Chương 73: Happy Tunes

At the crack of dawn, the mucks all went up in flames and cheers erupted through Eltershay Avenue. The archers and mages climbed down from their towers, and Maelle went in search of Dory and Remore. It was Dory who found her first.

"Maelle! Hey, Maelle! Over here!" This made more than a few heads turn her way, and the crowd whispered as she passed.

"Does she mean that Maelle?"

"Has to be. She came with Amberlin last night, remember?"

"I watched her fire off hundreds of spells without a break. How does she have so much mana?"

"I heard she burned down the waystation."

"Like, on purpose?" She ignored them and met with her friend. Remore was there too, though he seemed rather glum. From their faces, it looked like they'd had another argument. But neither said anything about it and they instead put on a smile for her.

"Amberlin wasn't kidding when she said this sector would be easier," Dory said.

"I heard remarks that tonight's numbers were strangely light," Remore said.

"Maybe it has something to do with the changes Amberlin made," Maelle suggested. It seemed that her party leader had some hidden talents.

"Maybe so!" Dory chirped. And then, eyeing her brother, added, "Perhaps this means they can shift some of the active assignments back into reserve." Maelle was worried they'd start arguing again, but Remore kept quiet. The three of them walked back along the avenue to the animal shelter, where Amberlin had asked her to pick Boots up in the morning. Standing out front wasn't Rufus or Rhianna but a woman she'd never met before. She learned when Remore called out her name in greeting that this was Ella.

Boots came out during the introductions and clambered up onto Maelle's shoulder, where he began licking at her cheek.

"Would you look at that?" Ella had a voice that could soothe an intemperate child.

"He really likes you."

"Yeah, Amberlin gets jealous sometimes," she replied.

"It must have taken a lot of work to gain his trust."

"Not really. We got along pretty much from the get-go."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah! He likes baby talk and sleeping with the window open," she explained.

"Baby talk?" Ella gave Boots a questioning look. When Boots started pawing at her ear, Maelle said, "It seems he really wants us to get a move-on. Must be all tuckered out from playing all night, so I've got to get him to bed. Talk to you later!"

"Wait," Ella said.

"Would you mind coming by early this evening? I'd like to hear more about what else Boots likes."

"Uh, sure." It was an unusual request, but perhaps Ella was just really into cats.

Back at the McRory home, they found Amberlin in the kitchen helping the parents prepare dinner-breakfast. When it was ready, everyone sat down together. No one questioned it when Amberlin pulled out an extra chair for Boots. The only person missing was Havlo. The meal was very basic due to the rationing, but Maelle was grateful for anything to fill her belly.

Since the fighting had been so intense their first night at the bay, she'd thought it would be the same again last night and hadn't brought more than a couple of simple things up into the tower to nibble on.

"Before I forget, Remore, be careful when you enter your room," Mr McRory said.

"We had to move some of the cake pyramid into there."

"Okay."

"You don't mind?" Mr McRory seemed puzzled by his son's casual acceptance.

"They're Amberlin's cakes, right? It's fine." Mrs McRory touched him on the arm.

"It was the only room that could fit the Carpenters' spare table. Dory's has Maelle's bedroll laid out, and ours has Havlo's. We told him he could use our bed, since we'd be out during the day when he's in, but he's such a polite guest, though it does make it harder to get to the dresser..."

"It's all right, Mom. I understand." Dory, who was seated beside her, tapped Maelle on the shoulder and whispered, "Where has Amberlin been sleeping?" Now that she thought about it, she wasn't actually sure. Amberlin had left her bedroll behind a couple of towns back, before the haunted hills, and the topic hadn't come up since.

"Hey, Amberlin," she said.

"When was the last time you slept?"

"I've been getting what I need," the adventurer said evasively.

"You'll burn yourself out," she said.

"Everybody needs downtime." That's what her tutors used to say, at least. Though with how much homework they'd turn around and assign, she wasn't sure they believed it themselves.

"Have I ever told you this story, Maelle? One time, I was locked into battle with this ferocious monster. For two days and three nights we fought nonstop across this vast woodland. The battle only ended because it decided it wanted to go home. Hey, what are you doing there, Remore?" Dory's brother had pulled out some paper and was scribbling furiously.

"Just taking notes." Amberlin glanced over at the page.

"You got the number of days wrong."

"It's poetic symmetry. Three days and three nights sounds better."

"Stories about us aren't going to spread, are they?" Amberlin sounded a little worried.

