“Wait, what?” Ezra asked, beginning to stand up.
“Nope, you stay there,” Yoran said, hurrying forward and pushing Ezra back into his stool. “I’ve been told that using aura is exhausting. You need to take a break before you pass out again. I don’t have any food for you.”
“Are you the…” Ezra trailed off, realizing that he had no idea what the title he was looking for would be. “The guy who’s in charge of all the equipment?”
“Oh, may the Watcher spare me,” Yoran laughed. “No, I’m no quartermaster. I’m just an apprentice to one. Maybe I’ll end up there eventually, but no time soon!”
“You don’t want that?” Ezra asked, confused. “Isn’t it a good thing to be the… quartermaster?”
“Yes,” Yoran answered, “but I don’t know the first thing about how to actually be one. I’m happy just sticking in the back and paying attention to the books instead of running laps.”
Ezra blinked three times, each one slower than the last. Then, he said, “You’re crazy.”
“I like numbers,” Yoran laughed as he pulled a spear out of a corner and planted it near the fire. As he hung Ezra’s tunic over the spear, Ezra got a good look at the quartermaster-in-training. He was a shorter boy, about Amy’s height, but where Ezra had felt obvious strength under her slight frame, he could see the lack of training in the way that Yoran held himself. His shoulders were hunched in on themselves, and the way that his uniform pulled at his belly and not at those shoulders was a promise of too much food and not enough training.
Ezra fought to keep a look of disgust from his face. A fat boy? While children were starving in the slums. And he didn’t even have the decency to put in the hard work to turn that fat into muscle.
“But I can see that you’ll fit in among the rest of the soldiers, like I can’t,” Yoran put on a smile that was different from the other smiles he’d had before. “I’ll make sure you’re ready to begin practicing with the rest tomorrow. I’ll have anything we don’t have on hand brought to the barracks around nightfall.”
“The barracks?” Ezra asked.
“Yeah,” Yoran nodded. “Will you be taking the standard issue boots? If you have to, do it, but I’d suggest you buy good boots before you buy anything else.”
“I’ll be buying boots,” Ezra said as he raised his hands in protest, “but what are you saying about the barracks? I know what they are, but why would I be in them?”
“Because you’re a soldier now?” Yoran answered, looking twice as confused as Ezra felt. “You live in the barracks, and that’ll be your home until we leave on the mission.”
Suddenly, the Madam’s command to bring all of his things today, giving him the nice pack and sending him on his way with his money, made sense. She’d known this would happen. A part of him was angry at the thought that he wouldn’t be allowed his goodbyes, but another part of him smiled at the faith she’d had in him. She’d had every confidence that he wouldn’t return.
“Alright then,” Ezra nodded, wanting to stand up but thinking better of it as his legs starting shaking again. “Where will I buy the boots?”
“You can purchase higher quality ones from the army,” Yoran said, “but I wouldn’t. There’s a good cobbler near the barracks, they’ve got a couple different levels of quality so that you can choose what best suits you. They’ll fit you better and break in faster while lasting longer. If you’d like, I can give you directions when we all return to the barracks.”
“Yeah, sure,” Ezra replied, already rethinking his original opinion of Yoran. “Thanks.”
“Sure,” came the reply with a beaming smile. “For now, warm up, I’ll see if I can get you something warm to eat. After all, you’re one of us, and you deserve your three meals a day.”
At those words, Ezra was suddenly ravenously hungry, and he remembered the small loaf the Madam’d provided for his breakfast. Another reminder of the trust she had in him. As his stomach growled its protest, Yoran nodded and walked out of the tent, leaving Ezra alone.
Looks like you’ve got a pretty friendly troop waiting for you, Jormun mused to himself. I wonder how competent they are as a whole. Haven’t seen any others fight. It’d be a fuckin’ shame if they’re nice but only one of ‘em’s worth anything in a fight.
Ezra grunted noncommittally as he stretched his hands towards the fire and began pulling some of the flame aura into himself. Immediately, that biting chill that’d seized his core weakened, and he allowed himself a smile. His fingers and toes were still freezing, but it wouldn’t take long before they were mostly right as rain, so he wasn’t too worried. The feeling was returning, and he flexed them as he tried to recover his aura reserves that he’d accidentally wasted.
While he looked at the fire, Ezra pulled the aura into himself and was surprised as the flames leaned towards him so much that they almost licked at his fingers. He retreated a bit, feeling the fingertips at his lips and being relieved that, though the feeling still evaded him, they were just a little warm. The tingling returned uncomfortably, and the aura continued to circulate within him and keep him warm.
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“What was that attack I did?” Ezra asked, barely raising his voice as he looked to see if anyone was coming. Seeing that there weren’t any other soldiers that were going to interrupt right now, he could finally ask the question that’d been burning in his mind since he’d somehow knocked himself out.
It was an aura-infused attack. As the Lieutenant said, an aural blade, Jormun answered. It’s the most basic expression of aura for an attack. In that dream I showed you, all my attacks were aura-infused because I was using my shroud at the time. That’s something only Knights can begin to do, so don’t worry too much about it. You didn’t make the choice to do it, but it’s not common that someone who’s still an Initiate can make an aural attack.
“So I’m pretty good,” Ezra grinned to himself and at the looming old man’s ghost.
