Anatoly was a blur of silver and purple. That was what most people in the village thought of him. Some would call him lively, others would say he was the spitting image of Seer Dietrich in some ways. The good or the bad ways, depended on the day.  Anatoly made his rounds about the village like he did most mornings; with a basket full of herbs and produce in one arm and a bright smile on his face. A morning person in every sense of the phrase. 

His violet coat lazy bounced behind him as he made his way through the market, already filled with people. He was probably the most well dressed person in this cozy little seaside town, save for his master. The gold chain that held his coat in place glinted in the morning sun, his white shirt well pressed, and his black trousers and shoes without a speck of dirt on them, despite all the running around he was known to do.

A handsome snow-kin elf like Anatoly, living in this part of Envidia wasn’t unheard of but rare indeed. But he was Gram Dietrich’s adopted son, and most people in the village held the Seer in high regard, which naturally went to his kin as well.

“Good morning, Madam Query!” 

“Good morning, Anatoly.”

“Good morning, Sir Wilkinson!”

“Mornin’ Anatoly.”

Anatoly’s voice rang out in the air, giving a greeting to everyone he came across. He comes to a bakery tucked away near the center of town, people bustling in and out. The chime above the door rings with each new customer and brings with it the smell of wheat and sugar. Absently, he licks his lips, and trots around the building to the back entrance. Before he can offer a greeting, a large, gruff man in the center of the chaotic kitchen calls out.

“Anatoly, finally!” He gives the dough on the flour dusted table a punch before maneuvering through workers carrying trays of pastries and breads fresh from the ovens to the front of the store.

“Thank the gods you’re here! We’ve already sold out of our herbed solstice loaf! I need all the rosemary and lemons ya’ got boy!”

“This winter solstice is an important one, huh, Sir Huvei?” Anatoly comments, laying all the rosemary and lemons he brought on a nearby worktable.

“The people need bread for offerings, no offerings, no good fortune until the next solstice! This is Enriah’s hundred-year solstice, of course it’s important! What is that Dietrich teaching you?!” Huvei scoffs, but reaches into his apron pockets to grab and empty coins into Anatoly’s hand.

“Thanks for saving my hide, now skedaddle!” Huvei goes to push the boy through the door, but before it can be shut in his face, a shoe wedges itself between the frame.

“You’re not going to push a starving child into the street now are you?” Anatoly bats his eyes, sliding his free hand through the crack, palm up, expectantly.

“You’ve been pulling the ‘starving child’ bit for twenty years,” Huvei growls.

“And you’ve fallen prey to it just as long,” Anatoly chirps.

They stared at each other for a while. Until the soft feeling of a slice of loaf cake hit his palm. Without another word, Anatoly slides his hand out and the door is slammed shut. Chuckling, he took a bite of the sweet. He’s found that if he stares at someone long enough he’ll always get what he wants. Eventually. Shaking the coins in his other hand, he suddenly hisses; spitting out the cake and dropping the coins in the alley.

His palm has a small, circular burn on it. On the ground amongst the gold pieces lay a single silver piece. Anatoly scrunches up his nose.’That asshole,’ he thinks, picking up the gold and kicking the silver piece down the alley. Rubbing his burn on his pants, he continues with his morning errands.

The general store is no exception to the chaos the winter solstice is bringing, and Anatoly thinks as much as he weaves between patrons looking at small altars, candles, and dried goods.

“Anatoly, my boy!” calls a voice behind the counter at the far end of the shop.

“Sir Tilde!” Anatoly returns with a smile, holding up his basket.

“Ah, yes that will be thirteen copper pieces,” Tilde takes the payment from a customer and starts wrapping their wares in paper, his glasses sliding off his pointed ears slightly, “Deliver my goods to Millie would you! She’s in the stock room!” he calls, already ringing up another customer.

Anatoly squeezes his way to the back and into the stock room, where the noise of the shop dulls. A blonde elf-kin girl sits on one of the many crates stacked in the room, tallying the wares on a piece of paper.

