The next morning woke him with the fantastic smells of breakfast. He quickly dressed and came downstairs to see what that delightful aroma was.

Hugo almost stopped dead when he realized what it was. Shakshuka. The baked egg dish was a staple of nox cooking, and normally smelt like death. More than once, Hugo had crossed to the other side of the street when he smelled the traditional nox food. It was the machoke eggs, their odor made him vomit. Or they normally did. Apparently his sense of smell was different as a nox.

“Ah, I see that my clever plan to get you out of bed worked,” Themba said and served him a dish.

Hugo nodded at his mother, “It smells delicious.” He took a bite and groaned. It was divine. Machoke eggs poached in spicy tomato sauce with baked cheese. It was his new favorite food.

“Dad and I are going into work, can you watch your sister today? The rest of the week, really. Grandma and Grandpa are already at the shop and we all need to put in extra hours to make up for being gone.”

Since he didn't have any firm plans, it was easy to say, “Sure, I can watch Nobomi. I’ll take her with me if I go out.”

“Thanks darling,” Themba said and kissed both cheeks, “I know you don’t like it but I really appreciate it.”

“Xhosa likes me now, I am his knight errant,” Nobomi said.

His mother looked to him for confirmation and he nodded with a smile.

“I am glad to hear it. You watch over him, Nobomi. Make sure no owlbears or strix come to steal him away,” Themba said. She kissed her daughter and left for the day.

After they finished breakfast, Hugo got up and cleaned up. Once the kitchen was clean, he looked outside. The sun was fully up, he must have slept in. That would be why the rest of his family had already eaten and left by the time he woke up.

Never having had a sister before, he didn’t know what to do next. How did older brothers handle this? He had mostly heard them complain about taking care of their sisters, but he didn’t know what they were complaining about, exactly.

“So, Nobomi, what do we usually do all day?” Hugo said. He figured he could just ask, she already knew that Xhosa had some memory problems.

“Well... normally we go to school, but there is no school today. If mom makes you watch me on Eighthday, you hide in your room, or sneak out to go play with your friends. But you won’t do that today, right?”

“That’s right. You are my knight errant, you have to stay with me to protect me,” Hugo said with a smile.

The next few hours were spent playing games with Nobomi. She was a little old to play pretend, but the novelty of playing with her brother was enough to keep her engaged. Hugo spent most of the time getting used to four arms. It wasn’t just that he needed to get used to how to use them, but he needed to get used to when to use them too. It was an extra option that he had to keep reminding himself was available.

Eventually, he started juggling with four hands. It entertained her and was great practice. It took some time, but eventually he was able to create complex patterns, passing between different pairs of arms.

“When did you learn to do that?” Nobomi said with awe.

“It’s because I am soulmarked. You get better when you rank up,” Hugo said, skirting the truth.

She tried to juggle herself, but failed miserably. Eventually she gave up and went to her room to read.

Since she was taken care of, he decided to write a few letters with his free time. The first one was to his mother. He kept the notice of Hugo’s death short and included most of the money he had on him. The next one was a bit longer, it was to Marion’s family.

Mr. and Mrs. Armată,

I have very terrible news, and I am sorry it has to come from a stranger. I am writing to let you know of the death of your son and my friend, Marion Armată. He and I got to know each other on a hunt. I am sure I don’t need to tell you his friendly nature and happy demeanor quickly made him many friends, me included. A few days ago we ran afoul of a large group of owlbears. The hunt group were just barely able to fight them off, but not without injuries. We were forced to run, and I was slowed by an injury to my leg. Marion was uninjured, and could have easily escaped. Instead, he stayed behind and helped four of us escape the monsters. Sadly, he was killed after he saved the last person.

I would like to tell you this news in person, but we were far enough from civilization that I lost my leg, and I am still recovering. Please accept my heartfelt thanks for your son’s sacrifice and my condolences for your loss.

From,

Hugo Rebane

Writing out the letter made him feel a bit sad, but he felt his friend deserved a good send off. It was also nice to sign it with his own name. Finally, he wrote a third letter, this time to Mia.

Mia,

You know how you lived the same five months over and over again because of Alexandru? He is at it again. This is my third time reliving events. Hopefully you can help me make it the last time I have to write this letter. Sadly, there are several dire situations we need to take care of first.

In a few weeks, a coalition of Deva spies and hedge mages are going to sabotage the city walls. Not just in Reval, but all of the southern cities of the wheel. They have the sabotage planned for the night just before the height of the monster surge. They will disable the control runes on the walls, but it is only obvious to someone with mana sight.

I recommend going directly to Dean Artjom. He has good contacts with sentinel command and he should be able to get the ball rolling quickly. You can get trapped in his chair yourself though, I am not coming with you. By the way, can you send me the passcode he has on his wrist? If we aren’t successful this time, I might need to use it myself.

