The Aldean branch of the Adventurer’s Guild occupied an impressive stone building of a similar style to the castle and the fort, though it lacked many of their martial features. A single tower rose above the rooftops of the surrounding buildings, and at its peak stood an imposing stone obelisk. Twenty-four such towers were scattered about the city, each with an obelisk of its own, all critical for maintaining the city’s magic barrier against the ravages of the Tempest.

  Together, the boys made their way out of the alley and along the sidewalk to the grand entrance of the guildhall. As they walked, Evran peered into the ornate glass windows set within finely carved stone arches. The hall was packed with adventurers.

  The coming of a Tempest was a difficult time for everyone, as travel between islands came to a standstill. Many of the usual types of assignments were no longer on offer, making work harder to come by. To drive demand during this period, the Guild relaxed its pricing, leading to a glut in the posting of odd jobs. Many of these assignments were the unpleasant type — things that could be set aside until the Tempest could persuade a sufficiently desperate adventurer to do it on the cheap. How else would one acquire four bottles of green slime at a silver apiece?

  “I’ll check out the board while you guys turn in your assignments,” said Evran, splitting from his friends. Although his childhood fantasies of becoming an adventurer had died with his mother, Evran still signed up with the Guild. He did the occasional odd job with Lerrum and Narro, and took advantage of other perks such as discounts at certain shops and access to specialized training facilities the academy lacked. The only jobs he absolutely refused to do were anything involving fighting powerful monsters, anything that might have him fighting other people, and absolutely anything involving labyrinths. These self-imposed rules made it next to impossible to find jobs that would pay him well enough to make a living out of.

  Meandering his way through the noisy crowd, Evran passed various parties of adventurers wearing dejected looks on their faces. He noticed a few academy uniforms sprinkled among the shifting mass of people. After arriving at the jobs board, he quickly scanned the various postings. Evran doubted he would find anything worthwhile, but curiosity compelled him to look anyway.

  “Looks like the local Magic Academy is planning a scouting mission to a virgin island after the Tempest,” said a man in fine steel armor. Evran thought he recognized the voice. “They’re looking for an advance team to do a preliminary scout of the island before they let the students explore it.”

  Evran glanced over to see the same party of adventurers he’d encountered on the docks the day before. They were arguing with some ship’s captain trying to secure passage to somewhere after the second storm sign. Orenth, was it? They had apparently failed to make it there.

  “It doesn’t exactly pay well, but look here.” The steel-clad man pointed to a paragraph near the bottom of the posting. “They’ll give us first-crack at the labyrinth. And they’ll provide all the transportation and supplies! All we need to do is make sure the island is safe enough for the students before we can enter.”

  “So we scout an island, and in return, they pay us and fund our labyrinth expedition?” asked a shorter man with leather armor and a bow.

  “Our fortune turns. Perhaps our failure to make it to Orenth was a hidden blessing from the gods,” said a bald man wearing the priestly robes of the Risen Faith. “Let us confer with the girls before we accept. Jex has been eager to challenge her first labyrinth with our party.”

  Evran watched as the three adventurers disappeared into the crowd. A strange feeling of longing stirred within him. He pictured himself, Lerrum, and Narro all setting off together for some distant island in search of fortune and wonder. He’d just hold them back. Evran pictured his friends yelling at him, trying to convince him to take on a labyrinth job or some pirate hunt. He would have to refuse, and they would resent him for it. That sort of life wouldn’t work out.

  He perused the postings a final time. Evran had been hoping for a repost of the job Lerrum accepted last night. It was likely an unpaid assignment, but it would still count toward one’s yearly membership quota. Not finding anything of the sort, Evran made his way back to the entrance. He found Lerrum and Narro chatting with a pair of dwarves handing out advertisement fliers.

  “Alright, we’ll check it out! Thanks for the tip!” said Lerrum. He looked up and waved when he saw Evran. “Hey Ev, we’re going to try a new dwarven noodle place on Harbor Street.”

  “Great, I’m starving.” Evran replied.

  ***

  The boys gathered around a patio table overlooking the harbor and devoured their noodles. Only the absurd strength of a dwarf could pull noodles so chewy. They had expected the place to be more crowded, but the restaurant had only recently launched. Its owners may have lacked the foresight to advertise before their grand opening, but the noodles were the finest Evran ever tasted.

  The restaurant had an amazing view of both the harbor and the esplanade in front of the Navigator’s Guild. The pleasant orange of sunset was marred by a thin trail of black smoke drifting high into the sky from a ship entering the bay from the northeast. Several vessels from the harbor patrol made to intercept.

  This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

  “Those sorts of things are usually due to some alchemical accident,” Narro said with an authoritative flair, as he drizzled more of a spicy red sauce over his noodles.

  “This Kazad sauce is an alchemical accident!” said Lerrum, dabbing his tongue with a napkin. “How can you stand so much heat?”

  “I grew up eating far deadlier concoctions. My parents were spice merchants, remember?”

  “Do you think they might have been attacked by Ravagers?” asked Evran, returning to the topic at hand.

  “If they had the mages to fend off a Ravager attack, they probably would’ve put out that fire already,” Lerrum argued.

  “But if they don’t have mages, how did they fly the ship?” Narro asked as he chewed. He received credulous looks from his friends. “What? I’ve never piloted a ship before.”

