I am woken up by an elf hitting the wooden bars with his spear. Shortly, I am escorted by two elfs to a large tree house, in the center of the house there is a mature looking male elf who is sizing me up. Is he a mage? Kate has told me that usually mages are able to sense another mage 1 rank higher than themselves, yet I suspect he is stronger than rank 2.

The mature looking male elf asks me: "You are the human Kathorrunth, Seeker of Knowledge took in as a student?"

Questions swirl in my head but I promptly answer "Yes."

"I am Kerym Brypeiros, elder of this village, your teacher has left you in my care while she attends to some business."

I stand in silence, social interaction was never my strong suit. Should I say my thanks?

"Thank you."

"Kathorrunth has explained to me that you were dropped as a baby and as a result can not speak comprehensively but have excellent affinity to many elements. While you are here, you will join one of our patrol groups to earn your keep."

I have a blank face, as many positive thoughts about my teacher go through me head. Is this her attempt to cover up my origin? Inability to speak comprehensively? Kerym talks to the guards who nod, then gesture for me to follow them. We exit and climb down to the forest floor. We meet a group of 4 elves, 1 female to the side which I suspect is the group leader and 2 males and 1 female lined up beside her. My escorts say a few words to the group leader and promptly leave.

The leader walks up to me with a face that says 'I want to punch you human'. I smile, which only makes it worse...

The leader addresses me via telepathy: "Name."

She puts a hand on her absent chest and vocally says: 'Aelynthi Brypeiros' then she gestures to me.

I answer 'Anton Ippolitov' then after a few seconds repeat 'Anton'.

She continues to stare at me as if to find a lie or my inner guilt of me committing some heinous crime, at least that's what I feel when I look into her emerald eyes. Then she says 'Anton' with a nod, turns around to give an order to the 3 guards, 2 of which are smiling for some reason, and they start walking. I follow behind them after a few seconds of indecision.

Alright, so Aelynthi is related to the village elder and knows magic enough to use simple telepathy, rank 1? If I were to believe my vague mana sight she is rank 1 but I should not make a judgement using such a small sample size. For all I know she is a rank 0 mage using an artifact or is a rank 3 mage and just does not want to talk to me. On the bright side I can see her mana unlike the village elder who was a blank just like Kate. Her mana levels are about 46 times ambient mana levels... So, rank 1 after all? I do not have a shred of confidence in my guess. Hopefully she does not stab me in the back with an ice spike... Why am I here anyway? Is it because Kate did not want to leave me alone in her cave? Was she afraid I would escape? I think I can escape now but I bet I will have elves on my tail...

The elves speed up and I have to jog to keep up. I feel like this will be a long day and tomorrow my legs will hurt. I can also now see that there is no way I can escape these elves judging by their ability to move in this forest. I wonder what is included in earning my 'keep'... I hope they have meat, or at least decent food... Well, almost anything freshly cooked would be better than jerky, dry bread and pure water gathered from air.

After a long day of jogging in the forest and dealing with the team leaders dissatisfaction, we return to the village just before dinner. My face was emotionless but I am sure anybody could see the sadness in my eyes as I ate berries and dried roots. Once dinner was over, I was pleasantly surprised to get my own tree house, if you count a hammock and a few floor boards tied to the tree to be a house. Hopefully there will not be any heavy rain during the night, as tree leaves are not exactly leak proof. Concerned with the security of this place I did what I could to make sure I wake up tomorrow. I improved my chances of surviving the night a hundred fold by lifting up the rope ladder of my treehouse, I immediately felt safe… not. Next thing I did was to tie myself to the tree as a fall from this height will not be good for my back... Note to self: design and enchant quite a few items in the near future for camping, how did I forget to do so before? On the bright side I have a lovely neighbour, the team leader, Aelynthi, who is looking intently at me right now through her window. I feel safer than ever knowing that she will keep watch over me while I sleep. I climb onto the hammock, lift up my hood and metaphorically cry myself to sleep. I think I prefer the cave.