The Unknown Realm #4 (Waverly Stump and The 7 Realms)

XLI

The days of winter dragged on at a slug's pace, however, evidence of contagious excitement amongst the townsfolk regarding the impending festival as well as the soonest arrival of Fall made one barely notice the slothful days. The weather filtered through several changes; from the warm and almost soothing heat of noon to the lingering, frostbitten cold midnights; which during one of such townsfolk had spotted the lovely occurrence of a white arc in the sky – a frostbow. The legendary weapon of a certain god's blood from olden days.

Waverly had seen the frostbow already – three nights in a row.

The first time, she had mistaken the circle for a simple train of cloud, but, upon closer inspection, realized that the phenomenon was something more. There was a single brilliant star rested at the head of the arc, twinkling like the frequent yet irregular blink of a human eye. She had stared at it for hours until sleep took her on the frozen windowsill and a deep shiver roused her at dawn. She told Judson about the frostbow, but he claimed to know nothing about it nor even heard of it before.

HalfHyde, on the one hand, told her that the frostbow was called Phanyrnid in the Alp tongue. Dream, in English. And it had once belonged to Talandren Forestcloak – mortal daughter of the Entonian, Hephus, god of dreams. The Zanaan was the last of godly children to ever exist in her time, born during the reign of the former Elf King, Cérodros Elegrindh, father of Javan. Waverly found it thrilling that Talandren was a Human despite the sad fact that the former's name and deeds were widespread only amongst Humans.

"Defeat of a Nobility be the accomplishment that drove Talandren to prominence. Alas, tis same became her very grim end." HalfHyde had further explained whilst perched over a heap of scrolls with his glasses almost falling off of his nose ridge.

"A Nobility? What is a Nobility?" Waverly inquired.

Her question had startled the Elf so much that he knocked a vial of ink near off the edge of the table. He perked up at once, his expression showing extreme surprise and faint traces of brewing anger.

"I take it a hilarity ye has meant the question to be and nothing more."

Waverly thinned her lips. Her father had taught her about such things repeatedly, but she could not quite recall them. The one thing that irked him even more than her usual inattentiveness was her ability to swiftly forget, and she felt strangely nostalgic as the Elf glared at her, waiting for a tangible reply. The more he stared, the more difficult it became for her retentivity to kickstart.

Instead, she blinked and faked a sheepish smile.

"Of course, Pa. I was merely joking. I do know what a Nobility is."

HalfHyde's eyebrows sterned. "Pray tell to me what."

A pack of Rages. Her inner voice whispered. She could have sworn she heard it giggle too.

"A group of Rages." Waverly replied and drew in progressive breaths of relief when her father nodded and returned to glaring at his scrolls.

After that, she opted to speak to Judson about such delicate topics instead. Thankfully, Abelena's threats remained mere words and nothing of dreadful sorts had happened to him. Waverly was yet to be given the unstated punishment Henry had threatened some many days back because it seemed that Lord Malcer's advocation about there being no instance of physical violence made sense after all. They could do nothing to her as long as she made no attempts to hit Abelena. The latter, on the flipside, was working incredibly hard to make a confrontation inevitable.

The High Scribe's daughter had set out inconspicuous little traps around town for Waverly to fall into, making sure to be absent herself so as to properly deny any involvement.