Chapter 14

“Dammit!” I shouted. “I don’t want this. I want to be a wizard, not a priest. I don’t even know who the fuck Miralis is!”

“She is the Shield Maiden! The Guardian Spear!” Jackob cried.

“And for all I know she could be a lunatic who brings peace by slaughtering heathens!” I shot back. Jackob went pale. I turned to Mirri. “You said the gods do whatever they want. That if you want something from them, you have to give them something they want. I don’t have anything to give.”

I whirled on Jackob. “What does Miralis want from me? What’s the sacrifice?”

“She requires none,” he said quickly, almost pleading.

“Bullshit,” I snapped. “There are always rules. Always a price. Something I’ll never get back. What does the prophecy say?”

“The… the what?” he stammered.

“There’s always a goddamn prophecy with this shit,” I raged. “Am I supposed to bring balance the ****? Stop some great evil? Die gloriously so everyone else can live in peace? What is it?”

“I know of no prophecy,” he said weakly.

“Seth,” Mirri said again.

“Mirri, this is heavy shit,” I said, rounding on her. “If I’m Miralis’ champion, then everything I touch becomes hers. If I sleep in an inn, that inn’s chosen. If I buy a muffin, that baker’s chosen. Wars get fought over that. People die over that. I don’t want to be responsible for starting wars.”

“Seth,” she said gently, and reached into her pack. She pulled out the little butterfly shaped hairpin. “You bought me this. Remember?”

“Of course I do.”

“What do you want from me?” she asked.

“What?”

“You gave me a gift,” she said evenly. “What do you want from me?”

“Mirri…”

“What do you want from me?” she pressed.

I dragged a hand down my face and exhaled. “I don’t want anything from you.”

“Bullshit,” she said flatly.

I looked down. My voice dropped. “I want you to be happy.”

She smiled, soft and tired. “And I wanna be happy too.”

I swallowed. “I’m not a god.”

“That doesn’t matter,” she said.

I sighed, the fight draining out of me, and wrapped my fingers around the hilt. The blade slid free of the stone as if it had never been lodged there at all. Light rippled along its length, and in my hands it softened and flowed, reshaping itself into the familiar weight of a staff.

I didn’t look back.

I turned and walked out of town, leaving the shattered shrine, the staring villagers, and the stunned silence behind me without waiting to see if the others followed.

* * *

It took about ten minutes for the others to catch up to me and inform me that I was heading in the wrong direction.

“Of course I am,” I muttered, and fell back in line behind Ashlara.

The rest of the day passed in relative silence. Ashlara gave me space after lunch and skipped combat practice entirely. I was conflicted. On one hand, I needed to learn how to fight - to defend myself, to defend others. On the other, my head was a mess, and I needed time to sort through it.

Maybe Mirri was right. Maybe it really was just a gift. I had a hard time believing that. Why me? I brought nothing to the table. I couldn’t fight. I couldn’t cast magic. I couldn’t even reliably walk in a straight line without supervision. I caused more problems than I solved. More pain than I eased.

And deep down, I knew I’d lied to Mirri. Maybe not outright, but I hadn’t told her the whole truth either. I did want her to be happy, but I also didn’t want her to leave. Maybe the hairpin would give her a reason to stay. A reason to put up with me. It was stupid, pinning something like that on a small piece of metal, but the thought wouldn’t leave me alone.

That night we made camp. I skipped dinner and crawled into my tent, staring up at the fabric for a long time. I wondered if I’d made the right decision. If I’d even been allowed to make one. Free will, fate, choice - it all tangled together until I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began. And somewhere in that mess was the uncomfortable truth that nothing was the same anymore.

I slept eventually.

The next morning, I felt… lighter. Not better, exactly, but steadier. I apologized to everyone - for storming off, for souring the mood, for dropping my responsibilities. I helped clean up breakfast, broke down camp, did whatever I could to make up for the night before.

By midday, things mostly returned to normal. Ashlara led. I followed. Mirri and Serah brought up the rear. Serah still watched me, still kept her distance, but she no longer tried to hide when I caught her looking. There was curiosity there now, not fear.

We stopped for lunch and Ashlara resumed my training. It became obvious pretty quickly that the staff didn’t magically make me a better fighter. What it did give me were… options.

With it in hand, I could make my body nearly weightless. Getting knocked down no longer meant staying down - I could lever myself back onto my feet with unsettling ease. I learned to vault over obstacles, though sticking the landing was still a work in progress. And perhaps strangest of all, only I was able to lift the staff. When Ashlara lay on the ground and I set it across her chest, it didn’t pin her with crushing ****, but she couldn’t move it either. She had to wriggle out from underneath, scowling the whole time.

That night, I helped set up camp, gathered firewood, and cleaned up after dinner despite Mirri’s offers to help. When the meal was done and the fire burned low, I pulled out the guitar and clumsily ran through a few scales. Ashlara ignored me. Serah looked unimpressed. Mirri watched with quiet curiosity.

