Months passed, and the frozen temperatures finally released their grip on the land. Patches of snow were still visible in places that remained in shade all day, as well as up on the mountains where the air was colder. Only a handful of conifers were starting to show signs of budding and the forests continued to be bare of leaves except for the occasional evergreen dotted here and there.

The winter came and went with little fanfare, only one bad snowstorm made the two-hour travel to Ikuno’s cave impossible for close to a month. When he finally made the trek, the oni attacked Kal like a feral animal upon arrival, shredding his clothes and throwing him on the bed in her haste to get him inside her. Ikuno felt horrible for her actions afterwards, apologizing over and over for her loss of control until Kal began laughing, telling her that if she hadn’t already been naked when he got there he would have done something similar to her. Going from getting some action regularly to going almost four weeks without had left them both very pent up.

Prior to the storm, Kal had used the time he was with Ikuno to make improvements on all his runes as well as layer the protection phrase, as Kal had started to call it going along with his writing analogy from before, from the strength rune into the speed rune. Though it turned out to be significantly more complex than he had anticipated:

“Why the hell won’t this work! It’s like they completely cancel each other out!” Kal put his head down and bumped his forehead against the table a few times, “I’ve been working on this for hours and it feels like I’m getting nowhere.”

After their earlier activities, the oni hadn’t bothered putting her clothes back on and was now luxuriating naked on her bed, sipping saké and perusing one of the books from her library as Kal worked. The young mage sat up as Ikuno placed the tiny cup of rice liquor on one of the table next to the bed and walked over to take a look. Stepping up behind him she leaned over, placing her large blue breasts on either side of his head.

Once she had inspected the rune floating in front of them, the oni looked looked down, giving Kal a questioning look. “Of course they don’t want to work together, they’re opposite affinities,” she said finally.

Kal rubbed his head back and forth inside Ikuno’s cleavage and brought a hand up to casually play with a nipple. “Much as I’m enjoying this,” he looked up at her and smiled, “I couldn’t make out a word you just said.”

Ikuno chuckled and stood up straight, uncovering his ears and allowing him to hear again. “I was saying, you have two opposing affinities that’s why they don’t want to work together.” The oni went over and picked a book off the bookshelf as Kal collapsed the floating rune, streaming the ink back into its bottle.

As she laid the book in front of him, Kal recognized it as one of the very first Ikuno made him read after agreeing to teach him magic. A few pages from the front was a diagram of two concentric circles with several lines bisecting them.

“These are your main magic affinities,” she explained. “It’s not very complete, but most other affinities fall somewhere within these circles. As you can see here, Speed has an Air affinity while Protection is Earth affinity.” Looking closely Kal could now see that the symbols were very close to the base runes for each of the spells, from there he could also tell that Strength belonged to Fire and healing came from Water. “The illustration shows them directly opposite each other, meaning they try to cancel each other out. Really, you should have remembered and realized this without my help.”

Feeling sheepish Kal studied the diagram, having largely overlooked it in his initial excitement about beginning his studies. In the very center lie a geometric figure representing pure magical energy. The innermost ring held four symbols in each of the cardinal directions labeled Sylph, Undine, Gnome, and Salamando for each the four primary elements. On the second ring were Celeste, Sol, and Luna, representing the schools of Divination, Illusion, and Astral Projection. Across from those were Necros, Nox, and Obfuscati, in a very faint *********** and lacking symbols of their own. Far off in the bottom right corner, the word Entropa appeared in the same light *********** without a symbol.

“Other than these two,” he said pointing at Luna and Necros, “the rest of them make sense.”

“Astral Projection has also been called Dreamwalking,” said Ikuno pointing to the representation of the moon next to the word ‘Luna.’ “Honestly, I’ve never done it, so I’m not sure how accurate that is. As to why it’s across from the Necros school; Astral focuses on magic of the spirit without the body, Necros affects the body without a spirit, a corpse.”

Kal nodded in understanding then pointed at Undine and Salamando, “If I mix fire and water it creates steam, is there anything that mixes air and earth in a similar way?”

Ikuno was lost in thought for a few moments, “The only thing that comes to mind is a sandstorm.”

“What’s that?”

“A storm that only happens in dry, sandy areas called deserts, strong winds pick up huge clouds of sand and can carry it from one horizon to the other. Most of the time it’s just an annoyance to be waited out if you get caught in one, but if the winds are strong enough it can scour the flesh from your bones.”

“So, there is a way that they can come together in nature, now I need to figure out how to do it in the runes,” Kal leaned forward and went back to work while Ikuno returned to her bed and saké.

