LOCATION: THE CRUCIBLE, 50TH FLOOR
PLANET: LAPIS DIVINUS, ORION LUMINARY INSTITUTE
YEAR: 1 | DAY: ?? | TIME: ??
It was mid-day when Kaela arrived at the mayor’s mansion. She used the iron knocker, and a maid answered the door.
“Kaela, welcome back,” she said. “What can we do for you today?”
“Is the mayor available?” Kaela asked. “I need to speak with him, and it is quite urgent.”
The maid wrung her hands, looking down at the doorstep.
“I apologize, but he’s still sleeping.”
Kaela sighed.
“Fine. I will return in a few hours. Please don’t let him leave until he’s spoken with me. It is important.”
The maid nodded and said she’d pass the message along.
Kaela then turned and headed for The Cracked Tankard. It was time to confront Edric and hear his side of the story.
She entered the tavern through the double doors, and Aveline was just setting a tray down on the counter. She rushed to Kaela and gave her a hug.
“Kaela. It’s been several days. What happened?”
“Actually, a lot. I need to speak with you and Edric.”
She looked around. The lunch rush was over, and there were only a few customers lingering at their tables chatting.
“In private,” she added.
Aveline’s brow raised at that, and she asked Kaela to wait a minute while she tracked her husband down.
When they returned, Edric led the two women to the back and into his office.
“So?” he asked. “What’s this about?”
His impatient tone failed to hide a look of concern on his face.
Kaela explained everything she had learned in the forest.
When she mentioned meeting and spending time with Aeryn, Aveline began sobbing into her hands, shocked to hear her old friend was still alive. Edric reached out to comfort her, but Aveline swatted his hand away.
She turned toward him, her face already red with anger and sadness.
“I always suspected something like this, you know. It wasn’t like Aeryn to just leave and never return.”
Edric fell to his knees. He was a big man, and the floorboards shook with a thump as he landed in front of his wife.
“I’m so sorry, my love. When the wolves attacked Hark, we all froze in fear. They were fierce, and their growling chilled me to my bones.”
He was crying now, his hands on her knees, begging for forgiveness.
“By the time I shook out of it, Hark was already a bloody mess, and the other two were already gone. I wanted to help. I wanted to…”
He sniffled and wiped his nose on his sleeve, leaving behind a streak of mucus.
“I just kept thinking about you, and how I didn’t want to leave you a widow…”
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Aveline’s face shot up at him at that.
“So you decided to make Aeryn a widow instead? Great decision on your part.”
Kaela stayed back and let this play out. There were so many things she wanted to say, but she held off for now.
The couple argued for another half hour, seeming to forget Kaela was even there. Sobbing and yelling. Hugging and slapping. With Aveline doing all of the slapping, of course.
But then something new came out of the discussion.
As they began to get exhausted from the drawn out spat, Aveline confessed something.
“When I saw the village dragging on, sad from the loss of Mayor Fenwick and Aeryn, I remembered a flower she had shown me on one of our trips into the woods to pick herbs.”
Aveline looked into the corner of the small office as if reliving the memories with her dear friend. A faint smile graced her features.
“She called it a Snowmire Blossom. It was a white flower that grew under fallen logs and under heavy brush in the forest. We picked a bunch of them on that outing, and when I brewed tea with it, I realized it had a calming effect.”
She sighed.
“When Aeryn disappeared after losing Hark, it was too much for this small village to take. We’re not used to that kind of brutal life here, you know?”
She was looking at Kaela, who nodded in understanding.
“Anyway, over time, I came to realize that the Snowmire Blossom was not only calming everyone. It was dulling their senses, too. I had started using it in our coffee and our ales, even as seasoning in many of our dishes. Everyone was consuming it one way or another.”
She looked down at the floor.
“I thought the people deserved to feel less pain. Eventually it became clear that with too much long-term consumption, Snowmire actually caused partial amnesia. It was like they would go to sleep and wake up not remembering the night before.”
Kaela nodded again.
“I did find it strange that everyone seemed to keep going with the endless struggle day after day without doing anything about it.”
Edric was sitting back in his chair, and seemed to find his voice again.
“If it hadn’t been for you pushing us to train, to build that alarm system and that wall, we would still be going through the same routine, night after night.”
He looked at his wife, understanding the part she had played in all of this. Aveline looked terrified.
“It’s not your fault, love. You were trying to ease their pain. You couldn’t have known it would go this far.”
They spoke a while longer, and Kaela helped them arrive at a conclusion.
To her, it was enough that Edric confessed to his wife. Aveline promised to begin phasing out the Snowmire Blossom, hopefully returning the village to its senses again.
Kaela then returned to Mayor Halford’s mansion, finding him in his sitting room drinking a cup of tea.
She confronted him also, and found his answer to be similar to Edric’s. When the wolves appeared, the other three men froze in fear. The Guard Captain grabbed Marris’s sleeve and the two ran.
He was ashamed, and admitted that his sleep was haunted every single night by Hark and those wolves. The wolves attacking the village day after day only further cemented the dark dreams.
Marris Halford felt that he was a coward, and didn’t think he deserved to be mayor after allowing his friend to die in such a gruesome fashion.
“I have no way to make amends. I’ve been searching day and night for a way, but in the end, Edric and I both end up drinking ourselves into oblivion and trying to sleep it off.”
He drained his teacup and set it down.
“But then the nightmares come, and they don’t let me go until I finally wake, only to do it all over again.”
Kaela suggested a course of action.
“Find a successor, Marris. Find a successor, teach them how to be an effective mayor. A true leader. Then once they are ready, appoint that person and step down. You will make your amends by helping a new mayor usher Greyhaven into a new era that is not marked by nightly attacks, but by prosperity.”
“But the wolves are still coming every night,” he said.
“About that…”
Kaela told him about the plan she and Aeryn had come up with.
“Please,” the mayor pleaded, “allow me to join you. It’s the least I could do.”
Kaela thought about it for a moment.
“You know, it’s not a bad idea. But I need you to convince Edric and the Guard Captain. We leave before sunrise tomorrow. Meet me by the northern gate.”
With a plan in place, Kaela had a hearty meal at The Cracked Tankard. She even heard the story from Aveline directly about how they changed the name of the inn after Aeryn’s disappearance.
“Pewter is malleable, and just like our hearts, susceptible to cracking. Or breaking in the heart’s case. I thought it fitting to change the name in honor of Hark and Aeryn.”
The next morning, Kaela met the three men at the gate.
Kaela wrapped her fur cloak around her again, bracing against the frigid winter winds.
They set off to the northeast.
Toward Aeryn’s hut.
To finish off the witch doctor and put an end to the cycle they had so long endured.