Chương 11: Friends & Family

Once they were back on the flying carriage, Ari finally asked Elric what a Phasewalker was.

"They're an Eastern sect," he explained as they started home.

"Order of the Shifting Phases. They believe in a layered reality, and that true mastery of stoichiomancy can only be achieved by moving between phases at will."

"I don't understand what moving between phases means."

"Each essence has different isotopes that, when placed into a spell, give it a different phase. For example, Calor-β gives heat, while Calor-ɑ gives a kinetic force. Phasewalkers believe they can shift a single calor essence from one isotope to another while holding the rest of the spell form steady, thereby remaking the whole spell at will. This is what makes them so dangerous."

"Ah." That explained the bond switching she'd seen in the Phasewalker's spell form. He had been shifting through different phases of the same spell, giving himself motion, heat, and explosive force all at once, without the need for multiple spell forms. It was genius, and they probably conserved a lot of essence that way.

"Can I learn that?" she asked.

"Possibly, but I couldn't teach you. I don't know how to do it myself. It's a skill mastered only by those in the sect, and attempting to share sect secrets likely triggers certain death."

"Oh."

"Yes. And it's probably for the best that the skill remains an enigma, to prevent amateurs from attempting it. Switching phases is an extremely technical and challenging task, something that only the Phasewalkers have perfected. Failure carries dire consequences. Even one misstep can lead to severe entropic backlash, like what happened to the one in the market." Arielle didn't mention that the entropic backlash hadn't been caused by the man's misstep, and it had, in fact, been her doing.

She didn't want to get in trouble for using magic without permission again.

"The Phasewalkers used to be a more neutral sect," Elric continued, "Having originated from one of the Calor-dominant clans. However, after the sect was denied a seat in the Celestial Assembly, some of their members have taken to committing acts of terrorism as revenge. The sect leader, of course, denies all this and claims that the acts are being committed by defectors of the clan and are not sanctioned by the sect at all. But I'm not sure how much I believe that."

"Why not?"

"It's a long story, but essentially, there are disputes about who the head of the sect should be. The former head was caught colluding with the head of the demonic sect. Do you know who that is?"

"No, but I'm not sure I care." Now that he was discussing politics, Ari promptly lost interest in the direction of the conversation and asked,"Why do you never display your celestial blessing? You keep it restrained, don't you?" He looked taken aback by the question, but answered honestly.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Frankly? It's because I find it tacky. Unrestricted authority, or celestial blessing as it's more formally known, is essentially like walking into the room and throwing gold coins in the air so people think you're important. It's a cheap way to earn admiration and respect, and it often has the opposite effect, in signifying a distinct insecurity and a lack of mastery. After all, only the most talented mages have enough control to restrict their authority." She nodded.

"So Master Phineas is tacky, insecure, and untalented."

"No." Elric choked and snorted at the same time.

"No, I wouldn't say that at all. Well, maybe a little insecure, but definitely don't say that to his face. Or repeat to anyone else." She nodded.

"Is Master Phineas a friend of yours?" He thought about it and said, "I don't know. I suppose. It's hard to have true friendship or anything more than acquaintanceship with someone in a different position of power than I am. I used to believe it was possible, but now... we can try and pretend for some time, but eventually something will happen to reveal the vast distance in our station, and that can cause a split in the friendship as well. I guess that's what happened with Phineas and me." He cleared his throat.

"I suppose that's another reason I prefer to restrict my authority. Most of the people I work with are either adept-level mages or unascended, and sometimes they treat me with a deference that can be off-putting and isolating."

"What about other Archmages? Can't you be friends with them?" He made a face.

"No. First of all, there are only about fifteen Archmages in existence right now, and they're spread out all over the continents. Most of them are old and cantankerous, and the young ones are arrogant and crazy. The white-haired man you just met is one of them."

"Archmage Giovanni? He seemed sane and friendly."

"It was a ploy to get you to let down your guard. He was toying with you." He looked her in the eye.

"Be very careful around him, Arielle. He's not entirely a bad person, but he has a slight sadistic streak that you will only discover when it's too late." He shook his head.

"He's like a barely domesticated dire wolf, parading as a pup. I wouldn't be surprised at all if he allowed those Phasewalkers to escape just so he could have the pleasure of hunting them down."

"Why would he do that?"

"I just told you why. Because he's a sadist."

"But it's so wasteful. The Phasewalkers caused a lot of damage." Elric shrugged.

