§100 Running (Patreon)

He wanted to send a purification circle to the clinic, but getting materials into the palace wasn't so easy. They only trusted certain people to transport goods, and there were procedures to follow. Taylor had no way in other than as Miss Wibbles, and a summoned spirit couldn't leave permanent items behind. But he might know someone who could help.

He found the parlor occupied by Rasmusen, Ophelia, and one of the three boarders, who was probably a spy. Taylor had tried to follow the "writer", but the man rarely went anywhere, and he really did stay in his room all day and write. There was a slight possibility he was not a spy.

"You're back early," Ophelia spoke to him, which made his chest do happy, fluttery dances. Taylor had hardly seen her since she moved in, involved as he was in everything. That, and it was hard to talk to her. He was even having trouble remembering why he was in the room in the first place.

"Uh, yeah. Some things happened. I need some help."

"Anything!" When she smiled, he was every eight-year-old child with a crush on a pretty teacher, all rolled into one masked, clumsy package. He desperately searched for something he needed her help with, anything at all, but he was too stuck between adoration and a brain seizure. Did 'anything' include holding his hand for extended periods of time? Because that could be nice.

Rasmusen coughed. "I think I'm the one he needs help from." He seemed to understand exactly what was happening, gods bless him, and came to Taylor's rescue. They went up to Taylor's room together.

"She is beautiful," the priest teased, "and very intelligent. I can see the attraction."

"Please don't tease me about this," Taylor groaned, "I'm a twelve-year-old human, and she's an arc. The problems are obvious. She's worth every dori as a tutor, but I think I brought her here just to torture myself."

Rasmusen chuckled, but not unkindly. "Then let's talk about something else. What do you need help with?"

"The palace healers are in serious need of a purification circle. They have a ward full of people who are sick with an advanced form of mana corruption."

"And you know this how?"

"Spirits talk to each other, and I know a lot of spirits. There are limits to what any of them will say because of their bonds, but news spreads. Apparently, it isn't widely known outside the palace, but there are a lot of these cases. Normal healing can treat the effects, but the patient never gets stronger. Eventually, they die."

"I've read about this. It's supposed to be rare. There must be a source somewhere in the palace, or in a place they all frequent in town. A commonality, somewhere."

"And I'll probably end up in Avimore, looking for it," Taylor grumped, "even though the imperial capital should be the Emperor's problem."

"Avimore is a big place. I don't think you can blame him personally for this."

"I bet you lunch that we can. If we find the source, I bet we can trace it back to the emperor, somehow. Winner chooses the place, loser has to pay."

"Oh, it's 'we' now, is it? Do you want me to get you into the palace? Because I might be able to do that. You know who I work for, and I'm sure the emperor would be interested enough to meet you."

"There's no way I'm setting foot inside that place. Not happening. But I'll have to drop by Avimore soon on related business. If you could run ahead and put a circle into their healers' hands, it would save lives."

"When you put it that way … I'll have to inspect it first. I have to know what I'm carrying into the palace."

Taylor gave him one of the circles from his fresh stock and a tube to carry it in. "There are a few minor refinements since the first one I gave you."

Rasumusen unrolled the black cloth and began examining the designs, looking for anything suspicious. He had enough skill with Spellscript circles and Permutation to identify anything amis.

"You know, these take considerable power to run. Depending on who the patients are, the palace might not spend mana crystal on them."

"Then you can have some of my mana sources." Taylor handed over half a dozen red stones, flat on one side and rounded on the other. "All of this is on loan, to heal people in the palace. I want it back."

"A gift would go farther," suggested the priest.

"I already gifted His Imperial Majesty with a circle through the IEF, and I'm publishing a whole new system of magic. He doesn't need my generosity. Besides, these things have orichalcum in them. I can only make so many. If the palace wants one, they can buy it on the market like everyone else."

"I've been meaning to ask you, where do you source your orichalcum?" The question was asked casually, but the priest had to know it was a touchy subject.

"I'd rather not say. It's not stolen or anything, I can promise you the source is legal."

