Arturia and Asuna had gone back up to their now shared room. Asuna was back to exercising on the floor, and Arturia was busy fiddling with the crumpled up sheet of paper.
"Let's see.. is this how you.. no that's not it…"
"Whatcha doin?"
Arturia made some symbols with her hands but nothing happened, she sighed. "I thought I'd heard of a spell that could decipher things such as this. It lets you understand any language you're reading, but I can't quite get it right…"
Asuna did some more pushups, "Wish I could help, but I'm ill.. uh.. what's the word? Can't read."
"Illiterate."
"That's it!"
Arturia gave a worried look, "Did you never have a formal education? I'm not sure what it's like in Veridia, but my parents in Sherene taught me to do it."
"Everything I know, Iro taught me. If he didn't teach me, it must not have been important!" She laughed.
"I-I could teach you, you know!" Arturia crawled excitedly to the edge of the bed, "It's not that hard, we can start with the basics sometime!"
"Sure I guess, sounds good." Asuna stopped mid pushup to give a shaky thumbs up, and promptly fell face first on the floor.
Arturia jumped up and rushed over, "Oh no! Are you alright?"
"Yeah! Never better!" Asuna chuckled and lifted her face, showing off a bloody nose.
"Oh dear, no no no. Sit up for a moment."
Arturia took her by the shoulders and leaned her up against the bed frame.
"You really mustn't push yourself. I've seen you do nothing but work out every night, and after that bout of arm wrestling today your limbs must be exhausted."
"Yeah, maybe…" Asuna said in a weary voice, "I do feel a little wobbly and light headed."
Arturia reached out and brushed the bangs out of Asuna's face. Asuna's eyes widened and she leaned back a bit.
"W-what are you doing?"
Arturia jerked her hand back, "I'm checking your nose. Please hold still."
"Fine, go ahead."
Arturia gently cupped the girl’s face in her hands, tilting it around and eyeing her nose. Asuna turned her eyes the other way.
“Hmm it looks like it’s bleeding a bit from inside and on the bridge, you’ve broken the skin. And.. oh dear, do you have a fever? You’re awfully warm and look a bit red.”
Asuna tried to speak but her voice broke and nothing came out, her lips were quivering, “It’s just the way I am! Always pretty warm! Just ask that one guy!”
“Are you sure?” Arturia turned her head.
“YEAH!” Asuna turned her head a bit in embarrassment, prying herself out of the girl’s hands. She put her hands over her bloodied nose and held them there, “H-hey! Go downstairs and get me something to stop this bleeding, alright? I don’t wanna have to wipe it up with my clothes.”
Arturia nodded “Sure thing, that’s a good idea. I don’t think either of us have any bandages anyway.”
Arturia got up and scuttled out the door down the stairs, meanwhile Asuna breathed a sigh of relief and continued to hold her nose until the girl returned.
Downstairs Arturia had found the barmaid back in the kitchen doing dishes, “Excuse me, ma’am? Do you happen to have any bandages around here? I can pay you if I need to, my friend upstairs had a little accident.”
The elven woman gave her a glare, “What kind of accident?” She’d seen enough tavern tomfoolery before and knew to be suspicious.
“Nothing bad! She just fell and hurt her nose. Can you please help?”
The woman pouted for a second, “Fine. We don’t have bandages but you can grab some washrags from here in the kitchen. That should work if it’s just a bit of blood you need to clean up.”
Arturia smiled, “Thank you miss!”
The woman returned the smile, “You can call me Léa. My sister in there is Holly.”
Arturia looked through the open door at the other woman. They were twins, but Léa usually kept her hair up while Holly kept hers down, enough of a way to tell them apart she figured. She nodded to the woman, “Right! Thanks Léa!”
“Don’t mention it.”
Arturia went off and started looking around the kitchen, digging through cupboards and drawers looking for extra rags. She didn’t want to use a dirty one, she was no expert but she knew that’d make the little wound only fester. Eventually she happened to glance over at the oven, it was old and made of bricks, and caked in dark blackened soot inside. Something about it made her reach over and draw her finger across the rough surface, she pulled it away and eyed the black smudge left on her hand.
“Soot…”
…
“Soot!”
She felt like her brain had been struck by lightning as she realized what had been missing. Quickly she looked over and found two clean rags, one for Asuna and one for carrying. She looked at Léa to make sure she wasn’t watching, and started scrubbing at the oven with one of the rags. It didn’t take long for it to get dirty. Then she opened the pantry she’d searched earlier, grabbing a pail of salt she’d found and pouring some into the rag. She folded it up and tied the ends into a knot, making it a tiny pouch. She took the pouch and the clean rag and scurried out of the room, forgetting to even say goodbye.
In a flash she was back up the stairs and shut the door to their room. Asuna was laying on the floor still holding her nose.
“Took ya long enough!” She said all stuffy sounding.
