“Can you read?” I asked Veronica.
She looked affronted. “Of course I can read.” Then she looked at my face. “Oh, right. You were a slave; I suppose you can’t read.”
“I’m hoping to learn how to.” I flipped open the book. “Look at this page.”
“It’s empty,” Veronica looked at me with pity in her eyes.
I laughed. “I know it’s empty. I know that much about reading. Take it between your fingers.”
“Um, okay.” Now Veronica looked at me like I was a bit crazy. She took the page in her fingers. I waited a moment. As I expected, nothing happened.
“All right. Now, watch this,” I said.
Veronica let go of the page, and I took it between my fingers. Immediately, the top of the page began to darken. Veronica gasped and bent forward to look closer.
Just as it had last night, the letters began to appear on the page. After about a minute, the message appeared in full.
Veronica read it out to herself in a quiet voice. I listened to her whisper exactly the same message. I hadn’t forgotten a single word of that life-changing message.
“My end grows near. Ink Mage, in the hour of my final desperation, I leave this message here for you. Ink Mage, if by your touch you reveal this message, know beyond all doubt what you are, and what you must do. You are the only one who can save us from the folly of the High Order of Arcanists. Ink Mage, I have seen this. The greed of the High Order has grown great, and it will grow still greater in the years to come. The High Order of Arcanists will unleash a terrible evil upon the Kingdom. Only an Ink Mage has the power to confront this evil. I hope that even for you it will not prove too strong. You must prepare yourself with practice, and equip yourself with loyal allies and faithful companions.
You will face a formidable challenge sooner than you might wish.”
“What does it mean?” she asked after she’d finished reading.
“We’re not exactly sure,” I said. “But it’s obviously meant for an Ink Mage.”
“You’re probably the only Ink Mage in the whole world,” Amelia said. “It must be addressed to you.”
Veronica sat in silence for a few minutes. Amelia and I waited beside her, allowing her to think.
“This is going to take a little while to get used to,” Veronica said at length. “But I think that, like you, I could do with allies at the moment. You helped me at the battle with the monsters on the hilltop, and that means a lot to me. I’ll trust you, though it might take me a while to get used to your powers.”
“That’s understandable,” I said. “It’s going to take a bit of time for me to get used to them as well.”
That broke the tension, and we all laughed as we rose to our feet.
I put Amelia’s book back in the carry sack, and the three of us began to walk again. The sun was getting lower in the sky, and we didn’t want to waste time.
“I still can’t believe it,” Veronica muttered. “An Ink Mage.”
Chapter Nine
I continued walking down the road, flanked by Amelia on my right and Veronica on my left. The land around became rockier and hillier as we went north, and on the horizon, in the distance, we could see the blue foothills of the northern mountain ranges.
The trees on either side were less dense and wild than they had been before, and we crossed more streams as we went. I guessed that they were all heading toward the lake Amelia had shown me on the map, the lake that gave Brightwater its name.
We munched on some of the rations we had taken from the slavers as we went, and stopped to refill our waterskins once. Aside from this short stop, we didn’t delay, and so we made good progress as the day progressed.
The women made some small talk together, and they seemed to be getting on well, which I was glad to see. I stayed silent, content to let them get to know each other as I thought over the events of the recent days.
“So, how do these tattoos work?” Veronica asked, after a period when we had all been silent for some time, lost in our own thoughts. She couldn’t help the note of apprehension in her voice as she said the word ’tattoos.’ I figured I’d bring her round over time to realizing that tattoos were not inherently evil. It would take most people a while to get used to the idea.
I gave Amelia a chance to answer, but she looked at me, so I did my best to explain.
“I push a strand of my Mana directly into the tattoo,” I said, “and use the tattoo to shape the Mana. Then I just push the Mana out onto my hand to cast it as a spell.”
“So, you can directly manipulate your Mana?” Veronica asked. “And, hang on, how did you get two affinities?”
She’d asked me the same question earlier, but I hadn’t been sure if I could trust her then, so I’d let the question pass. Now that things were different, I figured I should try my best to answer her. I took a breath, then stopped as I realized that I didn’t even really understand it myself. How had I ended up with two affinities?
I glanced at Amelia, walking on my right. Her face was bright red.
“Uh,” I hesitated. “Let’s just say I’m not exactly sure how I ended up with two affinities.” That was partly true. “How did you end up with yours?”
“I was born with it,” Veronica stated. “Most nobles have affinities. We are all tested at a young age.”
“I’m kind of ignorant of the process,” I said. “Being a former slave, and all.” I smiled at her.
“Oh,
