Curselock

Chapter 184: Viewing Glass

“And that is why seaweed is sometimes rainbow in color,” The Wave Slicer’s Captain, Gull, explained to Leland.

Leland blinked a few times, calculating internally. “Wait really? I feel like I would have heard about that before? Just seaweed and Essence of Storm?”

Gull snorted. “How many times have you heard of seaweed outside of swimming at a beach and those restaurants serving raw-fish?” He glanced at Isobel lounging a few steps away. “I can answer for you! None! Seaweed is one of the least-alchemically useful plants in existence!”

Isobel cracked open an eye. “Seaweed is a plant?”

Leland giggled at that but the Captain did not. He scowled in fact, muttering about “these darn youth today.”

Feeling like he needed to keep the peace, Leland said, “Regardless of building material, this ship really is something.”

Their passage to Shoutwell was a ship created strictly out of seaweed, rope, and metal fasteners. No wood, no sheet metal, just good old fashion… seaweed.

Leland laughed again but this time the Captain smirked right along with him. “Watch your tongue boy-o, I should have thrown you off my ship the moment you and this one,” he jerked his thumb at Isobel, “started yelling in the gallery! Woke up all those fine passengers of mine!”

Isobel chortled, “They are only ‘fine’ because they are paying.”

Gull hid his smile. “Be that as it may, they are still my passengers. And! My passengers should be able to get enough sleep! Not be woken up by some kid and his guardian yelling about who is the most scared of dying!”

Leland turned red. Isobel did the same but quickly cooled herself off with a pulse of Hunter’s Instincts, a Legacy ability.

“In my defense,” Leland began, “I wanted to have a proper conversation with her, but she—”

Isobel cut him off, inferring what he was about to say, “’Is a great beast and doesn’t know how to speak at a proper volume level?’”

He smiled. “Not at all! I was going to say how wonderful you are and that any and everything you do, you do for the greater good.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”

Gull looked between the two of them. “Sounds like you two have been together for a while now. How’d you meet? You look a little young to be his mom and a little old to be his girlfri—”

Leland coughed. Isobel stared at the man.

He held his hands up. “Just saying!”

Letting out a sigh, Leland said, “She was the local law enforcement when my friends and I came into this town. It was supposed to be an easy trip for us to get some adventuring experience, but one thing led to another, and well, Isobel here helped us save a different city from some murderous group.”

Isobel gave Leland a warning glance.

Gull went through several stages of emotion, his gruff beard and mustache highlighting all of the fine changes. “It’s not that I don’t believe you, boy-o…” He shook his head. “No, that’s exactly it. I don’t believe you. You saved a city? How old are you?”

Leland let out a long sigh and thought. “Huh. I guess I’ll be twenty in two months. Time really has flown by.”

Gull laughed. “Now I know you are yanking my seaweed-chains. You saved an entire city while only having a Legacy for less than a year? Preposterous!”

Leland gave a shrug. “And you made an entire ship out of seaweed. Normally I would say that is preposterous, but here we are.”

The old Captain squinted. “Fair enough.” Then with a hearty grunt, he stood, his knees popping under the sudden movement. “I’ve got to get back to the navigator’s cabin before the First Mate skins me for getting lost. I’ve over-sailed ports before and refuse to let it happen again.”

Isobel sat up. “Does that mean we will be arriving soon?”

Gull looked up at the stars. “Aye, I’d say so. A few hours, maybe a bit more.” He stretched, then added, “It was nice talking to both of ye. Most of my passengers are the boring merchant types. Money, money, money. That’s all they talk about.”

Leland stood and held his hand out. “Thanks for the ride, Captain Gull.”

The Captain shook his hand and turned to Isobel. “I’m glad you two got out whatever your argument was about. Can’t have friends mad at each other, trust me.”

Isobel slowly gave him a nod and then he walked off, disappearing into the hardened seaweed ship.

Leland leaned over the ship’s railing, watching the coast go by. “What do you think about flying from here?” he asked.

Isobel hummed. “Maybe in an hour. I’d rather not camp out in the wilds if we don’t have to, and with your lack of mana, we surely would.”

He gave her a flat stare. “Are you still sour I’m faster than you? Because I do not want to get into this again.”