Before turning in, I ran through the focusing exercises Mirri had taught me. Then I lay down, closed my eyes, and let sleep take me - still uncertain of where I was headed, but no longer running from it.

* * *

The next few days passed in much the same way. We walked. We drilled at lunch. Then we walked some more. Mirri kept up my lessons in magic, patient as ever. I took on more camp duties, always looking for something else to do - something useful. At night I practiced the guitar and ran through the focusing exercises. I still couldn’t light so much as a match with magic, but I kept at it, encouraged by Mirri’s steady optimism.

The weather grew cooler as we traveled. I wasn’t sure if that was the season changing or the climate itself, but the cold of night bit a little harder than before, and the mornings came with frost-kissed air.

One afternoon we stopped at a solitary farm, hoping for a warmer place to sleep. The owners were human, so I did the talking and convinced them to give us shelter in exchange for a bit of work.

Ashlara provided a strong back, hauling equipment and sacks of grain as if they weighed nothing. Mirri tended to a few sick animals, murmuring softly as she worked. I chopped wood. And Serah… well, Serah rarely did much around camp to begin with. I couldn’t tell if she didn’t know what to do, didn’t feel like asking, or simply thought it beneath her. If you asked her directly, she’d do it without complaint, but she never offered.

I still hadn’t managed a real conversation with her. She wasn’t as sharp as Ashlara, but her answers were short and rarely expanded upon. Always polite. Always distant. Talking to Ashlara was like talking to a wall. Talking to Serah was more like talking to a cat - easily bored and prone to wandering off mid-thought.

Despite the chill in the air, I’d worked up a sweat splitting logs. My shirt lay draped over a nearby stump. I’d never been much to look at, clothed or otherwise, and I generally avoided going shirtless because of that. Still, with limited clothes and no washing machine in sight, it seemed prudent to keep at least one set clean.

Serah sat on a nearby bench, lazily watching me work. I was making steady, if not particularly fast, progress. When I reached for another log, I caught sight of Ashlara staring at me intently. She was rigid, tense. Instinctively, I glanced over my shoulder, half-expecting some monster creeping up behind me.

There was nothing.

When I looked back, Mirri stood beside her. The warrior flushed. “I’m going for a walk,” she announced abruptly.

“Me too,” Mirri said.

Ashlara shot her a glare. “A different walk!” the petite goblin snapped, before stalking off.

The orc headed in the exact opposite direction.

I looked over at Serah. “Did I miss something?” I asked.

She shrugged, utterly unconcerned.

* * *

I kept working in the quiet for a while, the steady fall of the axe and the dull thud of splitting wood the only sounds in the cool air.

“Why have you not asked me?”

Serah’s voice cut through the rhythm. The axe glanced off the corner of a log, sending the wood spinning off the block. I was fairly certain this was the first time she’d actually spoken directly to me.

“Asked you what?” I said, setting the axe aside and wiping the sweat from my brow.

“Anything,” she replied. There was suspicion in her tone, her amber eyes fixed on me. “We have traveled together for eight days. You have yet to question me about who I am. What I want. How I came to be.”

“I tried to talk to you,” I said. “You didn’t seem like you wanted to be around me.”

She exhaled sharply. “You misunderstand. You know nothing about me. You rescue me from a wizard, invite me into your circle, and never once ask who I am, or why I was there.”

“Well,” I said carefully, “I do know a little about you.” I caught the flash of fear that crossed her face. “I know your name is Serah. That you’re soft-spoken and polite. That you’re an incredibly beautiful dragon… and that you don’t want to talk about what happened in that cave.” I shrugged. “I didn’t want to pry. You’ve been through a lot. I figured trust was something I had to earn.”

She scoffed. “How have you survived this long with such blind trust? How have you not been killed or enslaved?”

“Luck,” I said with a grin.

She rolled her eyes.

“I’m serious,” I added. “I was unbelievably lucky Ashlara found me. Of all the people I could’ve run into, it was her. She protected me. Kept me alive. And when I met Mirri…” I smiled despite myself. “I couldn’t have hoped for better. She’s kind, patient, and stubborn in the best ways. She protected me too. And now I’ve met you. Honestly? I couldn’t have been luckier.”

Her gaze sharpened. “So you are stupid as well.”

“I’ve been called worse,” I said, lifting the fallen log back onto the block. “Look, I haven’t demanded Mirri’s life story either. She shares what she wants, when she’s ready. I don’t know how she ended up with Hek. For all I know, she could be a murderer.” I met Serah’s eyes. “But look at her. Does she seem like one? Because I trust her with my life. I already have.” I set the log in place. “Same with Ashlara. And the same goes for you.”

“What is wrong with you?” she snapped.

“Ask my ex-wife,” I said reflexively. “She’s probably got a list.”

That didn’t help. Her or me, as my mood briefly darkened at the memories.

I sobered quickly. “Do you want to talk about it?” I asked, doing my best to keep my voice gentle.

“No,” she said sharply, crossing her legs and turning away, like a petulant princess.

I nodded. “Well, when you do want to talk, I’ll be here.”

I picked up the axe and went back to work.