Winter changed the Realm, Cadence decided.

Oh, there was the danger that it brought with it. That much was obvious. Winter was when the life magic that infused so much of the Realm had nowhere to go, instead blending with the turbulent energies of hunger and rage and frost and storms to make monsters not seen any other time. One was never safe during winter.

But it was more than that. Life in the Realm was primarily defined by industry, by activity, by hustle and bustle. Farmers, ranchers, alchemists, herbalists, artisans, merchants, laborers, bureaucrats. It was an infinitely complex sum of endless effort that allowed the Realm to continue flourishing (more often than not, at least). But come winter, all of that changed.

Fields lay frozen and snow-covered, impossible to work for any but the most hardy and gifted of farmers. Animals were led inside, the efforts of ranchers turned to keeping their herds alive and healthy, rather than allowing them to flourish. Reagents froze and died. Blizzards and monsters alike froze trade, and with no merchants moving, artisans had little to but work through what materials they had stocked up on.

Only hunters, wardens, knights, and other battle-gifted had true purpose during the frigid months, as the first snow announced the Realm's turn from a nation of quiet prosperity to one of quiet bloodshed. There was a reason, after all, that age in the Realm was often counted by the number of winters survived.

Which also meant that, soon, Cadence would be seventeen.

Cadence sat atop a boulder on a small rise, looking out at the rolling acres of still, quiet, snow-blanketed farmlands. The frozen powder had changed the atmosphere of the field, making it a place of magic out of a ring novel, smothering sound and setting it aglow with the ambient werelight reflected off the stars above. In the distance, a large shadow moved smoothly between two snowbanks, and even with her vision sharpened by her boon, Cadence couldn't tell if it was a monster or a simple trick of the light.

She shifted on her stone perch. The rock was cold under her butt, but Cadence had been born and raised in the heartlands. Cold and discomfort meant little to her, and she felt no fear, even as far out as she was from the town.

Besides. The night was… peaceful. Still, quiet, serene in a way she hadn't experienced in so, so very long. The buzzing and chirping of insects didn't disturb the night air. There were no twittering birds, no scurrying rodents. What little noise the half-empty streets of Keystone produced was soaked up by the inches of snow that coated everything, unable to cross the distance to Cadie.

And so she sat, silent, and soaked in the peaceful solitude of a world asleep, not knowing when she'd get another chance to witness such perfect stillness.

She didn't know how long she sat there. It could've been minutes or hours. But in either case, Cadence felt it when the moment passed, like a sigh exhaled, and she finally turned to face the man looming behind her.

"I was wondering when you'd show up," she told Storyteller.

The most powerful adventurer in the Realm smiled a grim, mirthless little smile, and took a long step forward, approaching and leaning against Cadence's boulder casually. He looked much the same as the last time she saw him–tall, lean, and incredibly mundane. His eyes were at their most normal, a muddy brown shade that matched his dull brunette hair. His canvas cloak might've been a little more tattered, and the rope tied around his waist a little more frayed, but otherwise, the man who had set Cadence down the road that had led her to this place looked just as he had when that night in Jellis, right before he vanished.

"Tobias tells me you were less than satisfied with his answers," Storyteller observed, his words tinted with a hint of sardonic mirth.

"Oh, I understood his answers just fine," Cadence said. "It was the person giving them to me that I was unsatisfied with."

Storyteller snorted. "You know, very few people in the Realm can claim that they want to talk to me and have it actually happen, Cadence."

"Very few people were given your mythic gift," Cadence pointed out.

Storyteller nodded, and Cadence thought she could feel some of the ease leech out of Storyteller's posture. "I assume the Mendicant caught you up on what that means, then?"

Cadence said nothing, simply looking out at the endless fields of snow before her instead. Somehow, they seemed less magical, now that she was sharing them.

"Cadence?"

"I'm not answering rhetorical questions, Teller. Let's not pretend you don't know everything the Mendicant told me."

Storyteller took a slow breath. "You've changed, these past few months."

"Turns out a few near-death experiences will really change your perspective. Oh, and also finding out you might be responsible for saving the world one day."

Storyteller reached up to rub the back of his head, visibly wincing. Only after she saw his reaction did Cadence fully process what she had just said, and how she had said it.

