Meyriv neared the village just after sunrise the next day.

To the side of the road sat a young man.

As he neared, Meyriv sighed.

A bolt of energy zipped from his hand to the man’s torso.

The man grunted and shivered, massaging his stomach.

“Many thanks!

I don’t know it was, but I’ve been achin’ since supper last night.”

Meyriv’s eyes narrowed.

“I imagine you were advised to wait here?”

“O’ course, the messenger gathered everyone who was ailing and told us to wait along the road! Said you’ve agreed to heal everybody.”

“This is not what I…”

He sighed and rubbed his forehead.

He continued along the road.

Every hundred meters or so waited yet another person. He was glad they kept a good distance from each other so he could cope with the Reflections one at a time.

One had a broken finger.

Another had constant back pain.

An elderly woman had only three teeth left. Meyriv excised the decay and reconstructed a full set. She kept opening and closing her mouth and clicking her new teeth together.

“Take better care of those ones.” He said tiredly.

The cases seemed to become more serious as he got nearer to the town. He assumed this was so those with worse injuries wouldn’t need to walk as far.

A wave of nausea threatened Meyriv as he approached his next patient.

A large man stood to greet him, holding a young teenage boy. He had an infection spreading up his entire arm. He was, pale, shaking, and burning with a fever. His eyes kept glazing over.

The man explained quietly,
“He cut his arm last week. It wasn’t bad at first, but it started to get red. Then the fever started.”

Meyriv looked at the wound.

“Hold him down on the grass.” He ordered the man. “I will need to remove the infected arm.”

The man nodded grimly. He gently lowered the boy to the ground and braced his hands on the boy’s shoulder and good arm.

“Brace yourself.” Meyriv warned.

A precise ribbon of energy cleanly severed the infected arm near the shoulder. The boy gasped and shrieked. Meyriv merely flinched and deftly removed the arm, incinerating it with a flash of light.

Over several minutes, he used a complex weave of spells in tandem to construct a symmetrical duplicate of the boy’s healthy arm.

As he finished, Rynisia’s thoughts flowed into his mind: You need to teach me how to do that sometime.
He nodded distractedly. The boy’s father looked at him in amazement. “You said you had to remove it…”
“I did.”

The man grinned
“You could’ve saved me a lot of worry if you had told me you intended to give him a new one!”

“Oh, right. I suppose it slipped my mind.”

The boy’s shaking had quieted. His body relaxed into an exhausted slumber.

The man grabbed Meyriv by the shoulders and roughly drew him into a hug. “You saved my boy.” His voice cracked as he spoke.

At the entrance to the village sat one last person.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Meyriv exclaimed, looking down at a middle-aged man reclining in a woven basket-chair.

The man had no legs.

This one’s pain was not like the others.

A dull ache washed over Meyriv. Emotional, not physical.

He saw through the man’s eyes. He felt his daily hurt, feeling he was a burden to his family. He felt the man’s longing to walk. To be useful.

“You were born like this?” Meyriv asked

The man nodded.

“Fine. Don’t blame me if the proportions are off. I have no exact model to follow.”

Meyriv began his preparations, ordering the sequence of spells he would need.

Who’s idea was it for limbs to have so many little bones and stringy bits?

He was almost ready to begin the spells. He paused, and his eyes widened.

He revised several of the steps.

Neglecting to synthesize proportional blood could have killed him. And then I would be responsible for his death.

His face paled as he thought of the potential pain that could cause.

I can’t risk that kind of error. The consequences are too costly.

He checked and double-checked the spells to be certain he had not forgotten anything else.

A crowd had begun to gather nearby, whispering excitedly.

Finally, he was satisfied.

He began the process.

Each leg materialized in turn, one component at a time. What appeared simple and miraculous to observers was in reality thousands of small steps, each occurring mere fractions of a second apart.

Finally, he finished. Even with access to plenty of power the effort was exhausting.

I’m glad my anchor has all of my personal reconstruction spells built in.

The townspeople were crowding around the man.

Two of his friends grabbed his arms and lifted him to his feet. They laughed and joked while teaching him to walk.

He tried to be gracious to all the people trying to thank him, but his patience quickly thinned. He slipped away from the town and down the road as soon as an opportunity presented itself.

He continued West, moving at a light run.

Days passed in a blur. He had forgotten how comfortable power was.

I could get used to this. She knew I couldn’t resist the opportunity to have it back.

A thought struck him.

He contacted Rynisia.

What do you expect of me when I get there?

A few moments passed silently, then:

At minimum, investigate their capabilities. See if you can discover what they’re planning. It’s likely they intend to interfere with the Swamp. Or my garden. I find it unlikely a group of mages just happened to set up shop so close by.