“Madam Millie.”

“Would it kill you to not be so polite?” she says, the roll of her eyes audible.

“I’m sure Gram would have my head if I wasn’t,” he chuckles, coming closer and sitting next to her. “It’s crazy out there.”

She laughs and adds a few more tallies to the list, “We had a line around the building at dawn, I barely had the floor stocked before people started rushing in like headless chickens. Deanah Marsh almost started a fist fight over the last bundle of patchouli, can you believe that?”

“One hundred years is a big deal.”

“I guess, but no good fortune is worth hitting your neighbor over in my opinion.”

“So you don’t want this?” Anatonly sings, waving some sachets of dried patchouli.

Millie looks at the herbs and bites her lip, “Well, Father wants us to sell all of our stock…”

Anatoly sets the bundle on the crate between them, “Just make sure you take home one, everyone needs a little good fortune.” She sighs and runs her hand over the herbs, smiling in a thankful way.

“Speaking of your stock,” Anatoly hums, “you wouldn’t by chance have any more journals, would you?”

“There’s always a catch with you isn’t there?” she groans.

“Not a catch, just…a delivery fee.”

She sets down her list and puts her hand out, “Let me see the last one I gave you, then I’ll tell you.” Reluctantly, Anatoly takes the book from within his jacket and hands it to her. She flips through about half of the book before turning it back to him.

“You still don’t know who he is?” 

Her finger points to one of many sketches inside the book. Dark and rough lines make out the image of a half-orc man, with kind eyes and long wild hair. He was the only subject in this journal and many others before it.

“No,” Anatoly says, wistfully gazing at the man who has appeared in his divinations. All he knew was his face and his voice, but over the last few months, everytime he practiced divination he would see this man.This beautifully mysterious man.

“Have you tried asking around town, or even Dietrich?”

“Do we ever see half-orcs this far north? They’re gigantic, it would be the talk of the town, plus they rarely travel outside the Oldlands. And forget about asking Gram, I don’t know how I would even ask…” Anatoly’s cheeks tinge pink at the thought. Despite himself he was smitten with the mysterious man. He practiced the Libra formation more than he should so he could catch a glimpse of the man. His kind eyes lured him and his smooth deep voice was entrancing. Gram would scold him for sure if he knew of his carelessness.

Millie giggles beside him.

“What?”

“You’re like a maiden in love,” she coos.

“Stop it,” he says with a huff.

“What was that one divination you had?”

“Stop.”

“Oh yes!” Millie says clapping her hands together, “ The one where he lays you on your bed and leans down to ki-”

“Millie, I said that’s enough!” he yells, standing up.

“Whatever happened to being polite, Sir Anatoly.” Anatoly grits his teeth, and Millie relents. She stands up as well smoothing out her cream colored dress. Picking up the patchouli sachets, she opens the crate they sat on and pulls out a small leather-bound journal.

“Hey, chin up. I’m sure you’ll find your prince charming one day. If the solstice finds you in good favor then maybe soon. But nothing is going to happen if you don’t start looking.” She sets the journal in his hands along with a small bag of gold for the wares. “At least think about it.”

It seems as though the craziness of the solstice has calmed down slightly as the afternoon rolls in. Anatoly takes a stroll through the rest of town after he finishes his deliveries. Banners and altars are put up around houses, fresh fruits and breads being prepared for offerings waft through open windows. People wearing traditional holiday clothes start getting ready for festivities that are only hours away. Anatoly wonders idly what it’s like to participate in a solstice celebration, and imagines it to be better than what he will have to do this solstice.

In his pondering he runs into the back of a stout man. The man stumbles forward a few steps, then turns around with a sneer.

“Who-!? Shava!”

“Oh, pardon me Sir Anthony.” Anatoly bows his head slightly.