She smiled. Ryme would've been proud of that one, she decided.

"I hated to leave you like that, Cadence. But I had to."

"Because you knew Geoffrey was about to die, and you had to get to Emeston in time to stop it. Which you didn't."

Storyteller turned to look at her, and even in the dark, Cadence could see the surprise in his posture.

"You told me yourself that my brain was my most dangerous weapon," she told him. "It's not my fault if I started actually using it."

"Fair enough," the man admitted sheepishly.

"And speaking of which, my understanding is that Sir Toren is supposed to be in Elliven right now. What are you doing here?"

"Kenton has Elliven under control for now," Storyteller said dismissively. "We've pushed the hags enough that they're going to have to back off for a while."

"Just long enough for you to come have a chat with your ward?"

"More like long enough for me to look into some other events."

"The attack here?" Cadence asked, finally turning to look at the archon. Even knowing what he was, even having seen him in combat, the celestial found it hard to be intimidated, or even really impressed, by the lanky scarecrow of a man.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

"This is just a pit stop," Teller said, shaking his head. "I'm headed to the Divide."

Cadence blinked. The Divide, the massive range of mountains that formed the Realm's eastern border, was named due to its nature as an impassable obstacle. Though there were no few accounts of explorers who had tried to cross the treacherous mountains, few ever made it back–and those who did had been forced to turn around in the middle of the range, never seeing the other side.

"Teller, I might not be a cartographer, but isn't the Divide in the east? Not far from Elliven?" Cadence didn't voice the obvious–how was Valley Hearth, on the opposite side of the Realm from Elliven, a pit stop on the way to the Divide?

"Teleporting is a handy thing," Storyteller explained casually, in a tone Cadence recognized as "this is one of those things I'm not going to explain."

"Okaaay…" Cadence drew out the word. "So. Do you want to share why you bothered teleporting across the Realm for a chat?"

Storyteller spread his hands. "Tobias told me how you were feeling about everything that had happened lately. I thought you deserved a check in from me."

Cadence mirrored the motion, spreading her own hands. "Well? Here I am."

Storyteller sighed. "Do you have any more questions for me? About the mythic gifts, the coven? Anything you think only I can answer?"

Cadence frowned, and turned back to the sprawling snow fields. Questions. She had plenty of those–she always had.

"Why me?"

"What do you know about Tenebres's gift?"

"What's your plan for my future?"

"How much of this was in your script?"

She didn't ask any of those. She couldn't bring herself to say the truth out loud: that she simply couldn't trust any answer he'd give her on any of the important questions.

Finally, instead, she asked, "What does authority mean?" She'd come across the term a couple times now, always in reference to mythic gifted, but she was still unclear on its meaning.

Storyteller blew out a pensive breath. "Right. Should've guessed you'd ask that."

"Let me guess: you're not going to tell me."

"No, no, I will," Storyteller said. "I'll start by saying that I find it a little distasteful, but it is valuable information for you to have." He took a moment, and Cadence tried her hardest not to to interrupt him, recalling when that had been a daily struggle for her. "Well, you recall how I gave you my gift, right?"

"Sort of. All I really know is that you imbued a copy of your gift into my soul."

"Right. That's something anyone can do at Master level with a mythic gift–we basically reflect the pattern on our own soul onto another person's, bestowing on them our own mythic gift. It can only be done once per person, though–that's why mythic gifts remain so rare.

"Authority is a way of getting around both the level requirement and the single use limit. It lets an Adept mythic gifted bestow a shadow of their own power onto another person, in a form that's not quite a true gift. It's closer to an augment–but an augment that exists in the conjunction between two souls, rather than two gifts."

"Okay, Cadence said, nodding to herself. "Why is that so bad?"

"Because, Cadence–while the gift I gave you might be fledgling in its power, it's still separate and distinct from my own Echo. With authorities, the shadow of the original gift is still linked back to the mythic gifted that bestowed it. It gives the mythic gifted a level of influence and control over those who have accepted their authority that I can only call invasive.

