Micah

Gaillard called Allie back to their cluster, and Micah edged close enough to hear as well, feeling curious.

“The scurf, so far as we can tell, has multiple versions with different effects,” the mage said. “The dockalfar brought it with them and presented it as a gift from Saguenay, a luxury consumable.” His words were tinged with disgust. “At first, they gave exclusively what we call the high-P variant. That’s ‘high pleasure’; it produces feelings of euphoria and serves as a powerful anti-depressant,” he explained.

“At first,” echoed Allie, crossing her arms as she listened.

“The high-P scurf became a fad with many of the Atlanteans, from the Lows to the inner ring. It was distributed in all the districts, and it was cheap, so cheap even the poorest could afford to try a little. Gods below, they gave out free samples at times. And people were so happy; I can see how it was so tempting.”

He shook his head, his eyebrows knitting together as he remembered.

Geir took over for him, continuing, “It became apparent soon after that that the scurf was potently addictive, and we discovered that they had changed the variants around on us. The inner ring continued to receive the high-P, but in the Lows it had been switched for low-P. It’s less physically deteriorating, we believe, but no less addictive and provides sharply diminishing returns. Over time, the Lows became… well, you saw.”

Gaillard stroked his beard thoughtfully, and then looked up and, upon noticing the human was waiting patiently, he said, “Dani, we might have Allie here for a bit. Do you think maybe you could take Micah to the barracks so that he’s not left waiting? I’m sure even a cot would be preferable to the conditions in which we’ve slept.”

Danica straightened and beckoned Micah casually.

He followed the fay out of the dining cavern, weaving in and out of busy beings who seemed to open up like the Red Sea for the former captain, but became a Cnossian labyrinth when he attempted to follow the same path.

They passed through another smaller cavern and came to a winding, low-ceilinged hall that led into a cramped space which appeared to be a linens and uniforms closet, most of which were indistinguishable from the rest except by size. She selected some from a specific pile and handed him a wrapped wad of an entirely neutral outfit that matched nearly exactly what he was already wearing, but this time he had the addition of a pair of boots, made of stiff animal leather and black as the night.

She caught him studying them.

“These boots have been magicked by shadows, so dense and dark that they silence the wearer’s footsteps, and they can disguise--” Danica began, with a flair of drama, and then, catching Micah’s quizzical look, she dropped the theatrics and said, “Oh, you’re no fun because you don’t even know when I’m joking or not. They’re just boots. Decent ones, from Sitis, but only as silent as you are.”

“Sitis?”

“Sitis is a desert state further into the Dawn. Firenze and I have contacts there who provide us supplies as they’re able.”

She pulled a small bag from a hook where a number of them hung, and passed it to him.

“There’s a bit of soap in there -- I’ll show you where you can wash in a bit -- and Gobie leaves. They’re a cleanser for the mouth and breath. Just chew for a song’s time.”

She led him then to the barracks, a long series of caves shaped like sparse beads on a string, each room holding perhaps a half-dozen cots, containing the various but austere possessions of the Vanguard's members.

Dani strode right through the occupied caverns and into one that was empty except for its cots, which were compressed in a corner. She chose a vacant spot at random, and pulled one of the cots into full size.

“There’re perhaps thirty caverns in the compound, most carved out by our dedicated team of undar, but at maximum we probably only have about ninety beings living here full-time beneath the city,” she explained. “But more come in every few days.”

Her scar puckered her nose when she smiled, but it was no less warm for it. “Anyway, I tried to afford you a little privacy here in one of the vacant caves.”

He thanked her, noting that she looked sincerely pleased at the acknowledgment of her consideration.

“This may seem like an ignorant question, but do you know any magic or martial arts, or maybe medicine, or how to cook?” she asked.

“I was studying to be a doctor,” he admitted. Her face showed no recognition of the word.

“But uh… you’d be pretty useless in a fight?” She looked truly concerned, the paragon of practicality.

He nodded.

“So, to clarify, humans don’t know magic, right?”

“Right.”

“Okay, that’s what I thought,” she replied. She thought for a second. “I could attempt to train you appropriate to your skill level, but that would most likely put you in lessons with the children. Ideally, I’d train with you one-on-one, but quite truthfully I don’t have the time.” She paused, then admitted, “Or, honestly, the patience.”

She grinned at him apologetically, then said, “I’ll have a word with Gaillard when he gets done, to see if he has any ideas on what you’re suited to.”

“A word about what?” came the voice of the mage in question as he entered from the adjoining cavern.

The captain walked to him to converse quietly, just out of earshot. Micah had a strong feeling Danica was trying to preserve his self-esteem.

It only took about thirty seconds of discussion before Dani beckoned him closer, smiling.

