The Family all broke down the moment the portal closed, Aida was hit the hardest, she had lost one son to stillbirth, now she had lost another to something she didn’t even fully understand.

Harlow tried to comfort her, but it was like pouring water from one broken glass to another, both too hurt to really help the other.

Jaramis had tried the same with Autumn, but she struck him, knocking him onto the floor, his cheek bright red. The guards near the door rushed towards her.

“IT’S FINE, she is just upset.” He lacked emotional intelligence but even he could see when to stand down.

Ava and Amber didn’t bother trying to help the other, they were wallowing in their own self hatred, the only thought they had was that they should’ve just dropped it, things were awkward at the house but at least they had each other.

Things were very tense for the next week, Jaramis made sure no one bothered the family, he had their meals brought to them in their rooms, didn’t send them away, he paid for the extra helpers working on the farm from his own allowance.

By the end of the week things had calmed down, the girls were trying to be resolute in their own ways, Amber decided to throw herself into magic training, she thought if she made herself valuable to the kingdom she could get her brother out of whatever pit they were keeping him in, and if he was dead, she needed power to make them pay at least.

Autumn wanted to grow the Redwall house, gain enough political power to find him.

Ava… Ava was aimless, she didn’t have the talent with magic Amber had, or the possibility of political connections like Autumn.

She just spent her time in the sparing room, beating the reforming clay target for hours, sleeping on the floor. Neither her sisters or her parents could get her to leave. Eventually the sparing teacher took pity on her and spent his free time teaching her.

They returned home after just shy of 2 weeks at the Redwall manor.

After another week had passed the grieving was over for the girls, they were fully committed to their goals. Amber convinced Jaramis to bring her over 3 days a week, he felt guilty about his part in their grief and she knew it, she would take him for whatever she could while she had the chance.

Ava tagged along but she went to train her body.

Autumn only took her magic tutoring twice a week now, spending her extra time either learning politics and scheming or just hanging out with Jaramis, she didn’t really hate him for what he did, he was just doing what he thought was right in his own way.

The Wedding was just around the corner, Aida and Harlow refused to go, they were bitter at them still, taking their oldest daughter, then their youngest son.

Ava and Amber decided they should go, Amber wanted to go to an Academy, and if nothing else some noble at the party might take a liking to her, and she really was talented for her age.

Ava wanted to just eavesdrop, maybe they had heard what happened and knew something about where Harlan was, it was a childish idea, the Facility was designed to keep nobles from finding it and dealing with their shameful offspring.

What no one expected was Redmond, he received a letter from Aida and went AWOL, there really isn’t much of a difference from just being a ranger, but he missed his 2 week check in and searches were sent out for him, though they looked in the forest around his patrol zone and not half away across the country where he really was, he saw the wedding and was about to burst in, flames and lightning, he decided it was suicide, with the different families there he wouldn’t have made it 5 minutes before being put down.

He just left, going to comfort Aida before he went back out, he would make up a story about why he was missing for so long by the time he got back, a luxury for being a ranger.

Back at the facility 3 weeks had passed.

Harlan had gone through many rodents, then rabbits, birds were next.

He didn’t expect Rosewell to walk in with a condor as big as him with very hungry eyes, bound in rope.

“This is a black soul condor, they have a surprising ability to scratch directly at the soul of their victims, now it is your subject, our previous method of soul searching was… incompatible with these. So we are going to let you poke at it, our researchers haven’t quite managed to recreate your method, the mana tends to clash as it passes close to the soul, feathers were everywhere. We think something in your bloodline is letting you counter the force of the soul on mana by instinct. And feel free to poke at this one as much as you like, they are a pest and we can get many more of them.

“Alright.” Harlan had passed caring about when his tests ended with a bloody explosion, he even managed to map out a small section of a rabbit’s soul before it burst. There was something about seeing how strong a human soul really was that put them on a different level compared to animals, though he never had issues eating them before, now he didn’t care even if they were just being used up. At least it was painless.

