TRC - Searching for the Sky Ch. 06

'In pain' wasn't the most comfortable way to wake up but Kelthor welcomed it this time, it was better than opening his eyes and finding himself in the afterlife. He discovered that attempting to open his eyes was a bad idea, as pain once again lanced through his head from the daylight pouring into the room.

On a more pleasant note, it was certainly nice waking up to the feeling of a naked woman pressed against his side. Rose had crawled into bed beside him and rested her head on his shoulder, her arm thrown over his chest and a leg draped over his. She must have decided on an afternoon nap because small whimpers escaped her lips as her limbs made tiny jerky movements from whatever dream she was having. Judging by the dampness, heat, and small grinding motions she was making where her sex rubbed up against him, the dream was a pleasant one.

Though he loathed waking the girl, his mouth was extraordinarily dry. His arm felt like it had weights attached to it as he brought his hand up to the top of her head so he could gently pet the woman awake, where it ran into triangular ears that weren't supposed to be there.

This wasn't Rose.

Waking from his movements, the woman gasped in surprise before quickly sliding out of the bed and running out the door as she called for the golden-haired dog girl.

The old man grunted. She could have at least given him something to drink before tearing off.

Less than a minute later that he heard the clicking of canine claws coming up the stairs just before Rose and the girl who had been napping with him entered his chambers, at least he assumed it was the same woman, he hadn't opened his eyes yet. She immediately began fawning over him, her excitement that he was finally awake almost palpable. Kelthor raised a hand and she pressed it to her cheek, which was wet with tears of relief.

"Wa..ter," he finally whispered looking at the girl, finally able to open his eyes without it hurting.

The golden-haired woman jumped up, apologizing for not considering he would be thirsty when he finally awoke. She poured him a glass from the pitcher on his nightstand as the girl with the black and white coloration of a collie crawled into the bed from the other side. The wizard was about to ask why she was in bed with him when they each put an arm behind his back and lifted him up, the other girl sliding behind him so he could lean back against her as Rose put the cup to his lips. He quickly realized that without their help he wouldn't have been able to do this on his own, which made him immediately wonder just how long he had been out for.

The sound of heavier footsteps was immediately followed by Kal and Daxas entering the room, the wolf girl standing up and shifting to her human limbs once they had cleared the stairs.

"Good to see you awake, old man," said Kal, smiling as he approached the bed. "We weren't sure how much longer you would last if you didn't wake up soon."

Kelthor's surprise was evident on his face, looking over at Rose he asked, "How long?"

"Almost ten days. We could get you to drink but Kal has been healing you three times a day to fend off the effects of starvation," she replied.

"Rose here got the idea to start grinding up food and adding it to the water they were giving you, otherwise I don't think you would have lasted this long even with my help. These last few days you've been going downhill fast."

"Sounds like I owe you my life."

Kal shrugged. "If you owe anyone it's those two," he said, indicating Rose and the black- and white-haired girl, "along with the other two who kept you warm when we came back. Dax said that she was worried I might not make it for a little bit, so I can only imagine how close you came to drawing your last breath."

"Stop it, Kal, you're the reason he's like this," Rose growled, her teeth lengthening as she glared at the human.

"I'm also the reason, he's alive now."

The dog girl's teeth retracted but her lips stayed curled into a snarl until the old wizard rested his hand on her head.

"Peace, Rose, it was my decision to do this. Kal expressly said that he was uncomfortable crashing out of the last session, I was the one who insisted," Rose looked between him and Kal, her surprised expression telling him this was new information to her. "If you want to assign blame you could just as easily blame the lich who forced Kal to seek me out in the first place. Granted, I didn't think it would be this bad, but then, I've never done that so many times so close together. I don't think anyone has and lived to tell about it, until now that is." He looked up at the younger mage, "I want you to record everything that you felt and experienced from the time you began the crash."

"Already done, I figured you would want some kind of documentation."

Kelthor glanced over at the dog girl, she was staring at the younger mage with a mixture of embarrassment and apology. "Why didn't you tell her it was my decision, Kal?"

