.
According to Aunt Elianora, the reason many Darkness and Light spells seem to do things other than those related to the Dark or the Light is that the nature of these manas is also the nature of knowledge. By which, she meant, using 21st century Earth terms, data.
Light reveals knowledge. Darkness hides it. Therefore, both of them control it. Spells that affect the mind, spells that pass messages, and spells that aid or inhibit detection.
For invisibility using Light, one recreates the image on one side of an object on its other side, rewriting the information, the image, to render the object invisible.
The spell doesn’t ‘bend the light around the object’. Fantasy writers sometimes make the mistake of describing invisibility that way. If you did such a thing, then the person inside the affected region would be blind, since no light would reach their eyes. I can verify this, because Ceria showed me a Light spell called [Twilight] that does bend light. It bends as much of the sunlight as she wishes away from the space covered by the spell. A little bit, to lessen the glare, or more, to create a cooling shade, or even all of it, to create a zone of pitch-black darkness. Since it covers in all directions, even the ambient light from the sides is deflected.
It has very little utility in its strongest form, because it is very fatiguing thanks to the quantity of mana required. But she says she has used it as an effective countermeasure against ranged weapons. She didn’t cast it on herself, but rather, on the enemy, dropping them into total darkness.
But my [Vampire Cloak], a spell driven by Darkness, interrupts information, and that’s why it should work on this barrier. The barrier spell depends upon detecting the presence of an intrusion– whether it is an object or an attack– and countering that intrusion with a repelling force, normally using Wind mana. If the fact that I was coming through never reached the spell, it could not react.
That was a good theory, but as I reached the barrier, a very large part of me was ready to feel an impact. I mean, I could see the barrier, so it looked like I was about to hit something.
Sidis was also troubled. I felt her body stiffen as she braced for an impact.
I did feel something as I passed through several feet of manifested Darkness, but it was just the feather touch of that insubstantial layer passing through my body. Since half my flesh is made of mana, I’m very sensitive to the stuff. But my flight path was never affected, and we were inside without a hitch.
“That was a little anticlimactic,” I commented, sending the girl in my arms into a giggle fit. I’m sure the length of her laughter was mostly the release of tension. It wasn’t like I had made a hilarious joke.
“Where do you suggest we put down?” I wondered.
“Are you still using your stealth?”
“Yeah. I don’t think suddenly appearing in the air in the middle of a military crisis is wise. I would like to get us down on the ground, first.”
Bear in mind that we were flying above a circular basin five miles wide filled with wetlands that looked in some parts like flooded woodland and in others like bogland, with zones between that resembled the Everglades to some degree. But there were also many raised patches with buildings standing on them, mostly thatched cottages built of stone. I thought about historic events like the Seminole wars or the battle for New Guinea during WWII and realized any invader was going to have a hard time conquering this place. The Amaga tribe had chosen tough grounds for their headquarters.
Sidis guided me to a low hill with a cluster of ancient-looking stone buildings on it, next to a lagoon. The rest of the lagoon’s shore was ringed with trees, except for gaps where the water connected to the marsh beyond, and opposite the hill, the forest widened into a dense, marshy thicket where other old stone buildings crouched here and there. I could feel a dense flow of mana of several different elemental types streaming out of that thicket, and I quickly realized that I was seeing their mana spring.
We touched down on a gravel path at the spot she chose, between two low-lying stone buildings. The eaves were only up to my eye level.
“Halflings live here?” I wondered. Although halflings would normally build into the hill if they had one.
“We don’t know who built this place, My Lady. The water-folk say the buildings already stood here before they moved into the area. They were ruins that we are restoring for our own use.”
I put Sidis down and dropped my [Vampire Cloak].
“We can be seen now,” I told her.
She looked around, then grabbed my hand and began walking down the path.
A little perplexed by how easily she had latched onto my hand like that, I followed her around a corner and past an entry, which turned out to have several steps down before the door. Rather than halfling structures, the buildings were half-sunken, it seemed.
Beyond the buildings stood several large tents. The first people we had seen here, a pair of glaive-carrying human warriors, were standing guard before the closest one.
The glaive is a weapon a lot like something you see in anime from time to time, the naginata. It’s basically a single-edged blade mounted at the end of a pole. The Huadan version has a tip so that it can thrust like a spear, but it is also swung like a halberd. Bruna carries one, apparently because she heard that her father used them, but they are actually very rare outside the mountains. In Orestania, the standard infantry unit consists of a square of pikemen supported by crossbows.
As Sidis marched right up to the tent as if she was about to walk in without stopping, the two warriors crossed their glaives to bar our entry.
“Don’t you recognize me?” she demanded.
“We don’t recognize the woman behind you, Miss,” the one on the right answered.
“Sidis!” came a voice from inside the tent, before she could reply. A human man, probably in his late thirties, came rushing up from behind the guards. They hurried to retract their weapons when he showed no sign of stopping. As he came up to her and grabbed her by the shoulders, he continued, “Dreniu told you to head the border! How did you get through the barrier?”
