never let me approach one of their cities uncontested.”

“That…that is a very good point.” She patted his shoulder. “We’ll figure something out.”

“We?”

“Yeah! You don’t think I’ll let you go somewhere that unique without me, do you?”

He smiled, turning back to the view and their treats. “No. I suppose not.”

All too soon, they were done, and Rane was leaning back. He let out a long sigh. “Well, we should probably get to the playhouse. I think the doors close in less than half an hour.”

Tala nodded, standing and placing her items into Kit. “Alright. Terry?”

Terry flickered to her shoulder, sized for the perch, not breaking his seeming sleep.

She scratched his head affectionately, then smiled to Rane. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Tala was in heaven.

She lay within Kit, wrapped in a truly ludicrously sized bearskin.

The tanner had gone above and beyond, maintaining the fur, cleaning it, and conditioning it with a lavender-mint scented oil that would keep the entire thing smelling amazing and in great condition. He’d even included a tin of the stuff for touch-ups as needed.

These hides must be really valuable, if one was worth this much work on the other. She didn’t much care, though. I’m never selling this.

She’d woken up nearly a quarter hour earlier, and it was probably her enhanced sense of touch talking, but she just couldn’t bring herself to leave the luxury of the fur.

Another few minutes won’t hurt anyone.

Even so, she did need to begin her day. She began by restarting her fusing for the day, pushing the process to the back of her mind.

Finally, she reluctantly got out of bed, stretched, and dressed.

She looked back at the bearskin. “I’ll be back. Don’t go anywhere.”

Okay, Tala, you’re being a bit weird…

That was true.

She shrugged, placing her hand on one of Kit’s walls and refilling the storage item with power. “Good morning, Kit.”

Kit did not respond.

Tala moved through her normal morning routine, finishing with her bath and coming back up into the training room for the last time just as the sky was lightening towards dawn.

“To charge the cargo-slots!”

Terry lifted his head, gazing her way.

She grinned and tossed a scattered handful of jerky pieces.

The avian’s eyes widened, and a series of dimensional blips heralded him snatching each one from the air flawlessly. He ended his precise flickering on her shoulder, where he head-butted her cheek.

“Good morning to you, too, Terry.” She looked around the training space one last time, noticing her bedroll in the corner where Terry had been sleeping. “Oh, right!” She gathered it up and pushed the whole thing into Kit, topping off the pouch’s power once again. “Sorry for not folding and rolling it first, Kit.”

The pouch did not respond.

“Alright, let’s go!”

She checked out from the training facility, passing over the key, and thanking the clerk at the front counter.

Terry carried her down the tree to the work-yard, where her cargo-slots were waiting.

She charged them with relative ease, though she did have a bit of difficulty before she got used to the process again. Nearly a month away from an activity really adds some cobwebs.

Even so, she was just finishing up when Mistress Odera arrived so that they could go to breakfast together.

* * *

After another filling breakfast, Tala found her way to the marketplace in search of a gift.

Master Jevin had been incredibly kind to her, and she wanted to find a way of saying thank you. Not that he’s likely to be surprised. He could be watching me right now. She shuddered. No, Tala, he promised he didn’t do that. Either trust him or don’t. This waffling is a bit ridiculous.

She was wandering through the various stalls when she saw one that caught her eye, attached to a large, brickwork building.

“Makinaven’s Marvelous Munchy Makers?” That seems promising.

As she approached, she noticed that the stall tables were covered with display cases, each containing row upon row of chocolates.

There were other delicacies as well, but chocolate was definitely the most prevalent, underlying theme.

Perfect.

While scanning through those available, she found that there was a whole table of chocolates filled with liqueurs of various kinds.

One section of that table was dedicated to caramel liqueurs. Exactly what I was hoping to find.

But there were a LOT of them. “Oh… this is going to be harder than I thought…”

A clearing throat sounded from behind her, followed by a soft-spoken voice. “Pardon me, but young master Reve would like to look at the chocolate liqueurs.”

Tala turned, half frowning.

Behind her, an Archon stood just in front of a deeply blushing young man.

The young man’s voice was strong, but quiet, as he spoke to the woman, stepping up beside her. “Mistress Criada, please.” He turned, bowing towards Tala. “My apologies. Please take your time.”

The Archon opened her mouth, a stubborn look in her eye, but the young man cut her off, still focusing on Tala.

“I’m Reve.” He held out his hand.

Tala regarded him for a long moment.

