Chương 86: Chapter 19: The Jester's Riddle

The weeks slipped by, turning into a routine of study, frustration, and physical exhaustion; the small comforts lay in casual conversations with Maya or Ren, and Samira's smiles every time Selena mispronounced a word. The search for The Oneiric World of the Blindfolded Mage became an obsession that colored her visits to the library. She combed the corridors of the fifteenth-floor time and again, her desperation growing with every shelf checked, every corner of gloom explored.

Until, one day, with her patience exhausted, she stood before the librarian in charge, a man whose expression was as dusty as the volumes he guarded. —The book is not in the library. The man informed her monotonically, consulting a leather-bound register. —It was checked out four months ago. By Master Valerian. Everything clicked with a dull thud in her stomach. The showman, the fool, as Isolde called him, had the book.

He, who knew about her bracelet, who seemed to see through her masks, had given her a clue knowing it was unreachable. Is this another of his cruel jokes? A lesson in frustration? She questioned herself with clenched fists, anger boiling in her blood as she left the library, determined to confront him. Right at the exit, she ran into Maya. The healer's eyes were bright, and a broad, genuine smile lit up her face. —I have a surprise for you! —she said.

Then, taking her by the hand with a familiarity that, at another time, Selena would have found jarring, but which now, in the midst of her fury, served as an anchor in reality. —You must follow me; I want you to see something. Selena, bewildered, allowed herself to be guided. Maya, pure contagious joy, led her directly toward the imposing glass and steel greenhouses Selena had glimpsed on her first day.

As they drew closer, the crops she had only seen as a blur of color from the carriage window took on shape and name. —That golden one is sand wheat —Maya explained, pointing enthusiastically— as you can see, it grows amidst the sand, hence its name. Thus began a parade of botanical wonders. —Dryland sweet potato, highly valued for growing among the dunes; rock spring onion; Fragest beet; golden zucchini; scarlet bean; glass cane… She paused before a humble-looking plant.

—That one that looks like grass is Helsan variety flax; they use it for clothing, especially the cheapest kind. She took Selena by the arm decisively and led her to another sector, a place where the soil was rockier and the air smelled of wild spices. —That is fire root, or solar ginger —she pointed to a plant with reddish roots— and this one here is stony mint. Without giving her time to take it in, she led her further toward a grove where species already familiar to her and new ones stood.

—The whitish pine is zintel, coral tree, silicariel, dusaut, some twisted and short ones are called Solbaj, the guard tree, or they also call it verprot… —she listed, and fell silent suddenly, as if the names, on their own, were a sufficient poem. Selena finally learned, her curiosity satisfied, that the ones resembling willows were dusaut; she could not stop smiling, but the greatest gain of the day was seeing Maya's enthusiasm while explaining things.

Maya took her by the arm again, her unstoppable eagerness leading them to a series of pens where creatures of this impossible world grazed or moved. The healer's voice filled with professional tenderness as she pointed: —Nimora, Anurhy, Titanopod, Ornitura, Vespera, Chelokran, Aracnex, Lanquirios… Selena watched, with a lump in her throat, how as they approached, the animals shrank back, withdrawing with that instinctive fear Isolde had described to them as one of their curses.

It was a painful and silent reminder of her status as an outcast, even among beasts. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Finally, Maya took her to an adjoining, warm, and humid enclosure. The air smelled of wet earth and something slightly sweet. —Go on in, Selena —she said, inviting her inside with a gesture. Within, in stone incubators warmed by some subterranean source, lay numerous eggs, large and of a pearly whiteness.

—These here —Maya whispered, with an almost reverential respect— are Mollucapra eggs. The giant snails you saw on your journey. The walk through the greenhouses had been an unexpected balm, a reminder that life, in all its exuberant and sometimes alien variety, continued its course beyond the stone classrooms and the secrets of the Void. As they finished, with the twilight light painting the sky in shades of orange and purple, Selena, driven by genuine gratitude, invited Maya to eat in the city of Kaelburg.

