Even without my arm tightly secured in Tamrie’s grasp, I would’ve found myself correcting Thozgar. “Ah, I’m not actually single. Tamrie and I are together.”

My immediate clarification caused Tamrie’s grip to relax. It also caused a smile to bloom on the face of Thozgar’s daughter.

“There you have it, father. He’s already engaged,” his daughter said, pushing out of her chair and turning to Tamrie holding her hand out. “A pleasure to meet you, I am Arizar, daughter of Thozgar. Though I suppose that part is rather obvious, after my old man tried to foist me off on your betrothed. Upper Hold, White-one, also pretty obvious.”

Tamrie reached out, holding her hand cupped upward and Arizar placed her own fingers inside. “Right pleasure, lady Arizar. Tamrie, daughter of Tamarah, Lower Hold Azure-Three.”

“Oh, you were born in the lower holds? I’ve never met someone actually born there before. Your mother must’ve been a truly dedicated worker,” Arizar said, her thumb moving to capture Tamrie’s hand as she pulled her forward. “You must tell me all about your life there. Sit, please.”

Wasn’t sure who was most befuddled at Arizar’s sudden friendliness; me, Thozgar or Tamrie herself.

Either way, we moved on quickly.

“Well, it seems I’ve made a bit of a fool of myself. A rather poor way to welcome you to the neighborhood. Please, accept my apologies,” Thozgar said, patting the cushion next to his. “I was under the impression you hadn’t found a partner, and with the Howling season preventing visitors…”

Accepting the implied invitation, I sank into the cushion next to his. It was as comfortable as it looked, though the texture was smoother than I expected. With Tamrie settled down next to Arizar, Bevel flopped onto the cushion beside me, arms and legs spread wide, thumping each against the cushion while looking up to the roof.

Tresla settled down on a cushion behind us, while Inertia seemed more interested in testing the effect of the enchantment, quietly walking in and out of it, only letting out an occasional puff of steam, much to She’erd’s apparent dissatisfaction.

Leaving Inertia to her diversion, I focused on Thozgar, who’d lowered himself, goblet and all, into his cushion.

“Refreshments?” he asked, “I’m afraid the war has impacted several of the city’s usual luxuries, but we have most of our signature dishes.”

“Fruit smoothies?” Bevel asked before I could respond, perking up to peer over at him, using my shoulder as support.

“I… what is a smoothie?” Thozgar asked, shifting to glance over at her.

As Bevel explained, I found my gaze shifting over to where Tamrie and Arizar were chatting away, both smiling. It was good to see Tamrie getting along with her so well. She didn’t have many friends back in Cape Aeternia.

“I shall have the kitchen prepare some of this ‘fruit smoothie’,” Thozgar said, raising his hand free hand. A stone appeared in it, and a second later, a silvery face appeared on the stone’s surface. Several quick instructions later, and Thozgar turned back to us, smiling. “We shall try one of these fruit smoothies shortly.”

Bevel clapped her hands together and I found myself ruffling her hair as she did so.

“So, how much do you know about the Calming Run?” Thozgar asked, swirling his goblet before taking a sip.

“Not much. Just that the Surgers carve their own boards and then use them to race up and down the major waterlifts,” I replied.

“And that they’re very fit!” Bevel added.

“That they are,” Thozgar agreed. “There’s a lot of prestige involved in winning the Calming Run. It and the Tide Run are considered the two most important events of the season, though I’m more partial to the Carving Festival myself.”

Having apparently had a lull in their conversation, his daughter called over, “That’s just because everyone wears masks and you like spooking the contestants by taking yours off in the middle of a crowd, dad.”

I couldn’t help but note that her demeanor was significantly more relaxed than it had been a couple minutes earlier. Nor did I fail to note Tamrie laughing into her hands.

“Outed by my own daughter. Truly, the youth of today have no respect,” Thozgar said, shaking his head. Then his rather bushy eyebrows rose, and a smile stole its way across his face. “Ah, it seems the ‘smoothies’ are here.”

