"Oh Seline, you're awake!" Palinus said in surprise as he poked his head into the tent. Instantly he noticed she was alone and panicked. "Vesuvia didn't come back?…and where is Bruchts?"

"It seems we have all had a bit of an adventure tonight." Seline said sternly, though Palinus could see a hint of anxiety veiled behind her classic annoyed schola mistress expression. "We will just have to wait and see who comes back and what they have been up to."

"We went to-" Palinus started to tell her everything, buoyed from his victory he was too excited to hold it in.

"We should wait for the others." Seline cut him off. Knowing her for as long as he did he could see the tension in her shoulders. When she unconsciously bit at one of her already short nails he knew that something big was bothering her.

Sitting down with her he folded his hands in his lap and committed to waiting together, but he struggled to contain himself. Bouncing his leg and tapping his fingers he struggled to remain still, and he smiled as he noticed Seline struggling to keep herself centred as well.

Giving Palinus the side eye she sighed dramatically as she gave in and tried to feign disinterest.

"Ok, what happened?"

Excitedly Palinus recounted their whole adventure from sneaking out of the tent, which he apologised for, to the one on one battle in the arena. She hung onto every word as he talked about how he felt and the confidence he was suddenly feeling.

"... Then Dravian took me up into the participants box and we drank for a bit. I'm pretty sure I saw Censor Caelus up in the stands, though I'm not sure why he would be in Tremona." Palinus had lost the train of his thoughts as his story concluded.

"Amazing Pal!" Seline smiled radiantly as she congratulated him for his win, "It sounds like you thrashed that idiot, haha."

"Thanks Seline…" He smiled sheepishly, "I was thinking… the whole time I was thinking: 'I can't wait to do this with the whole team.'"

"So we should leave the legion and fight in the arena instead," she laughed as he joined in.

"That sounds like a good plan!" Rufian's voice interrupted their conversation as he pushed through the tent flap.

"I'm not sure how my father would feel about me in the arena…" Vesuvia added, "Let's do it!"

Laughing together they played up the joke about their plans to quit the legion and become an arena team.

"I would never retire!" Rufian said boisterously. "I'd die in the arena."

"... or in a puddle of vomit like most of the alcoholics there." Palinus jabbed.

The group laughed at the joke, but Rufian's chuckle seemed hollow as he sat back on his bedroll.

"What's wrong, Rufi?" Palinus asked. The joke hadn't landed like it normally would, teasing Rufian about his love of wine was normally fertile ground for humour.

"Did you see Marius tonight? He was more drunk than normal." Rufian said, concern shadowing his face in the torchstone light of the tent.

"I saw him not long ago, he seemed fine?" Vesuvia commented. "What happened?"

Starting from finding Marius in the smugglers' den with Domitia Rufian told them about how drunk Marius was, stumbling through the alleyways and vomiting his guts up.

"..and then he said something about his wife. But, I'm pretty sure that he isn't married? Anyway, we made it to the Crow but by the time I got back he was gone."

"So you got the calculus?" Palinus couldn't help but interject in his excitement, he could see the stone on Rufian's hand and wanted desperately to look at it more closely.

"I did!" Rufian showed off his new calculus like it was a flashy piece of jewellery. The group made appreciative noises as he shared the story of fighting Khet. "Now we just need to go and win the Rift Trails and the legend of the Iron Fist can begin!"

He lifted his fist and flexed to punctuate his pronouncement, but he quickly dropped the pose to return to a more thoughtful expression.

"You saw Marius…?" He started asking Vesuvia, before shooting off on his own tangent. "Oh, and what happened to the plan? That Aurelius fool was pretty quick on our tail."

"Oh right…" The humour drained from her face as Vesuvia hesitated to answer the question. "Soooo."

She flushed with embarrassment.

"I'm so sorry Pal, the stuff with Aurelius is all my fault." She spoke quickly, her normal confidence evaporating. "As soon as you cast your ars they were onto you. Like we planned, I tried to use my 'womanly' charms…"

Pushing out her chest with a waggle to illustrate her story her shoulders slumped and she wrung her hands in her lap.

"Aurelius instantly knew it was you, and as soon as he realised, he was agitated. So I cast my ars to [Charm] them earlier than we hoped I'd have to…." she met Palinus's eyes. "There are some conditions with my ars: it will work on hostile targets, but for a shorter period of time, and it will piss them off even more when the [Charm] effect ends. So I just made it worse. I even tried to throw myself at them, but they weren't interested."

"That is on them V." Seline said, rubbing their friend's arm and understanding instantly what the real reason for her upset was. "You are gorgeous and any man would be lucky to have a chance with you."

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"You don't need to apologise at all!" Palinus added. "You did the right thing, I found out why that guy hates me and he just had it out for me because he can't accept responsibility for his own failures."

A warm smile began to replace the worry on Vesuvia's face as a tear dropped from her eye onto her uniform. Turning to Rufian she got serious as she returned to the original question about Marius.

"I ran into Marius when he brought Domitia Commodus to help me beat the snot out of my cousin again."

She told the story of the healing battle and how Domitia of all people had helped her master her ars.

"... so it seems like Marius had a fine evening with beautiful company if he was hanging out with Domitia." Vesuvia finished, before adding some other thoughts. "She is a scary woman… because she has to be to stand up to all the men who would pull her down. I think I like her."