"Don't worry. I'll use cool mythical names for all of you. No one will ever make the connection!" Amberlin nodded.

"Yeah, I suppose there's no harm in that." After the meal, Mr and Mrs McRory left for their jobs while Dory and Remore retired to their rooms. Maelle went to clean her teeth and was about to head to bed when she saw that Amberlin was still at the dining table. A heap of pages were spread out in front of her, each one drawn with lines and esoteric symbols. Fascinated, she stepped in for a closer look.

"What are these?"

"There are so many talented musicians around here, I want to take their songs with me," Amberlin explained.

"I've written down some of the ones I liked to memorize them later."

"I've never seen music written like this." She'd had to learn song and composition as a princess. It hadn't been her strongest subject, but at least it was more fun than the tea ceremonies. Though her music tutor had gotten upset when Marina taught her some songs that they sung at the military academy. Apparently the only thing the soldiers in the official version of Flight of the Draegorians rained down on their enemies was [Fireballs]. This book is hosted on another platform.

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"For most of the songs around here, you don't need anything this complex," Amberlin said.

"I just do it out of habit, in case I want to make tweaks of my own. Do you want me to teach you how to read it?"

"Will it take long? I've got to get up early to go see Ella."

"Oh! So the two of you have met?" Amberlin thought for a moment.

"I can run through the basics real quick. Each line and space represents a different note, going up by one, with special symbols to denote half-steps. The shape of the symbols tells you how long each note is held. The advantage in writing music this way is that you can see at a glance where all your fingers should be. But I'll start you off with something simple. Here's what each note sounds like."

Amberline drew a sequence of notes on a sheet, each stepping up by one each time, and then whistled the sound as she pointed to each one.

"Now you try it."

"I can't whistle," she said.

"Then hum." She tried her best, and though she was sure she got a few wrong, Amberlin clapped.

"Wow! You're a fast learner, Maelle! Here, try this tune." Amberlin drew a short sequence of notes and then waited.

"Aren't you going to demonstrate it for me?" she asked.

"Have a go first," Amberlin urged. She hummed it out, but it didn't sound like anything special.

"That's close, but you got this note and this note off." Amberlin pointed to ones in question.

"It should sound like this." When Amberlin whistled the tune, the floor fell away beneath Maelle. The feeling brought her back to when she was just a chick, that first time falling out of the sky. Her father, silhouetted against the sun, watching proudly as she took that plunge. That desperate flapping of her wings as the wind rushed past and her guts lifted weightlessly inside. The fear of the water coming up fast. The instinctive push of mana to force that water out of the way.

She couldn't move the water, but she did move herself, and there she was, hovering for the first time on her own. How she climbed up to boast of her success to her father, or maybe it was him who'd come down to her. The pure joy of flight. And a future that looked so bright.

"Maelle, are you all right?" She realized that Amberlin was squeezing her. The floor hadn't moved at all. And Boots was there, licking at her tears. Why was she crying? It had been such a happy memory.

"You must be exhausted," Amberlin said softly.

"I'm sorry for keeping you up. Why don't you go get some rest?" And that she did.

Maelle's reaction to her song had been unexpected, and Amberlin worried that her youngest party member was being overworked. She could see how it might happen. A child who'd found a place to belong, wanting to impress, might not speak up when she was struggling to cope. While she'd tried to put Maelle on a lighter assignment, perhaps it was the long nights that were the problem. She stopped by the governor's manor and asked the staff to give Maelle the first half of the night off. They were extremely agreeable.

Then Amberlin spent the morning making a round of the city, checking how each sector had held up in the night. She quickly noticed that she was getting a lot more attention than she was comfortable with. All the whispers and stares hadn't bothered her yesterday because she'd been touring with the governor's staff. At the time it had seemed natural enough. But now she was realizing that this was a repeat of the lesson she'd learned back in Ardark.

A lesson that apparently hadn't sunk in, as her first night at the bay had seen her getting a little carried away. People in this region were low-level and easily impressed by a couple of fireballs. Though they were also very nice. She understood what it meant for them to be spending their limited ration points to send her cakes. That's why she really wanted to help them defend their homes. She just didn't want the spotlight that came with it.

Luckily in the hot zone, there were a lot of places where she could slip out of sight. While many of the buildings had been boarded up, a lot of those had been damaged and left unrepaired, as reconstruction work prioritized the militarized zones. She found a shop that was missing its door. Inside were a couple of mucks hiding from the sun, but they were easy to deal with, and she was careful not to burn the building down like Maelle had done at the waystation. Then she changed into her Hooded Winker costume.

