Tanya (1/3)

Several weeks later, the first snow comes down, and the villagers spend less and less time outside. The only person who regularly goes out is Haalfrin, since he can easily use magic to heat his own body up.

Still, when the villagers DO go out, it's usually to visit each other, rather than working. Thanks (in no small part) to Haalfrin, everyone has more than enough food stored away for the winter, and all of their urgent house projects are caught up on.

When the winter reaches its harshest point, several of the villagers congregate in the largest houses to conserve warmth, as well as keep each other company.

The idle, winter months ARE the best time to relax and socialize. After a manner of speaking, winter is the only holiday farmers really have.

During the winter months, Haalfrin ends up staying in the chiefs house with two other small families – one of which is Tanya and her son.

For several months, Haalfrin teaches the children interesting facts about nature – how the earth is really round, and how the worlds hurdle through space.

Of course, to keep the kids entertained, he uses telepathy magic to transmit information and images directly into their minds – helping them see planets and stars in real time.

Seeing Haalfrin get along so well with the kids, their father asks Haalfrin, "Are you sure you want to leave after the snow thaws?"

Haalfrin thinks for a moment, then nods his head. "I'd mind as well."

Tanya flinches when she hears Haalfrin's answer, though her reaction goes unnoticed by everyone else.

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Only a few days into their stay in this cramped house, Tayna approaches Haalfrin and sits next to him. At first, she doesn't say anything, but then she points to the bone ax laying at his feet. "What is that thing? Whenever I look at it, I feel a little scared. I heard the chief say that it's a magical weapon."

Haalfrin nods. "Yeah. It's ax made from dragon bone."

Tanya goes wide eyed. "That's a dragon?! I've heard of dragons before! I heard stories that the Felkri Kingdom to the south is being terrorized by a dragon. The thing keeps raiding the farms and taking food. He even harasses the king. I heard from Mr. Alas that he had to stop traveling to Felkri to sell his goods after the dragon woke up again two years ago."

"Oh? A dragon?" Haalfrin smiles with amusement.

Tanya nods her head enthusiastically. "Oh? You've never heard of him? The dragon's name is Lord Dakka. He's been around for hundreds of years… I thought you'd have heard about him?"

Dakka's ax shakes with pride. 'Ha! They're still telling stories about me! Aren't I famous!?'

'Terrorizing the countryside isn't something to be proud of,' Haalfrin rebukes telepathically. 'Besides, I thought dragons were righteous and chivalrous?'

'What? I only took what I needed! That makes me chivalrous. Other dragons would've flattened half the country just to satisfy their pride. Aren't I considerate?'

Haalfrin rolls his eyes out of instinct at Dakka's stupid claim. Being the shiniest and most pleasant smelling turd doesn't make you any less disgusting to hold. Being the most well mannered of a race of tyrannical monsters doesn't say very much about your character.

Tanya doesn't know that Haalfrin is having a conversation with another person, since he's talking telepathically. So, when she sees him derisively roll his eyes, she actually gets a little scared. "Um… Did I say something wrong?"

Haalfrin snaps out of his thoughts, and he looks at Tanya. "Oh? No, sorry. I was just talking to this thing?" he says as he kicks the ax away. "I rolled my eyes because he said something stupid."

"He said something?" the village elder says in a questioning tone.

"Dragon spirits are stored in their bones when they die, and this guy is pretty chatty."

"Oh? What's his name?" Tanya asks while eyeing the ax curiously.

"Lord Dakka."

"!!!" ~ Tanya

"!!!" ~ Mr. & Mrs. Alas

"!!!" ~ the village elder

"???" ~ the children

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Over the rest of the winter, Haalfrin gets to know everyone in this house very well. Haalfrin ends up telling everyone about his past with the Kareen, and he even educates them on the Kareen's foreign origin – something even the modern Kareen seem to have forgotten.

In turn, Tayna talks about how she and her husband were childhood sweethearts. However, he was killed by Kareen a few months after their marriage. Everyone in the village felt sorry for her – especially because she'd moved dozens of miles away from home in order to be with him here. So, they all pitched in and built a house for her.

Sadly, the house got damaged by rot and neglect, since Tanya herself didn't know how to maintain the thing, and she was far too shy to ask anyone else for more help.

Mr. and Mrs. Alas have a lot to say as well. Apparently, Mr. Alas used to take his wife on his trading trips every summer, but that eventually stopped once she started having children. She felt it wasn't safe to bring such young ones out on long trips away from home.

Along the way, the kids make Mr. Alas tell them about dragons. When they hear about how it's a talking, magical beast that towers taller than the highest building, they all get super excited, and they make Haalfrin tell them about how he killed it.

Haalfrin looks up and thinks for a moment. 'How am I supposed to answer this? In order to properly tell them the story, I'd have to tell them how my Name powers work… Is that wrong? I don't think it is?'

No… It's more than that. He knows that these people see him as an average mage, so if he goes into detail about how overpowered he is, that would either come across as bragging. 'I can just oversimplify the story… a little…'

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In the end, Haalfrin tells the story by first talking about how the dragon was killed at the Pit.

"The Pit?" the village chief raises an eyebrow at this. "The empire's prison for mages? Were you a guard there?"

"No. I was a prisoner."

"Oh… Sorry about that."

Haalfrin shakes his head. "I don't mind. I was put there because I made my king angry, but that king is dead now, so I don't have to care about that anymore. Anyway…"

Haalfrin then makes drawing motions, and glowing images start appearing in the air. "The Pit was shaped like this, and the walls were several hundred feet high…."

He spends a few minutes talking about the defenses on the place – about the enchanted golem warriors, as well as the thousands of mana cannons on the walls.

