Aster Brooks Books

Ch. 24: Kohen?: Level Up

The last of the rhynselks fell to his skill. Their blood oozed from their bodies and into a shallow lake of crimson. An excellent harvest. A macabre sight.

He turned away from the scene, trying not to think about the smell of iron on the air or the unclaimed power in all that blood.

They had not entered. He was done. That was all that mattered.

His teeth clenched as he processed that thought.

More bodies filled the space within the walls. More blood. More he could take.

Ignore it.

The queen’s body was the biggest among the corpses, a mountain of flesh and fat and blood. So much blood.

Ignore it.

“Looks like it’s over,” Tiador said.

“Yeah.” He hopped down from the wagon wall and stumbled with the landing. Pain shot up his knees. He suppressed a wince.

That shouldn’t have hurt. With his Strength and Dexterity—

No, he knew better. It wasn’t just his Concepts and Skills scrambled. Even his stats had been changed.

He had only a third of his previous Strength and maybe half the Dexterity. At least he’d gotten a lot more Will, Alacrity, and Resolve from the deal, but for unknowable—perfectly knowable—reasons his Vitality had gone way up too.

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. He needed to be more careful. ‘New’ spells he could explain. Clumsily breaking his ankles dismounting from a wall was harder to rationalize away. And Tiador wasn’t an idiot.

Tiador and Daidyn followed him down, landing with a grace far more expected from physical martials. He could feel their eyes on him. Had they noticed his stumble? Or was it just the eyes of subordinates on their superior?

“We should regroup with the caravan leadership,” Tiador said.

Why? So he could go back to hiding behind other martials? His teeth clenched tighter.

He didn’t need that.

He didn’t need to hide.

He was strong. Fighting had earned him another level.

Level Up!

+ 1 Str

+ 1 Res

+ 2 Frt

+ 2 Vit

+ 5 Free Points

He flinched at the notification. That wasn’t a human’s stat increase. It should have been one point in Str from his First Step expansion, three free points from being human, and two more from the grace of reaching the Gate. This was almost double.

Was he going to get this many points every level from now on? Was this a side effect of being a demon?

A stupid question. It had to be.

The real question was what he did about it. His mother would tell him not to touch his stats. Anything he did to them might set them more permanently in this twisted configuration. Might make him more permanently this demon thrall.

It went without saying he didn’t want that.

A clever man might leave the Free Points undistributed and wait until he’d seen the miracle healers his mother had found.

And yet, he still felt the twinge in his knees from jumping from the wall. It would take much more than five points to set his Str and Dex back to their previous values, but it would be a start. And it would be so much easier to hide that his stats had been changed if those two hadn’t.

Or he could embrace it, a voice not his own whispered. What is a mage doing with such physical stats, anyway? Why waste his time on this mixed path when the power of a pure mage and then some was waiting at his fingertips?

No. No. No, the smart thing to do was to wait. Wait until he’d seen the healers and gotten their expert opinions. Only an idiot would mess with this now.

And he wasn’t an idiot. Really.

But this was a distraction. Tiador was right; they should regroup with the caravan. Even if he wasn’t going to hide, regrouping was smart. The caravan wasn’t going anywhere tonight.

It took only a quick glance to see that most were injured. Blood pooled over the gravel. It dripped down legs and oozed from wounds. Ignore it.

Several wagons were broken. Many horses were simply gone.

None of which was his problem, beyond being an obstacle to this caravan moving again.

Was the caravan master even still alive? The caravan was finished if he was among the dead. They were close enough to Belden they could make it on their own if that’s what it came to.

But, no. There was the man. And Alyx.

And her.

They were discussing something.

The caravan master spotted him over the bastard’s shoulder.

“My lord!” the excitable caravan master shouted as they made eye contact. The caravan master’s arm hung in a sling. A bandage wrapped tight around his forehead, attempting to staunch an oozing head wound.

“I’m going to go tend to the wounded,” she said, the blue of her robes fluttering as she spun away from him.

“Cass,” Alyx hissed after her. “Wait! You should—”

He tuned them out as the caravan master continued. “Amazing work, my lord! Amazing work! Thank you!”

A grin slipped across his face. Adoration was appropriate.

His contribution had not been planned, but that was all the greater reason for them to heap praise on him.

“I had heard about your contributions to rescuing the dragonlings during the festival,” the caravan master continued. “But it’s another thing entirely to see your skill firsthand. I can hardly believe you could kill so many of the beasts alone!”

“A shame he didn’t use it before the rhynselk breached the walls,” Alyx drawled as she stepped back into the conversation. Her arms were crossed, her fangs bared for a fight.

He scowled. Just like the bastard to sour a good thing.

“He shouldn’t have needed to,” Tiador cut in. “He is injured, remember?”

His scowl deepened. He was being forced back behind that lie again.

“He shouldn’t have been forced to defend anyone in his state,” Tiador continued.

His teeth clenched tighter.

“Oh,” the bastard said, her nails suddenly interesting to her. “Right. I forgot.”

Blood pulsed loud and hot through his ears.

“Injured,” she repeated, her sharp eyes cutting through him. The single word was equal parts condemnation of his weakness and doubt of the claim.

It was every part biting criticism.

Criticism she had no right to level.

His hands clenched at his sides.

“All the more impressive then!” the caravan master chimed in, the man’s voice a salve on his pride. “To do so much while injured that the rest of us struggled with. A hero among men, certainly!”

The bastard rolled her eyes, shaking her head.

Just like her, to dismiss him like that.

The caravan master continued heaping on the praise. It should have felt good. It was the minimum reward he should expect. He should be negotiating compensation.

Instead, a weight pressed on him.

His eyes drifted away from the caravan master and over the dead and dying.

A campfire ignited amid the cold. Its heat stole his breath.

She stood from beside it, turning to speak with one of the caravan’s help. Something warm and certain slipped over him. The tension in his jaw released. The clench of his hands loosened.

She didn’t so much as look at him.

His hands clenched again.

Why had she walked away? She, more than this boot-licking caravan master, should be heaping on the praise.

She was no one, yet he’d done as she’d Commanded. Her trick had worked again.

She should be on her knees begging his forgiveness for forcing him to act like that.

She should—

Why, a cold voice whispered at the back of his mind. What backing do you hold? Not now or future Dragon Knight. Not now or future Heir. Not favored son or grandchild.

Who was he?

His hands clenched tighter, his nails digging into the palms of his hands. Had they always been so sharp?

No, he was Kohen. He repeated that to himself as the caravan master moved on to other topics. Organizing the survivors. Repairing the wagons. Watch for the evening.

He was Kohen, he repeated again as they all ignored him.

He was— The name slipped from his mind. His hands clenched tighter, and his heart pounded in his ears.

He dumped all his Free Points into Str, pushing the stat closer to where it was supposed to be. His nails dug deeper into his hand. Blood, warm and sticky, trickled between his fingers from his palm.

He was Kohen. He had to be. So why did every repetition sound more and more like a lie?

Ch. 23: Team Fight

“Kelstor, withdraw and prepare Scorching Lance!” Cass shouted over the battlefield. “Pellen, hold your spell until the last moment. Everyone else, keep the queen busy!”

She could have ordered Kelstor back silently via Salos, but there was no need to hide their maneuver from a monster that didn’t understand language, and announcing it would give everyone else a better idea of what was happening.

Kelstor’s claws tore off another hunk of the queen’s flank as he pulled back.

“Fairy Fire!” Cass shouted next, pointing at Alyx. Salos lit the swordswoman in purple flames.

The queen snarled, thrashing after Alyx, entirely ignoring the retreating Kelstor. Ice materialized over the queen’s head, razor shards pointed at Alyx.

Their timer had started.

“Marco, between Kelstor and the queen!” Cass ordered. “Everyone else spread out!”

There wasn’t a lot of ‘everyone else’ left. Sir Kaiz had found another spear and was lurking around the edges. A few of the caravan guards remained on their feet, their levels about equal with Cass’s.

Cass Sprinted to stand behind the queen, opposite Alyx. She drew a Tempest Blade along her staff and darted in, the lightning cutting into the queen’s back leg.

Swap Fairy Fire, Cass said to Salos as the queen grunted in pain.

Cass’s skin erupted in flames.

The queen jerked around, its ice projectiles turning and firing on Cass.

Cass darted back, using Elemental Manipulation to turn the ice spears aside.

Seven seconds remaining.

The queen charged Cass, its horns stabbing for her.

Sir Kaiz lunged from the side, stabbing a spear into the queen. He twisted the shaft and yanked it out again with a fount of blood.

Salos, swap Fairy Fire, Cass said. The flames bloomed around the noble.

The queen snarled, its charge drifting toward the spearman.

Alyx was already behind the queen, her sword glowing with her aura. She slashed down, the gold aura biting deep into rhynselk flesh.

Purple flames flickered around Alyx, dying around the spearman. The queen tossed its head in frustration, rounding toward Alyx again.

<<Five seconds,>> Kelstor warned, his telepathic voice crossing clearly across the battlefield.

Salos, Cass prompted him.

I know, Salos grunted. Fairy Fire erupted around Marco.

The guardsman slammed his sword against his shield. “Over here, beasty!”

The queen veered off Alyx, its eyes glowing with the purple of Fairy Fire’s taunt. It charged Marco, ice shards growing around it.

Four seconds.

Marco’s aura bloomed before him, creating a glowing shield.

The queen slammed into it, its forward nose horn hitting it with all the force of a semi-truck. Marco grunted, his feet skidding back through the gravel.

His aura shield held.

Three seconds.

The queen reared back, mana accumulating in its hooves, preparing a stomping attack.

Prepared but never to be released.

Pellen shouted the last word of her chant. Silver bands wrapped around the queen’s body.

The queen’s head thrashed, but it couldn’t move. It was caught, perfectly aligned to expose its underbelly to Kelstor’s charging attack.

It could still fire off ice shards, though.

They careened through the air, all aimed at Marco. His shield flickered as shard after shard slammed against it.

Two seconds.

Marco’s shield failed. One too many ice shard hit his aura. The construct fell. He staggered.

The ice kept coming.

But Cass was already at his side. She held her staff out, pushing Elemental Manipulation through it, shoving every ice shard aside.

One second.

Kelstor’s jaw opened.

The queen squealed. Mana twisted around the beast and ice sprang into existence between them. Another ice shield.

Would Scorching Lance cut through it and the queen’s hide?

Cass couldn’t risk it. She needed to do something.

Alacrity slowed her perception of time. The last second crawled.

She Wind Stepped past Marco and rode the wind into the floating ice wall. She slammed into it, her hands slapping Elemental Manipulation into it as they collided.

Unlike the earlier ice shards, the wall was teeming with the monster’s Wll. It rebuked Cass’s touch. It demanded that the water hold this form. That it freeze. That it reject all heat.

Cass shoved her Wll into it anyway. It would melt. It would fall. Her Wll was greater. Her Wll aligned with nature.

This shield would MELT.

Zero seconds.

Scorching Lance released from Kelstor’s maw.

Water and ice sloshed around Cass as she and it fell from the air. As her 100 Wll overpowered the beast’s control of the material. As Scorching Lance burned through the space she and the ice had occupied barely moments before.

It burned into the queen’s exposed chest.

It was so bright, Cass couldn’t see.

It was so hot, the formless water around her boiled.

The scent of burning leather filled the air.

The queen screamed.

Kelstor’s lance sputtered out, revealing a scorched pit in the rhynselk queen’s chest. Revealing a slowly pulsing heart and burned organs.

Pellen’s spell broke. The little mage collapsed to her knees.

The queen’s hooves crashed down onto the stony ground. The mana in them exploded out in every direction, materializing ice in razor spears.

It was still alive?

How was it still alive? Cass could see its heart. Nothing should be able to survive with a heart visible to the elements, never mind the damage to its other organs.

Even as she watched, ice crept up and over the gaping wound, as if a sheet of ice could somehow act as skin. Maybe for the rhynselk it could.

Vitality specialists, Salos said it like it was a curse.

Cass pushed herself to her feet, her hands clenching around her staff.

Focus: 63/630

Vitality or not, there was no way that thing could take much more. What did they have left?

Marco was down, an ice spear impaled his thigh. He was breathing.

Pellen was out of Focus and collapsed on the back line. Out of spells, but also out of immediate danger.

The handful of other martials stood unsteady on their feet, most with new bleeding holes in their armor.

Kelstor shot over Cass’s shoulder, slamming his entire body into the queen. His claws scraped against the ice sheet, ice and fire sizzling against one another.

Alyx was at his side a moment later. Her sword, dripping with her aura, slammed into the ice sheet. It cracked under her Strength.

But the queen was already repairing it. Mana swirled cold and fast around the wound, the cracks resealing.

Alyx swung again, stressing the cracks. Kelstor clawed at it, heat robbing integrity from the cold.

It wasn’t enough. They needed just a little more.

Cass Sprinted in. She just needed to break the ice. Alyx could do the rest.

Ice was brittle. Brittle enough to shatter under force.

She summoned a Tempest Blade. It hummed in anticipation.

The queen roared. Ice materialized around it in a sea of spears. They slammed down on the attackers.

Kelstor unleashed another wave of Dragon Fire, the heat of his breath matching the cold of the queen’s attack.

Alyx’s sword slammed against the ice sheet, aura digging into the patch but not breaking it.

Cass swung, thunder roaring as it crashed into the ice wall, all the power of Tempest Blade roaring in her ears, backed by her staggering Wll and the bonuses of her staff.

Thunder rolled through the ice and the sheer force shattered the crystalline structure.

The cavity beyond was scorched black. Water vapor wafted through it, condensing in the unnatural cold of the beast’s body. The heart pumped slow and methodic in the center.

More ice grew around the edges. Another second and the gap would reseal.

Alyx was faster.

Her sword, drenched in her amber aura, plunged into the cavity and stabbed through the bulbous tissue of the heart. Steam exploded around them as the cold blood of the rhynselk boiled around Alyx’s blade.

The queen screamed. Ice spiked around them in a last desperate attempt to fend off its attackers.

The heart stilled. The ice shattered, dissolving into delicate powdered snow. The queen collapsed.

They’d won.

Cass dropped to her knees as adrenaline gave way to exhaustion. System notifications pinged in the back of her mind, accompanied by the rush of power that came with another level.

Alyx pulled her sword from the beast’s heart, dark blood spraying from the suddenly still organ and steaming where it hit the surrounding snow.

They’d done it. Cass could feel the survivors. Their breaths were soft on the cold air. Some ragged from fighting. Some shallow from fear, slowly realizing their safety had been won.

They’d won. Cass repeated that to herself as she forced herself to her feet, leaning on her staff.

The air smelled of iron and char. The ground crunched with frozen blood with every step.

She’d saved more than had died this time. They’d won.

Even if she hadn’t saved all of them.

Even if she’d stripped a man of his autonomy to do it.

They won.

Ch. 22: Plans

Her command echoed in her ears as she fought the rhynselks already inside the walls. She’d done it.

It hadn’t been an accident. It hadn’t been a mistake.

She’d meant to override his will. She’d intended to force him to act against his wishes.

Did it make a difference that it would save everyone else? Did it matter that her command put him in relatively little danger?

Maybe.

But why did she get to decide?

Her Tempest Blade went through the knee of a rhynselk. She dodged to the side as the beast crumpled to the gravelly ground in a howling squeal of pain. It tossed its head, its horn slashing through the edge of her cloak as she ran past.

Salos ran his claws along the beast’s side, leaving a set of bleeding gashes in the fallen creature.

Regret and resignation warred in her gut. A hundred questions of how she could have handled it differently. A hundred ways she might have convinced him without the Command.

There wasn’t time to debate the decision already made. Just like there hadn’t been time to debate him. She left the wall to him. Already, the flow of new rhynselks slowed.

Already, the defenders were turning this fight in their favor.

She threw a Tempest Blade at the spine of a rhynselk fighting a pair of swordsmen. The beast snarled as the blade of lightning sliced into its meaty bones, the electricity dancing down its central nervous system. One of the swordsmen took the opportunity, jabbing his sword into an eye. The other stabbed behind a foreleg.

Across the defensive zone, another rhynselk reared at a group of noncombatants. They screamed, their hands going up to cover their faces. Cass Stormstride Sprinted. She wasn’t going to make it. Not even by Stepping onto the Wind.

She tried it anyway.

The beast’s hooves careened down. Cass still wasn’t close enough.

A blue force field appeared between the noncombatant and the beast. Its hooves struck the shield.

Cass materialized from the wind midair behind it, a Tempest Blade along her staff stabbing for the creature’s body. Her momentum carried her blade through rhynselk flesh. The creature fell forward. She twisted her staff, willing the lightning to burrow deeper.

Muscle spasmed beneath her and then stopped.

The noncombatants’ terror turned to shock as they processed they hadn’t been crushed beneath the monster’s hooves.

There wasn’t time to check on them in more detail than that. Cass leapt off the corpse and ran to the next monster.

There were only a few left. A few and the Queen.

It was covered in wounds, but so were the defenders.

Captain Jont lay against the far wall, covered in blood. Sir Kaiz leaned against his spear. Kelstor had ice crystals jutting from his flanks, a mist of condensation effervescing around them.

Only Alyx still stood tall, though she too was covered in cuts. Her armor glowed amber, her crown shining in the afternoon sun, bright and furious against the air’s chill.

Alyx darted around the queen, her sword trailing glowing embers behind her. Kelstor lunged, his jaws snapping shut around the queen’s neck. It threw its head back, its horns gouging Kelstor in return.

Alyx sunk her blade into its flank, slicing a long gash through its hide and spilling more of its blood.

The queen stomped its hooves, ice spreading around them in a wave of spikes.

Alyx darted back, her armor turning aside a spike that got too close. It did nothing to stop the ice from creeping up her legs.

Cass took down another lesser.

Another fell to one of Captain Jont’s soldiers.

Alyx drove her sword into the ice. Her blade pulsed with golden light, shattering the ice. Free, she burst toward the queen, her sword digging into the creature’s flesh.

Kelstor’s claws ripped into the queen’s side. Its horn gouged his shoulder.

A storm of ice shards grew over the queen’s head. They dropped on the combatants.

Marco lunged forward, his shield raised. It glowed with his aura, expanding and rising above the heads of Captain Jont and Sir Kaiz. But it didn’t quite cover Alyx.

Alyx and Kelstor were going to take the brunt of the ice storm.

Cass Sprinted in. She raised her staff.

Ice was just water. Water was an element.

If she didn’t want it to fall, all she needed was Elemental Manipulation and the Will to make it so.

Elemental Manipulation grabbed the ice above them. Cass had been prepared for a battle of Wills with the queen, but found nothing but gravity pulling the shards down.

Cass grinned and turned their trajectories toward the queen’s gigantic form. With another burst of Will, the shards shot into the queen’s flesh, burying themselves in its hide.

Kelstor ripped out a section of the creature’s neck.

Alyx’s sword tore out of its body with a spray of blood.

Sir Kaiz lunged into the break in the queen’s attacks, his spear burying into its chest.

And yet the queen was still standing. Its blood froze along its skin, sealing the wounds, and created a frozen pool under its feet.

How is it still alive? Cass asked.

It’s a bulky creature. We probably haven’t reached a critical organ, and it probably has Vitality—and therefore Health—far beyond what is reasonable, Salos said. I mentioned I hate fighting Vitality specialists, didn’t I?

So what do we do? Cass asked.

Hit it harder, Salos said.

Cass scowled. That wasn’t helpful.

Bleed it dry or destroy something vital. That’s how you kill things, Salos said. This is no exception.

Sir Kaiz leapt back as the queen thrashed again, leaving his spear in its body. Ice encased the weapon in place.

"Abyss," he cursed. "Not deep enough."

Three quarters of his spear was buried in the queen's body. Cass wasn't sure how much deeper it could get.

Cass drew a lightning Tempest Blade along her staff and slashed it across the queen's chest. The lightning burned through its hide and jolted through the fat beneath. It snorted and swept its head at Cass and Alyx.

Alyx met its horn with her sword, skidding back as the queen's immense size and Str pushed her back, while Cass darted out of range.

Lightning hadn’t been enough. What about her favorite trick?

Salos, Fairy Fire, please, Cass said.

You want it on you? No, that’s crazy.

Where else?

He shook his head, regret rumbling across their bond. Yet purple flames erupted along her skin.

Cass pulled at the stone beneath her as the queen’s bloody eyes turned on her. Cass grinned at the creature as it pawed the ground. As it charged, horn first.

Elemental Manipulation yanked up more and more stone, creating a towering spear. Cass angled it lower. She reinforced it.

The queen charged toward her. Ice accumulated along its horn.

“Cass!” Alyx screamed, her Perception and Alacrity finally catching what Cass was doing.

This isn’t going to work, Salos said. You need to move.

It’ll work, Cass said, adjusting the stone spear again.

Cass, move! Salos yelled.

Ice met stone.

Ice shattered. Stone cracked.

Cass’s spear exploded into shards as the queen barreled through it.

Alacrity slowed her perception of time.

The queen’s horn shone in the afternoon sun, sharp and level with Cass’s stomach.

She couldn’t take that attack. Liminal Dodge warned her she didn’t have the Stamina to mitigate this attack down to something survivable.

Dodge attempted to twist her body out of the way anyway. It would not be enough.

Run, whispered the wind.

The queen’s body barreling toward her certainly displaced enough. Cass Stepped onto it, dissolving into the wind as the horn crashed through the space she had just occupied.

“CASS!” Alyx screamed, her sword slashing across the queen’s exposed back.

Cass rematerialized on the ground a dozen yards away. Her heart pounded in her chest. Air refused to fill her lungs.

She’d nearly died. Anyone else would have died.

She wasn’t strong enough to kill this creature.

Are you crazy! Salos demanded, materializing in her face. I told you to move!

I thought I could do it, Cass said, her breath still coming up short. That’s worked before.

Not against a level 39 opponent!

The Thunderback Boar was 31, and I was only level 15, Cass said. Her heart pounded in her ears. That had been bad, but it could have worked.

And that nearly killed you too! Salos shouted back. Something flared on his side on their bond. Hot and frantic. It burned at her.

This isn’t the time for this! Cass turned away from him. They still had to kill the queen.

Lightning was out. Stone Spears were out.

What did she have left? Her hands tightened around her staff.

Kelstor unleashed a wave of flames over the rhynselk queen. It squealed as the flames washed over its exposed side. Its horns glistened and ice exploded around her. Flames and ice collided, vaporizing into steam.

Leave this to Alyx and the others, Salos said.

Cass glowered. There was sense to that. She could see it.

Kohen’s skill was keeping the rest of the rhynselk out. She and the other combatants had killed the lesser rhynselk that had gotten in.

There was only the queen remaining. Marco could keep stray attacks from hurting the noncombatants behind them.

There was no reason to rush.

As long as someone eventually killed the queen, all was well.

Alyx’s sword slashed across the queen’s snout. Kelstor’s jaws tore open another gash in her shoulder.

Blood oozed and froze, resealing the wounds.

It wasn’t enough. None of it was enough.

The queen threw herself at Kelstor, its horns slamming into his scales. Flames licked along them. Ice frosted along its skin. Steam sizzled away where the two met.

But Cass didn’t have the power to change that. She didn't have remotely enough stats to cut through the queen's. That was just the reality of a level gap of this size, even with all the bonuses of being a Slyphid. Monsters just had even more stats per level than she did.

So, what? She couldn’t kill it, so she should leave it to Alyx?

Yes. Obviously.

But could Alyx handle this?

The queen bucked suddenly, jerking away from Kelstor and into the air above Alyx.

Alyx rolled to the side as the queen’s hooves slammed into the ground, ice exploding around them. Shards of ice and stone few everywhere. Bits pelted Alyx and Kelstor, puncturing armor and scale. Alyx was barely holding on too.

If Alyx couldn’t, what then?

No, this was wrong. This wasn’t a one-on-one fight. They were in this together. There had to be more that she could contribute. There must be some other combination of skills that they could use.

Something that could penetrate through the rhynselk queen’s defenses.

Could you Hidden Blade Alyx’s attack? Cass asked Salos.

Yes, but that won’t make it stab deeper than her sword is long.

But it would do more damage? Cass confirmed. She was still fuzzy about what that meant practically.

Yes.

So it’s an option, Cass said.

Maybe once or twice, Salos said. His head bobbed back and forth in thought. Against a monster like this, maybe a few more times than that.

It was a possibility. Did they have other big attacks?

Alyx has her Aura Blade, Cass said. That would probably go deeper.

Salos made a noncommittal noise.

Not a ringing endorsement. What else did they have?

Pellen had already said she couldn’t use her squeezing spell on the queen, but she could hold her in place. That might free up Kelstor to do more than grapple with the monster. He had a big laser breath attack, didn’t he?

