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“Hm, well, let’s see if you’re telling the truth for once,” I said, and it came out more bitter than I intended.
Clem’s antennas drooped, and his body flashed green and then a dark shade of blue as he crouched beside me.
“Sorry,” I whispered as I plopped down on my butt from my crouching position, exhaustion finally winning out, no longer trying to hide it since only Clem and I were here. I felt less on guard with him.
He didn’t respond, and I didn’t know how to comfort him, so I allowed the uncomfortable silence to stand between us like a wall.
Clem helped me tear large strips of cloth from my uniform in silence, and I covered my hands with them before I went to work. My back against the bark, I struck the nocturnal stone together hesitantly, hopeful that Clem’s words rang true.
To my surprise, just as my mothian instructed, the strange nocturnal stone sparked when I struck them together. Curiously, as I sharpened a shard into a dagger, the edges began to glow, changing from a faint dark purple hue to…
“Woah!” Lightning danced in the palm of my hand. My eyes widened with wonder as Clem grinned at me.
Whittling the edges, and honing the tip, I kept my hands and mind preoccupied with this newfound power, however short lived. Soon, it would just look like a very sturdy dagger, but I was enchanted by the lightning despite knowing it wouldn’t last.
I still missed my deer-horn dragon blades, but this was a worthy substitute. My hands as well as my soul buzzed with the prospect of harnessing its full potential, as I quickly fashioned an arrow, and went back to sharpening my main weapon.
Jia and Atlan were better archers than I, but I thought it wise to prepare for close and long distance combat with the stone. In prison, picking up an ax had been difficult when I had been worked to near starvation. Even the meager weapons my comrades managed to make couldn’t fight off our captors. But now I knew we could turn the tide of the war with this knowledge. If only I could get this information to Emperor Gaulu, or at the very least, Atlan or Jia who could reach a military base to pass it on to our emperor. Dio knew I couldn’t step foot on a human encampment without being killed, visibly tethered to my trio still.
“Ah,” I thought, holding my new weapon up to the setting sun, a dark purple blade that had lost its electric luster. “This is why you call it Blood Onyx.”
I assumed it was because it tore flesh like a paddle gliding through water when handled without care. But on closer inspection, the edges turned crimson when exposed to the light, a current of electricity sparking from the tip one final time before petering out.
Fascinating as it was deadly. I stored this new knowledge away, eager to make more weapons before two sets of palms landed on my shoulders and squeezed.
Glancing upward, I frowned as Clem beamed down at me from above.
“Now that you are done, I need your help to gather mana,” my mothian whispered with an eerie smile. “Let us work together, Sun, until master and Kiar return.”
Chapter 2
Clem
Click. Click. Click.
My nervousness slowly morphed into frustration as Sun absorbed himself with making weapons and ignoring me.
“Sun?” I asked, shaking him out of his intense fascination with peeling away the layers of the stone.
He’d been made to mine it as a slave to the traitors currently occupying Yewan, and now he seemed intent on discovering all of the Blood Onyx’s secrets when he had better things to explore.
Like my body, as a matter of fact!
“Yes, you need mana. I heard you the first time,” Sun replied, raising an eyebrow, and shooting me an incredulous glare as I squeezed his shoulders with all four of my hands. “You don’t need my help to get mana. Small prey will do, won’t it? Things that can’t hurt you. I’ll keep watch so you won’t be harmed.”
“Or hmmm.” He tapped his chin. “Maybe we can forage for some berries in the brush? Though I doubt many are left at this time of year.”
Sucking on my lip, I shook my head no as Sun rose to his feet. Now, eye to eye with him, I tried to plead my case.
“I can’t hunt, and we can’t forage. You’re not invincible, even healed by my magic. We can do something else to gather mana instead,” I said, resisting the urge to reach for the silk on his body. I wanted something much more filling than silk could ever be.
“You can’t or you won’t? Which is it, Clem?” he asked as he pressed the blunted tip of his half-fashioned knife into my chest.
It made my heart race, eyes fluttering shut briefly, wondering what it would feel like to have him cut into me. But then I shook away my nature and let my rationality bubble back up to the surface.
“I can’t hunt,” I protested, thrusting the obsidian dagger back toward his chest, careful not to cut him with it. “And foraging in the woods will be too dangerous. And I’ll die without it. We’ll die without mana, Sun.”
He inclined his head as if to ask, Is that true? I’m sure you have more than enough until they return.