She held up her hands, surrendering… but then quickly added, “You’re faster for like two miles then you have to rest for a few hours. I can fly continuously forever if I had to.”

Leland sighed, making it very pronounced and drawn out. Then he smirked and spewed out, “Slowpokesaywhat?”

“What?”

He laughed.

Sitting in a small inn by the Shoutwell Harbor, Jude and Glenny played cards. Glenny tried to be tactical, taking long turns and thinking through all possible outcomes. Jude, during this, fingered away at his harmonica, softly playing. When it was his turn, he’d play instantly, seemingly choosing a card at random and laying it down with the strictest confidence.

And it drove Glenny mad.

Well, it irritated him for sure. Because he was losing. He was losing to a dull strategy created by a dull—

“I found it,” Spencer said from the corner.

Jude hopped up from his seat. “Finally!”

Glenny slowly stood as well, took a deep breath, and refocused. Sitting in a cramped room doing nothing for the last few days had been miserable. Playing cards didn’t help much either, but that was all they could do. Wait, bide their time and wait. Luckily Spencer’s magic allowed for remotely checking out ships so they didn’t have to sit outside in the cold.

“Is he there?” Glenny asked.

“Checking,” Spencer said, his eyes glowing with magic. “…Found him!”

“Thank the Lords!” Jude screeched.

Glenny smiled softly.

“Okay, I’m going to open a portal. Be ready to yank him—” Spencer paused. “Cancel that. I’ll just tell him to step over.”

Jude and Glenny looked at each other. Over the last few days they had discussed how this fateful event was going to happen. Worst case scenario, they would steal him back from those who took him in the first place. Best case, he was alone and safe.

It looked like the latter scenario was happening.

Still standing at the bow of the ship, Leland and Isobel were talking about the Lord of the Hunt. She was explaining why she didn’t think he’d get much in the way of a contract if he ever chose to petition him. As it turned out, the Hunter Lord was in a similar vein to the Lord of Curses or Lord of Magic. Their Legacies were a culmination of other Lord’s powers.

The Lord of Curses could make claim to any “curse,” the Lord of Magic to any “spell,” and the Lord of the Hunt likewise could claim any classifier that dealt with “hunting.” Spells, curses, abilities, techniques, whatever. This, while opening plenty of doors, was much too broad. Isobel theorized that unless Leland had something very specific to ask of culmination-type Lords, he was better off petitioning a specific-type Lord like the Lord of Fire or Lord of Erupting Skies.

Case in point was Erupting Steps. Since Leland asked the Lord of Erupting Skies for a movement ability, he received something to do with lightning-like speed. If, instead, he were to ask the Lord of the Hunt, then Isobel guessed that he would receive something far less impactful.

“There are just too many abilities that grant increased movement that the Lord of the Hunt has access to. And knowing him from way back during my Dream Ceremony, he’d offer you something rather limiting. Like increased speed toward beasts only, or something.”

Leland nodded along with what she was saying. “And so instead, I asked the Lord of Erupting Skies and was offered something from a smaller, more niche pool of spells that have lesser limitations.”

He understood and promptly agreed. It was common knowledge that broader Lordly domains were much more limited in scope. His mom was a great example of that. She, a Legacy of Magic, specialized in lightning. Her spells were always weaker than a Legacy of Erupting Skies, for example, but she also had more options to choose from. Like the red-lighting of the Lord of Parallax.

“I wonder if there is a book of spells from various Lords I could get my hands on.” Leland said. “That way I know what I should bargain for right from the—”

A portal opened beside him.

“Leland!” three voices called at once.

His eyes widened and his legs reacted before his brain did. For having been fighting near-nonstop for so long, the sudden spell work sent his mana supply into overdrive. His hands flooded with magic and multiple spells reared into ready. But that all came crashing down when he saw loved ones.

He sprinted through the portal, the oddly metal seaweed under foot giving way to old rotted wood. His dad was first in his sights and he opened his arms wide to hug—

Leland skidded across the floor, a sudden weight crashing into him from the side. Jude burrowed his head into him, two meaty arms wrapping around him like alchemical tongs.