Salos, can you sneak up and ask Kelstor some questions for me? Cass asked.

Sure, Salos said with a shake of his head. He disappeared into a shadow. What exactly am I asking?

Can you ask him about his laser breath attack?

<<Yes, I have two breath attacks,>> Kelstor responded directly via his draconic telepathy. <<I have both Dragon Fire and Scorching Lance.>>

Could he use Scorching Lance on the queen? Cass asked. Salos passed the question on.

<<It needs a moment to charge. And I would need to create distance between myself and the target. If I back off to prepare it, I do not know what the monster will do. It nearly killed you a moment ago when I let go.>>

We can restrain it in other ways, Cass said.

I’m not telling him that, Salos said. Not without an actual plan.

I have a plan, Cass said. Her eyes swept across the defenses, landing on Pellen. The little mage was huddled against a wagon beside a group of noncombatants.

Cass Sprinted across the gap to her.

“Ready to catch the queen?” Cass asked.

Pellen jumped. “Are you sure? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Cass said. “And yes. I have a plan. How long can you hold her?”

Pellen shook her head. “A few seconds? I don’t have much left.”

“That should be enough,” Cass said. It wasn’t much, but a few seconds was an eternity amid the heat of battle. “Be ready on my signal.”

Pellen nodded, flipping her tome to the proper page.

See, I have a plan, Cass said.

You have the idea of a plan, Salos muttered. It will take more than a few seconds for the dragon to create the distance he needs and charge his attack.

Kelstor, in the meantime, had torn off another chunk of the queen’s shoulder muscle. Alyx had added new gashes along the sides of its face and flanks of its body. In return, Kelstor had a new gouge in his chest.

How long, exactly, does he need?

<<Ten,>> Kelstor answered.

Cass inhaled sharply. But no. That’s fine. We just need to keep the queen from killing any of the non-combatants—

Or you, Salos interjected.

—Or any of us, Cass amended, for those ten seconds. We don’t need to lock her down in one place.

Salos grunted.

Cass darted across the field to Marco’s side. The guardsman was breathing heavily, his shield held far lower than he usually did. Blood trickled down his forehead, and he favored his right leg.

“How are you holding up?” Cass asked him.

“I’ll live.” His eyes remained on the fight before them. Alyx ducked under the queen’s horn as the monster swept its head across the field. Ice filled the air.

Marco lifted his shield a little higher, aura gathering on its face.

“Think you can block one of her strikes?” Cass asked.

He grimaced but nodded.

“Be ready.”

He nodded again.

We’ve got this, Cass said to Salos. This is how it’s going to work…

Ch. 21: Kohen?: Blood Spines

His master’s Command hit him like a physical force. Like a slap to his face. Like something had slipped into his skin and squeezed his soul.

At his side, Tiador snorted. “As if yelling it louder would make it so.”

He ignored the Jothi nobleman’s words. They were unimportant to his current orders. How did he stop the rhynselks from entering the defensive perimeter? Some part of him still wanted to run, but his body refused to take a step away from this place until he’d ensured that nothing else could get in.

Blood Spines flickered to the fore of his mind. It was a skill that was not his own, but which he knew he could use. A line or two of them along the front wall would stop just about anything of this level from entering.

He just needed to get over there.

The space between himself and the wall was chaos. Beasts rampaged through noncombatants and combatants alike. Their blood rushed through their bodies with the fervor of panic.

Getting through this would be difficult. But that was what he had people for.

“Tiador, Daidyn, make a path for me.”

“Of course,” Tiador said as he stepped in the wrong direction.

“Back to the wall,” he clarified.

“What?” Tiador asked, confused.

“Really?” Daidyn asked, hopeful.

It was a simple order. He didn’t feel he needed to repeat it. He drew his rapier from his hip. The gems along its hilt weren’t attuned properly for his Concepts, but they would serve him well enough for this.

He ran, his blade trailing lightning as he cut through the beasts.

Daidyn roared behind him, quickly overtaking him and notably thinning the herd before him. Good. He’d need to preserve his resources for what needed to be done.

The Jothi nobleman followed in their wake, his head shaking. He was saying something about not falling for the mage’s taunts. This wasn’t about the taunts, though those had stung too.

It was a Command. As necessary as breathing. As natural as bleeding.

A corner of his soul hissed in displeasure. Why should he listen so dutifully to that airhead slyphid? That accursed demon tamer? That nobody?

He was—Well he was sure he was more important than her. He knew that much, even if the specifics escaped him at this moment.

None of this was important right now. Now was the time to prepare his skill. First, to gather all the blood he’d need.

Call of Blood.

There was so much spilt. It was almost a relief to collect it up. It coiled around him, growing with every step. So much unclaimed and his for the taking.

The vargher sliced through another beast, its blood spraying high and wide. He pulled it all into his train of blood; not a drop hit the ground or the vargher.

And like that, he was atop the crumbling wagon wall, a tide of blood behind him. He held his hand out and willed his gathered blood to disperse into head-sized orbs and spread across the wall’s front in three rows. The rhynselk ran through the orbs, properly unnerved by the floating blood, but not smart enough to understand what came next.

“What are you doing?” the Jothi noble asked, the question whispered and breathy.

He ignored him. Instead, he gave the command word for his skill in Kaldish, “Skewer.”

The orbs all simultaneously shot spines, like crimson urchins. The rhynselks amid the orbs were instantly impaled, spines stabbing through organs and eyes. Panic sent their blood pumping. Death stilled the blood of others.

Still, they came running. Most tried to turn away from the sudden spines. Some succeeded. But many had no room to turn away, pressed in on either side by their fellows. Many, many ran directly into the spines, skewering themselves with their own weight and momentum.

He grinned, drawing up the spilt blood of the dead. The dead had no claim on it—and twisted it into another row of orbs.

“Skewer.”

More rhynselks collapsed. They fell in waves, their blood pouring out and joining his wall of spines. It was a beautiful sight.

His master would praise him for this, right? He’d have their approval? This was enough. It had to be.

Surely.

“Ko, what is this?” Tiador whispered at his side.

Kohen blinked.

He opened his mouth to explain. It was his skill. Tiador had seen all his skills. This was—

His blood ran cold as he stared at the field of blood spines before him.

This wasn’t—

This was—

He wasn’t supposed to show these skills to anyone. He wasn’t supposed to use them. They weren’t his. The more he used them, the more he made them his, the harder it would be to fix.

They’d been leaving.

The caravan had been doomed.

Saving it had been so easy.

He stared down at his hands. He could see the blood pulsing within them. Just as he could feel the quickening blood through both Tiador and Daidyn’s veins.

“What is this?” Tiador asked again, louder.

Kohen clenched his jaw. He’d exposed himself. But that didn’t mean he needed to answer truthfully. The truth was what he wanted it to be. “A new spell.”

“A new spell?” Tiador repeated. The man wasn’t stupid. He was anything but. That was why he liked him. “You expect me to believe that?”

“Yes,” Kohen said, reinforcing the word with his Noble Authority. It washed over his followers. He could feel Daidyn relax. The vargher had no reason to believe otherwise.

Tiador resisted the assurance. He challenged him instead. “What language was that?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Kohen said, again pressing his authority into the words. He was a son of Veldor. He was Tiador’s lord. He was the honorable son of Thaycer Delim Veldor.

Even outside the limits of Velillia, he should have more than enough Authority to get Tiador to drop it.

And yet, he could feel his authority flexing. Like a muscle about to fail. Like a spinning top running out of steam.

Had losing to Ahryn undermined his authority to this degree? Was it the way his mother had ‘entrusted’ his safety to Tiador? Was it that abyss-cursed mage Cass Commanding him?

“It’s Kaldish,” Kohen added before his authority could crumble completely. “It—” How did he explain it was an ancient language of the vamphellish, steeped in magic and in tune with blood, without explaining how he knew that? How did he even know that? “—was part of my reward from the duchess,” he lied at the last second. “I asked for advanced magic tomes. This was one of the spells.”

Tiador squinted at him.

Was that enough?

“But what about your injuries?” Tiador asked.

Kohen stiffened. That was his mother had told his retainers, that he was badly injured and was struggling with Focus recovery. She had said he was unable to use any of his spells.

“I can handle this much. I’m not some infirm child.” He didn’t need to be babied. Pretending to have been badly hurt had been a mistake. This was an opportunity to cast it aside.

He turned away. This was more explanation than he owed anyone. They should be grateful for this much.

Why did he put up with minders? He didn’t need them. Stupid martials just got in his way. Stupid Jothians made him sick just looking at them.

He wanted to leave.

But he needed to keep these stupid monsters out of their defenses. Some part of him knew that this wasn’t something he had chosen for himself. But it didn’t matter.

He needed to keep them out. It was a fundamental truth. As necessary as inhaling his next breath. As pressing as maintaining his authority before Tiador. As important as becoming his father’s heir.

It wasn’t something he could make himself give up.

Even if he should.

Even if he needed to.

His teeth ground together. “Skewer.”

Why should he give up anything?

The monsters were endless. But this skill cost him next to nothing, as long as there were things to bleed.

He’d always liked this skill for that reason. Oh, sure, it was useless against many constructs. But who really had the resources to raise armies of constructs?

No one he wanted to tangle with—that was who. No, he’d leave messing with powerhouses like the Custodia to fools like—

Pain laced through his head. He put a hand to his forehead. What was that?

What was he thinking about? Who were the Custodia?

What was he—

Stop the rhynselks from entering.

The words rang in his head.

This wasn’t his fort. Why did he need to protect it again?

Stop the rhynselks from entering.

The beasts had pushed their way between the first and second lines of blood caltrops. He set them off with a word of command, “Skewer.”

How had he gotten here?

Erizen had invited him somewhere? And then? Pain spiked between his eyes.

He shook his head. As soon as he was done here, he’d find that abyss-cursed nyxdra and remind him not to waste his time. If the fool was going to ditch him for his mistress—

His vision went white from the pain. His hand pressed against his forehead as he reached for his cane to steady himself. Where was it?

“Ko!” a man shouted in alarm. “Are you alright?”

He blinked, forcing his eyes to focus. The man—Tiador. Who was Tiador? Why did he know his name?—was staring at him, concern worn loud and visible over his face. Tiador’s pulse was fast and frantic.

“I’m fine,” he said. A full second passed before he realized the words had come out in Jothi. A full second passed before he realized the man had spoken in Jothi.

“Are you sure?” the man—Tiador—asked.

No, he suddenly wasn’t. “Where is Erizen?”

The man stared at him, slitted yellow-green eyes widening. “What?”

Did the man not speak Kaldish? Where—? Was he on the Jothi Peninsula? Why would he—?

His head pounded.

Obviously, he was on the Jothi Peninsula. He had been born here. His city was here.

Except no. No, he wasn’t. He was from the Undergarden. He was—

“Kohen, you’re scaring me,” Tiador said. “I don’t think you should use that spell.”

“I’m fine!” he snapped back. He didn’t need to hold it much longer. The herd was dispersing. This would be over soon.

And then he would—

—continue Belden and have his soul looked at.

—go find Erizen and kick his face in for whatever this was.

What was this?

“Are you?” Tiador demanded.

He looked away. No, he wasn’t. None of this was fine.

He’d been unofficially exiled. He was some nobody’s lackey. His head was full of people he didn’t know and places he’d never been. And to top it all off, his head hurt too.

He was broken. There really wasn’t another explanation. He was broken, and he couldn’t afford to let anyone else notice.

Ch. 20: Dire Straits

Cass leapt in front of another rhynselk, a Tempest Blade flying from its end. The blade crashed into the beast’s side, slicing through the hide and electrocuting the muscle. Salos launched out from her shadow, his claws burying themselves in the monster’s face, raking at eyes and nostrils.

It groaned in pain, its legs buckling and its body crumbling under its own weight.

“Get back!” Cass yelled at the noncombatants behind her as the beast careened forward on its charging momentum.

They weren’t moving fast enough. They’d be hit. She’d be crushed between them.

“Noncombatants, move to the sides!” the caravan master’s voice echoed over the chaos as his guards pushed apart the back wall of wagons. “Combatants, channel the beasts through the center!”

The sea of noncombatants surged away from the fortification’s center, the frantic people pushing and shoving to get away from the beasts.

But still not fast enough.

She drew a Wind Tempest Blade to her staff’s end, widening and blunting it. She twirled, turning on the noncombatants behind her. She hoped they had reasonable Fortitude. Her wind glaive slammed into the people, throwing them out of the way.

She twisted her staff, drawing it up and over their heads while maintaining her momentum, driving the wind blade into the falling rhynselk’s face.

Salos, swap!

Space shifted, and he continued her turn in her body, his greater Strength slamming into the monster and shoving it wide around her.

That all you wanted? he asked.

Yup, swap back. Cass triggered the skill again and returned to her body before the winds along her staff dissipated.

More rhynselk were already pouring through the opening at the front. Several still tore through noncombatants as caravan guards attempted to kill or redirect them to the newly opened exit in the back.

How much longer could they continue like this?

Time slowed as her Alacrity ramped to maximum effect.

Alyx, Kelstor, Marco, and several of the higher-level combatants contained the rhynselk queen. All of them were bleeding. Kelstor had a deep gore in his shoulder, bleeding profusely. Blood dripped down the armor of most of the humanoid combatants. Marco had a blood trail starting under his helmet and continuing over one eye and down to his chin.

The queen was in little better condition. Long gashes ran across her hide. An eye was bloody red. The horn under that eye was broken off, while her nose horn was visibly cracked.

Still, ice magic rolled through the air, cold and deadly, driving ice shards the size of Cass’s arm and as sharp as broken glass into the defenders.

None of them had the luxury of stepping back to protect the noncombatants from the lesser rhynselks.

Something needed to change.

If they could kill the Queen, the defenders could focus on the lessers. If they could keep more lessers from entering, they could turn their full might on the queen.

Rhynselk Queen (lvl 39)

Cass couldn’t kill that. Not when so many others were already struggling with it.

That meant she needed to keep the lessers out and kill or drive out the ones already inside. More ran through the gap every second, each pushing the opening wider and wider as they ran through.

Could she plug the gaps with Elemental Manipulation fast enough to keep them out? Maybe, but what about the wagon walls? How quickly would the rhynselk blow through the wood, creating new gaps?

Cass needed not only to close the gaps but to keep them closed.

Stone spears along the periphery might help, but did she have the Focus for a working as big as this?

“Could you keep the rhynselks out with a barrier?” Cass asked Pellen as she turned her staff on another beast. Lightning sliced through its side as it charged past.

A bolt of dark blue energy shot from the little mage’s tome and into the side of another rhynselk as Pellen finished her spell. The rhynselk grunted and thrashed its head, but kept running. Pellen’s shoulders slumped in exhaustion. “Not for long. A minute? Maybe?”

That wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.

“Could you restrict the queen?” Cass asked, changing tacts as she drew up another stone spear, letting the next creature skewer itself with its own momentum.

Pellen squinted at the queen. “Once. And for even less time.”

“What about the squeezing variant?”

Pellen shook her head. “No. It’s much too Fortified for that to work.”

If Cass could come up with a one-shot kill for the queen, Pellen’s restriction spell could guarantee the shot. But they couldn’t use it before that.

Stone spears seemed her best option.

Cass darted through the chaos, skirting around the thrashing rhynselks and pushing noncombatants out of the path of danger. She Stealthed around the queen and pressed herself up against the wagon walls.

They shook as rhynselks ran past. Alarmingly so.

Atmospheric Sense showed her the herd outside. Most still ran around the walls. Too many funneled through the gap. Far too many slammed into the wagons before bouncing off and choosing one of the other two options.

She closed her eyes and pressed into the stone beneath her with Elemental Manipulation. She grabbed at what was beneath her feet and pushed it into the gap in the wagons.

The stone flowed up, thickening with her will.

Focus: 326/630

A rhynselk slammed into the stone. The shock reverberated through the stone and into Cass. She could feel cracks forming.

She redoubled her efforts, pulling up more stone, thickening it and smoothing the cracks.

Focus: 287/630

Down the wall, a horn slammed through. Wood splintered. The rest of its body burst through a moment later.

Cass darted toward the new hole, Elemental Manipulation already reaching for the stone beneath it. Her staff tip reached it first. She yanked it up, filling the gap before another rhynselk could storm through.

Behind her, a rhynselk slammed into the first stone wall, its horn piercing straight through. It shook its head, shattering the barrier.

Cass’s heart sank. The walls alone weren’t enough. Would stone spears keep them out?

She had to try. She pushed the stone under the wagons, forcing it to jut out into spears. They came up faster than the walls.

A rhynselk swerved around the section of spikes, slamming its head into the wagon wall at an angle. The wagon shook. The beast buffeted off, running parallel to the wall and turning again through the existing hole.

Cass walked along the wall, pulling up more spikes.

Focus: 242/630

Already, rhynselks were skewering themselves on them. Some beasts died on impact. Some squealed in pain and shook themselves free of the stone, breaking the ones they hit and more.

Another horn went through the wall in a section Cass hadn’t lined with spikes.

They were still pouring through the gaps.

Her Focus was falling.

This wasn’t working.

If she could throw up spikes across the wall all at once, this might work. But Elemental Manipulation just didn’t have that kind of range, especially not for manipulating stone.

Cass grimaced. There were so many corpses out there, and it hadn’t made a difference. So much blood.

It reminded her too much of the cathedral and the countless paladin corpses.

That thought, as gruesome as it was, gave her pause.

Kohen had a skill for turning blood into spikes. He’d turned the cathedral into a minefield of blood. Couldn’t he use that along the wall?

Where was he?

She spotted the back of his head, unmistakable from the streaks of white through his purple hair. Daidyn walked backward behind him, the huge vargher standing out amid a fleeing crowd made up as much by combatants as it was noncombatants.

Cass’s blood boiled and Hearth flared.

She Wind Stepped, materializing between them and the exit. “KOHEN!”

Kohen jumped. Tiador raised his blades. Far behind them, a rhynselk trampled a man.

“What are you doing?” Cass yelled as the fleeing portion of the crowd pushed around her. “Why aren’t you helping?”

Kohen flinched.

“He can’t,” Tiador snapped far sharper than Cass was used to. “He’s one man. And he’s hurt.”

Kohen looked away.

Hurt? Cass tried not to snort. Right, he was pretending. She couldn’t imagine why. Especially not now. He was in as much danger as everyone else.

Another combatant attempted to block a rhynselk’s horn, only for it to go through their shield and impale their chest.

There wasn’t time for this. “What about your blood spike spell?”

“His what?” Tiador asked. He shook his head. “Get out of our way. If you want to defend this falling caravan, be our guest, but don’t expect us to stand with you. We weren’t hired as guards. We have no obligation to die here.”

Tiador pushed past her. Kohen moved to follow him.

“Is hiding those skills worth dying over?” Cass shouted after them.

They didn’t look back.

“That’s it?” Cass growled. “Coward. Spineless, self serving, coward.”

Kohen stiffened but kept walking.

“Sorry, miss,” Daidyn whispered as he followed his master.

Cass’s teeth ground together. Salos was on her shoulder. She could feel his opinions, unvoiced, against her consciousness. He agreed with Kohen. He’d rather she ran too than stand and fight here.

He thought if she was going to do this anyway, she should make Kohen stand and fight with her.

She shook. All it would take was a word from her and Kohen would have no choice. All it would take was a word from her and these people would be much safer.

All it took was overriding one man’s will.

As was apparently her right.

“You’ll die pointlessly out there!” she screamed after them, as if they hadn’t already run the calculation. As if her opinion of their chances would push the needle at all.

Behind her, people screamed. An endless pounding of hooves thundered toward her. Wood splintered as wagon walls crumbled. A dragon roared and the queen squealed.

She could feel frantic breaths stop. Could feel people dying. There wasn’t time for this.

“KOHEN!” Cass shouted over the din. “STOP THE RHYNSELKS FROM ENTERING!”

Ch. 19: Kohen? : Kohen Delim Veldor

Kohen grit his teeth as he watched the wall fall and the queen charge in. His hands twitched at his sides, eager to draw his lightning blade. Eager to rip blood from the beast’s veins and twist it into a weapon of his will.

Except, Kohen Delim Veldor should not have any such spell. Kohen Delim Veldor, eldest son of the Warden of Vaisom and the Force Enchantress, was a Force and Lightning spellsword. He fought with a lightning aura and force and lightning spells. Kohen Delim Veldor did not know how to manifest Concept Blades. He did not know how to steal blood or manipulate it.

He knew that.

And yet. He—whoever he was—knew exactly how to do those things.

His sister’s lackey blocked the queen’s advance and interrupted the charge of her children.

His hand twitched up. It would be easy enough to throw up a Fortitude’s Aegis to reduce the inflow of beasts. Was it not his duty to protect noncombatants as a member of Fortitude’s faithful?

He clicked his tongue, his hand tightening into a fist.

Kohen Delim Veldor was not a member of Fortitude’s faithful. He did not know Fortitude’s Aegis. Fortitude’s Aegis was a skill granted to Fortitude’s elite paladins, a fact Kohen Delim Veldor had no business knowing. He should not have access to that skill.

That his hand itched to perform the gesture to summon it was irrelevant.

He needed to stand here. He needed to stay out of the eye of people who knew what he should know and would notice if he knew things he shouldn’t.

He also should be in the thick of it.

He should have been on the wall. Killing rhynselk vanguards would have been easy experience. After losing out on a dragon, he needed every advantage he could get his hands on.

And it shouldn’t have been hard to stick to Lightning Rain from there.

Kohen Delim Veldor should have been able to keep Lightning Rain up for half an hour at a respectable density if that was the only spell he was using. With Kohen Delim Veldor’s Arcane Concept reducing the Focus cost of his spells, it should have been easy.

But Arcane was gone.

Arcane was fucking gone.

He pulled up his abyss-cursed status screen, as if checking would change it this time.

Kohen

[Race: Vamphelish Demonic Thrall

Lvl: 33

…

Concepts:

- Lightning

- Blood

- Aegis]

His teeth ground together. Should he be thankful he hadn’t lost Lightning at least?

Should he be glad he hadn’t lost his Gestural Magics skill? Should he be happy it wasn’t worse?

That he wasn’t worse?

“You are going to Trallyn’s Apothecary and Clinic. They are doing revolutionary work in skill alteration and curse removal. They will be able to fix you,” his mother had said. “Stay out of sight until then. Don’t use these corrupted skills. Don’t engage with these infecting Concepts. You are Kohen Delim Veldor. My eldest son. We will fix this, and you will proudly support your brother.”

He’d agreed. Everything she said made sense—as rotten of a Jothi woman as she was. He winced at the thought. That wasn’t him. He was Jothi. He was a noble of… Of…

Abyss and blood. Focus, man.

“Of all the poor luck we find ourselves with,” Tiador muttered, his lime eyes not leaving the advancing tide of rhynselk.

“It was never going to be a peaceful trip,” Kohen said.

Tiador snorted. “That was why we joined a caravan, though, wasn’t it?”

Kohen nodded. The thought all but made his blood boil again. They—his mother—had picked out a caravan that could protect him.

Him? Needing to be protected like some common noncombatant?

He was a noble. A priestess. A—

He winced again, putting a hand to his forehead. Abyss. How far gone was he?

The point was, he would be protected. By the caravan. By Tiador and Daidyn. He would make it to Belden without raising his sword or casting a spell.

Like an infirm coward. That woman had done this to him.

His eyes slipped across the battlefield. There she was, a new staff in her hands. His mage behind her. A growing pile of beasts before her. She was raking in the experience while he was trapped here among the noncombatants.

Air-brain slyphid should know her place.

Ahead, a rhynselk rammed through a caravan guard, its nose horn impaling him through the chest. Blood sprayed through the air, suddenly and beautifully unowned. His for the taking.

He closed his eyes. As if not looking would help. As if not looking would blot out Sanguine Sense. As if he could ignore the pulsing of blood through the bodies around him, the rapid heartbeats of the noncombatants, the labored bodies of the shield-bearers ahead, the rabid pulse of the running beasts.

It was a symphony he couldn’t ignore.

That he had to ignore.

It was demonic. Unnatural. No human should have a racial skill like that.

But it was perfectly normal for a vamphellen.

Which he wasn’t. It didn’t matter what his status screen said.

He was Kohen Del—

What was the rest?

Abyss take him.

The rhynselk threw the man to the ground, tossing its head and lowering it again for another charge.

There were rows of noncombatants between himself and the beast, rows of living shields to cover him. His teeth ground together. That was how weak he was now. Forced to rely on noncombatants for cover.