“Gaillard has offered to take you under his wing for some magic training,” she announced, “and we’ve both agreed upon an individual who would teach you the physical aspect of battle, from a foundational standpoint.”

Gaillard clapped a hand on Micah’s shoulder.

“Come with me,” he said, then began leading him through caverns at a leisurely pace.

“I recall you saying you didn’t think humans could do magic,” said Micah, unable to quell a siren-songed spark of excitement.

“I said that because I was still gauging your character,” replied the mage, shrugging. “You’d do the same.”

Micah admitted his point.

“Now, you might not find this story as fascinating as I do, but bear with me. At the very least it should provide some insight into the underlying magic structure of our world.”

Micah was rapt.

Gaillard continued, “Now, the story goes that in the beginning of history, the gods Rodull and Manon had five children, each the embodiment of one of the core branches of magic, as well as providing the form for each of the First Races -- except Soltinn, the unfavored son, who was a bit of an ass, as you’ll see.

“Anyway, the gods made tiny, blank beings and intended to make gifts to them of all the magics, but Soltinn, jealous of everybody involved, stole them. When Rodull caught up to him, Soltinn panicked and scattered the gifts among the people, and in a rage Rodull tore his son to pieces and scattered him among the empty sky as stars.”

“With you so far,” acknowledged Micah as the mage paused, letting a short procession of armed young fae go by before continuing.

“Now, the magics distributed among the races were haphazard and not as orderly as the gods might have intended -- some fanatics and fanatical magic scholars have argued that each core of magic should belong exclusively to the race that predominates, like the undar are inclined to the magicepts involving water -- but I think that's nonsense, personally. What the gods really gifted were just sources, simply the ability to form magicepts, not at all limited by race, though geography and economy have influenced and reinforced these divisions.”

The mage ducked into a side corridor with a low-slung ceiling.

“That's all silly controversy, issues of our world that don’t pertain to you. However, it does bring to light the crux of your own problem: you want magic, but you have no source.”

“And you have some idea to, y’know, circumvent that?” asked Micah, stooping in the corridor as he followed the other into a larger cavern where he was able to stand upright. “It’s not my fault our gods didn’t trust humans with magic.”

The mage chuckled. He had stripped his disguise in the hours since their arrival, but his wise smile and crinkly eyes stayed just the same. “You’re a funny one. Trust me when I say magic is — has been — a mixed bag. We have gained much from it, but it has also been the objective, motive, and weapon of countless wars and atrocities…”

“We haven’t needed magic for that,” responded the other.

Gaillard looked at him steadily, refining his idea of the human as a person by their conversation. He decided he liked the man.

“I believe I can teach you a few things that do not require a magic source. Herblore, anyone can learn, of course, but I also know a way to harness magic that is already ‘present’, so to speak. Magic isn’t so mysterious or limitless as it would appear from the outside: in most forms it is simply energy, transformed and directed by our magicepts. Your and this plane of existence have been found to be close enough to each other that we have many similarities in function, even down to details like light and fire, phenomena that you explain with science. But humans cannot ignite a fire nor control its destructive power, any more than they can teach it manners.”

Gaillard paused near the entrance of a cavern, off to the side of a small group of fae poring over a map on a table.

“Many times these various energies impose themselves on you and your world, and you must bend to their power, but in Sidhe, some beings are powerful enough to impose their own will on the world around them.”

The mage looked a little dreamy at this point, as if thinking of old heroes. “There are beings that, with enough talent and practice, have mastered gravity, harnessing it to fly or crush people into the dirt until they are only bones and paste. Theoretically, at least, anything you can conceive of can be made into a magicept. You may not be able to draw these abilities out of your own source, like Sidheans can. But I would like to teach you things that are less about your natural ability and more about your dedication, memory, and, of course, having a knowledgeable teacher.”

“I’m not worried about my memory or dedication,” Micah claimed, his shoulders straightening.

The other smiled knowingly.

“You say that now, but you are about to have a lot on your hands.”

Micah smiled in return, saying nothing.

“Danica told me you were studying to become a healer in the Overworld,” the other remarked, “which I’m sure is no casual pastime. Caring for the sick, the wounded, the ones left to that great edge between here and death -- these things can haunt a person when they realize they can’t help as much as they wished.”

He paused on that out-of-place, slightly morbid note and then grinned toothily at Micah, the previous sentiments completely wiped from his expression.

“But before we get into anything like that, I’d like to give you a tour of the compound.”

Micah was surprised to find, in addition to the rooms carved by magic, a number of the compound’s caverns and grottos were natural, adding a kind of austere, craggy beauty to the place, from its cathedral-esque heights to its dizzying lows. Among both types were barracks and training areas, a mess hall and a kitchen, tactical rooms, armories, as well as a somewhat sparse pantry.

