Shopping and going home.

The deal is excellent but I keep negotiating a bit more with Lucan. We end up agreeing on 5 gold and some steel tools on top of the iron chains, some manacles for monsters and more.

After that I need to wait until tomorrow to get the things. Most he already has but some tools need a bit assembling or repairing. I now need to check for other things that can be good to have, it would not be good to only depend on adventurers to re-supply.

After a few hours of darkness I can do no more shopping and go back to my room at the guild. No sighting of the woman today, good.

The next day I spend shopping, mostly clothes for colder weather for both me and Harn and in the end of the day I go back to the forge to get my things. In the end my backpack is so heavy that the walk up the mountain will be a challenge.

Afraid that the woman is planning something I think that it would be for the best to get away from Lind tonight. Walking in the dark is risky but I have Vana with me and I do feel more at home out in the wild than in town.

While leaving I start thinking about magic and a few things that the apprentice said. He said grandmasters can make magic items, but I learnt that the dungeon also can make those and that craftsmen would go there to learn. Does that mean it exist two different kinds of magic items, just like the true magic and magic to power one self? Or maybe it also exists more than that? And what is the difference? Maybe by learning the difference and other kinds I can make items for the dungeon, both for the undead to use and for to put in the chest. That way I will not lose too much when they are taken by someone, I can just make new ones. And if the level of danger goes up it makes it a higher chance that the adventurers bring magic items themselves. Wait, can undead learn magic, eh, if they can learn anything at all to begin with, Bork is not exactly smarter since he died and became a zombie. Not that he seemed that smart to begin with.

After walking for half the night and reaching the forest, me and Vana make a hidden camp. I do the work and she helps by marking the trees around the camp, important business for a wolf.

" I have been thinking Vana. What if I cast magic on someone else, not the kind to hurt them but some kind to buff them up. Like the kind that Harn wants to use, but I try to do it on someone else. Would that get a different result than just casting beneficial magic on them? It should be possible right? From what I understood, it does not need words or other kinds of resources. What do you say Vana, should we try it on you?" Vana looks at me while I am talking but in the end just lay down next to my feet. She is an intelligent girl but that seemed to be beyond her understanding.

I decide to see what I can do, I do not think it will succeed but it will be worth trying. I have had some success with things I tried before. Laying my hand on her head and slowly stroking her fur I concentrate on the magic feeling I had after I succeeded using the light magic. The feeling is weak and small and hard to grasp.I do not yet have a good grasp on magic, I have a better feeling of my life force. But deep inside the life force and the distant power of the dungeon I can feel a low beat of something. It is dark and wondrous at the same time, like a deep well where you can not see the bottom filled with dark water that slowly gives off a feeling of power. I concentrate on this feeling knowing that no words will help this time Inow need to grasp that water and try to feed it to Vana through my touch.

I keep trying for a long time without having any knowledge about my surroundings. In the end I succeed grasping a small trickle of power and it drips out through my touch. Did I just succeed with a new kind of magic? It did not feel the same as casting light, more like giving a piece of my life and power to another. Not the feeling of using something else like then.

I look down on Vana and can see her looking back at me. Her fur has become even darker. It is now so black that it is hard to see it, like it removes the small light in the dark forest around it, making it even darker. She is not hiding in the shadows as much as being one. I can feel that this is not magic, this is something else.

"What just happened?"

Vana looks back at me and nudges me carefully with the tip of her snout. When it touches my skin I can feel a connection that I instantly recognize. It has been there the whole time but I just never noticed it. It is like I can feel Vanas life and loyalty, I can also feel the connection to the dungeon through her.

"Did I just strengthen your connection to the dungeon through me? "

Arrf

Vana answers in what I can only take for affirmative.

"Haha.. wonderful, now we truly are connected, I can feel that it is not as strong as my connection but it should do something for you."

I touch her head again and try to feel the connection.This time it is easier, it is not the same kind I have, more like she has truly become a part of my power. A small part but a real one.

With that I fall asleep with happiness in my heart, part of that loneliness that has always been there feels more filled now. I now know that what I have been feeling is love and longing. And the love to and from Vana has filled a part of that hole.

The next morning we keep walking up the mountain. We notice no signs or tracks of the orcs that day. But the next day we notice a camp like the last one. It seems like they have gotten closer to the dungeon. During the day we both stay on high alert and looking for more tracks, with the orcs so close the danger have gone up considerably. In the end we notice more tracks, but not from orcs but humans, Looks like adventurers have been here just a couple of days ago. Hard to tell if they were here before or after the orcs. Dammit I was hoping that this journey would keep going fine, but this is one of the worse case scenarios. I can see just from the tracks that I can not handle the orcs and Sunshine at the guilds words give even more proof of that.