Zyn wasn’t constantly tailing Isak. Nor Xoco for that matter. Not even Tonauac. Just during the agreed upon times. The drow had offered to tail Citlali even though there was no possible way she was the one with apparently invisible stalkers following her, but she insisted that no one would want to stalk her anyway.

The drow shook his head and grimaced upon recalling that conversation.

They had added a new member to the friend group a few weeks back and of course she had just as many poorly buried problems as the rest of their membership who weren’t drow. Zyn mused on how he had managed to find so many friends like this. Not that he minded.

Just as he didn’t mind the occasional lurking about and tailing after his friends as part of their grand plot to find out who was after them and why. Quite the opposite, he enjoyed the thrill of it mixed with the intrigue of uncovering a no doubt nefarious plot.

Zyn grumbled at the day’s breeze trying to blow the pages of his book to the side, glanced up, and noted that Isak and Citlali were almost out of sight. He made a subdued show of looking over at where the sun hung in the sky and sighed, then packed up and resumed following at a distance. All of it was planned in advance. Whoever was being tailed that day would come up with a rough idea of where all they would be on campus and Zyn would lurk about to observe.

A lizardfriend would accompany each group being tailed. The goal being to discover who exactly was the focus of this mysterious stalker. Isak had been the first to discover he was being stalked, but it was well within the realm of possibilities that Isak was merely a secondary target while someone else was the focus.

But it was totally Isak. 

Zyn knew Isak was absolutely the focus no matter how much his human friend tried to insist that everyone else in their group was way more important than he was. 

Yes, those were the human’s exact words.

Yes, Zyn had ensured that Isak found a chocolate bar that had been conveniently ‘forgotten’ during one of the drow’s tailing missions.

For today’s tailing mission, it consisted of a more open space like the field that sat in front of the dining hall. With trees and benches scattered about, it doubled as a park for students to congregate in. Both of which served as a good cover for Zyn while making his own observations. The drow stopped at a tree to let Ozzy clamber around for a while. A few other students were letting their own tree loving familiars play in this and nearby trees. One lizardfolk was collecting his small monkey from the tree just as a vanara girl set her down her own monitor lizard on the tree which scrambled up to stare at Ozzy.

Even if he knew that lizardfolk were much different from lower lizards, and vanara were similarly different from monkeys, he couldn’t help but think to himself how weird it was up here. Starting with getting used to lizards and monkeys being a thing at all. Or how the lizard people called themselves lizardfolk but the vanara who looked like monkeys would be offended if you called them that. Apparently monkeys were like an octopus but on the surface, and with fur, and less limbs, and with an affinity for trees as opposed to fungi or abyssal coral.

Even Ozzy was still unused to these ‘trees’, clinging to a branch as the tree swayed in the breeze. Perhaps during the holiday vacation the cave octopus could explore some of his beloved web mushrooms back in Mu without all of this ‘wind’ strangeness. 

“Pardon me, you’re in my familiar studies class right?”

Zyn didn’t skip a beat as he realized the vanara girl was in fact talking to him. He looked over to her and his eyes widened as he realized that he did recognize her. “Ohhhh yeah. Yeah I recognize you. Sorry didn’t mean to be rude, just keeping an eye on Ozzy. Looks like I’m not the only one.”

He motioned up into the tree at the monitor lizard still curiously staring at Ozzy. From this angle, Zyn could also keep an eye on Isak and Citlali in the distance as they sat on a bench next to some flowering tropical plant. As he recalled, Isak was working on sketches for a class project and Citlali was probably watching the plant like a squid of prey, ready to protect the human from spiders of the land or sea variety.

“Apologies for that!” The vanara girl nervously laughed. “Alia just does that with animals she doesn’t recognize. Hey I hate to bother you more but could I talk to you about some of the homework?”

The drow was all too happy to help as it gave him a perfect excuse to stand here and steal glances over at Isak and Citlali. Noticing anything out here in the open was going to be even more of a longshot than usual but they had still wanted to try it. And blending in socially was vital to ensuring Zyn didn’t make himself too obvious on these missions. 

He talked to his classmate about their homework for Familiar Studies. It was simple enough, do a report on what creature you had as a familiar. Zyn still remembered Isak’s panic over getting that assignment. His vanara classmate wanted his opinion on the direction she was going with her report and Zyn was happy to give feedback.

