"And what reason do you suspect one of the villagers to be aiding your supposed conspiracy?" Lord Orlando asks, not with outrage or skepticism but with a practiced lack of affect.
I accept a cup of spiced cocoa from Iustina and dip my cruller in it. "A local hedge mage disabled the wards," I say.
"Disabled, without destroying them," Hikaru clarified. "An Adventurer trained to fight mages and magic could simply unravel the wards, but this was subtler work that I believe required insider knowledge."
He nods, frowning, stroking his goatee. "Unfortunately, that narrows it down very little," he says. "Our fair village is near a conflux of mystic energies - higher in the mountains are abandoned auracite mines and, at the site where the lines of Water, Earth and Heaven meet, an ancient temple to Io. We are blessed with many minor breathworkers here."
"Imports: steel, mutton, cocoa; exports: wine, apprentice mages," Sekhmet mutters. "Yeah, that tracks."
"We don't have nearly enough information to say who, unfortunately," Alesha says. "Our investigation will have to continue; our next report - if not a likely target - will be the Gratitide celebrations unless we find dramatic evidence beforehand."
"I agree," says Lord Orlando, "that the foe may take liberties during the Gratitide celebration. Rest assured that Vinyedo will have her guard raised during them. I will, of course, expect you at my table for the evening."
"It will be our honor and privilege to dine with you," Siobhan assures him.
Orlando leans forward to his eggs and hash, as if he expected this to be the end of the conversation. I look around the table, then clear my throat. He looks up at me, and tilts his head. Go on, then.
"There's a complication," I say. "We believe there is at least one group and one individual who knew... us... prior to taking up our service who are seeking us out, and we can't tell why."
I can see the shudder down Iustina's spine, ending in a lash of her tail. Orlando's frown is subtle but no less worrying.
"How do you know they knew you as Unenthused?" he asks.
"You are probably aware that we adopt noms de guerre upon taking on our powers," Siobhan says. "This is one of the reasons why - if someone seeks us out by our former name we know they knew us beforehand."
Iustina refills her mug. "And do you think they mean to do you mischief?" she asks.
I try to answer, but can only grit my teeth and shake my head. Thankfully, Ace puts a hand on my shoulder and answers for me.
"We need to know that - yesterday, really, but we'll take soon," she says, and that's rewarded with a laugh from both Lord Orlando and Siobhan.
"I can tell you that some of us have nasty memories connected to our old names," Sekhmet agrees, folding their arms. "They've already, as you said, ' done us a mischief' by putting them in the mouths of strangers."
Lord Orlando shakes his head. "Talking of smoke where there's fire is more apt a metaphor by the day. I dislike so many vital facts being wreathed in the choking dark."
"Pray let us illuminate them," Alesha says, then finishes her cup of cocoa.
"Well spoken," he says. "Godspeed you, then."
We rise - but to my surprise, Alesha clears her throat. "I may have a favor to ask you, my Lord." She turns and tilts her head - bids us to leave.
I frown, and lock eyes with Ace and then with the others, but we do so.
I dissipate the fireball headed my way - not by blocking it with wind, but by withdrawing the air, choking it in a bubble of vacuum before it can reach me.
"Very good," Matriarch Jaatu Almez says, before spinning and throwing out three more explosive curveballs.
I swear, tumbling out of the blast radius of one as I swallow another in a conjured vacuum - and barely shield myself from the third. I can feel the heat of the near miss. Then I instinctively jump back and blindly ward my face, voiding the fourth fireball and, somehow, parrying the fifth.
"You're a dirty cheating bastard, you know that!?" I yell, laughing,
"Would that our enemies be as merciful, acolyte," she responds, offering me her arm; I pull myself up. "Besides, here you stand, unsinged by my assault."
"The breathing exercises helped," I admit, before taking a swig from my waterskin.
"Of course it did," she says. "The Breath is the beginning of all magic, the Word shaped by the Will. A warcry will do, but there is no power without Breath."