Kahrin was relentless in her pursuit of giving Kal a proper ‘thank you’ over the winter months, seeming to pop up every time he went into town, much to Perra’s annoyance. Despite what she had said after the incident with her brother, she tagged along almost every trip to act as ‘protector’ for Kal against the tenacious barmaid. Kal soon got the impression that Kahrin was showing up as much to tease Perra as she was pursuing him.

To make matters worse, he was making trips into Telsin far more often than he wanted. Now that the townsfolk knew he was a healer, it seemed like every few days someone asked him to take care of some ache or pain that person or a relative was having. In the beginning, he didn’t feel comfortable taking money from the people he healed. However, when he was pulled away from his duties on the farm for the twentieth time that week only to ride all the way to town for an aching elbow or knee, he began to feel like the people of Telsin were taking him for granted. Kal realized he had to do something for the sake of both his sanity and his farm. Asking for a bit of copper for his services resulted in a sharp decline in healing requests.

Ikuno got a good laugh out of his predicament, teasing him about being the savior of Telsin’s creaking bones during one of his and Perra’s visits. Perra then went on a short rant about Kahrin showing up every time they went to town, hunting down Kal and reiterating her offer.

Perra’s eyes almost popped out of her head when Ikuno calmly looked at Kal and said, “The girl feels she owes you a debt, let her pay it so she can move on.”

Perra refused to speak to him the entire way home.

His newfound fame did give Kal the opportunity to help when a snow-laden tree came crashing to the ground on the northern road, pinning a young man who worked at the nearby tannery. Having already been in town to take care of a man’s aching shoulder, that was more due to his old age than some ailment, he heard the sound of the tree falling but didn’t know someone was injured until one of the other workers came banging on the door of the house he was at.

Kal arrived just as they had just gotten an ox in place and were throwing ropes over the tree. Shovels lay nearby from a failed attempt to dig the boy out, unfortunately, it was too late in the winter season and the ground was frozen solid. The next quickest option was to drag the tree off the young man, Kal was immediately concerned their plan would prove as lethal as leaving the tree where it was.

The rescuers looked at the young mage like he was a fool when he told them to undo the ropes. When they refused, he walked over to one that was already tied off and used the strength rune to snap it in half, the farmer inside him cursing at the waste of a good rope, then threatened to break to the rest of them if they didn’t listen, large ropes like the one he just destroyed were valuable and hard to make. The tree was quickly freed and the menfolk cleared of the area. With the strength rune shining bright Kal sunk his hands into the wood, lifting the tree off the boy and tossing it down the road like it was a large stick. As the villagers watched in shock, he bent down and began healing the young man’s broken ribs and arm. Kal hadn’t realized it yet but, with the exception of the innkeeper, that was the first time he had used anything besides his healing rune in front of the townsfolk.

A short time after that, things between Kahrin and Perra finally came to a head. Starting when a rider came galloping into his farm yelling for Kal at the top of his lungs.

“I’m here!” he yelled back as he stepped out of the barn, “what’s the problem?”

With a tug on the reins, the messenger pulled up beside Kal, “The midwife has sent for ye, Master Kal, she’s sayin’ it’s urgent, a babe an’ mother are both in danger,” the man presented a hand to help him up onto the horse.

Kal ignored the offered hand and darted for the house, running inside he went into his bedroom and grabbed his bracers, having not needed them for something as mundane as cleaning out horse and oxen stalls. Perra and his mother both frozen in place when he came bursting through the door and now stared at him wide-eyed as he walked out of the room sliding his arms into the vambraces and quickly drawing the rune to tie them.

“What’s wrong Kal?” asked his mother, now standing in front of her chair.

“The midwife sent for me,” he said as the laces finished tying, swearing under his breath he looked back into his room as he pulled his gloves back on. “Perra! I need you to dig my crystal out of my pack, get a ride with the man outside and meet me in town.” Perra set down the ladle from the soup she had been stirring and ran towards Kal’s room just as Kal grabbed his winter cloak and stepped out the door.

The man had pulled his horse around to the front of the house and, like before, was offering his hand.

Once again Kal ignored it, “There’s a girl coming out in a few minutes with something I need, give her a ride instead, which house am I needed?”

The messenger withdrew his hand, “Ye’ve no time ta saddle a horse Master Kal but it’s the second behind the inn, me brother’ll be out front,” he hung his head, “Jus’ listen for the screamin’.”

Stamina and speed runes shined nearly white as Kal sprinted off in the direction of town, kicking up swirls of loose snow in his wake. He was suddenly more appreciative of the extra traffic to his home keeping the trail packed down.