And if they’re hostile? I don’t want to fight them, as enjoyable as it once would have been.

I won’t ask you to fight. On the other hand, if they attack, I’m ready to respond accordingly. My garden has...limitations in place that restrict preemptive aggression, as convenient as it would be.

You’re using me as bait to provoke them.

I admit that would be a simple solution to the problem. I do not enjoy violence, but from the information we have, they are far from benign. The sooner the threat can be removed, the better.

I can’t argue with that.

He arrived at the doors to the bleak, cubic structure.
I wonder if I can just stroll in?

He pulled on the handles. Locked.

Pity.

He wove a subtle enchantment to disguise his eyes.

He picked up a rock and knocked on the stone doors.

While he waited, he mused over what he could say.

‘Hello? I seem to have misplaced my cell. Could you please help me find it?’,

Excuse me, you have dropped this building over my cave. Would you mind moving it a few kilometers South?

Finally, the doors opened a sliver.

“State your business.” A gruff voice demanded

“I am but the humble mage Treb. I have come seeking knowledge.”
You’re overdoing it. Rynisia laughed in his mind

Acting was not in the job description. Take what you can get. Meyriv responded and suppressed a smile.

“Who told you to come here?”

“I heard there was a group of mages doing research here.”

The door shut.

A few minutes later it opened again:

“You will speak with the Tutor. Don’t try anything.”

 

The doors silently swung open.

The guard waved him in, spear at the ready.

 

The doors closed behind him, again moving without a whisper of noise.

He examined the enchantment; Lazy and crude. Why waste energy suppressing noise instead of smoothing the points of contact and preventing sounds from ever being made?

The guard grew impatient and jabbed his shoulder with the butt of the spear.

“Get a move on. I haven’t got all day.”

 

Meyriv smiled,

“Don’t you? You’re on guard duty. You have all the time in the world! You should be thanking me for—”

 

The spear haft hit the side of his head.

He staggered and turned his fact forward so the guard couldn’t see his grin.

 

Worth it. He thought, keeping himself from chuckling.

 

The guard walked behind him, guiding him up some flights of stairs.

 

They arrived at an engraved metal door.

The guard rapped his knuckles on it. They waited in silence for a few moments, then the door opened.

 

“Send him in.” A sing-song voice sounded from the doorway.

Meyriv strode inside before the guard could shove him.

The door slammed shut behind him with a dull crash.

That one was purposefully amplified. They do enjoy their theatrics...not that I’m any different, I’m just better at it.

A nondescript woman sat at a plain desk, empty save for some scrolls, an ink pot and some quills.

She sneered and spoke:

“Useless.”

“Excuse me?” Meyriv asked

You’re useless. I was hoping you would be able to provide a meaningful supply of power, but you don’t even have enough of a conduit to call yourself a mage. Normally, I’d offer you the choice of lifetime servitude or death. Lately, though... I’m not in a good mood.

A delicate-looking amulet around her neck caught his eye as an enchantment activated. A wave of sickly yellow burst from it, washing over him in an instant.

His body disintegrated, leaving only his clothes and possessions behind.

He watched from his conduit, disoriented from the sudden change and loss of his physical senses.

Well. That’s annoying. Death and decay aspect? How unoriginal.

The woman called for someone to clean the mess.

 

Rynisia spoke to him:

Shall I intervene now?

Not yet. Perhaps I can glean more information. She has some interesting enchantments around her.

Tell me when.

Of course.

He moved his anchor’s crux point nearer to the amulet, examining the enchantments.

As he thought, it had at least one conduit reaching externally.

But is it the source or the desti—Oho! I have an idea.

He reformed his body, returning all his possessions to his person.

He omitted disguising his eyes.

The woman looked up from her desk, mouth hanging open in surprise.

Meyriv pretended to brush dust off his shoulder, smiling smugly. He pulled the copper ring from his pocket and examined it while he stealthily modified some of the spells.

The Tutor stood up.

“Who are you?” she demanded

“I am the mage Treb, as I told you guard.”

“I’ve never heard that name. Who are you really? Who inducted you?”

“You did, in a manner of speaking.” He improvised

He tried to seem imperious and dismissive.

“They prefer that I don’t mention them by name.”

“Don’t get cocky. You’re still an initiate. You have no right to hide information from your elders. If you displease the arbiters, your blessing could be removed as easily as it was given. Show me which catalyst you were given.”

“Uh. One moment.”

He pretended to search through one of his pockets to distract her.

Rynisia, I seem to have run out of plausible bluffs.

Incoming.

The ground rumbled.

Meyriv jumped back and flattened himself against the wall.

The woman looked around in confusion.

A twisted stone root the width of a tree trunk smashed through the wall, coiling around her like a snake constricting a rat.