A lithe elven woman moved between us, offering each of us a chilled silver-engraved glass. Inside was some sort of orange and red swirled ingredients. A sip revealed that it was a much better flavor than the blue fruit smoothies Esbee made.

“Huh…” Bevel said after taking a sip from her glass. “It’s not bad, but Esbee’s are better.”

“I’ve had similar before, I believe. There are a tribe of… oh, what were they called. A sort of lizard people who live within the ice at the southern shelf? Arizar, do you remember?”

“The Vaptoril?” his daughter replied, sipping delicately at her glass. Then her gaze shifted upwards. “Oh, I think they’re ready.”

“Ah, I suppose they shall be calling on me shortly then,” Thozgar said, handing his silver glass to the side. Even as he’d been drinking from the silver glass, he hadn’t surrendered the goblet, and he kept it in his hand even as he straightened his robe.

With a flick of his finger, his hair - which had been a distinguished but not particularly impressive grey - was transformed into lustrous silver locks. His merry brown eyes became piercing orbs of sapphire blue, marbled through with emerald.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

I realized that this wasn’t a disguise. The face he’d been wearing when we first came in, that had been the disguise. As Thozgar stood, moving to the center of the upside down platform, the view above shifted again, splitting into hundreds of screens, each one showing a different crowded street, waterlifts running alongside or through.

“Welcome new guests and long time residents, to the 317th Calming Run! A rather more exciting year than most of us would have preferred has passed since the last, yet we are nothing if not persistent, here in Spellford,” Thozgar said, holding his goblet up higher.

At this, across those hundred screens, everyone raised goblets of their own. Child or elder, elf or eight-foot tall blue-skinned hulk, when he drank, so did they.

I didn’t have a goblet, but I did have my smoothie, so I followed along, as did Bevel.

“Now you all know I’d rather be in the stands than on the podium, so I’ll keep this as short as you’ve all come to expect.

“Surgers, you know the rules, yet even after officiating over three hundred of these events, I find that if I don’t remind you, one of you will conveniently ‘forget’ that any violence beyond shoving will immediately disqualify you for the rest of the season, as well as a full criminal trial. That includes slamming into your fellow Surgers heads with your boards.

“Now, with that tedious business dealt with, let Spellford SURGE!”

With the last word, Thozgar lifted his goblet into the air again. Once more, the crowd followed along.

And so did the city.

All those neatly contained waterlifts, the tidily arranged flags, the massive rings with their channels of water.

It all surged upwards in time with the crowd.

I was so stunned by the display, I forgot to follow along, my glass sitting in my hand half forgotten. To my further amazement, the suspended water remained surging upward.

Glancing over to Tamrie, I caught the smirk on her face. She’d deliberately undersold the event, I realized as she winked at me.

The screens collapsed back into a single viewing screen, moving back to the Surgers starting position. They were all on their boards, fighting to stay upright as the water beneath them churned.

“It isn’t just the Surgers who look to gain from the run,” Thozgar said as he relaxed into his cushion once more, retrieving his glass from the elven servant. “Despite my efforts to keep Spellford a neutral place of learning and discovery, the factions of Terra Vista have ever sought to take our city from us.”

“And the run is a chance for them to do that?”

“Not directly. But they often sponsor the Surgers,” Thozgar waved at one of the Surgers in question and a separate display popped up in front of us, fully three dimensional, though it shimmered as if made out of water. “See the line of five triangles, moving diagonally across the board. That’s the sigil of Banthil Foresthall. They specialize in Nature affinity materials and spells, and have long controlled most of Terra Vista’s food supply. Not Spellford’s, though I will admit the current crisis has been a strain.”

“I imagine they won’t be too pleased if you acquire more Nature materials of your own,” I said, tapping my chin. Above us, the race started, and the figure rose up, much like a surfer would, though they were surfing up the wave. “Though I’m a little surprised you’d tell me. Aren’t you worried I’ll try to drive a harder bargain?”

