Draith
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Chapter 88 - Untethered
🕑 Added 2025-04-29 14:00:18 +0000 UTCAfter finishing Bevel's lessons, I spent the next couple days getting things sorted. First I created Spellkeys for Calbern and Tamrie, so they could keep me from locking myself away on accident.
Only for Tamrie to tap me on the shoulder and send me back to work refining more organs and silver dust during the day. Then I started carving a space in the mountain for our home each evening before giving Bevel her lessons. It was going to take a while, since I didn’t want to let anyone else work on it.
At least, not those who wouldn’t be invited once it was done.
During my work, Tamrie had indeed set Calbern to finding people to serve as interim leaders. To my surprise, the two of them had convinced Xoth to step up, at least temporarily. He was the interim mayor-figure of the refugees of Verdant Point. Which was apparently the name that had caught on for the refugee valley.
Mainly because of the surprisingly bountiful trees that made up the pier.
My new assistant had also convinced Selvi to get some other experienced Tethered to step forward as leaders for their fields. While they weren’t council members, we now had an official head carpenter and head weaver, though I hadn't met either yet. They both answered to Myris for anything related to Tetherfall or net related, which was basically everything at the moment, which also meant I didn’t have much to talk with them about.
That would change soon enough, but first I was visiting Verdant Point to deal with a minor disturbance.
Another Shaper had arrived, and according to Tamrie, she was, "Agitated a fair bit more than is usual, for one of their sort."
Since Xoth was literally hip-deep in fixing an enchantment for Verdant Point's water storage, I'd volunteered to sort things out.
Looking over the valley, I felt a twinge of pride at how quickly things had recovered. The signs of fire had been wiped away, the Tethered's ropeway had been rebuilt, and there was even the frame of a crude cargo elevator taking shape. Then my gaze drifted past the repairs to the far wall of the valley, that pride smothered by the reminder of what they’d lost.
The gratitude when I’d helped erect the memorial for those who'd died during the attack had felt as hollow as the gaze of the man who’d offered it. All I’d done was carve a simple set of stone plaques set along the far wall where their ashes had been interred.
A loud voice drew me back to the moment. In the middle of the latest construction efforts was a tall human woman, with an elegant dress that had intricate embroidery running up and down the sleeves and along the bottom. All of it was covered with mud. She was currently pointing at a pair of young men, clearly being the source of the voice that had drawn my attention. Even as we approached she waved at the surrounding buildings.
"Can I help you?" I asked, wondering if they'd splattered her with the mud. They were familiar. I was pretty sure they'd both spent time working on setting up the tunnels running between the halls.
Her gaze swiveled towards me, her eyes narrowing as they flicked over my features. "Are you in charge here?"
"I'm Magus Dominus Perth of Althon," I said, giving her a slight bow. "And you are…"
"Unimpressed. Very unimpressed," she said, apparently not one for basic niceties. "This foundation is pure slop. Do you want the entire village to be swept away in the next rainstorm?"
"I… uh… foundation?" I asked, glancing towards where she was gesturing.
"Who is your Hold Shaper?" she asked, both her hands on her hips as she glared at me. "They should be ashamed of such sloppy work."
"We don't have a… whatever a hold shaper is," I replied, squinting at her. "And these are temporary structures. We had a grand total of two shapers here, and one of them attempted to take over while killing several of the refugees. I've had less than two weeks to set up. If you're unhappy with the state of our… foundations, then please, feel free to do something about it, miss…?"
"Hmph," she said, shaking her head. "In that case, I will." Then she stepped forward, waving the two young men to follow her. They glanced at me, but before I could say anything, she turned about, looking at them. "Didn't you hear your Magus? He told me to fix this. And you'd best believe you're going to learn how to set a foundation properly, or my name isn't Alestrosia Vetrov!"
"Well, she's a bit more like the ones I'm used to. Proper Hold Shaper, no doubt," Tamrie said from my elbow, leaning past to watch the woman stomp uphill. "She's worked the lower holds, no doubt about it."
"You've met Shapers like her before?"
"Oh, yes. Might've even met her, truth be told," Tamrie replied, tucking an errant strand of hair behind her ear. "Shapers that come to the lower holds know we don't have time to be mucking about with manners and such. Too much to be done."
"Sounds… tough," I replied, already headed back up the hill. I'd had to take a break from refining for this interlude. I'd let Xoth deal with managing the woman now that I was sure she was going to hurt anyone.
Well, not more than their egos, anyway.
"Wasn't too bad, till the Bladesingers ruined things," Tamrie said, spitting to the side again. "Lower holds keep the ford afloat, as it were."
