[YF] Chapter 253: Mages

Leal felt awkward.

She shifted on her feet, looked back down the hall she came and considered if it would be better if she waited elsewhere. The two guards standing besides her hadn’t spoken a word, and each second seemed longer than the last. They were staring. Each time she glanced the way of the short pair of dohrni, she caught their eyes.

The purple one, the woman, pretended like she wasn’t looking, and turned away each time Leal glanced her way. But the dohrni with deep blue slightly transparent skin didn’t bother. He held her gaze each time she tried to discretely inspect them. Never speaking.

Leal didn’t know what they were thinking. They were Beiths; the strongest in the pact nations besides the Inner Circle. Both were strong warriors that could likely kill her in an instant with those blades they kept strapped between their tentacles… but Leal didn’t find herself intimidated by that. Not after she’d spent so much time around the strong in the army and with Solvei.

It was the silence.

Leal hated standing amongst others when they weren’t speaking. It sent her mind spiralling. What were they thinking? Had she missed a part of her fur in her grooming? Could they tell how awkward she felt?

She needed to speak. Leal needed to be the one to initiate the conversation if she wanted this uncomfortable silence to end. It was something she’d long since learnt; if a situation was uncomfortable, nobody else would fix that for her.

It would be helpful if the sound of shouting from before made it through the doors, but they could not hear a peep. In the brief moments the set of doors had been opened before, Leal had seen the inscription that inlaid the heavy timber. If she was to guess, it was one based on pressure hyle to prevent the passage of sound. Not something she’d ever seen before, but interesting non-the-less. Appropriate for a place of political meetings.

Leal glanced at the woman again, catching the twitch of her eyes as they shifted back to the far end of the hall. They weren’t going to speak for her. Leal needed to start or they’ll continue to stand around in this awkwardness for who knows how long the meeting would still go for.

She gathered her courage, opened her mouth, and found her mind blank.

What kind of conversation could she start for a couple of guards? Was there something that would be inappropriate for dohrni? Was it possible they held a grudge from when New Vetus invaded during the previous war? Was she being presumptive that they’d even want to speak to her?

Maybe something as simple as speaking about the weather would be a good opener? That always works. Leal opened her jaw to speak… and immediately shut it again.

Weather? What weather? They’ve been facing nothing but a sky of ash for the longest time now. Asking of the weather would be like slapping them. They would take it as her gloating about how New Vetus has mostly avoided the unnatural ashen winter.

Leal shook her head, attracting the eye of the purple dohrni again.

She couldn’t let her mind keep circling like this. Even if they did think her odd, what would it matter? She’d likely never see them again after today. It was a shame neither was a mage. If they were, Leal wouldn’t have had any trouble starting up a conversation over the things they had in common. But they weren’t. She needed to deal with that and say something. Anything.

“So… wha—”

Leal was interrupted by the large timber doors swinging open and a dozen people striding out. Two mages with an impressive array of markings leaving no visible skin beneath their dense, interweaving artistry led the pack, followed by some other pact nation races and the áed.

Leal was so caught up in staring, that she didn’t notice Solvei until her small friend tapped her arm. “Come on. You won’t need to miss out on this next part.”

Leal, not seeing any reason to object, followed the áed. Though, from the dirty glare an albanic sent Solvei’s way, Leal had to guess that it might be better if she did sit out. But once more, before she could speak, the opportunity was taken.

“We’re going to fight some duels to prove to this lot that we are capable,” Solvei whispered, motioning behind herself. Leal looked back, and sure enough, the rest of the arrangement of leaders were making their way through the hall behind them.

“My family’s old training chamber should be suitable,” a purple dohrni with a unique set of marking arrays strode up to them, making it clear she’d heard Solvei. “But I have my doubts about its ability to survive an attack of an Inner Circle mercenary. Please ask your elders not to destroy it; the place is the only reason this half of the castle hasn’t crumbled.”

Leal almost missed what was said. Too busy trying to identify the hyle that might match the unknown markings of the woman. The stone markings are obvious, but between them, there is another that she simply can’t remember having ever seen. Leal was certain she wouldn’t have forgotten any of the memorable signs.

That meant it was one of the rare hyle types. One so rare that the indicative features were unrecorded. Or, at least unrecorded in any of the books or scrolls she’d gotten her hands on.

“What marking is that?”

The words were out her mouth before she could even remind herself these were some of the biggest names in the pact nations. Despite how she towered over the people here, Leal suddenly felt tiny.

In the privacy of her own mind, she cursed herself. Why couldn’t she have had this openness before, when it was just a couple of guards she might have insulted, rather than anyone important. Leal wondered if it was too late to hope she was just some attendant or something.

“Oh, Leal. This is Princess Imiha,” Solvei said, completely oblivious to Leal’s mounting inner turmoil. “I think I told you about when we met over on the other side of the Alps.”

