Torchbearer - Chapter 5 (beta - early access)

“A Custodial room, you say,” Hazel hummed, peering around the notched stele and the platform below it. She leaned over, sniffing the stone then poked it with a claw. Without looking, she asked. “You sense it, right?”

“A little,” Miles said. He’d gone back to sitting down after having pulled a cushion. He was biting into some dried meat and cheese, enjoying the late afternoon sun as Hazel roamed about. In his soul, he could sense the barely perceptible current of mana wafting out of the platform. He hadn’t picked up on it earlier, but ever since he brought back the platform closer, he’d noticed it.

“What do you think?” Hazel asked, hopping nimbly to land in a seat at the edge of the blackstone structure to face him.

Miles pointed at the stele as he finished chewing. “I think that’s gonna somehow keep track of how deep I delve through that,” he said, lowering his arm to point at the platform. “Ideally, going deep would raise the mana being generated by the structure.”

Hazel clicked her tongue, shaking her head as she ran her finger along the stone. “Not generated. Funneled,” she said.

Miles raised a brow. “You sure?”

Hazel seemed to hesitate for a second, then nodded. “I… can’t exactly put my finger on it, but I’m sure. It’s a gut thing.”

Miles hummed. While Hazel remembered being asked before she was brought to work for him, she couldn’t remember much else from her old life. She often had gut feelings and impressions that had nearly always been accurate, so he was inclined to trust her.

“We’ll test it, then. I’m loaded on elixirs and potions, but this will soon become an issue. With the mana being so watered down up here, it’d take me 2 to 3 days to recover half my core through my natural regeneration. Same goes for the book. So… once things are settled here, I’ll head down through this. Should take me less than a week to hit the fifth if I get lucky with shortcuts. You could stay and keep an eye on the mana. Make sure it does change, because I don’t know if I’ll sense the difference between the first and fifth layers once I’m back.”

Hazel nodded along, eyes roaming about, and when he was done, she tilted her head as she spoke. “What if you have to use their exit again?” she asked, glancing down at the platform on the edge of which she was seated. “After all, we don’t exactly know how all of this works. It might spit you back out there,” she added, nodding toward the ghostly door. “And if you’re right about mana changing… boy is it going to be fun,” she said, eyes twinkling with dark amusement.

Miles scratched the back of his neck, grimacing. “Yeah it’s a theory, but if we’re right… that’s going to be a whole other thing. But we’ll worry about when we get there. As for potentially popping back out the other gate, yeah, it would suck. But hopefully the rule holds. I go out the way I got in. As for the outside gate, I’m going to have to go on a delve from there with the new identity as well, sooner or later. Ugh,” he groaned, shoving another piece of dried meat in his mouth.

Hazel chuckled at his misfortune. “And you were so excited about taking a break from the Dungeon. It’s already dragging you back in.”

“Yeaaah. But it’s like coming home after a long day and having to make something to eat and taking a shower, you know. I am tired, but I’m not so tired that I’d just go to sleep hungry and dirty. I’d rather get the work done now so I can really relax once it’s over.”

Hazel gave him a begrudging head tilt, and the flowers and on her horns swayed. “That’s a fair point. So why do you need to do it with the identity as well, then? Why not just use this?”

“It’s simple,” he said, taking a sip of water from his clay bottle. “Because when I exit over there and go through the Surveyors, they can tag my ID with how deep I got. Floor 20 is the minimum to establish a Silver guild with the Registry, and that’s how we can have our own delving rights, do business with other guilds, and bypass a lot of questions and headaches.”

“You thought this through,” Hazel noted hopping down from the platform.

“I had time for it,” Miles grinned. “So? What do you think of this place? Can we grow some crops? How about some spirit herbs and flowers?”

Hazel had been adjusting her robes when she slowed and slowly looked up at him. “How would I know? Do I look like a farmer to you?”

“You got flowers in your horns. Also you’re a witch.”

“I’m not a green witch.”

“Your eyes and robes are.”

“That’s reductive, master Miles. It’s borderline racist.”

“You literally grew roots to lock down Ashirruk so I could land the final blow on him.”

The two stared at each other, then Miles chuckled first and Hazel followed right after. She sat down in front of him, nearly two feet taller than he was even in her regular form, and eying the content of the coffee mixture through the container’s mouth, she took a swig.

“Ah… that’s good,” she said, licking her lips. Looking around, she nodded. “You got some variety of terrain for crops, but for most magically charged stuff we’re gonna need to do something about the mana. That’s your bottleneck. Spirit herbs eat the stuff up and if you want anything good, it’s gonna have to be much denser than this. As for the coffee you want to grow, I frankly don’t remember it. If you’ve got spare seeds, I can try to speed up the growth of one of the things and see what happens.”