"He must have known I would be around to fix it. Even if I wasn't, I'm not sure how much he would have cared. One thing about having that much power is that it makes things very boring." Ari looked down and flexed her fingers in her lap. Everything Elric had told her did somewhat dim her enthusiasm and cast a dark cloud over what she'd thought would be a significantly bright future.

"I thought having power made it easier to make friends." It was one of the things in the 'pro' column of her list, and part of why she was so excited to start at the Academy. She thought that being an ascendant might make up for her social ineptitude and make her more of an attractive candidate for companionship. It was a simple equation. People liked useful people. Power made people more useful. So if she gained power and became useful, more people would like her.

"It doesn't," Elric said, dashing her hopes even more.

"People might admire you, but it will be for the wrong reasons. It won't be for who you are. It will be for what you can do for them." Ari perked up.

"Why is that a bad thing?"

"Because it leaves you vulnerable to being taken advantage of." She didn't understand. Friendship was a trade, of which the cost was some kind of labor. If she was okay doing the labor, why was it bad to earn friendship that way? He looked at her for some time and told her, "I'll have to warn you, the first couple of years at the academy aren't really for making friends. It's the most competitive year, with the highest attrition rate, and the fact that you're starting in the middle of it won't help."

"Oh." That made her sadder.

"One of my sisters is currently in Cohort 3. If you want, I can talk to her and ask her to welcome you on campus. That way, you have a built-in friend."

"No," she said instantly.

"I don't want that." He nodded.

"Just as well. I don't know that she would listen to me anyway. I'm certainly not her favorite person in the world. In fact, I think she might hate me." Arielle blew out her breath.

"My sister likes me, but she does silly things because of it. A few months ago, she paid a girl called Greta to be friends with me. A copper coin every week."

"Oh," he said.

"That's sweet but–""Upsetting. Very upsetting. I want to earn friendship on my own. I want people to like me because they think I'm likable, not because they're being paid." He winced.

"Yes, I can see how that would sting."

"I have no other friends in the swamp. At the schoolhouse, people thought I was strange. They always think I'm strange. I don't want that anymore. I want to make friends here."

"Is that part of the reason you said yes to my offer?" She nodded.

"People like people with power." His expression shifted.

"Yes, but you shouldn't want people to like you just because you're powerful too," he said.

"Believe me, that can feel nice at first, but it gets old and very lonely."

"Are you lonely?"

"Sometimes." She pressed her lips together and debated what to say next, running her palm on her frock and wrapping it around her knees. She looked at them, counting the lines underneath her knuckle as she admitted, "I just want people to like me first. I can figure out if they like me for the right reasons later." There were a few beats of silence before he sighed.

"Well, you have at least one friend now."

"Who?"

"Me." Her head snapped to him.

"You want to be my friend?" Her eyes widened.

"Really?"

"If you'll have me. I mean, we are cousins now. We have similar standings and similar backgrounds, caught between the world of the mundane and the ascended."

"Yes." She nodded slowly.

"I suppose that's true."

"It is." A slow smile spread across her face, mirroring the one on his.

"We can be friends?" she asked again. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

"Yes," he said.

"We might not have a choice, since we're officially a fake family." Relief spreads through her muscles along with a sense of accomplishment. Her first unpaid friend.

"How often can I write letters to you?" she asked.

"I assume I can send letters from the Academy?"

"Yes, but I'll give you a messaging scroll for convenience. That way, you can write whatever message you have for me in it, and I'll receive it in my adjoining scroll."

"Wow." That fascinated her. Ascendants made things so much simpler. She wondered if she could do the same thing with her father.

"How often can I do that?"

"Anytime you want. I'm not sure how often I'll actually answer. I get busy sometimes, but I'll try to respond as soon as I can manage."

"Okay." She beamed, suddenly filled with renewed joy. As the carriage moved higher in the air, she told him, "I'm so glad I met you, Archmage Elric."

"I'm glad I met you, too, Arielle."

After Gio delivered the Phasewalkers and filled out his report, he made a beeline for Youth Affairs. Something had nagged at him all afternoon, and he had to assuage his curiosity, or it would never leave. As he walked down the hall, he saw a man in green robes walking up, preoccupied with some scrolls he was reading. Ah yes. He was familiar. Gio remembered that the man handled youth evaluations.

"Philip," he called out and waved when the man looked up.

"Nice to see you again." The man cleared his throat, adjusting his robe.

"It's Master Phineas, Archmage Gio."

"Please, just call me Gio." He cocked his head.

"I heard you completed an evaluation this afternoon. On Elric's cousin."

"Yes," Phineas/Philip answered.

"I didn't know he had such a cousin."