Daidyn moved in between them, his greatsword drawn. The vargher’s whole body leaned forward, as if the fool wanted to rush to the front. Did it hurt his sensibilities to cower back here, or did the man have delusions of heroism? He’d never been able to tell with Daidyn.

The crowd in between tensed, the first row shifting back.

A man to his left glanced his way. “You’re Lord Veldor, aren’t you?”

Kohen stiffened.

“You’re here to protect us, right? The last line of defense?” Desperate hope flickered in the man’s eyes. His pulse pounded through his veins.

“Daidyn, handle the creature,” Kohen ordered, looking away from the noncombatant abruptly.

“My lord, you sure?” Daidyn asked, hope all too loud in his voice.

“Our job is to protect you,” Tiador whispered from his other side.

“Which you will do better by slaying the things than hovering around me,” Kohen snapped.

“As you will,” Daidyn grunted. Louder, he shouted, “Coming through!” and he sprinted through the crowds.

They scrambled out of the big man’s way, splitting like a river around a rock.

The rhynselk charged at the same time.

Daidyn swung his sword, the long blade glistening black with his Concept of Obsidian. It slammed into the rhynselk’s horn. The two clashed, like titans of legend. For a moment, they were locked in place, bestial momentum straining against martial might.

The horn cracked first. It went with the sound of ice crushed beneath a blade, sharp and powdery.

Daidyn’s sword kept going, digging into the beast’s shoulder and driving it to the side with the force.

The rhynselk snorted in frustration. Ice crystals formed around its face, spinning through the air and back at the huge swordsman.

Daidyn whipped his blade up in salute, the wide blade covering his face. “Ardent Block”

The ice shard slammed into him. Or, into the invisible defensive field his skill had created.

Daidyn twisted his blade around again, slashing at the monster’s flank. It cut deep into its hide. Crimson blood, hot and steaming into the magically cooled air, flowed onto the cold stone.

Daidyn more than had this one handled. Unfortunately, it was far from the only beast.

Far ahead, the Queen and the mercenary leadership fought. She bled across her sides and snout. But so did her opponents.

More of the caravan guard and hired mercenaries fought the endless tide of herd members that flowed in around their queen.

More rhynselks fell before the defenders. Blood, beast and man’s, pooled into the dark stone.

And still they came.

A rhynselk burst through the line of defenders and into the sea of noncombatants. A horn went through a chest. More bodies were plowed down, hooves crushing flesh into stone.

Tiador pushed him back, his swords flying from their sheaths and into his hands. Tiador darted forward through the crowds like an arrow and skewered his silver blade through the beast’s eye. In less than a breath, he’d withdrawn the blade and Shutter Stepped back to stand in front of Kohen.

The rhynselk stumbled, its body suddenly not responding to the impulses firing through its brain.

Daidyn’s blade sunk deep into the shoulder of another.

Tiador darted out again, dropping another.

An ice shard shot into Daidyn’s chest, denting his armor.

A horn sliced across Tiador’s cheek as he withdrew again.

Hooves crushed noncombatants.

The Queen slammed Captain Jont to the ground with the thrash of her head.

Kelstor unleashed another gout of fire from his maw.

More poured through the gap.

It was chaos.

Chaos he would have thrived in if only he were able to join. He could see it: Lightning rain over the gap in the wall, pelting the rhynselks as they charged through; Revolving Lightning around him keeping the beasts off him as he set up Grand Revolution, his major ritual spell and trump card, around the Queen.

Did he still remember all of Grand Revolution? Abyss. Why was the spell form fuzzy? He couldn’t have forgotten it. That was the spell he’d used to kill the Lord of the Pass.

His hand twitched again. The Concept Blade would be so easy to draw here. He could build it of Blood or Lightning and reap chaos through these cursed Jothi and blasted beasts. There was no good reason to restrain himself.

None except the knowledge he shouldn’t know that skill.

Daidyn cut down another rhynselk, its head dropping from its shoulders.

Tiador skewered another.

Another noncombatant fell.

Sir Kaiz slammed into the wagon wall, blood coughing from his lungs with the impact.

The line was crumbling. There were beasts among the noncombatants.

The caravan would not make it.

He took a step back. They were still a day and a half out from Belden. Could he make it there with just Tiador and Daidyn? With no supplies?

Not to mention, there were more rhynselks outside the wagons. But if they took horses, they could ride with the beasts until dark when they would inevitably slow, then pick their way out of the herd under the cover of night. It wasn’t a safe plan, but were his chances better if he stayed here?

No, not a chance.

“Daidyn, fall back!” he shouted over the crowd, his voice filling with the authority of Commander’s Rally and his status as Daidyn’s liege.

The vargher backstepped through the crowd, falling back to Tiador’s side. “What’s next, boss?”

“We back up,” Kohen said. “And we get out of here.”

“We’re abandoning the caravan?” Tiador asked.

“Do you see a reversal in our favor?”

Tiador shook his head.

Daidyn’s shoulders stiffened. “You sure, boss?”

“I am.” Kohen let Noble Authority fill his voice. There wasn’t time for debate. He’d made his decision. It was time to go.

The vargher nodded. “Behind you, to your right, there’s a gap in the wagons. Lord Tiador, sir, lead the way. I’ll follow behind.”

Ch. 18: Alyx: Aris, Veldor, Alyx

The rhynselk queen broke through the walls with a rush of ice and a burst of physical might. The defenders scattered into new defensive positions before her.

Alyx’s hand on her sword tightened. Take us down.

You aren’t going to Grand Descend? Kelstor asked, his surprise loud over their bond.

Alyx froze. What?

Aris always jumped into the fray. I’d Battle Cry to intimidate our foes, while she dropped on our enemies, shrouded in wings of flames. An image of Aris doing just that floated over their bond.

Was that a common Dragon Knight skill? Her hand tightened on her sword. Would she have been taught if she hadn’t been banished? If her mother lived?

I don’t have that skill, Alyx said instead, forcing a confidence in herself back into her thoughts. She had plenty of other tricks. Just take us down; we’ll stop her.

Right, Kelstor said, his wings angling down in a sharp dive. Wind rushed past them, cold and biting, filled with more and more ice crystals as they got closer. Just above the heads of the defenders, Kelstor leveled off, charging the queen. His jaws snapped out and his claws ripped into her side.

Alyx leapt from his back, rolling across the icy ground to her feet, already building aura along her blade. She dashed forward, slicing across the exposed flank of the beast with a growing Heaven’s Strike. Blood poured from the wound, only to freeze in the creature’s coarse fur.

The queen squealed in protest, thrashing her head and throwing Kelstor off with a blast of icy wind. Kelstor was buffeted back, his wings ballooning out and dragging him back a step.

The queen charged after him, her horn glowing with magic. Alyx darted in, Heaven’s Blade still burning bright along her blade. She slashed it across the queen’s horn, forcing her to the side and away from Kelstor.

From the other side, Captain Jont slashed across the creature’s flank with her massive greatsword. A spear dropped from the sky, impaling the beast behind a shoulder blade. Blood splattered over the ice-coated ground.

And then there was heat. That was her only warning. Sudden and burning against her back as her sword sliced into the ice coating the queen’s horn. There wasn’t time for questions. She activated Forceful Exit before the heat could do more than lick at her summoned Dragon Scale armor.

She flickered out of existence as Dragon Fire filled the space she’d just occupied, washing over the queen, and reappeared a yard back, panting and sweating from the heat.

Did you just Dragon Fire me? She asked, staring in horror as Kelstor continued breathing flames.

Yes?

Are you trying to kill me? Her heart pounded in her chest. Her body shook.

Aren’t you fireproof? he asked.

Alyx stared at him, the answer slowly shaping. Was my mother fireproof?

She was the Everburning Flame and my knight, Kelstor said as if that was all the answer he needed to give.

There wasn’t time for this. Mana swirled around the queen and a sheet of ice materialized between her and Kelstor, blocking his breath.

Well, I’m not, Alyx said and charged around the queen’s side, her sword slashing into an exposed side.

The queen thrashed, a back leg kicking out. Alyx dodged around it, her sword lashing out to slice another long gash.

Oh. Intense regret echoed in that single word. Right. Sorry.

Alyx shook her head. Should she have tried harder to hold on to her mother’s Concepts after all? This fight would be easier with the power of the Everburning Flame.

No, there was no time for that kind of regret. She had the Concepts she had. She had the skills she had. This beast before her would fall. She would make certain of it.

[Endless Assault: + 1 Str, + 1 Dex, + 1 End]

And she had the skills to make it happen. She didn’t want this to be a battle of endurance, but as long as she didn’t fall, it would become one. And she couldn’t lose such a fight.

A civilian screamed behind her. The queen wasn’t the only enemy, but she’d have to trust Cass and the others to handle the rest.

The queen squealed and a wave of ice exploded up from the ground in deadly spears. One sprouted from beneath her feet. She had only a split second to decide: forward or back?

A grimace spread over her lips as she launched herself forward, driving her sword into the queen’s neck.

Alyx! Kelstor shouted behind her as the ice shot up behind her. Blood dripped down her blade and over her hands, hot despite the ice magic the rhynselk wielded.

He spun, his tail sweeping the ice clear and knocking a dozen lesser beasts out of the way.

I’m fine, Kel, Alyx assured him, yanking her sword from the queen’s fat neck. But the blade stuck halfway.

The queen thrashed, throwing her head toward Alyx. The horn below its eye gouged at Alyx’s armor, denting the plating but not penetrating it. The force of the queen’s mass slammed into Alyx, sending her tumbling away.

ALYX! His distress screamed in her head, ringing with the force of the impact. The pain left her reeling.

He charged, roaring.

“You okay, girl?” Marco’s voice drifted through the ringing. “That looked a bad hit.”

Alyx shook her head and forced herself to her feet. He’d stepped in between her and the monster, his shield glowing with his protective aura.

“I’m okay,” she said. Where was her sword?

His shoulders stiffened at the declaration, but he didn’t argue. “Of course.”

Had it come with her?

Kelstor’s claw raked across the queen’s snout while Captain Jont and Sir Kaiz both attacked its exposed flanks. The queen reared back, its horn glowing.

There it was, still jammed in the creature’s neck.

Her hooves crashed back down, a new field of ice spines shooting from the earth.

Pulling it free would be dangerous. She had her second, shorter sword. Except she wasn’t hitting anything vital even with the longer Reverberating Blade, what would the short one do?

No, she needed to retrieve it, dangerous or not.

A memory of Cass pulling an orb off the collar of the Herald of the Forest sprang to mind. How had she done that? She had stealth skills for one and probably Salos’s help for two.

How would Salos do it? That was the real question. He was an assassin with Fairy Fire. He snuck around while redirecting attention elsewhere.

Fire Breath the queen, Alyx said to Kelstor, as she sprinted past Marco. She had a plan.

Flames erupted from Kelstor’s maw. Are you okay?

Fine, I’m fine, she assured him.

But your sword.

I’m working on it. Keep that fire going.

The queen squealed and ice formed a wall between her and the dragon fire. The ice around the edges melted and turned to plumes of rolling steam.

Alyx let her aura dim. She wasn’t sneaky, but on this battlefield, she just needed to be the least interesting.

She sprinted through the steam, hidden by it as she slipped up to the queen’s neck. She lunged, her hands wrapping around the hilt.

The queen’s eye turned on her. She snorted, her breath condensing into visible vapor in the cold. Her head jerked away.

Alyx’s aura surged, channeling Radiant Aura along the blade and blowing the rend in the beast’s flesh wider. At the same time, she activated the blade’s unique effect: Reverberating Strike. Additional wounds materialized across its body, bloody and gaping.

The queen howled.

Alyx wrenched the blade the rest of the way free, and sprinted back, not about to make the same mistake twice.

The queen charged after her.

“Marco, hold it back a moment,” Alyx yelled, retreating behind him as her guard’s man took the front.

The queen was massive, so she needed a massive attack.

Heaven’s Strike charged along her sword, the aura growing. It was a hungry skill, eating up point after point of her Stamina to fuel her aura. This was nothing new.

Yet today, it wanted something more. A Concept.

The Veldors, her family—her father’s family?—applied Lightning to it. It was part of the swordplay her grandmother had pioneered. She’d seen Fioreya do it easily, transforming her aura into buzzing lightning along the blade’s edge.

She didn’t have Lightning. She had made her peace with that.

Really. She had.

She had her own Concepts. Her own path to walk.

Heaven’s Strike demanded a Concept.

It could have its pick. Light was an easy choice. It would match her Radiant Aura skill, making them both Light-applied aura attacks. She shoved Light at the skill.

The queen slammed into Marco’s shield. His knees buckled, but he didn’t budge.

Her skill didn’t take Light.

Why? It was so similar to Lightning. She’d used it as a substitute for so long. It was an easy replacement.

Or a shallow copy.

She wouldn’t be a copy. She had to be more than that.

The queen swung her horn against Marco’s shield. He slid back over the icy ground.

What then? She couldn’t imagine how Vines would apply.

Kelstor lunged.

But that just left—Oh.

She could see it. She could feel the skill accept the idea. She could feel her aura deepen as it absorbed the Concept. Her hands twisted around the hilt. She charged in swinging.

Embers fell from the blade as it arched through the frigid air. Her aura glowed with the amber-orange of molten metal.

She could only Forge her own path, even if she didn’t know what it was yet.

Concept Applied: [Forge - Heaven’s Strike

Central to the Veldor family sword arts, this skill makes manifest the power of the heavens in a way only those who accompany dragons can know. And yet, yours has been re-tempered by the lessons of others. Strike while the iron is hot with the fury of the heavens. …

Association with the Concept of Forge applies the properties of molten metal to the shrouding aura. Charging this skill allows the user to temporarily reforge user’s Frt into any Physical or Mental stat.]

Her sword slammed into the queen’s horn. Ice struck molten aura.

Horn cracked. Alyx grinned.

Ch. 17: The Queen

Four more waves. That was how many it took before there was no room for the frightened beasts to run away.

By the fifth wave, they were packed so tightly that the boom of thunder erupting in front of them only sent them running faster at the defenders.

“Ranged combatants, ready attack on the herd!” the caravan master shouted over the squeals of fear.

Cass readied another Tempest Blade, drawing lightning to her staff. It came easily. Happily. Like lightning was supposed to be there. It had never cooperated so easily with her.

Lightning had always been unruly. It wanted what it wanted, and it had never cared much for her instructions. And even now, she could feel it tugging to go. But it was more like a toddler pulling at her shirt sleeves to hurry to the playground than a rabid animal pulling at its chain.

Was this the effect of her new staff? The lightning rippled through the dark stone in the staff’s center, sparking through its depths, as if distracted from its purpose by the stone’s presence.

“Lease!”

Cass threw the blade. It blasted from the end of her staff, even faster than ever before. And wider. The blade had only been about two feet long at the end of her staff, but it had widened to six across as it sliced through the charging beasts.

It cut deep into the leading rhynselks, burning into the beast’s hide and slicing into the muscle beneath. It tumbled to the ground, tripping the ones behind it.

Arrows and mage bolts rained around. They gouged out eyes, blew holes through heads, melted flesh, or blasted out legs. Many more beasts fell, some tripping those to follow them, while others found themselves crushed underfoot their fellows.

“Fire at the ready!” The caravan master screamed over the screaming below them. “Don’t let them hit the wall!”

And there was so much screaming. Fear and pain and panic echoed through the air as rhynselk after rhynselk bolted into the kill zone, their horns ramming into the fallen ahead of them, their hooves crushing below them. There was no room to turn, no room to get out.

And still, the magic and arrows fell on them.

Cass threw Tempest Blade after Tempest Blade into the torrent of pain.

Rhynselk after rhynselk fell.

And yet, the line of corpses got ever closer.

The end was nowhere in sight.

“Dragon fire!”

Kelstor hovered over the wagon circle and opened his maw. Fire poured out, scorching the ground and incinerating the corpses. The heat scalded Cass’s face.

As his breath receded, the ground was again clear ground with only scorched bones crumbling in the wind left behind.

It was a short-lived respite. The wave poured forward again.

“Keep attacking!”

And again the cycle began, the mages and archers shooting into the incoming wave.

And still there was no end in sight.

“Arrows!” the archer to her side shouted down at the support behind the walls. A moment later, a noncombatant was sliding another bundle of arrows into his quiver. He fired off another wave.

Again, the rhynselks pushed forward toward the hilltop and the defenders, unable to run around it due to their tightly packed herd mates. Again and again, they fell to the defender’s attacks.

It was a siege. A fight to see who would last longer: the defenders or the endless stream of monsters.

Rhynselk Foal (lvls 3-12) x158

On her other side, Pellen was slowing, the gaps between her mage bolts increasing with every volley. Had she burned through her Focus already?

Pellen wasn’t alone. The spells were slowing along the wall. Arrows still fell freely, but the magic effects of their impacts were tapering off too.

The defenders were running out of steam.

“Queen approaching!” yelled an archer down the wall.

Through the throng of low leveled foals, a hulking beast plowed forward. It was twice as tall at the shoulder as the surrounding foals, easily fourteen or fifteen feet tall at the shoulder, with a hump of neck muscles thicker than Cass’s chest. Ice crystals swirled around it. The air dropped in temperature with every step closer of its pounding hooves.

Rhynselk Queen (lvl 39)

“Dragon Fire!” the caravan master shouted.

Kelstor unleashed another wave of fire over the incoming monsters.

The leading foals squealed in pain, incinerated under Kelstor’s breath. The corpses fallen ahead of the queen vaporized under the flames.

The queen thrashed her head, her horns glowing with blue-white mana. A sheet of ice appeared above her and her children. Heat and cold collided.

His flames melted at the sheet, even as the surface turned the flames aside. Her horns reinforced the ice, more forming underneath to replace what Kelstor melted.

Cass couldn’t believe Kelstor’s fire could be stopped by a random monster, not after she’d seen it melt men much stronger. But it wasn’t just the queen. All the lesser beasts had joined in, their horns glowing with the same blue-white mana, each adding their thimble of power to their queen’s greater whole.

On they charged, the air filling with steam and mist. They were going to hit the wagon wall.

“Increase fire! Take her down!” the caravan master yelled.

Cass threw more Tempest Blades at the creature. Blade after blade cut into her hide, the electricity zapping at her thick layers of fat beneath. Fire and force bolts struck her again and again. And the arrows never stopped.

But neither did the queen.

Pellen shouted the final word of her spell. A wall of dark blue mana materialized between the queen and the wall.

The queen rammed into it, her entire weight slamming into the plane with an audible THUMP. Pellen winced through a second chant.

More blades and arrows rained on the queen and her children. Kelstor’s breath poured down. An arrow struck her eye. A blade took a chunk from her horn.

Around her feet, her children rammed the wall.

Each impact sent fractures snaking through the magic-summoned wall.

Pellen shouted another activation word, and her shield shimmered, thickening, the cracks closing. Maybe it would hold.

And then Kelstor’s breath gave out.

The floating ice wall shattered, the shards exploding into him and the wall, digging into his scales and sending new cracks spidering across Pellen’s shield.

The queen reared up, her body impossibly heavy for such an action yet strengthened beyond Earthly possibility by the system stats, and drew mana around her. It glowed impossibly bright to Cass’s Mana Sight.

“Take cover!” For the first time, there was alarm in his voice. “Melee fighters at the ready! Prepare for wall breach!”

That was all the encouragement Cass needed. She grabbed Pellen and Stormstride Sprinted off the wagon and behind the accumulating melee fighters.

Beyond the wall, the air accumulated around the horns of the queen, stilling and slowing as they cooled far below what the afternoon sun would have of them.

There was a crack. Like ice shifting on an otherwise still sea.

Then a roar of wind, and the temperature plummeted below freezing as the queen’s magic manifested an arctic wasteland. Pellen’s teeth chattered. The noncombatants behind them shivered. Ice condensed on metal plates and along blade faces.

And then the queen slammed down, her full body crashing through Pellen’s barrier and into the wagon wall.

Her horn crushed through the wood. A thrash of her head yanked it out of position, throwing open a gap in their defenses.

Around her legs, the lesser beasts poured in.

Cass’s heart stopped. It had looked huge from the wall. Now, looking up at this creature, Cass felt tiny.

Wind pulled at her, asking if it was time to run. Whispering that she was in no danger if she fled now.

It was a sweet promise. It was a plan Salos would approve of.

But not yet, she whispered back. This wasn’t lost yet.

Marco planted himself in front of the queen, his shield glowing. A large version made of maroon aura materialized between him and the beast.

The queen’s horn struck it, only to rebound off.

One of the mercenary leaders—the woman, Captain Jont—darted around his shield, a two-handed longsword swinging. It cut deep into the queen’s side.

The queen stomped, a ring of ice appearing around her hoof. Captain Jont dodged back, even as Sir Kaiz materialized on the far side of the monster, his spear jabbed into the soft armpit of the queen.

She squealed. Ice crystals formed in the air around her and shot down all around her.

The queen wasn’t the only problem either. With the wall breached, more rhynselks ran into their fortress.

Cass had seen the size of the herd. Just killing the queen wouldn’t be enough.

The noncombatants behind her shook from the cold and fear.

“Form up!” Exavier shouted. His guards accumulated around him, shields rising to form a wall between the noncombatants and the incoming monsters. “Protect the caravan!”

The wave was upon them before they could finish organizing themselves.

A rhynselk ran straight for Cass. She couldn’t dodge without letting it run into Pellen and the noncombatants behind her.

Cass grit her teeth and raised her staff. She drew a Tempest Blade and threw it at the coming monster. It hit the creature’s upper leg, slicing deep and tripping the beast. There wasn’t time to celebrate, for the next was already coming.

Rhynselk Herdsmember (lvl 25)

It vaulted over its fallen herd mate and charged Cass.

She still couldn’t dodge.

She thew another Tempest Blade. Lightning sliced into its snout, running along and across its face, down its flank.

The rhynselk threw its head, snorting in pain and disapproval, but hardly slowed.

Another Tempest Blade. Another long gash across its flank.

Another.

A sheet of ice appeared before the lightning blade, shattering on impact, but dispersing the lightning.

Another rhynselk charged behind it.

The one Cass had tripped was climbing back to its feet.

Another Tempest Blade.

Pellen’s shield appeared in front of the lead creature. It struck it full force, its horn slamming through the deep blue shield. It bled off some of the monster’s speed. But it kept running.

As did the two behind it.

She couldn’t kill them fast enough.

Her mind spun through her skills list, looking for some other way to stop them.

Confounding mists? Would it faze them, or only confuse her allies?

Thunder Tempest Blade? Where would it scare the beasts into? There was nowhere else for them to go but through her and into the vulnerable noncombatants behind her.

Elemental Manipulation?

There was barely a yard between her and the lead rhynselk, wild madness in its eyes.

There was something familiar about this situation. A large beast charging her? Cass unable to dodge? Elemental Manipulation her only option?

Cass almost laughed. Sometimes more skills just made things more complicated than they needed to be.

She channeled Elemental Manipulation through her feet and into the stone below her. With a twist of her Will, she drew up a set of stone spears, angled for the charging creatures.

There was no time for the rhynselk to stop. No time for it to slow. All 3000 lbs of monster skewered itself on the spikes Cass had raised. Brain matter and skull pieces flew. Blood and tissue squelched.

Three down. A million to go.

Ch. 16: The Herd

Cass had never felt more at ease than she did on Kelstor’s back thousands of feet in the air. The wind whipped around her, tugging at her robes worn over her armor and pulling her braid in a dance behind her. Atmospheric Sense painted a picture of the rolling air currents as they played over the landscape below her and leapt through the air. A storm rumbled in the distance, too far for mundane ears to hear it coming and too far for mundane eyes to see, but still a delight buzzing against her skin, as comforting as the warmth of the sun on her face.

They were five days out from Velillia, and the novelty had not lessened. If anything, the initial rush had settled into a comfortable ease.

She was meant to be here.

How do I learn to fly? Cass asked Salos.

Salos shuddered, his claws clamping tighter to Cass’s robes. Why in the deepest abyss would you want to do something as nonsensical as that?

Cass laughed. How could she explain this sensation to him? The feeling of absolute freedom welling in her. The certainty that nothing could hold her back?

Was that her that felt this way, or was it this slyphid body? Or the Concept of Wind singing in her chest?

Did the distinction matter? Did she want to find out?

They flew in wide circles over the caravan, Kelstor’s wings spread wide to catch the updraft of the warm earth below. A magic glowed along his wings, multiplying that weak updraft’s force to hold his massive body in the air. Occasionally, they’d flap, pushing them higher into the sky.

In the distance, outside the range of her natural eyes, Atmospheric Sense reported a rumbling herd.

“Do rhinos travel in herds here?” Cass yelled from behind Alyx over the wind.

