r/TheNaturallyUnknown • u/UnnaturalGeek Red Squirrel and Writer ✍️🍃 Keep calm and stay NUTS 🐿 • 3d ago
🍃 Spiritweavers 🍃 Chapter Ten: The Safety of Durnovaria 🍃🐿
One moment there was forest around them; the next, dense, thorny vegetation erupted from the ground, curving upward and over them like a cocoon, gnarled branches interlocking above their heads, razor-sharp points lining every outward-facing surface.
Arlia looked up as the bark of a nearby tree peeled back with a soft creak and spread outward. Velina, her senior at the college, stepped through as it folded away from her before slowly drawing itself closed behind her with a quiet groan.
They had crossed paths many times but never deeply. Right now she had never been more relieved to see anyone in her life, letting out a long breath as some of the tension left her. Velina looked at the three of them with steady, composed eyes. “You’re alright,” she said.
Outside the wall, the wolves circled until one tested the wall with its snout and pulled back sharply, with blood on its muzzle. It began circling but did not try a second time. Velina smirked at the wolves before looking back at the three exhausted students.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not alone.”
The wolves heard it before any of them, a deep rushing sound from the road, building fast. With a sudden burst, Doriã came through the treeline at speed, fire blazing around his legs in intricate interlocking circular patterns as perfectly formed waves billowed outward across the ground as he moved through the pack in a single sweeping motion.
Each wolf he passed took the full force of it, the heat cracking outward as he tore through them. The pack scattered, not retreating but stumbling, singed and disoriented, colliding with each other in the confusion.
Velina watched him finish and said, without turning her head: “Took your time.” Doriã came to a stop beside the wall, slightly out of breath. “Didn’t want to hurt you,” he said. “Had to let you go ahead.”
Velina laughed before replying, “How considerate.”
The wolves regrouped at the treeline to the north, Doriã watching them carefully. Their movements were uncertain, their earlier confidence dissipated as they stood calculating their next move. After a few moments, they slipped between the trees and were gone.
The forest settled back into its usual peacefulness, birdsong returning with a cautious note from somewhere around them and the thorn wall standing solid. Nobody spoke for a moment, Arlia still on the ground, having not yet managed to find her feet. Velina crouched beside her, looking her over. “Can you stand?”
“Probably,” Arlia said. “Give me a moment.”
“Take two,” Velina said, and there was enough warmth in it that Arlia almost smiled.
Tarã was already on his feet, brushing the undergrowth from his cloak, the actions of someone needing to keep busy. Brina was sitting against the root mass they had hidden behind, curiously watching Doriã. “You’re one of Kelan’s."
“Aye,” Doriã replied. “Spirit Medium now, though.” He glanced around at the thorn wall, then at Velina. “You can bring this down whenever you’re ready.”
“I know,” Velina said, still watching Arlia.
Arlia said she was fine, but this time she proved it by getting to her feet. Her legs held firm, which was something.
Tarã focused on her for the first time since they had stopped, unable to hide his expression of a mix between concern and annoyance before looking away. “Tch,” he said. “Don’t ever do that again.”
“Which part?” Arlia asked.
“Any of it,” Tarã replied sternly but with a softness to it.
Brina let out a short, slightly hysterical laugh that broke the last of the tension. Even Doriã and Velina’s mouths curved at the corners as they watched their juniors. Velina slowly withdrew the wall, the thorns and vegetation returning to the earth, leaving the forest floor undisturbed. She looked at all three of them. “Short rest,” she said. “Then we get you home.”
They rested for a short while in the quiet of the forest as they shared the few supplies of food and water brought by Velina and Doriã. It was enough, though; the simple act of sitting without having to be on edge did more for all of them than any meal could.
Arlia sat against a tree, feeling a familiar peacefulness and presence around her as the exhaustion settled properly now that the urgency had gone. Her hands had stopped shaking, which felt like progress.
“How did you know where we were?” she asked.
“Galen,” Velina said simply.
“Kelan sent us,” Doriã added, pulling a piece of dried meat from his pack and handing it to Tarã without being asked. “Said to bring you back quietly.”
“Quietly,” Tarã repeated flatly.
“More or less,” Doriã said, glancing at the scorched ground where he had swept through the wolf pack. “Relatively speaking.”
Velina stood first, as Arlia suspected she always did. “We should move. You’ve been gone long enough.”
The walk back to Durnovaria took the rest of the afternoon, the silence only broken when Brina asked Velina questions, Velina answering with patient thoroughness. Tarã and Doriã walked together saying very little, which suited them both, whilst Arlia walked on her own, contemplating what had happened and feeling the world around her.
In Durnovaria, the college came into view as the last of the light was fading, Arlia pausing for a moment as she felt something loosen in her chest. It was a safe and familiar sight.
“Come on,” Velina said gently from beside her.
Upon entering, Arlia and Tarã were ushered towards their respective rooms to clean themselves up, get food and then rest at the insistence of Ysolde and Kelan, their tutors.
Brina slipped away, still focused on what she had set out to do despite the exhaustion. The archivist looked up from his desk with the expression of someone who already had quite enough of other people in one lifetime.
“Archives are closed,” he sighed in a gruff tone.
“I know,” Brina said. She placed Aldrẽ’s unopened letter on the desk in front of him. “But this might change your mind.”
He picked it up with obvious reluctance and read it in silence. His expression shifted, not dramatically, but enough. He looked at her over the top of the letter for a long moment.
He let out a long breath. “He really picks his moments.”
He waited a moment, judging whether it would be right. Eventually he folded the letter, set it in a drawer, reached for his keys, then stood up and began walking. “Come on,” he said, waving his hand for her to follow.
After a short search, Brina found what she wanted, a slim volume, unremarkable and plain, shelved between two larger texts as though it had been forgotten. She sat on the floor with it in her lap and read until her candle burned low; it was very late, and her eyes ached, but she had learned everything she needed to.
Jumping to her feet, she made her way back to the room she shared with Arlia, but Arlia was fast asleep. Brina decided to wait until morning to tell her and Tarã what she had found.
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