114. Training

The three of them enjoyed a nice dinner with the Earl's family as they talked about all of the things that still needed to be done as well as some of the precautions they needed to take in order to not give the assassins a chance at any of them. They also determined that Shannon would be staying with Aureus while she was training and taking care of the few things left for the wedding. He also made sure that she had plenty of funds for while she was here. He could come back at a moments notice in case something went wrong.

The couple shared on last kiss and then he and Theren walked through the circle and back to the manor. As soon as they were back the two of them split up to go and talk to all of the people in the area that were on the list. He was not to worried about the ladies but there were several older people that he was not sure could take care of themselves. He would invite all of them back to the manor to stay until the people behind the list were taken care of.

By the time the sun was set everyone that was on the list was either in the manor or had been alerted to the event. The one name on the list that made him the maddest was the bounty for kidnapping Emily with a bonus for Jane. He also insisted that they come to the manor but they were staying with Granny and he knew that she was more than capable of keeping them safe. He also put Fang on guard around the house that they were staying in.

After all those things were taken care of he made sure and sent a message to his network so that they could keep and eye on everything and let him know if any of the big guilds appeared to be making a move. Once that was done he pulled Theren to his study. "We need to start making a plan." He laid out all of his maps on the table. It covered the entire region and a lot more. It cost him a lot to get all those maps gathered up and he was still not positive on their accuracy.

Shannon and Aureus were sitting by the small fire talking and drinking some of the local wine that they both found they enjoyed. They were most of a bottle apiece when Shannon broke the nice silence. "Aureus, I am going to ask you something. If you do not want to answer then say so it will not hurt my feelings."

"Well given the start I might be drunk enough to answer the question, go ahead."

"Please don't take this as judgement but why are you not in a relationship?"

"Oh, this old question."

"Seriously, you are gorgeous, powerful, highly intelligent and just a great person. I can't think of any reason that there is not a line of people outside your door."

"Shannon you have said it twice but you have not said anything about a man. You keep speaking in general terms. Why is that?"

"I have known to many people that are not attracted to just one gender or the other. They love who they love and that is it." She giggled. "And Novum mentioned that you might play for the same team as you simply ignored him and he is absolutely gorgeous in his opinion."

"How to say this without offending him or you. I do think that Novum is a handsome man that any woman would be proud to call her husband but when I look at him there is the not the least bit of attraction. Well maybe a little but more towards the things that he has done and not his actual appearance."

"That is fine. So is there a person that has caught your attention?"

"Not really. As far as attracted to someone a few people but I have never had the nerve to ask them. This area does not seem to be as open minded as where you are from."

"It was not that open minded until the people fought for it. But that is neither here nor there. If you find someone and they give you any crap about it come and live at the manor with us. When I say that you will be safe there, I mean that Novum and I will take care of anyone that gives you any trouble. Also come on out and look at some of the locals over there."

"You are serious about that. No questions I can stay there."

"As long as it is not the Earl that is trying to kill us we are good."

Aureus threw her head back and laughed. "Yeah even if he was an option I don't think he is really an option. Thank you for accepting the different things about me without any questions. But don't think that means that I am going to go easy on your training tomorrow." When they remember their training the following morning they both put the wine up and headed for bed.

Aureus started them both of with some conditioning and based on the stats she started with Shannon ran faster and longer then at any time in her previous life. She was in good enough shape that she did not start showing signs of fatigue until about the same time as Aureus, which made her feel good about herself. That was where the good feelings stopped.

They started with the lightest armor, that was just a little thicker than normal clothing and she just kept casting all of her spells over and over again. The clothes were not that heavy they still altered a couple of her spells. When her magical energy was completely empty then she picked up the sword. It was not a lot for a swordsman but for a mage this was a lot of work and she was actually getting a few blisters on her hands.

After a couple of hours of sword training they stopped for the day. The two of them got cleaned up and headed out to take care of a few things for the wedding and even went and spent some time with Aureus sister-in-law about her wedding and got a few tips and hints from her since she was married not long ago. She brought up several things that they had not thought about. It was her first full day without Novum here and while she missed him it was also nice to be able to be her own person. She had never been in his shadow but they were always together when they were married.

They kept training over and over and by the third day Shannon was wearing the lightest metal armor to cast her spells in the morning. The fail rate was higher than her normal spells and she was having a slight feedback issue since she was using lightning magic but by the time she cast her last spell there was not feed back. The failure rate was just a little higher than when she was wearing the heavy clothing.

About the time they were finishing up the sword fighting for the third day Novum showed up to see how things were going. This time he brought the nobles from the neighboring region with him. The girls needed to pick up some things from the capitol as Three Mines did not have a lot of stuff that a noble would feel was necessary. Theren had split the noble purse between the two of them when they arrived before so they still had some coins that could be used.

After some introduction Aureus agreed for both of the girls to stay with her for a while, until they got their bearings and were able to take care of themselves. They did not expect it to be a long time since they were both talented and had already made arrangements to meet with the adventures guild the following day. Aureus was more than happy to play host to them.

Novum and Shannon slipped away while Aureus was showing the girls around. "How is your training going? Do you need anything?"

"No, I have everything here that I need to train. I have moved to metal armors but I only started today. I am not sure how long it will take me to totally control it but I am willing to put in the work. After we take a short honeymoon I will come back to training."

"After the honeymoon I will probably be headed over to the neighbors to kill the earl and anyone that has any designs on our home or revenge on me. If you want to stay here and train that is fine. If you want to come with me that is also fine. We are in no rush as we will have time to think about it during the honeymoon."

"Nope this time I don't need to think. If you are going to war I am going to war with you." She pulled him into a kiss and held back the tears.