"Are you making it with Alchemy?"

Taylor nearly choked. "Alchemy can't create fundamental elements, not economically. It's best at recombining what already exists."

"Ah, but orichalcum is an alloy. Nobody knows everything that goes into it, but it's completely within the bounds of … you sly brat! You just lied to me, didn't you?"

"I haven't said anything that wasn't true," insisted Taylor.

"But you let me think you didn't know that orichalcum is an alloy, and implied you couldn't make it. That's a deception!"

"I also told you I didn't want to say," accused Taylor, "and you know better than to pry into my secrets, nosy priest!"

Rasmusen chuckled at him. "Come on, how much did you make?"

"A lot less than you're imagining. There's an irreplaceable ingredient that's hard to find, and I've bought up the entire stock. Once it's gone, I won't be able to make more of the sacred alloy."

"How many more circles can you make if you process everything you have?"

"Maybe a hundred."

"That's quite a lot, considering what they can do. It's also a lot of orichalcum." 

Rasmusen continued with his inspection until he was satisfied the circle was sound. He didn't want to be responsible for anything going into the palace without checking it first. He loaded it into the tube and sealed it with a complicated cleric spell. He put the container aside and faced Taylor.

"I think those circles are going to be a headache for you. People are going to notice the thread content, do the math, and arrive at the obvious conclusion: that you're using, in a month, more orichalcum than the market sees in two or three years. There are insiders who will kill you to eliminate the competition, and outsiders who will try to force you to make it exclusively for them."

"I've been thinking of changing up the formula so it looks different, but I haven't had time for more research."

"The kinds of people we're talking about won't be fooled."

"What do you suggest?"

"Let the church handle them. When the divine envoy business becomes public knowledge, and you know it will sooner or later, people will know you designed them. But they'll also assume we handled the orichalcum supply. We handle most of the market as it is."

"And thus deceive the public while collecting a commission? Domine Rasmusen! How could you?"

"There are lies, and then there are deceptions, as you know all too well. Give the idea some serious consideration. You can set the price and allocate most of the pieces. But the church will want to allocate part of the supply to people it chooses."

That was typical when dealing in scarce goods. Different interests would try to lay claim to portions of the supply. The right to choose customers could be just as important as the money.

"I'll think about it."

The next morning, Taylor ate breakfast with the rest of the house, but couldn't tear his eyes from Ophelia.  She was drilling Kasper on his history, in preparation for a test he had at school, and the two of them were smiling. He envied them. Even when she was Taylor's tutor, she hadn't spent as much time with him as she did with Kasper. The wolfkin didn't appreciate how easy he had it, not being cursed.

Ophelia's eyes met his, and Taylor looked away. What could he even say to her without sounding like a lovesick child? He tried to have a conversation with the so-called writer instead. He was shy when talking about his work, suspiciously so. Maybe instead of writing, he had amazing hearing and was listening to everything inside the house. Taylor didn't sense much magic coming from him, so he was either untrained or he was superb at hiding his mana.

Taylor eventually gave up on breakfast and headed to his room. To his surprise, Ophelia followed him up the stairs. "Can we talk?"

"Yes." He kept climbing and said nothing else. He couldn't. Not while his brain was in shock from having her undivided attention. How long had it been since she was his tutor?

He didn't trust his voice, so when they entered his room, he pointed at a chair. A few of his experiments were sitting out, and she drifted to them. "Still probing the laws of the creation, I see." She peered closely at a mana scope, and a pile of materials had gathered from Twilight to test. "I got your book on Permutation. You've done something really amazing. But, I'm sure you know that."

"Thank you. I had some good partners."

"And you gave them ample credit for the research. But the system is all your doing, right? People don't just pop out new magic systems whenever they feel like it."

"I've done two this year. I don't see what the big deal is."

She stared at him in surprise and then laughed joyously. "Oh, that's so Bilius!" She kept laughing, "I have missed you! You're definitely the most interesting person I've ever tutored. Here, have you seen this?"

