Restart Again: Volume 1 by Adam Scott (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📕

feet up on the bed frame next to her. “Though I have to say, if you’re going to be traveling with me, I should probably know more about you as well. Can’t have a stranger watching my back, now can I?”

“That wasn’t part of the original deal, you know.” She rolled her eyes in an over exaggerated gesture. “But I guess that’s okay.”

Lia tapped her chin a few times, then perked up as she thought of a question. “When we were down in the dungeon, you said you made a promise to someone a long time ago. Something about keeping people safe. Is there a story behind that?”

I was surprised that she remembered the remark given the emotionally charged situation we had been in at the time. “Yeah, there is. It’s probably good for this to come up now, actually, because it will most likely influence our traveling plans.” The statement brought a confused look to Lia’s face, but she waited patiently for me to explain. “It was a promise I made to Amaya. She was wrongfully taken prisoner to use as leverage, just like you were.”

It felt strange to finally put into words a theory I had been thinking of for so long. “I don’t know why I keep getting sent to other worlds, but there seem to be some rules associated with it. The first and most important is that no matter where I go, the ruling party of that country wants to use me to solve all of their problems. I don’t know how, but they always seem to find me.” Bitter thoughts from my life in Hedaat came unbidden to the forefront of my mind, bringing a scowl to my face. “And they seem to do whatever they please to coerce me into their plans.”

Lia’s face was painted in sadness as she continued to listen to the story. “The King of Alderea somehow heard about me, a nobody smith in a small town, and needed to meet with me immediately. He tasked the Lord of our township with arranging the meeting, and when I refused to go…” I trailed off, shrugging. “They didn’t hurt her, at least. Lord Eadric was spineless, to be sure, but he wasn’t cruel.”

Seeing Lia’s reaction made me feel a pang of regret. I did my best to perk up, moving on to more uplifting things. “I went to get her at the keep and made a deal with the Lord. Amaya got to go free, and after a month’s time for preparation, I would head to the capital and meet with the King. I made other demands, her safety chief among them, which were all accepted.” I couldn’t help but smile as I remembered the aggressively one-sided negotiation.

“I left with Amaya that night. I promised I would never let anything like that happen to her again, but she wasn’t upset about the ordeal. Instead, she was worried that it would happen again, to someone else.” Her passion still inspired me even when retelling the story so many years later. “So, I promised her that within my power, I would never let it happen to anybody again. And then, a couple lifetimes later...I ran into you.” I gave Lia a quick smile. “Does that answer your question?”

She nodded. “Yeah, of course.” Lia seemed to look off into the distance past my head. Her face still seemed to have traces of sadness, but she gave me a smile. “I guess I owe Amaya my thanks.”

The comment caught me off guard. “I guess so.” There was a long pause in the conversation as we both thought in silence. “I think she would’ve liked you,” I said with a wistful smile. Lia looked embarrassed by the statement as she reddened and looked away. Clapping my hands, I sat up straight. “Okay. My turn to ask you a question.” I narrowed my eyes and studied her face. She scrunched up her nose and stuck her tongue out, bringing an honest laugh out of me. “I’ve got one. Your father told me that even though he arranged a few suitors for you, you always turned them down right after you met them. Why is that?”

Lia stifled a gasp in shock. “Why would he tell you THAT?!” I raised my eyebrows and shrugged, chuckling. “T-that’s not even important to anything! Why do you want to know that?”

“Oh, we can only ask the important questions now?” I asked mockingly, crossing my arms. “Maybe I’ll learn something about your character from it. Now, let’s hear it.”

“Well, I just...I just didn’t like them, okay? One of them seemed more interested in working with Father than getting to know me, and another one was so overly nice he wouldn’t ever disagree with me about anything.” She looked at me and let out an exasperated sigh. “I’m not just going to marry someone because my father told me to!”

“That’s good! It’s not something to be taken lightly, so you shouldn’t compromise. You should be able to marry who you really want to, not someone who gets chosen for you that you’ve never met.” My mind flew to a perfect memory of Amaya in a white dress, standing in front of the large oak tree behind Ashedown’s forge. Lia stammered something incoherently, snapping me back to the present. She was bright red, looking at me with a nervous slant. “I’m sorry, I spaced out there for a moment. What did you say?”

Lia cleared her throat and seemed to settle down a bit. “I said, I answered your question, so now it’s my turn.” She pulled herself up and sat cross legged at the edge of the bed. “I want to know more about magic. I know I can’t do it right now, but maybe if I learn more about it I’ll figure it out faster.”

I let out a low whistle. “That’s a pretty big topic. Anything specific?”

She thought for a moment. “Maybe you could describe what it feels like when you do it. You