“Leland! Leland! Leland!” Jude repeated with cheer, his tune bouncing like his knees. He jumped up and down, taking Leland with him.

“AhhaaAhhhhaAAhhhh,” Leland sang in line with the bounces. “Jude! Get off!”

He got his arm out and leveraged Jude off himself with a shove, finding it much easier than it should have been. He didn’t think too much about that, however, instead rushing forward to hug his dad.

“Dad!”

“Son!” Spencer pulled him in and didn’t let go, even when Jude hugged both of them.

From the side, Glenny deliberated for a moment before joining the trio. His cloak of shadows joined the fun as well, its tendrils of darkness wrapping around all of them like a cocoon. Glenny forced it to heel when the light started to drain from the room.

“You’re alive!” Jude screeched despite being directly next to everyone.

“Yes!” Leland yelled back. “No need to yell!”

“But you’re back! Yelling is part of it—” A tendril of darkness snapped around his mouth and spun around his head like a roll of tape. Muffled shouting sounded from behind the shadow.

Leland laughed at that. He turned to Glenny. “You’ve gotten better with the cloak!”

Glenny’s eyes widened a bit, not expecting the sudden directed enthusiasm. “Yeah—” He looked Leland up and down. “And you aren’t as flabby as before!”

“’Flabby?’”

“Well, you don’t look as mage-y as before.”

Amused, Leland accepted the compliment and suddenly realized the portal leading to the ship was gone. “Did Isobel—”

“I’m here,” a voice sounded from the corner. “Have your moment. Don’t worry about me.”

A muffled gawk sounded from Jude.

Glenny, likewise, made a surprised yelp.

Isobel looked more than pleased. “What? Forgot about me, huh?”

Glenny sputtered out some nonsense and Jude had a look of fear in his eyes. A moment went by, and both boys recovered.

Spencer took command of the silence, his arm still on his son. “We thought you were dead, Isobel.”

She squinted at Jude in particular. He flinched. “Nope. Back and better than ever. A real weight has been lifted from my shoulders.” She looked to Leland before saying, “I think it’s from leaving the Inquisitors. You should think about doing that as well.”

Leland knew she was lying. She wasn’t feeling better because of her lack of a profession but the yelling match they had on the ship. But that was private between them. No one else had the right, nor should, know.

Spencer didn’t smile, he didn’t frown. In a flat tone he said, “Already done. And I’ve already planned to kill Aunty P.”

Isobel raised an eyebrow.

Leland spun on his dad, knocking his arm off in the process. “Did Sybil not make it? Everything should be smoothed over, right?” He turned to Isobel. “Right? Right!”

Spencer regarded his son for a moment. “Sybil was with you? We were never sure if you all were together.” He glanced at Isobel. “You two obviously were. What about the princess?”

“She was with us as well,” Isobel filled in as Leland was suddenly too ill to talk. “Leland went into a great deal of debt to make sure she was returned home before things went south for her.”

The shadows wrapped around Jude’s mouth had disappeared and he and Glenny were whispering to Leland, trying to calm him down. It wasn’t working, not really, at least.

“Where—” Leland said to the room. “Where is she? She should be here. In the castle, home. She should be here!”

Spencer, Jude, and Glenny spoke over one another, each trying to get more information while also calming Leland.

Isobel spoke to Leland, her voice like a light in the darkness, “She’s fine. She is in the castle. You know how that spell worked. And unless the Lord of the Void lied to you, she’s home. And knowing ‘Aunty P’ she probably thought Sybil was a face changer or something before the Queen showed up.”

Leland nodded. “I have to make sure.”

“And we will. But for now, we’ve just made it back. You need to see your mom and I need to sleep.”

With that, Leland looked at his father. “Where’s mom?”

Spencer went from eyeing the Huntress to feeling like an old man looking at his son. “She’s fine. She’s safe. I don’t want to verbally say where, but we will go there.”

“Okay, let’s go!”

“In a moment, my son.” Spencer kneeled, locking eyes with Leland. “Are you okay? You don’t seem okay.”

Like a cork cracking under pressure, tears leaked from Leland’s eyes. “It’s been really hard, dad,” he muttered, his face crumbling into an ugly mess.

Spencer hugged him, and for a moment all other worries disappeared.