Return of the Runebound Professor

“Magus Gentil, the group you’ve asked me to keep an eye on are back in Dawnforge,” the assistant said, his eyes cast to the ground. “They returned less than ten minutes ago. I tailed them back to an inn, and it appears that they plan to stay the night there.”

Gentil beamed at his assistant. “Splendid, my lad. Absolutely splendid. You’ve done a marvelous job.”

“Thank you, Magus Gentil. What would you have us do next? They appear to move erratically, so if we don’t keep a constant watch on their whereabouts, it is likely they will leave again.”

“So it is,” Gentil agreed, leaning back and rubbing his chin. He shook his head and let out a small chuckle. “This has grown into such a kerfuffle, hasn’t it? I must be getting old. Am I showing wrinkles?”

“Yes, Magus Gentil.”

“Ah. Of course I am. Keep your distance from those three, but don’t let them out of your sight. No other guards, and do not engage them under any circumstance. We must observe until Father responds.”

“It will be done. And if they spot me?”

“Ensure they don’t.” Gentil’s features went flat. “Those poor mercenaries already spilled our hand, and Lenk is still paying the price for their failure. We cannot give away any more. This is a passing interest that could gain us favor with Father, not our main goal. If the time comes, you will choose to abandon this mission before you allow yourself to be discovered. I trust that a treasured family member such as yourself would never fail me to such a degree. You will remain hidden, won’t you?”

“Yes, Magus Gentil.”

***

“Whatcha doing?” Moxie asked, stepping into the room and closing the door behind her.

Noah lowered the book of Formations that Revin had given him. Moxie’s hair was still damp from a bath, and she carried a towel made of vines over her shoulder. Noah wasn’t convinced that vines were a particularly effective cloth, but he didn’t mention it. If Moxie could use magic, he was sure she could find some type of vine that absorbed water better than normal.

“Light reading on Formations,” Noah replied. “This is surprisingly insightful. I totally thought it was going to be a bunch of garbage.”

“Because Revin gave it to you?”

“How’d you guess?”

They both chuckled. Moxie glanced around the room, then tilted her head to the side. “Where’d Lee go? Don’t tell me she’s looking for food again.”

“I asked her the same thing when she left, but Lee said she wanted to scout the city to see if she could smell the people that attacked her.”

“Is that really wise?” Moxie’s brow creased with worry and she approached the window, peering through it to see if she could spot Lee. “We just had assassins come after us. It’s probably not safe for her to stroll around on her own.”

“That was the exact same question I followed the first one up with. Lee had a pretty compelling argument, though. She just changed forms and then blurred out the window faster than I could see.”

Moxie snorted. “Yeah, that sounds like her, and that’s a fair point. She’s the fastest thing I’ve ever seen – especially at our Rank. It’s kind of weird, since she doesn’t have any Runes that lend themselves to speed.”

“I never thought about that,” Noah admitted, scanning over another passage in the book. “Good point. Maybe she’s got a clever Body Imbuement?”

“That’s probably it,” Moxie said with a nod. “Either way, I reckon she’s safe. They’ll have to spot her if they want to catch her – and even if they do, well, they’ve got to catch her.”

“Which is why I’m sitting here reading instead of chasing her down. As long as she’s comfortable, I’m not worried. She likes roaming around at night anyway. It wasn’t very often that she actually stayed overnight in my room at Arbitage.”

Moxie walked over to join Noah, sitting down on the bed beside him. His gaze drifted away from the book’s pages as the faint scent of honeysuckle reached his nose. Moxie grinned at the shift in his expression.

“What? I’m not distracting you, am I?”

“Not at all,” Noah replied, lifting the book and returning to his research. He really did want to get through a good bit of it before the following morning. He was confident that, if he could just get a better grasp of how Formations linked with music, he could start learning how to use them fairly soon.

It might have been a stretch to get everything prepared for the next day, but there was no point wasting good time, and meditating to get just a little more energy in Natural Disaster wasn’t going to make any real difference. Violin practice was equally un-ideal, as it was way too late for him to get away with playing it without someone overhearing him. Thus, the best focus was Formations.

Moxie leaned against Noah’s shoulder, peering down at the book as he studied it.

“You don’t mind if I sit here if I’m not a bother, right?”

He didn’t mind at all.

***

The sun rose the next morning far earlier than Noah would have liked it to. He blinked the sleep out of his eyes, squinting as he realized that he’d fallen asleep at some point during his research.

His book had fallen on his lap on an open page, and Moxie was still slumped against him, her chest rising and falling with slow breaths. The sounds of the early morning bustle came faintly through the window, just loud enough to pull him out of his sleep but somehow less annoying than he would have expected.

It sounded energetic, for lack of a better word. The city was alive, and it wanted to be alive.

It’s too bad that the city’s going to be a bit less alive by the time the sun rises tomorrow. No matter. We’ll just be doing the city a little bit of public service and picking up the trash.

Noah adjusted his Body Imbuements, trying out a few small tweaks that he’d had the previous night to try and limit how much information entered the Imbuements on his eardrums. He sent a trickle of power into them, then paused as he felt not one, but two other forms in the room beside him.

Moxie was easy to sense – she wasn’t moving much in her sleep, but she was physically touching him, making all her movements far easier for his magic to pick up. Considerably less easy to pick up was the small lump in the inside pocket of his jacket.

He carefully pulled the flap back, revealing Lee in her crow form. She must have sneaked into it at some point in the night. Lee peered up at him, clacking her beak once. Noah tried to suppress a laugh, but it was still enough movement for Moxie’s eyes to drift open.

She straightened, rubbing her cheek and glancing from Noah to Lee.

“Well,” Moxie said, coughing into her fist. “Looks like all of us are here. I guess we should go ahead and get everything turned in, right?”

“No point wasting good time,” Noah agreed. “Ready, Lee?”

She clacked her beak again.

As far as Noah could tell, that was about as close as he was going to get as resounding agreement from Lee in her current form. He was pretty sure that crows were capable of mimicking some level of human speech, and was willing to bet that Lee was only avoiding speaking because she found it amusing, but there was no reason to ruin her fun.

Noah and Moxie stood up. They managed to take one step toward the door before another clack emerged from the depths of Noah’s cloak. Both of them paused mid-step, then looked to Lee.

“What?” Noah asked.

Lee fluttered out of his coat and flew around his head, landing on top of it and pecking him lightly. Noah swore, nearly batting her away before he stopped himself.

“What was that for?”

Lee hopped to the ground, then turned to send a pointed look at him with her avian eyes. A chill pricked at Noah’s back as Lee extended her wings and mimed stretching.

“Oh, come on. We’re on vacation.”

Lee’s eyes didn’t change in the slightest.

“I suppose it’s a good idea to stay in shape,” Moxie said with a defeated laugh. She sat down and started to stretch her legs out. “And limbering up is probably a good idea. We’re going after the idiots that attacked us after we finish selling all our stuff, so we might as well make sure we don’t get a cramp mid-fight.”

Noah flopped to the ground before Lee and joined Moxie. “Did you at least manage to figure out where they’re hiding, Lee? It’ll be a lot easier to do this if we don’t have to scour the city for them.”

Lee bobbed her head.

“Good. After we get everything sold, we’ll prepare through the day and pay them a visit at sunset. How’s that sound?”

Lee clacked her beak. Even though she wasn’t using any words, Noah could tell what she meant without a shadow of a doubt.

Finish stretching first.

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