“Rhinos?” Alyx repeated the word. It had come out in English, implying that whatever Cass was feeling at the edges of Atmospheric Sense probably weren’t exactly rhinoceroses.

Cass pointed toward 10 o’clock. “There is a large herd of horned creatures out that way, all moving in our direction.” The air rolled out of the way of their vast mass. At this distance, she didn’t have any more details than there were a lot of them, they were big, and they probably had horns.

Alyx squinted into the distance, standing in her saddle.

<<I see a dust cloud coming up from the Halven plains,>> Kelstor projected mentally. <<This time of year, rhynselk herds are common. It could be a group of them.>>

Alyx frowned. “The caravan is in trouble if that’s what it is. Cass, could you hop down and let the caravan master know Kelstor and I are going to investigate?”

Cass nodded and stood.

Abyss, just hop off, she says, Salos muttered, dematerializing into his pendant.

Ready? Cass asked.

As I’ll ever be, he muttered.

Cass grinned and waved to Alyx before leaping from Kelstor’s back. The wind whipped through her hair and past her robes. Her heart soared as she approached free fall.

Cass, please! Salos begged, his panic pulled as tightly into himself as he could hold it, yet still leaking over their bond.

Cass Wind Stepped, dissolving into the air, the skill sending a different flavor of joy through her immaterial body paired with Salos’s relief.

She directed the surrounding air with Elemental Manipulation, riding it the rest of the way down to the lead wagon. She materialized on the bench beside the caravan master.

Exavier jumped, his sword materializing in his hand, its blade against her neck.

Cass leapt back, her Dexterity allowing her to dismount the moving cart without injury. She jogged beside the wagon. “Whoa! It’s just me!”

He blinked. “Oh. Mage Yuan. Don’t sneak up on a man.”

“Sorry.” She hadn’t expected him to be so jumpy, but then, in a world like this, that kind of reaction probably kept him alive in the wilds. She added it as a consideration for the future. “We spotted a large herd of rhynselk ahead.” Cass pointed in the direction she’d sensed them.

“Hopefully, they’ll turn before they reach us.” He didn’t look particularly hopeful. “Hop back up.” He patted the bench beside him, and she seated herself beside him.

He tapped his thigh in thought. “We’ll redirect east a little. If they hold their current trajectory and speed, they’ll hit us around Halden’s Crown.”

A wave of mana rippled out from him and down the line of wagons. Cass peered around the wagon to the one behind them. A system window appeared in front of its driver, green and flickering around the edges.

“Rest up,” he said as he cracked the reins of his horses. “Be prepared to defend us all.” Another wave of energy rippled out from the caravan master. His system notification window appeared before her.

[Rhynselk herd spotted on the horizon. Projected intersection: 1 hour.

Prepare for defensive battle at Halden’s Crown.]

***

Halden’s Crown turned out to be a sharply sloping hill that was as much tough grey stone as it was shifting gravel and dry brush. Exavier circled the wagons at the top, forcing them close together into defensive walls.

Cass stood on the roof of one of the wagons. Pellen was on one side; one of the caravan archers was on her other.

The herd had not turned. Alyx had returned to confirm as much a while ago. Now the hope was that the creatures would break on the hillside, pouring around it, leaving the caravan untouched.

From the tension in the bodies of the other travelers, Cass was led to believe this wasn’t much more likely.

Already, she could see the creatures approaching.

Rhinoceros was not a bad comparison. They were heavy-set, four-legged, mammalian creatures, with thick neck muscles supporting a bricklike head. However, they sported not one but four horns apiece, one on their forehead, long and curving back; one, short but fat, jutting up from the snout; and one under each eye, short and pointed like spines. A thick and curling mane ran down the back of their necks, dark like storm clouds over dusty grey hides.

The air cooled as they approached, as if they were the coming winter. Atmospheric Sense whispered of ice crystals in the air around them, their breath condensing into clouds around their faces.

The other major difference between these rhynselks and rhinos was the sheer number of them.

Rhinos on Earth are largely solitary creatures, while these creatures herded into groups more reminiscent of wildebeest in the thousands. Their hulking forms had overtaken the horizon. They were truly uncountable, though Identify helped.

Rhynselk Vanguard (lvl 24) x 123

Rhynselk Vanguard (lvl 25) x 146

Rhynselk Vanguard (lvl 26) x 139

[Powerful herbivores native to the plains of the Jottena Peninsula. They crush even the well-prepared under their hooves as they stampede past. All four of their horns are deadly weapons.]

Rhynselk Queen (lvl 39)

[The leader of a rhynselk herd. She decides where the herd will graze and when to move to greener pastures. She is fiercely protective of her hoard, slaying any potential threat with the aid of her Vanguard. She usually holds a single Concept which spreads among her herd, further empowering them.]

Cass inhaled sharply at the description.

Identify has increased to level 16.

That was only the front line and the giant queen looming just behind them. How many more were there? Even with all the combatants guarding the caravan, they couldn’t hope to kill so many of them.

Her hands tightened around her staff.

They didn’t need to kill them all. Identify said the queen was highly protective. Was she also intelligent enough to retreat if enough of her herd was hurt? Or would defending themselves only enrage her more?

Relax, Salos said. He stretched at her feet, his back arching forward, then back the way cats like to.

There are a lot of them out there, Cass said.

You’ll be fine.

Cass shot him an incredulous look.

Look around you and tell me we can’t escape if this goes poorly. His eyes swept over the open field. The wind blew over her shoulders and over the herd ahead as if for emphasis. Worst case, you take off on the wind, and we make our own way to Belden. You can’t be killed here.

I can’t just leave!

Your Alyx has dragon wings; she can escape this kind of fight if need be just as easily, Salos said.

What about Marco, Telis, and Pellen?

If she doesn’t have to carry you, I imagine there would be plenty of space on the dragon for the guardsman. And I’m sure the butler could slip out if forced to.

And Pellen? Cass pressed.

Is an adult who can take care of herself.

Cass shook her head. He was right. But she didn’t have to like it. It also neatly ignored everyone else in the caravan. They were here as guards, which might have been so they didn’t have to pay to join the group, but it still implied a certain amount of responsibility to the non-combatants in the group.

But they weren’t worth dying over. She hated admitting that much, but she couldn’t pretend to be so noble as to believe otherwise.

“Ranged combatants, at the ready,” the caravan master’s voice rang out over the afternoon air. The first of the beasts broke against the hill, spilling around it, their hooves thundering over the dry earth, throwing dust into the ice-filled air in thick clouds.

She shook aside her thoughts. They hadn’t been overrun yet. She should focus on—

If you are really worried about the little mage, Salos said slowly, each word spoken like a man testing the ice and expecting to fall through, you could leave instructions for your thrall.

Cass shuddered. I’m not ordering Kohen to protect Pellen.

Cass had been avoiding Kohen around camp since their altercation. Presumably, Kohen was avoiding her as well.

Why not? Salos asked. A genuine question.

Cass pinched the bridge of her nose. Do you hear yourself?

This wasn’t the time for this discussion, but she couldn’t help herself. You realize I hold this power over you too, right?

Discomfort rolled over their bond. Did it start from her or him? It sloshed back and forth, impossible to say.

How can you advocate I use it on someone else?

Salos looked away. It’s your right. If it keeps you alive, you should use it.

“Fire loud skills ahead of the approaching beasts,” the caravan master’s voice carried over the rumble of the monsters. “Do NOT hit any of them yet.”

That’s you, Salos said, cutting off any response Cass might have had.

She wanted to glare at him. To argue further. To tell him all the ways he was stupid. But now wasn’t the moment.

Cass called Tempest Blade to her staff, willing lightning to form along the blade. Lightning was flashy and dangerous, but it wasn’t ‘loud’. Was it the best she could do?

Tempest Blade (lvl 18)

[Gather the tempest itself to be your blade and lay low all who dare to stand before the coming storm.

Condense elements of the raging storm into blades…]

Technically, it let her call up the elements of storms, not just wind and lightning. Could she create a blade of riotous thunder? Once again, the question was ‘what was an “element”?’ Her experience with Elemental Manipulation suggested it was a broad category. Perhaps broad enough to include the sound of lightning?

She pulled her mind back to that last day in Uvana, focusing not on the light and power of the lightning but on the resounding booms in the air. The way each shockwave reverberated down her spine.

She pulled at nights on Earth, a child again, in the dark of her bedroom and the boom shaking the entire world over the rush of wind.

Tempest Blade grabbed up the images, her blade dimming as the lightning faded, yet it thrummed invisibly with power she could feel.

“Lease!” the caravan master shouted.

Cass swung her staff, throwing the new blade down the hill’s slope with all her might. It fell amid arrows, magic bolts, and aura blades, all glowing in her Mana Sight. They struck the ground, erupting in flames and flashes of color, cracking stone and splitting the ground.

And then her thunder blade hit the hillside with a deafening BOOM.

The shockwave rippled out, blasting loose gravel back and dislodging small stones. The nearest rhynselks reared back, their squeals of fear echoing through the herd. They bolted away from the hill, merging with the crowds wrapping to either side.

Pellen shrieked from Cass’s side, her hands white knuckling around her tome. Her eyes flicked to Cass. “Did-did you do that?”

The archer on Cass’s other side scooted away from her, his knees shaking.

“Yes?” Power rumbled through Cass’s chest, fortifying her Resolve. That had worked even better than she’d hoped.

“If you had a Terror Effect, why wouldn’t you have used it in the Trial?” Pellen asked.

“Terror Effect?” Cass repeated.

Was that Tempest Blade? Salos asked from her ankles. His fur stood on end, just about doubling his size.

I channeled Thunder through it, Cass explained.

“It’s what it sounds like: a skill or spell that fills the affected with a bone-deep terror. Like what the Soulbound Wolf could do with its roar.”

Oh, she hadn’t expected it to have that effect. The skill description didn’t say anything about that. “Is that a property of thunder?”

“Maybe?” Pellen said. “There is a lot of research on lightning at the Academy, but that wasn’t my field.”

“Ranged combatants, ready next wave!”

Pellen’s attention snapped back to her tome, her lips mouthing the words of her chant.

Cass prepared another Tempest Blade, drawing on thunder again.

Ahead, the gap was filling again, the next waves of rhynselks running at the hilltop, pressed forward by their peers around them. The stampede only grew denser the further out she looked. There had been plenty of space for the first group to split at the first thing to scare them. But too soon, there wouldn’t.

Was that when the fighting would start? When there wasn’t room for the rhynselks to avoid them even if they wanted to?

“Lease!”

Ch. 15: Dinner

“How did you end up cooking?” Alyx asked as she stirred her bowl of stew.

Night had well and truly fallen over the camp. Cass sat beside a smaller private campfire at the edge of the caravan’s encampment. Kelstor lay on the outer edge, his head resting over his paws. Alyx leaned against him while Pellen and Marco sat alongside Cass in the fire’s glow.

Cass shrugged. “It just happened.”

“It’s good,” Marco said approvingly.

“I just chopped stuff,” Cass said. She’d learned a lot from the experience, but she couldn’t claim to have had a hand in its quality.

Road Stew

[A tried-and-true roadside favorite by Hess Decar. Combines filling paro root with a collection of low-cost herbs and whatever meat is convenient to create a nutritious stew.

Greatly increased Stamina regeneration.

Greatly increased Focus regeneration.

Increased Health regeneration.]

“Not every road cook is good at their job,” Marco said. “Alacrity knows I’m not. Charred meat skewers are about all you can expect from me.”

“Telis is pretty good at it,” Alyx said.

“Well, she’s got a cooking skill, which helps.” Marco laughed.

“A skill I spent far more sweat and tears on than you spent on any of your fighting skills,” Telis said, stepping into sight from around a blind corner. Except Atmospheric Sense insisted she hadn’t been behind that tent until she stepped out.

Marco laughed. “That’s probably true! Aris wasn’t petty ‘bout much, but the only thing worse in her book than a missed meal was a bad one!”

Telis snorted, perching at the end of the bench beside Marco. “I never knew a pickier eater.”

Alyx smiled down into her bowl.

“I always liked your cooking, Miss Telis,” Kelstor chimed in.

“Oh, I remember.” Telis shook her head disapprovingly. “Aris would declare it ‘inedible’ and then, not five minutes later, I’d find you’d scarfed down the entire pot!”

Marco laughed.

“It was tasty,” Kelstor confirmed.

Telis shook her head. “But the rest of us wanted to eat it too.”

“You were making more anyway,” he said.

“A single serving!” Telis moaned. “I would have made her a single serving of something.”

“I was hungry.”

“You had your own food!”

Kelstor’s lips peeled back into a draconic grin, oozing with mischief. “But yours was tastier.”

Marco snorted.

Telis shook her head. “The things the lady let you get away with.”

Cass chuckled. For all the bickering, there was no real frustration in anyone’s voice. This had the cadence of well-worn ribbing. A skit they’d all performed a dozen times, each character with a well-understood role.

It was odd to see Telis drop so much of her professional bluster, but Alyx didn’t seem at all surprised. Perhaps this was how she usually was behind closed doors.

“You remember when Alyx was little?” Marco asked.

Telis let out a theatrical sigh. “I assume you are leading into the ‘snack escapades’?”

Marco and Kelstor both grinned.

Alyx covered her face. “Oh, gods. No.”

“Snack Escapades?” Cass repeated, sensing Telis was waiting for an outsider to ask.

“At some point, Kelstor got too big to fit into the House’s kitchen,” Telis explained. “It was about the same time a young lady of ours was big enough to get from the courtyard to the kitchens without supervision and just tall enough to reach the cooling shelves without help.

“Someone,” Telis’s eyes fell on Kelstor, “suggested to the young lady that she could have extra sweets if she took matters into her own hands.”

“Cute,” Cass said, imagining a tiny Alyx pilfering cookies freshly baked from the kitchen.

Telis didn’t quite roll her eyes. “Very. Until suddenly there is a band of 4 to 7-year-olds raiding my kitchen every afternoon to share with their ‘big brother Kel’.”

Kelstor smiled, clearly remembering it fondly. Alyx’s face flushed, an awkward smile on her lips.

“Every afternoon!” Telis repeated. “Stealing Lady Aris’s snacks! Do you have any idea how many extras I had to make?” She huffed, shaking her head, very clearly unbothered but too proud to admit it.

Marco laughed again.

“Don’t,” Telis pointed at him. “I know you helped.”

As the group laughed, continuing the gentle ribbing, Salos slunk back up beside Cass, settling in the dirt at her feet.

You’re back, Cass said.

He nodded.

Cass waited for him to say something else. She could feel his soul was withdrawn, only the edges barely brushing hers.

Alyx was yelling something, her face flushing and pointing accusingly at Marco. The old guardsman laughed.

His retainers forced him to retire for the evening, Salos reported.

Kohen? Cass clarified, though there was no one else he could be talking about.

Salos nodded. They act as if their lord is ill.

Telis said something sharp. Pellen covered her face, a chuckle slipping out.

Is he? Cass asked. Could her fix for his demon-ness have had other side effects?

No, that was the wrong question. She knew it had side effects, just not to what extent. Was it more than just the confused memories?

I’m not an expert, Salos said, but he looks physically fine to me.

His mother mentioned a ‘miracle clinic’ when we left, Cass said. So Kohen must have told his mother something about what happened to him. Was he pretending to be sick? He hadn’t sounded enthused about going when they’d left.

“Cass?” Alyx calling her name snapped Cass back to the conversation of the rest of the group.

Cass blinked. She hadn’t meant to zone out. She shouldn’t have needed to with her mental stats. Following the banter around the fire should have been trivial, even while talking to Salos.

Before she could ask Alyx to repeat herself, Liminal tugged at Cass’s sleeve, pointing to a thread on the far side of its Veil.

Carefully, Cass pulled the thread back over. She blinked again. Right. The others had kept teasing Alyx. She’d attempted to throw it back at Marco, only for Telis to jab at her again. In an attempt to throw off the teasing, Alyx had asked Cass about her family.

Cass hadn’t missed it. Rather, Liminal had set it aside momentarily. She could remember it all clearly now, as if she’d been paying full attention at the time. But now wasn’t the time to wonder at Liminal. She needed to help Alyx.

But not before taking her own shot first. Cass grinned over at Alyx. “I don’t know. I think I’d like to hear more about that story Telis was about to tell us.”

“Don’t you dare.” Alyx glared at Telis.

Telis chuckled and shrugged. “You heard my lady.”

Alyx looked away.

“I don’t know if I have that much to say.” Cass scratched the back of her head. What was there to say? Kaye was Kaye. Robin was Robin. It wasn’t fun to tell embarrassing childhood stories if the subject wasn’t around.

“You’re just so determined to get back to them,” Alyx said softly. “But I don’t even know their names.”

Oh. Salos looked up at her from where he lay at her feet. Had she even told Salos about them?

“I’d like to hear about Miss Cass’s family, too,” Pellen chimed in.

She hadn’t talked about them much, had she? “Well. I’m the oldest of my siblings. There are three of us. Me, Kaye, and Robin.

“We’re two years apart,” Cass rambled as she looked for anything interesting to add. “Kaye’s a mechanic. Robin is still in school.”

“A mechanic?” Alyx repeated. The word had come out in English.

“Ah, it’s a kind of craftsman, I guess,” Cass tried to explain. She was sure there was a pseudo-medieval equivalent if she thought about it hard enough. “She works on—I mean, does maintenance on—cars, a kind of self-propelling carriage.”

“Then, is she a kind of artificer?” Pellen asked.

Cass shrugged. That sounded like a magic-type of profession. But the only magic Kaye did was keep the family’s car running despite it failing on them three times last year.

“What does Robin study?” Pellen asked.

“He’s a linguistics major,” Cass said, immediately aware that the entire phrase didn’t come through in Jothi. Cass tried again. “He studies language.”

Yeah. That came through that time.

“Oh. A particular one?” Pellen asked.

“I don’t think so,” Cass said. “It’s more about how language works in general. Like why certain sounds are found together. Or how languages evolved from one another, I think? I’ll admit I don’t know the specifics. It’s way outside my area of expertise.”

“What is your expertise?” Pellen asked.

“Oh,” Cass chuckled a little. “I studied computer science. Imagine little magic constructs that can do all sorts of crazy calculations for you on demand; that’s a computer.”

Pellen’s eyes got wide. “Mathematical calculations?”

“You were a mage back home?” Alyx asked. “I thought you said there was no magic?”

Cass shrugged at Alyx. “I say ‘magic construct,’ but it doesn’t work under any of the principles of magic of this world. Not that you’d believe me, given the only way I can think to explain it is that its powered by stored electricity—” which Jothi Language Comprehension equated much more closely with ‘lightning’ than English did, “—and can be used for everything from talking to people on the other side of the planet—ah, Continent—in real time, to playing video recordings on demand, to looking up a wealth of information from an endless database of information available at all times to all people with one of these devices.”

Cass hadn’t thought Pellen’s eyes could get that big. Her entire face was all eyes.

“And you made these?” Pellen whispered.

Cass laughed again. “No. Not even close. I piddled about with some of their programming.” Programming came through in Jothi as a word closer to ‘instruction’, as in the word used to describe teaching children. That wasn’t really right, but it was close enough for this discussion.

Pellen drew her notebook from her pocket and scribbled something down.

“You’re right that it sounds like magic,” Alyx said. She shook her head and stared up at the stars. “But I believe you.”

“Thank you,” Cass said. This wasn’t what Alyx wanted to talk about. Cass could see it in her fidgeting hand, worrying around the hilt of her sword.

“None of you were combatants?” Alyx asked.

Cass nodded. “Where I’m from, most people aren’t.”

“I suppose that’s true even here,” Alyx said softly. Most people in the towns and cities Cass had seen were laborers or craftsmen. It really was only the nobility she’d seen a sizable increase in combatants. But the nobility was most of the people Alyx interacted with.

“Kaye does some sword reenactment stuff, for fun,” Cass added. It was cool, but Cass had never had the aptitude for it. She looked down at her hands. She could probably mop the floor with Kaye now, with all her magic stats. Maybe even with just her Strength and Dexterity. “And Robin started archery a month or two ago. But again, that’s all for fun. No one is ever seriously hurt. Not on purpose, at least.”

“And you get along with them?” Alyx asked. Was that a longing in her voice?

Cass shrugged again. “Better than most other siblings I know.”

Alyx sighed. “So your relationship is unusual even on Earth.” Was it relief or resignation in that sigh?

Cass shrugged. “Hard to say.”

“Do you have family, Pellen? Alyx asked.

Pellen looked up from her notebook. “Oh. Yes.”

“Siblings?” Alyx asked.

Pellen nodded.

“Do you get along?”

“Oh. No,” Pellen shook her head. “I don’t have any hard feelings toward any of my siblings, but they would want to spend time with me about as much as I want to go back to the Catacombs. And I think the feeling is mutual.”

“That bad?” Cass asked. If that wasn’t a ‘hard feeling’, Cass was worried how Pellen would describe one.

Pellen shrugged. “They aren’t the worst.”

Again, Cass worried about what Pellen considered ‘the worst.’

Pellen went back to scribbling in her notebook. Cass waited another beat for her to elaborate. She didn’t.

Well, not everyone got along with their family.

Alyx leaned back, staring at the sky. The fire crackled between them.

What about you, Cass asked Salos. Do you have family?

Salos considered the question for a long moment. For a moment, Cass worried he wasn’t going to answer at all.

Spirits don’t have familial relationships like what you imagine, he said finally. Before she summoned me, I was one of the thousands of mindless spirits of the Azorth seas. And after… He shook his head. Perhaps if she had other permanent summons, we might have considered one another siblings. But I was the only one she kept at her side.

That wasn’t what Cass had expected. She’d assumed… What had she assumed? That Salos had always been a person, she supposed.

She didn’t know much about spirits, and it showed.

He sighed. Most spirits are much like animals. They possess instincts that aid their survival and little else. Left to their own devices, only the old and powerful ones develop a sense of identity.

And summoned ones? Cass asked.

It depends greatly on the summoner and how they treat the summoned spirit. His voice was heavy, like his thoughts were elsewhere.

Despite everything, Cass wanted to reach down to scoop him into her lap, but if he’d wanted to sit there, he would have. So she restrained the desire to stroke his back and pressed a wave of comfort over their bond instead. He stiffened, but he didn’t pull away either.

Cass stared up at the night sky, the warmth of the campfire suddenly not enough for her. Was it Kaye or Robin alone out here in this world? Were they safe? Were they looking at this same sky, wondering where she was? Were they looking for her, too?

She’d find them. They’d make it home. She had to.

Ch. 14: Dinner Prep

Cass continued helping with cooking as dark fell over camp and the other travelers trickled into the camp’s center, all lurking a respectful distance in wait for dinner. The rolling night air carried their conversations to her. Most of it was quiet grumbles about how long the journey was and how uncomfortable the wagons were and how bumpy the old road was. Some guards discussed watch shifts. Merchants danced around potential business deals among one another.

She didn’t pay any of it much mind, focusing on the conversation of the apprentices instead.

“—and that is why you shouldn’t try to clean fire-poppers with a spoon,” the younger of the two was saying. She smiled. She still wasn’t entirely clear on what a fire-popper was, but the image of the young man missing his eyebrows was more than enough to carry the humor of the situation, anyway.

“Is that Mage Yuan over there?” Tiador asked amidst the growing din. It wasn’t directed at her, but it cut through the rest all the same.

She didn’t need to look to tell Kohen was nearby. Or to feel the pulse of something ripple hot and unpleasant off his soul.

“Is she cooking?” Tiador’s voice carried the same disapproval Salos’s had.

Her knife chopped decisively through another vegetable, trying to focus on the new story the other apprentice.

“I don’t know why you’re surprised,” Kohen snapped. “She’s not a noble, remember. She’s not even a wizard. Her master’s even been banished. What else would you expect from the vassal of a mongrel?”

Cass’s hand tightened around her knife. She couldn’t hear the apprentices at all anymore.

“Well, I suppose,” Tiador said. “Still, that ‘mongrel’ is a dragon knight.”

“A banished, hoardless, dragon knight,” Kohen grumbled.

“What do you suppose they’re doing here?”

“Making my life complicated.”

Tiador laughed. “Really Ko? You don’t think this is an opportunity?”

Cass could feel Kohen’s glower oozing off his soul. It was sticky and cold. She should ignore them. Ignore him.

“I know what you said, but I still think it’s worth considering. After you get your Health back in order, you’ll have options,” Tiador said.

Kohen’s glower didn’t lessen. “I won’t work with her.”

