SIGILBORNE: The World Beyond

The Calling

The carriage rolled along the road, its wheels turning far more smoothly than those of their old cart. Eiran had to admit that Bishop Aldren's gift was a considerable improvement. At least now, he no longer had to fight the reins while worrying that a wheel might fall off.

Arthur seemed equally pleased. He had spent much of the afternoon checking the carriage's fittings and praising its sturdy frame, while Seren sat beside him, occasionally glancing at the two Sigils engraved on her hands.

The sun had nearly disappeared behind the distant hills when Eiran finally pulled the horse off the road and found a suitable place to camp. They had travelled for several hours since leaving the Church, and none of them wanted to continue in the dark.

Arthur climbed down, stretching his arms. "Now this is what I'm talking about. A proper carriage, a good horse, and food that doesn't consist of whatever we can pull out of the ground."

Eiran retrieved their supplies. "You say that as if you haven't been complaining about my driving for the past three days."

"Because you keep giving me reasons to."

"Then perhaps you should be grateful that your injuries are almost healed."

Arthur grinned and reached for the food bag. "I am. Especially now that we have something worth eating."

They settled beneath a cluster of trees, where the branches offered some shelter from the evening breeze. This time, they had dried meat and fresh bread from the Church, enough for a proper meal without having to forage for anything. Arthur took a generous piece of meat and bit into it with such satisfaction that Eiran couldn't help laughing.

"Careful," Eiran said. "You might choke if you eat any faster."

Arthur swallowed and looked at him indignantly. "After three days of questionable vegetables, I'm allowed to enjoy this."

Seren smiled as she broke off a piece of bread. She had grown more comfortable around them since the Rite, though she still seemed surprised whenever they treated her as an equal rather than someone who needed to be handled carefully.

After they ate, Eiran's attention returned to her hands. He had been curious about her Convergence since the moment the two Sigils appeared, but he had waited until they were away from the Church before asking her to try using them.

"Have you tried either of them yet?" he asked.

Seren shook her head. "Not properly. I can feel something when I concentrate, but I don't know how to bring it out."

"Then let's start with Aqua."

Eiran led her to a shallow stream nearby. Arthur followed, still chewing the last of his bread, apparently unwilling to miss the opportunity to watch.

"Don't force it," Eiran instructed. "Focus on the water first. Think about what you want it to do, then try to understand how it moves."

Seren crouched beside the stream and held her hand above the surface. For a moment, nothing happened. She frowned, concentrating harder, until the water beneath her palm began to ripple. A thin strand rose from the stream, trembling in the air before collapsing back into it.

Her eyes widened. "I did it!"

"You did," Eiran said. "But you lost control when you tried to lift too much. Start with a smaller amount."

She tried again. This time, a narrow ribbon of water rose more steadily, curling around her fingers before falling back into the stream. It wasn't much, but she managed to maintain it for several seconds.

Arthur nodded appreciatively. "That's better than my first attempt with Terran."

"Your first attempt nearly buried your feet," Eiran reminded him.

"I was trying something ambitious."

"You were trying something foolish."

Seren laughed, and the water slipped from her control. After a few more attempts, she began to understand how little effort was needed to move a small amount. Eiran encouraged her to pay attention to the water's movement rather than simply trying to force it into shape.

When she was ready, they moved a short distance away from the stream to practise Aeris.

"This one may feel different," Eiran explained. "You're working with air, something you can't see directly. Pay attention to the movement around you. Don't just think about pushing it. Think about where you want it to go."

Seren raised her hand. A faint breeze brushed past her fingers, stirring a few strands of her silver-gray hair. She tried to strengthen it, but the air scattered in different directions.

She lowered her hand, frustrated. "I can't seem to keep it together."

"That's all right. Try again, but don't push so hard. You're trying to control it before you've understood how it moves."

Seren closed her eyes and took a slow breath. This time, she focused on the air passing between the trees. A small current gathered around her hand and swept a handful of dry leaves across the ground.

The leaves scattered farther than she had intended, but she managed to direct most of them toward a nearby tree.

Arthur gave an impressed whistle. "Two Sigils, and you've already got the hang of both."

"Not the hang of them," Eiran corrected. "She's only beginning to understand them."

Seren looked at the leaves, then at her hands. "But I can feel the difference now. Aqua feels easier to follow. Aeris is harder to hold."