Miles looked at the stele and sighed. “We’ll see what happens when I delve from here. And if that doesn’t work, there are plants that concentrate mana. But their uses is a limited and we’d have to plant so much of it that we’ll barely have enough space left for the good stuff. It’s not my first choice, frankly. But we’ll see. As for our first attempts—”

Miles stood up, and dug into his storage for a second before he pulled up two hoes. Extending the handle of one of the tools to Hazel, who eyed it distastefully, Miles smiled. “— let’s get started! We could start with one of the coffee seeds. See how that holds. Then we’ll do a couple rows of sugar cane and go from there? I’ve got a lot of stuff in storage. But let’s just start small. See what happens.”

Hazel gave him a slightly annoyed, dubious look. “Miles. I’m a fey witch specialized in curses and glamor. I’m not a farmhand.”

“But I bet you’ve got a mean green thumb. And I bet you’d enjoy that coffee you’re drinking a lot more if it was you who’d grown it”, he said, brows dancing. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

Hazel narrowed her eyes at him, took a swig, and sighed, looking down at the empty bottle. “I guess if we’ll end up making more of this stuff it’ll be worth it.”

“That’s the spirit!”

In what remained of the day, Miles and the one-handed Hazel traced two thirty-feet long furrows before filling both with sugarcane cuttings. Hazel had tried to use the hoe, but after a couple of awkward attempts, she chucked the little tool to the side and just pointed a finger down and ordered the soil to split open. A few paces away, after marking the spots with a few rocks, they put down one Arcanth coffee seed, and closing her eyes, Hazel held her green glowing palm atop of the little mound. Squatting next her, Miles watched, eyes reflecting the witch’s magic, until a little cute leaf peeked out of the soil.

“It’s working,” he whispered, a wide smile on his face.

“I’ll give it a little more so it’s stable, but I gotta stop soon,” Hazel warned, eyes flaring with focus.

“Got it,” Miles said as the stem reached up higher and as more leafs burgeoned outward, and a few moments later, Hazel stopped, breathing a little hard.

“That’s good enough, I think,” she said, and already, her form was glittering as the Skill called her away.

Miles winced. “Sorry for having exhausted you, Hazel. I’ll look into accelerating your recovery.”

Hazel gave him a simple smile. One that lacked her usual bite or theatrics. “You were right. It was fun. And it really looked like you were enjoying yourself. How come you’ve never done this before?”

Miles looked down at the young coffee plant and gently poked one of the leaves. “Because they couldn’t have grown with me dying every few weeks. Sure, I could have put some in pots… but it’s not the same. Out here, with me finally having the time and opportunity to be out of the loop, they can put down roots and grow. In a way, it’s even better that I can’t activate the loop here. It means what we did just now… cannot be erased. This happened. Today happened. It’s fixed. And no loop is going to take it away. For better or for worse.”

Miles hadn’t felt this free in years. The loop was such a powerful and broken ability to possess, but it had also trapped him for a century, hammering and melding his memories with what had happened, what nearly happened, and what never did. And sometimes, it was hard to tell which was which. But this… seeing Thalia, dealing with his rough exit out of the Dungeon, planting a few seeds and cuttings… this would happen just once. He didn’t have the option to mess around with his Skill to make the event canon and he didn’t have to worry whether he was trapping himself in a dangerous timeline or not.

He had no choice. There was no loop to reset. And that made it all special.

“Well said,” Hazel said after a few quiet moment. “Once we figure out a fix for the mana, I’ll be able to sustain my form for much longer but for now, I’m taking a nap. See you soon, Miles,” she said, voice echoing as she faded away.

Miles stood up and looked at the little patch of coffee and sugar. Then looking up at the moon, he summoned his bed roll out of storage and settled in. Stealing one last glance at the cuttings and at the tiny coffee tree, he smiled.

“Good night, little fellas.”

***

Thalia’s POV

Ever since the day started, Thalia had been expecting someone to tap her on the shoulder and tell her to come with them.

It had begun ever since she’d entered the gates with Brie and went back to report—where they’d gotten grilled about the dangers of stepping into dilapidated homes before they were sent away. That had been the lie they’d come up with. Which was that Brie had heard something in one of the home, she went to check, only for the foyer to drop on her head as soon as she tried to force the door open. She barely dodged back, but she still got nicked.

That had been their story, which they rehearsed on the way back to Rivergate. They repeated it at the door when they were asked about the dust and blood, and again at the Watch barracks, and a couple more time to curious colleagues.

Then Thalia repeated it to her mom—because things felt volatile enough as is and she didn’t want to drop the bomb that Miles was still alive now, without having to bob and weave around the subject that he might be a mildly infamous figure nowadays. Still, she did manage to get some sleep. But only a little. And ever since she’d woken up, she felt it in the air, that at any moment, someone was going to knock on the door or ask her some very pointed questions.

It didn’t happen though. Not in the barracks where she reported in, not after their squad leader chewed her up and partnered her with a senior instead of Brie, and not when she was working her shift.