Gaillard gave these all cursory attention before leading Micah across a long, thin bridge of stone suspended over a plummeting drop, the blackness reaching down beyond sight except for a handful of stalagmites straining to reach a sky they could not see. There was a small waterfall crashing down into the depths on one of the opposite walls.

“Past here is where the garden is plotted,” said the mage.

After the bridge was a long, dim hall, which was already occupied by two people, genders made mystery by the shadows, who were clearly busy with each other against one wall. Micah caught slightly apologetic chuckles and a glimpse of bare thighs as Gaillard went right past the pair, acknowledging their presence only with a cheerful, “Don’t rut close to the food, please.”

Micah couldn’t keep from remarking, once out of earshot, “So you just treated that as a very normal thing.”

Gaillard smiled at him as he led him out of the hallway and into the gardens.

"Isn’t it, though? Sex is probably the most natural thing we can do, eating, sleeping, and dying aside.”

“Well--”

“Last I visited the Overworld, people were oddly hung up about it, despite being really into fertility symbols. Is it still like that?”

Micah grimaced.

“I’ll take that as a yes. Pay it no coin here; it’s easy stress relief at the very least. Anyway, welcome to the gardens,” the mage said and moved on, giving the topic no more thought.

The gardens were housed in a cavern -- large, but not as high-ceilinged as some they had passed. Arranged in a triangle in the center of the space was a trio of yawning pits, each spanning about thirty feet in diameter. Twice as deep down as across, each pit was a spiral carved into the ground, sloping gently inward, that bottomed out in ponds of clear water. On each tier of the spiral were hundreds upon hundreds of plants, watered by the level above them, so that water ran down the spiral and culminated in the filtered pool below. The plants were healthy and lush, many of them laden with small unripened fruits.

Over the mouth of each spiral was suspended a glass orb of sorts that contained a blue light, whose rays nourished the growing plants.

“We have a phytocanist that has done an incredible job with helping the plants flourish. Would that I could do the same with my plants at the riverfarm, but the soil in that part of Hyperborea is weak, and they do not do as well under Nibiru’s light as these do under the blue lights.”

He knelt by the edge of a pit to gesture to the setup.

“The soil soaks up any contaminants in the water, which is from an aquifer nearby. The hyper-filtered water,” Gaillard said, pointing to the pool, which had a bucket and pulley system set up to haul water, “is what we draw from for drinking and cooking water. However, the food is most important, since we must grow most of our own food supply, nothing whatsoever from Atlantis.”

Micah’s expression clearly read he did not know why this was.

Gaillard let out a soft sigh, not directed at him.

“We are in a horrid situation,” he remarked, and put a hand on Micah’s shoulder, leading him out of the garden cavern.

“The scurf we were discussing earlier — it’s in the food,” he started, and Micah nodded, remembering what he’d heard the mage tell Allie earlier. “Every single bit, every mote of food that gets sold in the city is poisoned.”

He stopped in the middle of the hallway, in front of a set of doors, and turned to the human to explain, “Most of the people in this city -- the ones left anyway; they’ve really thinned the herd in the last year -- are addicted to it in some form or another. Those damnable factories produce unthinkable amounts of it, and the people in the Lows maintain the crops and livestock to keep themselves fed, but only after it’s been saturated with scurf. Then it is sold right back to them, and in order to eat and keep from suffering withdrawals, they continue working for it. It’s a cycle that we’ve as of yet been unable to disrupt.”

His face was drawn and he seemed lost in thought.

“Surely some people would survive withdrawals and be able to detox themselves,” Micah surmised.

“Those in the Lows have no way to do that. The ones that were able to resist the initial wave of control are here with us, or were killed, or were taken. Those left who try to break the cycle either starve without an unlaced source of food or the tremors take them. Without our assistance and medicine, as far as we know, they die. Which brings us here," he said, gesturing to the doors.

"Micah, the Vanguard is relatively small in number. Most of our members are from the outside or never were addicted in the first place. There are a few we’ve managed to successfully ease from the drug’s influence, but medicine is expensive and difficult to smuggle in, and we are as limited in funds as much as resources.”

He opened one door and Micah slid in after him, into a cavern that was quiet compared to the rest of the compound.

Four people stood among three rows of crude gurney-like beds that held perhaps a half-dozen patients, most of whom were unconscious and appeared even more haggard than the addicts in the streets above.

“This is the recovery room. Sometimes we’re able to sort of kidnap citizens and care for them here, if we think the Guard won’t notice and if we’re fairly sure we can still save them,” said Gaillard softly as he led Micah to a young girl shivering on one of the beds.

