The caravan trundled down the high road, and Tenebres was ready to go insane from boredom. The boy was leaned back in his seat, tattered canvas cloak pulled over his closed eyes, desperately wishing that he possessed the same knack for sleeping in the back of a shaking, rocking, creaking, uncomfortable wooden wagon that the brawny laborer sitting across from him was currently demonstrating

Tenebres resisted the urge to sigh and firmly reminded himself that finding this caravan several days before had been an incredible stroke of luck. The small sack of coins he had found hidden in Kellen’s office before he left the compound behind had been more than enough to buy his way in the column of ramshackle wagons, scruffy laborers, lazy guards, and reclusive travelers. Supposedly, they were en route to one of the trade cities. Tenebres didn’t know which one, as he had tried his hardest to avoid spending too much time with any of the couple dozen people who traveled with the caravan for their own reasons. Mostly, they had been willing to accept him as just one more traveler who had attached himself to the convoy for the safety of numbers on the open road. The inhuman features that had manifested with his gift, including the little protrusions his newly pointed ears made in his hood, were odd, but generally ignored. Plenty of wraiths possessed traits far stranger than his, even after his recent transformation. 

To those few who had approached him anyways, like the gregarious laborer he had ended up sitting across from today, he simply explained himself as a boy from one of the nearby villages, heading to the city in hopes of getting his gifts and making it big. No one had tried to pry any deeper than that, so the invented story Tenebres had spent weeks coming up with had yet to be told. Which was maybe, just a little bit, kind of insulting. Did no one want to hear about Johanson, the cruel miller who had told him he’d never amount to anything? Or Dottie, the kindly weaver who had let him apprentice with her long enough to earn his way to the city?

Really. If nothing else, it was unprofessional of the guards! He could be anyone! He could even be a demon-summoning former cultist who had murdered a score of people with his dark powers!

Not that he would characterize himself that way. It had been self-defense, and he hadn’t learned to control his gift yet. 

But still!

Abruptly, the cart jostled to a halt, and Tenebres looked around in surprise. “What’s going on?” He and the large man sitting across from him were the only people riding on this wagon - the rest of the covered bed was full of various crates and canvas bags full of things he didn't care about. There wasn’t even a driver - the wagon had simple runes of force spinning its wheels, controlled by a crystal the head merchant kept on him, and it was simply tied to the next one in front of it so it would stay on course.

The big man blinked away sleep and looked around, his eyes unfocused. “Hrngh…” His lazy gaze swept around, and he shrugged his broad shoulder. “Must be bandits.” he finally declared.

Tenebres was not nearly as casual about the apparent attack. “Bandits? Shouldn’t we… I don’t know, do something?” Even as he asked, a half dozen rough men and women, all armed and wearing a motley assortment of boiled leather and crude chain, rushed by the open back of their wagon. The guards’ faces were hard, clearly ready for trouble, and they already held their weapons at the ready. 

The laborer looked at him, arching a heavy eyebrow. “That’s why the boss pays for guards, kid. Besides, I thought you didn’t have any gifts. What are you gonna do?”

Tenebres wasn’t exactly reassured. Anyone relegated to guard duty for a ramshackle caravan like this wouldn’t exactly be the best and brightest. They’d be lucky if any of the guards even had a Warrior gift, much less the second gift that would get them to Novice level. He swallowed hard, making a focused effort to not lift a hand to his chest, where he could feel the brand left by the gift of the void seared into his flesh. That yawning gate hungered, but Tenebres had refused to yield to its urges in the weeks since he left behind the bloody remains of the cult compound he had nearly died in. 

Even as he considered the power that had been burnt into his soul, he looked up at the sound of more figures running up from the back of the caravan. At first he took them as more guards - but they looked even more slovenly, the rough but serviceable iron weapons the escorts bore replaced by knicked, rusted swords and crude wooden clubs with nails jutting out of them. 

