Battle Mage: Winds of Change (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 11) (15 page)

"I believe the saying is 'when one door closes, there could be an open window' or something to that point," Liam corrected the younger mage.

"I don't mind looking, but if one of them wants to open the window, I'm game," the boyish mage laughed loud enough to make some of the girls look over at their table. Sebastian almost thought the looks were telling the men that they couldn't enjoy themselves without the females, though they were having enough fun by themselves.

Sebastian shook his head slowly, "You are still chasing women. I don't think you will ever grow up entirely."

"I should hope not!" Elzen retorted with another laugh. "I'm too young to be acting like an old man, that's for sure; but I hope I never lose my love for the ladies.

"You still haven't answered my question, but I have to say that I believe I must have a preference for a certain type of girl though. Dark haired beauties about my height, they kind of turn me on, I guess," the boy said with amusement.

Sebastian and the others had sometimes debated on whether the mermaids had actually followed him to leave the island to look for husbands. Their people had been reduced in numbers by the slave trade the pirates practiced. Too few men near their age remained. Both men and women had been sold over the years leaving their community very small. Sebastian wouldn't mind finding out where the pirates had taken the others in the past to try and free more of their people; but even if he knew where they were, it would be hard to free them without a lot of money.

Some countries didn't care about others' rights and allowed the slave trade to continue. A mage from Southwall could hardly go to another country to demand that they change their laws and practices. Instead, he could start a war being from another nation.

Liam replied to Elzen pulling Sebastian from his thoughts, "Well, her sister likes battle mages, so maybe Naoromi might like them too. Of course, Olan is also a lot taller and considered handsome by the girls from what I gather."

Frowning at the water wizard, Elzen waved off the remark saying, "I do pretty well myself. Thanks for the vote of confidence."

Sebastian shrugged at Liam saying, "It's true. Elzen doesn't worry over rejection. He would ask one girl to dance, if she said no; he'd move on until he found one that would say yes to him."

"Yes, to a dance or a kiss or whatever," Elzen replied with a wicked looking smile. While he acted like a player, Sebastian doubted that the younger mage was quite as advanced as he would like the other men to believe. On the other hand, while Elzen had been willing to talk about other girls with him, Bas rarely said much although until Yara and Ashleen, there hadn't been a lot to talk about.

"Did we ever figure out if they were here looking for husbands, Bas?" Liam questioned giving the mage a sly smile. Usually talks of marriage would drive most young men away, especially those who liked pursuing multiple women.

Elzen rolled his eyes and ignored the water wizard. "Bas, really, come on. Have you heard her talking about anyone in particular?"

"I rarely talk about romance with a pair of girls I barely know," the owl said refusing to talk more. He knew of a couple men that had been interested in the mermaids, but those had been more like stalkers and had required extra motivation to leave them alone. Again that made him feel more like a protective brother keeping undesirable men away from his sisters.

"Well, I guess I'll just have to ask her to dance tonight and see if she says yes," the younger mage stated deciding to throw caution to the wind.

"Aren't you going back with Darius to Windmeer, Elzen?" Sebastian asked changing the subject abruptly.

Looking confused by the sudden question, the boy sat forward in his chair leaning onto the table with his elbows. "We're using rooms here for tonight and until your little conference on this new gate is finished."

"I know. I meant after that."

"Why do you ask?"

Sebastian leaned onto the table with one elbow resting his chin on his hand before idly tapping his lips with his fingers a moment in thought. "Well, I have lost a lot of my team to new postings or missions and thought if you were getting tired of helping Darius, maybe you'd want to come work with me for a little while. Since you are one of the few healers besides me in the corps, I was curious if I could pass on some of the other magic I've learned to you.

"If I can, maybe that means other healer mages can be taught the same things."

"You might be reaching with that idea," Elzen replied leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. "I've tried a lot of your spells. Not every one of them I can do. It's more like half maybe."

"But still, maybe things like the rune spells or working with metal to make Hollow Swords would be something we have in common."

Wrinkling his nose, Elzen said, "I might be able to learn them, but I don't think I'd have the patience to stand in a hot room hammering on steel to make a sword. The process just takes too long and looks really boring to me. I doubt that I'd have the patience for it."

Sebastian sighed understanding his friend's resistance to the idea. It certainly wasn't a type of magic that everyone could appreciate or enjoy, but his hope to find other men to help produce more Hollow Swords was still an ember burning inside of him. While the mage enjoyed the peace he felt creating the right mixture of metals and making new items, he could tell that it was an acquired taste. Ashleen still followed him into the forge, but the girl did it to win him over and spend time with him more than because she had any love of it.

As dinner time arrived, the two groups move to join each other. The Black Smith Inn had large tables and small, so they formed up with a couple places to spare if Sebastian's other mages returned in time for dinner. Sometimes they ate at the mage garrison building first. The meals were free after all and they would come after supper to join the others for dancing and socializing.

Elzen found his way to sitting beside Naoromi. At first the girl merely took him to be a friend finding an available seat, but the boy tried his best to be charming as he struck up a conversation with the mermaid. While Sebastian watched him trying, he also noticed the frowns Rilena tried to hide at his attention.

When the music began, Elzen led the dark haired mermaid onto the floor. Rilena remained at their table and Sebastian noted her disappointed looks at the dance floor as the two danced together.

"Would you mind if I asked Rilena to the dance floor first?" he quietly asked Ashleen. The girl could tell that he hoped to talk and learn what was going on between the two mages.