"Feel like if I wanted to, I could take your flames and make them - bigger. Hotter," I say. "Feed the flames with oxygen - uh, with the winds, Matriarch."
"I'm a potion-brewer," she says, chuckling. "It's known to me that, alchemically, air is an alloy of vapors. Oxygen, then? Fire's sire?"
"...Yeah," I say.
"We can drill with strengthening fire later, then," she says. "And see if you can learn to light your own sparks. For now?"
"Dodging and blocking?" I sigh.
"Dodging and blocking," she says, and then I hop over her sweep.
When I meet with my party again, it's at the town bakery. The only town bakery. It doesn't need a name; the tall chimney that vents its enormous oven is the only advertising it needs.
The head baker is a middle-aged woman, her dark hair tied back into a tight bun to avoid hair getting in her work, adding to the hawklike profile with the angled cheekbones, beaklike nose and piercing gray eyes; a mostly white apron is over a simple but beautiful blue dress. People in skullcaps (judging by appearance, clearly her adult son and teenage granddaughter) stoke the fire with charcoal and mind the front of the store, handing out breads and pastries baked minutes before.
The prebaked stuff goes fast; the store is bustling. To my surprise, I see Shadi here, giving a crockpot almost too big for her to the baker's son; he places it in the oven next to other pots, presumably owned by other villagers, just like it before closing the door tight and handing her two round loaves of bread and a small bag of what looked like donut holes.
"Hi there," I say to her, turning an impulse to ruffle her hair into a handwave. "Doing errands for the family?"
"Getting tomorrow's dinner and today's lunch," she says. "Can't talk long, oat harvest today."
"So getting extra snacks for the boys, huh?" Sekhmet says, approving.
"Exactly." She pushes out the door. "Goodbye, friends."
We wait in line like everyone else - our eclectic Adventuring attire attracting some attention. There's still the odd bit of hostility there, but I spot some smiles from a Quinyone grabbing baguettes and hand pies, a curtsey from one of the servers from the Barrel of White.
After a short eternity, we're at the front of the line, earning a scowl from the matriarch.
"Talk to my children if you don't have bespoke orders," she says.
"Of course," Alesha says. "Are you Agatha Robledas?"
"Agata," she corrects.
"My mistake, Agata, thank you," she says. Then, to the son, "A loaf of rye, half dozen spinach pies, and a marzipan tart?"
"Going to have to ask for coin," the son says, a note of apology in his voice as he glances at his mother. "5 rooks for the bread, 5 more for the pies, and a Crown for the tart is -"
Sekhmet places two Crowns, each no bigger than a modern dime, on the counter. "Can we pay now for some more stuff later?" they ask.
"That... should be alright," he says, frowning.
"Kickass," Sekhmet says, adding another three gold coins. "Heard from the inkeep that the tart's something special, so trying it for our post-victory party."
He doesn't take the bait, just pursing his lips, taking the coins, marking us for thirty silver in credit. The granddaughter is already there with our stuff on the counter, stealing the odd glance at our strange attire. Hikaru opens a bag and accepts our order.
"We're busy from now till at least Vespers," she says to him.
He blinks, surprised, but nods. "We'll be back after Vespers, then. To tell you how good the tart was."
The crush of people behind us compels us to keep moving, out the door, a little bewildered for our trouble.
"So," I say. "When the hell is Vespers?"
"Roughly sunset," he says. "I admit, I'm not sure what we were thinking, going to the village bakery during business hours."
"Lucky that you're apparently handsome," Siobhan scoffs.
"It's the facial hair," he replies, utterly deadpan, running a finger over what was now a pencil mustache. "Now if it were someone other than a damn human teenager that thought so."
I look up - and see the elven warrior who ambushed me heading for the bakery.
I tense up.
I exhale.
"Battle plans back at the base," I say, hoping it doesn't sound strained.
Fortunately, my friends don't argue.