"Partly because I didn't know if she would believe me, but mostly because her anger at me distracted her from how close you were to dying."

"I'm guessing that means you didn't get the notes in my study?"

Kal shook his head, grinning, "No, I haven't, but that was more because of superstition than because of her." The old mage gave him a confused look, making him chuckle before continuing, "I was worried if she gave me those notes you wouldn't have a reason to come back to us."

Kelthor laid his head back against the girl behind him, closing his eyes as a smile crept onto his face. Kal wasn't sure if it was because of his comment or because he was relaxing with his head in between a rather nice set of breasts. Breasts he had seen very little of since the incident. The collie had spent most of her time up here with Rose tending to the sleeping wizard.

"Now that I'm awake, you needn't worry about that," he said keeping his eyes shut, the light wasn't painful anymore, but it wasn't comfortable either. "Rose, go into my personal study and get the notes on the table there when you get a chance, please. He will need them before he leaves." He opened his eyes slightly to look at Kal, "I was able to verify that Prentas and Te'thalas existed and that your ancient mage traveled with an elven woman named Lehrien Te'thalas. The most interesting piece of information was what I didn't find."

"I'm confused, did you say what you 'didn't' find?"

"Exactly, the only mentions of the cities of Te'thalas and Montar were where the names hadn't been completely erased from the ledgers. Someone tried to erase both cities from history."

Everyone in the room was looking at the wizard with shocked looks on their faces.

"But... Who? How? Why?" asked Kal.

"Who and how are related, there was only one organization that had the kind of power back then to alter thousands and thousands of documents over an enormous area, effectively erasing both cities from history. The church."

"But why?"

"I can only venture a guess, but I think it was mostly because they could. If Ikuno's story is true, then the largest and third-largest cities effectively vanished overnight, leaving a gigantic power vacuum for the church to step into. Removing Montar also erased the church's greatest defeat at the hands of a magic-user. If they wanted to rewrite history there was no one left with the ability to challenge them.

"The other reason you may already know the answer to and just never realized it. As you were growing up what were you told about monster girls."

Kal was curious where he was going with this, "That they were evil and needed to be avoided or destroyed. That they would capture a human man and turn him into an unwilling 'husband,' never allowing him to leave and draining him dry to produce more of their demonic offspring." Kal's face looked as though he had bitten into something rotten as he spoke the words, thankful that his mother had raised him to not off-handedly believe everything he was told.

"That's the word I was looking for!" said the wizard excitedly, "the church teaches that monster girls are demonic in nature. What would it do to their credibility if it were discovered they were created by an immensely powerful mage? A mage who cast a spell powerful enough not only to create the monster girls but to create them across the entire world. Kal, that's a mage who held the power of a god, even if only for a moment. The church doesn't like competition"

Kal stood frozen, stunned by the revelation.

"People think we're demons?" asked Daxas.

"Not all of us obviously," replied Kal, putting an arm around her and pulling her close before giving her a kiss on the forehead.

"You will find that most of us practicing the magic arts don't believe what the church says about monster girls," said Kelthor, wishing he had the strength to do the same for Rose, who was looking hurt and insulted by the news. She was aware that humans, in general, didn't like monster girls, but they had never discussed the reasons why. "Nearly all of us have access to a simple spell that allows us to detect evil. Apart from a couple of purely carnivorous species, monster girls are no more prone to being evil than humans.

"Back to the topic at hand, Kal do you know where the church is based out of?"

"Lantaris, right?" Even if the church had little to no presence in Telsin there were things that everyone knew.

"And that is located where?"

"Far off... to... the... fuck. Lantaris was the second most powerful city in the area behind Montar, wasn't it?" asked Kal.

"Correct, Lake Montar is five weeks journey northwest of Lantaris. Unfortunately, I don't have any maps of the area so you will have to continue your search once you get closer."

The younger man smiled, "That sounds amazing already, I won't complain because you couldn't give me pinpoint directions."

The conversation was interrupted by the arrival of another of Daxas's pack who had been working in the kitchen since they received the news of the wizard waking up. The woman entering the room with a large bowl of stew was almost a copy of Rose but with shorter jet-black hair and more triangular ears, she was also the one to use Kal's last piece of messenger parchment. Along with being the only one of the pack who knew how to read and write, she was also the only girl who knew how to cook in a human kitchen.