Leal could feel her heart sink. She was doomed. A royal?! Leal didn’t know much about the politics of the pact nations, but there was no world in which she hadn’t just insulted someone important.

“Please, just Imiha,” the dohrni mage said. “I gave up my family’s title. The matriarchy is no more, after all.” She seemed unbothered to Leal, but the ursu never did have an eye for expressions — especially those of another race — so she couldn’t tell if it was genuine. “But you want to know of my markings? But I can definitely show you, and see if you can guess.”

Leal had to physically hold herself back from expressing her relief visibly. The dohrni’s amused smirk a comforting sign that there was no hard feelings.

In the former princesses’ tentacle, a rock condenses from the flowing amber of its hyle form. Once solidified into a physical piece, she tosses it softly in the air. When it landed back in her hands, it seems to take a mind of its own. First, the stone bounced back the way it came. Then, when it landed in her tentacle for the second time, it jerked to the side and rolled around to stop suspended while barely touching her purple membrane.

“Momentum,” Leal said immediately. “Or maybe some type of force. At least, assuming you’re not cheating by controlling it with stone markings that light up where I can’t see?”

Imiha’s eyes widened. “You were right the first time,” she said with a tone of clear disbelief. “How did you…?”

“I’ve recently had a few rediscoveries in how hyle works. The idea that material aspects and intangible concepts can have hyle too has been on my mind a lot lately.” Leal gushed, staring at the glowing ivory markings. “It’s incredible to see that someone already went beyond our self inflicted limitations of perspective.”

Leal tried to hide the slight hint of accusation in her tone, but apparently it was impossible to hide from the politically inclined Imiha.

“I’ve been sworn to secrecy from my teacher, so I could never tell anyone. But having someone else discover it for themselves is completely different,” Imiha announced her rather questionable reasoning. “Most people not already in the know usually assume pressure or a type of force, but neither of those can apply instantaneous direction changes.”

Leal and Imiha immediately launched into a discussion. Both trying to needle each other for information. Leal had learnt plenty from her discoveries, but the Anatlan energy that allowed her to switch versions of herself stopped short of giving her answers on rare elements. Her mirrored forms had to have been possible in the first place for the shift to occur. In no world could she have gotten access to such rare markings. She would have to learn them herself. Which is why talking to someone with actual experience was incredible.

Even if Imiha didn’t share her markings with Leal, just listening to the woman talk about the difference in the way the hyle types interacted with the world compared to the more traditional type made this whole trip worth it in Leal’s eyes. As much as she enjoyed her time with Solvei, the áed’s eyes always glazed over when Leal spoke in depth of markings and hyle.

“There is a limit on the instant transfers of momentum. I could do so much with the little rock because I can disperse the energy through my body instead. There’s no such thing as cancelling out momentum, but say I push some spikes up to speed in a circle, I can have each opposing spear transfer their energy and crash down on a single point. Whatever’s stuck between becomes a pincus—” Imiha’s explanation of how she used momentum hyle in battle was cut off by a voice at their side.

“Did you two want to watch? Or should I leave you to your… discussion?” Solvei’s teammate, Remus, asked.

Suddenly Leal discovered she’s no longer in the hallway she thought she was. Somehow, they’d found themselves in a large open chamber even by ursu standards. It was… completely undecorated, which was a major shift from the ornate — albeit fractured — stonework of the rest of the castle. Just flat stone no matter where one looked. Besides the curved opening behind her, of course.

In the centre of the hall, Solvei stood across from the volan that had walked besides the mages from earlier. Before Leal could inspect the small creature, it was gone. A clatter rung out, and Leal turned to watch Solvei looking at her hands, with her spear falling to a rest at the wall behind her.

“To be disarmed so easily…” the volan murmured, her voice carrying from the ceiling where she hung.

Before Leal or Solvei could turn to look, she was moving again. She dove, easily moving faster than sound, but left no obvious ripples through the air, nor any audible cracks. Her long needle scraped along Solvei’s cheek, before she hit the ground and spun it to press threateningly into the áed’s chest.

As the side of Solvei’s skin-like face burned, the volan spoke. “I am disappointed. For the one that achieved enough in the last war to have been denoted a nickname not able to even defend herself… the áed aren’t worth our while.”

The silence in the hall was deafening. Enough that Leal’s sigh could be heard by all. This volan didn’t know just how useless her weapon was, regardless of the many complex inscriptions coating it. And she had to go and insult Solvei’s family. With how wound up her friend had been in the past months — not to any lacking reason — Leal didn’t think Solvei would be in the mood to hold back.

“How strong did you say the walls were?” Leal asked the dohrni mage besides her.

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Should I continue with Leal's perspective for the duels, or go back to Solvei? Alternatively, I could go with one of the people that don't know the aed at all.

I didn't explore much of Leal's desires or feelings in response to the alternate version of herself in this chap as it didn't really fit, but if I write a second from her perspective, that's the sort of internal dispute i'll focus on in the background of the fights.

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