"Well, he does. He has plenty of them." Phineas/Philip seemed very uncomfortable with this line of questioning, which only made Gio more curious.

"May I see her system scores?"

"You know that's confidential." Gio chuckled.

"I know it sounds like I'm asking, Philip, but I'm not really asking, if you know what I mean." Phineas swallowed. He clearly wanted to argue, but was smart enough to know how outranked he was. He looked around, and when no one was coming to save him, he nodded. A few moments later, Gio was witnessing something truly wonderful. Cores in perfect balance. A capacity that was high for her level. This Arielle was going to be interesting. But apart from that, he'd expected more. There had to be something more.

Especially since Philip was radiating nerves like a dirty sewer rat underneath the holy altar.

"What aren't you saying, Philip?" Gio asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes, you do."

"No, I don't." He leaned in and grinned at his face.

"Why don't I find out then?"

Arielle had wanted to spend the next day studying and catching up on the scholarly material. Elric had told her that since she was starting in the middle of the year, she was behind on a lot of the theory, so she was desperate to get ahead. However, too many things happened that day to derail that. The first was errands that her mother had her run in the morning and afternoon, in preparation for her departure. She needed her hair cut, her skin smoothed.

She needed to eat a variety of foods and drink herbs for her stomach to adjust well to a new diet. She needed to pray for a safe transition. That took most of the day, and by the time she was back, it was time to wash up and get ready for the meal. Dinner with grandmother was usually quiet, which Ari liked, but tonight it was more hushed than usual.

"Your mother has let me know that you will be starting at the academy," Grandmother said, eyeing Ari with her gray gaze.

"Yes," Ari answered.

"I'm not for it. You will lose your sight soon and get upset that you wasted your time."

"I won't," Ari said.

"You will."

"Don't say that, Mother," Thessa said.

"I'm not saying anything wrong. Every Mossborne who had even a slight ability eventually had it fade away."

"Her ability is more than just slight," Celie said, and their mother shot her a look. The true extent of Ari's magic was supposed to be kept a secret from everyone but them. Archmage Elric had stressed that.

"It's a waste of time," Grandmother said.

"You should be training to be a warrior, or taking your mother's place so she can do her duty and my son can come home." Her mother stiffened. She glared at their Grandmother, who stared back at her just as ferociously.

"Are you saying that mother is the reason he's gone?" Ari asked because she wanted to know. The two women ignored her.

"Is that what that means?" She turned to her brother, for clarification, to make sure she'd read that particular situation correctly.

"Grandmother is angry at mother, right?" Brom snorted.

"It only took you ten years to realize." Ten years? Had their grandmother been angry all this time?

"Go upstairs, Ari," Thessa said.

"But I'm not done eating."

"Take your food with you." Ari wondered what she'd said wrong, but she was grateful for the reprieve, so she didn't fight it. She ate as she read Beginner's Spellcrafting, but before she could do more than crack open the first few pages, her mother came back upstairs.

"Your grandmother is gone," Thessa said.

"Your friend is outside waiting for you."

"Who?"

"Greta."

"She's not my friend," Ari said, without looking up from her book. That didn't make mother leave. Instead, she walked into the room, sitting on Ari's bed. It creaked under her weight.

"Are you really going to leave without saying anything to her?" she asked gently as she rubbed Ari's hair. Ari didn't like to be touched like that by anyone who wasn't her mother. Even then, only for a short time.

"Sometimes people do the wrong thing for the right reasons," Mother said.

"I know that."

"And sometimes they hurt our feelings unintentionally, even when they care about us."

"I know that too."

"Life is a long journey to take without making any mistakes." Ari ignored her and pretended to still be reading, but her mother knew her too well. She tucked her hand on her chin and dragged it up so she could look into her eyes.

"Life is also a long journey to take alone," she said.

"I won't be alone," she said, "I have you. And Celie. And Brom. And Archmage Elric, who is my new friend and my fake cousin." The Archmage had explained the cousin ruse to her family when they'd returned from shopping.

"I'm also going to make new friends at school anyway."

"I see. So does that mean that you want to just toss away your old friends? Out with the old and in with the new?"

"She wasn't really my friend."

"Telling yourself that won't make it hurt less." Her mother got up and walked to the door, stopping to deliver the final line.

"I just don't want you to grow up with too many regrets." After she left, Ari's heart twisted in her chest. She felt unsettled, restless. Though her wrist was bare, she could still feel the impression of the woven bracelet Greta had made for her. A friendship bracelet. Ari sighed and got up. It was better to make a clean break. Greta was outside sitting on the raft by the pond. Ari walked over to join her.