This proved to work well. She'd been worried about receiving a different sort of attention, but in a port city that frequently hosted sailors, no one batted an eye at the sight of an eyepatch. And being used to foreign travelers also meant that residents didn't glance twice at fashionably dressed strangers. As a city, Ygg Latten Bay definitely suited her better than Ardark. The talk of the day was a mysterious flying hero dressed all in white.

One who never spoke, and would come and go out of nowhere—but always in a time of need. Nobody knew their name. They certainly sounded like the sort of costumed hero she hoped the Hooded Winker could one day be, once she learned to fly. In her mind, she started calling this hero the Moony Walker, based off the white circular mask that they wore, and the fact that they never once took to land.

Scholar Juan was stressed. Life had been considerably less stressful when he'd been powerless to prevent the tragedy about to befall his home. But now there was a glimmer of hope, and he had to work for it. Half a dozen tomes were open on his desk, as well as a copy of that rabbit drawing. Time was running out, and he had yet to come up with any results. He glanced over at the basket that took up center space on the table. The half-elf had dropped it off earlier. Inside was an egg.

As best he could tell, it had come from a regular chicken. The entire shell was covered in tiny runes, drawn in an ink that glowed faintly in the dark, though strangely without color. There was a magic in them, and when he'd gently lifted the egg from its nest of soft fabrics, it had felt warm despite the lack of heating in his cottage. This was proof that the half-elf could deliver on her promise, and she would only teach him how to complete the resurrection ritual once he delivered what she wanted.

It was the key to saving everything. His home, his neighbors, his books. His books. His library was the result of decades of careful collecting. It broke his heart to think that in a few days, it could all be gone. Most of these volumes he hadn't had a chance to read yet, and most of what he'd read had been forgotten. Some of them were rare, the only known copies in existence. Should they be destroyed, so would the knowledge contained within. He'd tried to rescue what he could, but the lockdown made it hard.

Some of the caravaners who worked the governor's supply line had agreed to smuggle a couple of volumes out on each trip. They were sold at a fraction of their worth at the merchant town, but at least that would allow them to survive the fall of Ygg Latten Bay. This had to be done on the down-low, however, as private cargo was explicitly forbidden on the supply line during the lockdown.

He supposed the rule had to do with maintaining the governor's facade that the city was defensible—something that Juan had foolishly accepted until recently. He should have started rescuing his books sooner. But there was a chance to save everything if he could resurrect the right devil. The question of what could be saved depended on which devil was available. Each devil had a unique ability. One had a near-limitless inventory, which would mean he'd be able to save all his books.

Getting them off the peninsula would be easy, as all devils had the ability to fly. Some had access to powerful magic. He didn't know how useful that would be, as it might only delay the inevitable by a couple of days. One could change the land. This could save the peninsula if they could be supplied with enough mana to raise all the shores into cliffs. The problem came down to knowledge and availability.

Only dead devils were available for resurrection, and one had to know how to perform it—each one required a unique ritual. Knowledge of those rituals was restricted. As a scholar, he'd never sought it out, and now that he needed it, had no way to obtain it. That was, until that half-elf had shown up at his door. She'd offered him Ella. Curiously, little was known about that devil's abilities, and even the half-elf couldn't tell him.

But what was known was that Ella had once stood in the way of Annaconda's army, and the town she was in had survived the lich's path of destruction. This fact was corroborated across several historical texts and was often cited as an argument to allow devil resurrection under special circumstances. The counterargument was the war that Ella subsequently started, which left tens of thousands dead. There came a knock at his door.

He was tempted to let it go unanswered so he could focus on his work, but he'd tried that before and ended up with a very angry lieutenant in his face. He couldn't remember her name, but she'd brought instructions from the governor. They didn't want him to help that male elf, the one who was looking for the Apostle's Key. That suited him just fine, since he didn't have time for that. Nor was he ever going to give away the names of his other clients—not that he remembered them, anyway. The knock came again.

With a heavy sigh he got up and opened the door. The woman before him had horns and a tail. Her silver hair was unusual for how young she looked, but it was her dark eyes that struck him as not being quite right. He tried to figure out what it was.

"Aren't you going to invite me in?" He realized he'd been staring for too long.

"Oh, sorry. Come on in." It wasn't until the door closed behind her that he realized this was the opposite of what he wanted. But it was too late now. He could only hope this wouldn't take long. And then he saw her staring at the deviled egg that he'd forgotten to hide away.