Tiador sighed. “Alyx doesn’t even have to be a rival anymore. When she comes back, you know it’ll be—”

“She is a rotten, lying bastard,” Kohen snapped, his voice rising above the general din of camp. “She sends her minions on underhanded missions to undermine and bewitch. I would sooner work with the Copper Crescent—”

Cass’s pulse quickened, her Alacrity racing. Did he, Kohen, actually mean that? Or were the lingering memories of the paladins and priests he’d eaten confusing him? Should she stop him?

It wasn’t her business if he wanted to out himself as… whatever he was, as long as he didn’t bring her down with him. The statement so far could be interpreted as hyperbole, anyway. Who would believe he’d really ally with the enemies of his city?

“—than entertain the idea of working with that god-forsaken, de—”

“STOP.” The Command rippled off her and through the camp.

She could feel every eye on her. She set her knife down on the cutting board and stepped out from behind her workstation, grabbing her staff as she passed it. Her body buzzed.

Kohen glared at her, immobile, but she could see his soul seething.

What now? Maybe Salos was right about him. Maybe she couldn’t trust him to keep his stupid mouth shut.

But what could she do about it? She couldn’t just kill him.

“Couldn’t” was a strong word, a cold, practical voice whispered. Killing him this moment would be impractical, not impossible. Ill-advised in the current moment.

She gritted her teeth. Also, she didn’t want to. Idiocy and loose lips weren’t such great crimes warranting death.

Then what was? Where was the line?

She shook her head. This wasn’t worth thinking about right now.

More importantly, she’d Commanded him in front of everyone. No one was likely to understand why her outburst had stopped Kohen cold, but people would talk. She needed them to talk about the right things.

“I saved your life.” Cass stormed toward him through the retreating crowds, her voice rising with every step. “Alyx saved your life.”

Tiador’s eyes flicked between them, calculations running faster than Cass’s Alacrity.

Kohen still didn’t move. Couldn’t move.

“And you have the gall to insult us?” Cass demanded. What response did she want? She couldn’t leave Kohen stopped like this, but she also couldn’t just say ‘at ease’ in front of everyone either. She needed to release him in a less obvious way. “Tell me,” what? What question could she ask that would make sense here that he could answer honestly without mentioning demons? “Do you value your life?”

Kohen’s teeth ground together. “Yes.”

His hands clenched at his sides. Good, he could move again.

“Then watch what you say,” Cass said. Her words rolled over him. She could feel it. They were too poorly defined to be a proper Command, but she could see his soul writhe under them, anyway.

“Lady Mage.” Tiador slid in between them, his voice tinted with an overwhelming feeling of comfort.

Cass turned her glare on him.

Status Effect (Charismatic Charm) Ignored.

“Don’t use that in my presence,” Cass said.

“Ah,” the skill dropped from his voice. Panic leaked into his eyes. “Right. My apologies. But perhaps we can talk about this like civilized—”

“This was talking about this like ‘civilized people’,” Cass interrupted.

“Of course,” Tiador assured her.

“Get out of my sight,” Cass said and turned away as the Command hit Kohen. He didn’t move immediately, she wasn’t looking at him after all, but she could feel his soul tensing to run.

“Let’s just go,” Kohen said, retreating without another word.

Tiador lingered another moment. She could feel his eyes on her back and the continued calculations in that gaze, before he finally turned to follow Kohen out.

The crowd shuffled around them as Kohen pushed his way out. The whispers started again.

“That was the young Lord Delim, wasn’t it?” asked one.

“A cook saved him?” asked another.

“Look at her staff. What cook has a mage’s focus like that?”

“But what kind of mage…”

Cass tuned them out. She didn’t care what they thought. Their questions were all benign. Not one of them wondered about what Kohen had been about to say. That was all that mattered.

She set her staff down at her workstation and retrieved her cooking knife. She closed her eyes, inhaling sharply.

“Um, Lady Mage,” the older of the two apprentices said, his eyes downcast. “Would you rather I take over that?”

Her hand tightened around the knife. “No. I’ve got this.”

“As you like, ah, Lady Mage.” The apprentices shifted away from her, exchanging furtive glances, their conversation from before her outburst entirely lost.

She let them retreat. She couldn’t blame them. She could yell at a noble combatant in public and get away with it. How many non-noble noncombatants could say the same?

Her insides rolled with frustration. He shouldn’t be her concern anymore. He should be in Velillia, where it wouldn’t matter what he said because she’d be long gone already.

And instead he was insulting her behind her back and risking revealing the both of them.

Are you okay? Salos’s voice whispered at the edge of her soul.

I’m fine. She leaned against the workstation. She didn’t want to explain. She didn’t want to hear his opinion. She didn’t want him to tell her to kill Kohen.

I saw it, Salos admitted.

Hell. Don’t.

You handled it well, he said. A lie and not, all at once. She could feel him shuffling closer.

But she didn’t want his approval either.

She forced another deep breath and opened her eyes. She positioned an already peeled paro root—lumpy like a potato, but soft like a pear—on her cutting board and chopped it in half so it would lie flat.

But she had to admit, We should keep an eye on him.

He was a bigger idiot than she’d thought.

Yes, I can do that, Salos said, slipping away again, his soul drifting after Kohen’s. Something lurked under his words, but he held their bond tight, letting little beyond the literal words across.

She let him slip away, slicing the halves into inch-long cubes. Dinner would be ready soon. She focused on the task at hand, wishing she didn’t feel so alone.

Ch. 13: Salos: Partners and Pawns

Salos stalked out to the outskirts of camp. He climbed up the wagon walls, slinking along their length, watching the darkening horizon.

Cass didn’t understand, and she wasn’t listening. It shouldn’t surprise him. She was stubbornness incarnate. Stubborn and naïve.

It wasn’t a hard concept but she just had to make it complicated, dragging some misplaced ideal of dignity into it. She hadn’t said it. But he could feel it. That and her disappointment in him.

His claws scraped over the wooden railings below him.

Why couldn’t she just accept the way things were? She was an up-and-coming combatant. A mage who already had few peers and fewer still her own level. A mage like her shouldn’t have to keep watch at all if she didn’t want to, even as a guard.

There was no reason to worry herself over menial tasks like cooking or—gods help them—cooking prep.

This wasn’t something he should have needed to explain. It wasn’t an explanation she should have gotten upset over.

<<What has you so frustrated, spirit?>> the dragon telepathically buzzed into Salos’s head.

Salos flinched. He glanced down. The dragon stared up at him from where he lay at the base of the wagon, his amber scales glimmering like fire in the early evening dusk, his head still resting over one monstrously sized paw.

A familiar sight. All that was missing was their mistress and it would be just like—

Salos shook his head. Kelstor’s amber scales weren’t even remotely similar to his dusty orange. Only a fool would mistake them. And only a true fool would miss that prick.

He sighed. He should just walk away.

“Sometimes my mistress does the incomprehensible.” Salos didn’t know why he was saying this. Or why he hopped down from the wall. Maybe so he wouldn’t have to shout.

The dragon chuckled. “Your Miss Cass does seem like a handful.”

Salos snorted. “What would you know, lizard?”

His shoulders heaved in a colossal shrug. “Only a certain kind of person turns down slaying a mad dragon when he begs.”

Salos’s claws dug into the dirt. He could hear Cass’s explanation ringing in his head and all the post hoc justification that made her stubborn refusal to kill the dragon the ‘correct’ answer.

But the dragon—the level 38 dragon, bound and beaten, vulnerable and ripe for the taking—had begged her to kill him, and she still hadn’t taken the experience sitting there?

“And I know what it’s like to have a stubborn partner,” the dragon continued.

“Partner?” It came out more of a sneer than he’d meant, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Is that what you call your relationship?”

Kelstor’s head listed to the side over his paws. “Yes?”

Deepest abyss, the man was serious. “Dragons are bound when they unlock their system, correct?”

“Yes.” The dragon nodded.

“To adults. Proper martials, near or past the Gate? People already well set on their paths?”

“How else would our partners protect us?” the dragon asked.

Salos rolled his eyes. “Partner implies equal.”

The dragon stared at him with the biggest, most confused, maroon eyes.

“What?” Salos asked.

“But, we are equals?”

“Are you?” Well, maybe this time they were. The dragon and the swordswoman were mentally the same age given all the time Kelstor had lost to madness, and their level gap wasn’t particularly large. If anything, the dragon with his higher level and greater battle experience should be the ‘master’ of this particular dragon-knight pairing.

Though if that were true, there was little chance the dragon would have let his knight drag him from his home and out on the fool’s errand of a stranger. Whatever the practical power difference between dragon and knight, it was clear this fool still saw himself as the ‘junior partner’.

It was delusion and nothing more.

“And what about in your previous ‘partnership’?” Salos asked. “The Lady Aris, was it? Were you two partners then?”

“Well,” Kelstor paused.

“Equals?” Salos pressed.

“I was the source of her power.” The dragon lifted his head, pride slipping into his posture. “And she the source of mine.”

Salos scoffed. “And you think that makes you equals?”

“What else would that make us?” Kelstor stared down at Salos.

Abyss and blood. This one actually believed all this?

The diplomatic thing to do was to walk away now. Cass would not appreciate him starting fights with her friend’s servant. Moreover, Alyx and her dragon were valuable pieces that could keep Cass safe. There was no good reason to antagonize this one.

Broken Concept shards dug into Salos’s soul. How could the dragon not see that the loyalty he held was a poison? A blade poised at his throat, just waiting to cut the moment the value of his suffering outweighed the value of his comfort?

“And what happens to you if your mistress dies, again?” The question clawed its way out of Salos’s mouth, all the sharp edges of his broken concept slashing through the dragon’s bluster.

Kelstor recoiled like the question had cut.

“And what happens to her if you were to die?”

Kelstor opened his mouth, but no protest manifested.

Salos cut again. “Madness for one, minor inconvenience for the other?”

It was the height of imbalance. Anyone could see it, if they just used their eyes to look. Dragons were cursed. And Alacrity had ‘fixed’ them? He wanted to laugh.

She’d just cursed them again. She’d bound such a proud people to a life of servitude? And these fools thanked her for it?

Salos hopped back up onto the wall. “Don’t talk to me about ‘partnership’. Things like us don’t get that kind of luxury. The sooner you remember your place, the easier your life will be.”

Salos stalked away. That was right. Cass treated him too well. It was too easy to forget.

Embarrassing. What was he doing, fuming over her ignoring him?

That was her right. If she wanted to act like a fool, squandering the power and prestige she should hold, that was her prerogative. He was just a pawn for her to use as she pleased.

Pretending he knew best was only going to get him hurt.

He was better off making himself useful than offering unwanted advice.

<<Is that what your ‘mistress’ believes?>> the dragon telepathically whispered after him. It buzzed in Salos’s brain. His claws scraped over the wood.

Cass? Stupid Cass? Undoubtedly, the fool would agree with the dragon. That didn’t make her right. That didn’t change anything. As if earnest belief could change something.

He almost turned around to say as much. But what good would that do?

Stupid dragon, getting the last word in via telepathy. Rotten pricks, the lot of them. Prideful and stupid.

Fools like that believed that if things were good now, they would be forever. They believed trust would hold for no other reason than it always had.

His broken concept dug deeper into him.

Rely on no one, the pieces hissed as they cut and he bled. Expect nothing. Promises will break. Goodwill will run out. Kindness will kill.

He shoved the pain aside. It only hurt when he dared to pretend otherwise.

He was better off keeping guard and not concerning himself with anything more complicated. Kohen was loose. Who knew what trouble he was scheming?

Where was he? Salos scanned the camp from the wall. There was Cass, still chopping vegetables like a common laborer. She was chatting with one of the apprentices. Was she laughing?

He let his soul touch hers. The shimmer of wind chimes rang over the tentative touch. A soft joy. Had she laughed since they’d been back from the temple? Had she laughed much at all in all the time he’d known her?

He pulled back, shaking his head. Her happiness was none of his business.

He should go find Kohen. Make sure he wasn’t up to something.

Which was why he was settling here on the wall, watching Cass instead. Watching her talk and laugh and care for others. As was her right, as a person.

As an individual.

She glowed in the warmth of the firelight as the cold night descended over the walls, shrouding him in its growing darkness.

Her kindness would kill, he reminded himself. Kill her for sure. Probably kill him too.

But would she be alive at all without it? a soft voice whispered at the back of his mind. Would she want to be?

Ch. 12: Setting Camp

They made camp as dusk fell, the sky a gorgeous shade of orange along the horizon, with wisps of pink and crimson clouds. Already, the silver moon was visible in the darkening sky, with the ghosts of stars dotting the darker horizon. The copper moon would join it soon, as the sun dropped the final degrees out of sight.

The wagons circled around the campground in loose walls, with canvas tents popping up along their sides. Already, some of the caravan guard took up posts along the wagon walls, bows slung loose over shoulders, sharp eyes watching the encroaching dark.

All around the camp buzzed with activity, every person well aware of their place and the tasks they were responsible for. Alyx and Marco had disappeared to discuss watch and defenses and such with the other combatant companies. Pellen had set up her tent and retreated into it faster than Cass could offer to help or chat. And Telis had vanished entirely.

Cass stood by her tent, entirely unsure what she was supposed to be doing.

Resting, Salos said. Your Health still hasn’t fully recovered.

Cass sighed. So I should just sit here?

You could lie down in the tent instead.

Grudgingly, Cass did as he suggested. Sleep had been rough lately. Nightmare after nightmare. But last night had been better. Quieter. Maybe she was getting over it?

She closed her eyes.

But all she found behind them were green hallways and armored corpses.

She shot up. This wasn’t helpful. This wasn’t restful. She inhaled sharply and shoved the images across Liminal’s Veil.

She’d sleep—she had to sleep—but later. Tonight. When she had to.

She moved to a stool outside, listening to the wind. It carried descriptions of camp and its buzz to her, easily interpreted by Atmospheric Sense into clear images of the encampment and its inhabitants.

All around, people were forming small groups to chat and rest and greet the night. There was Kelstor on the edge of camp, dozing in the last of the dying sunlight. Some martials were sparring on the other edge. Mostly slow half-speed exercises, probably focused on form or something. She should probably know.

Something to ask Marco about later. When her Health was recovered.

In the center of it all, a man stacked logs in an earthen pit, arranging them into a log cabin. He was a bulky man, heavy-set the way men who did physical labor for a living but didn’t necessarily work out were, with a set of back-swept horns sprouting from his temples.

Cass couldn’t make herself sit still any longer. That was all she’d done all day. If she were left alone any longer with her thoughts… She wasn’t in the right headspace for rest.

She approached the horned man.

Where are you going? You should focus on your recovery, Salos hissed.

She needed to do something. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

The man looked up from his pile. “You’re that sorceress, aren’t you?”

Cass nodded. “Cass Yuan. Nice to meet you.”

He squinted up at her. “I’m alright, thanks. I don’t think I need anything blown up.”

Cass chuckled. “Oh, no. I’m not that good at explosions, actually.” That seemed like a missed opportunity. What kind of sorceress couldn’t blow things up? How could she use Elemental Manipulation and Tempest Blade to make explosions?

You are thinking something strange, I can feel it, Salos muttered.

Cass shook her head. This wasn’t important right now. “I was wondering if you needed any extra hands to help set up camp.”

Beacon of Hearth and Home had started as the skill Set Camp, and it hadn’t leveled up in a long while. Possibly because she hadn’t been doing much camping since leaving Uvana, possibly because she hadn’t needed to push it any further than she already used it for just herself.

“You want to help?” the man asked.

Cass nodded. “Especially with anything campfire related.”

He snorted. “That sounds more like a combat mage again.” He shook his head, humming to himself. “Well, if you want to get the fire started, then I can get started on meal prep.”

Cass nodded. “I can do that.”

“Thanks.” He held out the log he’d been holding to Cass. She took it as he stepped out of the fire ring. “The name’s Hess, by the way. I’m the caravan’s quartermaster and cook. You have questions about supplies or dinner, I’m the man you ask.”

Rorst Quartermaster

Lvl 24

[The rorst are a stubborn and hearty people of the mountainous regions of the Western skies. This one has spent many years on the road, developing a knack for organization and logistics.]

“Nice to meet you,” Cass said again.

“I’ll leave that to you, then,” he said and strode away to one of the wagons.

Cass picked up where he left off on the wood stacking, carefully arranging the logs for airflow and heat control.

Why are we doing this? Salos asked.

Hearth hummed softly in response.

I would have thought you’d be praising me, Cass said. I’m working on skill building.

Go practice your Staff Mastery with Marco if you want to train skills, Salos huffed.

Later, Cass promised. It had been ages since Marco had said they’d do that. But it had been one thing after another stopping them. Even now, it might be better to wait until her Health was more recovered before sparring.

Salos grumbled, hopping off her shoulder to curl up in the dirt just outside the fire ring. You could set the fire by our tent.

I’m sure I can build that one too, Cass agreed. None of this was his point, though. Are you still worrying about people finding out about my camping skill?

He looked away. Anything your opponent knows about you is a scale in their favor. Real fights begin long before you step onto the battlefield.

Cass sighed, shaking her head. How would someone use knowledge of Beacon of Hearth and Home against me? Who would bother?

It radically changes how quickly you recover, Salos said. If you keep a tight lid on the details of the skill, an opponent may underestimate how much Health you have or how much Focus you can recover between ambushes. This information could be the difference between a successful sneak attack and a failed one. As for who might benefit from this knowledge. Salos glanced over his shoulder.

Cass didn’t need to look to know who he was talking about. She could feel him at the edge of her perception.

Kohen can’t hurt me, Cass said.

For now, Salos agreed.

Cass shook her head as she summoned a ball of flames to light the campfire. The kindling at the base burst into flames, licking at the logs, coaxing them to join the inferno.

Beacon of Hearth and Home spread around her with the fire’s heat. She closed her eyes and breathed a little easier.

Salos’s concerns were excessive, but the core concern—Kohen—wasn’t unfounded. What was she going to do about him? Saving his life shouldn’t have resulted in this kind of headache. Honestly, why did he have to join this caravan?

“Oh, that’s nice,” Hess said as he returned to the fireside. He pushed a cart over the uneven ground, laden with foodstuffs. Behind him, a pair of skinny youths carried tables. “You should’ve told Exavier you had a camp buff.”

Cass shrugged. “I don’t like to flaunt it.”

Salos snorted.

“Yeah? I’ll keep it vague if anyone else asks what’s doing it then.”

“Thank you,” Cass said.

“Any who, these are my apprentices, Jain and Valk,” Hess waved at the two youths again. They waved awkwardly with the introductions. “We’re gonna get started with dinner. Did you want to help with that, too?”

“Anything to help with camp, yes please,” Cass said. Just setting campfires wasn’t enough to push the skill; it was time to try other activities to see what would.

He clapped. “Happy to have another hand.”

Hess and his apprentices set up the table and began spreading out vegetables and meats on cutting boards. He directed her to chop a vegetable that looked much like a bushy, yellow celery but which smelled more like licorice.

Adenian Parsley

[A long, fibrous vegetable, with a mild spicy flavor and sweet aftertaste. It is also known to enhance the effects of other medicinal ingredients, making it a common concoction ingredient as well.]

“Have you worked with parsley before?” Hess asked her.

Cass hesitated. Yes, Earth parsley. Which was an entirely different plant. “Not this variety.”

“Oh?” When Cass didn’t elaborate, Hess continued. “Well, we’ll be stripping the stalks of the leaves. They’ll go into the watch’s pick-me-up. Then chop the stalks into thin slices. That we’ll put in the stew.”

“Simple enough,” Cass said. “Not too different from celery.” Not that Cass had ever made—much less drunk—a tea made from celery leaves, but she knew the leaves had a lot of strong flavor and could be boiled to make stock. “Are the leaves more medicinally potent?”

Hess raised an eyebrow. “That’s right. Are you an alchemist?”

Cass shook her head. “No, but I dabble a little bit.”

She had a skill in it after all. Even if it was mostly just something she used to make herbal teas.

Although, “Maybe I’d like to be?”

It sounded kinder than being a spellsword, at the very least. An alchemist wouldn’t be having nightmares like hers.

“Considering a career change?” he asked.

Cass shook her head. “I don’t think I can afford to.”

He chuckled. “I promise a skilled alchemist can bring in far more glin than a spellsword, any day of the week.”

“It isn’t about the money.” An alchemist couldn’t rescue her siblings.

“Hm,” the man said. He let it drop. “Well, to answer your original question, yes, the leaves, especially of fresh parsley, are much stronger. If left on the stalks, the stalks slowly reabsorb that potency over time. You can preserve the effect and potency of the leaves by stripping them after harvesting the stalks and drying the leaves. Especially if you can dry them under starlight or a full copper moon.”

Cass began stripping the leaves like he’d instructed. “Then why not do that right away?”

“With the leaves stripped, the stalks start losing potency right away,” the quartermaster explained. He chopped away at starchy tubers that Identify called Marsh Potatoes as he spoke. “They also quickly become bitter. If the goal is to make potions or medicinal concoctions, you’d only be interested in the leaves, so that’s fine. But in a matter of days they become too bitter for most folks to stomach, which is a problem if you were planning on using them culinarily.”

“What makes that happen?” Cass asked. She had never heard of a plant that acted that way on Earth.

He shook his head. “I don’t rightly know. That’s something for an academy alchemist to answer. I’m more of a practical chef than anything fancy like that.”

The evening continued like that, Hess lecturing her and his apprentices on the proper preparation of stewing vegetables for maximizing their regenerative effects without compromising flavor or increasing food waste.

“On the road like this, you have to make every scrap of food count,” he said. “You never know when you’ll be able to resupply. So, only cook what you need and use or preserve every part.”

It wasn’t enough to level up Beacon of Hearth and Home, but Cass got a few levels of Herbal Concocting instead.

Herbal Concocting has reached level 6.

Herbal Concocting has reached level 7.

You really should get some sleep, Salos reminded her. You are expected to join the watch tonight, and you need every minute of rest you can get.

I’m okay, Cass assured him.

It’s not a matter of how you feel. That’s just how Health regeneration works. Recovery factors are multiplicative, not additive. Resting in camp with your skill is significantly better than resting in the wilds on the dragon and working in camp.

You worry too much, Cass muttered.

Salos bristled.

Cass stared down at the knife and root vegetable she was cutting.

I worry too much? Salos repeated. Shock snapped across their bond, followed by a buzzing.

Her hands kept chopping. She didn’t look at him.

Say it again. Say that to my face, he hissed. Images flickered across their bond. Cass in the claws of the epherwing. Cass pale and passed out on the floor of the catacombs. Cass fleeing paladins and dragonfire. Cass slammed against the wall, the figure of a 41 combatant looming over her. Cass lying motionless in the infirmary, unconscious for no reason he could discern.

All of it rang with fear. It twisted up her spine, cold and clammy and suffocating. Not her fear, but his.

I’ve survived this long, she choked out, though the thought was little more than a whisper. Her survival was as much luck as skill. It was unreasonable to assume her luck would hold forever. She should be more careful. She should find the time to heal and recover.

He didn’t need to say any of it. His frustration rumbled through the fear. It billowed off him like smoke from a fire, filling her lungs until she could barely breathe.

Maybe I could step away, Cass said. She finished chopping the vegetable directly in front of her, pushing the pieces into the cooking pot, and set her knife down. “Thank you for letting me help. I should get some rest before my turn on watch.”

“Nah, don’t worry about watch,” Hess said without looking up from his cutting.

“I’m sorry?” Cass stuttered.

“Noncombatants don’t have to participate in watch,” the quartermaster said.

“But I’m—”

“A noncombatant as far as camp chores are considered. Specifically, I’ve decided you’re part of my crew now.”

Cass shook her head. “I don’t—”

“Do you have any skills for night watch?” he asked.

Cass pursed her lips. She didn’t, but she wasn’t supposed to just admit what kinds of skills she had.

“I already sent Valk to tell Exavier,” Hess continued.

“But why?” Cass asked.

The man frowned in thought. “Perhaps because you volunteered?”

Cass shook her head. That didn’t make any sense.

“Would you rather join the watch?” he asked.

Not even a little.

Do what you want, Salos muttered.

You think my time would be better spent on watch? Surely she’d recover faster in the warmth of the fire helping around camp than on the wall staring out into the dark of night.

No. The word came with a restrained resignation. The additional rest you can get on kitchen duty is worth the humiliation. Probably.

Humiliation? Cass repeated.

She wasn’t going to like what he said next. He knew it already and was projecting that knowledge over their bond.

Salos? It came out sharper than she’d intended. But he couldn’t say that and then not explain.

This kind of work is beneath you.

Cass flinched.

It’s noncombatant work.

Hearth flared in her chest. Excuse you?

You are a mage. A combat mage, not some hedge witch. Doing this for yourself when you have to is one thing. But one doesn’t become powerful spending time on this kind of thing, so the powerful don’t.

