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Chapter Sixteen:
A Guru and his
Priestess
Cadillac woke up the next morning, as
bright and chipper as an alligator at feeding time. Everything looked like it
was after him, and since he was so small, everything looked like it was going
to get him too. Except Marium. “She would never harm me. We’re teammates.”
Marium was snoring lightly, turned
away from Faede, who was sprawled out in a rather uncomfortable way. He was
taking up most of the space on the bed, and Marium was almost falling off.
Suddenly, Faede kicked in his sleep, and that sent Marium crashing to the
ground with a hollow thud. “Ugh, did anyone get the number of that bus?”
The short guru helped Marium to her
feet and checked for any bruises or sprains. “I’m fine, Cad. Don’t worry, I’ve
got worse in store for him when he gets better.”
This made Cadillac grin in agreement.
“Yes, I’m sure you do. So, are you ready to start the search? I told Jonah that
he’s going to stay here and watch over Faede while we’re gone.”
Marium was silent, contemplating their
predicament. “Altaire. I think I should go with Altaire, because you’re a
master magic user, but we’re just novices.”
“I’m pretty sure that Altaire can take
care of himself, Marium.” Jonah’s voice was all it took to convince Marium to
go with Cadillac. “Besides, I’m sure that our perverted little squirrel guru
would just LOVE your company, Marium…”
Cadillac turned bright red and turned
to Jonah, embarrassed. “I’m not a pervert! You two are ganging up on me, it
isn’t fair!”
Laughing, Marium scooped the
sputtering guru into her arms and squeezed him in a bear hug, just enough to
get him to stop whining. “Look here, Guru, I don’t want you whining like that
while we’re on our quest. It isn’t that fun to listen to.”
She put him down, and then noticed
that Altaire was standing, as silent as ever, in the shadows of the walls.
Marium also noted that Faede was still asleep. “Hm. I really don’t think we
should wake him before we go. And Cad?”
“What’s wrong, Marium?” he asked,
hoping he could be of help. Marium tapped her toe on the ground before dashing
to the closet to retrieve her sheathed sword and then strapped it loosely over
her shoulder. It hung, neglected on her back.
“You said that physical distance will
bring pain. Do you have a dispel spell somewhere that could shield him and me
from that effect in any way?” Marium questioned, snapping on her discarded
bracers and armor. Cadillac gave her an apologetic look.
“I’m sorry, Marium. That isn’t my area
of expertise…” he stated, quietly. Suddenly, there was a grunt of frusteration.
Faede was struggling to prop himself up, since he was now awake. As he erupted
into a coughing spree, Jonah advanced to give him a hand, but the mage’s pride
made him recoil, not accepting the gentle giant’s hand.
“Warrioress, come here.” He commanded,
making Altaire glare at him, unbeknownst to everyone else in the room. The High
Priest Yang didn’t like when Faede called the Priestess that. It wasn’t
respectful, even if they were above and beyond titles. In any case, Marium did
come forward, and knelt down to his level, since he couldn’t get up any
farther.
A pale, shaky hand went into his
shirt, and felt around, searchingly. Faede removed his hand and with it came a
necklace. The necklace was just a regular, silver chain, but hanging on the
thin chain was a single, silver ring. Embedded on the circlet of silver was one
small jewel, the color of a blazing red flame. In fact, the gem was shaped as a
flame, and upon further investigation, the ring wasn’t just a plain band, it
was shaped like a curled snake. In its mouth was the jeweled flame.
“Esimorp fo Evol… tcetorp, Dleihs,
tcelfer lla niap… Dull tie effects…” his hand clasped the ring tightly, and his
awesome power flowed into it. He seemed to become a shade paler, and coughed at
once. After he regained himself, he firmly snatched up Marium’s hand which had
been resting by her side the whole time. “Now, as long as you wear this, you
will be shielded from the pain of the tie, and you won’t be affected by the
distance between us.”
It seemed that only Cadillac
understood what this meant. “… Why don’t you make one for yourself, Faede?”
The mage sent Cadillac a look that
said, ‘Shut up, she doesn’t know’, but Marium caught on quickly. “Faede, what
about you? You’ll still feel the pain of our distance, and also you’ll have the
pain of that disease! Make yourself one, or I won’t go!”
Faede gritted his teeth together, then
spoke. “I don’t have enough energy left to make myself one.”
Marium was struck silent. She felt
like she had been hit by a lightning bolt, and it had ripped her heart in half.
