Return of the Runebound Professor

Noah woke the following morning to Moxie knocking at his door. The sun had still yet to rise, and the night still didn’t show any signs of waning. By the time he’d rolled out of bed and was just a little over halfway through pulling his clothes on, Lee had already let her in. Noah glanced over at Moxie as he pulled a coat on and tried to comb his hair with his hands.

“When you said early, I didn’t think you meant this early,” Noah said through a yawn. He rubbed his eyes. “Is the library even open?”

“I already dropped by it,” Moxie said, pulling out her bag and setting several books onto the desk. “I read through a few spots and I think I’ve got a good idea of where we should go. The Vibrant Woods should be a great starting point, and we can follow them up with the Red Barrens. After that, we can gauge how things are going and make the decision for where we’re going to go next.”

“Wasn’t figuring all that out the whole point of us meeting?”

Moxie rubbed the back of her head. It was difficult to tell in the darkness, but Noah was pretty sure she blushed. “I got over-eager, and the library opens early.”

“Well, I’m not going to complain about having less work,” Noah said. He picked up the first of the books and flipped through it. It looked like a summary of the areas around Arbitage, with small notes on each of the locations. While it wasn’t particularly extensive, it was a good overview.

Noah spotted the Scorched Acres on one of the pages and paused to scan over it.

An area inhabited by a variety of bipedal monsters under the influence of a Great Monster. The area was cultivated as a training ground by Arbitage and is not safe for Rank 1s or below. While there is accessible water in some lakes, the location is acrid and inhospitable. The glossary contains a list of all known monster species in this area.

Noah cleared his throat and closed the book, setting it back on the table. Lee plucked another one from the pile and held it up before her face, sniffing at it.

“It’s probably too early to get the kids,” Noah said, glancing out the window as if to remind himself of the time. “Not that I actually know where they live.”

“Yeah. I was originally not planning to get them until an hour or two after sunrise,” Moxie admitted with a frown. “Sorry. I probably shouldn’t have woken you up. You could have slept for a while longer.”

Noah shrugged. “Eh, it’s fine. Is there anything to do on Arbitage this early? I haven’t really gotten a chance to get around the school too much. It’s always been rushing from one place to the other.”

“There’s a good place in the bushes,” Lee provided, setting the book down, evidently finding it unworthy of her attention. “You can stick your leg out and trip people as they walk by, then pull it back before they spot you.”

“Is that what you’ve been spending your time doing?” Noah asked.

“Nobody’s going to be walking around this early,” Moxie added.

“Oh. Good point,” Lee said, rubbing her chin. “Okay, I’m out of ideas. I’m going back to bed. Wake me up before you go anywhere, ‘kay?”

“Will do,” Noah said. “Where are–”

Lee slipped into Noah’s bed and pulled the covers over her head, turning into a lump under the sheets. Noah and Moxie exchanged a look. Moxie collected the books back into her bag and they stepped into the hall.

“So… any suggestions?” Noah drawled as he closed the door behind him.

“Do you really think I had the time to get around all that much more than you?”

“Okay, fair point,” Noah admitted. They set off down the hall toward the exit of the T building. “That kind of just makes both of us boring, though.”

“Boring?” Moxie narrowed her eyes. “Boring is by choice. You’re the boring one. I just had other things I had to do.”

“How long have you been teaching here again?”

“About two years,” Moxie said as they stepped out onto a stone pathway. She glanced to the side and cleared her throat. “A bit less.”

“And you haven’t found anywhere interesting at all?”

“I know a good spot to train in.”

“Right,” Noah said with a huff. “Well, we’ve got time to kill and nobody else is up. Now’s as good a time as any to crawl around campus and see what kind of interesting things we can dig up.”

Moxie sent Noah a doubtful look. “Dig up? Are we trying to steal the bushes or something?”

“It’s a figure of speech. Stop being sour and get a move on already. You’ve been longer than I have, so even if you haven’t had a chance to look yourself, I’m sure you’ve got some clues. Do you really have no suggestions? If not, maybe we could try getting on the top of the library or something. I bet the sunrise would really look nice from there.”