Cass’s teeth ground together. There were so many problems with that. The inherent classicism. The absolute dismissiveness.

Her indignation boiled across their bond and his soul recoiled from hers. It builds skills like anything else, doesn’t it? Skills mean stats. It shouldn’t matter what skill it is.

But will the skill milestone bring useful stats to your combat style? Salos pushed back. Could you not also get a combat skill instead and spend the time cultivating levels in those?

Maybe I don’t want to spend all my time in combat.

I am simply explaining how things are, Salos said, avoiding her eyes. You asked. In a quieter voice, he added, What you do is up to you.

Cass grit her teeth. She had asked. He’d answered.

Hess cocked his head, still waiting for her answer.

Cass took a deep breath, forcing her frustration with Salos out of her voice. He was right about one thing, at least. This was her choice. “No. I’d be happy to join your crew. Thank you for having me.”

“Glad to have you!” Hess said. “So get back to chopping!”

“Right away,” Cass said, picking up her knife again.

Behind her, Salos slunk away, his emotions indistinct but bubbling in his soul.

Ch. 11: Alyx: Stats

Alyx did not stare as Velillia disappeared behind her. She did not watch as the walls shrunk from the impossibly tall barriers between the vulnerable lower district and the wild continent to a thin line along the horizon. She did not look back as the only home she’d ever known disappeared behind them.

The wind was cold as it whipped around them. But the sun was warm on her face and beneath her, Kelstor’s wings beat at an even pace against the aether-rich skies of the Continent.

Below them, creeping along the Old Road, drove the caravan. Seven wagons lumbered over the uneven road surrounded by two dozen horseback riders. Marco was among them, while Telis was seated on one of the wagons. Cass rode behind Alyx on Kelstor’s back. She probably didn’t notice, but she was making happy humming noises as the wind gusted past them.

Alyx, Cass, and Kelstor were keeping watch from above. They were still close to Velillia, so beasts or bandits were unlikely at this stage, but gryphons and serives (winged serpents) roosted in the countless spires of the Sea and bandits could make the poor decision to set up along the road at any time.

But for now, things seemed peaceful.

From her vantage, she could see the caravan master, Exavier, in his feathered cap at the reins of the lead cart and his regular guards positioned along the train to either side, mixed in with the two other mercenary companies who had joined the caravan.

To the right was the Striking Rapids, led by Sir Galden Desmer Kaiz on horseback. They were easy to pick out by their shining armor and navy bands on their equipment. He stood out further with his long cape whipping behind him and the matching pendant flying from the base of his spear point.

To the left rode the Black Aerons, distinguishable by their blackened armor and mismatched armaments hanging from their bags. Their leader, Captain Welha Jont, sat on top of one of the wagon roofs, her sword lying across her lap, her eyes watching the wilderness with palpable intent.

Between the two companies and Kelstor there were four combatants over level 36, another dozen over level 30 and no reason this caravan should have any difficulties reaching the coast and Belden.

Her heart pounded in her chest anyway, for reasons entirely unrelated to the inherent danger of leaving an established city.

Her hand ran through Kelstor’s mane, curling into the fluff of gold, and brushing against the warm scales beneath.

He was here. This was real.

He really wasn’t dead. It still felt impossible, like a dream she’d wake up from any moment now.

But she could feel the thrum of his heart. Could feel the weight of his soul beside hers.

He was alive. And he was hers.

I missed you too, Kelstor whispered back, his voice echoing directly into her mind.

Alyx flushed. She wasn’t used to the mental communication yet. Her thoughts easily slipped across to him.

She could feel his chuckle rumble through his body below her. You’ll get the hang of it soon.

She had to. This was the bare minimum a dragon should expect of his knight.

And she was his knight. She repeated that to herself. She was his knight. A Dragon Knight.

She pulled up her stats window, marveling at the changes.

[Name: Alyx Aretios

Race: Dragon Knight

Lvl: 30

Str - 103 Dex - 55 End - 100

Wll - 28 Ala - 25 Res - 18

Frt - 68 Per - 34 Vit - 24]

There was no arguing with that. Those weren’t the stats of an ordinary human. They were nearly double what they’d been before binding with Kelstor, and they would only keep growing.

A normal human got three Free Points per level. A Dragon Knight got three more points, distributed according to their dragon’s values. Most dragon-knight pairs worked together to pick them at the First Step.

In her case, he and her mother’s choice seemed to have carried over. “[Your dragon reveres Strength, Endurance, and Fortitude. This will be reflected in future growth.]” the system had said. She couldn’t have gotten luckier. For all Kelstor had worried about them matching, she couldn’t have asked for a better set of stat growths from him. With her First Step expansion into Strength and the two Free Points grace at the Gate, she now got Str +2, End + 1, Frt +1, Free Points +5 every level.

There would be very few at her own level who could match her now. Fioreya, as another Dragon Knight could, obviously. Cass, as soon as she finally closed that ever-shrinking level gap. Maybe Kohen, depending on what exactly the fallout of his demonic powers were.

Now, she just had to decide what to do with all this power.

She’d wanted this for as long as she could remember. First, out of blind admiration for her mother, the way all children want to be like the parent they admire. Then, after her mother’s death, it had become a desperate need to prove herself and her absolve her mother’s name.

And yet, she hadn’t really expected to get here. Not really. Not when Kohen and Fioreya were both better supported. Not while she was constantly fighting to even stand on the same starting block as them.

But she was here now. And she didn’t know what came next.

If she hadn’t been banished, she would have devoted herself to the city, as was right as a dragon knight. She and Kelstor would have been one of the hoard. In time, they might have been granted a territory to protect or a position in court.

Her position as her father’s heir would not be questioned. She could set her sights higher, to the duchess’s heir if she wanted.

Did she want that?

It didn’t matter. She was banished.

It would have been trivial not to have been. All she had needed to do was use her boon from the duchess, and her father wouldn’t have been able to do a thing.

It was a waste to use the boon on such a thing, though. So she hadn’t. That was obviously the only reason she hadn’t.

No, all she needed was a feat of valor or strength or strategic merit, to Vaisom and her grandmother would be more than happy to welcome her home. As a dragon knight with a fully grown dragon at her side, returning to Velillia was a matter of when she felt like it, not if she could.

Did she feel like it?

She would go back eventually. She owed it to Kelstor. Cass would go home eventually, and then what else would she do?

Not that she was just following Cass around. No. She snorted. They might be friends, and they might be traveling together just because, but she wasn’t just following Cass.

Then what was she doing?

Her mother’s homeland was on Cass’s way. They had plans to stop. And then what?

Alyx’s hands wound deeper in Kelstor’s mane.

It didn’t matter. He was here now. As unbelievable as that was. She pulled up his stats page, as if seeing the system’s description of him would make him realer.

[Name: Kelstor Aretios, of Kaidrach’s Hoard

Lvl: 38

Race: Bound Dragon

Str - 120 Dex - 57 End - 96

Wll - 53 Ala - 21 Res - 32

Frt - 78 Per - 31 Vit - 72]

[Draconic Scale (Racial) (lvl 37)

Dragon Fire (Racial) (lvl 26)

Absolute Might (lvl 20)

Full Body Fighting Mastery (lvl 36)

Suppressing Bellows (lvl 15)

Tail Sweep (lvl 30)

Flight (lvl 9)

Scorching Lance (lvl 19)

Bramble Surge (lvl 10)

Battle Cry (lvl 20)

Architectural Aesthetic Understanding (lvl 5)

Identify (lvl 9)

Shielding Wings (lvl 24)]

Alyx frowned. Are these all your skills?

Discomfort rolled over their bond. Oh. You noticed.

There was no way a dragon at his level should have so few and such low leveled skills. She had more skills. Cass probably had more.

And it wasn’t like skills devolved from disuse.

I don’t know why it’s like that, he admitted. But I think it is a side effect of what the cult did to me while I was feral. They sliced at my soul repeatedly. I don’t remember most of it now, but…

No, it’s fine. Don’t try to. Alyx shook her head, her fingers twisting tighter into his mane. She wished she had more Copper Crescent cultists to kill. She’d dealt with their captain too quickly in the end. She should have returned Kelstor’s treatment on him and then some.

I’m fine now, Kelstor assured her.

But you’re not. His skills had been decimated.

I’m with you now, he tried again, broadcasting calm against the burning in her chest.

Her hands clenched tighter.

Skills can be earned again. He’d moved on. She should too.

One finger at a time, she forced her hands to relax. The people who’d hurt him were dead. The people who’d killed her mother were dead.

They were alive and together. And that was what needed to matter.

Ch. 10: Departure

Cass and company met at the city gates. That company had greatly increased while Cass hadn’t been looking. Alyx, Kelstor, Telis, and Marco stood at the edge of a collection of wagons.

Telis spoke with a portly man in a leather vest and a tri-pointed and feathered hat, ironing out the last details for the trip.

Caravan Master

Lvl 31

[The owner and leader of a caravan company. This man has seen more of the world than most, from dusty roads between great cities to hidden pathways across the vast Continent.]

It had been five days since meeting the duchess. Six since her rescue from the cultists. Long enough for her injuries to heal but not for her Health to bounce back.

Given her low Health, they had decided that it made more sense to travel with a group from Velillia to Brighchess. They would be one of three groups protecting the dozen or so non-combatant groups braving the wilds between the cities.

The group would travel overland from Velillia to Belden, where they’d embark on an aethership to cross the Sea of Spires, resupplying in Myratos along the way.

Cass shifted back and forth impatiently. Would Robin or Kaye be in Myratos or at the end of this journey? Odds were good they’d be in one of them. Unless she was wrong about the motivations of the gods.

“This’ll be easy,” Alyx said, noticing Cass’s fidgeting. “There aren’t that many monsters this close to Velillia. You’ll have plenty of time to finish recovering before we run into anything you need to worry about.”

“Oh, no,” Cass shook her head. Alyx had clearly misunderstood Cass’s anxiety.

“Bandits should take one look at Kelstor and let us past. Only the truly foolish or powerful would bother challenging a caravan protected by a Dragon Knight,” Alyx continued.

Oh. Right. Bandits.

“Once we’re in the aether, we can expect leviathans. Maybe pirate fleets too.”

And pirates. People. Cass suppressed a grimace. She’d killed already. What were a few more.

“But, you should focus on your recovery. You’re listed as a guard, but I fully intend to shoulder that responsibility by myself for our group.”

“Alyx.” Cass sighed.

“What’s that?” Marco asked, nudging Alyx’s side. “You aren’t thinkin’ of making me hang back.”

“I don’t know why you’re even coming,” Alyx huffed.

He laughed loudly. “Where else would I go?”

Alyx looked away. “That’s for you to decide, isn’t it?” She coughed. She produced a bundle from Kelstor’s saddlebags. “Anyway. I have stuff for Cass.”

Alyx shoved the bundle into Cass’s hands.

Cass unwrapped it, revealing a set of blue-tinted armor. A bird with a key clutched in its feet took flight across the breastplate, over her heart. A cat stretched along the back panel. Swirls reminiscent of gusting wind were etched over the arm and leg guards and were inset with dozens of purple dime-sized crystals.

Cass’s Bluesteel Armor

Class: Light armor (Armor)

[Armor repaired and reforged for Cass Yuan, engraved with her loved ones so her goals may always be close at heart.

Crafted from bluesteel, inscribed with protective runes by an engraver approaching the Gate, and inset with mana crystals, this is a set of lightweight armor designed for a low Fortitude mage.

+ 2 Effective Fortitude to covered areas.

+ 3 additional Effective Fortitude to areas covered by both mail and plate.

+ 50 mana storage.]

Cass’s breath caught in her throat. “They remembered what I asked for.” Cass’s hand traced the bird’s neck. It wasn’t quite a robin as she knew the bird. Earth robins didn’t have quite that voluminous tail feathers or anything like talons like this bird did. Cass couldn’t say if that was simply stylization or a difference in breed.

“The way we stormed out, I’m sure it was hard for Xri to forget.” Alyx looked away, her face flushing.

You had them engrave me on your armor? Salos snorted from her shoulder.

You think it’s stupid, Cass sighed.

Salos chuckled. I did not say that.

I can feel it, Cass muttered.

Well, Salos looked away. It’s a very sentimental thing to have done.

A breath of satisfaction floated across their bond beneath heavy embarrassment.

“There is this too,” Alyx said, holding out a long staff.

The wood was familiar: almost white, with a soft blue undertone, the smooth wood crisscrossed with engraved patterns first cut by an amateur. But it had been transformed. No longer was it in two pieces. The segments had been joined in the center with a large, fist-sized jewel—the Stormcaller Stone. It had been cut and polished until it shone. Its matte, dusk-colored finish had been replaced with the sparkling blue-purple of where the night sky met the fire of the setting sun.

Around it, the smiths had set a collection of swirling mana crystals, all of it held in place by silver metal, binding and reinforcing the break in the wood into a cohesive whole.

The runes Cass had carved into the wood had been further refined, her amateur carvings smoothed and expanded into a twisting design of reaching vines and gusting winds. Black and silver powder were painted into the etchings, making them sparkle against the light wood.

Stormtamer’s Staff

Class: Staff

[Crafted from Zerden Madrone and Elysian crystal, this staff was made to tame the violent storms of the Fractured Skies. Wind and lightning powers course through this weapon.

+3 Effective Str when channeling forces of the Storm.

+9 Effective Wll when channeling forces of the Storm.

-20% Focus cost of all skills.

Additional -13% Focus cost for Storm-associated skills or spells.

+20 mana storage.]

“Thank you,” Cass whispered as she took the staff from Alyx. It was comfortable in her hands. Like this was how it was always supposed to be. Staff Mastery flickered to life in the back of her mind, its relief at having a weapon again mixing with her own.

This version of her staff was a far cry from the stick she’d found in Uvana. It actually gave stats for one. Cass hadn’t been sure weapons could even do that then.

She’d come a long way since then.

Name: Cass

[Race: Slyphid

Lvl: 27

Stamina: 153/153

Focus: 630/630 (+0/70 external Mana Reserves)

Health: 49/146

Str - 27 Dex - 70 End - 51

Wll - 100 Ala - 90 Res - 70

Frt - 28 Per - 41 Vit - 40

Free Points: 0

Concepts:

- Wind (Dex, Ala, Per) The Wind is Ephemeral. The Wind is Speed. The Wind is All.

- Hearth (End, Res, Vit) The Hearth burns. The Hearth provides. The Hearth protects.

- Liminal (Will, Ala, Res) The space between. The space overlapped. The space that is neither and both.]

Add her cloak:

Aura Cloak

Class: Accessory

[A broach that manifests the wearer’s aura in a defensive cloak. This is an artifact from another age, knowledge of its construction has long been lost.

Increases Effective Frt by 20% in areas covered by the Aura.

Increases Effective Frt by 5% over rest of contiguous body.

Increases the effect of Aura, Movement, and Defensive skills.]

and she had a bonus of 6 Frt if she was struck on her cloak and another 5 Frt if that was also in a place both the plate and mail covered, like her back or chest. That was an effective increase of about 40% to her Frt, which was impressive.

Her Str and Wll buffs were effectively a bonus of 10% so long as she was using Tempest Blade, which wasn’t bad at all for either.

Look at you, a proper martial now, Salos muttered. Hardly the scared child I met in the Deep now.

I’m not that different, Cass protested halfheartedly. In truth, she could see what he meant. She was a real combatant now, in every way that mattered.

Would the Cass that had been dropped in Uvana recognize her now?

Her hands clenched tighter around her staff. Did it matter?

Atmospheric Sense pulled her attention away from the thought, pointing out a familiar silhouette from the still-growing crowds.

“Pellen?” Cass called, turning to see the little mage approaching with a group of martials.

“Miss Cass?” Pellen squeaked. “What are you doing here?”

“Alyx and I are headed to Brighchess. What are you doing here?”

“Oh, um. I’m headed to Belden. I wasn’t expecting our paths to converge again. I—How was talking to Lady Mage Daith?”

Cass raised an eyebrow at the sharp conversation turn, but let the conversation run that direction. “Informative. Pretty much confirmed everything I was afraid of, but hiding from truths don’t make them less true. I’ve got my work cut out for me, but what’s new?”

Pellen nodded.

“You joined as a caravan guard?” Alyx interrupted.

“Oh. Yes. I offered to act as a guard in exchange for passage,” Pellen said. Her fingers thrummed over the cover of the magic book in her hands. She nodded. “It’s a good deal. I get to go to Belden and, if I come back, I get track credits.” Her nodding continued, almost as if she was still trying to convince herself this was a good idea.

‘If she came back’? Pellen had said she was switching to a combat mage track, so why wouldn’t she come back?

“You’ve got this, girl,” Marco patted her shoulder before Cass could ask. “Between the catacombs and that temple business, no one would doubt your skills.”

Pellen ducked her head. Her hands squeezed tighter around her tome. “Oh, yes. I suppose not.”

We have more company, Salos growled in Cass’s mind. On your right.

“I know, I know,” a familiar, petulant voice carried over the crowds.

“But you packed your spare casting gloves?” Madam Litya Delim fussed as she and Kohen walked into view.

Cass suppressed a groan. This couldn’t be happening. What were the chances he ended up in the same caravan as them? She was supposed to be getting away from him.

“Yes,” Kohen said, the frustration in his voice loud and strained.

“And you have extra underwear?”

“Mother,” Kohen snapped. “You oversaw the servants pack my bag. If you think they forgot something, fire them. What good is quizzing me on what you had them pack?”

She grabbed his hand, squeezing it between her own. “I can’t help but worry.”

He rolled his eyes. Cass did too.

“Then why send me on this pointless trip?” he asked.

“It will be good for you to visit the miracle clinic,” she said. “We talked about this.”

“Right. Sure.” He looked away, his tone entirely unconvinced.

“By the time you get back, everything will be right again. Don’t you worry.” She squeezed his hand again.

“I’m not.”

Tiador slipped in between mother and son. “My lady, he is in good hands.”

“I know.” The madam reluctantly released Kohen’s hand. “Thank you for agreeing to travel with my boy.”

“Mother,” Kohen snapped.

She waved down the outburst, her attention still on Tiador.

“It was always the plan to stay. Though we had imagined our first journey after the Festival to have been a Dragon Knight tour, this isn’t too bad a consolation.” Tiador wore a soft smile, just the right mix of sincere and regretful.

“Thank you for understanding,” Litya said.

“Anything for Ahryn,” Tiador said.

Kohen’s glower darkened.

“Ugh,” Alyx muttered, finally noticing her half brother. “Of all the caravans out of the city, why this one? I would have thought he would want to spend the next couple of months skulking about to earn himself a better position in court. Why is he in such a hurry to leave Velillia?”

Cass didn’t know, and she didn’t really want to. It didn’t matter. This didn’t change anything. He was just another traveler, no more important to her than the dozens of others loitering around the wagons waiting to depart. She didn’t need to pay any more attention to him than to anyone else. That she could Command him was unimportant.

Her focus was on Robin and Kaye. They were waiting for her out there. And she was finally coming for them.

Her hands clenched around her new staff. Just wait a little longer. She was coming.

Ch. 9: Salos: Dreams

Salos watched Cass sleep restlessly. She tossed and turned on her guest room bed in the Delim manor, limbs tangled in her blankets, pillows scattered to the wind. This wasn’t unusual, exactly. She often slept fitfully, not that he’d ever tell her. But usually she settled as the night progressed.

She was usually well settled into the oblivion of sleep by now. Instead, she kicked again, murmuring senseless English in her sleep.

It had been worse since her run-in with the cult.

He crept up next to her, curling into the hollow along her side between her chest and arm, and shut his eyes.

The night was quiet. The kind of quiet that left him more on edge than less.

But it was nominally safe. If the lord had wanted Cass dead, he would have done it the night they’d come back. There was little reason to wait. They just weren’t powerful or important enough to warrant more effort.

That was less than reassuring, but it was what he had. Paranoia that was right more often than it was wrong and the kind of rationalizations that accounted for their own relative unimportance.

Tomorrow they were leaving Velillia. Setting out on the road. He needed to be sharp for that. Sharp enough to catch the danger before it snapped closed around them. Before Cass wandered into trouble again.

Eventually, sleep took him, and he slipped into the deep dark, settling into the space which made sense only to the unconscious mind.

He was in a hallway of green glass. Tension twisted through his body like a spring compressed. He knew he couldn’t stay here, even if he didn’t know where here was.

He started walking. Every few steps he glanced over his shoulder. There was nothing here but him.

He turned a corner.

A corpse lay mangled in the hallway.

A scream wrenched itself from his mouth, and he scrambled back. Terror rippled through him.

He turned around before he could look closely at the corpse’s crushed bones and fried skin. Before the eyes could look at him accusingly.

He ran. Faster and faster. The halls twisted around him.

A door ahead. He burst through it. He was in an alleyway. The smell of blood was overwhelming. His stomach turned.

He turned around, slamming the door behind him. The spring coiled tighter.

He ran. Green hallways expanded out around him. They did not end. There was no escape. He knew with a certainty he could not explain.

Another door. On the other side was a storage room. A frozen corpse lay in one corner. A scorched corpse sat tied up in the center.

He stumbled backward, back into the hall.

There was a skittering noise to his left. A black cockroach skittered around the corner. The sight of it sent his skin crawling. And then another followed. Then a centipede, long and glistening in the nebulous light of the hallways. Then more. And more.

His eyes widened. He took a step away. Then another.

He ran.

Behind him, the cockroaches and centipedes crashed down the hallway like a black tide. They were always gaining. Every time he looked over his shoulder, they were closer.

There was no escape.

Something grabbed him. Fear laced down his spine. Hands grabbed his arms and legs. They were metal and unyielding. Cold and dark. He screamed.

They pulled him down, into an inky abyss.

He pulled against them. Futile.

He screamed.

Ahead was a dark campsite. Two figures stared in horror as he was pulled away. A man and a woman.

Robin and Kaye.

No.

The scene shifted, like static over his skin.

Ahead was a laboratory of dark stone. Two figures stared at him, one in fascination, one in horror as he was tied down to a table. A woman and a man.

****** and Cerivan.

Salos bolted up from the bed. His paws were drenched in sweat. His fur stood on end. It was still dark.

What was that? A nightmare?

Why was he so scared? The dream had been full of blood and corpses and vermin. None of that should scare him. He was no stranger to any of that. He had made more corpses than he could count. Blood was an occupational hazard. Bugs were an annoyance at worst.

He’d never seen Cass’s siblings.

Oh. That was Cass’s dream.

He had never seen his previous mistress’s dreams, which suggested this was a demon bound to another soul thing. He groaned quietly into the blankets.

Cass would tell him to ask Kelstor since the dragon-knight bond seemed similar, but the idea of telling a stranger about the state of his soul rankled.

Cass rolled over, murmuring in distress in her sleep.

She was still in the middle of it. Had it restarted, or was her mind dragging her through something else unpleasant?

An impulse to do something about it rolled through him. It pinged painfully off his broken Concept. He pushed the thought aside.

There was nothing he could do for her. He was not comforting. He never had been, even before he had been a demon.

And now he was a demon, he reminded himself. As if he needed reminding. He was Cass’s servant. He did not need to care.

He did care. It was pointless to pretend he didn’t care. It was pointless to try not to care.

But he didn’t want to care.

There was only heartbreak in caring.

Caring made it so easy to fix his broken Concept.

[Broken Concept Loyalty can be repaired. Would you like to repair it?

- Swear allegiance to mistress to reinstate Concept as Loyalty.

- Betray mistress to reformat Concept to Violation]

He pushed the notification aside. He would not swear his allegiance to anyone again. He liked Cass, he really did, and he was her servant because the system had made it so, but he would not willingly endorse this relationship.

And he didn’t want a Concept of Violation. It wasn’t just that he didn’t want to betray Cass. Definitely, it wasn’t about Cass. He just wasn’t interested in making such an idea a core part of who and what he was.

It was bad enough he was a demon.

Cass moaned again.

He settled down next to her, hoping his meager warmth might be enough to help her relax.

She moaned again, and he knew it wasn’t.

[Skill available: Unlink Previous Growth to Accept]

He glared at the window. This was not the first time he’d seen it. But it was the first time he’d been at all tempted.

As things were, with his growth linked to his previous, non-demon state, as he gained levels, all his skills leveled up with him. That was a massive advantage. The biggest power spikes were on the stage milestones, like the First Step at level 9 or the Gate at level 27.

Partially this was from the bonuses gained at these levels, and partially it was from one’s skills hitting these milestones too and receiving additional bonuses. Getting all the bonuses for his skills as he hit the threshold level was an unmatched power spike.

The only downside was that he could not gain new skills or alter his existing ones. Doing so would unlink all of his skills, and he would have to level them up like everyone else.

