Lovi had barely gotten a wink of sleep. The feeling that her obstinate little brother would be gone the second she closed her eyes would not leave her alone.

Come morning he was still there, waking up and looking irritatingly well-rested to Lovi. How he was able to sleep so easily through Andrés snoring she had no idea. Especially as she knew for a fact that trying to creep up on Sten would have him wide awake before you ever laid a hand on his body.

Within fifteen minutes they had a fire going and were roasting some tasty alman roots they had been lucky enough to find out here.

“How was your sleep?” The teasing question should have been delivered with a smile, but Sten was deadpan as he said it. Someone else might have been able to excuse it, but Sten not being able to tell someone was tired was laughable.

“Fine.” She managed to unclench her jaw before delivering the word, but it still felt like she said it too quickly to really hide her irritation.

André piped up. “Ah, lucky you. I slept terribly, I know it’s only one night so far but I miss my bed already,” André chuckled heartily after his very welcome input, then went to grab for the roots.

Sten impeded his hand. “They are not ready,”

André accepted the words with a calm smile, fishing up another sandwich from his pack to sate him in the meantime. Some people are just impervious to tension.

When another fifteen minutes had passed Lovi felt like speaking again. “Ah, another day of tree kicking ahead you reckon?”

She tsked in irritation when Sten did not look like he felt inclined to answer. Then she kept going: “Are you really gonna keep pretending you don’t mind wasting time out here, like those were not your friends I caught you with? They’ve gone already. They left you–and you not wanting to go with–I’m not buying it.”

Not even André could ignore the situation when she was that blatant. He looked at his pack, considering another sandwich to keep himself occupied.

“Since when is training people heading out for Dormata rare for us exactly?”

Lovi’s retort was immediate. “Oh, instead you’re gonna act like you are not always doing the bare minimum? Not to mention father knew nothing of a request like that. Took the fee directly into your own pocket, did you?”

“I did, yes. If Birgir wants it he will ask, that is between us,”

Using his father’s name openly had been a slip-up he realised too late. His sister glared and looked like she wanted to hit him.

“And you going with them to the lumber mill just a lucky coincidence, of course,”

Sten was feeling less and less in control. “I was obviously there for a visit to my favourite sister, how could you consider anything but that first?”

André reached for the roots again. Sten slapped his hand. “They are not ready,”

“Oh fuck off, let him eat it if he wants to, you runt.” She grabbed the edibles like she was impervious to the heat and practically shoved them in Andrés face.

He started nibbling nervously.

Back in the day the casual insult would have been followed by a just as casual threat of violence. Those days are over.

Sten moved to stand.

“What are you doing?” Lovi said, a little too fiercely.

“Going for a piss, want to help me hold it, sis?”

Harold was zooming through the forest like a [Sunmage], holding on to the prince for dear life.

The proud stag was hurdling boulders, roots and the occasional beast, and landing in sunny glades, hardly disturbing a blade of grass yet gathering enough force to make great leaps whenever he was not zig-zagging in between trees.

It was going fast, but not nearly fast enough to justify the timetable that the prince had assured Harold was doable. However, at times it felt like they skipped giant parts, or like his memory was blanking, it was hard to be sure.

The only thing he was able to tell by was a sudden gathering of energy and then the angle of the sun, it kept shifting abruptly, gradually. While the trees and glades all around felt like they repeated themselves endlessly at the blistering speed.

It reminded him of how Nalai had disappeared when she first stole the last of his apple drink, and left them the Cloven honey.

People had been a bit annoyed with Harold–about him acting secretive with so much on the line–but the truth was that he himself barely knew any details.

He had simply met the prince on a day out and happened to bring up how his [Guild] would be travelling towards Cloven lands, when it turned out the prince's flock was doing the same was when he had his idea and explained to the prince what Harold needed to accomplish.

The thing was, he could basically only get affirmatives and negatives from the proud beast, it seemed like it was very smart, but what was it gonna do to convey nuance, scratch a tree with its horns? Actually that might work.

But when Harold asked a hundred questions to figure out what he was capable of, the prince seemed to barely have any limit.

He just needed a safe place to leave his flock during the mission. As long as a [Druid] was backing the prince up, and they did not face some other Spellcaster, travelling through vast tracts of the forest would evidently be a piece of cake.

He was starting to see why.

The prince would not normally be able to do this, not with a passenger anyway and certainly not two. Harold’s [Primal Domain] was what made it possible, it harmonised the magic around him to a degree that buoyed any Spells of the affinity he allowed and suppressed any he chose to combat.

With no other [Domain] to challenge his, the primal energies of nature could reign freely and the prince jumped between glades, that were miles apart, where the static magic synchronised enough for his movement Spell to activate for the two of them.

They slowed down as they passed Salcret and then started conserving energy as soon as Blackenberg was in sight.

It was go time.