Waking up from a gory nightmare, Hadrian's eyes fluttered open.

Alia, lying next to him, did a gentle motion with her left hand, and the rock tent around them "melted" wrapping itself around the bark of the branch.

Warm sunlight graced their faces.

Birds chirped all around them, and the wind made the leaves sing in chorus.

Hadrian took in a deep breath then flicked his wrist, and a small amount of brima appeared in his hand.

He gave a piece to Alia and the other he chewed.

Hadrian observed the sprawling wilderness and the wide open space that led up to the black line in the distance that was the outer city wall.

The beauty didn't escape him. The heaviness he felt in his heart from the nightmare crawled away, replaced by the warmness of the scenery.

Fully awake, he and the Alia vessels turned to each other, altering their sights and making sure the fog layer wrapping around them was still potent enough.

After the confirmation, he entered that space once more, for his check in with Baruch.

Now that he was near the city, these had gotten frequent, looking if there were any changes that would create an opportunity such that he wasn't caught on re entry.

As the portal formed in front of him, Hadrian's left brow rose.

A dream.

It wasn't the first time he'd caught Baruch sleeping, but since his experience entering injured knee's dream, he didn't plan to enter Baruch's.

It's good I don't directly descend into him anymore.

Perhaps stimulated by Hadrian, the incoherent scene in the portal faded as Baruch's eyes opened.

He was still in that grand resting chamber. This time, the lighting of the sun allowed for Hadrian to see more of its opulence.

Four metres from the feet of the bed was the fireplace, where above it, a two metre long magnificent painting was placed.

It portrayed a boat in the middle of a storm at sea. The large grey brushstroke clouds accentuated the painting's dark and gloomy atmosphere.

Baruch looked away from it as his head tilted to his left where Lys lay the previous night.

He could hear her shower in the chamber's bathroom.

On the desk that was on her side of the bed, were her items.

Parchments, scrolls, small leather bags, threads, goatskin and a lot more.

She carries all these?

Baruch's brow slightly pinched. Last evening, as he undressed her, he had not noticed.

That day of the ceremony, he'd actually seen her fight beneath the dais, where she used scrolls that stretched unnaturally.

With deep curiosity, his left hand stretched anxiously, scared to be heard, and he grabbed the top most easiest item to grab.

It was a thick, slightly yellow, folded paper.

Unfolding it cautiously, scared to tear it or be heard, Baruch unveiled the city's map.

His eyes narrowed as he studied it. Some places were marked with times and dates that had either passed or yet to come.

Slightly disappointed, his hand stretched as he returned it and picked a small clear jar with a goatskin covering.

It was the size of his thumb and had moon coloured sand in it.

Returning it, he grabbed a goatskin. All items were grabbed according to the ease in which he could.

In that space, Hadrian's brow furrowed as he leaned forward.

In blank ink, the name "Alia" took much of the goatskins space in a beautiful hand writing.

Hearing the splashing of water die down, Baruch hastily returned things as they had been.

His hand stretched back across the bed just as Lys stepped out.

A small towel wrapped around her, exposing most of her already dried pale skin.

Baruch was twenty and she seemed to be at least four or five years older than him.

His heart beat with slight excitement as he rubbed his eyes pretending to have just woken.

As Lys dressed herself, Baruch looked back to the painting. Sitting up, he uncovered the beddings and swung his legs off the bed.

With his feet on the carpet, he sat in that position for a few moments, contemplating skipping the shower.

With a grunt, he got up, showered and dressed himself.

When he was done, all of Lys' items had vanished somewhere in her fluffy black gown.

They left the chambers together, looking clean and smelling of perfume.

Baruch himself was in one of the dark red mage robes he'd been given.

Two flights of stairs later, they ran into some mages and regular human cleaners busy with their duties.

They had their morning meals together, conversing for a while about nothing important, then parted ways as Lys headed to the council meeting which Baruch could not attend, while Baruch headed for the training and sparring grounds.

Lys seemed to be in a good mood.

Mages of other paths were mostly already being stationed elsewhere, however, for the three paths mages who were truly new and inexperienced mages, they still had some training to do.

Meanwhile, in his projected hall, Hadrian studied the map Baruch had seen, now on a thin rock slab.

When Baruch had his eyes on the map, Hadrian traced it with the mist, then traced this tracing onto a real rock through elemental manipulation.

He could not make much of it even after pondering for a while.

In any case, I now have a map of the city.

Concerning the goatskin, he could only hope Alia's mother is fine.

After that first time he'd seen her at the keep, he hadn't seen her again during his regular check ins with Baruch.

Glancing at his unaccommodated cores, Hadrian descended out of the space.

The chorus of leaves and birds filled his ears once more.

He reached out to his Lizard-like and burrowing creatures' vessels, who had also been in their own rock tent.

At the time, the lizard-like creature vessel carried the force path cores, but he did not intend to leave it with it.

When he entered the city, he planned to leave it behind. It would stand out too much, and unlike him and Alia, it didn't have the fog layer wrappings.

The small burrowing creature vessels could hide in Hadrian's and Alia's clothes, underneath the fog layer.

For now, though, he kept the beast.

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