The night was colder than the loud fights during the day, as sparks drifted up into the dark like small lost souls.
Ragna sat nearest the flames with her legs crossed and a plate on her knees. She tore into a haunch of something that had once been a mountain goat, grease shining on her fingers. The young knight boy who'd looked ready to faint earlier hovered near her with a ladle.
"More?" he asked whenever her plate thinned.
"Yes, yes," she answered every time.
He refilled her without complaint. Every time his hand brushed hers, he went red to the ears. She did not notice. Or pretended not to. The little boy had a crush.
I sat with my back to a rock, a little away from the worst of the smoke. My own plate cooled slower. I picked at it while watching the fire and the people around it.
House Marcellis's crest was a stylized tower over lines, and it glimmered on cloaks and shield-bosses. Their colors were green and gold, but they were dulled with soot and blood. They'd lost three knights and half a dozen caravan men in the night attack. The bodies had been wrapped and laid aside in neat rows, ready for whatever rites Ethenia used.
The knight captain, Elayne, sat across from me with her sword within reach and a cup in her good hand. Her shoulder had been strapped and dosed with whatever painkiller their healer carried, but the way she held herself said the wound had not gone away. Just been pushed into a smaller corner.
"Thank you," she said.
It wasn't the first time she'd said it tonight. She seemed to think it needed repeating.
"You already did, knight girl," I said.
She seemed to have some prejudiced ideas toward Valtherians, and seemed surprised that I was conversing in such a civil manner with her. But she was the type to not show her surprise at matters like that, to maintain respect.
She shook her head. "I feel like it’s not enough." Her eyes went to the ridge above us, where the Red Ridge positions had been a few hours earlier. "We've ridden through these passes for generations. During our House’s good times, we didn’t even have to pay a toll. Recently we do. We paid the toll, glared, and moved on. They were bandits but they were smart enough to know how to survive. So they never pulled this many men, never pushed this hard. Someone paid them to bleed us dry."
She did not add, and to take the special item we’re carrying. She didn't really need to. The third wagon still sat in the hollow, intact, its reinforced sides untouched. Magical wards protected it. Everyone pretended it was just wood.
What’s up with me stumbling upon merchants carrying valuable items? I found it a little funny, although this time we were mainly dealing with knights rather than merchants. "What did you carry that was worth it?" I asked, for it was understandable to be curious.
She held her gaze from flicking to the wagon, staring at me. "It’s just House business," she said. "Letters. Ledgers. Minor goods. All precious to us, nothing to anyone else."
Lie by omission, not invention. Better than most nobles.
"Once again, thank you for your help, Valtherian warrior. Our lord needs to hear about this incident and figure out the culprit who leaked the information." She took a small sip from her cup. "The lord will deal with those backstabbers when we return."
So the traitor lived closer to her home than these rocks, or at least she assumed so. That was interesting. Ethenian noble politics were very heated even without Grey Sentinels and Concords poking at the edges. It made sense since it’s such a large nation.
She set the cup down and reached for her belt. A small leather pouch came free. She weighed it in her hand once, then tossed it across the fire.
It landed on my plate with a soft clink.
"Your payment for the Red Ridge job."
I picked it up and loosened the tie. Gold glinted inside, heavier than it looked. But it couldn’t be more than a dozen, which felt like nothing given the amount I’d received from Isolde. "This is a lot," I said. "But not what that fight was worth."
She grimaced. "It… isn't. We lost three knights and too many men. The provisions we saved here were meant for our own people. I can't squeeze more coin from the House purse for this leg without stealing from what they need."
She glanced at the pouch, then at me.
"I'd pay you twice that if I could," she said. "Or ten times. You took a task I could not have finished even with all my men alive. I know what it means to face a Sixth Ascension when you are not their match. You did it twice over, and then some."
She paused.
"There is one thing I can offer," she added. "If you'll take it."
I waited.
"My lord will surely want to meet you," she said. "Count Severus Marcellis is a man who dislikes keeping debt; he’d like to thank you for bringing his people back from a grave his enemies dug. And to put the right amount of gold in your hand without gutting my supply barrels."
House Marcellis's lord was a Count? Severus Marcellis. A proper Ethenian noble, not a provincial knight. An introduction like that was not small.
Ragna glanced over from her meat at that, then went back to chewing. She listened more than people thought when her mouth was full.
Elayne kept going.
"Come to our city," she said. "Maricall. It's three days' ride from here on the north road, if the weather doesn't turn. We'll give you beds, food, and a chance to leave this mountain stink behind. And my lord will decide how to thank you. He is a fair man."
“Hmm,” I pondered. There were a few reasons to say no. Noble houses meant politics, oaths, and hidden knives. I'd just finished dragging a kingdom out of an Outer God cult's mouth, maybe walking into another nest wasn't wise.
