This was the first time that Josen showed anything like respect or interest toward Alfric, and from that point on, they gravitated toward each other at Junior League. Josen was most interested in wizardry and spoke about it often, which Alfric listened to patiently, understanding relatively little. Josen had a seriousness to him that the other Junior League kids seemed to be lacking. His interest in dungeons was largely mercenary, mostly to get what entads he could and make as much money as possible. When they were fifteen, they did some math together and found that ten years of dungeoneering would see both of them set for life, even using conservative estimates for both time traveled and days per dungeon.
They had dreams together, in their own way. Alfric’s dream was always of
gearing up and meeting the challenges of the dungeons, while Josen’s
were largely about the constructs he would build when he had virtually
unlimited access to mana stones. Alfric didn’t quite understand the
compulsion even though Josen spoke about it often. All Alfric knew, all
he thought he
Party composition was a hot topic in the Junior League, especially since one of the points of the organization was to get everyone ready to eventually embark on actual dungeoneering. The Junior League was where plans were made and parties were formed. By the time they were fourteen, it was obvious to both of them that they were going to form the core of a party, and from there, they had a number of discussions about who the other three might be. Alfric considered a bard to be an absolute necessity, because a skilled one could act as a multiplier on the entire team, allowing what felt like circumvention of the five-person party cap. A cleric was another must, at least until later on in their career when healing could be done almost entirely through entads, though a cleric would still be helpful even then. Alfric favored clerics of Oeyr, largely because they could stop people from dying and had good offensive power when they weren’t doing that, but Garos was a close second because they were able to directly cancel out a wide range of damage. Other clerics could offer utility of one kind or another but nothing like the raw healing power of those two. That left the last position to fill, and they’d gone back and forth on that one. Eventually, more by chance than planning, they’d come across Marsh, who was a triple threat, being both a warlock (locking things in place, or in relation to one another) and a nascent Pyro, as well as a proficient fighter.
By the time they were all sixteen, the party seemed like it was fully together. There were arguments, sure, but it seemed like they were going to go out and conquer the world, figuratively speaking. They spent quite a bit of time together, and while Alfric did his best to keep them on track, it was only natural that they’d become friends. It was always Josen who was closest with Alfric, and privately, Alfric thought of the two of them as being the core of the team.
And then Lola had taken it all, but it wouldn’t have been possible for her to do that without their help.
“Josen,” said Alfric. He couldn’t keep the disdain from his voice.
“Alfric—what are you doing—what are you doing in Liberfell?” The shock was clearly visible on the wizard’s face. He looked at the door he had just come through, as though he was going to run away, which was laughable, because Alfric knew from experience that he could almost double Josen’s speed, even without the stride boots.
“Did you get my letters?” asked Alfric. There had been three of them over the past year, all without a response.
“I did,” said Josen. “But I didn’t—didn’t know what to say. I’m sorry.”
“The others I understood,” said Alfric. “We’d had our disagreements about funds. But you were always on my side in those arguments.”
“She—she came to me last. She had already gone to Grig, Marsh, and
Mardin. She’d gotten them to agree to break the party. She knew that I
would be the toughest, and she had someone lined up to replace me.”
Josen was wringing his hands. “The decision was mine, she said. I could
stay with you and try to cobble together a new party from scratch as
quickly as possible, or I could go with her and carry out your plan.” He
repositioned his staff and ran his fingers through his thinning hair.
He’d lost quite a bit more in the past year, his hairline continuing its
steady march backward. That had started around fifteen, horribly young
for it, and Alfric had always felt a bit bad for him. “And then you
spent a year floundering, and… I’m
