The Eyebright's Dimension

Chapter Fifteen: Eavesdropping

Eunae felt Kasity struggling against her concealment charms as she hurried them away from the two figures in the fog, and whispered, “Kasity, it’s a concealment charm. Stop struggling.”

Eunae could feel Kasity’s bewilderment, but thankfully, she at least stopped trying to yell. Her drowsy and senseless response to the concealment charm obviously meant Kasity didn’t have enough exposure to strong magic. Eunae would have to speak to Lander about that. They came near the stadium doors, and Eunae shoved Kasity in through the doors as another person burst out through the doors—Calixte.

Eunae moved hastily out of her way, and almost called out to her, but then she saw the icy, metallic look in Calixte’s eyes, and her heartbeat started to echo loudly in her ears again. What was going on? How could Calixte leave during the Final Round? Where was she going? Did she not see the two strangers—the two strangers that Eunae knew, instinctively, were dangerous and should not be on Academy land?

Calixte strode right past Eunae behind the concealment charm, and sealed the stadium door behind her, muting the screams and cheers of the crowd inside, and leaving Eunae outside the stadium, but Kasity safe inside. Every particle in Eunae’s body told her that she should leave and fly away before anyone sensed her. But there was something else now, a weird force tugging at Eunae’s mind…curiosity. And that curiosity kept her pinned to the spot, her senses tingling for the faint voices that lilted their way…

“Valorén?” Calixte yelled in a brusque way, placing her hand on her hips. Her manner of speaking startled Eunae; she had never heard Calixte ever speak like that before. “Stop hiding. I know you’re here.”

“Funny you still do after all these years,” said a pleasant, melodic voice, and the owner of the voice, a tall, willowy woman with white-blonde hair, and eyes as black as smoldering coals, stepped out of the fog, examining her long, white fingers as she did so. Curiously, as she strode towards Calixte, the fog seemed to disappear, and in Eunae’s mind, the two became connected, although it made little sense; precious few could have such control over the weather, and Eunae did not make the beautiful stranger out to be a weather magician…

“You brought someone else with you,” Calixte said with a wary glance around the surroundings.

“Yes,” Valorén replied, and a man seemingly materialized next to her, a man with hair as dark as the woman’s eyes, who wore a quiet, unassuming expression.

“Teagan Callon,” murmured the man, bowing a little.

Calixte eyed him with great dislike. “You again?”

“So she remembers after all these years, after meeting me once,” Teagan said to Valorén. “Just like you said she would.”

“Am I ever wrong?” asked Valorén, and Eunae detected a little flash of amusement across her pale face. “Here we are, Teagan, three years since the last date we met, in the same place we met for the first time. I have learned much in three years. Much about my powers…about the vulnerability in our world…about time…”

Teagan yawned visibly, turning his back towards Valorén. She laughed, a silvery sound that made Eunae shudder.

“And you, Teagan, are the only person who can do that in my presence and live,” Valorén murmured. She glanced Calixte, turning those unnaturally black eyes onto Calixte’s blue ones.

“Your eyes have gotten darker,” muttered Calixte, averting her own eyes from Valorén’s gaze.

“So they tell me,” Valorén replied. “And now you tell me, little monkey, what you have been up to for the past three years.”

“You didn’t come to Vivele’s funeral,” said Calixte, her eyes bright and the muscles in her face taut.

Vivele? Who was Vivele?

“I despise funerals. Dead people don’t do me any good.”

“She was your sister!” cried Calixte. “She died, and you disappeared!”

“I could never figure out why you were so attached to her. She was boring.” Valorén yawned. “I know you must have a lot of emotional baggage, but please don’t overload me with it. I didn’t let you feel my presence to hear your whining.”

“Valorén…” said Teagan, but Calixte cut him off with a wave of her hand.

“Don’t you butt in,” she growled in an uncharacteristic way. “You’ve been doing enough of that already.”

“Really, you need to control your temper,” Valorén said, studying her nails. “Well, it’s obvious my suspicions have gotten out of hand again.” She turned to Teagan. “She obviously doesn’t remember. I was afraid that…Morwenn said…”

“Morwenn is a silly girl, and is more paranoid than you are,” Teagan cut in. “If that was at all possible.”

“What suspicions?” shouted Calixte.

“You’ll be late for the Final Round,” Valorén said. She waved her hand with the air of a princess dismissing a servant.

“No!” yelled Calixte, so loudly that several birds from the nearest tree were startled and scattered into the sky, cawing. What was wrong with Calixte? Never had she ever displayed any emotion other than her usual cool, calm, cheerfulness. There was something about these two strangers, then, that unsettled Calixte in a way that nothing ever seemed to unsettle her…How about that time she talked about her sister? said a small voice in Eunae’s head, and Eunae remembered again that metallic look in Calixte’s eyes…

Calixte began pacing in front of them, leaving small footprints in the malleable ground. “You’re going to tell me, Valorén, exactly what is going on. You’ve been keeping things from me for too long. Vivele said she would tell me, but she’s gone now, and I know there’s something—something,” she added with a resolute frown.

“Nothing you can’t figure out on your own,” Valorén said with a broad smile. “Now, Teagan, about that trip to Serentan we were planning…”

“Must we go?”

“You did promise,” Valorén reminded him. “We'll be back soon so you can attend to your precious Company. Besides, I can feel those dratted catacombs calling me…well, I would like to return for the last ones. It's tradition.”

Eunae barely had time to register what Valorén said about catacombs, for she saw the look of growing anger in Calixte’s eyes. Suddenly, she flew up in the air and disappeared around the curvature of the stadium.

“Flighty,” observed Teagan, watching Calixte’s shadow slide off the stadium wall.

“She’s twelve,” murmured Valorén.

“But you, my dear, at twelve, were already planning on taking over the world.”

“She would, too, if we didn’t keep such a good watch on her. Morwenn hasn’t been doing a good job for the past couple years. You don’t think she has forgotten, do you? Let’s pay her a visit.” Valorén offered her arm to Teagan, who accepted it with a debonair gallantry. The pair marched off into a misty fog that rolled in from nowhere. Their voices drifted and faded into the sullen mid-morning breeze.