Rose took the bowl from the newcomer, setting it on the table next to the bed. As she stirred its contents Kal and Daxas excused themselves, promising to return after he had finished eating. The black-haired woman left a few minutes later once the other two assured her they didn't need any help.

Behind the mage, the collie gathered her legs under herself and sat the wizard up a bit further to make it easier for him to eat. Kelthor groaned inwardly as Rose brought the first spoonful of stew up to his lips. This was going to be a long recovery.

---

A dour-looking mage waved his hand above the bowl of water, wiping the image of the golden-haired dog girl feeding the wizard from its surface.

"Soon enough he will realize that his wards have been breached and recast all of them. Once that happens, we will lose our eyes into his tower and only be able to watch from a distance again," he said to the leader of the slavers standing next to him.

"Did you find out anything else about where he's headed next?" growled Kogen, still staring at the water's surface. Seeing the yellow bitch, the wolf and that fucking mage had him nearly seething with rage.

"South to the main road and then off to the west, towards Lantaris it sounds like." The man frowned, "You would be best to leave this one alone, Kogen. From their conversations, it sounds like the boy fought Kelthor to a standstill in the astral plane then did something to take him out for the last ten days. If that weren't impressive enough, he managed to remove all my collars without losing a single one of the bitches or getting himself killed, and now it looks like he's teaching them to defend themselves. You're good, Kogen, but I've watched as he spars with the women, he moves in ways I've never seen before. If you have your armor and sword you're evenly matched at best. If he takes any of the girls he's training with him, you don't stand a chance."

"I can't," said the slaver, "Rist, the thieves' guild, the beggars' guild, none of them will work with me until I bring his head back. Not only did he steal all of my stock, but he did it without killing any of my men. Now they're all laughing at me, saying I'm weak because a boy and his dog brought me down without wasting the effort to slit a throat. What's the news of the men I sent to Carris forest?"

"Dead."

"What!" Kogen roared in the robed man's face.

"What stupidity possessed you to think that was a good idea!" the wizard snapped. "You sent three idiots to retrieve seven bitches with sharp teeth and nothing to lose! They're lying in the forest with their throats ripped out and covered in what looks like dog piss. Now we've lost three more besides the two you killed and those who ran off when you couldn't pay them. Rest assured, when I compared you to the boy earlier, I was only speaking of your fighting abilities. When it comes to using your brain, he has you beaten by far."

"Don't yo..." Kogen went to grab the mage's robes. There was a bright flash and the leader of the slavers found himself hurtling into the wall behind him.

"You were warned to never raise a hand to me, Kogen," said the mage as he finished tracing a rune. "I'll leave you the collars I've made already. However, my employment ends here. Get out of my room." He held the rune out, pointing it at the armored man as he picked himself up off the floor and tried to exit the wizard's quarters with some semblance of pride and decorum.

As the door closed behind the slaver the mage waved a hand in its direction, activating the magical lock he had placed on it back when he first took this job. Taking a flat, round bundle of cloth out of his pocket, he unwrapped the small mirror inside and spoke the word written on the piece of fabric. The looking glass had mysteriously appeared in his robes during his last outing for supplies, it wasn't hard to guess who had put it there.

"Hello, Jerrin," said the mage when the leader of the thieves' guild appeared on the mirror. The wizard's eyes narrowed as he noticed the man appeared to be lying in bed and the image was bouncing with a familiar tempo.

"Ah! Farik! My sincerest apologies, you've caught me while I'm a bit occupied, but I was hoping to hear from you soon. I imagine that Kogen has run out of money to pay your wages?" asked the guild master.

"I have decided to leave his emplo... Dammit! Could you stop that bouncing?!"

Jerrin looked beyond the mirror, "What say you, ladies? Could you put things on hold for the wizard?" he asked turning it around. The scene changed to a woman facing away from him happily bouncing on the guild leader's prick as another woman with bright red hair standing on the foot of the bed held the bouncing girl's mouth to her sex, her torso rippling and legs shaking with pleasure.

