The Third Gate: Chapter Forty-Three (Patreon)

The following morning, I burnt through almost all of my mana to build and fuse as many teleportation platforms in as I could, then stepped into my cauldron and flew out to meet Kene. 

That was the reason behind me draining almost all of the mana. I needed some of it to cast my Analyze Space and Sense Directionality, so I could set up some Spatial Anchors on the way. Full, international platforms might require me to run it through the Ghost Market, and even normal teleportation platforms needed me to own the land, but I’d never run into trouble just throwing around Spatial Anchors. I figured it was probably just a matter of the anchor spell being too common for it to be regulated. 

When I arrived in the village where Kene’s shop was, Alice spotted me and waved me over. I felt a knot of tension in my gut as I landed and tossed the cauldron back into the alchemy room. It had been a while since I’d seen Alice and her village. Would they blame me for taking Kene away from them? 

“Hello Malachi,” she said. “It’s been quite a while. Even with Kene’s warning, I almost didn’t recognize you. Though, to be completely honest, the lack of a suit is almost as startling. And hello Dusk! And who’s this?” 

She reached out to scratch Dawn’s semi-tangible chin. 

Normally, I wouldn’t be as brazen as to have Dawn out and about with me, but being in a small village, mostly full of farmers and older people, I didn’t think she was in much danger here. At worst, someone could pass on word to someone else that I had a weird, glowing spirit dragon, which was already known by a lot of powerful people. 

“Hey Alice,” I said. “Sorry for taking Kene away for so long. It… really wasn’t my intention. I meant it to be a month or two, not half a year.” 

Alice paused for a second, then smiled. It was sad, but soft, comforting, but not willing to lie to me. 

“I won’t pretend some people weren’t bitter about it, especially after the supplies they left in their shop ran out,” she admitted. “At the same time, when Kene first tried to settle down in the village, they told me that they probably only had a year or so to live. They’ve lived a lot longer than that, and while some of that is their grandmother, I won’t make the mistake of thinking that your merry band of misfits weren’t a part of it as well.” 

“I didn’t do mu…” I started to say, but paused. 

While it was true that if Kene hadn’t gone to the Idyll-Flume with me, they wouldn’t have had to contact the hag, they also wouldn’t have been able to use the drops of destiny on their tattoos, and thanks to Orykson, I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that reinforcing the tattoos before bonding them had bought Kene years. Literal years of life. 

Dusk’s ability to consume power from the hag had allowed them to not need to completely remodel their second gate for solar mana, and also bought them months to take in those drops of destiny. 

And it was only through my bartering and bargaining with Orykson that we had the knowledge of the ways that we might be able to remove the hag and give both her and Kene a chance at life. 

Dawn… Admittedly, Dawn hadn’t done much to help yet, but she was also still growing. Orykson and Aerde thought that Dawn would be a great help.

“You did,” Alice said, reaching out and gently squeezing my hands in her own. “You gave them hope. Life. And Kene isn’t an item for people to squabble over. They are their own person, and can make their own choices.” 

I felt my guts twist around again as I thought about Crysite. Was it fair to ask Kene to come to Crysite with me? This time, at least, they’d be able to get back to their village fairly easily. 

Actually… That was always true, now. No matter where we went, with mana and time, we could get back to the bakery, and then it wasn’t long to get back to Kene’s village. 

“Thank you,” I said. “Really. Thank you.” 

Alice and I made a bit of small talk before I headed to Kene’s apothecary. They’d clearly spent the last several days restocking it, getting their business back up and running, and even as I stepped inside, I could see them pouring over three cauldrons at once, running back and forth. I waited until they’d finished up the batches they were working on, using the time to pet Siobbhan. Once they finished, I coughed and waved. They looked up and broke out into a grin. 

“Malachi!” they said. “I didn’t expect to see you so soon.” 

“I can’t pop in to check on my partner? Or visit blink foxes? Or visit a fungal folk’s village?” I asked, and Kene laughed, wiping some sweat off their brow. 

“You’re always welcome to do any of those. But I don’t know if I can take a break to go with you today. Especially not with Crysite looming so close.” 

“Well, I wanted to talk to you about that,” I said. “Do you actually want to go? Or would you rather be here?” 

Kene’s face froze for a second, and they let out a slow puff of air. 

“That’s… Quite the question,” they said after a moment. “I want to do both, honestly. I like adventuring with you. I like the challenge of setting up a new place for people to live, driving away slaughter spirits, all that sort of thing. But I also like being here. I can help people here. Now that I’m third gate, I can get access to some of the really impressive healing spells. I’ve refined my spells for healing a lot as well, and I’m even going to start picking up a couple of more comprehensive diagnostic rituals.”

“It’s hard,” I said. “I felt very fulfilled working at the sanctuary. But I also crave being on the move, and I felt tied down.” 

“It’ll be nice, if you become an Arcanist, to be able to portal more freely,” Kene said. They wiped at their brow again, even though it was dry, and I thought they might be giving themselves time to think. After several long moments, they finally spoke. 

“I’m going to stay here,” they said. “But I want you to come back and see me. A lot. And I want to go on trips with you. A day. Even a week or so. But I want to be able to return back to the village. No more multi-month long delays.” 

