They spent half a day climbing to the next village. The rain came and went, killing conversations and dampening the mood. The temple guards had given Viv strange looks the night before as she was trying to teach proper table manners to Arthur. The worst thing was that you could hear the louts smacking their lips and swallowing through a concrete wall and they threw the food down their gullets like it was going to escape. Not to mention the burps. They were animals. It took all of her self-control not to make scathing comments on their abominable table manners. Farren felt the tension in the air and he tried to distract everyone, but it just led the guards to talk, which sent droplets of saliva and half-gnawed gobbets of meat across the room. Viv had retired outside after that.

Around them, the green grass and brambles progressively gave way to lichen and hardy growths clinging stubbornly to cracked stone. The massive mountain range encircling Harrak started there, before them, its many peaks snuggly covered in eternal snow. A green band expanded horizontally across the full range as spring struggled against the deadlands’ grip. The first signs of civilization came as they passed by a rocky outcrop and the air suddenly felt wetter. Viv recognized it immediately. It was terrace farming.

The mountain tribe had painstakingly created terraces of horizontal terrain, forming steps climbing up and down the edge of the mountain. Green buds were already popping from the brown earth with surprising vigor. Viv could look left and see the deadlands expanding to the horizon, but the black mana had little hold here.

They followed a well-traveled path large enough to accommodate their carriages, quickly coming across people in brown and red garbs working the field. The locals shared the brown hair, brown eyes and slightly greenish skin of everyone, but they were also taller and a bit too thin. There were men and women and children seeding the rich loam, and they toiled in silence with their eyes downcast. Viv almost thought that they were sad, but as they turned a bend in the road, the sound of a distant song proved that she and her companions had been the problem all along.

“Mightily hostile for people we’re supposed to help,” she remarked with some annoyance.

//Your Grace.

Solfis spoke for the first time. His voice was low and she thought she detected excitement, or at least animation in the artificial tone.

“Yes?”

//I recognize the facial features of those people from my time.

//They harbor strong resemblance to the Harrakan southerners I met.

//Hypothesis: those mountain tribes are descendants of survivors who refused to move on!

“That would make sense. Is there any way for us to use that piece of information though?”

//Not at the moment, no.

//Keep in mind that their language could be close to an imperial local dialect.

//Hence, they might understand our conversations, should they overhear them.

“I’ll keep it in mind.”

The trip went on. The terraces were expansive, to say the least, and those working the fields lived in small villages dotting the flank of the mountains. The houses looked barely more than hovels. It was a deceptive look. In truth, a glimpse through an open door showed that the locals had dug into the earth to protect themselves from the cold.

All of the houses were half-troglodyte dwelling, and the roofs were thatch and brick. Wood was scarce in everything.

Viv also noticed a lot of tiny red flowers the exact same dye as the locals’ clothes, hinting at natural pigments.

They arrived at a major settlement by nightfall, coming across another convoy of several families moving in silence. Farren had joined Viv in the middle of the afternoon to distract her from her constant training.

“The mountain tribes gather in their winter quarters to endure the cold season, but also whenever they celebrate a major event. When spring comes, they return to their individual villages. Most couples meet during the cold days. It’s one of their cultural specificities.”

“Interesting. Is it for safety?”

“Yes. They leave no food behind, so even roaming, hungry monsters will leave their abandoned houses alone. Winter in the mountains can also be boring and depressing, so it’s usually better to spend it together. Lots of games, and uh, many kids will be born in early autumn.”

“I see.”

Viv remembered the old joke about what one’s great grand-parents used to do in the days before the internet. If one wondered, they could just ask the ancestors’ seventeen children.

“So what’s the plan now?” Viv asked.

“We will meet with some elders and there will probably be a small feast. The work begins tomorrow.”

Viv winced, and Farren jumped on the occasion.

“I meant to ask, what’s with you and table manners? Even poor Marruk eats as daintily as a Baranese countess these days. You know that you can relax with us, right?”