"That makes sense," Eiran said. "Water is easier to observe because you can see how it flows. With air, you'll need to pay closer attention to its movement. Keep practising, and you'll understand more."

A small smile spread across Seren's face. For once, the marks on her hands didn't feel like something frightening or unfamiliar. They were abilities she could learn to use, and for the first time, she had people willing to teach her without expecting anything in return.

When they returned to camp, Arthur had already begun preparing their shelter. He placed his palm against the ground and focused on his Terran Sigil. The earth shifted beneath the bedding, smoothing the uneven patches and raising a low ridge around the campsite to keep loose soil from sliding inward.

Eiran watched him work. "Your control's improved."

Arthur glanced over his shoulder. "You sound surprised."

"I'm impressed. There's a difference."

Arthur continued shaping the ground, adjusting the raised edge until it was firm without becoming a wall. His understanding of Terran had grown during their travels. Watching farmers work their fields and road workers shape the earth had given him a better sense of what his Sigil could accomplish. Eiran's explanations had helped him put those observations into practice.

"It's easier when I stop thinking about moving the earth as a whole," Arthur said. "I can feel where it needs to shift instead of trying to force everything at once."

"That's Understanding," Eiran replied. "You're beginning to comprehend what you're working with."

"Then perhaps you should keep teaching me."

"Perhaps you should keep paying attention."

Arthur snorted, but his grin showed he had taken the praise to heart.

They settled down for the night, with the horse secured nearby and their supplies tucked safely beneath the carriage's covering. Seren fell asleep first, exhausted by the day's journey and her attempts to control her new Sigils. Arthur soon followed. Eiran remained awake a little longer, staring at the dark sky through the branches.

He thought of the two Sigils Seren had received, then of his own empty palm. The feeling of jealousy was small, but it was there. He was happy for her. She deserved the chance to learn and grow after everything she had endured.

Still, he couldn't help wondering why the Rite had given him nothing.

Eventually, he closed his eyes and let the question remain unanswered.

Three days passed with little to interrupt their journey. They travelled through farmland, crossed shallow streams, and stopped at small clearings whenever the horse needed rest. Arthur took over the reins once his injuries had fully healed, leaving Eiran free to study the maps they had purchased in the first settlement they went to. 

Their destination remained uncertain. Veridian Academy was one possibility, but they had not committed themselves to it. For now, they intended to keep travelling and learn more about the world beyond the barony.

On the map, a vast forest occupied a large stretch of land farther along their route. The road passed through it before continuing toward the next region. From the map alone, it was difficult to tell how long they would spend beneath its canopy.

By the afternoon of the third day, the forest had risen around them. The trees grew taller and closer together, their thick branches casting long shadows across the road. Arthur kept the horse moving at a steady pace, occasionally glancing at the clouds gathering overhead.

"We should make it through before nightfall," he said.

Eiran looked toward the darkening sky. "If the weather holds."

It didn't.

The first drops struck the carriage roof a few minutes later. Within moments, the rain grew heavy, hammering against the wood and turning the road into a slick stretch of mud. Water streamed from the branches overhead, and the trees blurred behind a curtain of rain.

Arthur leaned forward, squinting through the downpour. "I can barely see the road."

"Slow down," Eiran called. "We don't want the horse slipping."

Arthur eased the reins, but the road was becoming harder to distinguish. Puddles merged across the ground, and the mud swallowed the tracks that might have guided them forward. Continuing would be dangerous, especially with the carriage and horse at risk of losing their footing.

"We need shelter," Arthur said. "Somewhere we can wait until the rain eases."

They turned off the road and guided the horse beneath the trees, searching for a clearing or an overhang large enough to protect them. The forest floor was soaked, and water dripped from every branch. They moved slowly, careful not to lead the horse into uneven ground hidden beneath the fallen leaves.

They searched for what felt like an hour, though the heavy rain made it difficult to judge the time. Every promising patch of ground proved too exposed, too narrow, or too close to a slope where water was rushing downhill.

Seren pulled her cloak tightly around herself. "We should have stopped earlier."

"Perhaps," Arthur admitted. "But we couldn't have known the rain would get this bad."

Eiran looked around, frustration building as the rain continued to fall. They couldn't remain out in the open, but he didn't want to risk taking the carriage any farther into unfamiliar terrain.

Then something changed.

