Chapter 10: Chapter 9

“What happened here?” Ciana asked as she examined the driftwood log.

Nym shrugged. “It was like that when I got here.”

“It looks like someone started carving it up with a knife.”

“Sure does.”

“You don’t own a knife though.”

“Nope.”

“So who did this?”

“That is a good question.”

Ciana squinted at Nym. He looked back at her, expression blank. “You know something,” she said. “And you’re acting weird.”

“How was your trip into town?” he said, changing the subject.

“Worthless waste of time,” she growled. “Watch Captain’s still telling me I’ve got no proof of who it is, could be anyone. I’ll have to deal with Senman myself next time I see him.”

She paused thoughtfully and looked at the log. “Senman, huh. Okay, spill. What happened here?”

“How should I know?” Nym protested, but there was no real resistance in his tone. Ciana wasn’t stupid, and there wasn’t much he could do to hide the evidence that someone had been there. Of course she’d figure it was Senman. He was the only one who ever visited. “I told you it was like that when I got here.”

That was technically true. The log had already been hacked at with a knife prior to him getting back. She didn’t need to know that Senman had still been there when he’d arrived, or anything else. No good would come from that.

“Sure, but you know more than you’re telling me,” she pressed.

“I figure it was Senman who did it. He’s been screwing with you for weeks. Probably got bored of waiting for you to come back.”

Ciana studied him some more. “Fine,” she said finally. “You’re still hiding something though. Everything okay?”

“I’m fine,” Nym said. “Hit my head on a tree branch practicing flying earlier. I have survived worse.”

And that was the end of the matter, at least for that day. Dinner was a collection of foraged nuts and berries and a pair of potatoes from the garden. It was sparse, but it was what they had. As they ate, Ciana sighed and said, “We should get a loaf of bread. It’s been forever since I had that.”

Nym didn’t have anything to say to that. He was feeling particularly out-of-touch with reality and wondered what precisely was the cause of it. He’d channeled more arcana than ever before in such a short time, even more than their escape from the sharks. Ciana had been right: he wasn’t exactly acting normal, and he was starting to wonder if drawing so much arcana at once was the cause of it.

Or maybe it was the man who’d tried to kill him, or the subsequent killing of that man. Or maybe it was the memory he’d recovered. All of those were viable options. He wasn’t particularly bothered by how numb he was to everything though. It was just a thing he noted, examined, and put behind him.

He thawed out over the next few days and returned to the boy he’d been for the first month after he’d washed up on the beach. It was a strange feeling, like he’d been a passive observer in the events that had happened with Senman. He remembered them. He was there for them. But it was like some other person was moving his body. He wasn’t sure he liked that. It wasn’t so much that he felt regret for defending himself from Senman’s murderous intentions, but he’d taken steps to ensure the man drowned in a place where his remains would never be discovered. And he hadn’t told Ciana the truth.

About a week after the encounter with Senman, they received a visitor. He was an older man in his fifties with salt-and-pepper hair and a lean build. They saw him approach while they were working in the garden, where he stopped at the edge and said, “Hey there, Ciana. Do you have a few minutes?”

“Who’s that?” Nym asked.

“Guard Captain Mordat,” she told him. “The one I’ve been talking to about Senman and him screwing with my snare lines.”

She straightened up and cracked her neck. “Can you finish this up while I go see what he wants?” she asked Nym.

“Sure,” he agreed. The pair went into the shack, which was right next to where he was working anyway, so it was easy to overhear the whole conversation.

“What do you need?” Ciana asked.

“It’s about Senman,” the captain said. “When was the last time you saw him?”

“Hmmm… a few weeks ago when I went I got into that fight with him after I caught him stealing out of one of my traps. Before that it was when he showed up to fight with me about keeping Nym here. I never did find out who told him about that. Somebody was running their mouth though, because he was right out immediately.”

“And you’ve had no other interactions with him since then?”

“No. Why?”

Mordat ignored the question. “What about what you told me before? You said you caught him cutting the lines on some of your other traps.”

“No, but I know it was him. Believe me, if I had caught him, I’d have torn into him. I’ve been looking for him to give him a piece of my mind for a week now.”

“That’s the thing, Ciana. We don’t know where he is. He’s been missing for a few days now, and according to his friends, he was planning on coming out to visit you. Nobody’s seen him since he left.”

The shack was silent.

“Ciana?” Mordat prompted.

“I haven’t seen him. If I do, you’ll know because I’m going to give him a black eye. Maybe two black eyes.”

“That’s your official stance? You know this makes you look bad, right?”

“I’ve been to your office twice about him harassing me. It’s not like it’s a secret that I’m not friendly with him. He’s always showing up sniffing around me, trying to tell me how to live and what I can and can’t do. I don’t know where he went when he was done causing trouble with his friends, but I haven’t seen him.”

“Alright then. Thanks for your help.”

“You see him, you let him know I’m still pissed about him messing with my traps.”

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“I’ll do that. Have a good day.”