Viv shot the poor boy the most scathing, haughty look she could. She knew from previous feedback that her green eyes had a distant quality that some could find intimidating. She used them now.

“Manners are not about relaxation, they are about respect. You know that, right?”

Farren was a bit chastised.

“You remind me of my etiquette teacher.”

He grimaced.

“Look, I can’t help it,” Viv finally said, “it just annoys me. I don’t say anything because, in the end, it’s my personal reaction, and they don’t owe it to me to behave the way I want. But don’t expect me not to be pissed about it, it’s a visceral reaction.”

Farren nodded thoughtfully.

“Good of you to tolerate what you could prohibit instead.”

For a moment, the temptation was strong to force the temple guards to sit straight and bring their food to their mouth instead of the contrary. She was a caster. She could threaten them. It could work. It would also be a massive abuse of power.

Chewing noise had always been the bane of Viv’s mom. Her dad had told Viv that he had made a fortune in business and investments but he was still a ‘nouveau riche’, a mannerless oaf, until he met Viv’s mom. She had taught him how to eat, how to speak, even how to dress with understated grace. Her dad instinctively understood fitting in, but it was her mom who had given him the veneer required to blend in the particularly hermetic southern upper class. Viv had inherited her Mom’s tendency to be annoyed at organic, repetitive sounds.

It made her miss her family.

Farren eyed her, considering. Viv noticed him lick his lips.

“You never talk about your past. Were manners important for your family?”

He was trying to get her to open up. It felt like genuine interest. Farren was safe.

Viv talked a bit about her parents, but they were interrupted before she could tell much. They were entering the settlement.

Viv looked with interest at the large village, nestled as it was between two flanks of the mountain. There was a dip in the ever-present wind that gave the place a warmer feel, and several sources of light cast white radiance on colorful walls. With red and brown paint, the walls of large buildings depicted important scenes of hunt and migrations, using a primitive art that gave every scene a transparent meaning. Here were families fleeing from the wrath of a large, winged predator. There, they found a cave to settle in. Finally, a warrior covered in beast skins returned and slayed the monster. Dyed pieces of cloth attached to ropes hung over the streets held aloft by the weakened gales. The mood here was more curious than circumspect as they entered the place. Several people pointed them to a central plaza.

The two carriages stopped in a tiny central square, with a few villagers rushing out to take care of the horses. Farren and the temple guards climbed down with Viv and company following closely.

An old man wearing the most outrageous hat Viv had ever seen strode out of the largest building with his entourage. The entourage was interesting in itself, and so was the man, but not as much as the hat. Viv could only watch with amazement as the massive headdress bobbed along its proprietor. It was a mix between an Ushanka hat and a turban, massive and glittery with ornaments. Here, it said, was the person in charge. Viv had to force her mouth closed and actually pay attention to the people once they stepped almost right in front of her. Fortunately, Farren acted as a buffer.

He and the old man started a conversation in hesitant Enorian, giving Viv time to rectify her diplomatic faux-pas. The mountain tribe leader had a long white beard dotted with little pearls which were, Viv realized, pierced transparent rocks. He wore a large red sash and heavy clothes. Two of the men around him wore chainmail made dull by age, of a kind that Viv recognized with great surprise. Those reminded her of the few intact statues she had seen in Harrak. They were Imperial garbs!

Besides the two guards, she also noted tall men dressed in layers of animal skins covered with primitive runes. She easily recognized black mana shields. The men all had quarterstaffs strapped to their backs, and kept their faces covered.

The conversation finished, and Viv found herself face-to-face with Mr. big hat.

The elder turned to one of his aides and muttered a few words in a language that Viv recognized, and that sent her mind reeling.

When Maradoc, the god of secrets, had granted her the knowledge of the Old Imperial language, she had obtained the entire breadth of variations and cultural references that went with it. She could recognize the man’s tongue. It was a strange mix of Imperial southern dialect and something else. She could follow it in the same way as someone with good knowledge of BBC English could understand a strong brogue.