Moxie thought for a moment, then shook her head and started toward the far edge of campus. Noah took a few quick steps to catch up with her. His legs were a little longer than hers, so even though she’d gotten a head start, it wasn’t too hard for him to catch up.

“So you did have an idea of where to go,” Noah said, shooting a smug glance at Moxie.

She let out a huff. “Just an idea. At the very least, you can read through some of the books I found while we wait for the sunrise.”

Noah chuckled. Moxie increased her pace and he matched it. The fast walk wasn’t exactly what he’d had planned for the morning, but it had a surprising way of helping him wake up better.

He followed Moxie along the path, watching the main section of campus off to their left as they headed along a weathered stone path. The path was surrounded by small bunches of foliage and dirt had been scuffed across it. Based on how unkept it was, Noah suspected the path probably wasn’t used often.

The path wound around, passing through a small garden full of bulging fruits and vegetables growing on everything from bushes to vines winding around trellises, then continued onward into a small ring of tall, old buildings.

Instead of the typical marble and eloquent materials that much of Arbitage was made of, these were just plain gray stone. Several of them stood three or four stories in the air, square and jagged. Several large stones had fallen to the ground and were overgrown with moss.

It’s been quite a while since anyone bothered cleaning this area up.

Moxie looked familiar with it, though. She walked up to one of the larger buildings, ducking under a hole in the wall and stepping inside. Noah followed after her. The inside of the building was in just as much disrepair as the outside, and perhaps more.

He wasn’t sure what it had been before, but all that remained now was rubble along the ground and tufts of weeds poking through the cracks in the floor. A rubble covered stairwell at the back left of the house led upward, but several of the stone steps had eroded or been damaged to the point where they were unusable.

“Where are we?” Noah asked. “It doesn’t even feel like part of Arbitage.”

“This was the old Horticulture building,” Moxie replied, not looking back at him as she started up the stairs. She took each step carefully, putting her feet down in deliberate motions – practiced ones.

She’s been here before.

Noah matched her steps, holding onto the rough wall for balance. They made their way up, passing the second and third floors without stopping. A cold breeze brushed through Noah’s hair as they passed by a large crack in the curved stairwell leading out into the open air.

“Come on,” Moxie said, looking over her shoulder at Noah. “If we’re slow, you’re going to miss the sunrise.”

Noah blinked, then hurried to keep up with her, nearly slipping in the process. He grabbed onto the wall and quickly righted himself before Moxie could turn back again, giving her a sheepish grin.

Moxie just shook her head and continued up. The rest of the stairwell made no further attempts on Noah’s life, and the two of them reached the top a minute later. A cold breeze blew Noah’s hair back as he stepped out. The floor he’d stepped out onto could hardly even be called that.

Three walls still rose around on either side and behind him, but the fourth wall had crumbled away. A large pile of thick green vines was curled in the corner of the room like a nest. Just over the horizon, faint rays of orange light started to poke out and light up the clouds.

Moxie hopped over the crumbling wall, landing on an outcropping of stone right below. She sat down, letting her legs swing in the open air. Noah padded over to look over the edge of the wall, then carefully lowered himself to sit on the ledge beside her.

“And you said you didn’t know anywhere,” Noah said, leaning back against the wall as the wind nipped at his face. Rays of golden orange crept further into the clouds, illuminating them with their light.

“It’s not a spot,” Moxie muttered. “It’s just an old ruin.”

“I’d call it a spot.”

“Well, it isn’t,” Moxie said with a huff. “It’s just an old windy building that nobody comes to. The damn thing will probably end up getting blown down in a few years anyway.”

“It’s nice,” Noah said after a moment. “And the wind is refreshing. Who would have thought you had a secret location like this stashed away. I bet Todd and Isabel would be jealous.”

The top of the sun peeked out from behind a cloud like the yolk of a perfectly orange egg.

“Noah?”

“Yeah?”

“Just shut up and watch the sunrise.”

“Right.”

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