The door opened, and Nym squatted down and started working on pulling weeds. The watch captain spared him a glance before he turned to the path and started walking back to Palmara. Ciana appeared in the door frame and watched him go.

“Nym,” she said without moving her head, still watching.

“Yeah?”

“Come inside for a minute, will you?”

“Sure thing.”

He followed her in and stood in front of their driftwood log bench. With one hand, she gestured towards all the notches and nicks in it. “Tell me the truth, now.”

The game was up. One part of Nym was panicking. Another part of him descended into that calm, emotionless state he’d found. That part won. “I went home when you went to Palmara. Senman was sitting right in front of where you’re standing, whittling away at the wood with his knife. He was waiting for you, but when I told him you’d gone to town, he decided he’d stumbled onto an opportunity.

“He grabbed me and carried me out to the bluffs. He was going to throw me straight into the water to get rid of me. We both went over the edge, but I could make myself fly and Senman couldn’t. Last I saw him, he was underwater in the cove.”

Ciana didn’t say anything for a while. Finally, she asked, “He’s dead then?”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Would it have made a difference? By the time you got home, it was already over.”

“You should have told me. I asked you what happened. You lied to me, Nym!”

He nodded. “I suppose I did. I don’t regret it. Nothing good would come from dragging you into what happened.”

“I don’t know. It would be nice to know that I was involved in his disappearance. You ever think of that? Did you think I’d be mad at you? He tried to kill you, and you fought back?”

Nym thought about that for a second. “I didn’t know if you’d believe me. And like I said, it was too late to change what happened. It was easier to just not talk about it.”

He stared straight ahead, not really seeing anything as he confessed to covering up murder. He’d have to leave now. She could tell them what he’d done when they came around to question her again. If he left immediately, he could get a decent lead. The ground here was relatively flat, but he was sure he could find somewhere where being able to fly would give him a terrain advantage.

When Ciana put her arms around him and pulled him into a hug, it shocked him out of that numb state. “What… what are you doing?” he asked, his voice cracking.

“Nym, you should have told me. I know better than anyone what kind of person Senman was. I’m surprised he would go that far, but he’s been going down that road for months now. He was obsessed with me in a scary way. It wasn’t healthy. This was just the point of no return for him.”

“I-”

“Hush.” Ciana squeezed him tighter. “We still need to tell Mordat what happened to him.”

“That’s an awful idea.”

“It’s the right thing to do.”

Nym sighed. “One last way for him to screw with you, huh?”

“We’ll survive.”

That was easy for her to say. She wasn’t the one who’d killed him. An image of Senman’s wild-eyed stare as he struggled to stay above water while Nym’s magic ripped him off the rocks and drowned him came to mind. Ciana didn’t really understand what had happened. That wasn’t her fault. She wanted to believe the best of him, that Nym hadn’t had a choice. That he’d defended himself the only way he could.

That wasn’t the truth. Nym could have restrained him on the bluffs. He didn’t have to throw Senman into the cove. He didn’t have to take extra steps to ensure the man died. He’d done it because he’d decided not to leave an enemy alive. Senman had been willing to kill him. Nym had been willing to return the favor.

The numbness settled back into his thoughts.

If he confessed and they arrested Nym or tried to execute him, he couldn’t see himself meekly complying. He wanted to live, even if that meant killing someone else to make it happen. He had his magic, but he wasn’t nearly strong enough to think he was invincible. Something told him that he would be an utter fool to ever believe that no one could hurt him.

“Nym?”

“Hmm?” he came back to himself with a start, belatedly realizing that she’d been talking to him while he stared at nothing.

“Let’s have lunch. We’ll go into town after and talk to Mordat after.”

“Okay,” he said.

He wasn’t doing that. Ciana had been good to him, better than anyone had a right to ask. But it was time to leave. He needed to work on his magic, and the resources in Palmara were practically non-existent. The magister was a weak source at best, and Nym suspected he was already reaching the point of surpassing the old man. Never mind the fact that the magister wasn’t a resource he personally could tap into.

“I’m going to go take a walk,” he said.

He found himself standing at the bluffs, looking out over the cove. With a thought, he stepped into thin air and floated down to the sandy beach below. Somewhere in the water was whatever the shark’s had left of Senman’s remains. He doubted it was very much.

A familiar fin broke the water, cruising parallel to the shore. Nym could see the scar at the base. He shook his head. “What is your problem with me, anyway?” he asked the shark. Of course, it didn’t answer.

Further out, past that, was that thing in the water. He could still sense it. It dug at his thoughts. He couldn’t get to it though, or could he? His magic wrapped around him again and he drifted through the air to the center of the cove. The shark followed him the whole way and circled around him, occasionally rolling on its side and staring at him with its dead black eyes.

Whatever was down there called to Nym. He tried to grab it with his magic, but he couldn’t find anything to hold onto. Shaking his head, he flew back to the shore. It was invisible, intangible, but there was something there. He knew it.

One day, he’d come back to claim it.

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