And some of his skills would be difficult to increase at this point.

He denied the window.

Any skill offered now was likely to do with his wish to comfort Cass. And there were lots of reasons he did not want a skill like that. To begin with, leveling it would be a pain. He did not have any interest in comforting anyone else, so he would only use it on Cass, restricting opportunities to gain familiarity and experience with the skill to highly limited times.

Second, he very much doubted Cass would appreciate anyone else touching her mental or emotional state. She likely would repel an attempt with Contrary Will and/or her Liminal Concept.

In short, taking a skill like that would be a major waste.

Cass thrashed.

He sidestepped her flailing and waited for her to settle again before crawling back to her side.

He could wake her up. That would end this set of nightmares. But then she’d have to fall back to sleep, and he had seen the trouble that had been. And there was no guarantee the next set of dreams would be kinder.

In short, he was helpless.

Not—he reminded himself sharply—that it should matter to him. She wasn’t dying. She wasn’t a child.

She would live.

He repeated it to himself as if it would make a difference.

She twisted, mumbling something in English. It might have been ‘stop.’ English was harder to understand when he couldn’t use their bond to catch her intent under it.

“Salos,” she moaned.

His hair stood on end. There was no mistaking his name, though.

Her arm stretched out, reaching for something. Her legs kicked wildly.

He dematerialized, slipping into the necklace.

Or, that had been his intent. Increasingly, his attempts to slide into the necklace landed him in her soul well instead. Like now.

Increasingly, that felt like a natural place to be.

Her soul well was a campsite. He was given to understand it was the last place she’d been on Earth before being kidnaped to the Fractured Skies. Perhaps it was the last place she had felt safe.

A campfire burned low in a metal ring in the camp’s center. A collection of cleverly folding chairs and stools sat around it. Tall trees, like the lightningwood of Uvana, stood tall over the dark campground. Behind him, he could hear the rumble of water falling over stone.

A tent made of strange, smooth fabric stood on the far side of the fire. Cass’s consciousness slept within it.

He was humanoid here, still looking like the Nyxdra he had once been, all lean muscle and dusty purple skin.

He didn’t know what he could do here—if he could do anything.

Cass groaned again, turning over in her tent.

But he needed to do something.

He stepped closer to the campfire. It was a representation of her Hearth Concept. It was her bleeding heart and her need to care for others. If only it could be her need to care for herself too.

Logs were stacked by the fireside. Carefully, he lowered one into the pit, resting it on an already burning log. It caught quickly, and the camp grew warmer as the fire grew.

Cass whimpered. Quieter than before. Had feeding the fire helped or was he deluding himself?

He added another log before dragging the stool to Cass’s side. He sat just outside the open tent flap. If he reached out, he could touch her.

She rolled toward him, her arms flopping off the side of her cot.

He should just sleep.

Sitting here wasn’t going to change anything.

Cass would be fine.

He took her hand.

He didn’t know why he did it. It couldn’t change anything. He couldn’t sleep sitting like this.

Her hand was warm in his. Her skin, soft and smooth. It was the hand of someone who had never held a weapon. Someone who did not do hard labor.

If she had a physical body, these hands would likely already be calloused, but her image of herself was unchanged.

Even mages usually had calluses along their fingers from writing. Her hands had only the ghost of such a callous, like it had been a long time since such tasks had been asked of her.

How could a world be that soft, Salos asked himself again.

She twisted again, her face scrunching in a fitful scowl.

He shook his head. It couldn’t be this easy. As he’d thought, this changed nothing. His presence did nothing to stop the nightmares around her.

And for some reason, that bothered him.

He didn’t owe Cass anything, he reminded himself. Her comfort was not his responsibility. She would not want him to feel like it was.

Was it just knowing Cass would hate seeing him like this? That soft, bleeding-heart Cass would hate seeing anyone like this?

Was it knowing Cass would look for someway to make it better? That stubborn Cass would probably find an answer regardless of what common sense said should be possible?

Fine, he’d keep thinking about it. What could he do?

He didn’t want to wake her. He wasn’t going to take a new skill. Feeding her Hearth hadn’t helped. Sitting beside her hadn’t helped.

Really, he wanted some way to end her nightmare, but he couldn’t manipulate dreams.

Could he?

He’d fallen into hers. Could he drag her into his?

Logic suggested the first step was to fall asleep, so he’d have a dream to pull her into, but that left him wondering how he’d manage step two while asleep.

No, that couldn’t be it.

He could see her dream because they shared a soul well or because their souls were joining. Due to the nature of their relationship, he tended to float into the parts of the well which were more hers than his, namely this campsite.

But what if he moved her to the part that was more his? Would that be enough?

He was flailing in the dark and hoping for the best, but worst case, moving her would do nothing.

He picked her up.

She was probably bigger than he was. If they had physical bodies in these proportions, she would almost certainly be heavier. But they were spirits in a soul well and he had more than enough Str to lift her, regardless.

Slowly, so as not to jostle her, he carried her from her tent to the ravine at the edge of her camp. To the dark pit that was what remained of his soul well.

It was a long ravine, dark and cold. Water poured down the sides into a still pool at the bottom.

Looking down into it, he hesitated. Between the warmth of Cass’s campground and the darkness of his ravine, it was hard to imagine this was a good idea. Every bit of common sense said this shouldn’t work.

What was he doing, thinking he could be a comfort to her?

Cass wriggled in his arms, her head thrashing back and forth.

But what did he have to lose?

He hopped down the ravine, the water splashing around his thighs as he landed.

Now what? Set her down? In the cold water?

There wasn’t anything else down here, so he did.

She floated in the dark water, her robes billowing around her like a silken ghost. Her face was still scrunched in a scowl, but her body seemed to relax in the water. Maybe this was working.

He lay back in the water beside her—feeling increasingly silly—and closed his eyes. He let himself drift, holding only to their bond and her hand.

Ch. 8: Champions

Cass’s next stop was the temple. It floated over the river on the wide spire, its towering glass walls shimmering in the afternoon sun.

Alyx was waiting for her outside with Kelstor. The crowd hung around them, holding a respectful buffer of several yards around the dragon. Most passed by quickly, trying to look like they were focused on their business. A few stopped and stared up at Kelstor, his horns glistening in the sun. But every eye was staring, whether or not they meant to. If it bothered the knight or dragon, they didn’t show it.

“You didn’t have to come,” Cass said as she stepped out of the crowd. The crowd’s eyes added her to their gaze. Cass’s skin prickled under the weight.

Alyx snorted. “And let you walk into a temple unsupervised?”

“What does that mean?”

Alyx shot Salos on Cass’s shoulder an incredulous look.

He shook his head dejectedly in return.

“You are two for two for meeting gods in temples, for one,” Alyx said. “And last time you were kidnapped.”

Cass scratched the back of her head. That wasn’t wrong. But, “That wouldn’t happen again.” Right?

Salos rolled his eyes.

Alyx shook her head. “Come on, we’re causing a scene here.”

“I wouldn’t have on my own,” Cass grumbled, but followed Alyx into the building.

You’re coming too? Cass asked Salos. He’d dipped out when she’d visited the temple in Hervet. She was pretty sure it was his history with Alacrity that had made him hesitant to enter before, rather than some aversion as a demon, but she didn’t fault him for wanting to avoid the place.

The statue of Alacrity loomed over the main room, inhumanly large and imposing, her crimson dragon twisting around her waist. People crowded around it, even busier today than it had been the day before.

Obviously. He stuck his nose up.

She didn’t miss the tension coiled like springs down his feline body or the reverberating reservation along their bond.

I really will be okay, Cass said. There is no way anyone would do something to me here a second time.

You claimed you would stay out of trouble before I absorbed the soul piece, and look where I found you. I am not letting you lure me into a false sense of safety.

Cass shook her head. He could be as stubborn as she was when it suited him.

Alyx led the way through the room, the crowd splitting around them.

A priest hurried to meet them, a slender man with dark hair and pale skin, dressed in the blue of Alacrity. “Dame Aretios, welcome to the temple. What brings the dame here today?”

“My friend and I had some questions,” Alyx said.

“I will prepare a room.” The priest bowed his head. “Would Lord Kelstor like to wait here or in the gardens for the dame?”

“Oh.” The word slipped from Alyx’s mouth like an escaping sigh. “Right.” She looked up at Kelstor, his shoulders stood far taller than the internal cathedral doors. How had they gotten him in or out of the basement? How had the duchess’s dragon fit through here? She was even bigger, and Kelstor barely fit.

“The gardens,” Kelstor said. “There is a good spot for napping, if memory serves.”

“Very good, my lord,” the priest said and waved over another priest. “Please let this one help you. My lady, if you would follow me.”

He led them out of the main room and into the private corridor, Alyx glancing over her shoulder to Kelstor the whole way.

Cass tensed as they stepped out of the public eye. This was the way the priest of Fortitude had taken her the other day. But they turned into a wide room before they reached the stairs at the end of the corridor, and Cass relaxed.

The priest gestured to the chairs, seating himself on one side of the table. Alyx sat across from him, and Cass slipped into the chair at her side.

“Welcome again, my lady,” the priest said. “What questions may I answer today?”

Alyx glanced at Cass.

Her turn. “I had questions about Champions.”

“Indeed?” The priest glanced from Cass to Alyx and then back to Cass. “What about them?”

“Which gods have them, to start with.” The man the other day had answered that much, but Cass was unwilling to blindly believe everything he had told her given what had followed.

“Yes? Well. Our Lady Alacrity has chosen recently our Fioreya Ahdain Veldor. Lord Strength has a Champion based in Celestine’s capital, Soarntal, and Lord Will’s operates mostly within the Empire. They have served their gods well for the last many years. Lady Fortitude selected one of her paladins last year, and she has been making rounds of the Empire, last I heard. ”

Cass nodded. This matched what she’d heard yesterday. “So, Dexterity, Endurance, Resolve, Vitality, and Perception don’t have Champions?”

He hesitated. “That is probably correct. It is speculated Lord Dexterity may have a secret Champion as he is known for his desire to remain shrouded in mystery. Master Resolve similarly avoids the public eye and may have directed a Champion of theirs to do the same.”

“That leaves Endurance, Vitality, and Perception,” Cass commented.

He nodded. “Endurance has only chosen a Champion twice in recorded history. And Vitality’s most recent Champion died two years ago, ironically, succumbing to old age.”

“And Perception?” Cass asked.

“We would likely know if Perception had a champion. They would have announced it with the fanfare befitting their domain.”

Cass was inclined to agree, more because the god had offered her the position than for any other reason. Though there was always the possibility the god might kill their previous champion to make room for her.

Cass tensed at the thought. Why was that a realistic possibility? She took a deep breath.

No, did they need to go that far? Even gods had to have difficulty just murdering people, right?

“Can gods change their Champions once picked?” she asked.

He hesitated. “There is a story of a Champion angering their patron so greatly that the god cursed them and withdrew their blessings. It is unclear how accurate that story is, as it is from a previous age.”

Elenseth of Will, Salos muttered across their bond. She died a hundred or so years before my time. Well. I say died, but her undead, screaming corpse was still standing strong, water pouring from her mouth and eyes in an endless font of liquid mana last I checked.

What? Cass glanced at him, her eyes widening.

As I understand it, Salos said, she betrayed her goddess, so the goddess twisted one of her blessings. Instead of endless Focus to use in declaring Will’s will, it exploded out of her body indefinitely, for any worthy to claim and use. Her body turned to stone, but, supposedly, her mind was left very alive and in endless agony.

Cass grimaced. Are all curses that unpleasant?

Salos shrugged. None I’ve heard of are nice. It is a curse after all.

Wait, I thought only demons could cast curses? You said that they come at the cost of the caster’s soul.

Salos shifted uncomfortably. It’s an old story. It’s probably not true.

That she was ‘cursed’ or that the god did it? Cass asked.

I don’t know, Salos admitted. Does it matter?

It mattered a lot, but maybe not now. Hopefully not now.

She put a pin in it and returned her focus to the priest. “Do Champions ever retire? Or part on non-cursing terms?”

“The previous Champion of Fortitude retired,” the priest said.

Cass let out a breath of relief she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

“But no new Champion was chosen until he died,” the priest continued. “Only the gods know if that was because he was still the Champion according to the system or if Lady Fortitude simply had no need of a new Champion until after his death.”

And there it was. Cass suppressed a sigh.

Perception had said they’d let Cass quit if she wanted when they’d offered her the position. They’d said they would take back any boons, which had sounded fair, but did that actually mean they’d curse her like in the story of Will’s champion? Or was it closer to the retirement the priest described of Fortitude’s Champion?

And would Kaye or Robin’s god be as magnanimous about it? An image of Robin turned to stone, water pouring from his open, silently screaming mouth flashed across her sight. She shuddered but shook the image away.

Finding them was the first step. She could worry about what happened next after she knew where they were.

“Endurance, Vitality, and Perception, you said,” Cass repeated. “Maybe Dexterity or Resolve. They don’t have a champion.”

He nodded.

That was half of the gods. Even removing Perception from that list, it was too many.

It also didn’t match what Dexterity had told her.

“Oh, I do see why Perception is fond of you and why Strength couldn’t be bothered,” Dexterity had said to her as she’d left the temple. The god had implied it was Strength that had summoned her and that it was to Strength that Perception had traded one of her siblings for Cass.

There were three explanations for this contradiction.

1. Dexterity was messing with her. He was the god of betrayal and demons. Would it be out of character for him to lie?

2. Strength did not intend to use her sibling as a Champion. It was only Cass’s assumption that was what the gods wanted from them based solely on Perception’s actions. But, just because that was what Perception wanted, didn’t mean that was what every god wanted.

3. Strength’s Champion was being replaced. Either it had just happened and word hadn’t gotten here yet or it was about to.

How much should I trust Dexterity? Cass asked Salos, running down her thought process for him.

Hm. Hard to say. Trusting the gods is not something I would do in this age. But the gap between truth and lies is far from a narrow line.

So hold what he said under advisement, but don’t go trekking across the world about it?

I suppose, Salos said.

“Between Strength, Endurance, and Vitality, who has a stronghold closest to here?” Cass asked.

The priest raised an eyebrow at her list. “Vitality is closest. Her holy temple is in Brighchess in the Koralis Kingdom. The journey is about a month when the winds over the sea are favorable.

“Strength is a close second. I mentioned his Champion is based in Soarntal, which is the capital of the kingdom to the north. This time of year, that will be closer to two months. Possibly longer if the Kingdom shifting is faster this year.”

Cass stared at him, her confusion loud on her face.

He stared back, his frown an indication he understood she was confused but clearly not understanding why.

Cass glanced at Alyx.

“The Kingdom is on a separate Continental plate,” Alyx said.

Cass shook her head. That sounded like plate tectonics, but that seemed unlikely given that they were on floating land masses.

“The Continent—the Kailz Continent—is made up of three plates. They grind past each other as the entire continent floats through the aether. In winter, we’re as close to the Kingdom’s plate as the Jottena Peninsula gets. But it is already moving away from us at this point in the year.”

“The plates move?” Cass repeated. That in and of itself wasn’t strange. The continental plates of Earth moved too. But that was on the grand timescale of planets, not “Over the course of a year?”

Alyx nodded.

Cass shook her head. She couldn’t imagine how that worked. Surely it would be endless earthquakes and lifeless rolling rock along that seem. Maybe it was. No one said people lived on that boundary.

“And what about Endurance?” Cass asked, choosing to move along rather than dwell on this new and disturbing fact.

“Endurance is far less centralized than the other two. She has a large temple on the Far Continent, but most of her devout prefer to honor her through travel rather than great works,” the priest said.

“But she does have a strong following in Myratos and many of the other isles,” Alyx said softly. There was something tender about the way she said Myratos.

Cass glanced at her, but Alyx didn’t elaborate further, and the priest continued without noticing. “True. The Isles favor her and Perception both.”

“Where is that?” Cass asked.

“The Isles float in the Sea of Spires, off the gulf, circling the Elysian Gyre at the sea’s center,” Alyx answered. That gyre was where her Stormcaller’s stone had come from.

“Is that on the way to Brighchess?”

Alyx waffled her hand. “Eh. I’ve heard that it depends on the aether currents.”

“Is there anything else I can help you with?” the priest asked.

Cass flipped through her questions and shook her head. She’d gotten what she’d needed from the priest.

He looked at Alyx, ignoring Cass.

“That will be all,” Alyx said, standing.

“Very good.” He shot up after her, scrambling to the door to get it for her. “Please visit again, dame, if you find yourself with more questions.”

“Sure,” Alyx said with a wave as they left.

Any of those places sound familiar to you? Cass added to Salos as they followed Alyx out of the building.

None of the names are familiar, no, but the Gyre—from its description and location—might be what I knew as the Eternal Storm. The Custodia had a base there once. I doubt we could find it without more information, though.

Unless another soul piece is there, Cass suggested.

Horror flickered over their bond. She wouldn’t have. They wouldn’t have let her. If they’d known, they would have stopped her.

So, one vote for the Elysian Gyre and the surrounding Isles, Cass said.

This isn’t a vote, Salos snorted. You need to go where you think has the best shot at finding your loved ones. And that sounds like that would be Strength’s stronghold in the kingdom.

“What do you think, Alyx?” Cass asked instead of acknowledging Salos’s answer. “Where should we go next?”

“Aren’t we leaving because you picked?” Alyx asked as they stepped outside and into the temple’s garden. The sun was bright and warm on her skin. The breeze pulled at her clothes, asking her to play.

“What? No.” Cass shook her head. “That narrowed it down a lot, but we’ve got at least three choices still.”

“Should we go back inside?” Alyx asked.

“He can’t divine where my sibling is,” Cass said with a sigh. She stopped mid-step. “He can’t, right? That’s not a thing people can do with magic, is it?”

She was going to feel really dumb if there was a magic ‘find my siblings’ spell. Dumb but happy.

Alyx shook her head. “Maybe if you had something that linked back to them.”

Cass sighed. Well, so much for that. “Either way, I have three leads. I was asking if you had a preference.”

Alyx rubbed at her sword’s pommel in thought. She definitely had a preference. Alyx would’ve just said ‘no’ if she didn’t. This silent debating was out of character.

“Did you want to go to that Myratos place?” Cass guessed.

Alyx flinched.

“What’s there?” Cass asked.

Alyx’s hand tightened on her sword pommel. “My mother’s from there. Or so I’d heard. I’m not in a hurry to visit. It’s just something I should do someday.”

“Got it, so two votes for the isles,” Cass said.

“It isn’t a vote,” Salos hissed aloud.

“It probably shouldn’t be,” Alyx agreed. “You have a specific goal. A time-sensitive goal. I can always visit later.”

“But all three options are equally likely,” Cass said. Sort of. Depending on how much trust she put in the words of the gods.

Neither Alyx nor Salos looked particularly convinced.

“We’re all traveling together,” Cass said. “You two have as much say in where we’re going as I do.”

Alyx shook her head.

“Look, the way I see it, we have two directions before us. Either we go to that Brighchess place across the sea, stopping in as many isles as we need to along the way, one of which could easily be Myratos, hitting two potential god’s strongholds; or we go north to Soarntal and visit one.” When she put it like that, the decision seemed fairly straightforward.

They had all the reasons to travel through the gyre to Brighchess and Vitality’s stronghold. There was just one to travel north to the Celestine Kingdom and Strength’s stronghold.

Alyx and Salos exchanged an uncomfortable look.

“But Dexterity—” Salos started to say.

Cass cut him off. “It’s not just about whether I trust the gods.” Her lack of trust in the gods was an uncomfortably large part of her reluctance to go north, but, “It’s also about what I expect to find when I get there.

“Strength supposedly has a Champion. That means there is a solid chance my sibling is just next in line for the position. They are probably, relatively safe. There is probably some time before Strength makes them the actual Champion, if that’s even the plan.”

Probably. There were several other options, but they weren’t unique to Strength.

“On the other hand, if my sibling was claimed by either Vitality or Endurance, they may be made a Champion any time now. And I think it will be harder to go home if they are already a Champion. If I can get to them before they are officially made Champion, things will be much simpler.”

Again, probably. For all she knew, god-curses were very real and as applicable to Champion candidates as Champions.

“That makes some sense,” Salos allowed. Incredulity crept into his voice and across their bond, but he didn’t launch a real objection.

“If you’re sure,” Alyx said. “I’d appreciate it if we could stop in Myratos. Thank you.”

“I don’t see why that would be a problem,” Cass said.

There was still so much she didn’t know. So much no one but the gods themselves might know.

But she had to act anyway. For herself. For her friends. For Kaye and Robin, wherever they were.

“Let them be in Myratos,” she whispered as they walked away from the temple. “Let them be in Brighchess.”

Ch. 7: Tamara Daith

“A book from the last age,” the woman, Lady Tamara Daith, muttered, flipping through the pages with a delicate hand. Daith was a bird of a woman, with a narrow build and a sharp nose, her eyes piercing like a hawk’s.

Cass sat across a cluttered desk in the crowded office of the mage. Tall shelves consumed the walls, filled from floor to ceiling with tomes. The books spilled out into piles on the floor, more than half of which were stuffed full with notes sticking from the pages.

“I’ll admit, it’s not every day such a tome wanders through our tower. This will be a welcome payment for my services, even at this less than ideal time.”

“Glad to hear it,” Cass said.

“Now, what was your request again?” the mage asked. “Interrealm traversal?”

Cass nodded. This was it. She’d finally have an answer. A clear path home. She tensed in her chair, leaning forward.

“Simple answer?” Daith snapped the book shut and set it on the pile of mana-glowing books on her desk. “It is impossible.”

“Impossible?” Cass repeated. That couldn’t be right. She’d gotten here after all. She was living proof that it could be done.

Was she being scammed?

No, this was Pellen’s professor. Would this woman really take her payment and shove Cass out?

“Impossible if you are looking for a practical approach to travel.” The woman leaned back in her chair dismissively. “As you aren’t an academic, I can only assume that is your concern. You can’t become a Traveler. Sorry to burst your dreams of heroics in other worlds.”

Cass tensed, her entire body tightening with the mage’s accusation. That was so not the point. “Then, from a non-practical point of view, what’s your opinion?”

“Oh, it’s very theoretically possible,” Daith said with a wave of her hand. “Every model of realm (stability?) and spatial barrier (physics?) suggests this world as we understand it only works if there is an ‘outside’ for our realm to exist within. There must be a Void beyond. And simple probability suggests that it is more likely that there exists an infinite multitude of other realms in that Void than us existing alone in the infinity we believe the Void must be.”

“That’s all an argument for why other worlds exist,” Cass said. There was a lot of technical garbage there and, for the first time in a while, Jothi Language Comprehension was struggling with the translation. But that sounded like none of it was an answer to Cass’s question. Was she doing it intentionally?

The mage rolled her eyes. “If I must explain, teleportation, such as the spells my assistant Ioptes has been working on, only work by (piercing?) the spacial barrier of our world, forcing the target out into the Void and then back into this realm at a nearby location. Like a needle plunging through folded fabric.”

Cass’s patience was quickly running out. “Sewing is famous for connecting multiple disjoint pieces of fabric into a single whole.”

There was a pitiful look in the professor’s eyes and her voice dripped with condescension. “It does seem like it should be that simple, doesn’t it? And it might be, if you were a single needle.”

Cass clenched her hands in her lap. She needed this woman’s expertise. She had to put up with it for now.

“Ioptes says she used her spell on you? You survived. No bits were left behind here or in the Void. All your bits ended up in the right orientation and at the correct coordinates?”

Cass’s stomach turned as she remembered Pellen’s warning about her spell’s success chances. And the fatal consequences of failure.

“This is just the first obstacle. What is a single ‘target’ for this kind of spell? We are so used to spells targeting the entirety of an (aura?) body, it is easy to forget that a person is truly made up of an inordinate number of individual components. I speak of components smaller than what you are thinking. Not simply your heart and your lungs and your right hand. But—”

“Individual cells?” Cass interrupted. This might have been a revelation to a world with a medieval understanding of medicine, but not to a modern woman like Cass.

The mage’s eyebrow lifted. “You are familiar with the concept? Interesting. I was made to understand you are a useless spellsword sorceress with no Academy backing to speak of.”

“I’m educated in other fields.”

“Interesting,” the mage muttered, a new light in her eyes, suddenly looking at Cass like she were a strange animal, rather than a dull child.

Cass didn’t love that much more. She coughed. “You were saying? The first issue is determining which cells, or perhaps even which molecules, to send over the barrier? I imagine if the entire body isn’t being recognized by the spell as a single entity, then clothing and equipment need to be accounted for as well?”