  “You can still fly a ship without a mage. You just need someone to feed mana into the windcasters. Even Ravagers can manage that,” Lerrum explained between slurps of his savory noodles.

  Evran tuned out Lerrum’s long-winded explanation of how ships flew, choosing instead to focus on the amazing view from the elevated patio. His eyes wandered across the harbor, admiring the multitude of different ship designs. Most were upscaled watercraft, like one would see on a lake, though the principles of buoyancy were irrelevant when it came to airships. Evran favored ships that rejected those conventions and explored sleeker alternative designs. Sadly, there were only a handful of such ships docked at Aldea.

  While admiring a particularly interesting yacht, a familiar uniform caught Evran’s eye from the street below. A certain elf with white hair met his gaze and waved.

  “Hey look, it’s Kaila!” shouted Lerrum, interrupting his own explanation of windcasting mechanisms. “Hey Kai! Get your butt up here and say hi! Narro’s buying!”

  She waved back and accepted the invitation. Narro rolled his eyes and ran to fetch another bowl for Kaila. Even if she didn’t want it, the three teenage boys wouldn’t let it go to waste. Kaila climbed the stairs to the patio and sat herself next to Evran.

  “Were you three in the swamp earlier? You all smell more than usual.”

  Evran pulled his shirt to his nose and sniffed. It wasn’t that bad. At least not much worse than the miasma, which had begun to increase in concentration after the second stormsign. Though, elves were known to have sensitive noses, and Yorna had guessed it as well. Evran made a mental note to add some perfume to his shopping list.

  “Don’t worry, the noodles here will remove your sense of smell. I think this sauce might actually be a paralytic of some sort,” said Lerrum. “Anyway, what brings you out here? Ev said you were too busy to go shopping with us.”

  “I was just taking a quick break from some research. You see, my uncle collects ancient artifacts from the fallen world, and he was supposed to have received an item sent by a trusted friend, only the item never arrived. This was some time ago, and we only just learned that he had sent it. So I’ve been pouring over records at the Navigator’s Guild trying to figure out where it might have gone missing.”

  “Sounds boring!” said Narro, plopping a bowl of dwarven noodles in front of Kaila. “It’s good to see you, Kai! I’d hug you, but I probably reek of swamp mud.”

  “Oh, that’s fine. Thanks for the noodles!” Kaila smiled in appreciation. “Anyway, the research is painfully slow, but I’m oddly fascinated by the problem itself. You see, I have to guess the route the package likely took from the friend on Karath to my uncle’s place on Sygel North. Then I have to look over all the ship manifests along that route.”

  “And the guild here on Aldea has all that information?” Lerrum asked.

  “Well, it happened over six years ago, so copies of the manifests should have all trickled in by now. The Navigator’s Guild keeps very extensive records.”

  Evran gasped and held a hand to his mouth.

  “Whats wrong, Ev? Too spicy for you?” asked Lerrum.

  “Sorry, it’s just… that’s right around when my father and brother went missing. He was also traveling to the Sygelic Archipelago, and he likely would have passed through Karath.” Evran turned to face Kaila. “Kai, would you mind if I helped you out with your investigation? I might learn a thing or two about my missing family members.”

  “Oh? Sure, I’d be grateful for any help I can get! I have to warn you, though, it’s a lot of work! I know how much you hate studying.”

  Kaila smiled, but Evran got the strange sense that something was wrong. He could swear she looked reluctant at the prospect of his helping. Was this something she wanted to do on her own? Still, Evran was unwilling to pass up the opportunity to retrace his father and brother’s final journey. It would go a long way in finally putting the matter to rest.

  “I guess Evran has to put effort into something,” Narro scoffed, earning himself a disapproving look from Lerrum. “I’m just saying, if it were my family missing, I think I would have looked into it by now.”

  “Narro!” Lerrum shouted. He gave him a glare demanding an apology.

  “Sorry, Ev, that was bad. I didn’t mean anything by that.”

  He looked genuinely remorseful. Narro sometimes said things without thinking, and they often clashed over it. But he had a good heart… and a good point.

  “No, Narro, you were right. It’s shameful that I haven’t done more. I just assumed that since my father was such a capable fighter, there was no way he was actually gone. Any day now I’d get a letter from home informing me of his return. I’ve only recently come to accept that he’s probably dead.”

  The table fell silent. Kaila hovered a hand over Evran’s back, eager to comfort him, but she quickly withdrew it. It probably wasn’t the best idea to touch him again, at least not today. She decided to change the subject instead. “Well, Evran was only a kid back then. Gee Narro, I thought we elves had a poor sense of the passage of time!”

  “Oh, come on, Kai. You will have several of our lifetimes to pull the age card on us humans, but we are the same age!” said Lerrum.

  “I’m twenty-six.”

  “Wait, really?” Evran asked.

  “Although I won’t be considered an adult by elven standards for another six years. But you’re right in terms of maturity, at least. I really look forward to lording my years over people, though. It’s fun to be condescending!”

  “Elves!” groaned the boys in unison.

  Kaila stuck out her tongue in defiance. “Well, I have to get back to work. You’re still welcome to join me, Evran! And thanks again for the noodles, Narro. I’ll owe you one.”

  Lerrum scrambled to respond before Evran could accept. “Sorry, Kai, but we’re keeping him for the night. We have some shopping to do!”