“You could have left while I was recovering in Delitone,” I said. “But… I understand.”

“I could, but I would have felt bad. I hadn’t established a boundary yet, and I didn’t even really know where the boundary was. I’d never gone through anything like that. But things have changed. Dusk, this isn’t really fair to ask you, but if your brother gets broken, can you bring us back here? Or, well, to the bakery.” 

Dusk, who had been playing on one of the shelves, looked up and cheerfully said that wouldn’t be a problem. Kene thanked her, then they looked back at me. 

“If you have to stay where you are… I’ll stay with you as long as I can, but I’ll be making regular trips back here, at least once a week,” Kene said. “Really, the regularity will depend on how often Dusk is willing to ferry me back and forth. I can’t put the demand on her, but for now, it’s all we can do.” 

“That’s a completely reasonable boundary,” I said. “I don’t expect you to tether yourself entirely to my whims. Being together is good, but not if it’s to the detriment of your life.” 

Kene sagged then, and let out a relieved, heaving breath. 

“Primes, I was so worried that conversation was going to go awfully,” they said. “I know you’re not like that, but I was imagining all of these arguments where you point out the hypocrisy of me expecting you to adventure to save me, but allow me to come home.” 

“Nah,” I said, shaking my head. “I know you’re not using me like that. But I get why you’re afraid.” 

They were quiet for a long moment, then pulled me into a tight hug. Though Kene was my partner, this was a different kind of vulnerable intimacy, the sheer relief of this having gone well. 

After they let me go, I grinned at them. 

“I am still dragging you out on adventures,” I said. 

“I expect nothing less,” Kene agreed. “You’re going to under-prepare for them, too.” 

“Hey, I prepared well for the Beastgate,” I said. 

“You did. You are getting better.” 

“Thank you!” 

“Slowly. Very slowly. Edgar’s seen glaciers that moved faster than your improvement rate, but it is there.” 

“I take back my thanks.” 

We bantered for a little bit longer while Kene bottled and put the potions out on the shelves, then they looked over at me. 

“Well, if I’m going to be able to stay here in the village more, then I don’t need to work quite as frantically to restock everything,” they said, wiping their hands on a towel. “If you’re still planning to go delving in the forest for magical secrets, I’d love to join you.” 

“You’re always welcome,” I said. 

“Let me change, and I’ll be right out,” they said, dashing upstairs. I headed outside, and spent a bit of time chatting with the people in town, mainly apologizing for taking their alchemist and healer away from them for so long. I did really feel guilty about that. 

Kene arrived after a little bit, and we flew out over the forest, landing as we approached the crumbling ruin where Dusk had absorbed the time catch. From there, we slowly wandered through the woods as I cast my mana senses far and wide. I was still low on mana, and I didn’t want to have to draw on the plants in Dusk unless I was in a fight, so I relied on my baseline sensory capacity, which was still fairly formidable. 

It didn’t take us long to find the den of blinkfoxes, but as we approached, I saw a rather familiar looking fox trotting up to us.

“Hey, I know you!” I said. “You’re the one I got Foxstep from.” 

The fox sneezed.

“You advanced to third gate!” I told it. “Good for you.” 

The fox teleported over to me and bonked me with its nose, then teleported away. It must have also ingrained Foxstep, because it no longer needed to turn its head to look where it was teleporting.

“I’ll let you two catch up,” Kene said with a chuckle. “I’m going to try and figure out where the nexus itself is located.” 

“Just shout if you need me,” I said. “Or flare your mana, I’ll probably sense that more easily.” 

Then, with all the speed I could muster, I chased after the fox. The fox warped away as soon as I got close, and I considered throwing out a Foxstep of my own to catch it, but before I could decide, space blurred around me. It felt supremely strange, like when Orykson teleported me, but much less… delicate. More like I was being shoved around in space than delicately pulled through it. 

There was a half a second where I could resist it with the spatial energy burning through my body, and probably even engage Immovable Lock to block it, but I chose not to. 

The moment was over, and the fox was where I had been, while I was where it had been. That must be the Foxswap spell that Orykson had mentioned.

I Foxstepped behind the little creature and dove at it, but it Foxstepped away, and I couldn’t follow fast enough, as I was forced to wrestle my spirit back under my control. 

If my spirit wouldn’t work, my body would have to. I kicked off the ground in a sprint, and dove down the hill, letting my enhanced body handle the tumble as the space around the creature seemed to strangely warp and flex, giving it just enough time and space to nimbly leap from stone to fallen log, to another branch. Foxarmor, I assumed. 

At the bottom of the hill, the fox lashed its tail, and I realized that I was doing the same. It used a powerful Foxstep to get back to the top of the hill, and I followed with my own. 

As I was wrestling my spirit back down, I felt it. The fox did as well, as it stopped its game to quickly trot behind my legs fearfully. 

Some ways away, two groups had just unleashed their power. 

The first was an exceptionally powerful third gate tempest and life mage, powerful beyond even what I’d normally associate with a peak third gate mage.

And the other one was Kene and Siobbhan. 

Dusk zipped back over to me from where she’d been chatting with a different fox, and Dawn slid into Dusk’s realm. I leaned down and patted the fox’s head.

“Get back to your Foxden and stay safe,” I said. “It’s time for me to end this.”