"Eventually Lord Dakka destroyed the enchantment nexus keeping all the magic in the prison up. Once the barrier keeping me prisoner went down, I was free to go. I made my way up to the surface, and I started fighting him."

"How'd you beat him?" one of the kids asks.

"What'd the dragon look like!?" another kid asks.

"I want another light show!" Kamyen demands excitedly while hopping side to side and making grabbing motions with his stubby little fingers.

"Well, I know a bit of spirit magic, you see," Haalfrin says. "A lot of my innate spells lets me touch people's spirits. That's how I was able to kill all those raiders before without even moving. I attacked their spirits and killed them."

"Anyway, a lot of guards had died during the attack, and their spirits were feeling very unwilling to accept defeat. So, I offered to use my magic to help them get revenge. So, all the dead soldier's spirits possessed all the excess weapons lying around, and I fought him for a long time that way."

Haalfrin lifts his head up and laughs. "Even after I was knocked unconscious, the restless spirits kept fighting. They got really creative too. They started modifying the enchantments in the fortress to make the mana stones explode everywhere."

"By the time I woke up again, Dakka had been severely injured. I took the opportunity to finish him off."

After Haalfrin finishes the story, Dakka's ax quakes in anger. 'You skipped all the good parts! NO! I mean, you made me sound like a weakling!' he roars in Haalfrin's mind.

Tanya gets a worried look on her face. "Haalfrin? Is the dragon angry that you're talking about his death and laughing about it? I think you're being a little rude to him."

Haalfrin shrugs. "Sure. We'll go with that."

'No! Haalfrin! Don't move on!' Dakka shouts. 'You didn't show the kids how powerful I look with your illusion magic! Aren't you going to show them!?'

Haalfrin ignores Dakka. He then wraps him up in a cloth and stuffs him in a corner.

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Two months later, the snow finally thaws, and everyone starts venturing out of their houses and stretching their stiff legs.

Spring is usually a welcome sight, but many of the villagers are feeling a little despondent. Their mage HAD promised to leave before the next spring and… well… the "next spring" just arrived.

True to his word, Haalfrin goes back to his house and starts packing his belongings.

On his way down the road leading away from town, he finds Tanya sitting on a rock beside the road, as if she was waiting for him.

"Haalfrin?" she asks, "Before you go… can I have a word with you?"

"Sure. What do you need? Wait, where's your son?" Haalfrin expected to see Tanya looking after him right now; she's so protective of that boy that he's never seen her more than 10 feet away from him.

"The chief's looking after him right now. I'd like this conversation to be private."

Haalfrin feels his heart thump momentarily. Judging by how her spirit is knotting itself up, Haalfrin already has a feeling of where this conversation is going.

Sure enough, Tanya looks at the ground in shame and embarrassment, and she says, "Would you mind staying behind? I… I know how lost and lonely you must be feeling – finally getting out of prison and finding that everything you knew is gone. It's just… I'd like you to know that there's a place for you here."

Haalfrin's heart thumps again. Sure, the life here was very simple, but there's some primal part of him that felt relaxed and satisfied here. He felt what it was like to be part of a community, and nobody judged him for his past. More than that, because of his magic, he felt like he had a unique place among these people.

"So… you want me to stay behind and be the village mage?" Haalfrin asks.

Tanya goes red in the face, and she looks down again. "N… no? I mean, that too, I guess. I… I was just thinking about how much of a positive influence you've had on my son. I came to realize that you'd make a great father… So… you could stay behind and live with me? I'd like you to be my son's father."

Haalfrin almost snorts a laugh at how indirect this girl is being right now. She seems so scared of being rejected that she feels like she has to dance around the subject of proposing to him.

Still, Haalfrin can't deny that he's felt very happy while living here, and being around Tanya has made him feel at peace in a very profound way. It's as if being around her erases all need for worries or drama.

'I could come home to a person like that,' Haalfrin thinks. 'Besides, I've always wanted a family…'

The reason Haalfrin had refrained from getting married as a Kareen was because he was sure he was going to die young; he didn't want to irresponsibly make a woman a widow. Later, when he was seeking death in battle, he avoided women for the same reason. What kind of monster leaves children behind, then actively tries to get himself killed?

Now…? A kind wife and a child to raise is being offered to him on a silver platter. He can't help but at least consider it.

'That's right,' he thinks, 'if it's with Tanya, I think I can be happy…' He's not quite able to articulate WHY he wants to marry her; it just feels right.

'But… what about our difference in lifespan?' Haalfrin thinks in alarm. 'She'll age to death long before me! Do I really want to go through that kind of painful separation?'

The moment after this thought flits through his mind, he bats it aside, 'Gah! What's the point in worrying about it?! If you always whine about your fear of the future, you'll never do anything. People who never do anything are left with regrets for all eternity. I don't want to regret anything anymore!'

So, Haalfrin pauses in his footsteps, then walks closer to Tanya. "Did the village chief put you up to this?" This is a valid concern, since the chief would certainly do whatever he needs to in order to keep the mage around.

Tanya vehemently shakes her head. "No! I… I've been thinking about it ever since winter started."

Haalfrin can tell from reading her spirit that she's not lying. Knowing this, his heart is finally put at ease.

Instead of vocally answering her, Haalfrin takes his coat off and wraps it around her, since he saw her shivering from the cold.

Tanya immediately goes red in the face, and her breathing gets hot.

In her culture, sharing clothes of any kind is only acceptable between close relatives, or husband and wife. Haalfrin knows this particular about her culture too…

... That means his action was him tacitly accepting her proposal.