He was barely taller than she was with black hair, eyes dark enough to be basically black that were obscured behind magically empowered glasses, and skin so pale that only a lack of sunlight could explain it. Lastly, Tala noticed a well-worn book tucked under his other arm.

Hesitantly, she took his hand. “I’m Tala. Nice to meet you,” her mage-sight showed inscriptions, but no keystone. “Reve.”

He smiled. “Mistress Tala.” He bowed again. “This is my instructor and…” he colored slightly once again, “chaperone, Mistress Criada.”

Tala gestured to Terry on her shoulder. “This is Terry. He keeps me out of trouble, too.” Terry trilled a soft affirmation without opening his eyes.

Criada huffed interjecting herself into the conversation. “Be sure to keep that animal on a tight leash. Arcanous creatures have no place in human cities.”

Tala regarded the tall woman with mild irritation before glancing back to Reve. “Maybe she should be in your charge, rather than the other way around?”

She intended it as a mild joke to break some of the tension, but Reve winced.

Tala held up her hands. “I meant no disrespect.”

Criada opened her mouth, clearly meaning to give Tala a piece of her mind, but Reve snapped his fingers. “Enough” There was a marked authority to his tone that brooked no argument.

Criada vanished.

Tala blinked at the spot the woman had been standing.

Criada was still there, but an expertly crafted illusion wrapped around her, keeping any sight or sound of the Archon trapped within and leaving no evidence of her presence.

It was expertly done to the point that even Tala’s enhanced senses couldn’t detect her, and only Tala’s mage-sight let her see the illusion for what it was.

Terry, for his part, opened his eyes briefly and flickered around where the woman had been, seemingly examining the space before returning to Tala’s shoulder.

“That- that’s incredibly well-honed magic.” She reexamined the young man. A bent towards Immaterial Guide style magic, focused on waves of various kinds? Sometimes her interpretation of other people’s inscriptions was entirely unhelpful. He even had a portion of his keystone, now that she looked closer; it just wasn’t complete. “Why aren’t you a Mage?”

He scratched the back of his head. “She thinks I’m not ready yet.”

Tala shrugged. “Well, if you trust your teacher, I’m not one to interfere.” She glanced back to the waiting chocolates. “No reason we can’t both look.”

He bowed his head, once again, light glinting off his glasses. “Thank you, that is kind.”

Tala glanced to the still obscured Criada. She had to hide a smile as she saw the Archon’s arms crossed and the woman seemingly squirming in indecision. Or something…

Reve followed her gaze and gave an apologetic smile. “Please forgive her. She is a bit overprotective at times.”

Tala nodded, regarding the case of chocolates once more. “If I may ask, why is an Archon seemingly taking orders from an inscribed?”

He seemed to be conflicted, almost squirming before answering. “She was sworn to my parents, before they died, and vowed to protect me and raise me in their absence.”

Tala turned to him. “I’m…I’m sorry to hear that.” That’s heavy…Not something I’d tell a stranger, but I suppose I did ask… If someone asked me, would I lie? She probably wouldn’t. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”

He shrugged.

Change the topic. Congratulations, Tala, you just made things awkward with a complete stranger. “So, have you shopped here before?”

Criada seemed to have had enough, because she waved her hand and the illusion dissipated. “Yes, we shop here often, and master Reve, we need to get to the library for today’s lessons.”

He nodded. “Of course, Mistress. Let me just get one or two.”

Criada crossed her arms again. “Very well.”

Tala cleared her throat. “I’m actually looking to get a few for a…mentor?” She shook her head. “For someone as a thank you. Are there any of the caramel liqueurs that you’d recommend?”

Reve glanced her way, then nodded.

Over the next five minutes, they talked through those available, and Tala found him quite a pleasant conversationalist, at least around the topic of food.

Maybe he’s just nervous or doesn’t usually talk to strangers. He was nice enough once he came out of his shell a bit.

Eventually, Tala decided on a selection of ten chocolates, with Reve’s guidance, and some input from an attendant who had come over to help them both. She almost changed her mind when she learned the price. A half an ounce, silver, per chocolate? It was a bit ridiculously expensive, but it was what it was.

“Can you package it up? It’s going to be a gift.”

In the end, she parted with six silver for the gift wrapped chocolates. She paid and placed the all-too-small box into Kit.

She gave a small bow towards Reve. “Thank you for the assistance. I would have taken much longer to decide without your help.”

He smiled and bowed in return. “I was happy to assist, Mistress. Take care.”

“You as well.” She turned and walked away from the confectionary. Now, I just need to find some full-bodied whiskey.