"That's amazing V!" Palinus cheered for her victory against her cousin, a topic he knew would distract her from talking about Domitia. "Surely with stomping Marnus the medicus would have to accept your proficiency now."

"I will never be accepted by those crusty old men," Vesuvia replied venomously, "and I wouldn't want to. We are going to return to Erulea in a triumphal march… and I will take my pick of men and retire to a life of luxury."

With the joke, that Palinus wasn't sure was entirely false, to lighten her story they knew Vesuvia to be back in high spirits and they laughed as they pitched her potential future husbands.

"Vel is far too scrawny! He may be a prodigy red mage, but he can barely lift his massive head, let alone anything else!" Rufian argued against Seline's suggestion. "If you were talking about the 111s then surely you would go for Arruns, the man knows how to handle an axe!"

"Yuck, he is out for the same reason as Aurelius, far too angry." Vesuvia replied, "besides, they are both obsessed with Palinus."

"Do we even call them the 111s any more?" Palinus wondered aloud, ignoring the comment.

"Well no." Seline answered, "They would be the 1131s now, until they select a designation and signum. I was waiting until everyone was here… but I don't think…"

She paused as she battled with what she was trying to say.

"I don't think Bruchts is coming back."

The statement sucked all the air out of the tent and Seline explained that he was going to be recruited by his clan.

For several long seconds no-one said anything as they considered the implications. Without Bruchts there was no team, they wouldn't be able to continue with the Rift Trial. Palinus wondered if they would force him to go back to the capital or if he could stay in Tremona. Maybe the joke about becoming an arena fighter wasn't so far from the truth.

"You're wrong."

Rufian said it quietly, but with absolute certainty.

"He and I have done everything together since we were kids," he said with an earnest conviction that was unlike anything Palinus had ever heard from him. "We have talked about our future… together."

"How do you-?...Oh…" Seline gasped.

"I knew it!" Vesuvia said as she punched Rufian on the shoulder and gave him a throaty chuckle.

"I feel like I'm missing something?" Palinus said, confused. The way that Rufian had phrased what he said made it seem significant, but everyone already knew that Bruchts and he were childhood friends.

"I'll explain it when you're older." Vesuvia said as her chuckle escalated to a laugh that infectiously spread to Seline and Rufian at Palinus's expense. The laughter only escalating further with his confusion.

"Well I hope even more that he does join us. If he does I'm sure he will forgive me for being too impatient to wait for him" Seline said, leaning forward conspiratorially. "I have something to show you all."

From beneath her she pulled out a square of linen that was embroidered elaborately. The figure on the flag was a majestic mythical creature from an old story that Palinus knew Seline was a fan of. Part beast and part man; it was a creature of the forest covered in runic magic that embraced the flame that destroyed it to seek vengeance.

"What is it?" Rufian asked.

"It's a Cinderborn Alseid." Palinus answered. "It's perfect."

"What is a… one of those?" Rufian asked, following up his question.

"It is from an ancient fable, from a city that was destroyed and forgotten up in the north thousands of years ago." Seline replied, sensing the group buying in to her words she continued. "For hundreds of years the city coexisted with a nearby forest. Within the forest was a sacred grove of oak trees guarded by a tribe of Aseid. They are a type of nymph with the body of a horse and the torso of a woodland spirit in both Stoneman and Sylvanian lore.

One day the lord of the city decided they needed more room to build and they burnt down some of the forest, they lost control of the fire and it destroyed most of the forest. The patriarch of the Alseid, seeing the damage they had done to its sacred grove threw himself on the fire as he took a vow of vengeance. Resurrected from the embers of the fire he took this form, the Cinderborn Alseid and took his vengeance by annihilating the city with fire and smoke."

"That's so cool!" Rufian whistled.

"And that is going to be our Signum?" Palinus asked.

"Yes," Seline confirmed. "As long as we still have a team for it to signify."

They chatted to distract themselves as they waited for their friend to return before one by one they fell asleep, exhausted from their night's adventure.

Palinus woke up with a start.

The horn was sounding for formation! He rushed to gather the stuff that lay strewn around him in the tent and was thankful he hadn't bothered to take his armor off.

It took him a few moments to notice that the rest of the team had already left the tent. They had packed up already too so he was even further behind as he rushed to join the century to avoid punishment.

Suddenly he had a thought that sent him spiraling, what if they had left camp while he slept? Bruchts might have come back and left for the north, maybe the others had parted ways and the team disbanded already…

Running to the road he was relieved to see that he was not alone in being late to formation and looking the worse for wear. It seemed like there were dregs from each of the teams still leaving their tents.

Hopping as he tied the leather on his sandal while he climbed the escarpment up to the road he was greeted by winks from his team as they watched him sheepishly run into place between them.

"You could have woken me!" He whispered his complaint, but he couldn't help smiling as he felt the warmth of his friends around him.

"We did wake you." Vesuvia said, with a hint of frustration "But then you went back to sleep and wouldn't wake up again while we packed, for you."

"Oh," he noticed his pack waiting for him in place. "Thank you.

Muttering his thanks he recalled the events of the night before and noticed the signum Selina had raised on her back.

"Good to see you Bruchts." Palinus whispered. "I guess you aren't going north?"

"I am going north." Bruchts countered. "WE are going north. That is where the Rift Trials are, and we are going to win them. Together. The clan have waited for years, they can wait a bit longer."

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