It took 2 minutes to just get the magic ready, only 30 seconds to find the soul, it was a black thing, barely solid, most souls had a vaguely round shape, this had a hole leading into it, greedily sucking up mana from the soul searching spell.

It was a black hole, a void, it gave him an idea.

“Miss Rosewell, how does it damage the souls of other things by just scratching them?”

“We believe it is channeling some form of magic cast directly from its soul into the soul of its victim.”

Harlan had his own idea. He let its claws puncture his flesh, watching what happened the entire time.

As soon as it drew blood the void in its soul started stripping the outer shell of his soul; if he was a rabbit it would’ve already been covered in a web of cracks. Causing indescribable pain. Harlan tried to use the mana already used for soul searching to make a plug in the void. The condor screeched louder than they thought possible, Rosewell’s spells trying to stop the noise weren’t working. The condor’s scream was coming from its own soul, when Harlan finished his plug the sound stopped, the condor went still, then it just… folded into itself, its soul pulling from every side instead of just from the hole built up some sort of pressure, unraveling its form.

But most curiously, the condor’s soul didn’t fade away immediately like when something died, it instead hung in the air, visible only to his soul sight. It started to lose power so Harlan tried to feed it, eventually he was nearly out of mana, but it held, the soul began to survive outside of the body, but it still needed a vessel, something physical to hold it, it was alright for now, but the disturbance of ambient mana seemed to be almost angry that it was naked, flouting in the air.

“How do we put a soul in something!?”

“It’s still here? I’m opening a gate.”

She pushed mana into a button on her jacket, not enough to make a spell, it was just to send a signal, 10 seconds later a gate opened up into a pristine forge.

The enchanters looked bewildered by the Princess having used an emergency gate call and the boy following her looking to be cupping nothing in his hands.

She explained and the group exploded into gestures with their hands and words silently spoken.

One of them grabbed the soul from Harlan, they just used a simple iron cube, not knowing how putting soul in something actually worked.

After an hour the experiment was almost a success, but once it stabilized the cube let out another soul signaling screech and seemed to willingly leave the cube.

But it didn’t matter to the enchanters or the princess, they had found a way to make a soul that could be put into an item.

The next week was nothing but Harlan plugging souls then handing them off to others who could feed them so he didn’t need to waste mana on it.

On day 5 they decided to place the soul in a mechanical bird, it stayed in the form and happily flew and sang, the enchanters were baffled, these were some of the most violent predatory birds around, and yet it was so peaceful in its new body. Harlan had seen enough of their souls to give his thoughts on it.

“I think they are so mad because they are so hungry, their souls seem… defective, they can’t generate enough to sustain themselves, so they hunt for the souls of other things, I think that not needing to sustain a magical beast’s body just lets it not feel the hunger that drives them.”

Mutterings around the room and the sounds of furious writing either meant they thought he was a naive fool or a genius.

The next 2 days were spent trying to find out how to place the souls in weapons or armor. Both days were complete failures, the blades would attack their wielders, the armor would shift to make sure not to catch a blow.

The next day was Harlan picking out bits and pieces, trying to map out their souls for common features, maybe there was some protective instinct in there that would work to actually let it defend its user.

After 3 days they finally made a shield that would subtly adjust itself to better block or deflect a blow, the people using it either loved or hated it, complaints about having to fight for control when it decided it wanted to deflect instead of block were most common, field testing was required, the enchanters started hounding Harlan for more souls like this.

Rosewell had to step in.

“We have one successful prototype, test it and give the kid a break, not everyone wants to spend weeks on a project with barely any rest.” The enchanters were clearly not happy but couldn't go against her.

She had him gated back into his room.

“Take a break, wash up, meet your friends again.”

“Thank you.” Harlan hadn’t realized how hot the forge was until he got back, he showered and then slept once again, this time peacefully.