“That’s Fowler to you, boy! Disrespectful little- can’t you see that I’m overseeing the decorating of Main Street?!” Fowler gestures broadly behind him where other townsfolk are covering statues of various gods with prayers and garlands made of flowers.

‘Self-important’ is the phrase that Gram had used to describe Anthony Fowler many times.

“He will always be rude to you no matter what you do, Anatoly. Just be respectful then be on your way. He isn’t worth the energy it takes to speak.”

The lawman and his master were always at odds with each other. Despite Gram wanting to keep things civil, even he prodded Fowler with an iron rod from time to time. To which made Anatoly also want to antagonize the small man, but it was solstice and he had other places to be than causing more trouble then Fowler assumed he did already.

“Apologies, sir. Here take this sachet of patchouli as penance.”

Fowler’s nose flares at the gift but he snatches it anyway, shoving it into his coat pocket.

“Get out of my sight then!” Shooing him away with the back of his hand.

Anatoly trots away with a smug grin on his face. He hopes the dried pepper flakes in that sachet burns the hell out of Fowler’s nose when he lights it later.

Anatoly finally approaches a shop with a sign that reads, Seer Dietrich, above the door. Another sign, on the door, reads ‘With client.’ which Anatoly completely disregards as he enters. The opening of the door causes Gram, who is in the middle of giving a divination to an older woman, to falter. The glow in his eyes quickly dissipates and as he realizes who is the reason for this interruption, his mouth sets into a frown.

“Anatoly!” He warns.

“Oh!” Anatoly says, sheepishly closing the door. “I’m sorry Madam Fen, here let me-” 

The boy comes up to the table quickly. He traces the star formation of Libra behind his back with one hand  and puts the other over the cards strewn on the table. His lavender eyes flood with light for a few seconds before they fade.

“Madam Fen your shipment of supplies will be late this week so plan accordingly and you might have a new business opportunity in your future. Make sure to be on the lookout-” 

“Anatoly, that is enough.” Gram says standing up, irritation lacing his words.

The elderly woman lets out a small chuckle.

“Ah, Seer Dietrich, your apprentice is always so lively,” she says with a wrinkled grin. She throws extra gold into the bowl with the sign that says ‘Sorry no silver accepted.’ then gently pats the boy on the cheek.

“Thanks to your insight and the offerings my grandchildren are bringing me, I'm sure to have good fortune,” she slowly stands up, grabbing the walking stick that leaned against the chair she was in, “Merry solstice you two,” she calls before leaving through the door.

“Now what was so important that it couldn’t wait until I got back? If I was half as strict as my master I would’ve struck you down in her presence for interrupting a divination like that!”

Anatoly’s shoulders droop only slightly before they perk up once again, remembering why he made the trip here in the first place. Taking a deep breath, he holds his hands in front of his face as if in prayer, then using his right hand traces a pattern on his left forearm until it leaves a glowing trail. Then there were two of him.

“Impressed yet?” the Anatoly’s say in unison.

“Is this your attempt to squeeze in one more formation before the solstice?”

“I’d say I’ve about mastered it,” the copy says putting an arm around Gram, “looks it stays corporeal and everything!”

Gram reaches forward and yanks a strand of the real Anatoly’s hair out. The pain is just enough for the boy to yelp and his double to disappear into stardust in an instant. Gram’s lips curl into a smug grin as he twirls the strand of hair in his fingertips.

“You are putting too much concentration into the double that you are forgetting about the sensations of the original. You need to equalize the sensations, split your mind between the two, then you will have mastered it.”

The boy’s face has fallen, and Gram bites his tongue from continuing. Instead he softly pats the top of his wards head.

“In time you will master it, for now you are doing great,” Gram looks at the window to see the afternoon sun lower in the sky, “Come, I’ll close up early today. The solstice celebration is about to begin anyway. Let’s forage for berries and feed, before it gets late.” Slowly peeling his eyes off the floor, Anatoly nods his head.