It was not a sound, nor a voice calling his name. It was a faint, inexplicable sensation, a pull that seemed to come from somewhere deeper in the forest. Eiran stopped walking.

He couldn't explain it. He only knew that, for a moment, the rain and the rustling leaves seemed distant, and his attention had fixed on a particular direction between the trees.

"Eiran?" Arthur called.

Eiran turned toward the sound, then looked back into the forest. "I think there's something over there."

"Something like what?" Arthur asked.

"I don't know."

He started walking before he could explain further. Arthur exchanged a glance with Seren, then followed, leading the horse carefully through the trees. Seren came behind them, trying to remember whether they had already searched that part of the forest.

The pull grew stronger as they moved farther from the road. Eiran pushed past wet branches and stepped around a fallen trunk. Then he stopped.

A dark opening lay between two massive rock formations, partly hidden behind hanging vines. It was a cave.

"There's our shelter," Arthur said, relief clear in his voice.

Seren frowned at the entrance. "That's strange. I'm sure I looked around this area earlier. I didn't see anything."

"Maybe the rain made it harder to notice," Eiran said, though the explanation didn't fully satisfy him.

They guided the carriage to a sheltered patch among thick trees near the cave, where the branches offered some protection from the worst of the rain. Leaving the carriage secured there, they gathered a few supplies, an oil lamp, and enough food for the night. Arthur led the horse toward the entrance while Eiran lit the lamp.

The cave mouth was wide enough for them to enter without difficulty. At first, the passage seemed shallow, with rough stone walls and a damp floor. But as the lamplight reached farther inside, they discovered that the cave continued downward, opening into a much larger space than they had expected.

Arthur raised the lamp. "This place goes deeper than it looked from outside."

"Stay close," Eiran said. "We don't know what's in here."

They led the horse into a broad section near the entrance, where the ceiling was high enough and the ground relatively even. Arthur secured the animal and used his Terran Sigil to smooth a patch of ground for their bedding. Eiran set the supplies nearby, while Seren helped arrange their belongings and kept the lamp steady.

They had intended to spend only the night there, but the deeper passage caught Eiran's attention. The walls were not entirely natural. As they walked a little farther, the light revealed faint markings carved into the stone.

Eiran stopped.

Symbols covered part of the wall, some arranged in neat rows, others grouped into shapes that looked almost like writing. They were worn by time, their edges softened, but the patterns were deliberate.

He moved closer, lifting the lamp.

Eiran had always been fascinated by old languages and forgotten ways of communicating. That curiosity was one reason the Church's ancient chant had captured his attention during the Rite. He had read about inscriptions, historical scripts, and the symbols used by people whose kingdoms had disappeared long before the present age.

But he had never seen anything like these.

The marks didn't resemble any script he knew. Some looked like interlocking circles; others were formed from sharp angles and lines that crossed in ways that seemed too deliberate to be decoration. There were no familiar letters, no obvious repetitions that helped him guess at their meaning.

"Do you know what they say?" Seren asked.

Eiran shook his head. "I've never seen this kind of writing before."

Arthur brought the lamp closer, examining the wall from a different angle. "Could it be some kind of map?"

"Maybe. But I can't tell where one symbol ends and another begins."

They moved along the wall, studying the markings. The cave stretched farther into the darkness, and the symbols continued beyond the reach of their first lamp. Eiran felt that same strange pull again, faint but persistent, drawing his attention deeper into the passage.

He didn't mention it. He wasn't sure how to explain a feeling he couldn't understand himself.

After several minutes, Arthur stopped before a cluster of symbols carved into a section of stone that jutted slightly from the wall. Unlike the others, these marks were deeper and more sharply defined.

"Look at this one," Arthur said, reaching out.

"Don't touch it yet," Eiran warned, still trying to understand the pattern.

But Arthur's fingertips had already brushed the central symbol.

A deep rumble rolled through the cave.

The ground shuddered beneath their feet. Dust poured from the ceiling, and loose stones clattered onto the floor as the walls trembled.

"Move!" Arthur shouted.

Eiran caught Seren's arm as another violent tremor shook the passage. The oil lamp swung wildly, throwing the symbols into flickering light. A crack split across the stone overhead, followed by the grinding sound of rock shifting somewhere deeper in the cave.

For one terrible moment, it sounded as though the entire cavern was about to collapse.