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“Osvald, you up here?” Partitio calls. “Soup’s on downstairs.”
“Oh?” Osvald says. He doesn’t look up. Partitio finds him sitting on the end of the inn’s bed, gazing down at the silvery-yellow flame cupped in his hands.
“Apologies,” he says, after a moment. “I could look at it forever.” He lifts it upward, closer, cradling it against his heart. “My answer.”
His smile, small and secret, is somethin’ to see. Partitio would never have imagined it, not even a couple of weeks ago. The way Osvald has changed, suddenly and entirely, is as close to a miracle as anything Partitio has seen on his long, strange journey.
“It’s prettier ‘n a picture, ain’t it?”
“Indeed.”
The flame curls harmlessly over the ragged lapel of Osvald’s coat, nestling against the expanse of his chest as though it belongs there. ’Spose it does, Partitio thinks, and the thought makes him smile, too. His heart gives a sudden, hard thump inside of him. Like it's meant to be.
Something about that last thought catches at the edge of Partitio’s mind. It sets him wondering, pacing back and forth at the foot of the bed, the way he does when there’s a deal on the wind.
“Say, Osvald. ‘Member those weird black crystals you took off those folks near the ruins?”
Osvald blinks. “Of course.”
“They drove people crazy, didn’t they? Ate their minds, or somethin’ like that?”
“So it seems.”
“So how’d you take ‘em? Y’know, without…” Partitio spins his finger beside his temple.
Osvald gives him a flat, unamused look. “I’ve been an active researcher since I was fourteen. I wear gloves for a reason.”
“Osvald. You sayin’ those ratty ol’ fingerless gloves you found in the pocket o’ that hog-wallow of a coat work against evil magic?”
Osvald looks down at those very gloves, watching the flame that rises from their worn wool. He snorts. “Say it plainly, Partitio. What are you insinuating?”
“I just… you’re Alephan’s chosen scholar, ain’t ya? Like, the real one. Not just ‘cause some statue said so.”
Osvald frowns. “I… do not know. It would be unwise to assume…” The flame in his hands flickers, faltering. Osvald's eyes slide shut behind his glasses. “Is it the Scholarking’s voice I hear, within the magic? Or my own?”
“Dang, I dunno. What’s it say?”
“It doesn’t speak in words, not exactly. It wants. It wants us to drive back the Shadow,” Osvald says, in a voice not quite his own. “We must. Or there’ll be no world left for Elena to grow up in.”
“Gonna go out on a limb here, partner,” Partitio says. “But that sure sounds like Voice o’ the Gods stuff t’ me.”
Osvald sighs, deep and heavy, and opens his eyes again. “I suppose that could be… a working hypothesis.” The light in his hands flares up again, as if inspired to dance, shining as bright ‘n pretty as the purest silver.
Beautiful, Partitio thinks, out of nowhere. Osvald is beautiful.
It’s a funny thought, maybe, because despite havin’ the kinda fortune that could buy a small city, Osvald still insists on wearing the rags he was given in Cape Cold (at least, when he’s not wearin’ his Arcanist’s outfit, which makes Partitio’s heart beat faster in a whole different way.) But that’s not what matters. The change in him, this beauty, is something else. Something deeper.
Osvald wore his vengeance like armor – the spiky, heavy kind, full of sharp edges that were always catchin’ on everyone and everything around him, leavin’ little wounds. He wears his newfound grace like a lordly robe, though, or Partitio’s yellow coat: lightly, but with purpose. Somehow, some way, their prickly ol’ Osvald has become a man who speaks openly of love, and carries it with him to battle: a fearsome weapon against the dark.
Just then, their fearsome weapon stands and stretches, shaking the flame from his fingers. (He can’t stretch all the way up, not inside the inn – he settles for a hunched-over shuffle instead, with his arms stretched out before him.)
“Well, then,” he says, when he is done. He claps Partitio on the shoulder, and Partitio tries (and fails) not to think too much about Osvald’s big, warm paw as it swallows him up. “Bifelgan’s Chosen. Care to go out and hire with us after dinner tonight?”
(Osvald always calls it “hiring”. It’s Partitio’s fault, kinda, sorta – he asked Osvald and Temenos to come with him after dark one time, just to see if they could help him find somebody to bring along on their journey, and… well. Partitio had better go along, again, if only so he can kick some poor folks a couple o’ leaves after Temenos and Osvald are through with ‘em.)
You’re the man who’s gonna bring prosperity to the whole world, Partitio, he reminds himself. They’ll be able to afford another piece of candy, or a keepsake sword, or an invigorating nut or whatever, right?
...Right?
“Ah, hell,” Partitio mutters. “Might as well, huh?”
“This was inevitable,” Osvald agrees.