"Hey," she said. Greta turned around.

"Hey." Her freckles stood out against her tanned skin, sparkling in the moonlight like stars.

"Your mother said I could wait."

"Oh." So her mother had known that she would give in eventually.

"You didn't have to come."

"Of course I did. I have to do it until you forgive me."

"There's nothing to forgive. You didn't do anything wrong." Greta looked almost relieved, but then she frowned.

"I didn't?"

"No. Celie's the one who started all this. It's all her fault."

"Oh, but..." Greta didn't know what to say to that. Ari stared at her. She suddenly recalled all the things that annoyed her about Greta at the beginning of their friendship. The other girl was constantly unsure of things and took a really long time to formulate a single sentence. She repeated stories all the time, with just enough details tweaked to drive Ari nuts, and force her to correct her. She was also very touchy, which had taken a lot of getting used to. But Ari had gotten used to it. All of it.

She'd even started to like it. She really liked Greta and her bright smile and her freckles. It was a shame Greta hadn't truly liked her back.

"Thank you," she told the other girl.

"For being my friend. Even for a short time." Greta bit her lip and said, "Ari..." But she still hadn't figured out what to say by the time Ari went back inside.

Ari didn't get much sleep and expected to make up for it in the morning. However, the day that she was to leave was far too chaotic. Ari hated chaos. It made her feel itchy and unsettled, and she was angry to be starting the trip on the wrong note. And it was all her sister's fault. She woke Ari up several seconds before the third rooster call and yelled, "Surprise!" As Ari blinked awake in her orange-hued room, Celie presented a neatly folded row of fabric.

"What's that?" Ari asked.

"Clothes that you wear under your student robes," she said.

"I already have clothes."

"I threw them out."

"You did what?" Alarm had her bolting up and glancing at her already packed suitcase that was now open and missing key items of clothing. She glared at Celie.

"How could you?"

"Please. There were only seven of them."

"Yes. That's all I need. There are only seven days in a week." And then she would go to the river and wash on the seventh day so that everything would be clean again. She paused. Did they have a river at Erynwall? She would have to check. Celie rolled her eyes.

"That's not enough. I won't have you starting your new school year wearing rags that you've had for years." She held up the clothes in her hand.

"These are better. They aren't my hand-me-downs, so they won't be too big on you."

"I liked your hand-me-downs," she said. It gave her comfort to wear clothes that her sister had worn, plus the way they swam on her body made her feel not as small as she was.

"I like the size too, because people then conceive me as bigger than I am. I imagine it's how peafowls feel when they flex their plumage to deter predators."

"That's what you thought you looked like?" Celie laughed.

"You looked like a drowned chicken more than anything." Ari frowned, then she considered the smooth, uncreased fabric in her sister's hand, unstained and brightly colored.

"These are all new?"

"Yes. Only high-quality braided wool because I know how sensitive you are about fabric."

"You shouldn't have done that. Now I owe you a debt, and there isn't enough time to pay it back." Celie's lip curled."You realize I'm your older sister, right?" Ari blinked.

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"It means that you don't have to keep score. You always do that, and it kind of hurts."

"It shouldn't hurt. It should comfort that I keep an excellent tally of our favor exchanges and I always pay back promptly." Celie gave her that disappointed, frustrated look that Ari recognized and just pulled her into a hug that had Ari stiffening for two seconds, before she forced her body to relax.

"I'll miss you," Celie said.

"Even though you get on my last nerve."

"You get on my last nerve, too," Ari said.

"But I will also miss you." It was sinking in that she was going to leave her home for somewhere she didn't know. She wouldn't see her sister every day, and her brother ever in non-hunting season. She would no longer taste her mother's cooking. Not to mention, she was going to a place that she was wholly unprepared for. In unfamiliar clothes. Everything would change. That was stressful to think about, but she couldn't go back now.

"You have fun at your school, okay?" Celie said, her voice watery.

"'I'll give you a few herbs. If anyone tries anything with you, then you sneak it into their drink. Okay?"

"Celie, please don't make her poison anyone," Brom commented. He was leaning against the door frame, having snuck up on them during their hug.

"Or we'll all be hanged for her crime."

"I'm not poisoning anyone," Ari said.

"That place is pretty wicked, I've heard. Nasty ass spirits roaming the place, eating people."

"Elric says that's all a myth. No one is eating anyone."

"And if they did eat Ari, they wouldn't be able to digest her, and they'd have to spit her out immediately," Brom added. Celie tossed her dagger at him, and Brom dodged while laughing. And then their fun was interrupted by a knock on the door. It was time.