"From what I've heard, you faced down an authority of the Chimera at some point in the past, and Adeline and Olivia fought more during the battle. The Chimera's authority allows for a gifted to ignore the traditional limitations of totem gifts, letting them turn into their own form of chimera."

Cadence thought back to Egin, the bandit leader she and Oli had once fought. Blessed with both the cat and hawk gifts, he had been a unique threat–and one that had only grown worse when Olivia faced him down a second time. According to the girl, however, Egin had become increasingly feral, even rabid, throughout their fight, his humanity progressively consumed by his gifts until only a monster was left behind.

"It's a great power," Storyteller said, "but it comes at the cost of your soul. The mythic gifted that bestowed the authority can reach inside of you, twisting and changing you, and you can do nothing about it."

"That… does seem pretty bad," Cadence admitted.

"It is. The Crown occasionally makes use of authority, as well–often enough that the Authority is a recognized rank in the Realm's peerage. Right now, for example, the King has sent an Authority to Emeston as an adjunct of his will, someone he can trust will act on the Crown's behalf no matter what. But I've never approved of the system, and I've certainly never done so myself. And for the record, before you ask, I don't even know what the Echo's authority would do."

Cadence nodded, considering that–and that, perhaps, she and Tenebres might have that same ability at some point. It was a disquieting notion at best.

"How are your gifts coming?" Storyteller asked, clearly trying to change the subject.

"Fine," Cadence answered absently. "I'm a full Apprentice now."

"Good," Storyteller nodded. "Have you made your first waystone, then?"

She had, in fact. Though the Battle of Keystone had come so suddenly that she hadn't had a chance to experiment with her newest ability beforehand, she had taken some time just days before to try it out.

[Create Waystone] - Ritual - Imbue an object of emotional significance with a link to your soul. Waystone can be targeted with Wanderer abilities from any distance. Major stamina and focus cost on creation. One waystone may be maintained at a time.

The ritual had proven more instinctive than she had expected, being little more than a prolonged bout of meditation. As the ability's description implied, the waystone didn't need to, itself, be a stone–Cadence had used a knotty splinter from the Lifetree shrine for her first one.

"That'll be a key piece of your kit in the levels to come," Storyteller told her. "I know it's unimpressive now, but-"

"It's what you use for your anchor when you teleport, right?" Cadence said. She had been nursing that suspicion for some time now. "You and Tobias."

"Ah… yes," Storyteller admitted, "though I've personally left that restriction behind, at least partially."

That figured. She had her suspicions, even, about just what Tobias had used as his anchor to get to Valley Hearth. After all, he had been in Correntry just shortly before Olivia received her previously unmentioned insignia, and the squire had then been the first to see the Silver Mage in person.

"I'd like to ask a favor," Caden said. She reached for her belt pouch as she spoke, pulling out the simple cloth-wrapped shape of her waystone.

Storyteller caught it when she threw it to him. "Let me guess," he asked wryly, "you want a way to keep track of me?"

"No," Cadence said. Her eyes had travelled from the snow fields to the glittering stars overhead, to the crescent moon hanging in the night air, only now recognizing why this hill and this view had called to her, remembering a similar view, a similar sense of serenity. "You're going back east anyway. I'd appreciate it if you could drop that with my mother."

Storyteller seemed baffled by that–little surprise there, for a man who seemed to have no real connections left in his life–but he nodded. "Of course."

Cadence watched from the corner of her eye as he took a tentative step away, apparently set on leaving, but before he could go any farther, she said, "And Storyteller… thank you."

A dry laugh escaped the towering man. "After all of this… you're thanking me?"

Cadence shrugged. "I don't like the way you go about things," she told him. She turned back to the stars overhead as she continued. "Good reasons or no, my friends and I are more than characters in some fucking ring novel. But… if it wasn't for you, I might never have met all of them. It's been a long road, and it's not over yet, and I resent the way you forced me down it without telling me just what was waiting for me–but right now, at least, I like where I am. And I wouldn't be here if I hadn't met you. So… Thank you."

There was another moment of heavy, baffled silence before Storyteller said, "You're welcome."

Cadence didn't turn back around, and didn't say anything else. She simply stared up at the twinkling stars and smiled–and before long, she once more began to drink in the peaceful solitude of the night.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.