Wielder

Chapter 24 - Disguise

Somewhere in Alie's gut, warmth blossomed like a flower in bloom.

Hoping the flush hadn't spread to her cheeks, she turned on her heel and started walking, not caring where exactly she was headed. "I think I saw a town that way," she called to him over her shoulder. "You'd better start teaching, because I want a hot meal when we get there."

He jogged to catch up, striding along to her right, while Michael joined them at her left. Together, like the inseparable unit they were, they strolled the flowery hills into the darkening night.

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Alie followed Darrel's instruction to the letter. The best way to hide, he said, was in plain sight. If they were going to blend in, first they would need to make disguises. It was easy enough to change her clothes and the look of her face with her imagination, but as Michael had no magic, she had to disguise him, too. She made them look like a plain middle-aged couple. She thought about making them older, but Darrel pointed out that if she looked too old, no one would believe that she had crossed the world on foot.

Darrel, strangely enough, decided to keep himself at around the same age. "I can pretend to be your son," he shrugged, as his face became unrecognizable, but no less handsome.

Not that she told him that.

The second thing they would need to hide were weapons. Darrel's swords disappeared easily enough with a wave of his hand. Michael ditched the sword he had stolen, asking Alie to imagine him another pistol instead. He tucked it easily into the folds of the loose-fitting vest she imagined for him.

The Ultimate was harder to hide. Magic didn't seem to want it to turn invisible, and tucking it in the folds of her dress couldn't completely conceal it. She had to wrap a light cloak around her shoulders to fully hide it.

But what was the most difficult to hide, was the magic itself. Nothing could fool a magic seeker, Darrel said, but unless soldiers were actively on alert for someone, it would be unlikely that one would be around to find them. What they needed was to hide the fact that they were using magic to disguise themselves. It wasn't easy to do, as the stuff liked to cling to her skin like glitter. But after a while, she managed to calm it down enough that it lost its shine.

They entered the town late. Thankfully, no one paid them much mind.

Darrel suggested they raid one of the restaurant kitchens after the establishment closed for the night, but Alie refused to let him do any more thieving. She may borrow his tricks, but she didn't want him committing any more crimes, either. Instead, she told one of the restaurant staff that she and her family had run out of traveling money and were willing to work for a meal. The man she spoke to smiled appreciatively at her. He didn't have work for her, he said, but he directed her to another restaurant that did.

That night, they scrubbed dishes and floors, and ate until they thought they would burst.

Then they set back off into the night, preferring to sleep out in the open where no one would see them so they could shirk their disguises and fearlessly use magic to make themselves more comfortable. They woke with the sun, and headed to the nearest portal.

They quickly fell into a new routine: wake, practice swordsmanship, work for some lunch and spare coin in the local town. Search for anything that might be out of place. Buy or work for dinner, camp outside of town, and disappear.

Alie made a point to keep on the alert for any signs that the worlds they traveled to might be in distress. The crystal had seemed to take them straight to each world's corruption, but without it, she had to search for it herself. The first few worlds they passed through had no signs of corruption at all, at least none that she could see. As she worked and talked with the locals, she tried to ask subtle questions of whether they knew what was causing the corruption in the first place. She had her suspicions, but with no confirmation, she felt hesitant about her next steps.