She shrieked and struggled as the root drained energy from her. After a few seconds she went limp, then her body disintegrated in a flash of yellow.

The amulet fell to the floor with a clatter. Meyriv picked it up.

Ah. She may very well be using similar tricks to mine. Although, the anchor is set up in an strange way. It seems almost…deliberately insecure.

 

The amulet pulsed with energy. Spells began forming to reconstruct its owner.

Nope, we can’t have that. Meyriv thought

He activated the ring’s enchantment and reformed its connection to the amulet. This time capable of more than communication.

He interrupted the process, sending a blade of magic into the amulet’s conduit.

 

He winced as his head exploded with reflected pain.

Yes. Definitely insecure.

 

He prepared another blade, but a spell activated around the amulet faster than he could finish.

It shattered and the conduit dispersed.

 

Suicide? Rynisia asked, confused.

I doubt it. Meyriv replied, She hadn’t even put up much of a fight yet. I suspect this was not the primary anchor.

 

The root withdrew from the newly-opened window, disappearing into the ground below.

A scrawny man with a broom opened the door and froze, looking from Meyriv to the rubble and then to the gaping hole in the wall.

He made a squeak of alarm before dropping the broom and sprinting down the hall.

Meyriv strengthened his muscles with a generous dose of energy and chased him down, tackling him to the ground.

He felt a sharp pain in his nose.

Oops. I got carried away. He must have hit it when he fell.

He helped the trembling man to his feet. He sputtered, and reached up at his face, trying to stem the bleeding.

“Sorry about that.” Meyriv said, trying to sound friendly.

He waved his hand and repaired the injury.

Hesitantly, the man spoke

“Is she dead?”

“Not likely. At very least she may not be able to return for a while.”

The man’s eyes widened with terror.

“If she lives, she will find you. You should hide and hope you can escape her notice.”

“What makes you think I can’t defeat her? I just made her run away.”

“I have seen what she can do.”

“Who is she? What are her goals?”

“I don’t know. Even if I did, I couldn’t tell you anything. She would punish me when she returns.”

“Which do you fear more: What she might do eventually or what I could inflict—”

Rynisia interrupted: No threatening innocent people.

Meyriv protested, It was just a harmless bluff!

He didn’t know that.

That’s the point!

...Are you constantly spying on me now?

Only when you’re misbehaving. She replied mischievously.

He rubbed his forehead and sighed.

“...Sorry.

You don’t have to tell me anything.

If you want a place to hide, go to the eastern coast and head north. You’ll get to a farming village. You should be safe there.”

The man bolted down the stairs.

Meyriv searched through the shattered remnants of the desk. All of the scrolls were blank, save one.

He unfurled it.

“I will consider your offer.

You will be contacted once a decision is made.”

It bore no salutation nor signature.

He tucked the paper under his belt.

He found nothing else of value in the room, so he descended to the lower levels. By the entrance the lone guard lay slumped against the wall, snoring loudly.

Meyriv asked Rynisia:
What about that guard? Can I intimidate him? He hit me with his spear-handle earlier.

Don’t go overboard.

When have I ever?

The incident on the ship comes to mind.

Ha ha. Real clever. He replied sarcastically.

He wove a spell to give his eyes a brighter glow. Next, he enchanted his voice to be louder and prepared a spell to cause the ground to shake slightly when he spoke.

Lastly, he drew his dagger and wreathed it in illusory red flames, holding it where the man could see it.

He took a deep breath.

 

“ANSWER TRUTHFULLY OR BE ANNIHILATED!”

The guard jolted awake and stumbled to his feet, fumbling for his spear.

Meyriv sliced off the spearhead with magic, accompanied by a flash and thunderclap for effect.

 

“WHAT DO YOU KNOW OF THOSE WHO COMMAND YOU?”

 

The guard stuttered, his voice an octave or two higher than normal.

“T-they’re powerful. Anyone who fails to obey disappears!”

“WHAT HAPPENS TO THOSE IMPRISONED HERE?”

“It-it’s just a job m-milord! I don’t know the details! I just guard the entrance and lead people to the Tutor. She takes care of the rest! There are others who tend to the inmates, ask them!”

“I SHALL.

THE TUTOR HAS BEEN VANQUISHED.

FLEE IF YOU VALUE YOUR LIFE.”

The guard needed no further encouragement. He pushed open the door and sprinted for the nearest trees.

Meyriv waited for him to disappear, then shut the doors and burst out laughing, wiping tears from his eyes.

What did I say about going overboard? Rynisia teased

You didn’t define what that entailed. Meyriv pointed out

If they soil their clothes, you went overboard.

Oops. Clumsy me.