Chapter 80: Reunion

Lucas walked through the dark forest, cold and exhausted. 

His left eye had completely lost its sight, leaving only his right eye to guide him. He leaned heavily on his old walking stick to support himself, as his weakened left leg threatened to give way with every step.

He limped forward at a walking pace – running was beyond his strength now. 

But at least he had shaken off the Icelanders and their undead minions. When he looked up, no night owls pursued him anymore. The necromancers seemed occupied with other troubles, no longer concerned with chasing him.

Though free from pursuit, the journey ahead remained long. Trapped behind Alvado’s lines, he faced a circuitous route back to the ravine where York and Bardel waited – across mountains and through rolling hills. 

He desperately wanted to lie down and sleep, but rest wasn’t an option yet. He had to keep moving before his blood ran dry. 

That singular purpose kept him going, though his mind grew foggy. To stay awake, he forced himself to recall a story the elf had once told him.

Long ago, when two kingdoms warred, 

A messenger exhausted seven horses and ran three days and nights to deliver news of an invasion to his king. After handing over the letter, the messenger collapsed dead. 

Because the warning arrived in time, his kingdom won the war. 

The people later honored him with annual races and a bronze statue in Victory Square.

Lucas now understood that messenger’s determination. Unless he delivered the Mist Stone, his people’s sacrifices would be meaningless. 

Death was life’s only certainty. 

All men died – that couldn’t be changed. But at least he could choose how to meet his end, couldn’t he?

His body felt heavy as stone, yet his mind was calm as still water, his soul light as a bird in flight. 

Once he delivered the Mist Stone, he could finally rest.

Just as he felt himself floating away, a song echoed through the forest.

The haunting melody cleared his thoughts, eased his pain, even partially healed his wounds – violently dragging him back to reality.

He saw a silver-haired elf with a lute, standing on a moonlit cliff gazing at drifting starlight. 

Lucas recognized that lute. 

Its familiar strains transported him back to that gentle spring day, forever etched in the instrument’s memory. 

He recognized the elf, and through the lute’s song, learned something new.

The elf was actually female.

She’d disguised herself as a man when visiting Lucas’s village. 

No surprise – wandering women faced constant dangers. You could find homeless men in Purple Thorn Castle, but rarely women, who typically disappeared from the streets within days. 

The elf’s male disguise made perfect sense.

But why was she here alone in the forest?

“Mu’en?” Lucas called softly, using the name she’d given him.

“Porter, it’s been long.” 

The elf turned, closing her feathered deerhide notebook.

“The Prophet’s vision was true – when starlight rises in the north, I meet old friends. My wandering ends here.”

“Vision? What vision?” Lucas didn’t understand.

“Keep moving forward, Porter,” said the elf. “Your path is clear now – this marks the Icelanders’ front line. Cross the Prague River to safety at Purple Thorn Castle.”

“But dark times approach. The shadow realms unite – demons no longer fight amongst themselves. A great evil consolidates the darkness, now extending tendrils beyond their domain.”

“Demons…” Lucas licked his lips. “Mu’en, did you come because of them?”

Young Lucas hadn’t understood, but now he glimpsed the elf’s power. 

The “time” gathered around her revealed just the tip of an iceberg – he sensed the enormous mass hidden beneath.

She was at least Gold-rank, perhaps beyond – realms Lucas couldn’t fathom. 

Only such beings could oppose those demons.

“I came only for the vision, Porter.” The elf’s form began fading. “Forgive me – I cannot alter fate’s course. I cannot stop the Icelanders’ advance, lest I lose my way again.”

“Are you leaving, Mu’en?” Lucas watched her grow transparent.

“Go forth, Porter. It gladdens me to see you grown.”

The perpetually melancholy elf who never smiled bid Lucas farewell once more – but this time left a gift.

His body straightened, exhaustion and pain vanishing as if after days of rest. Wounds scabbed over; necromantic toxins purified. 

More effective than York’s potions – even that fifty-silver healing draught paled beside the elf’s song. 

Though his left eye remained dark, he’d never felt better.

“Thank you, Mu’en.” Lucas bowed toward her fading presence.

Her words about Purple Thorn Castle’s safety were welcome news indeed.

Clutching the Mist Stone, he pressed deeper into mountainous forest as starlight drifted overhead.

After some distance, new starlight appeared beside him.

An unbelievable figure materialized – Sir Wade, somehow transported before him.

Wade equally marveled – the elf’s “magic” had whisked him from the square to these wooded foothills to reunite with Lucas. 

So Lucas was the “old friend” she’d mentioned?

“Sir Wade, what joy to see you safe.” Lucas smiled warmly.

Many mysteries remained, but the wandering knight’s safety gladdened him.

Yet Wade couldn’t accompany Lucas back to the ravine – this incarnation was fading. 

The time had come to return to the wasteland.

Wade intended to release the souls who’d fought alongside him. With the necromancer dead (though his soul claimed by a demon lord), the phantoms had no connection to the living – especially those warped into demons, mere evil newborns with fragments of the mage’s memory.

But some souls refused to depart, clinging to grievances over their tragic fates – determined to spare others similar suffering. 

A few noble spirits retained such purpose.

“Then remain with me,” Wade accepted these willing souls.

Other starlight dispersed – some rising skyward, others encircling Lucas.

“Aunt Susan…Uncle Brenk…Little Harry? Is that you?”

Lucas recognized the spirits – old friends who’d helped and laughed with him.

Through them, he witnessed Wade’s battle with the necromancer.

One small, frost-touched spirit hovered before Lucas – the most familiar of all.

Stunned, Lucas reached out. The tiny phantom alighted on his palm, smiling.

He remembered little Yisa – that lonely child who, like young Lucas, lived alone. 

Quiet Yisa rarely smiled, even refusing shared bread. Only during hunting trips would she join the other children.

Only discussions of hunting – how to obtain food and woolens through one’s own efforts – would make Yisa sit quietly listening.

Patient Lucas taught her everything, even giving her his cabin key under pretense of cleaning duties – really so she could handle the hunting bows and skinning knives.

He’d learned those skills the same way – hoped Yisa might too.

But that terrible night, he’d found Yisa’s body in the hunter’s cabin. Someone had laid her out neatly – and taken the cabin’s bow, cloak and curved blade.

That morning, he’d helped bury Yisa and the other dead.

He’d thought that farewell eternal – never expecting to see Yisa’s spirit today.

“Mia…so that’s your name now?”

The little spirit smiled at Lucas – living and dead reunited once more.