“My boy, I wouldn’t have invited you to witness the run in the Lounge if I thought we needed to play such games. We will arrive at a deal that is fair to both of us, of that I am certain. And we shall do so while looking towards the future. Dark times are upon the lands, and there are few I can count on. The council continues to bicker, the Dragons and Dragon-souled alike scramble for scraps of power and even the leviathans of the deep prepare for war. It is not-”

“Father, you’re rambling,” Arizar interrupted, though her voice was fond.

As he’d been talking, on the screen, the Surgers wove around each other, and more than one took opportunities to perform fancy tricks with all the air the Surging waterlifts provided. The tricks seemed to come at expense of position, but the crowd certainly loved them.

“Ah, so I was. Thank you, my dear,” Thozgar said, gesturing towards her with his goblet before turning towards me. “Apologies, but I do find our troubles vexing. Even worse, I find myself less prepared than I should’ve been. Too focused on the fall of the Pillars, I neglected my own home.”

“Pretty sure that’s understandable,” I said, watching as several Surgers went over the edge of a waterlift, outside of its protection. They grabbed the edges of their boards and seemed to pushed them into the side of the falling water, picking up even more speed as they approached the ocean.

Then they crashed straight through, moving into another network of churning water beneath the surface.

“I suppose it is,” Thozgar said, draining his smoothie in a single long pull before handing the glass off. “I feel I should warn you that you’ve attracted attention, surviving the Howling season as you have. With even more people taking shelter there than before the season began.”

“It feels like you’ve been keeping a close eye on us,” I said, feeling a little nervous. Everything Balthum wrote made it seem like no one paid attention to Cape Aeternia.

“On you, dear boy. Though not as much as I’d prefer. The storm wreaks havoc on scrying, and there are several places within your border that seem to disrupt the spell as well, if the lens is too close,” Thozgar said, tapping the edge of his goblet. “You and my people. I must apologize for Kallum. He was a good man once, one I trusted. His daughter’s condition… if he’d simply come to me…”

“It’s not your fault, father,” Arizar said. “He’d been soul-marked.”

“That only make it worse. It is my duty to keep such vile magic from being used within my city,” Thozgar replied, and the tone had the feeling of an oft-repeated argument.

“Not yours alone,” she said, shifting in her chair to look over at him. “And you weeded them out.”

“I can’t be certain we got all of them,” Thozgar grumbled, rubbing his beard.

“So… scrying on me, huh? Don’t suppose you could tell me where that doesn’t work. You know, if we’re going to be allies and all,” I said, both attempting to distract him and get what seems like pretty important information.

“Of course,” he said, flicking a finger and bringing up a map of Cape Aeternia. One I can’t help but note has higher fidelity than the Beacon, though it is lacking all the extra information. “Trying to scry too closely on these areas causes the lens to collapse. It seems to be some sort of meta interference, because even compounding magnification with a typical scry lens causes the spell to fail.”

He highlighted Mount Aeternia, an area in Mistvale, near the new bluff, most of Tetherfall and the northeast section of Verdant Point.

Right where all the active Waygates were located.

That would likely be handy. It also meant that the Worlds materials I was hoping to trade for were even more important. Thozgar scrying us might be somewhat benign, but he’s already said there are others who won’t be. Speaking of which…

“So… don’t suppose you know who else I need to worry about?” I asked, wondering just how much he’d share.

“Your most immediate threats will be the Unclean Clans who dwell along the coast north of you and the Sahevin who dwell within the depths to your east. Neither will be happy with your success taming old Aeternia. There is a good chance the Foresthalls will attempt to disrupt or confiscate your production of Nature attuned material,” Thozgar admitted, while gesturing at the still floating image of the Surger.

The run continued, the Surgers still performing their feats of skill for an enthralled crowd.

It was amazing. The sort of thing I’d like to try for myself, someday. Yet I could barely spare any attention for it.

I’d come looking for a potential trade partner, to solve an annoying, but not necessarily critical logistical problem.

Turned out I’d been a bit optimistic about my new neighbors.