“The whole idea is that you get to know your familiar’s species better.” Zyn explained. “So focus on that kind of stuff that helps you figure out how exactly to get ahold of just such a beast. Like Ozzy’s species is too smart for their own good so you have to keep them amused. Lucky me, he finds it very amusing to mimic me when possible. Which, the whole mimicry thing is also a thing they love. All of that is going in the report…but in a much wordier way.”

“Have to hit that required length somehow, right?” She noted with a pained laugh that told him she fully understood.

“Oh like you wouldn’t believe–”

Zyn didn’t believe it. 

Halfway through a smile and part way through a laugh he saw something that shouldn’t be. Pure chance. A tiny little detail his eye caught that at the best of times he would have been lucky to notice from this distance. In a gust of wind blew a petal from a flower, and the drow saw that petal collide with something that wasn’t there. It hung in the air, caught on nothing at all before continuing on with the wind. The invisible someone was standing just off a stone path with a perfect view of Isak and Citlali.

“-that I completely forgot I was supposed to pick up a book for a friend.” The lie came quick, and Zyn even decided on what kind of book he would be picking up for Xoco. He checked the pocket watch on loan from Citlali to note the time, then played it off with a sigh. “Sorry, I can do that later. Where were we? Reports savagely beating us?”

The green furred vanara girl laughed off the moment of strangeness and their conversation resumed. Zyn wasn’t in any hurry now as he had just seen about all he could hope to see. And how desperately it was needed after so long without anything. Eventually he excused himself from Neha, as he discovered was her name, and continued on with Ozzy draped over his shoulder.

There wasn’t as much need to keep a close eye on Isak and Citlali now as he already had his golden sighting. He barely even believed it himself but it was at least something to go on. It didn’t even matter that he let the pair wander out of sight. Isak was always easy enough to find with the one of a kind giant elemental rock man marching behind him at all times.

Now that he thought of it, Zyn imagined that also made things easy for this invisible stalker as well. Perhaps they could even use that…

Yes.

Isak was so obvious of a target that he could be the bait in an obvious trap and no one would suspect it of being too obvious! 

Of course there still remained details. Isak had to be safe of course. Perhaps even using an illusory Isak and illusory Vidal? No, Vidal could probably take on an army alone. And he would be the perfect snap component of a snap trap. All that was left for Zyn was to figure out literally any other details, but he already felt confident that they could all come up with something.

This invisible fiend would rue the day that he crossed Zyn’s friends! Whatever intentions they had were no doubt nefarious, and an appropriate response was no doubt warranted. May death even be on the line? It was possible!

There was much for Zyn to contemplate while making his way through campus. With classes very much done there were still plenty of students enjoying the daylight hours before dinner and before a sudden sense of panic set in at finally needing to work on those assignments that had been put off until well into the night.

That left Zyn with time to mingle with others. A hand on the pulse of the rumor mill was always in order. And Zyn was the best of their group at doing just that. He overheard one group talking about the recent presentations they had given in their Beginner Casting class. 

“Couldn’t help but overhear. You guys had your presentations already?” Zyn casually slid into the conversation and the small circle of students. “I’ve got mine tomorrow. Anything I need to know?”

The taller orc girl of the group thought for a moment and shrugged. The hawk on her shoulder didn’t budge. “Don’t awaken with only two spells? It sounds like you’d have it easier, but that’s a lie. It means you have to be even more detailed! Such is the toll The Sky Father exacts upon me for the gift of blood and lightning.”

“First of all, blood and lightning sounds pretty awesome.” The drow and his cave octopus both nodded with a hand on their chin…or an approximation of a cephalopod chin. “Second, my friend awoke with Storms and Illusions and he’s been sweating this presentation like he was being chased by a Nightspawn…let me re-simile that, because that actually happened to him that one time and it was no doubt traumatic–”

“Whoa whoa whoa whoa…whoa. Hang on.” The gray-blue kamoho boy waved his arms to pause that thought. “You wouldn’t be talking about Isak, would you? Lord of Storms?”

Zyn blinked as his mouth hung open. “...people are calling him that now?”

“So you’re Zyn the Eclipse?” The kamoho boy pressed on with a literal shark tooth filled smile. Even the sea snake coiled around his arm perked up. “Hey where did Isak get that ro–”

A svirfneblin in the group took her own turn to cut him off. “Wait, did you say he actually was chased by a Nightspawn?!?”

