He Was Going To Kill Beris

Wick deals with more and more fallout from his fights in the ring

Wick woke up.

He seemed to be doing that from pain and misery far too often. This time, his head pounded like he had been drinking, and his body felt raked over gravel. The only nice thing he could feel was the bed and pillow he seemed he lay in. Groaning, he forced an eye open. The light was exactly as bad as he feared.

“Ah, the young Scribe awakes.” Graeltin sat in a blurry mass off to his left.

“Scribe?”

“Well, being pedantic no, but one of your talent we would quickly induct and train.” He stood, and walked to the bedside, holding a pitcher. “Drink, if you would, it should help immensely.”

Blinking some more, his vision cleared and the headache receded to a gentle, cataclysmic roar at the front of his skull. He lay in a small room, a guest accommodation by the looks of it. It could be a prison though.

“Where is this?”

“Worry not, this is only my humble home; the board was a miscalculation on my part. You learn fast.”

Wick rubbed his temples, which did nothing. “It doesn’t do that normally?”

“No, not itself.” He gestured to the pitcher. “Drink, drink. No, the board will by itself only remove from you power equal to your reservoir; and it does so whether you wish it to or not. You, however, forced all the energy you had into it.”

It hurt his head all the more to try and think through that, but he was interested. He could do the same magic the Scribes could, evidently.

“So… all the energy, from the box yeah? More than the reservoir. Why does that matter?”

“Well — drink, drink, it will help truly — if you run out of reservoir, it burns your life.”

He started, nearly choking on the water from the pitcher as he took a swallow. “Permanently?” That would not be alright if so.

“Ah, no. They both are equal and restore over the course of a day, but if you burn through your life, you die.”

Oh. Much better.

“Drink more, if you would.”

Sharding man was really on him about the water.

“This board and energy thing then, that’s what the Scribes do, yeah?”

Graeltin gave him a withering look. “Yes, us Scribes practice the ancient magic of ‘Board and Energy thing’. You should call it Veyra, show some respect even if it is only because it could take your life.”

“That was your fault.”

“Oh? And what about those nights you were brought to wakefulness as if struck with something?”

How did he know about that? He eyed the room again. It was surely lacking in metal if it were a prison.

“You’re guessing.”

The man harrumphed. “So quick to be dismissive. If I am guessing, than navigating a ship and telling the week of arrival is guessing. You are obviously untrained in the Veyratic arts, but used them on accident to powerful effect. Summoning life force on your first try would make you a prodigy this world has never seen, so. I guess at you having done this on accident a time or two, and woken up after the sun has set as you failed to release the energy.”

Wick blinked, realizing the Scribe before him was not some doddering old man or aloof noble. He had read him like a book, and it was uncomfortable. The pitcher seemed to be doing a lot to alleviate his headache, however.

“People just…develop this, yeah?”

“Ah, rarely, though it can happen. Do drink more, please. It is well known now within our circles that the ability to manipulate physical energy tends to run in bloodlines, although it can indeed be random. You, though, I imagine are less random than we would think, owing to your noble blood.”

For a moment, his actual blood was ice in his veins, and he felt terrified. Then, his wits returned and he realized he was still dressed in fine, freshly bought clothing. Pretending to choke on the water to mask any possible expressions, he set the pitcher down. He’d drunken a sizable amount, given the Scribe’s incessant prompting.

“How do you feel?”

Rather pointed inflection, he thought. “Better, lots actually. Good water.” That could be problematic. There was probably something in the water, especially with the man’s continual pushing.

If he hadn’t been rather woozy still, he could have sworn the man seemed sad when he said that. The Scribe got slowly up, and grabbed the pitcher. He walked away into some other room, and the sound of cabinets being opened carried back into the room.

Wick threw the covers back, and got up himself. He felt…increasingly spectacular, actually. If this had been a real hangover, this rate of recovery would have worried him. As it was, he didn’t know how the magic worked, and it seemed highly likely the Scribe put something in the pitcher which probably was helping out. He hoped.

There was a window at the end of the room, which potentially he’d be able to ascertain his location from. Stepping up to it, he found it was quite dark now. He’d forgotten to ask how long he had been out, but seeing this guessed it must have been hours. In fact…yeah. That was the moon, at about the third quartile in the sky. He recalled that from one of the books he’d ripped up while staying warm in the streets.

He always read them first. That was his payment; he would read them, they would keep him warm.

By the moon’s pale reflection in the window, he guessed it must have been three or four in the morning. Out for a whole eight hours, shards. Also in the reflection was the Scribe, lunging at him with a short spear.