Even though it was during the day and they didn't need any light to see by, Isiah practised with the stone anyway. Every night during their long travels, he had been able to light a fire for them to cook by. He was proud of himself, being able to control the power even a little bit, but there was still a lot of work to be done.
They were taking a break, exhausted from the constant walking. It was starting to take a toll on them all. They would need to find a town soon, with soft beds to sleep in and hot baths to have. He felt dirty and when he looked at his hands, they were covered in muck. He didn't want to know what the rest of him looked like.
Emrick sat in front of him, the makings for a fire between them. Rina and Nerin weren't too far away, practising sword fighting again. He didn't like the fact that someone so young wanted to fight, but it wasn't his decision to make. If Nerin wanted to experience the same violence as him, then so be it. Isiah already knew that there was no way he was getting all the stones without seeing people die.
As long as he didn't hurt or kill anyone else, he would be fine. Thinking about it still left an awful taste in his mouth and a sick feeling in his stomach. He pushed the thoughts away. He couldn't change what he had done, but he could at least atone for it by helping the realm. Doing so meant mastering the thing that had caused him to kill so many, but that meant no more people would die by his hand.
"So," Emrick said, staring down at the stone in Isiah's hand. "How does it work exactly?"
"I'm honestly not sure," he said. "I can feel the power flowing everywhere and I just try to grab ahold of it, if that makes sense, and make it mine. That parts the easy part, it's getting it to do what I want that's a little more tricky."
Emrick huffed in amusement. "You are terrible at explanations," he said.
Isiah shrugged. "I don't know how else to explain it," he replied. The stone was strange and still very unknown to him, how could he possibly explain what it was like to use it? It was like a rush of power flooding through him that he didn't know what to do with, except it was his and, with enough effort, would bow to him. Emrick could only understand if he could use the stone for himself, which he couldn't.
"That's alright," Emrick said with a wave of his hand. "The most important thing is that you practice using it."
He didn't even know how the flames would be useful aside from cooking food. The stone itself already kept them warm enough, they wouldn't need a fire for that. The answer was obvious though, he was meant to hurt people with it. The Beast was meant to be a protector, but he couldn't protect without hurting people.
At least, that's what people believed. He wanted to prove them all wrong. He wasn't going to hurt another soul if he could help it. He would save the realm as he was destined to do, but he would do without any violence on his part. Emrick and Rina and Nerin could do what they wanted, he didn't control their actions, but he would not fight.
As he had every other day, he held the stone tight and concentrated on creating a fire. All he had to do was picture it in his mind and thin tendrils of smoke drifted up between him and Emrick. As with every other time he had done it, pride flowed through him. With enough practice, he wouldn't have another accident like at the Sanctum and the laboratory.
"You're getting a lot better at that," Emrick told him as the fire raged between them.
"Creating campfires is pretty easy, I suppose," he replied, giving the other man a small smile.
"I wish that was true," Emrick said, frowning down at the slowly melting snow. There was something in his expression that Isiah couldn't read clearly.
He wanted to reach around and put a hand on his knee but resisted. "Are you alright?" he asked instead.
The other man nodded. "Aye, just reliving some old memories."
"Did you want to talk about them?" he asked before he could stop himself. It was obviously a personal thing, but he couldn't stop the words from spilling out of his mouth.
Emrick didn't seem all that offended by the question. "When I first Turian, I saved his life, twice," he said. Isiah listened intently. Emrick's word felt like ones that hadn't been said in a long time. "The first time, I stopped him from being mugged in my hometown. People like him, Princes, I suppose, are attacked constantly in the border towns."
"Why?" Isiah asked and immediately realised that the answer was obvious.
"They're all poor. Someone like Turian is rich. And people like Turian have a bad habit of walking into these towns dressed in their fancy clothes," Emrick explained, fiddling with a stick on the ground. "They're easy targets too, meaning that anyone could go after him."
Isiah frowned. "He didn't come with a guard?"
"No," the other man replied with a shake of his head. "Turian was a bad Prince. He left the family to become a scientist and believed he didn't need servants or guards or anything like that."
It was strange to him that a prince would choose to live like that when they could have everything, but he didn't say as much to Emrick. "Admirable," he said instead.
Emrick hummed in agreement. "When he was being mugged, he willingly gave them his money. He'd always been kind, right from the start. So when they attacked him, I jumped in to help.
"The thing was, these people were practically in charge of the town and so, when I jumped in, it made me a target. I had to leave. Turian was grateful for my help and offered me a room in his laboratory for a couple of days until I could figure my own way out."
Obviously, it had lasted more than a couple of days. With the fire smouldering between them, he took the chance to cook up what was left of the meat. It would do for lunch, they would have to buy more when they finally reached a town. "What was the second time?"
"On our way back to his laboratory. It snowed pretty heavily and his powers weren't doing anything," Emrick answered, reaching over to help him with the food. "I knew how to start a fire because it's the only way I can keep warm. We found a cave to stay in for the night and I kept us warm."
"Is that why he asked you to be his apprentice?" Isiah asked. He never expected Emrick to share so much, the man seemed so closed off from other people.
