Chapter 26 #2
“Hello? Ainsworth? What is with you tonight?” Mal said, nudging his elbow. “We’ve been discussing Enach’s latest publication, and you have yet to say a peep!”
“Oh, apologies, what did you say?” Ainsworth replied. “I was just— I am still worn from my time away.”
“Of course you are, my dear!” Enach said, reaching across the table to clasp Ainsworth’s hand. “You poor thing, living in such uncivilized surroundings for so long.”
Ainsworth took his hand back, using the pretense of covering his mouth as he cleared his throat. “Well, I would not say ‘uncivilized’…”
“Yes, tell us about it, Ainsworth, we are just dying to know!” Jess said. “The funding you have potentially attracted from the council is more than double what I could ever hope to achieve.”
Ainsworth was briefly unarmed by her seemingly genuine compliment.
“Well, that’s what happens when you come across previously undocumented legends and heritage,” Enach said, leaning back in his chair to take a drink.
“But why anyone would want to read about that run-down inn and the common muck who operate it is beyond me. Especially since you’ve failed to secure any actual accounts of journeys across the mountain.
And yet, who am I to dictate what the council deems necessary contributions to knowledge? ”
Mal and Jess laughed as if on cue, clearly gleeful at being witness to this show of domestic tension. Once, Ainsworth would have withdrawn from it, submitted. Anything to not make a scene, to not be the subject of gossip the following day.
But he found he did not care about such things any longer.
“Enach,” he chided, and the tone of his voice shut Jess and Mal up. “That is no way to speak of those fine people.”
“Yes, yes,” Enach said, rolling his eyes. “I suppose they were very accommodating for your research, and so they are therefore good for something.”
Ainsworth took a deep breath. “That is not what I mean. I mean they are good people in themselves, leading good, honest, fulfilling lives—”
“Pah! Fulfilling?” Enach exclaimed, one fist pounding the table. Ainsworth was vaguely aware of nearby diners pausing in their conversation to listen. “What is so fulfilling about moldering in a backwater inn?”
Ainsworth felt a rush of anger, and it felt so good. It felt good to fight back, to let it out. He could almost picture the dragon in his mind, approval radiating from it. So this is what you want.
“There is so much more to people than that! We are so much more than what our money can buy, what our education provides, and the achievements we have, Enach. We don’t need those things—”
“You needed them,” Enach snapped. “You, who grew up in the mud, crawling here from your little village in Breggen, arriving at Skarrow with your scholarship that wasn’t even enough to fill your belly.”
“Oh, Ainsworth!” Jess gasped. “I did not know! How awful.”
While Jess looked positively giddy at this revelation, Mal seemed mortified at the escalation and became intent on withdrawing as far as he could into his chair.
Enach continued, relentless. “Without all those things you so disparage now, Ainsworth—without me—you’d be nothing.”
Ainsworth took a second to take it all in.
His past, which he so rarely shared with anyone, had been thrown at him like a weapon in front of an audience.
He realized then, when the expected waves of embarrassment failed to rise, that it was these people’s esteem that had made him feel ashamed of his past. But there was nothing shameful about it.
No, the only shameful thing was the people who sought to keep their knowledge, their culture, their security, and their stability for people like themselves—never opening the door for anyone who had little but might be deserving of a place.
And Ainsworth had bought into it, and into the mindset that accompanied it.
Laughed at those who failed, considered people beneath him if they did not have the kind of education or experiences he did.
As he looked at Enach, at the note of triumph on that handsome face, he briefly saw the person he had been.
He stood abruptly. “Without you, I am so much more, Enach.” He fished into his pocket and deposited coins on the table. “For my share. Jess, Mal, I wish I could say it was good to see you, but I won’t, for I fear you might take it as an indication that I desire to spend time with you again.”
“Ainsworth! Sit down,” Enach commanded, while Jess quipped: “Well, I never…!” and Mal turned a ghastly shade of gray.
Ainsworth just smiled. “No, I won’t. I am leaving, Enach, and we are finished. To be honest, we were finished when I left for Mount Vengeance. And I am departing for there once again.”
Then he turned and strode out of the room, the curious, barbed gazes of the other diners following him.
He was genuinely surprised when he felt a tug on his arm.
Enach had followed him out.
“How dare you embarrass me like that!” Enach growled. “You will get back in there and apologize—”
“Didn’t you hear me?” Ainsworth said calmly as he pulled his arm away. “We are done. And I am leaving.”
People slipped past them like a stream, creating a wide berth around the pair as they stared each other down.
Enach, his face darkening like the evening sky around them, briefly wore an expression that Ainsworth had not seen before.
He did not think it possible for Enach to look as though he had been struck—to see a flash of loss in his eyes and the temporary slackening of his jaw, with no words to be found.
But in less time than a click of the fingers, it was replaced by something else: triumph.
“Very well, then, Ainsworth, but how do you expect to get back there when I have barred your passage to the Wenslykirk and Mount Vengeance Transportation Circles? And I have no intention of undoing it.”
If Ainsworth had felt any glimmer of regret, guilt, or grief for the love he thought he had shared with Enach, it vanished in that instant.
For such an act was so like him—to keep Ainsworth away from friends, from family, from his own success independent of the proud elf who stood in front of him.
Ainsworth had been torn through that circle, feeling sick and wretched, and all the while Enach had been tampering with the magic he set up as the route’s administrator so that Ainsworth would not be granted passage again.
Oh, he could appeal to the transport office about Enach’s abuse of power, but that would take weeks to rectify and he would not let Enach win.
He would not let Enach keep him in Hinslyth any longer than he had to.
For he had Lyria’s permission, and a burning, suddenly clear purpose to get back to the inn—
To take on Mount Vengeance himself and finish his book with his own account.
So he did not let Enach feel any hint of satisfaction. He took a deep breath, straightened his shoulders, and shrugged. “That is no matter. I have made my way on foot once before, and I will do so again. Farewell, Enach. I wish you all the best, I truly do.”
Enach clearly did not return the sentiment.