“Legally speaking, it was a pack of them.” Zyn casually corrected her. As he did he recognized her from the procession from Mu that Isak had guided through the rain. “Mome beasts. Giant, tusked, horrifying, totally incinerated by The Lord of Storms.”

“No way.” A lizardlad in the group shook his head but couldn’t hide a sharp smile. “The man shows up with a familiar no one’s ever seen, strings his rivals up like trophies, nearly castrates one of them, seduces one of those rivals right after that so that she officially joins his official group, and all of that was just a sequel to killing Nightspawn?”

Zyn had wanted to encourage a bit of legend building. Nothing boosted spirits like having legends built around you, and Isak needed that. All of his new friends needed that. Thought maybe things were getting out of hand. “You got the main idea but some details–”

“What do you mean he seduced Citlali?!?” The tecolotecah girl seemed a bit too invested in this as her feathers ruffled. “I thought he was still single?!?”

The drow boy and Ozzy held up hand and tentacle. “While Isak is still single, I think he might have eyes for someone. And out of respect for my friend’s privacy I’ll leave her identity up to your imaginations.”

“I can work with that.” The owl girl waved off Zyn’s clarifications, and the drow wondered why there were now no less than two different varieties of owl women interested in the very human Isak. “Becoming wife two is way easier than wife three. I don’t have to wait for him to take that second captive for starters. Hey, do you know if he prefers his women in skirts or dresses?”

“W–”

“Enough with your girl talk!” The lizardlad’s barking hairless dog stole back the conversation. “It’s totally Citlali though.”

“Lies!” Now the orc girl was getting into it. “A fierce leader like that would pick a capable warrior as his bride. Stringing up one’s enemies as a living warning to others? Nearly castrating a rival because he slighted his woman? That’s right out of history lessons from home. So it’s totally Xoco. I’ve heard the stories about her duels. Also they’re childhood friends so it just makes sense.”

Zyn had completely lost control of the conversation at this point and could only bemusedly look on.“I thought it was just Mu that loved a good rumor mill…”

“But he rescued Citlali!” Even the svirfneblin girl was lost in this mess now. “He saves Citlali from the cruelty of her former team, strikes them down, and in an act of mercy commands Tonauac to heal them up after he realizes they were led astray. Classical wise leader. Classical rescue romance. Plus I heard he likes shorter girls.”

“Nah, I gotta agree with Yisu. Nothing is beating the whole childhood friend thing for the Lord of Storms.”

“Have you seen Citlali? Who would turn her down?”

“Someone who’s not a lizardfolk.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?!? You have scales too! And sharp teeth!”

“These are shark scales! Also that’s not the only thing!”

“Fools, all of you.” Yisi and her hawk shook their heads. “I won’t let scales get in the way of finding love. On that topic: Zyn is Tona–...wait where did he go?”

Somehow, as impossible as it would seem, the arguing group had not noticed the drow slip away completely without notice.

The assembled group looked around and found no sign of Zyn, but agreed that he was indeed earning his title of Eclipse.

For Zyn, such acts were easy. All he had to do was wait for a point in the conversation where the others were engrossed with one another. Then all it took was his secret weapon to ease in slipping away from people he might be standing right next to. 

Blur was a handy little spell. Shadow magic in its most basic form. It used just enough shadows to blur one target juuuust enough that it was harder to focus on. Not for long. Not at Zyn’s current abilities. Just enough for Zyn to duck out of sight and follow up with a Muffle spell to cover up any sounds of footsteps. 

Strictly speaking, attempting to use this in a manner similar to Invisibility was strictly inferior. But invisibility could only work on one’s self and their familiar rather than other targets. Just as an illusion spell would be able to make someone ‘invisible’ by hiding them under an illusion. All while numerous other factors threatened to expose the illusion if the caster wasn’t intensely focused. Instead, invisibility was the perfect way to remain unseen at the mere cost of demanding most if not all of a caster’s concentration.

While he was years away from learning Invisibility, he could still read up on it. And that was all the excuse he needed to make a temporary detour to the library. Finding that book for Xoco to keep up the lie would be a nice bonus. Zyn had learned of just the book series to introduce her to. In which a human teenager moved to the city and found himself embroiled in the plots of a criminal underworld.