“Uhm!” Tenebres all but yelped as one of the bandits peeled away from the group and approached their wagon. The noise drew the seemingly unconcerned attention of the laborer across from him.

The rough, unshaved bandit gave the two a yellow-toothed grin as he approached. “Well, lookee here! Ain’t you a pretty one!” the man said, his eyes darting up and down Tenebres’s lithe figure, obvious even under his cloak.

The wraith boy ground his teeth - not with frustration or even anxiety, but at the way his brand seemed to start burning from the man’s approach. It was as if it knew that Tenebres might need to use it soon. 

His original plan had been to try to get to a trade city, or even one of the bastion cities, so that he could find someone who knew more about his new gift, someone who could help him understand and eventually control its power. Tenebres wasn’t really afraid of the bandits - he was more afraid of what would happen if he lost control of whatever he summoned, the same way he had back in the subterranean sacrifice chamber where he had nearly died.

As if sensing his hesitance, the description of his gift appeared in front of his eyes, tempting him.

Gift of the Void

Level: Novice

Experience: 28%

Embrace the Void

Abilities:

Void Invocation - Active, Summon - Open a gate and beckon a fiend to cross over. Nature and power of the fiend as well as ability cost varies based on the strength of the invocation. Sufficiently powerful fiends may be difficult to control. Moderate duration.

Sacrificial Victim - Active, Final - Make a physical attack that does a small amount of dark damage on a hit. If this hit kills the target, receive a moderate boost to all physical or mental attributes for a lesser duration. Minor focus cost.

Enshadowed Soul - Boon - Major boost to will and charm.

Tenebres had never heard of such a gift, even in his studies of the Mage’s gifts. Of course, he had never heard of anyone receiving a gift from being tied up and almost sacrificed either, so he was far from an expert. And he couldn’t deny the power inherent to the abilities - it had been a desperate and subconscious use of the Void Invocation that had summoned the horrifying entity that had slaughtered Kellen and the other cultists, including his parents. But the summoning had left him drained, bloodied, and completely unable to move. He had to figure out how to review his attributes before he found that the summoning had sapped his strength, stamina, resilience, and speed all at once to beckon the seemingly invincible demon. 

Since then, he hadn’t used either of his void powers. He had no interest in paying such a price to summon an uncontrollable demon, nor in putting someone in the same situation he had been in, being sacrificed for the sake of power. Despite that, his single use of the ability had spiked the gift’s experience far faster than he thought possible. Still, ‘embracing the Void,’ as the gift urged him to do, did not appeal to him, given the nature of its powers.

But at this point, did he even have a choice? There were clearly more bandits than guards. They must’ve done something showy at the front of the caravan to stop the wagons and distract the sentries, while the rest snuck up from behind. If he didn’t try something, the entire caravan might be pillaged. He could end up dead, or worse, a prisoner yet again, slated for some horrible fate. That was unacceptable. Almost without meaning to, he felt the gift of the void beginning to activate, the invocation responding to the justification he was already lining up.

Then he noticed the laborer sitting across from him. The brawny man had the thick, dull slabs of muscle that years of his trade cultivated, but he wore simple canvas clothes, without a single piece of armor on him. Despite this, he was relaxed as ever. 

“Find a different wagon, friend,” the man suggested quietly. As he did, he shifted his weight, and a wooden haft fell from the bench lean against his leg. It was the handle of one of the heavy sledge hammers the laborers used for breaking down rocks on the road, pounding wagon axles into place, and securing poles in the ground. 

The bandit’s eyes went wide, and he looked from the laborer, to Tenebres, to the stock of the wagon behind them. He licked his lips, a nervous gesture that, combined with his pinched face, gave him a decidedly rat-like appearance. “I’ve got a gift too!” the bandit tried to boast. “Some laborer gift don’t mean you can take me!”

“Maybe.” The big man shrugged his titanic shoulders. “Only one way to find out though.”