At the same time, I needed a path into Ethenia that wasn't simply wandering until something interesting attempted to eat me.
I needed information on Fenixia, on the Trials, on maybe also whatever the System had planned next. Having a house's banner behind me would make most border checks and city gates easier. I didn't have to let them own me. Just borrow their shade for a while.
"Marcellin is near the Fenixia Duchy?" I asked.
She gave me a curious look at that but didn’t press. "It is on the way," Elayne said. "We’re not quite neighbors, but not so far that their banners are strangers."
That settled it.
I looked at Ragna. She shrugged.
"Food, beds, more people to punch later," she said. "Fine with me."
I closed the pouch and tucked it into my belt. "All right. We'll come."
Elayne exhaled, slow. Some of the tightness in her shoulders eased. "Good," she said. "You'll be welcome in House Marcellis as long as I can hold a sword."
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A log shifted in the fire, sending up a small burst of sparks. The young knight boy – Tomas, I'd heard one of the others call him – almost dropped the ladle in surprise.
Ragna held out her plate without looking.
"Oi, kid, bring me more," she demanded with a yawn. Shouldn’t she just go to sleep?
Tomas jerked, then hurried to fill it. His eyes lingered on the scar that ran along her arm, then darted away when he realized he'd stared too long.
"You fight well, L-Lady Ragna," he blurted and cleared his throat, as if the words had built up pressure and finally escaped. He seemed to have been gathering this courage all this time to speak up, and now he finally did. "I mean. Very well. For a–"
"Girl? Barbarian?" she offered, raising an eyebrow.
He swallowed. "For anyone."
She grinned, all teeth. "I know I’m good.”
He went red all the way to his hairline and nearly poured stew on her hand. Elayne sighed behind her cup and apologized to me for her companion’s behavior, while the knight vice captain Dolan shook his head.
I let myself lean back against the rock and watched them. Stories around Ethenia were pretty scary, but people looked at strength the same, at least. With fear, hunger, or worship. Sometimes all three at once.
Fenixia was somewhere beyond these mountains and these people. So was my mother. My brain got tired whenever I thought of how to search for her.
****
We broke camp at first light.
The road ahead went lower now, hugging the mountain’s side. The worst of the scree was behind us, but cliffs still dropped away to our right in long and dry falls. It’d have been a nightmare for any acrophobic sufferer.
The mountain air was cold in a different manner than the Thalassarian atmosphere. An hour in, the path curved around a shoulder of rock and opened onto a shelf.
Stone steps climbed from the road to a shallow alcove cut into the mountain. Someone long ago had carved an arch there and set a figure within it.
It was a man in old armor, helm tucked under his arm with his sword pointed down between his feet. Time had softened his face, but the line of his shoulders still looked straight. Offerings clustered at his feet. Old coins, a cracked helm, and a sprig of something long dead and powdered.
Elayne lifted a hand.
“We rest here for an hour,” she called back.
Why here? The caravan creaked to a halt. Men began to unhook horses and ease packs off sore backs. A few of the knights went up the steps at once, moving more quietly than they had around the campfire.
Elayne dismounted and climbed to the shrine. She knelt, scarred gauntlets resting on her thighs, and touched the stone base with her fingertips. Her lips moved, but the words didn’t carry.
Dolan and Tomas followed, then the others in no real order. Some bowed their heads. Some only rested a hand on the carved sword before going to sit. It had the feel of habit more than piety. You pass this way, you greet the rock.
Ragna stayed by the horses, chewing dried meat and eyeing the alcove like the statue might leap out and swing that stone sword at her.
I led my borrowed horse to the side and watched.
The figure wasn’t anyone I recognized, but the way the knights moved around him told me he mattered here. Not a god, they weren’t really praying to him, but I guessed something nearer. A man who couldn’t stay dead in people’s minds.
Elayne rose and came back down the steps. She noticed my staring and jerked her chin toward the alcove.
“That’s our General Caedran,” she said. “Held this pass when Erebia tried to take the spine two hundred years ago. He broke three legions here and died on his feet. He had been Eighth Ascension then. Ninth by the time the spirits were done with him, or so the priests say.”
Interesting. “Is he still around?” I asked. Such a question would have been stupid in my previous world, but this was a world of swords and magic. And the way she spoke of spirits did imply something like that.
She shook her head. “No. The old stories say he chose to follow the other demi-gods and leave this plane. We don’t really know, most people consider those tales as mere legends. But we keep his stone. It’s good for young knights to remember there were better men before them.”
“I understand the sentiment.”
“Indeed. We just stop here whenever we can,” she added after a moment. “Some stones are worth reminding they’re not alone.”
Ethenia paired its dead and its land in an interesting manner. It was different in Thallasaria; even with an undead king’s emergence, the dead remained dead.
Here, they didn’t consider that. Dead men were more than names on a stone; their achievements seemed to extend their lives beyond the grave.