Just telling them about the attack should solve things. That isn’t the only disaster we need to avert. On the third day of the seventh month, there will be a massive earthquake that will bring down some buildings in the narrows. You will want to get most of them out of their homes that night. Maybe hold a street fair.

The last disaster is a big one. It turns out there are hundreds of hedge mages in town and they have a coup planned for the next new year’s night. They will all be armed with shimmer casters, but I didn’t see any shimmer corps, so it does not seem like a coordinated effort.

The same night, the shimmer veins will explode, destroying all of the cities on the wheel. I was only able to catch a glimpse, but it seemed like the cascade failure started from one of the northern cities, maybe Deva.

I know this is a lot to take in. It might even seem unbelievable. But after the sentinel command captures saboteurs in six different cities, I am sure it will be easier to believe everything. We can talk again after that point. Please send me a reply to the address on the envelope so I know you got this. Thank you.

From,

Xhosa Bandile

Hugo decided against signing his own name for this letter. As he was writing everything out, he realized that the events sounded a bit crazy. He would wait until later in the year to reveal his body hopping ways. At least until after they caught the saboteurs and knew he was telling the truth.

He sealed up the three letters and walked out into the city to mail them. He brought Nobomi along with and she was happy to show him the way to the post office.

It was a pleasant day outside, but he still felt on guard. It was strange living in a city that was majority nox. It wasn’t just the fact that there were nox walking around instead of humans. It was more than that.

There seemed to be regimented strictures to every interaction. A set of formalized interactions and Hugo only knew half of them from his history class. One thing that he found pleasant was that there were lanes in the road so traffic flowed smoother. There were more mana carts on the road too, Hugo promised himself to look up their construction at some point. At the post office, everyone stood in a well mannered line, instead of the jostling he was used to.

He used the last of his money to send off the three letters. Knowing now that he lived in a poor family, he felt slightly guilty about the expense. Still, once he got his domains back, he could fabricate things to sell. It would actually be kind of fun thinking of new things to sell in order to appeal to a nox market.

This time around, he wouldn’t have to hide the fact that he had two domains, since nox could have two domains anyway. It would be nice to be able to freely practice both.

Getting a third domain was probably possible, based on what had happened before with Cristian’s body. It would be difficult to convince anyone that he wanted different domains with his stats though. With more than twenty in strength and dexterity, it would be a hard sell to convince a sage that he wanted to be a life mage with his nine points in that one.

Personally, he thought that a point was a point. It didn’t really matter if you started with them or if you gained them with a rank up. The conventional wisdom disagreed with him though. Everyone said that the points you started with determine how well you are able to use your domain.

Regardless, he would figure that out after he got into school. He didn’t know much about the nox school system. Only that it lasted twice as long as human ones, eight instead of four years. Hugo guessed that he would learn all about it if he managed to save the wheel this time around.

Now that he had sent the letters off, it was time to think about what he could personally do to save the cities from a shimmer explosion. He couldn’t leave everything up to them. What could he do here in Paarl as a nox?

The first thing he thought of was Lenna’s family and their mana cores. He knew they lived here. He had forgotten to include that in his letter, but it might be better if he handled it himself. Last time around he had assumed that the tiger gang stole the cores and sold them to Deva.

He hadn’t really considered the idea that Lenna’s dad could be a traitor and was selling the mana cores to the country they were at war with. It seemed unlikely that a respectable businessman would sell anything that a rival country could use to attack the country that they lived in. That would be immoral and stupid. Then again, the shimmer veins had exploded, and that power had to come from somewhere.

Either way, Hugo put it on his to do list. Step one was getting his magic domains back, step two was making sure the mana cores didn’t fall into the wrong hands. Step three was helping out his new family with their curse deal. They seemed loving and nice and deserved whatever help he could give them. Step four... track down the source of this conspiracy and stop it.

That last step was going to be difficult. One step at a time though.

“Nobomi,” Hugo said, “Do you know how I am supposed to gain my magic domain? Is it at school or is there a different way?”

“No, silly. You are done with school. You have to go bid for your apprenticeship now. I think your master gives you your domain, or they take you into a tamoko. Something like that. Anyway, you got to bid for it in two days. You are lucky. I have to go back to school tomorrow.”

Two days. He had two days to prepare for this apprenticeship bid thing. How was he going to figure out everything and prepare in time?

“Xhosa White, what are you doing here?” a voice said behind him.

Hugo turned to see four young nox men with their hands behind their backs.

“Oh, hello. It’s Xhosa Bandile actually. We are just out to mail some letters,” Hugo said with a smile.

Their expressions soured and they pulled out short sticks, one in each hand.

Nobomi hid behind Hugo and softly said, “Oh no, no, no. You should not have said that.”