Now that she was done, she really began thinking that they did get away with it. Stepping out of the Watch building, she found Brie waiting for her. And just like her, Brie had a traveling cloak on over some soft leather armor. A new one. The one she’d been intending to use for her own Delver’s Exam.

“Going somewhere?” Thalia asked, eying her friend’s outfit.

“I’d ask you the same,” Brie retorted, then with a furtive look around, she nodded toward the street and both began walking. They were quiet for a bit, eyes peeled as they walked toward the gates, and while Thalia caught herself twice from looking over her shoulders, Brie did.

“So. How was your night,” innocently asked Thalia.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Brie simply said, looking around as they passed the entrance to the Gate Wardens, the guild where they’d be taking their test. But they didn’t stop.

“I know what you mean. I keep expecting someone to show up and start asking questions. And… I keep thinking about the thing. The bottle. I spent a year collecting the exam fee. 3 golds. And this thing could pay for at least a fifty of the tests.”

Brie scoffed. “Fifty? Try a hundred or two. A ten gold-coin potion barely stops the bleeding of a small wound. That thing made my broken arm snap in place in two seconds. I couldn’t sleep yesterday. I’m almost sure it made me grow like an inch overnight.”

Thalia’s steps faltered as she took in her friend. “Wait that can’t be right, ” she mumbled, looking her friend up and down. Then her eyes widened. “Huh. You’re right. You are a little taller,” Thalia said, hand inching toward her sidepouch.

Brie slapped her hand down. “Don’t you dare. But jokes aside, seriously don’t. I had just a sip and it did all that to me. I honestly think that’s poison if you drink too much of it.”

Thalia rubbed her hand, but she kept thinking of the potion. Honestly, she wouldn’t say no to an inch or two in height. “I know it’s valuable but this is….crazy,” she said as they resumed their walk.

“We should take it to an alchemist to get appraised,” said Brie.

Thalia slowly turned to find Brie already staring at her, lips trembling, and they burst out laughing.

Brie rubbed a tear away from her eyes. “Can you imagine?”

“Imagine what?” Thalia grinned. “Waking up to a dagger in my stomach or getting accused of stealing it? If one of those crooks learned of it it’d be gone in the hour. I bet—”

Thalia’s voice died as she heard the sounds of someone heavy falling right behind her, and she glanced back, stomach twisting, and came face to face with a tall figure in all black, with an inscrutable blackness under their hood.

It was the rogue from yesterday.

Thalia opened and closed her mouth, taking a step back as she raised a protective hand in front of Brie. They were in the middle of the city? What happened to Miles?

What do I do?

Panic welled in her chest, and when the man raised his hands, she almost bolted, but her feet refused to move. Only for the figure to pull back their feature-concealing hood to reveal a young looking man with slicked back hair. Who then bowed his head.

“I wanted to apologize for yesterday’s incident, miss Thalia. Miss Brie. My behavior was unacceptable. And I will endeavor to make amends.”

Thalia stood there, stunned, and stealing a glance toward Brie, she found her friend just as dumbstruck.

“If you two are heading toward our common… friend, it would be my pleasure to escort you both.”

At that, she frowned. “Why are you going?”

Nonplussed, the rogue stole a furtive look around before answering. “Our friend entrusted me with an errand. I intend on heading to him to deliver what he requested. It would me my pleasure to ensure you arrive there safely and… unquestioned.”

Thalia’s brows knitted at that, and Brie just gave her a I-don’t-know-what’s-happening-but-you-deal-with-it shrug.

What’s Miles up to? And this man’s… awfully polite compared to yesterday, she thought. But it really did look like this was her step-sibling’s doing, and she did want to go check on him and see what he was up to. So she nodded. “Alright. Lead the way.”

The man gave her a smile which quickly disappeared as he put back his hood. “With pleasure.”

He stepped past them, and Thalia and Brie just shrugged and followed after him.

Yesterday had been crazy. Why not today as well?

***

Lott’s POV

Even after having had the night to sleep on it, Lott still felt a bit shaken by what had transpired the day prior. It had been easy enough to dodge the questions about his short absence, and it almost looked as if his own handler was about to start grilling him when he managed to pass the message that this was Choir business.

I still can’t believe he’s one of us. The Bagman’s a Shadow.

He would have lost the bet, of course, but considering he had to keep sir Miles’s identity secret, he couldn’t really reveal he knew the bet concluded.

Arriving at the controls at the gate, he edged toward the special lane, away from the busy section. The guard took a second to see his identification before they looked past him. “Sir. Are these two with you?”

“They are,” Lott simply said. The sentry gave back a nod to those behind him, and he was let through the tightly guarded and half-raised gate.

“We might have not been able to leave,” he heard one of the girl whisper, and a smile pulled on his lips.

With this, Lott was on his way to earning a spot in the Wanderer’s circle. His first impression was awful, but he’d make sure he’d do his best to recover.

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A/N: So what are you guys thinking so far? Still good? Not too confusing?