She nodded but warned, "Be careful. She tries to hide her emotions, but Rilena's more sensitive than she wants to let on."

Taking the warning to heart, Sebastian knew as much anyway. He and Rilena had become close, but they were never more than friends. Since he had originally had Yara on his mind, their relationship could be nothing more than that.

Sebastian pulled his friend to the dance floor and Rilena eyed him warily. She knew that the man wouldn't dance with her before Ashleen unless he had other motives behind it.

Not pulling any punches, he asked bluntly, "Ok, what is going on with you two?"

Though he rarely interfered with anyone's personal lives, especially if it had anything to do with romance, since the mage felt completely inept at helping someone with a topic he was just a novice at himself; these were two of his best friends.

Her dark eyes seemed to darken more as she tried to deflect his interest, "What do you mean?"

"Come on, Rilena, I know something happened between you two; but every time I see you and Elzen, there seems to be a bigger gap."

"There's nothing going on between us," she replied still appearing wary. "We just had a strange incident after you left Windmeer, that's all."

"What kind of incident?"

Letting out a sigh, the young woman's lips turned pouty as Rilena looked at him and asked, "You're really not going to let this go?"

Offering a wry smile, the owl returned, "Have you ever seen me give up on something once I've set my mind to it?"

Groaning in annoyance, Rilena asked, "You've heard what happened after you left Windmeer, correct?"

"You joined the army from Windmeer to take down Garosh's fortress only to have him surrender. Once the man was in Windmeer, you wound up being one of his guards until you had to flee from Palose and some witch who killed several people including her own assassins."

She nodded. "On the trip to the fortress I met Elzen. He even saved my life once and healed me. It was kind of like having you back with me, which I really needed on that trip. The weather was horrible and the enemy werewolves and werecats would fade in and out of sight using the snow to escape only to hit us again.

"When Garosh surprised both sides by surrendering without a fight, it made me angry having to see him walking among us like he was trying to be our friend. He even apologized to me personally as well as Nereith and Druick," she said speaking of her fellow prisoners. The three had been captured by Garosh's creatures to be brought to a prison inside a mountain fortress where he proceeded to use torture to try and discover why they had found him. Sebastian's wind riding had caught the enemy using a portal on the mountain and they had split off from the ambassador's party to scout out what he had seen in the mountains where no orc or goblin should have been.

The owl had managed to free them before too much damage had been done, but it had lingered with the girl for a long time.

"So Elzen helped you dealing with Garosh as well, I take it?"

"He was a friend and enough like you that I could forget that I barely knew him, but he was more of a kid than you. There were times where you'd think that he couldn't take anything seriously."

Knowing Elzen since he had first arrived in White Hall, Sebastian knew of his friend's shortcomings. Not everyone could deal with the class clown, but Elzen hid a quality mage behind his antics. Rilena had seen both sides of the young man in her time.

Rilena continued, "When the assassins came, Garosh says he was trying to save me by pulling me through a portal. He used the blood of a dying man to make the gate, which is strange since he was more powerful than any wizard I have met ever.

"Anyway, eventually the assassins found a way into the fortress also and Garosh shoved me into another portal telling me to think of someone I knew in Windmeer. The first one to come to mind was Elzen, so I came through a gate landing on him in the baths."

"In the bath?" Sebastian echoed unable to stop the laughter in his tone.

Her eyes narrowed as the young woman went on with her story, "Yes, he was in the bathhouse. Who knew that he actually bathed?

"It was an awkward situation and I was wet so I had to change in the men's dressing room also. He was mostly dressed and I had a robe, but for some reason we wound up kissing each other. We even started to get closer for a little while, but I couldn't make myself be his girlfriend. He is too young and immature, but I did like what I saw of him on that mission though."

Her voice trailed off and Rilena seemed unsure what else to say. Picking up from what she had said, Sebastian moved a little closer to speak quietly in her ear. The music was loud and in the middle of a song, so he didn't need to whisper, but Sebastian didn't want someone to overhear them on the off chance either.

"So you started to have feelings for him, but decided to make yourself believe that he is too young for you. You probably even talked yourself into not getting too close because the odds were that you would be transferred again, after all you came to Windmeer with me on a different mission. Falcon's Keep was our original base, but we both wound up traveling in different directions and never returned."

He felt her muscles tense at his assessment and the owl knew that he was correct. While Sebastian had studied, the mage discovered that not every problem was something he could or should solve, especially where women were involved. As her friend, Sebastian just hoped that he could at least help her work out her true feelings.

"If you didn't have to worry over being transferred, would you say that you would give him a chance? You complain that he's too young, but he's just two years younger than you and you're both full falcons also; so that is just another excuse I think."

"We're too different," Rilena breathed into his ear keeping her words quiet despite the noise around them. "I like Elzen and I don't want to hurt him, but I think I initially kissed him just because he was there to comfort me. He was a strong shoulder to lean on, even if he does act like a child half the time. When I needed him to be strong, he was."

"Being different doesn't mean it couldn't work out," he started to protest. Some said opposites could attract after all, surely Rilena and Elzen weren't as different as she made them out to be. They were both mages after all.

"Is that what you told yourself before you and Yara broke up?" the dark haired woman retorted without apparent anger, but her words caught him with the strength of a slap even so.

"I don't think that was why we broke up. She was younger than me by more years than there is between you and Elzen, but even that wasn't truly why. Yara saw Ashleen as a threat and talked herself into believing that I couldn't remain true to her.