The rider’s jaw hung open as he watched Kal’s quickly disappearing figure tear off into the distance faster than a horse, up until he rounded a corner in the trail and was out of sight. Perra ran out of the house and saw the rider’s awestruck expression as he looked in the direction Kal had gone. “Hey!” she said tapping his leg, “Are you gonna help me up?”

——

Kal let the speed rune go dark as he came into town not wanting to take a chance on accidentally running into anything. He was also thinking about doing something to counteract the extra cold from moving so fast, even with his winter clothes he felt half frozen. Making his way along the firmer ground on the sides of the street he waited until he was directly across from the inn before venturing out into the mud, thankfully the colder weather had frozen the lower layers, but the sun still made crossing the street treacherous on days like today. He swiftly and carefully made his way to the other side before running the rest of the way to the house, his ears telling him that the rider had not been exaggerating.

As Kal approached a man that Kal assumed was the father ran up to him, “Master Kal! Master Kal! Thank goo…” anything else the man said was drowned out by a gut-wrenching scream from inside the small house.

The man opened the door for Kal but made no move to go in himself. Stepping inside the single room house his nose immediately picked up the iron-laden smell of blood. Off to one side, a wrinkled old lady was tending to the woman who had been the source of the scream.

“Boy, I told you to stay outside and keep others out of my way, you needn’t be in here to watch this,” said the old woman calmly without turning around.

“I believe you sent for me,” said Kal setting his cloak and gloves to the side.

She turned her head just enough to peer at him out the corner of her eye, “The healer boy, so I did,” turning back to the woman on the bed she continued, “a bit young for a wizard, aren’t you? No matter, as long as you can save the girl I’m not for caring if you’re still in a swaddling cloth. Now then, get over here and get to work,” she said in a dispassionate tone as though the whole situation was commonplace.

Walking over to the woman in the bed, her expression held a hint of relief at seeing him mixed with the excruciating pain she was in. He held his hand on her belly as the healing rune lit up. A warning from one of Ikuno’s tomes flashed through his head. The book had stated that healing a woman while pregnant was no issue as the magic treated the baby like just another part of the mother. However, healing a woman during labor “confused the healing magic” as the author had put it, accompanying his statement with horrific drawings of deceased mother and baby accidentally fused together by people doing exactly what he was about to. The healing rune went dark.

“I can’t, not yet. The baby and afterbirth have to come out or bad things can happen,” Kal figured it would be best if he didn’t go into detail.

The woman in the bed wailed in despair at his words while the ancient midwife pushed him off to the side, “Not much bloody good then are ya?” she rested her hands on the laboring woman’s belly. “The babe is fadin’.”

“How do you…” Kal looked closely at her hands, tiny green tendrils extended from her fingertips down into the woman. “You can use magic,” he said.

“I ain’t no witch, boy. Don’t know nothin’ about doing magic, but after so many years being a midwife, I do know mothers and babes.”

The woman’s belly rippled with a contraction and the laboring woman threw her head back, screaming in agony.

Kal looked at the old woman, “Maybe I can help.” Putting his hand next to hers he pushed a tiny bit of magical energy into the woman and used it to flood her body much like he did when healing.

The old woman’s eyes widened for a moment as she looked down, “ye might be of some use after all. The babe is turned,” she said after a moment. Reaching to her side she grabbed a clean washcloth and rolled it up, “Put that in her mouth, she’s grindin’ her teeth no sense in breakin’ ’em. Now help me an’ keep up with whatever yer doin’ that lets me see the little one.”

The midwife began pushing up and to one side of the woman’s belly, while directing Kal to press on the upper side in the opposite direction, after a minute or so of shoving the woman’s belly around, Kal felt something shift.

The old lady made her way to the foot of the bed and inspected the anguished woman, “Boy, on the next one lift her up so she can push proper.”

“The next what?” but his attention was drawn by the woman in the bed grasping at his hand, though still in extreme pain there was a look of determination on her face now.

A moment later she pulled herself up using Kal and let out another howl of pain, only slightly muffled by the washcloth. Kal quickly switched hands with the woman and adjusted so he could put an arm behind her back.

Twice more he helped the woman push through contractions before the midwife held up the woman’s new daughter letting the fluid drain from her lungs. Laying the baby on the bed she tied off the umbilical and cut through it with a quick swipe of a knife.

Dumping the newborn into Kal’s arms she opened her mouth to speak but his healing rune was already working to repair the damage from the difficult delivery.

“Don’t be too long, the mother needs your attention as well,” said the old woman a couple of minutes later, walking past with a pan containing the afterbirth.

Kal could feel he was running low on magic and cursed himself for burning his resources to get here so quickly and not just accepting the ride from the man sent to get him, then again, they may not have lived if he had.