Chapter 17: Chapter 16: Breakdown

Lucy's POV

I haven't been back to Dawnhold for close to five years now; it hadn't been practical to bring Peter with me. I could have convinced David to take a day off from the fields, left Peter with neighbours or even just left him on his own by the time he was two, but I've never been able to bring myself to leave him. A bit strange given that he's happy to spend the entire day out of the house, but at least I know that he knows where I am. When he expressed an interest in looking up information, I jumped on the chance almost without thinking. I remember visiting the library myself as a child, looking up fourth rank crafting classes like my favourite [Starlight Weaver] and daydreaming of the day I would reach those heights. Then I grew up, got married, settled down and stopped dreaming. I'll reach [Expert Tailor] one day, and that will be enough for me. I am content.

I can tell already that Peter will never stop dreaming. He will always want to continue to grow; his [Curious] trait was well earned. The walk back will be hard, but watching him visiting Dawnhold for the first time will be well worth it. And so here we are on Henry's cart, leaving the village in the distance. Peter seemed to have something on his mind, but spoke it out loud before I could inquire.

"How do the crops grown by the village get to market? They wouldn't all fit in this cart."

I left that to Henry to answer. I knew that the buyers came to pick up our harvest rather than us delivering, but I didn't know what they did with it. They just made it vanish. Maybe it was magic. I smiled at the thought of an adult Peter waving his hands at our harvest and the whole lot vanishing to nowhere.

I watched the scenery passing by, but the plains were rather homogenous. This area was home to large herds of kafevoski, and any plant that stuck itself too far out of the ground was swiftly eaten. I wondered how the landscape would change if they were removed. Given how heavily hunting was regulated, the effects would presumably be catastrophic for our settlement. Our village had a tiny quota of ten head per year, which we reserved for celebratory feasts.

"Why was our village built so far away from Dawnhold when all of this space was available?"

I looked over at Henry; he was probably better placed to answer this one too. The village had been built before my mother was born, and I had no idea why that location specifically was picked. Henry got the message and began to explain. I listened in too; he ended up covering a lot of history I hadn't heard before. Peter was showing a comical set of facial expressions, jumping between riveted attention to utter confusion and disbelief faster than I could blink. I wasn't sure where the confusion came from. It seemed like he had made some assumptions about our surroundings and they had all turned out to be wrong. Peter's intelligence was funny like that. If you didn't look at him, you could believe you were talking to an adult one moment and then the very next he would say something that showed a complete lack of understanding of the subject at hand. It was as if he had some inbuilt idea about how the world should work and was constantly surprised when it didn't.

The conversation was brought to an end as we reached the outskirts of Dawnhold. Peter started looking around with rapt attention again as we passed unfamiliar stone buildings. Henry dropped us off in the marketplace. Today was not a market day, which was a pity, but waiting for one of Henry's trips to line up with a market could have taken all year. I decided to get our shopping done quickly so that we could head to the library; we didn't have money to spend on luxuries, and I didn't want to have to turn Peter down if he took a liking to something we couldn't afford.

Peter had another little moment in the very first shop we visited. The method of payment, where the buyer would work out what was owed and leave it behind, seemed to completely throw him. He seemed to think a store employee should be doing it, as if the town had sufficient manpower for someone to sit in every store all day doing nothing but dealing with customers. There would be someone here, probably in the back spinning more thread, and I could have called if I needed help with the maths, but since I could do it myself why bother them?

But it turned out that I was misunderstanding him. It wasn't that he thought someone should be here to help customers, but to stop people from leaving without paying. But you had to pay if you took something. That was the whole point of a shop. Even if you somehow managed to forget, you could always just go back later. It would be embarrassing, for sure, but it wasn't worth having someone watching the shop for.

And then he started asking about people who enforced rules, which equally made no sense. If it was a rule, why would you need to enforce it? He was looking at me like his world had been turned upside down. Luckily he seemed to work it all out after a bit and dropped the subject, because I had no idea how to explain it to him. It would be like trying to explain to someone what the colour red looked like.

Then he saw the slave traders, and that seemed to set him off all over again. He seemed to take particular exception to them trading the services of children. I didn't understand his objections at all; would he prefer them to be thrown into orphanages, or left to fend for themselves without any money? Their employer would give them food and shelter, which their parents obviously were unable to afford given the circumstances in which the slave traders step in. They even often get a better education than they might otherwise have had access to; I knew there were at least two people from our village who obtained their first class after being taken in as a slave apprentice by a workshop here. Again, he seemed to work it out after a while, and from his surprise as I explained how they worked, again it was obvious that he had some completely wrong idea about what was going on.

As soon as we reached the manor, he went straight from dazed to nervous. I took him by the hand, the grounds of the lord's residence not being the place for conversation, and headed to the side entrance. It had been a long time since I'd been here, but the layout of the grounds at least had not changed. The library is freely open to all, but this was still the lord's manor, so we couldn't just walk straight in. I knocked politely and to my amazement the door was answered by Cliff. I remember him being old even back when I was a child. Not only is he still alive, but he's still fit enough to be acting as a butler here? When he noted down our names for the visitors log, he gave a good reaction to Peter, which made me give a little smirk with pride. It seemed to make Peter even more nervous, though, as he grabbed my leg and hid behind me. Hopefully, he'd calm down once we reached the library.