He was asking a tiny old woman by his side how casters wanted to be greeted.

“Oh! Uh…” she said eloquently.

What to do?

Her well-honed instincts told her that hiding her knowledge could reap benefits, but also that the price of being found out would be steep. On the other hand, she could let them know that she understood them, and see where that got her. They showed a certain distrust of foreigners. Even when Farren and the elder had talked, the latter had never lowered his guard.

Viv considered it and realized that she had no real way of knowing what was the best option. She had to rely on her instincts.

She went with honesty. Besides, her understanding was not good enough to pick up whispered secrets.

“Do you speak Harrakan?” she said, trying to sound as close as possible to the southern accent.

The old man’s eyes went wide. So did every other tribe members’ for that matter.

“How do you know the old tongue?” the old man asked, surprised.

“I learned Harrakan through a skill and you sound just like it.”

“Amazing! Do you know what I mean when I say “as useful as skis in Harrak?”

“Yes, it means completely useless, because Harrak, the city, is perfectly flat. It was designed to be level.”

“Yes. Yes! What else do you know about us?”

“Not much. I received the skill when I was teleported into the Imperial palace. I almost died too.”

“You saw the Ziggurat with your own two eyes? Can you describe it?”

Farren and the rest watched with bemused expressions as Viv and the elder, who introduced himself to her as Marredyn, conversed with animation. His wife joined in when he started to speak too fast and Viv lost the trail.

“Oh, but where are my manners? Come in, come in!” he finally declared, and led everyone inside.”

Viv turned to Marruk. The Kark woman’s mouth still hung open.

“Big hat!”

Indeed.

They had a party.

The main hall of the mountain tribe village was almost completely open to accomodate a banquet room filled with long tables across a massive hearth that could roast a hippopotamus — or the local equivalent — with room to spare for a piglet. Heat was provided by coals, not wood. They glowed red in the semi-darkness.

Attendants busied themselves preparing food while the old couple grilled Viv on her knowledge of idioms. She could get most ancient references, but anything related to the mountain eluded her. Apparently, southern and northern Harrakan had enjoyed ribbing each other before the disaster struck. The elder also shared that most survivors had integrated into other societies, but a few had become nomads, and only returned a century ago when the black mana saturation had suddenly dropped to the current levels.

Viv found herself at the seat of honor to the speechless surprise of Farren and everyone else. The food they got was nice as well. There were sauteed vegetables, fresh and tasty, and triangles of hard cereals that reminded her of rice, held in long plant leaves and steamed until they were tender, with a heart made of either eggs or fatty meat. It was delicious and filling.

“Why is that food replenishing my mana?” she asked with wonder as she felt her core heating up.

The elders were excited to learn that she was a black witch, and reminded her that their food had a high black mana content. It made meals very attractive to Viv as they were not only delicious, but also possessed a rejuvenating quality that only she could truly appreciate.

“Will you recharge the ward stone?” the elder asked towards the end as they were drinking a powerful digestive to ‘dissolve the fat’.

“Yesh, that’sh why am here,” Viv seriously told them. That liquor was so naish! It really warmed her from top to bottom, it did! She wished Varska was here. That shy cutie.

They went on to explain that some of the ‘walkers’, whatever that was, would escort her and to be careful of revenants.

“Don’t worry about ravenee, errr, reva, errrr, those dead motherfuckers. I got zhish.”

Viv stood with all the majesty she could muster, which was not a lot, and promptly fell on her face.

The morning after.

“Owwwww They were walking down the edge of the mountain following a well-traveled path. The black mana was growing thicker, but it was still manageable. They had left the terraces behind. Only small plants and other enduring growths offered some color. The rest was grey rock, then the dusty bleakness of the deadlands extended to the horizon.

