CHAPTER 97: NEW POWERS

"Maybe it allows you to see weakpoints?" Elira suggested.

"I doubt it." Cassian shook his head. "This scar is almost ten years old, and it’s hardly a weakpoint - besides human body has many more places that would be more suitable."

"Yeah I agree with Cass, but I think you’re on the right track." Calen nodded.

"Look at other things then, maybe it’ll give us a clue." Isara said.

Calen moved his gaze between his other two companions, and frowned.

"Nothing out of ordinary about you two." He hummed. "Let’s check something inanimate."

His eyes stopped on one of the support beams near their table.

"There." He pointed at a large knot in the wooden surface. "It’s telling me that there’s something up with that spot."

By a coincidence he also caught a glimpse of another person - and what he saw made him pause and frown even harder.

Just to be sure, he looked at few other people, and sure enough, they all looked the same - their entire bodies were speckled with highlighted areas, as if they suffered from a bizzare kind of pox.

"So you can see something on everyone except us?" Elira rubbed her chin. "That’s a bit strange - what is the difference between us and them?"

"Maybe it’s because we were always protected by the flame?" Isara guessed.

"Most of those people never left the city, they were also protected since the moment they were born" Calen pointed out. "What else could cause us to be less polluted by these points that others?"

"Polluted...?" Elira’s eyes widened. "It’s the tea - it removed all the impurities from our bodies, everyone else would be full of them when compared to us."

"That would make sense, but what about the knot and the scar then? I wouldn’t really call those impurities."

"Imperfections!" Isara snapped her fingers. "Since we assume this power cam from ’truth’ and ’perfection’, it would make sense for it to show all imperfections."

"So essentially it allows you to see flaws of everything? That seems quite useful." Cassian commented. "I wonder whether it’s limited to physical flaws."

"At least for now it seems to only work on tangible things." Calen stated. "And it has a time limit, it just stopped working."

"What about the other two?" Isara was finishing her 3rd cup of wine and was already slurring words slightly.

"I’m not sure we’ll be able to check those here, I’m assuming that ’absolution’ merged with ’power’ while ’loyalty’ connected with ’perseverance’ - and neither of those combinations would have simple results."

"We could at least speculate a bit." Elira said. "For example, I think we can all agree that the ability that came from absolution will be connected to purification, right?"

"That would make the most sense, yes - and I believe the loyalty one has something to with connection, and with the influence of perseverance it will likely get stronger with time."

They continued discussing the possibilities for another two hours - and in the meantime Isara got completely drunk and passed out with her head on the table.

It seemed like the celebration was slowly dying down, as the volume of people pouring into the tavern decreased significantly, leaving it emptier and quieter than before.

"Should we go home? Isa is completely out of it, and while she’s safe with us I can’t imagine this sleeping position is comfortable - also I don’t want her to complain about her neck for the next week." Calen proposed.

"You’re heading out? But we just got here!"

They all turned around to see Maya and Alison standing nearby, looking slightly more disheveled than when they last seen them.

"See? They also want to retire for the night, I told you we’ve had enough." Alison crossed her arms.

"But we haven’t gotten a chance to drink! The next time we’ll have an opportunity to get smashed will be in a year!"

"Gods know you don’t need alcohol, but if you really want to drink we can ask Lady Sylara for something from her personal stash tomorrow." The capitan compromised. "I’m tired M, and we have to wake up for work early."

"Fine." Maya sighed and looked at Alfred’s unconscious body. "Should we do something about him?"

Alison simply walked up to a tall man sitting next to Alfred and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Wha...?" The man turned around. "Capitan! What can I do for you?"

He looked surprisingly sober considering the fact that he has been here longer than Calen and his companions.

"Could you drag Alfred to his room once you’re done drinking?"

"Sure cap, I’ll be heading out soon anyway."

"Thanks." She turned around and addressed the group. "We can go now."

After a minute of shuffling around to get Isara hosted on Calen’s back they left the tavern.

The streets were almost silent now, and so was the market - most of the stalls were already closed, and the few remaining ones didn’t have many customers.

"Where do you guys live actually?" Calen prompted. "You always walk us back to our room, but we never actually saw you go home."

"We have a room at the fortress, exactly one floor above you actually." Alison explained.

"Do many people live there? To be honest it seems kinda empty."

"Every public servant is entitled to a room in the fortress, but very few choose that option and prefer to pick one of the many empty houses in the city." She shrugged. "I guess they value the miniscule improvement on privacy that much."

"Weird choice if you ask me." Maya commented. "Living in the fortress comes with free meals and a bunch of cool facilities, who cares if our neighbours can hear when we’re fuc-"

"No need for details." Alison put a hand over Maya’s mouth. "And they wouldn’t hear anything anyway because the walls are soundproof."

Maya pulled the hand off her face.

"...anyway, did you like the festival?"

"The light show was really unique, but other than that it was a pretty standard festival." Calen said.

"Oh? Have you been to many different festivals?"

"Not that many, but Asharil had three annual ones." He nodded. "There were definitely bigger than the one here, but that’s mostly because our hometown population was over ten times bigger than yours."

"We were also on the solstice celebration in the capital once." Cassian remained him.

"Yeah but we were nine and I don’t really remember anything, do you?"

"I remember there was a lot of people."

"Well, hopefully we’ll get to experience more festivals once you liberate the world from the Blight." Maya chuckled.

"I gues we’ll see."

***

Back in the common room Auren was still sleeping soundly where they left him.

"I’m going to leave Isa in her bed and then hit the hay myself, what about you guys?"

"I’m heading straight to bed." Cassian said.

"Me too I think." Elira agreed. "Do you need me to help her undress before bed?"

"I was thinking of leaving her as is to be honest, we don’t really have sleepwear anyway."

"Right, goodnight then."

It wasn’t the first time Calen was hauling drunk Isara home, and it hopefully won’t be the last, but due to his increased strength the task became significantly easier.

"And done." He placed her on the bed and covered her, but as he was turning to leave the room, but something stopped him:

"...Cal?" Isara mumbled weakly.

Calen crouched next to the bed.

"Did I wake you up?"

"No? I don’t know." She frowned, her eyes only half-open. "I have some.. thing to say."

He knew she was either about to say something completely out of pocket or get very sentimental, but he decided to go along with it.

"Yeah?"

"You... you can be really dumb sometimes." She scowled.

"Thanks, I know." He tried not to smile.

"But you’re also always there for me - will you keep doing that?"

"Sure."

"Promise me." She stuck out her pinkie finger out of the covers.

He hooked her finger with his own, and looked in her eyes.

"I promise."

That’s when the unexpected thing happened:

A golden tendril of flame up his arm and then traveled down Isara’s, before disappearing completely.

Unfortunately for him she already went back to sleep, so he had no one to confirm whether what he saw wasn’t just a hallucination from the lack of sleep.

He quietly left her bedroom and found himself back in the common room - he had a feeling sleep wouldn’t come easily after what he just saw.

If it wasn’t just a mirage, then it was likely a one of his new powers - and it wasn’t difficult to figure out which.

’Absolution makes no sense here, so it’s likely loyalty.’ he nodded to himself.

The facts were that he made a promise, and it triggered a power born from loyalty and perseverance - logic dictated that the power had to do with keeping promises, vows or paths.

But if it just made him unable to brake a promise that was more of a punishment than a power - it probably had some other element he wasn’t aware of.

’No point in speculating, I’ll just ask Sylara tomorrow.’