Altaire was just as surprised, in fact, he almost fell from his spot against
the wall. Cadillac and Jonah stood pensively, eyeing the three younger ones. “He put me before himself… He’s sacrificing
himself for me… Faede, oh Faede… please, don’t do this…”
“Then you keep the necklace. You need
it more than I do, to dull at least some of the tie effects…” Marium went on
and on, not realizing that Faede was trying to protect her without fully
embarrassing himself in the process. But his temper was wearing down... fast.
“… and besides, it is your necklace…”
“MARIUM! I’m doing this to protect
you!!! There, I said it, now leave, let me die in peace! As long as you wear my
ring, you won’t feel anything that I feel, understand?! Never take it off,
never! It’s my gift to you, now go, just leave…” Faede let himself fall back
against the bed without trying to cushion his landing. Marium, stricken with a
strange, heartbreaking emotion, didn’t respond to anything, just stared at the
now unconscious form of the fiancée she had unwittingly blood tied herself to.
She didn’t feel Jonah gently lift her
up and place her outside the room, and she didn’t hear Cadillac as he tried to
explain where they were going first. Finally, she reacted to something. Altaire
silently took the necklace out of her hands, and put it on her, kindheartedly.
As he snapped the two ends together, Marium whirled around and threw her arms
around him and his giant, billowing cloak. She couldn’t cry, because no tears
would come to her eyes, so she just held on to him, her heart finally able to
feel love toward everyone, not just Faede.
“Come
on, Marium. There’s no time for this now… we have to help the mage in
training.” She was so happy just to hear his inner voice speak to her,
clear as a bell. With a small smile that was more to nothing than to anything,
Marium stepped back.
“Yeah, Faede needs me. We’d better
hurry, Cad. Finding that silver cahlot’s lair is first on our agenda, let’s get
a move on.” As Marium started off, she could have sworn she heard Faede whisper
to her. “Never… take it… off…”
She felt her heart skip a beat, and
she turned to glance back at the door of Faede’s room. Jonah was still outside
of the room, leaning against the room, seeing them off. “You’ll take good care
of him, right Jonah?”
The weaponsmith smiled, brainlessly,
and nodded. “Of course, of course. Now get going, you’ve got a quest to go on.”
Marium nodded in reply, then lifted
her hand up to grasp the ring that dangled from the thin chain of the necklace.
Energy seemed to swirl through her body, giving her strength. “Hold on, Faede.
Just … wait for me…”
Her mumbling was cut short as Cadillac
grabbed her other hand and pulled her out of the inn, by force. Lightheartedly,
dispite the mission’s objective, Altaire followed, without speaking a word.
The guru and priestess had to part
from Altaire at the crossroads a mile to the west of Burmingham. He was headed
to a distant town that had remained isolated from most of the world for awhile
now. That’s where the famous medic was residing as of the moment. The journey
there would take a few days at most… but then, he would have to come all the
way back with the medic. All in all, the least amount of time Altaire’s quest
would take would be about five days.
And to a dying man, five days would
seem like forever.
“Take care, Altaire.” Marium gave the
high priest a quick hug, and somehow ended up holding his hand. He had her hand
in a viselike grip, reluctant to let her go. “C’mon, Altaire, Faede’s counting
on us…”
“Yes.” Was all the priest said in
reply, then turned abruptly and strode off in the direction of some mountains.
The hermitish town was supposedly beyond two of those types of mountain ridges.
Marium sighed, then continued to walk with Cadillac.
“So, Cadillac, where are we headed?”
Marium questioned, swinging her arms back and forth. The small guru thought
deeply about this as they walked. “Hello? An answer would help.”
Finally, the disgruntled mage met
Marium’s stare with one of his own. “I’ve heard that cahlots live in groups.
They tend to like dark, shadowy places, and also, water. So… a place that has
an laudable amount of water, and a place for the cahlots to escape from the
sun.”
“What about a beach?” Marium asked,
helpfully. Cadillac pondered this, then shook his head.
“The water part fits, but what about
the shadows? That’s the most important clue, since cahlots despise sunlight.”
Cadillac stated, importantly. The priestess frowned, her mind working with
different ideas, trying to come up with a reasonable explanation. But her
thoughts kept on straying to the beach… it was a gut feeling she had.
After a short silence, the High
Priestess Yin came up with a weak, if acceptable, idea. “Well, what about a
cove or something, that’s on the beach? Like, a cave, you know?”
Cadillac shrugged, then sighed. “We
don’t have any other leads, so let’s head for the beach, and stop at a town on
the way. That might give us a lead somehow…”
This quest is turning out to be quite
dull, Marium realized, sadly. “If Faede were here, it wouldn’t be nearly as
quiet.”
The guru’s snort was his annoyed
reply, and it was sufficient enough to shut Marium up until they stopped for
lunch at a small city about ten miles away from their starting point.