“High affinity,” Viv replied, not trusting herself to move her lips too much. She was suckling on her water flask everytime she thought she would not throw up. That was some premium hangover. Viv usually downed water after getting a buzz and before sex if applicable to avoid this kind of headache. This time, the treacherous booze had caught her off guard.

She should get a few bottles to bring back.

“We are not far now,” one of the walkers said.

It turned out that the walkers were a specialized path that pretty much only existed among the mountain tribes. They were scouts meant to operate in the deadlands. On top of heightened black mana resistance, they benefited from a range of skills including the ability to escape revenant perception, and skills with a heavy quarterstaff that allowed them to disable multiple opponents at the same time. It would not work as well against human fighters, but most deadlands creatures could operate without issue with a sword planted somewhere, while a shattered limb would slow them down.

Once again, Viv was amazed at how adaptive paths were. It reinforced her opinion that they were just an interface for people to handle how they wanted the magic of the world to change them.

Something else that she should have guessed was that paths offered defensive skills. She had assumed that Marruk’s ability to block stuff came from a shield skill or something, but apparently some simply increased the general resilience of the beneficiary. It was just that Viv’s path did not have anything to make her more solid. She had danger sense and the ability to vaporize any incoming threat.

Come to think of it, that was pretty cool as well.

The walkers had been unusually open to explaining their abilities and Viv had also deduced another important facet of magical reinforcement. The more mana she had, and the more resilient to foreign effects she became. That meant that powerful mages could be just hurt by her spell instead of disintegrated. Viv suspected that it might be more relevant for other aspects. Black was in a class of its own when it came to destruction. It also meant that powerful monsters were well-protected against her. When facing them, she would have to take their resilience into account.

It took them only an hour to reach the first ward stone. It sat, lonely, at the edge of the dead plains proper. Before it, plants and lichen still struggled to cling to the ground in fading, but colorful blotches. After it, there was only dust, and the occasional black dot of deadland brambles.

Although they had called it a ward stone, Viv believed that ‘obelisk’ might be a better term. The rock rose from the ground in defiance of the surrounding flats, its surface glowing white with a network of runes. Viv could not detach her eyes from the construct. She almost slipped in a shower of gravel.

“Wow, this is the thing? It’s much more complex than I thought!” she admitted out loud.

“Of course,” Farren sniffed, “the network of ward stones was established by a famous mage from the Helock University as commissioned by our church. It was a grand endeavor.”

“Well la-di-fucking-da, fan-boy. Where is that thing’s battery?”

Farren grumbled while the entourage of soldiers and walkers made a show of not paying attention to them. The ‘battery’, as it were, was a circle with a handprint at the back. Viv placed her own there and recognized the familiar feeling of connection she had when feeding Solfis’ core. She pushed her mana in, and the construct drank it greedily. The closest runes shone with more energy.

“Simple enough, simple enough,” Viv muttered, but the glyphs caught all her attention. There were some she recognized, like “if” and “transfer”, and “black” of course, but others that escaped her and bounced around at the edge of her consciousness. She got the general impression that the stone absorbed ambient black mana and turned it into energy to repel the black mana. As far as designs were concerned, she thought it was a bit stupid. The construct was starving itself of the resource it needed to keep going, and then when the black mana increased in intensity, the runes were too weakened to function properly. It was a secondary concern, however. The important part was that the glyphs to self-sustain an enchantment were here, before her eyes.

Something tugged on her then, and she realized that her conduits had dried up.

“Shit.”

She pulled her hand and fought off the deeply unsettling sensation of being too low on mana. The obelisk was a third full, she judged. She could recharge fast on the edge of the deadlands. They would be done quickly.

Viv walked away a bit and started working on the forms Solfis had taught her, taking great care to feel the black mana overcoming the other hues as the world’s life crossed boundaries between the outside and her true self. The strange experience made her go over the edge.

Mana absorption: Advanced 1