Savages

A person came running into the garden, their hasty steps sounded dull in the dirt, "Alya! We need to leave!" He stopped next to her, "Excuse me." He picked her up and started running into the opposite direction of the noise. Along with the fires, it had moved deeper into the city. The flames got smaller, only one stayed close.

"What is going on?"

"Slaves are revolting." Olaf continued breathing through his nose. He had been running drills his whole life, these thirty seconds had not tired him.

Alya felt metal on Olaf's body. She took a peek with her blue eye. He had put on a silvery armor, it covered everything but his joints and his head. A hammer the length of a short sword cradled on his waist. Olaf had shoulder long blond hair, but a brown beard covered his face. Determined, his blue eyes watched the streets around them.

It was not too bad to be carried around everywhere, but Alya started getting tired of it already. She wished for a spell to replace her legs, but that seemed too specific.

"Sir!" A voice shouted at them. Olaf slowed down. The man was wheezing, but pushed himself to talk, "What's the plan?"

Olaf turned back into the direction he had previously followed, "We run."

Outside of the town, the crown's men regrouped. Many of them were injured, some even died. They had two carriages drawn by horses and were now travelling to a nearby city. They were certain this town was not the only one beeing stormed. They saw smoke rising to the sky near the road multiple times.

Together with some of the injured soldiers and civilians, Alya shared one of the wagons, "I definitely need to get wheels once we get to the city." The others in the wagon were quietly griefing. "This mood is in the gutters." Alya was bored, so started 'translating' the tome:

Whenever there is a need to see people without seeing them, to see if they are alive, understand that living is an effect, death is a passive status everything falls into at some point. Almost all is dead, life is rare. Only then will one be able to see the living between the dead. The earth beneath ones feet, the walls, flesh, it will become nothing and one will find to be surrounded by souls slowly turning into thin air.

Souls were what Alya had called the fires from the beginning. The term felt fitting, but she did not understand the colors. She looked around with the spell, she coined it 'soul vision'.

Most of them had simply light blue or cyan souls, they might have been slightly different in hue, but she could not tell a difference. There were poeple with differences, a man walking beside the carriage had a turquoise soul. One of the army's men, who rode on horses had a darker blue color. The farthest away from its original color, was Olaf. His fire burned in a white color with a hint of a blue tint.

It must have been something with magic, but what do the different colors mean. Olaf was a user of light magic, this was visibly reflected in his soul. Cyan seemed to be the base color of the soul, Alya was still unsure what magic the different colors meant.

It turned dark quickly. Nobody had followed the small caravan, so they stopped to sleep for the night. The campfire was surrounded by people, some had blankets. A couple of them stayed inside the wagon, a few knights were set to watch their surroundings.

Aside from the crackling fire, it was silent. Owls calls had echoed through the woods a few times.

"How do you feel?" Olaf sat down next to Alya.

"Good. It's nice... and warm"

Olaf sighed while he smiled. He opened his mouth to say something, but only shook his head. He still wondered just who he had found on the street. Alya seemed different. She could have been stupid, but Olaf preferred the option of her beeing a positive-minded dreamer. She was never in a bad mood. On one hand, she could be lying in her deathbed and get distracted by a hair in her mouth, yet she could be focused on something to the point of overhearing him calling her name. Her voice was breathy, always calm and soothing, the pitch rarely fluctuated much. The monotony could get painful during a conversation, but in the moment Olaf needed it, he was more than overwhelmed.

Olaf thought back to what happened. It may go down in history if it goes out of hand. "The slaves are revolting again. That's a sentence no one has ever said." He thought. Slaves were brought to the continent from a distand chain of islands. There were thousands of them scattered across the whole Kingdom. If they united to fight the army, with only some luck, they could win. Olaf was not sure on whos side the common folk were, either. If the civilians decided to join, it could turn from a revolt to a revolution. Even if they were unable to beat the army, bordering countries would surely fall into the lands to plunder or conquer the weakened King's lands.

Olaf turned to look at Alya. He noticed her nose, it was somewhat pointy, with a straight bridge, "What do you think about the slaves?" He kept looking at her, thinking he went unnoticed.

"I think they are destined to get violent. I don't like violence." Alya was feeling through a page of her book once again.

"Why do you always have that book? Is it readable by blind people?"

"Yes, the symbols are indented into the page." He held the book in front of him. He saw something unexpected.

"Those are runes, aren't they? Are you actually a magician?" Olaf strayed further from understanding her.

"I went to the academy near the village I was born in." She answered.

"Where was that?"

"I don't remember, but I probably would if I cared about the place." Alya smiled at Olaf. It was an honest smile, but Olaf felt mixed emotions. He hoped there was a family or a friend missing her somewhere.