Her cheeks had high spots of pink and her cracked lips were a pale blue, the only telltale colors in a face otherwise paler than milk. Her body was beset with a fine tremor. Micah observed her closely while Gaillard beckoned to one of the medical fae, who came over to sit the girl’s ragdoll body up and gingerly trickle sips of water into her mouth.

“At an earlier time we attempted to fight back against the Guard and the initial market saturation of scurf. They retaliated. We suffered a huge loss. Many of our early members and a large number of Atlanteans citizens were taken, including her mother,” Gaillard said, gazing down at the girl as the fay laid her back on the cot. She rested on her back, her small, shallow breaths audible as they passed with difficulty from her frail body.

“We’re no longer in a position to fight them, nor really do much that could expose our further operations. There is no real leader to give the Vanguard the organization and figurehead to follow that it needs.” Gaillard turned from the tiny fay girl and continued, “Geir does try to coordinate the various groups, but the Vanguard is proving difficult to keep running, between the shortages, the dissenting motivations…” He trailed off.

“And that’s what you’re wanting from Allie,” Micah filled in.

“Yes and no; well, some more than others. Some of the more progressive types among our members would rather see the age of monarchy eradicated from Atlantis, so putting her in a position of power will be seen as perpetuating the rule of her family. Some will likely resent her for the exact reason she fears: seeing her as a traitor, being unworthy or unskilled enough to serve as leader. She will have to contend with her fears and do it anyway.”

They left the recovery room and continued on into new caverns. Gaillard switched gears.

“I will speak with Firenze, who I would like to instruct you in physical combat. Through his and my instruction, you may well yet be utilized both as a healer and as a fighter. Here we are,” he said, sweeping under a stone archway and into a series of smaller, interconnected caves carved around a central, natural cavern.

There were six in all, filled to bursting with no particular assignment of tables and shelves with intricate glassware, burners, containers of powders and liquids of all different colors and consistencies. Dried and fresh plants and herbs hung from the cavern ceiling in bound bunches, spilling leaves onto metal and glass instruments and machines completely unrecognizable to Micah’s eye. Books were everywhere, towers of them, an uncategorized ecosystem of tomes, as if an entire library had been teleported there haphazardly. There were also three fae working in the jumble of equipment, so intent on their own work that they didn’t even acknowledge Gaillard and Micah’s entry.

“This is where your time with me will be spent, for now,” said the mage, enthusiasm clear in his voice. He led Micah over to a table and stacked its items to the side in an attempt to clear some space in which to work. Then he produced a small notebook and writing utensil from the jumble and wrote an unfamiliar, runic-looking symbol on the first page.

“I’ll fill out the first few sigils and have this ready for you in a few days, when I’ll start teaching you alchemy and outline its...particulars. Hopefully that will remind me what this book is for,” he said, then closed the notebook and put it into the pouch-like gap where his tunic overlapped in closing. “Now, the other thing is -- wait, hold on a moment,” he interrupted himself, stroking his beard and appearing to be lost somewhere else for a brief few seconds before he swooped off into the staggered towers of books like a deer disappearing into a greenwood.

He re-emerged within a minute, holding an intimidatingly thick, leather-bound book, which he set gently on the table.

“Now, I wouldn’t be offended if you choose not to use this, but you may find yourself unoccupied and need something productive. You can get a headstart using an introduction to herblore and medicinal plants of Aquilo-Sidhe. It's obviously quite thorough; you have spagyrics, your many tinctures and tisanes and salves, medicines and paralytics and poisons and ephedrics, all from the plants of this lush land.”

He revised, “Outside of the dead lands around Atlantis, anyway.”

It would have been easy for Micah to interpret this as busy work, but Gaillard had already zeroed in on a certain trait of Micah’s that could be considered both strength and curse: his relentless curiosity which manifested in the form of voracious consumption of any new knowledge presented. This peculiar drive went further than simply knowledge, but Gaillard had no way yet of seeing that, instead only impressed by Micah’s potential as a student.

Micah hefted the book into his arms, and Gaillard smiled with approval of his own plan.

“Ah, hold on. Let me—” said the mage, positioning himself in front of the other and staring intently as he put his hands to Micah’ temples.

Gaillard’s eyes seemed focused not on Micah but on something inside of him that only the mage could see.

Micah felt a faint shift in his mind, a mental rustle unattached to his thoughts, and then Gaillard backed away.

“That should do it. I’ve adjusted your translation magicept to extend to your sight as well, so you should be able to read this text without trouble.”

Micah was amazed at the flexibility and versatility of the mage’s work.

The mage continued, “I’ll introduce you to Firenze as soon as he’s able to start training. Until then, rest as much as possible to recuperate. Soon you will be quite busy.”

Micah nodded, feeling an ache that had crept into his muscles sometime over the last few days. He did indeed need a rest.