I nodded, thinking about some of the things Tamrie had told me over the last couple days. Things about her time back in Spellford. Mostly about the Shapers she'd met since taking on her apprenticeship with her master. She'd met a lot of them, which wasn't common for most people. It did sound like Terra Vista had a higher rate of ensouled than the Hundred Kingdoms though.
"Shaper Vetrov will be useful," Tamrie said, getting me back on track as we hiked towards the top of the valley, her journal in hand as she checked her notes. "Might be a bit of a thing, getting her to do as told, but she'll have a driving need to set things right, as she sees them."
"Think Xoth'll be able to manage her?"
Tamrie stopped, slapping her knee with a laugh, before wiping a tear from her eye. "That'd be a right miracle, my lord, a right miracle," Tamrie said, patting me on the shoulder, shaking her head as she jotted down another note. "It'll be another task for you, but worth it, I'd think."
I nodded as I followed behind my assistant, looking back at where Vetrov was already stomping a new foundation into being, the earth literally shaking into place with each press of her foot. Something similar to Trench, I suspected. Already working and she hadn't asked for a single Wave. Definitely worth some time every day.
For the entertainment if nothing else
Next on my agenda wasn't returning to the workshop. While we could still use some more dust, another matter had come up when we passed through the Waygate.
The first Tethered were ready to try their gliders.
Having me on hand would make it much safer.
Especially since I'd used some of my credit with Keeper to get a proper second Order healing spell. Restore Form wasn't nearly as restrictive as Bestow Health. It wasn't as powerful either, as it took five casts to get the same effects as a full Bestow Health. But it didn't have a time limit, nor was it restricted to ensouled. Plus, most injuries didn't need the effect of a full Bestow Health.
The initial tests weren't being done from the top of Mount Aeternia. Despite the ease with which we could get there, it was, as Selvi had put it, "An absolute insane place to launch from, no disrespect, Magus Perth."
I hadn't disagreed with her. It hadn't been my first choice either. But it'd been what I’d had. Despite having made the jump once, I doubted I could bring myself to do it again. Especially with how it ended.
Rubbing my chest, Tamrie and I made our way out to the Great Bluff Waygate.
The Tethered had chosen to use the new bluff on the west of our territory. They'd been able to clear the stone around the Waygate without needing my help, transporting it directly to Verdant Point where it was still stacked near the new settlement’s Waygate.
As I looked at the huge cliff the Tethered had already spread their nets over, I took a long breath. There were no lifts here, not yet. Which meant it was a whole lot of hand over fist to get to the top. Thankfully, I wasn't one of the folk doing the climbing.
Eagle Eyes let me pick out the forms of Calbern and Selvi at the edge of the bluff. Calbern had been the first to test the unpowered gliders. He'd requested a couple minor changes that had only taken Inertia a few minutes to make.
Then he'd spent half his days throwing himself off cliffs, Bevel watching him the entire time. She'd asked for a glider of her own, but her smaller size had been used as an excuse to not give her one. I knew that wasn't going to hold up for long. If we didn't get her one, she'd just make one herself.
It's what I would've done.
And I wasn’t half as independent as Bevel.
Which is why I'd had Inertia start on a slightly smaller glider that was clearly Bevel's. Only once we had them mostly safe would Inertia ‘finish’ it. For all her disregard for general safety, Inertia had at least listened to that request.
Today was Selvi's first day on the gliders. She'd refused to let any of the other Tethered use them until she did. There'd been a huge amount of interest once they'd heard Calbern compare the experience to climbing the nets. Was pretty sure the old bastard did it on purpose.
There were a few minutes of adjusting straps, which I suspected was Selvi delaying her leap. Unlike the other Tethered, she seemed to remain cautious. There’d been a few mumbled words about having flown under Balthum’s power, though she’d refused to elaborate.
Finally, she nodded at Calbern.
He nodded back as she set out to the edge of the log platform that'd been cantilevered over the side of the bluff. I could see the updraft tugging at the glider, making Selvi wobble with each step. Then she reached the very edge and with the experience of a cliff diver, stepped on the lip then dove forward.
She barely fell a dozen feet before the updraft caught her and sent her soaring upward.
When she didn't come down after the first five minutes, the next Tethered stepped forward, having already been checked over by Calbern. The process continued, and other than one young woman who got too fancy with her maneuvers, there weren't any accidents. Thankfully, she only had a busted up arm, which Restore Form mended quickly enough.
After nearly fifteen minutes in the air, Selvi was finally forced to land nearby. Her face was split into a giant grin as she hiked towards us, her glider folded together and held over her shoulder.
"This will change so much," Selvi said as she got closer, clapping my shoulder. "And you have a way to keep us up even longer?"
