Chapter 2:

  Dawn. The carriage smelled faintly of oiled leather and polished wood. The runes along the chassis pulsed with invisible light as the draft beasts trotted, their hooves striking sparks against the occasional stone on the mostly dirt street leading out of town and up the mountain.

  “Father,” Eli said, watching the fields roll by, “why not get one of the armored carriages from the capital?”

  Gabriel grunted. “Wasteful things burn mana stones just to run. Ranked Houses use them because they can, because they’ve got the cargo to justify it. Grand Houses keep them because they want to look important. Spirit beasts serve well enough, cost more than enough, and travel fast enough.” Then he huffed. “Also, your mother’s a space mage.”

  Eli couldn’t hide his smile. His father had always hated waste, and he supposed with teleportation being an option, traveling long distances with valuable commodities and passengers alike became significantly faster, and much less perilous.

  The miners were waiting when they arrived. Foreman and workers stood well back, eyes on Gabriel, while the Rodrigo retainers, their family’s mages, reservoirs, and blades – those with no magical talent, but significant martial skill – took position around the father son pair.

  “Lord Rodrigo.” The man bowed to Eli’s father before turning to him. “Young Master,” he said offering Eli a nod before abruptly turning back to face his father.

  Eli nodded back with precise courtesy, though he kept his eyes fixed on the man, gaze displeased and unwavering. He might only be a boy, but etiquette mattered, and it went both ways.

  They walked the edge of the rift site. The foreman and the hired guild-mage pointed out to the Lord Rodrigo where the containment enchantments had been laid. Eli engaged the mana in his eyes and initiated a technique that allowed him to see the normally invisible flows of power and observed the wards fencing off the distortion in the air. Something here felt, off. He couldn’t pinpoint anything though.

  “These are the containment wards,” the guild mage explained. It was common knowledge for people who delved or managed rifts, or who worked with higher level rune-script that containment wards generally acted to restrain the flow of mana leaking from a rift, mark points of danger, and redirect wandering currents away from the site, automatically equalizing the flow into and out of the enchantments.

  Eli studied them carefully, then asked, “Wouldn’t it be stronger if the barricade was layered with redirection scripts instead of the single point system currently being employed? They’d act as fail-safes for the siphon enchantments. It would also draw the mana inward instead of just working to equalize. If we did that, we could use the rift’s own power to strengthen the containment.”

  Gabriel’s gaze sharpened. “Is this true?” Gabriel asked. The guild mage’s face became sour before he smoothed it out again.

  “Technically, yes, my lord. This is possible, but it would require us to rework the script. The enchantments would have to be redone, and the reagents used in material strengthening have already been used.” The man said.

  “My lord,” the foreman cut in. “The current set up is standard for containment of this level or rift,” he said. His eyes briefly flickering down to where Eli stood, eyes focused on the rift. How would this mundane man know anything about the level of this rift. He pinched his mouth shut, however. While he trusted his gut, he knew he’d need more than that to justify the cost of redoing everything. Besides, while his suggestions would improve efficiency, they weren’t where that niggling concern lay.

  “Father, will you be entering the rift-”

  “No,” the word was hard, and seemed almost physical in the early morning chill. “The rift hasn’t yet stabilized.”

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  Eli didn’t bother to say he hadn’t meant right that second, or even that day. It seemed he didn’t need to however as his father looked at him and nodded.

  “It will be explored, though.” He stated, his voice calm, and tone steady. “Will you be on that team?” Something about the idea made him uneasy.

  “We’ll see.” His father said.

  When Eli asked if he’d be able to observe the first clear, Gabriel cut him short. “Don’t be in such a hurry for violence. I promise you’ll have enough of it in your life. Better not to seek turmoil when you have the opportunity to rest.” They were wise words. Eli knew Gabriel had no clue how true they were. “We’ll discuss thigs on the way back.”

  Eli inclined his head. “Yes, father.”

  While it was frustrating to be treated like a child, the rational part of his mind knew that he was one, at least in part. He could also admit that his father’s caution was justified. Seven-year-old Elias yet to finish expanding his mana pool. He was neither at full physical or magical peak, even for his present self, and it would be foolish to seek a battle when he didn’t even know have a baseline for his present ability. He was more than aware that knowing you cold do something in theory was nothing compared to having the experience of actually doing it.

  ~

  The carriage rattled lightly as they turned back towards the town. Eli folded his legs on the seat, spine straight, and began his meditation. Just because he hadn’t fully expanded his mana pool yet, didn’t mean he couldn’t make progress. His unique circulation method carried the comforting buzz of energy through his channels, around his body and back to his center, where the ethereal pool of energy remained. The quasi-metaphysical space filled steadily, though the pool itself had not reached complete saturation. Truly he had no business even contemplating a rift before he began the expansion phase of his magical development.

  His father’s voice broke provided a gentle backdrop to Eli’s active meditation with its steady, abrupt cadence. Gabriel was providing him a lecture on etiquette and chain of command in a rift. Instruction was truly the only time his father was verbose, and even then, his sentences were abrupt, his words precise, and his explanations direct. The Lord Rodrigo was not one for wasted words.

  Eli half-listened, half-drifted into memory, allowing his senses to expand, and his consciousness to drift in a state of complete alertness, and total relaxation. It was a state of being that couldn’t really be taught but was instead something he’d learned by necessity through countless days spent scrounging for every free scrap of mana, and sleepless nights spent guarding camps, hiding away, or just kept awake by restless thoughts and haunting memories.

  Then he felt it. A tug, clear and undeniable. He schooled his features, forcing himself not to visibly react. Slowly, he turned his head toward the carriage window.

  There, in the street ahead. A girl was bent under the weight of a basket much too heavy for her slight frame. The thing was strapped over her shoulders, and he could see each of her muscles straining as she placed one foot in front of the other.

  It was her; it had to be her.

  Aria.

  The breath left his chest, and he nearly choked on air. Memories of that final day, of one defiant pair of eyes in sea of sightless ones, of a single point of connection pushed out into the universe, towards him. Of defiance in the face of overwhelming odds, and a rage, and sorrow that matched his own.

  He’d known Aria before the wars. Of course he had. They’d been acquaintances at first, two people the same age from the same place. It was impossible to not at least know of on another, even if only as subject and ruler. Then they’d been friends, though it wasn’t until his first deployment when they’d begun to really speak to each other. Not getting to know her sooner, around despite them being together every year at both the imperial and officer academies, was one of the many regrets he’d had the first time. Even when she was bound to another, she and I—

  The thoughts cut off abruptly for Eli’s own sanity. She was here now. Aria. His Aria. She hadn’t been bound to him in his last life, but he’d be damned if she wasn’t in this one.

  “Stop,” he said, sharper than he meant. “Stop the carriage.”

  Gabriel’s lecture petered off as he turned his head to face the same window. “What is it?”

  Eli pointed. “Her. We can’t just leave her.”

  They both took a moment to observe the truly pitiful form of the little girl trudging with the weight of the world on her shoulders.

  “She’s managing,” Gabriel said, though his expression was dark.

  “I know we can’t help everyone. But when we can, shouldn’t we? Isn’t that what you say. Isn’t that what you mean when you speak of the true code of nobility?”

  Gabriel let out a slow exhale, closing his eyes and taking another deep breath before opening them again. “Fine. Be quick. Remember your lessons with your mother, and training tonight.”

  “I promise, Father. I’ll be back before dark.”

  He was out of the carriage before his father could comment, his boots hitting cobblestone as he strode toward her.