“Well don’t just stand there and stare at my familiar, boy,” the voice said, cutting in through the silence. “Quickly, haul it out of the creek before the stream washes it away! Do you have any idea how valuable giant salamanders of that size are? This is the find of a century!”
Zorian was tempted to point out that this ‘find of a century’ nearly killed him, but decided not to. If this was who he suspected, he needed to stay on her good side. According to Kael, asking the old witch for help was a bit of a long shot, but likely to achieve very good results if he could convince her to seriously try and help him. Silverlake was very powerful and skilled, but also very annoying to deal with. She wouldn’t kill him or do anything overtly hostile to him without provocation, but she was capricious and prone to wasting people’s time. Zorian figured it was at least worth a try to approach her for help.
“You would be Miss Silverlake, I presume?” guessed Zorian.
The raven answered him with a burst of laughter. It was really strange to see a bird laugh like that.
“’Miss, am I? Well aren’t you a polite one… don’t get too many of those, these days. Why, maybe I’ll even listen to whatever silly request you came here for!” the bird finally said. “Now why are you just standing around? Didn’t I give you a task to accomplish?”
With a sigh, Zorian turned away from the bird and started casting a levitation spell to haul the giant amphibian out of the water.
Silverlake (no last name, and he shouldn’t ask about how she ended up without one — Kael was very firm on that part) was not like Zorian had expected her. She was old, yes, but for a woman of 90 years she was incredibly lively and spry. In fact, Zorian had a feeling she had an easier time moving through the forest than he did. She wasn’t particularly unkempt, either, despite living in the middle of the wilderness — her pitch-black hair was devoid of a single white strand (she probably dyed it regularly), and the simple brown dress she was wearing was unremarkable but immaculate. If it weren’t for the wrinkles, he would have pegged her as less than half her age. Was this a consequence of some sort of potion regimen or was she just lucky that way?
Well, no matter. Zorian followed her back to her cottage, the giant salamander floating behind him on a disc of force, where she promptly started to butcher the beast with practiced ease. Her hands didn’t tremble at all as she handled the various knives and heavy jars at her place, and Zorian became even more certain she put herself through some kind of enhancement regimen to ward off the effect of aging.
She was a potion master according to Kael, and alchemy had always been one of the best ways to prolong your life and keep yourself healthy.
“Don’t think I didn’t notice you faffing around the area for the past few days,” she suddenly said, never taking her eyes off the salamander corpse. “Rather annoying, that. Also worrying. Means that someone told you where to find me. I don’t suppose you could shed some light on that, could you?”
“Kael told me where to find you,” Zorian readily admitted. It wasn’t a secret, really.
“Kael?” she asked, before frowning. “No, wait, don’t tell me. I’m sure I heard that name som— oh! Now I remember — he’s the little rascal that knocked up Fria’s granddaughter! But I heard he ended up marrying her afterwards, so I guess that’s not so bad. Actually, I recall that Fria had been quite happy about that. She had been afraid the girl would never find herself a husband.”
“Why?” asked Zorian curiously. Silverlake shot him a judging look, her brown eyes boring into his own, before returning to her work. “I mean, if it isn’t impertinent to ask. You don’t have to—”
“Relax, boy,” Silverlake snorted derisively. “I am a lot of things, but I was never very tactful. If I’m bothered by something you say, I will tell you. If you ask something impertinent, I will tell you to go screw yourself. I’m just thinking. Let’s see… as you probably suspect by now, Fria, Kael’s mother-in-law, is a witch like me. There are some nasty rumors circulating about witches and their daughters — about how they sacrifice male children, have orgies with summoned demons, poison their husbands for inheritance, how they’re too lazy to work around the house and other ridiculous bilge. It makes a lot of men reluctant to marry the daughter of a witch.”
“I see,” said Zorian. He had never heard about that particular issue, but it sounded plausible enough — witches had a really bad reputation for dabbling in various unethical and forbidden magics.
“It’s been years since I last seen Kael and his wife,” Silverlake said. “Or Fria, for that matter. I guess I should have been a little less harsh the last time they visited, but… well, what’s done is done. It’s strange the morlock saw fit to send you here when he himself dares not show his face to me.”
Zorian frowned. “I… think you’re misinterpreting the situation somewhat. I don’t know what happened between you and them, but the reason they haven’t visited you is because they’re dead. Fria and Kael’s wife both contracted the Weeping and died. As for Kael, he had been too busy grieving and taking care of his daughter to go on a trip like this. You are rather isolated.”
For the first time since he met her, Silverlake seemed taken aback by his answer.
“Dead? Fria is… and all this time I thought…” she mumbled, before halting and giving him a considering look. “Wait. You said Kael and his daughter. I see… hmm…”
Silverlake spent the next few minutes considering something. Zorian took the time to observe and study the cottage next to them. It looked rather flimsy and old, but it shone like a lighthouse to his senses when he discreetly cast a magic detection spell on it. How the hell hadn’t he noticed the thing earlier when he was searching for it? Those must be some powerful divination wards she placed on it. He couldn’t figure out how she was powering them, though — wards that strong needed a powerful source of magic, and this place wasn’t a mana well. There was no way Silverlake could be powerful enough to provide enough mana for the entire edifice, could she? Kael did mention that she was extremely strong and skilled in magic of both Ikosian and witch origin, and that he should never underestimate her, but this was still beyond what he was expecting.
Aside from the impossibly complex and powerful warding scheme, though, the cottage looked unremarkable. There were several racks next to it where various herbs and mushrooms were drying in the sun, but it wasn’t unknown for hunters and lumberjacks to have a side business of gathering herbs to sell in the nearby city so hardly something that would raise warning flags all by itself.
Silverlake snapped her fingers in front of his face, spraying droplets of salamander blood and other bodily fluids all over his glasses and breaking him out of his inspection. Despite his resolve to be polite to her, Zorian couldn’t help but glare at her in response. She just grinned at him, showing him two rows of gleaming white teeth. Apparently in all of her 90 years of life she hadn’t lost a single tooth.
Yes, definitely magic.
“If you’re done gawking at my home, we can continue our discussion,” she said. “I have a request for you. You have a way to get in contact with Kael, yes?”
“Of course,” said Zorian. “We’re friends, he and I.” Or they would be, once he returned to Cyoria in one of the future restarts.
“Then I would like you to deliver a message to him,” she said. “It’s nothing urgent, but I want him to know… that I regret how our last meeting ended and that I would very much like it if he came to visit me with his daughter sometime in the future. Oh, and that I want to teach his daughter the secrets of my magic. She is a descendant of a proud line of witches stretching back to time immemorial, and it is her birthright to continue it… should she want to. Got all that?”