Haven’t I already told you that? Jormun scoffed. You’ve got talent. That’s why you could sense and manipulate aura so quickly and easily. But since you wanna start bragging, here’s what I wasn’t going to do. That was fucking stupid. You drain your aura too much, you pass out, even cripple yourself. See, the aura you pull into your inner world is a part of you. The inner world exists for everyone, even if they don’t know how to see or manipulate aura at all. The reason why only Adepts begin to use aural attacks is because their inner worlds have already been reinforced enough that they’ll be fine pulling enough of themselves out for an attack.
The step to progress to each tier is an obvious one, and it comes with huge reinforcement to your inner world and each one fundamentally changes your aural reserves and the inner world itself. What you did? It’s like… it was as if you used your blood to freeze and then make a weapon to hit someone. Sure, it could hurt them, but you’re doing at least as much damage to yourself to do it. Once you become and Adept, it’ll be as if you have a bunch of bags full of your blood to use instead of taking it straight from your body.
“I didn’t know that,” Ezra shot back. “I didn’t know how to do it in the first place!”
And I wasn’t going to jump down your throat about it until you decided to start getting all big for your britches. Yes, you’re good at manipulating aura, but where you are now, if you’re not careful, it’s almost more of a danger than a blessing. So don’t be a fucking moron, and you won’t end up killing yourself. How’s that sound?
“Fine,” Ezra grumbled, knowing that there wasn’t anything that he could do but agree with the grouchy ghost. “How long will it take for me to get back to where I was?”
Your inner world? Eh. At most two weeks, depending on how much time you can devote to it, Jormun scratched at his chin. Since you’ve already expanded your inner world somewhat, you won’t be inflating it so much as refilling it.
Ezra nodded, then, the sour mood passed away from him as something occurred to him. “What element was my aura? I saw light, so was it fire? Or sunlight? Maybe even lightning?”
Attributeless aura. You’re not going to have any real attribute to your attacks until you’re at least high Adept, if not a Pseudo-Knight. It depends on how firm of a sense of self you’ve got, and, frankly, it doesn’t seem like you’re particularly outstanding in that way.
Ezra scowled down as he continued to pull the aura into himself, and Jormun laughed loud enough that he expected the tent to start falling.
Kid, that’s one thing that doesn’t matter at all. You’ll find yourself as you continue to journey, and you don’t need to be a stubborn old stone of a man like me. Be passionate as flame, rational as ice, powerful as lightning, righteous as light, duplicitous as shadow, or anything else. The attributes of your inner world don’t change who you are, just what you can do with aura.
Ezra grunted in response, but he couldn’t help but hear “powerful as lightning” and decided he wanted that if he could choose. Jormun seemed to understand what was happening and grunted in displeasure as Ezra imagined himself as a streak of lighting on the battlefield. His blade would cut through the Dragonkin, destroy the goblinoid, and—
“Damn, I figured you were good, but this isn’t what I’d ever expect to see from some slum rat,” Georg said as he stepped into the tent once again, bringing a scrappy-looking girl with him. Her hair was a light blonde, her right eye swelling, though not so much that she wouldn’t be able to see out of the eye. Her nose had a trail of blood trickling down from it, and her clothes were dirty, though not as much as his had been. That same clothing that she wore was only a little bit nicer than Ezra’s, with a half dozen patches sewn into it, though the materials were thicker than his. Another slum-dweller, then. She looked at him, seemed to come to the same conclusions that he had, nodded back at him, and then looked at Georg.
“I’m sorry, sir?” Ezra asked as he was able to stand now.
“The aura,” Georg said. “You’ve got as good a grasp on it as I do and I’ve been trying for nearly ten years. That’s some quick recovery. You really don’t have a master or anything? If you do and someone finds out about it, you go from being a soldier on a tight leash to a would-be assassin.”
Ezra swallowed around the lump that’d appeared in his throat, but nodded.
“No person’s taught me anything,” he replied, not lying. “I had a dream, and I have some inspiration on what I should do, but I really need someone who knows what they’re doing to teach me what to do with the aura I can feel.”
“Alright, Ezra,” Georg replied, still looking suspicious. “I hope for your sake you’re not lying. If you’re not, you’re a damn prodigy, and instead of being suspicious, I’ll be envious. Since you’ve recovered so much, step to the side and let Leah here get some rest.”
“Yes, sir,” Ezra replied as he stood and walked to where he could still be close to the fire while obeying the command.
“I’d insist on you calling me Georg,” the Lieutenant said, “but I think it’ll be better for you to try to be more formal, huh?”
Ezra nodded, already chafing at the constant obedience and “respect”.
“Alright. Well, sit tight, and we’ll see if there’s anyone else that meets up with expectations. As it is, we’re not looking for too many more soldiers anyways, so it’d have to be a pretty remarkable newcomer to qualify.”
At that, Georg gave the same speech (though without the suspicion to it) to Leah that he’d given to Ezra and walked out.
“Welcome,” Ezra said, feeling awkward.
Leah nodded as she held her hands over the fire. She said nothing, and Ezra made another attempt, “Someone else is bringing some food, so you should get some too.”
“Sounds good,” she said, her voice husky. “Thanks.”
Ezra nodded, and they settled into silence, each waiting to see what their passing the Lieutenant’s test would bring them.