Ophelia unfolded a piece of paper from her pocket and handed it to him. It was from a newspaper called Arcaic Times, and had the headline, "Wen-Uroda Free; Wen-Silvain Thanks Dux Twilight". There was a picture, not well drawn, of the great spirit in her arc form, facing a masked human who was a head taller than Taylor. The two of them were shaking hands.

"That's not how it happened. And they made me too tall."

"Artistic license. Can you really summon a hundred spirits?"

"They don't give out Dux titles for summoning five at a time."

Her eye held hope, couched in centuries of yearning. He remembered that look. "You once said … "

"That I would sail across the Middle Sea, pierce the Komodo Jungle, climb over Shik Karan, to take back Archome. For you. But according to my current information, it would be easier to cross from Okujuni and sail up the Muse. Or go by air. I haven't decided which."

"By air. I like the sound of that." She had a dreamy look about her, like a girl who caught sight of an irresistible boy. But that boy wasn't him. She was in love with the lost homeland of the arcs.

"Ophelia, those were the words of a boy in the throes of, well," he swallowed a chunk of pride big enough to choke a horse, "a breaking heart. I would have done anything to keep the one person who acted like she cared about me."

"And now?"

I still have a debilitating crush on you.

"And now I'm so happy to have you around that I can barely say two words to you."

I am going to die of embarrassment.

"That's sweet." She blushed and looked away. "But I was talking about Archome." Of course she was.

"Getting there isn't the problem. I could probably be there in a fortnight if I didn't worry about my other responsibilities."

"Do you mean it? Could you get there?"

"Probably. But not certainly."

"Then let's go! Stop messing around with the church and the empire, and let's go. Tonight! The dream of every arc is to see home again, and you could make it happen!"

There was a knock on his door, and Rasmusen stuck his head in. "Did I interrupt something? I can come back."

"It's fine, Ras. Are you heading out?"

He hefted the carrying tube on its strap. "I am. You'll catch up in Avimore?'

"I'll see you there." 

The priest left to catch the morning coach to Bostkirk. From there, he could take a train and be in the capital in a little over a day, and deliver the purifying circle to palace healers.

As soon as Rasmusen was gone, Ophelia was next to him, holding his hands in hers. Her grip was gentle and cool, and her eyes were hungry. "Let me help you. I know people, arcaics who would do anything for a chance to restore Archome. And after Archome, there's Garem-Da, for the dwarves. The worst thing we ever did was forget our own gods, and you're bringing them back to us! You can do this, too!"

He jerked his hand away from her. "You're not thinking clearly. You don't want to be a tourist. You want to live there. You want to claim it. Or do I have that wrong?"

"No. But if we can get there…"

Taylor laughed, and it wasn't kind. "Getting there is just the first of a long line of problems. Assuming we don't die, Archome won't be what you imagine. Time erases things. It might all be ruins. There might not even be ruins left to find. We have to take it back from the monsters living there, and then hold it against all the monsters who want to move in. That will require a lot more than one human can give, no matter how talented. If the monsters don't kill us, the weather might. We have to farm the land so we can eat, but we have no idea what grows there now. And if we succeed in all of that, then the real problems start because the empire will want to annex the new Archome. And we absolutely cannot allow them to do that."

"That's right! If the emperor couldn't hold it, he shouldn't get to rule it!"

Taylor was actually thinking about his plan to grant classes to all arcaics in the new land, and how the empire wouldn't allow it, but her point was valid, too.

"It's too early."

"But you have been thinking about it for a while. How close are you? When can the exodus begin?"

"Exodus? It'll be hard living for years. Not every arc will want to go."

"Any true arc will do whatever they can for the cause."

He knew this fervor for what it was, that urge some people felt to invest all their hopes and ambitions into a vision, willing to follow anyone who promised to bring them closer to their dream. Such people were tempting tools, but they were blades without grips, a danger to even the most careful user.

He had never seen this side of her before. Then again, they had always talked about his thoughts and his needs, rarely about hers. A little of the passion he'd felt for Ophelia died, and that made him sadder than he'd been in a while.