The dirty little man took a hesitant step backwards at the laborer’s laconic tone, noting that he clearly wasn’t intimidated. 

“See, the boss ain’t the richest guy in the world,” the laborer continued. “But he knew this stretch of road had a bandit problem, so he made sure to hire some men who knew how to handle themselves, Warrior gift or not.”

The outlaw went a little pale, and took another step back. Tenebres was pretty sure he wasn’t even aware of his motion, but the porter was clearly watching him closely. The big man casually gave Tenebres a knowing wink, and darted a quick look up at the top of the stretched canvas covering on the wagon. 

Tenebres followed his gaze, and noticed what the man had seen. There was a shadow, carefully balanced on one of the wooden bows that held the canvas aloft. His heart lurched a mile a minute at the sight - the man might have successfully intimidated the first bandit, but Tenebres wasn’t sure if he could actually win against the one, much less a second.

“Course,” the big man continued, “he was also happy to accept a few other travelers who asked to join us for this leg of the trip.”

The rat-faced bandit took another step back, and apparently that was far enough. The shape overhead moved to the end of the wagon’s frame, and the bandit’s face went stark white when he saw whoever it was.

“W-warden!” the bandit cried in fear - and it proved to be the last word he ever spoke, as a wave of flames suddenly flashed down from the bonnet of the covered wagon, a torrent of fire that lasted five, then ten, then fifteen seconds before it finally let up. What fell to the ground couldn't be easily recognized as a human. 

More impressive to Tenebres than the violence was the lack of heat that reached him. From this close, the wash of flames should’ve been like sitting next to an active forge, possibly dangerous even at a remove, but instead, the air in the wagon stayed as temperate as ever. It had to be some sort of gift power he had never heard of, controlling even the backwash of heat.

The shadow jumped from the bonnet with a grunt of exertion, landing between the rear of the wagon and the charbroiled remains before standing and fixing the two occupants with a pleased look. Tenebres couldn’t make out all of his features under the hooded, dark green cloak he wore, but what he did see was a grin on a face that was much cleaner and well taken care of than anyone else on the caravan.

“That was well done,” the man - the warden - complemented the worker sitting across from Tenebres. “Do you really think you could’ve dealt with him?”

The man snorted derisively, leaning back in his seat. “I wouldn’t have needed to find out either way. He was ready to run even before you showed up.” He sniffed through one nostril, a dismissive sound. “Now, you boys got this, or should we start running?”

The face under the hood cocked a crooked grin. “We should be fine from here. I expect the wagons will start rolling again any moment now.”

The warden barely finished speaking before another man ran up to him, clearly coming from the front of the column. Like the fire mage, he wore the same moss green cloak, but his hood was pulled down to reveal a young man, maybe in his early twenties, with a broad, honest face. “Barnaby, how’s it going back here?”

“Fine. Sartoh is taking the majority of them by the back, but a few are trying to slip through and do a snatch and grab. If you go help him, I can handle them.” The first warden paused, looking over the younger man. “Siroh?”

“Yessir?”

“Where’s your weapon?”

“Ah… it broke sir. I figured I’d help myself to one of theirs.”

The older warden sighed, and the laborer offered, “If you’d excuse me sirs, I’ve got this?” He hefted the sledgehammer casually, as if the iron head didn’t weigh twenty pounds by itself. 

The younger warden grinned and shook his head. “Not much my type of weapon, but thanks.” An idea flashed over his face, and he asked, “Actually… you wouldn’t happen to have some wood back there? Wheel spokes or something of the sort?”

The laborer blinked in surprise and turned back to take stock of the supplies the wagon was burdened with. In short order, he and Tenebres had passed a couple armfuls of wagon wheel spokes to the younger warden. The young man passed his hands over the rods, each about an inch in diameter, and Tenebres watched with wide eyes as they quickly started to squirm like a bushel of snakes. The rods writhed and twisted around each other, and in only moments, they had transformed into two knotted wooden cudgels. 