“Here!” Arturia tossed her the rag which landed on her head.
Asuna took it and wiped the blood away, still holding it to her nose, “Whatcha got there?”
Arturia was back on the bed and had smoothed out the note, she took the rag and untied it then placed it on top of the paper.
“Before, I was trying my best to cast that spell as I remembered it. But, well, you know I don’t use magic all that often.”
“Yeah, you mentioned it’s scary.”
Arturia shook her head, “Not scary, per se, just… dark. But this sort of thing won’t hurt anyone, so it’ll be alright. Anyway, I recalled that some magic requires ingredients to work properly. This one requires soot and salt, I hope I got enough…”
Asuna got up and took a seat backwards on a chair, leaning over the back and facing the bed, “So what, do ya just, like, pour it on there?”
“I think so?” Arturia wasn’t entirely sure. “Here goes nothing.”
She placed her hands over the rag and closed her eyes, as she did she began to speak and mumble something under her breath. Asuna shivered, despite the window being shut a frigid breeze blew through the room. The rag began to flutter, the salt was whipped into the air along with the soot which stripped the rag completely clean. The swirl of powder flowed for a moment before it seemed to dive into the paper and vanish without a trace.
Arturia opened her eyes and looked down at the paper, seeming satisfied.
“Sooo… did it work?”
“Yes! Yes it most certainly did!” She said nearly jumping with joy.
“So what does it say?”
Arturia held up the paper to her and smiled with glee, “Look!”
Asuna cocked her head to the side, “Can’t read, remember.”
“Oh, right. I think it only works for the spellcaster anyway, just me then.”
She examined the paper thoroughly for a moment. Then she reached into her satchel and pulled out a small scroll, a feather, and an inkwell. She popped the cork and dipped the feather in, and began taking notes.
“Hey! What does it say?!” Asuna grew impatient.
“Sorry, copying this down quickly. I’m not sure how long the spell will last for, and magic takes a lot out of me. Another reason I rarely use it is because I can only do so much at a time. After this and… what happened with those thieves… It’ll be a bit before I can use anything substantial again.”
“I dunno anything about magic but I guess that makes sense.”
Arturia gave her a funny look, “You don’t know anything of magic? But I’ve seen you use it, when you made fire come from your hands.”
Asuna grinned and pointed a thumb at her chest, “Nah dude, that’s ki. Part of being a martial artist is I learned to use the energy in myself to fight. Iro said I’m made of fire inside, and that Zander guy said I’ve got devil blood. So I guess it just comes out as fire, but it’s straight life energy.”
“Isn’t that dangerous? What if you run out?”
Asuna leaned back in the chair, then wobbled a bit from being light headed, “I try to be careful not to. But yeah, it can really wear me out.”
Arturia frowned, “You really do overexert yourself. I worry for you.”
“Psh, I’ll be fine. I’m made of tough stuff! But you should’ve seen me when I first joined the Salamander School, I was a total wimp. Not anymore though.”
A pause.
“So what’s that thing say?”
“Oh, right, the note.” Arturia cross referenced her notes, making sure she copied it correctly. “It says here the cult has regular meetings across Merravale at night. This one in particular says they’re having one in some derelict catacomb in an old graveyard not far from Mordain. However, the date was a few nights ago, we’ve missed it.”
“Damn, too late then huh.” Asuna knocked the wooden chair with her fist.
“Yes… but it couldn’t hurt to check out the catacomb anyway. Perhaps they left some clues behind somehow, we can’t afford to not search around. Especially in our situation.”
“Guess you’ve got a point. Wanna go tell Zander? He’d probably want to hear.”
“Yes, I think that’s a good idea. Save him the trouble of searching around town for the moment.”
Arturia folded her notes and tucked them into her satchel, and hopped up to leave.
“Hey don’t forget me!” Asuna hopped out of the chair and took a few steps, then stumbled. Arturia caught her as she fell forward. The girl had a semi delirious look and her eyes hung half closed.
“No no, you must rest for now. Please Asuna, do it for me?”
“N..noo.. I’m fine. I can go..” She mumbled halfheartedly.
Arturia held her in her arms and dragged her over to the bed, laying her down.
“Here, get nice and comfy. I’ll be back soon, I promise. Don’t worry we can get into plenty of trouble tomorrow, and you can save me all over again just like you like to.”
“Ssssave you.. Yeeeah.. I like.. Saving cute girls… yeah…” Asuna’s eyes fluttered a bit and closed, she’d fallen asleep.
Arturia sat there beside her and smiled, again brushing the hair out of the girl’s face. She always looked so cocky and smug, but now was the most peaceful she’d ever seen her.
“Cute girls, huh?”
She held the moment for a while, then pulled the blanket over her. Asuna rolled over in her sleep and made a grumble, she was out like a light.
Arturia double checked she had all her things and got up, then quietly left out the door.
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