Neither of them knew the city beyond the boundaries of the university. Amidst laughter and a shared sense of adventure, they asked several students and the occasional citizen for directions, until they found an inn that looked promising. It was not an ostentatious place laden with the noble opulence Selena detested, but a functional and cozy establishment, with wooden tables polished by use and the aroma of simple but hearty food floating in the air. A waitress with a kind face and nimble hands came to serve them.

Selena, suddenly remembering the taste that had been her first genuine comfort in this world, asked for help to find a similar dish. After a brief exchange, the waitress nodded knowingly. —Red eggs of the valley —she announced. When the plate arrived, Selena observed it with a pang of nostalgia. They were, without a doubt, the same delicacy Rolus had offered her at the old Orla's inn. The same texture, the same comforting flavor.

The only difference was an intense, slightly spicy red sauce that bathed them, and that they were served already shelled. Both ate with pleasure; the day vanished amidst easy smiles and the occasional mug of mead circulating around the table, pushing away, for a few hours, the weight of curses and arcane studies. Weeks later, the routine had carved its place. Selena was now able to wield the short scimitar with acceptable ease, dodging and delivering basic cuts that her instructor praised with brief sentences.

—They are decent for a novice —he would repeat. But Fjora's eyes, always watching from the shadows, did not deceive her. In the warrior's glacial gaze lay an implacable evaluation: what Selena was learning were the movements; what she lacked was the essence of combat, the instinctive coldness that Fjora considered the absolute baseline. With Samira, on the other hand, the bond grew stronger in the realm of the intellect.

Selena practiced Sahric with her daily, and her accelerated mastery of the language was a silent testament to the mind of the philologist residing within her, accustomed to deciphering and absorbing the structures of foreign tongues in her world of origin. Each conversation was another step toward deciphering not only the language, but the enigmatic woman behind the veil.

One Khelan, after a particularly somber class by Valerian on basic physiology, where the jester had made them speculatively calculate how much of their lives they could spend without dying, Selena decided she had waited long enough. She cornered him in a side hallway, just as the master was preparing to lose himself in the shadows with his habitual theatricality. Valerian stopped upon seeing her stand in front of him, once the last of the students had walked away. A mocking smile drew across his lips.

—My Crimson Lady —he said with an exaggerated bow that was a mockery in itself— Do you require something from your noble servant? —I need the book The Oneiric World of the Blindfolded Mage. Selena declared, without preamble, without bows, her voice as cold as the steel of her scimitar. —I have been told at the libraries that you are the one who has it. The accusation floated in the air, naked and direct. But Valerian's smile widened, amused. —Ah, that little volume.

I believe it is being especially useful as a prop for my desk leg, so it doesn't wobble —his gray eyes shone with malice. The rage, contained during weeks of fruitless searching, boiled in Selena's chest. —The King —she said. Her voice acquiring a firmness that admitted no argument, the firmness of the Duchess Heir. —... has given me express consent that no one get in the way of my access to information. For an instant, the jester's mask on Valerian cracked. The mention of royal authority had that effect.

His smile vanished, replaced by a graver expression, though not devoid of his peculiar irony. —Bloody girl —he whispered. The nickname sounded like a reminder of a past she had not lived but carried. —You must understand. Everything in its own time. It is one of the oldest and wisest principles of the echo. If you want to rush things… you might die. Or perhaps not. He paused, studying her, measuring something in her eyes.

—But if you want to know things more useful than the cryptic designs of the blindfolded mage, I will give you a question. One that I hope you will answer for me when the semester ends. Selena remained silent, expectant. —What is born —Valerian asked, his voice now a serious and penetrating thread— of speech and writing?

Without waiting for an answer, without another word of explanation or farewell, Valerian turned around and lost himself among the labyrinths of hedges in the garden, leaving Selena alone in the twilight corridor, with the frustration of not having recovered the book, but with a new seed of mystery planted in her mind.