When we arrived there were already others present so I still didn't get the opportunity to ask Peter what was wrong. Instead, I lifted him to a height sufficient to reach the library access point and let him start reading. He didn't stir for almost an hour, when the bell tolled above our heads. That seemed to disturb him, so he decided he'd had enough for the day. I was interested in hearing what he had looked up; was he fantasising about reaching fourth rank, as I had once done? We had a long walk home ahead of us though, so there was plenty of time to talk about it on the way. With our tasks in Dawnhold completed, it was time to get started.

Surprisingly, Cliff was waiting for us outside the door. Peter, who seemed to have recovered while browsing the library, immediately switched back into full nervousness mode. Was he scared of Cliff's rather unique appearance? No, it had certainly got worse during our first talk with Cliff, but it had originally started while we were walking up the path before I'd even knocked on the door.

"If you can spare a few minutes, the Lord would like to have a word with you."

I could feel Peter's grip tighten. He was obviously not happy here, but turning down a request from the lord would be far too rude. Besides, I hadn't seen him for years. Since I was here and had the opportunity, I wanted to say hi. I rubbed Peter's head to offer some reassurance and wished I had a few minutes to ask what was wrong, but we hadn't been alone since his unexplained nervousness started.

"We do have a long journey home, but of course I can spare a few minutes. Why did you wait for us here, though? Why not come in?"

"It wasn't important enough to disturb your reading. I trust you found what you were looking for?"

I looked down at Peter, who gave an almost imperceptible nod.

"We did indeed."

"That is good. Then if you would please follow me."

Cliff led the way to the lord's office. Peter's grip gradually tightened the whole while, and by the time we entered the office his hands were white. It was reaching the point where I was worried he was going to injure himself. Lord Reid stood up from behind his ornate wooden desk to greet us.

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"Lucy. Peter."

I gave a small curtsy. "Lord Reid. It has been a long time since our last meeting. I am glad to see you in good health."

Peter's grip loosened, and I heard a sharp intake of breath. Apparently he was surprised at something, but I had no idea at what.

"And I you. I apologise for the summons, but when Cliff informed me about our little mage visitor, I simply had to take a look for myself. Indeed, he does not look to be more than four or five years of age."

"His fourth birthday was a few weeks ago. Sorry about his shyness. He normally isn't like this, but today has been his first visit to Dawnhold and he seems rather overwhelmed."

I wanted to ask Peter to introduce himself, but in his current state I was concerned he would be unable to speak. I didn't want to make him feel any worse than this. Fortunately Lord Reid had noticed Peter's nervousness and considerately kept his gaze away from him.

"Might I ask how this came about? A child of that age would be considered to be advancing quickly had they obtained a single level, never mind undergoing a class change."

"He was simply fortunate enough to be born with an intelligence boosting trait."

Lord Reid gave a small frown at that. "That cannot be the whole story. High intelligence might improve memory, but it doesn't grant knowledge. Whatever their intelligence, any child requires time to build up experiences and an understanding of the world."

I looked down at Peter, who was now visibly shaking. I know he is very sensitive about his trait. Is he worried about it being found out? But it's not any sort of embarrassment he's showing, but rather outright fear. Anyone would think he was standing in front of a deadly monster rather than our town lord. But what Lord Reid had said; needing an understanding of the world. There was definitely something to that. Wasn't that exactly what I'd thought myself this morning? And that he'd displayed it again today, while shopping and at seeing the slave merchants. He seemed to have some idea of how the world worked, but it was often wrong. Was that what he had been born with?

"I'm afraid I don't know the details myself. It's a rank four trait though, and anything of a rank that high can explain away a lot of weirdness."

Lord Reid cocked an eyebrow. "Impressive. I'm not aware of anyone else of Dawnhold with a rank four anything. But it seems suddenly being summoned by the town lord on his very first visit is too much for the poor boy. I should let you be on your way. Peter, I look forward to your future with interest."

Peter gave a quick expression of surprise again, while I gave another shallow curtsy. "Thank you for your consideration. Then we shall be on our way."

Cliff led us from the office back to the side entrance and bid us goodbye. As we departed, the look on Peter's face was such that despite his slow speed, 'fled' might be a better description. By now I was extremely worried, and couldn't help but feel that this entire trip was a mistake. I had our dinner in my pack and it was long since time to eat, but I felt that getting out of Dawnhold was our highest priority right now. I picked up Peter and hurried in the direction of our village until the town was behind us and we were surrounded by fields. I sat down at the side of the road and hugged Peter tight. A tickle on my face made me realise that I was crying. "I'm so sorry. I should... I should never have brought you here... I didn't expect..."

Looking down at Peter, I realised that he was crying too. That shocked me as much as his fear; Peter never cries. He mumbled between his tears. "It's all wrong..."

"What's wrong?"

"Everything! All of it! He was right. It wasn't just intelligence. I know things. I was born knowing things. And they're all wrong! Or even worse, they're right and this world is wrong."

I... think he just confirmed what I was thinking. But I still needed to do something, and I had no idea what I could do. I hugged him tighter and tried to offer what reassurance I could. "Everything is okay. We've left town. We'll be back to our village tonight, and everything will be back to just how it was before."

"It won't! I know now! I can't just forget!"

"What do you mean? I want to help, but you need to let me understand."

"I... I can't. I... Why do I have to be immune? Why can't I just live in the same blissful bubble as everyone else? I don't want this..."

Immune? Immune to what? But that was the last I could get out of him. He broke down in tears, and no longer responded to anything I said. I kept hugging him close while I ate some food, and eventually he fell asleep. As distressing as this whole episode was, there was one inappropriately comforting thought stuck in my head that I couldn't shake; this was the first time Peter had acted in a way appropriate to his age since his birth.

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