“I had help, Uncle Bron,” she answered, gesturing over to me.
I extricated my hand and curtseyed. “I am Tia Mona, an adventurer.”
“How did you get through the barrier!” he demanded.
“I have a few small skills with Dark magic,” I answered simply. The frown I received in return looked quite troubled. Well, yeah, if it was so easy to get through their defenses, I suppose it would be troubling.
“Where’s Father, Uncle Bron?” Sidis asked.
Still mostly frowning at me, he spared Sidis a glance to say, “He’s with your grandfather on the southern border, facing the main enemy force. May I ask how difficult this magic you used is?”
Of course, he had directed the last question toward me.
I tipped my head to the side slightly. “For a half-fairy with extremely strong pneuma and high proficiency with certain Dark magic techniques, not difficult at all. Are there many such persons to be found in this area?”
His eyebrows rows slightly, “Oh. Pardon. I thought…”
When he stopped himself, I gave him a wry smile. “No sir, I am not a succubus.”
“Uncle!” Sidis reproved the man. But, he hadn’t been ogling me in the first place, no matter what he had been thinking, so I awarded him extra points in my head for gentlemanly behavior.
“It’s fine, Sidis,” I assured her. “A lot of people make that mistake.”
“Lady Tia is really amazing, Uncle,” she told him. “She saved me from a Berado patrol in Lisrau. And she healed my wing that they broke. I was very fortunate to meet her.”
He gave me a slight bow and told me gravely, “In my little sister’s place, I thank you for your kind aid to her daughter.”
I shook my head. “I had an ulterior motive for saving your niece, as I had realized she was an enemy of my enemy.”
“If I might inquire, I just heard that it was Lady Tia?”
The ‘Uncle’ title was now explained. Sidis had a human mother, just like Ceria. As Allia had mentioned, human x beast-kin was not uncommon in this region.
I gave him a mild smile. “I’m merely an adventurer, Sir Bron. My father was a Dorian baron, so my party companions insist on calling me ‘Lady’.”
It wasn’t a lie. As Duke of Pendor, Lord Egon was also Baron Mona, for the same reason Mother is Baroness because she is Duchess.
He made a dismissing wave. “We don’t use such titles here. I am simply Bron, first son of Dorin, our chieftain. I take it your enemy is the Berado tribe?”
So Sidis was granddaughter to that chieftain? It explained why she seemed well-educated. I nodded. “Yes. They have our client’s kidnapped daughter.”
After a moment of contemplation, he stated, “You aided my niece, so I shall trust you. Come.”
He wheeled and headed into the tent. Sidis grabbed my hand again, pulling me along. I gave that hand a bemused smile.
The inside was a familiar sight. During her stint in Lang Doria, the old Tiana had mostly served as an aide in a division headquarters, and this tent looked the same as then. Maps were spread on tables, and various aides were busy with their duties here and there. I noticed it was only barely a human majority; several bird-kin and cat-kin and a wolf-kin were in the mix.
Bron brought us to one side and gestured for us to take seats in the chairs there.
“Did you have a successful trip, girl?” he asked his niece as we sat. She nodded and untied the rope belt around her waist that carried her sack of ore stones.
“I was able to buy more than two hundred stones,” she answered. She finished freeing the sack and handed it to a bird-kin girl that Bron had gestured to come over.
“Bring that to the artisans immediately,” Bron ordered the girl, who did a chest-thumping salute and dashed out.
“Well-done,” he told Sidis, then turned to me and said, “You mentioned ulterior motives. Are you looking for our help? We’re somewhat busy here.”
“Just any information I can have. I need to know anything about the location of the Berado chieftain, or whereabouts of a couple women who have been spotted in Berado territory in recent days, if you happen to know those. Locations of their military camps would be helpful, too.”
His eyebrows went up and he rubbed his chin.
“I would introduce you to my father, but he and the rest of his commanders are at the southern barrier. I’m in charge of the remainder of the perimeter while the rest are facing the main force. You’ve helped us, but it’s my father’s decision whether your help merits sharing our hard-won intelligence with you.”
Intelligence is a very sensitive subject. Letting the information out risks letting the enemy know you have it. With a nod to convey my understanding, I looked around the calm, smoothly-functioning war room. “I don’t see any sign of panic here. It leads me to believe that your battle is going well. May I return to ask my questions again, once your crisis has passed?”
His mouth twisted with grim humor. “The Berado thought they could pull off a decapitation attack on our capital, but they’ve badly misstepped. Once our reinforcements arrive, they’ll have to beat a hasty retreat. With luck, we can make them pay a harsh price for the lesson as well. I’m sure we can deal with your request soon. Perhaps as early as tomorrow.”
The way he said it had a feeling of finality, as if that was my only option. Talking to high-level commanders is often like that.
“The mess hall should be serving,” Sidis noted, reading the air well. “May I treat My Lady to some breakfast, Uncle?”
It looked like he was about to agree, but a young man called out from across the room at that moment.
“Report from the northern perimeter! The barrier is under heavy fire near the river entrance! A fairy knight is leading the attack!”