I nodded. We didn't have many of the smaller Forgehearts, but there were enough to outfit three gliders. Which was the minimum number we wanted for patrols. Inertia had her sights set on the wyverns to the east though. Once we defeated the Awakened one, she suspected we'd be able to farm the wyverns much like we were doing with the drakes. She was looking forward to making Forgehearts out of fliers.
Apparently not all Forgehearts were the same, though they did have definite patterns.
Inertia wasn't sure she'd be able to cow the wyverns into submission like she had with the drakes, but even if we taught them to be wary of attacking us, that might be enough. I hadn't entirely given up on the idea of getting Vaserra's people to tame some wyverns either. There were enchantments we could potentially use, if I could get a specialist to visit. The ink Tamrie had paid for was a sort of enchantment. While hers prevented pregnancy and periods, there were several that the 'ranchers' of Spellford used on their more valuable herds to keep them in good health.
Most of the refugees had similar health tattoos. It was only the rich who went without in Spellford. They had less invasive ways to achieve the same effects. A tattoo that guaranteed a person wouldn’t suffer from the common cold or most minor injuries was… too mundane for them.
Getting one of the tattoo specialists to come to my little kingdom would be one heck of a challenge, but like so many things, it was on the list.
I was brought back to the immediate circumstances by one of the other Tethered landing.
They’d all landed much earlier in their flights than Selvi, not able to catch the updrafts with quite as much success as she'd managed. There was a lot of nervous activity among them. Even the young woman who'd broken her arm. It likely helped that her arm had only been broken for a few minutes.
Having the gliders pass their first trial run so cleanly gave me a sense of satisfaction. There'd still be more testing and training, but even those would serve the double duty of scouting the terrain around the Great Bluff Waygate. And once that was done, well, launching from Mount Aeternia might be insane… but I'd be surprised if Selvi wasn't asking to do so by the end of the week.
There was a certain appeal to not having to haul your way up several thousand feet before launching. Even if the air was basically non-existent.
With Tamrie and Calbern in tow, I returned to Tetherfall. With the tests successful, the next major obstacle was dealing with the wyverns. Calbern's regular jaunts, both with the gliders and Fang, had scouted out several viable routes to the east. He'd even mapped out a route between Tetherfall and Verdant Point. It took three hours, and several jumps that would be impossible without Fang, but it was a start. Building bridges between the two settlements would come soon, paid for with silver dust.
It also meant that Fang was waiting near Verdant Point. Inertia was making some final adjustments to my powered glider when I arrived. Calbern had recovered the wreck of his glider during his excursions, though only three of those Forgehearts had been intact. The frame itself had been a total write-off.
"Looks good," I said, running my hand over the new frame. It was mostly the same, though it'd been improved in line with Calbern's suggestions. I'd taken it for a single test flight, and it'd been surprisingly stable. The extra fins also added a sort of jagged edge I liked.
"Soar," Inertia said, letting out a whistle as she flexed her own wings.
"That's its name," Tresla clarified from where she watched on, pipe in hand. "Inertia says that's its name is Soar, since you’ll get to Soar above the clouds."
I nodded as we took Soar out. Was a lot better than Talons.
Several of the Tethered who'd just flown were standing nearby, including Selvi, who’s eyes were a bit sharper than they’d been prior to her flight. The others murmured excitedly as I strapped in, Tie Rope making the process much quicker, though I still let Calbern check everything over.
Only once he gave me a nod of approval, did I turn up the throttle and ascend. Soar was slow at first, though far more stable than my last attempt. Inertia had set the four thrusters above and below the wings, which allowed better balance when hovering upright. Once I was nearly a hundred feet above the workshop, I tilted forward, letting the wings take over the lift. I'd barely started when another winged form rose up beside me. Inertia looked over, tilting her head to the side as she let out a whistle-hiss of laughter.
Then she tapped the edge of my wing, causing me to tip.
My overreaction as I jerked at the controls caused Soar to tilt more than her little tap had. And neither had been particularly bad. The adjustments had made for a much stabler ride. Casting Gust on it might still send me for a bit of a tumble, but I suspected it wouldn't be anywhere near as bad as my early designs.
Laughing to myself, I pushed more into the thrust, chasing after my metal friend. We spent several minutes chasing each other through the clouds, diving, swooping and just… dancing. Despite the four Forgehearts I couldn't keep up when Inertia really poured on the speed. Her body was made for slicing through the air, and despite its name, Soar was held back by my own form.
We'd need to move to enclosed canopies for higher speeds. That would require materials we didn't have yet. Plus, I suspected the Tethered would prefer the feeling of the open air. Just getting them to use straps was tough enough. The Tethered, ironically, didn't like being bound.
Untethered might be a better name for them.
Honestly, in that moment, I felt blissfully untethered too.
Comments
Stephen Pearson
Thanks for the chapter:-)
ThoMiCroN
Bevels->Bevel’s lessons