Emrick laughed again. "No, that was at his laboratory. He caught me reading his books and was surprised that I could actually read them," he said and smiled at the ground. "I corrected something he had written and when I proved it correct, he asked if I wanted to be his apprentice."
It was a happy story and once again Isiah felt guilty that Turian had been ripped away from him. The guilt would never go away, but somehow, talking about it made him feel a little about what had happened, but also a little worse. With time, it would get better.
"I can see you feeling guilty, Isiah, stop it," Emrick said, a small smile pulling at his lips.
Isiah huffed out a laugh. "Sorry." He wouldn't though, not then and probably not ever, but the severity of it would lessen. A grunt sounded behind him and he turned to watch Nerin fall in the snow, Rina standing above him with a huge grin.
He turned back around with a shake of his head. Emrick was still cooking the meat and barely paying attention to what was going on around them. Isiah watched him in silence, so many questions running through his mind. He didn't know how much of them he could ask without offending the other man.
"What are you staring at me like that for?" Emrick asked. His eyes widened and he averted his gaze, watching the flames dance in front of him.
He took a deep breath. "I was wondering... What exactly do you believe in if you don't believe in religion?" he asked. "I know it's science, even if I don't know what exactly that entails, but what do you believe created the universe?"
Amusement twinkled in Emrick's eyes. "I don't know," he answered and Isiah frowned in confusion. "That's a big part of science, discovering the real answers to the universe. Turian and I were looking into it before we got Harudan's raven, but we hadn't discovered much."
Science was strange and it made little sense to him, but he nodded anyway. To him, the real answers to the universe were that Teremtys, God of creation, and their siblings had made the world thousands of years ago, creating a race of people each and gifting them diluted versions of their powers. Supposedly, Belganine, Nyat, and Teremtys's people died out thousands of years ago, leaving only the Ishini and Askari behind.
The story of the world according to the followers of Sol and Lune was different and he didn't remember how it went. He would have to ask Rina and Nerin later if he was curious enough. The fact that science didn't have a set origin of the world was unusual to him, but it still piqued his curiosity. He wanted to learn all he could about it.
"Well, what about life after death?" he asked. The smile dropped from Emrick's face in an instant and he knew he had said the wrong thing. "I- You don't have to answer that if you do-"
"We don't have an answer for that," he whispered and drummed his fingers against his knee. "I would like to think that there's something... But honestly, I'm not sure."
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you."
Emrick waved him away. "Don't worry about it," he said. "Put out the fire."
Confused, Isiah jolted back. "What? Why?"
"You need to learn how to do it, right? I saw you pull the flames back at the laboratory. I want to see if you can do it again," he said and pulled the meat from the flames. He cleared his throat and looked to Rina and Nerin. "Food!"
His words weren't as friendly as they usually were and Isiah's stomach dropped at the monotone sound of them. He shouldn't have asked, he'd overstepped his boundaries and upset the other man. Hopefully, he would be able to make up for it, but he wanted to be friends with Emrick, not just two people travelling together.
Even so, he concentrated on the flames before him. When he had pulled on them back at the laboratory, they had been flames of his creations, already in his hands. The ones before him, while created by him, were separate from the stone. He willed them towards him, knowing that even if they touched his skin, they wouldn't hurt him.
"I'm so hungry," Nerin complained, his voice sounding distant in Isiah's ears. The sound of voices worried him, but if he kept up his concentration, he wouldn't let anything distract him. He couldn't have a repeat of the time he hurt Nerin.
"Are you going to eat, Isiah?" Rina asked him as the flames came shooting towards him. She screamed but the flames didn't spread. Instead, they shot towards the stone and disappeared with a puff of smoke.
He blinked wildly. "Huh," he said. If he was being honest, he hadn't expected it to actually work. Even with the distraction, he had done it. It was a good sign. Hopefully, when the time came, if he truly needed to, he could use the stone in times of panic. "I did it."
Emrick showed no sign of pride, but Isiah smiled anyway. "Good," the other man replied. "Now light it again." Over and over again he lit the fire until there was nothing but ash left. Nerin and Rina talked the entire time and he was still able to do it. There would be no repeat of his earlier mistakes, not if he was careful. And he would be, he had to be.
By the time Emrick let him eat, he felt like he had mastered how the flames worked, but he knew he was far from it. There was so much he needed to learn. And then there was the second stone and all the others. It wasn't just flames he had to master, but whatever other powers he would gain over time. There was so much he needed to do, as well as figure out a way to deal with Harudan without violence.
It sounded almost impossible, but he would do it. There had to be a way for it to be done. He wouldn't save the realm with violence, what kind of influence would he be if he did? Not the kind he wanted to be. The Mother and majority of his religion may be dead, they would never know that he was the one they had been waiting for, but he would still strive to make them proud.
Around him, the others ate. Somehow, they were his friends. When he left the Sanctum a month ago, he never expected to be travelling with royalty from opposite sides of the war and a scientist of both races. He never expected to be friends with them either, but it had happened anyway. There were a lot of things he hadn't accounted for, but at least his companions were something he was happy about.