The girl pulled back from licking the redhead's pussy, without missing a stroke she glanced back at the mirror, "Nope, but I'll make it up to him when he gets here." Though she didn't stop, the mage noticed that she changed her rhythm slightly, so the shaking wasn't nearly as bad. He caught himself moving his head to the side as Jerrin turned his mirror back around, trying to keep the women in view as the redhead grabbed a handful of hair and pulled girl's mouth back to her sex. Farik glared at the guild leader as the woman getting licked let out a long shuddering moan out of sight.

The wizard cleared his throat, "As I was saying, I am no longer working for him and I understand that you have already taken in one of Kogen's former employees. I was curious if you had room for another?"

"I can't pay you as much as Kogen was, but I would love to have you join us... The thieves guild that is... not 'us' as in 'the three of us,'" said Jerrin, making a small circular motion with a finger encompassing the bed. The mage wondered for a moment how this man ever ended up becoming the leader of the thieves' guild. "I have someone with a bag of holding, do you need me to send them?"

Farik shook his head, "No, I have one of my own, but an escort would be nice, someone Kogen won't mess with."

The man in the mirror looked up and the mage heard the redhead's voice in the background, "Let me finish up here and I'll be right over." There was a slight shuffling from the bottom of the bed before Farik heard, "Nope, you've had enough of that, go higher," followed by another long groan from the woman.

Jerrin smiled, "We'll see you in a couple of hours, Farik."

The mage stood there for a moment holding the mirror that now only showed his reflection. Wrapping it back up in the cloth, he called out, "Fex." A red, naked female figure with bat wings appeared above a bag lying on one of his worktables. People often mistook her for a small demon or succubus when in fact she was just naturally red in color and had the body of a normal human woman, something in how the bags were enchanted made the avatars pick some form of flight mechanism, Fex chose bat wings just for the fun of messing with people.

"Pack everything up, we're leaving."

----

"Gods, Kal. What have you done to this spell?" asked Kelthor, turning the parchment to each side with a mock look of confusion. He was familiar with the spell but a part of the rune that had been mostly barren but for a couple of glyphs was now littered with symbols. Another area had a couple of new glyphs, but he immediately understood the purpose of those was to move according to the caster's desires, instead of just following behind as normal.

"Try it," prompted Kal, smiling.

With a charged crystal and the paper containing Kal's handiwork in one hand, Kelthor carefully drew the rune in the air with the tip of his wand. As he got to the portion with all the extra symbols he began noticing a pattern, they appeared to be dimensions. With a final glance at Kal, the old wizard activated the glowing rune. Where the spell normally summoned a golden disc that floated around behind the mage, instead, a chair made of the same golden material appeared.

"Rose helped test it out, she was the one who suggested the ramp on the front for your legs with a lip, so you don't slide out," the young mage explained as he grabbed one of the pillows off the bed and threw it into the floating chair.

"You've done a horrible thing, Kal," said Kelthor shaking his head as he looked at the chair.

Kal stared at the man in confusion and more than a little disappointment that the wizard didn't seem to like his creation. "How?" he asked.

Kelthor affixed him with a serious stare, "If all I have to do is cast this in the morning and float around all day," the hint of a smile broke through his serious façade, "I'll never walk again."

Kal covered his eyes with his hand and shook his head, smiling as the old man began to chuckle.

"You had me there," admitted the young mage as he helped Kelthor to his feet and sat him in the golden chair.

The wizard took a moment to acquaint himself with moving and rotating the magical chair before looking up at Kal, "Thank you very much Kal, with you leaving in a couple of days this will be a huge help until I can get my legs back under me." He turned towards the door then looked back up at Kal, "This thing still goes up and down steps, right?"

---

"I have to do this, Kelthor," said Rose, the retriever's eyes pleading with the wizard. "Saying I'm sorry just doesn't feel like enough. I hated him. Truly and honestly hated him for what he did to you. Then to find out it wasn't even his fault, I feel horrible for thinking of him in that way and I need to do something before he leaves, or I'll never forgive myself."