Ragna snorted softly behind me.
“Valtherians have better stones,” she muttered, not bothering to lower her voice. “We respect our ancestors too, there’s even a sacred graveyard for them where they gossip at night. At least that’s what mother said. But we don’t have to stop by to say hi whenever we pass it. Seems like a waste of time.”
Elayne’s mouth twitched at that, but she let it pass.
I gave Ragna a look, and she just shrugged. The knights began to spread out on the shelf, loosening armor straps and pulling out travel rations. A few went back up to the shrine one by one, dropping a coin or touching the base before sitting. No one made an announcement, nor did they try to drag anyone else up.
Dolan came down the steps, glanced at Ragna, then at me.
“Your friend said she reached Level Forty-Nine, if I heard right,” he said. “If she wants, she can ask the stone to show her Ascension Quest. Although this isn’t a God’s shrine, it should work the same since he’d reached 9th Ascension as a spirit.”
Ragna’s face went flat.
“I ask the System,” she said. “Not some rock.”
Dolan blinked. “It’s just a focus. Makes it easier for some folk to–”
“She’s fine,” I cut in. “Sorry, religious beliefs. We Valtherian are pretty strict about it.”
He took the hint and backed off, still looking vaguely baffled. Ragna clicked her tongue and walked off toward the far side of the shelf, where a shoulder of stone jutted out over the drop. I followed, giving the knights their space with their dead general.
We stopped ten paces from the edge. The world fell away under us in a long grey tumble of cliffs and dry gullies. A line of cloud clung to the distant peaks. Somewhere beyond them lay more mountains, more cities, and eventually Fenixia if the maps weren’t lying.
Ragna folded her arms. “Don’t try to talk to me about any of that,” she said before I could even open my mouth. “But yes, I’m Level 49 now. After killing that Goran.”
“Garrun,” I corrected. “Yes. You’re one step from your Fifth.”
She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t like that they think I need a statue to talk to the System.”
“Technically, everyone does when it comes to Ascension Quests,” I said. “Gotta visit a temple, shrine, or altar. Not everyone is me, you know?” My words landed as intended, making her shoot me an annoyed look. I enjoyed the moment.
Her jaw worked. Then she sighed.
“Fine,” she won against her stubbornness. “Check it.”
I touched her shoulder, and she locked eyes with me. Her skin felt warmer than normal people. “Reveal Ascension Quest,” I said quietly.
The world did that small, familiar hitch.
===
[Ascension Quest: Guard a Noble Heir]
- Objective: Protect Lady Ilyra Marcellis, Ensure her Safety for 31 Days.
Reward: Advancement to Fifth Ascension.
===
“Huh.”
Both Ragna and I made a curious sound while reading the lines.
“Isn’t this interesting,” I was surprised it wasn’t a monster-hunting quest. “It wants you to guard someone until she gets stronger. And it just happens to be Lady Ilyra. The System is really paving our path.”
Ragna frowned, then glanced back over her shoulder at Elayne and the wagons. “Their house’s heir, right? Glad we accepted the knight’s offer to tag along, then.”
“The System is trying to tie us with this household in a way, or maybe it just works like that all the time?” I wondered which was true.
She made a low noise in her throat.
“I wanted a dragon hunt,” she said. “Guard duty is boring.”
“You were the one yelling about protecting the Queen’s back in Solstara,” I reminded her.
“That was different.” She hesitated, then shrugged. “Fine. I like this Elayne girl. If her lady is anything like her, I don’t mind watching over her for a bit.”
The funniest thing was, Ragna was Level 49, whereas this Ilyra was Level 99. Few cases would require her to protect this girl, unless she turns out to be a non-battle class.
I looked back at the shrine. Knights in blue and white moved around its base, armor flashing in the pale light. Elayne had taken off her helm and sat on the lowest step, speaking quietly with Tomas. He was nodding along, face earnest.
The System had nailed her House to Ragna’s path and tied a neat little knot around both our ankles. The System worked in mysterious ways. While my quests had me mess with Outer God cults and saving kingdoms, Ragna’s looked at a single noble heir on a road through the mountains.
Big scales. Small ones. But it was the same entity moving pieces. What was the System, anyway? A seed, it said, but a seed of what? What was its purpose?
“I don’t like it,” Ragna said suddenly.
“The quest?” I asked.
“The System thinking it can tell me who to guard,” she said. “But I’ll do it. Because I want to. Not because a stone or a box of light told me to.”
“That’s the right order,” I lied to console her, although realistically it’s a stupid decision to not complete an Ascension Quest.
As we led our horses back toward the others, Elayne caught me glancing at Caedran’s worn face. “Sorry for making you wait, he’s just important to our hearts.”
“It’s alright, I’m loving the little cultural exchange,” I joked. Soon, we continued our travel and a few days later, the gate of Maricall City loomed before us.
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