The warden lifted the twin weapons, swinging them experimentally, and nodded with approval. “Much obliged,” he thanked Tenebres and his companion, before turning to jog to the back of the caravan.

The older warden watched him go, muttering something under his breath derisively. “Keep that hammer on hand, good man,” he advised in a louder voice. Then he jogged off too, in search of the bandits that had passed them by earlier.

Within minutes, as promised, the convoy was rolling forward again. None of the other outlaws made it to Tenebres’s wagon, and the fight remained a distant affair he could just barely hear. As he could still make out the sounds as they caravan rolled on, he assumed the distraction in the front and the bandits that had snuck in amidst the chaos had been dealt with, and the wagons were now trying to get clear of the lingering fight between the wardens and the outlaws. 

“Hey, mind if I ask you something… uhm…”

“Arl,” the laborer finished for him. The man had introduced himself that morning, but the name went in one delicately pointed ear and out the other. “Go ahead.”

“Right, Arl. Sorry.” Tenebres coughed to clear his throat, slightly embarrassed. “Who were those men?”

“What, the wardens? You don’t have them where you come from?”

“No, I know them,” Tenebres explained. Of course, his familiarity with the wardens came from the other side - they were a constant source of anxiety for Kellen’s cult. The skilled men and women who dedicated themselves to ensuring the safety of the high roads and trade routes that the local cities and villages relied on. “I mean the bandits. That one the warden killed, he said he had a gift, right? Couldn’t he have just found work in one of the cities?”

Arl sighed heavily. “Probably kid. Probably. But some men always want the easy way out. Why work for food, or money, or anything else you want, when you could just steal it?”

Tenebres blinked at him, then looked back down the road thoughtfully. “Because then you end up dead on the side of the road?”

Arl gave a loud bark of laughter at the response. “Good answer!” he said. “Course, some of them take a liking to it. And once you’ve got the wrong gift, there’s no going back.”

Tenebres looked up sharply, and his brand started itching. “The wrong gift?”

The man nodded, his face going sour. “Aye lad. Most bandits are like that idiot who was trying to threaten us. If they’ve got any gift, it’s usually some totem or ensouled item they managed to steal. But there are archetypes who like a man that steals and hurts and kills for a living. You got the Rogue and the Tyrant archetypes, and the dark gifts some of the nastier monsters out there can give a willing person. The wardens spend as much time hunting those forbidden gift bearers as actually patrolling the roads, I hear.” Arl shook his head. “Bad stuff, that.”

Tenebres had stopped paying attention. He had lifted a hand to his chest, to feel the brand carved into flesh, right above his heart. It was burning again, feeding on his torment. Forbidden gifts? He hadn’t known anything about those. None of his books had ever mentioned them, and Kellen certainly wouldn’t have wanted his underlings to know that they could get power from some dark archetype like that. If gifts could be forbidden… 

He thought about the abattoir the fiend had made of the ritual chamber he was nearly sacrificed in. If any gift could be forbidden, his gift of the void certainly was. He suspected that whether he wanted it or not didn’t matter, not anymore. A gift could never be given up or removed, willingly or by force. He was trapped with the fiendish power Kellen had accidentally bestowed on him, and those same wardens who had saved his life today would roast him as easily as that bandit if they knew. 

“So…” Arl drew out the word, clearly feeling the tension that had built up between them. In an attempt to change the subject, he asked, “Whatcha heading to Emeston for again?”

“I want to take one of the Mage’s exams,” Tenebres said instantly. He knew the words were true even as he said them. He needed to get another gift, and soon, before anyone tried to pry into the one that he was hiding.

Arl nodded cautiously. “That uh… that sounds good. Yep. A little bookish for my taste, but good on you.” The man’s head continued bobbing as he reached for any other words to keep the conversation going. “You know kid… you’re a bit weird, aren’t you?”