“Exactly,” Daith said. “Most spells and just about every skill take advantage of the System’s understanding of ‘entities’. This allows faster, safer, more reliable targeting in almost all cases. A person, the entirety of their body, their immediate effects are all scooped up in the system’s (abstraction?) of reality.”

That would explain why Cass’s Wind Step allowed her to phase into the wind with her clothes and weapons but prevented her from bringing other people with her. Her clothes and weapons were part of ‘her’ from this abstraction. Another person could only be another ‘entity’.

“But when you (shunt?) an entity out of this realm, you momentarily leave the (jurisdiction?) of our System,” the mage continued.

“There is a system in the Void,” Cass interrupted.

“Of course there is ‘a’ system in the Void. Just as there is a pull of the abyss and the breath of aether. It’s just not our system.”

Cass squinted at that explanation. ‘Pull of the abyss?’ She meant gravity, right? Right? And ‘breath of aether?’ Was that just the fact that people could breathe in the Void? She wasn’t sure about that one.

There had been some sort of gravitational force orienting an up and a down when she’d been in the Void, and, even before turning herself into a slyphid, she hadn’t had a problem breathing. She hadn’t questioned the why of it. It just seemed like the kinds of things weird void places should have.

But obviously, if it was the pull of gravity, it wasn’t the gravity of Earth holding her down. Was it a stretch to assume it also wasn’t the system of this world rearranging her body over there?

“The shift between systems causes a (re-indexing?) of entity identities. From the spell’s point of view, it is as if the entity simply stopped existing. So the target becomes lost in the Void and the caster experiences catastrophic spell failure as her spell (rebounds?) with nowhere to put the rest of the energies invested into the spell.”

“And this is just the first problem?” Cass was beginning to see the difficulty, but this couldn’t be the only problem. If it were, Pellen’s teleportation spell could not exist.

“This is the primary difficulty in teleportation. It’s a theoretically, if not practically, solved problem. However, you were not asking about teleportation.” She pointed accusingly at Cass. “You want interrealm travel, which adds a whole host of other issues. Primarily, where do you send your subject?

“We know where this realm is. We have done the experiments to map the movement of realm boundaries to physical distance. It’s a steadily improving science, but a science that can be experimented on and explored.

“But what do we do about other realms? We assume, with reason, they exist. There have been times in ages past when we may have even pulled entities from a small subset of realms with a little help from the gods and summoning magic.

“But where are they specifically? How far apart are we? The Void is infinite. Even if we knew the exact location, could we generate enough potential to send an object across the distance?”

How far was Earth from this world? The gods had yanked her over, but Perception had implied it had only been feasible because they’d worked together to do it. Was this something mortals could replicate?

Her chest tightened as the enormity of her goal took shape around her.

“Even if we could, who is to say that realm supports life? There are stories of summoned beasts that come from realms swallowed by abyss or perpetually aflame. Entire worlds without the breath of aether. Realms that are nothing but a vast emptiness of space.”

This wasn’t her problem. No, her problem was worse. Not just any life-supporting world would do. She needed her specific world. How would she be able to tell from outside it was the right one? How would they find it among the probably infinite realms?

“And even if we found a realm that would not immediately kill our would-be traveler,” Daith continued, jumping on the increasingly hopeless look on Cass’s face to twist the dagger, “how confident am I that we could get them across the realm’s barrier? Our realm has a malleable barrier. There are thin sections; there are thick sections. There are areas that can be made one or the other. There are days these change and moments where the barrier all but disappears on its own. We have carefully mapped these (fluctuations?). Our teleportation spell has (contingency?) cases for nearly every barrier state both on exit and on reentry and still experiences an unacceptably high failure rate.

“But what to do if the target barrier is drastically different? Our theoretical models have a large space of unobserved potential barrier states. Are these simply flaws in our model? Are they examples of states vanishingly rare? Or are they far more common in realm barriers not our own? How do we handle them? Would you be comfortable stepping through a spell with no real-world testing on 80% of the use conditions?”

Could Cass risk her life on such a small chance of making out the other side alive? Would Kaye or Robin want her to die trying to get back to them?

“And then, even if we found a world that was reachable, supporting compatible life, with a barrier we understand and can breach, what then? We have no way to guarantee where in that realm our spell would drop you.

“Assume it is like our Fractured Skies. The vast majority of unique coordinates would place you in the infinite skies with nothing but abyss below. You would fall until you died.

“Even assuming we could target over a land mass, there is only a narrow band of survivable space over land masses. Too high, and the subject falls to their death. Too low, and they materialize inside the solid ground. Our tests in teleportation suggest that it would at least be a quick death.”

How narrow was the band she was targeting? Not just a ‘survivable space’ but specifically a survivable space on Earth. Ideally, in the United States. Appearing on a habitable planet light-years from Earth wouldn’t do her any good whatsoever.

How small was that bullseye on a target the size of the infinite universe?

The mage shook her head. “No. We are at least thirty years off stable teleportation. Interrealm travel is a fantasy of the distant future. Maybe the work of gods.”

Cass shook her head. Was that it? Was this a dead end?

What about summoning? Salos asked.

Cass repeated the question for the mage.

“Summoning?” Daith snorted. “What about it?”

“Isn’t what I want to do the opposite of summoning?” She was grasping at straws. She could see it on the mage’s face even as she voiced the question. “Couldn’t there be answers in what summoners do?”

“Summoning is god-granted sorcery.” The mage grimaced at the suggestion. “And one of the rarer god-granted boons. There are only a handful of summoners in all of the Fractured Skies. If you can get one to show you their magic and you become an expert in transcribing Skill effects into spell forms, maybe you could duplicate the effect. You’ll likely be smitten for your efforts, but…” She shrugged like that wasn’t her problem.

Summoning is that rare these days? Salos muttered. Incredible. In my age, it was hardly something so guarded. But then, perhaps my mistress wanted her specialty to be special to her.

You started in her service as a summoned familiar, right? Cass asked.

Yes, Nyxdra are not natives of this realm. We come from the Abyssal Seas of Azorth. Her face was the first light that graced my eyes. Her service is where I went from nebulous idea of an entity to individual.

It was common in those days for noble children to summon familiars to protect them. That was my calling. His thoughts drifted off, dark and melancholic.

Cass let him. Where did this leave her?

Was this impossible? No. She pushed the rising hopelessness back. She could solve this. Start by restating the problems. “There are 3 problems with using teleportation as a means of interrealm travel.

“1. Defining the traveling entity.” Mostly solved. Pellen had at least three successful teleportations in the field. Either luck had been on the little mage’s side, or she was much closer to an answer than anyone gave her credit for.

“2. Locating the target realm and safe coordinates within.” Where did she start with that? Could some sort of ‘reverse summoning’ like Salos suggested find Earth from her existence? Should she find a summoner?

“3. Safely crossing the realm boundaries of a foreign realm.” More big question marks. Would a summoner know more? Did she need to let mages like Daith and Pellen do more tests? “Do I have that right?”

The mage shook her head. “Sure, if you want to condense the multitude of layered and nuanced problems into three. Sure. Those are them. Simple enough when you arrange it like that, but no more solvable than it was before.”

Maybe she would need Perception’s help to get home. She grimaced at the thought. Perception could be trusted to the letter of their word and not an implication further. The deal as they’d left it all those days ago in the temple in Hervet had been indefinite servitude for ‘a wish’. Not something to stake any plans on.

Not something to consider seriously.

No. If she considered Perception’s offer, it would only be after she’d found out what the god was really after. She would need real leverage, not blind desperation.

For now, it wasn’t an option either.

Better hope the Scholar’s Spire had better answers.

Ch. 6: Unneeded Books

The reception hall of the Academy of Arcane Arts was deserted when Cass and Salos visited it the next day. A single, very bored-looking receptionist sat behind the reception counter, his head resting on his arms. He sat up when he noticed Cass, a customer service smile, slipping over his lips. “Is there something I can help you with today?”

Cass hurried up to the counter, digging around her Bag for the slip of paper she’d been handed ages ago. “I had an appointment with a mage for after the Festival?”

He nodded, waiting for her to get to her point.

“Unfortunately, my plans have changed,” Cass said. There was the slip; she set it on the counter. “I won’t be around after the Festival, so I was wondering if there was any way I could see them—or someone else, maybe—sooner?”

He picked up her slip and squinted at it, a frown on his lips. He shook his head. “The Mage Daith is out until the end of the Festival. Most of our professors are.”

That was more or less what she’d expected. Not what she’d hoped, but what she’d expected.

“Is there anyway you could check?” Cass asked anyway, well aware she was being an inconvenience. Him checking, assuming he even could, was not going to magic an expert out of the aether to talk to her.

But this was her last concrete lead on interrealm travel. If a mage of the Academy couldn’t help her, she would be back to hoping some relic of the Custodia would get her home. She had to try.

He didn’t quite roll his eyes. He made a show of flipping through the registry on the counter, shaking his head the entire way. “No. No one relevant until well after the Festival ends.”

Behind her, the reception’s doors swung open.

“Miss Cass?” a familiar voice called.

Pellen stood in the doorway, all her eyes on Cass. The little mage had her hood up, covering her dark hair and hiding many of her far many more eyes. Her wide mouth hung open in surprise.

“Pellen!” Cass smiled. “Oh, right, you work here.”

Pellen was an Academy Mage, after all.

“But shouldn’t you be on vacation, too?” Cass asked.

Pellen’s head dropped, all her eyes suddenly finding her shoes very interesting. “Ah. Well. You know how professors can be.” Pellen paused. “Or, maybe not?”

Cass shrugged. She hadn’t had a professor like that personally, but she’d heard horror stories from other departments, not that mage professors were necessarily the same as Earth college professors.

Pellen shifted awkwardly, her eyes darting for the stairs to the left of the reception desk.

“Oh, wait!” Cass snapped. She rummaged in her Bag, pulling out a collection of books. “I’ve been meaning to give these back to you.”

Pellen’s eyes widened as the books came pouring out onto the reception’s counter. They were all the books they’d collected in the catacombs, back when they’d gone exploring after their unfortunate fall. Cass had been trying to return them to the little mage when Cass got kidnapped by the Copper Crescent.

And then the mage’s eyes darkened. Pellen looked away. “Oh. You can keep them, actually.”

Cass raised an eyebrow. “What?”

She remembered the wonder in Pellen’s eyes when they’d run into the wall of books. The glee with which Pellen had pulled the books from their shelves, her piles growing beyond what her meager pockets could hold. The regret in her eyes as she considered which books to leave behind and the relief when Cass had offered to carry them for her.

There was no way Pellen had simply changed her mind about them.

“I don’t need them anymore.” The vast majority of her eyes were downcast. Two around the corner of her face looked longingly at the books. One flicked up to glance at Cass.

Cass, we have better things to do than—

“What do you mean?” Cass asked.

Pellen shook her head.

It’s not our business.

“You were so passionate about these,” Cass continued.

“I just don’t.”

See, simple enough, Salos said. Leave it alone, Cass.

Cass crossed her arms over her chest. The little mage all but trembled in front of her.

Salos wasn’t wrong. It wasn’t her business. It would be simple enough to respect Pellen’s obvious lie and move on. Perhaps that would even be the polite thing to do.

“Why not?” Cass asked instead.

Pellen tugged her hood down over her face. “I’m changing tracks. I’m becoming a combat mage.”

Cass cocked her head to one side. “What does that have to do with the books?”

“Combat mages don’t need to do a research project, they only need to prove mastery in a school of combat magic.”

Cass’s head didn’t straighten.

Pellen sighed. “I only needed those books for my research project.”

“Was it really just for school?” Cass’s frown deepened. She’s lying.

Salos snorted from Cass’s shoulder. Does it matter?

“Yes.” Pellen didn’t look up.

She came to my rescue!

That does not make these trivial matters your business, Salos said.

Cass huffed. “Then sell them.”

Pellen recoiled, shaking. “I-I couldn’t.”

“Why not?” Cass shoved a book into the little mage’s hands.

Pellen’s fingers coiled around the tome. She held it tight to her body, like a child protecting a cherished toy from bullies even as she said, “I can’t.”

Cass sighed. There was more going on here. But Pellen wouldn’t look at her or the stack of books.

“Fine, I’ll hold on to the rest for now,” Cass said. “But let me know if you want them before the end of the Festival.”

“Thank you.” Pellen looked up at Cass from under the hood. “Are you leaving with Lady Alyx after the Festival?”

Cass nodded. “I’d be leaving soon, regardless. But, yeah, her dad gave us a more concrete time table.”

“I see,” Pellen said, her head bowing again. “But, um, what are you doing here?” She looked up, her eyes widening at Cass. A curious glimmer of hope flickered in their dark depths. “You couldn’t be here to hire a combat mage, could you?”

“Oh, no.” What would they need a combat mage for? With any luck, there would be no combat in her near future—which was why Alyx was getting their armor and weapons fixed, clearly.

“I had an appointment with Tamara Daith for after the Festival, but for obvious reasons, I was hoping to move up the appointment if possible.” Cass sighed and shot the receptionist behind her a baleful glance. “It seems like it won’t be possible.”

He shook his head, entirely unimpressed with her puppy dog eyes.

Cass shrugged again. She hadn’t expected him to be.

“Tamara Daith?” Pellen repeated.

Cass nodded. “Do you know them?”

Pellen nodded. “She is—was—my adviser.”

“No kidding? Any chance you could convince her to meet me?”

Pellen’s hands wound together, her fingers picking at her nails. “I don’t know. She doesn’t like people. Or sorcerers. Or spellswords. Or combat mages. Or people?”

“You said that already,” Cass said.

“That’s how much she doesn’t like people,” Pellen said. “She only takes public jobs through the guild as it is because she has to for membership.”

Was that it, then? Was she going to have to give up? And what? Just hope she stumbled on a Custodia base with answers?

“She doesn’t like taking public jobs?” Cass asked, more to buy time as she looked for another answer.

Maybe Pellen knew another mage with similar credentials. Who’d be willing to help on such short notice?

Pellen nodded. “Most of the professors don’t. But, they are required to have a certain number of consultations available every season or they lose priority. Others need it for the extra income public consultations bring into their labs. Lady Daith just wants the priority on new materials. She’s from a well respected noble house, so her lab is self funded.”

Cass hummed to herself in thought. She needed this appointment. Was there something from her adventures so far she could trade for an audience? “Any chance she’d be interested in the stuff we picked up in the Catacombs?”

Pellen shook her head. “The market will be flooded with that kind of thing. Even if she wanted it, she could buy up as much as she needed. It wouldn’t be enough to tempt her to see you on her vacation.”

Right. Every successful diver would have brought back arm loads of monster drops. “Not even the magic crystals?”

Pellen shook her head.

Did Cass have anything from Uvana? Most of the herbs were gone, and she doubted that would be interesting to a noblewoman mage, anyway.

The receptionist coughed pointedly.

Right. They were loitering in the man’s work space.

“Excuse us,” Cass said as she turned back to him and the pile of books she’d left on his counter.

The books.

These were Pellen’s, even if the little mage was refusing them right this moment, but Cass had collected her share of books too.

“You don’t need these because you aren’t doing research?” Cass confirmed.

Pellen nodded.

“And your professor, she is?” Cass asked.

Pellen nodded again.

“Would she be interested in books from another age?”

Ch. 5: Tired but Determined

Cass leaned back in her chair, closing her eyes, as Alyx continued speaking with the smiths. The swordswoman explained the other equipment she wanted for herself, Marco, and Kelstor, the smiths jotting the details down and sketching ideas across their papers.

But it wasn’t dark behind Cass’s eyelids. Lights floated around her, beacons in the dark.

Souls.

She inhaled sharply, but it was useless to pretend she couldn’t see them. Useless to pretend that wasn’t what they were.

Alyx’s burned brightest in the amber of her aura, hot and fierce, coiled in a perfect orb in her chest. A tether ran from the swordswoman’s soul across the room to the yard, where Kelstor lay, to Kelstor’s soul. His was far smaller than Alyx’s but burned no dimmer. It was a dark maroon, like wine in a dark cask. Across the tether, pulses of light drifted back and forth, from one soul to the other. They were slow, gentle things. Like casual touches of long time partners. Thoughtless but caring.

The smiths’ souls were far dimmer than Alyx’s. They glowed softly, one cream the other pale green. Periodically, one would pulse, and the other would pulse a moment later. Almost like lighthouses signaling one another silently through the dark.

Marco leaned against the smith’s worktable, his soul a pale red, shining with a steady light. Telis hung behind, her soul a dim white that seemed to slip behind his.

And then there was Salos in her lap.

He was a brilliant gold, the color of his eyes. A cord hung between them, far thicker than the one between Alyx and Kelstor. Light drifted over it, brilliant blue as it left her soul, gleaming gold as it left his.

Their bond.

Intangible yet more real than she could have ever believed.

And she didn’t understand why she could see them.

How common is seeing souls? Cass asked Salos. A brighter pulse of energy flickered across their bond with her question.

A bright pulse of gold came back to her with his answer. Souls are imperceptible. No one can see them.

Not a good start. No one?

No one, he repeated.

So you can’t?

I am included in ‘no one’, he said.

Cass pursed her lips. So not even demons can see souls?

A deep, unsettled grumbling rolled through his body.

Salos? Cass pressed.

Demons have a sense for them, but it still isn’t anything as sharp as ‘sight’. Like how you can smell food in the air. You know it’s nearby. He spoke about them like they were something other than himself. Cass let him.

So if I said I could see souls, that wouldn’t be a cause for concern? Cass asked.

Salos audibly sighed. What?

Well, I think they are souls, Cass hedged. Though she thought they were souls the same way she was sure the sky was blue and that the ground was down. This was ‘common sense’.

And that certainty scared her as much as anything else.

She didn’t need to explain that to him. He could feel it in her words. He could feel it across their bond.

Why does this happen to you? he muttered. When did it start?

When I saw Kohen in the underground cathedral tearing into the paladin captain’s soul.

Salos shook his head. That should not have been a trigger.

There were already a lot of soul bits in the air, Cass said.

Sure, but that should not have made a difference.

Well, what’s your theory then? Cass poked him.

He shifted away in her lap. I wish I had a better answer. Maybe your Mana Sense? Souls aren’t entirely dissimilar from mana.

Cass shook her head. That had been her first thought, too. But just like she could close her eyes, she could toggle Mana Sense off. And the lights didn’t disappear with it.

Your perception isn’t special, he muttered to himself. His tail thrashed.

But you don’t see them? Cass confirmed.

No. Not really. I have a feel for them. I can tell there is something soul-ish between Alyx and the dragon. I can imagine how the dragons could tell we were connected. But that’s it.

Maybe it’s a slyphid thing? Cass suggested.

I’ve never heard of slyphids having a special relationship with souls, Salos said.

We could check? Cass said.

Sure, go ahead.

Cass activated Shifting Minds. Space twisted around her as she went from sitting in the chair to lying curled in a lap as she and Salos swapped bodies.

She could still see the souls of their companions and Salos’s soul in her body.

I don’t see anything. Salos squinted around the yard. It isn’t your body.

Cass shifted them back, settling again into her chair. What is it then?

Something about you. Salos shrugged. Maybe your soul itself?

That wasn’t an answer. But they could speculate about the reasons for hours and come no closer to a conclusion. It could be any of those reasons. Salos could be wrong and some demons could see souls, just not him.

But they wouldn’t know without asking someone who knew more about souls. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to admit to strangers she had these kinds of questions.

She sighed. More powers she hadn’t asked for.

She reached out to the cord between them. It passed through her fingers, entirely intangible. Was it real or just a visual metaphor of their connection? Just the only way her human mind could understand the sensory information?

Could they cut it and separate themselves from one another, or would that kill Salos?

Out the corner of one eye, she could see another soul a great distance off. She grimaced. It wasn’t particularly bright—if anything, it was the opposite, strangely weak—but it pulled at her attention all the same.

She knew exactly whose it was. She had no business knowing. The color was muddy and indistinct, more purple than anything, but still a far cry from purple.

Kohen.

There was no cord between them, at least. But it flickered in tune with hers. Reshaped to her Will.

Have you decided what to do about your new servant? Salos asked.

Cass scowled. What can I do about him?

She’d fixed him. Even the demon god had been impressed with what she’d done. She’d smoothed out his edges. He wouldn’t attack anyone for demonic reasons. He was well enough.

He wasn’t her problem.

Say what you will about his manners, he is powerful, Salos said. And anyone with eyes can see he has no future here, even if he keeps a lid on his demon-adjacent state. He would be more valuable to you as a battle-thrall than a pawn here.

I’m not making him either of those things. Her disgust rose.

But she had power over him. Her Commands were a compulsion he couldn’t refuse.

He deserved it, a corner of her mind whispered. He was a trashy noble who exploited those under him with his Authority, both ‘natural’ and magical. There was nothing wrong with forcing him onto the receiving end once in a while.

Her stomach twisted, uncomfortable with the thought.

You aren’t seriously planning on letting him loose, are you? He knows too much.

Cass rubbed her forehead. What does he really know, Salos?

He knows about me.

So does Alyx.

He stiffened. Since when?

Cass bit her lip. She deserved to know. She’s our companion. Your hunger for parts of your soul has dragged her into too many dangerous situations to leave her in the dark.

Something dark and uncomfortable oozed over their bond. His soul pulled away, dragging his feelings apart from hers.

Was this before or after she came to rescue you from the temple? he asked.

Cass hesitated. He wasn’t stupid. He’d figure everything out if she told him the truth. He would realize why she was by herself after revealing that kind of information to Alyx.

But, just as she couldn’t bring herself to lie to Alyx, she couldn’t lie here. Before.

Something spiked across their bond, sharp and cold, and gone again just as quickly. And she came to rescue you, anyway? He shook his head. This and that are different. She is an ally devoted to your cause. He is conquered property.

People aren’t property. Cass glared at him, the ice in her soul leaking into the words.

He shuddered back, withdrawing further. Whatever you want to call him, you acknowledge he has no reason to hold loyalty to you?

Cass grumbled, but she couldn’t argue that. They hadn’t gotten along before this mess and he’d been anything but understanding the other night.

For entirely valid reasons.

Cass pushed on anyway. Whatever he thinks about me, he has no reason to tell anyone about me or you. He’s not stupid. Probably.

Anything he could tell anyone about her would only raise questions about himself. And as bad as all that would be for her, it would be just as bad, if not worse, for him.

You expect too much out of him, Salos said. Never underestimate the stupidity of others.

Cass rolled her eyes. We’re leaving, Salos. We aren’t coming back. What can he possibly do to us?

Salos grumbled. Our forces would be stronger if you brought him along.

Would they? Cass asked. Or would you spend the entire trip telling me to kill him because we can’t trust to take our eyes off him?

If you understand then—

I’m not killing him, Salos. Stop suggesting it.

Salos huffed and readjusted himself in her lap.

She would just ignore Kohen. That was the only thing she could do.

When she left the city, she wouldn’t be around to Command him anymore. It wouldn’t matter that she had this power. Their lives would continue unchanged. She didn’t need to make more complicated decisions about him.

He wasn’t her problem.

She pushed her thoughts of Kohen aside. Worrying about it wasn’t helping.

She was tired. The forge was warm. The open air of the yard, clean and fresh. The glow of love the craftsmen felt for Alyx and Kelstor was real and revitalizing. She would have given anything to sit here and celebrate the end of the Festival with them.

She would have given anything to relax the next several days in their company with no worries about what came next.

Unfortunately, this stolen moment while Alyx arranged for their equipment was all Cass was likely to get.

Alyx was banished, and even if she wasn’t, Cass had pressing business. Every moment she waited was another Robin could be in danger. That Kaye could be lost. That the other waited alone on Earth in the depths of depression assuming they were dead.

They had to go. The sooner the better.

That her Health was once again in the trash was irrelevant. That she had only just survived kidnapping and sacrifice was irrelevant. That the pile of things she didn’t want to think about teetered at the edge of her mind, taller than ever, was irrelevant.

It was time to get out of Velillia. It was time to find her sibling.

The duchess hadn’t had an answer. But there were still other avenues. She still had a meeting with an Academy professor. They’d know something about interrealm travel.

Cass would find her siblings. They would go home together. They had to.

Ch. 4: Commission

Tabith started sketching designs on the paper before her.

Cass couldn’t read any of the words the smith added to the margins of her plans, but she imagined it was notes on sizing or material.

“So, a new staff?” the smith asked.

Cass nodded.

“You sure? If you are going to change your mind, this is the moment. And, since I’m making you something new from the scavenged pieces, it could be anything.”

Cass hesitated. She hadn’t even considered there were other options.

You should pick what you are comfortable with, Salos said.

Her eyes lingered on the broken staff amid the other materials at the end of the table. Calling herself ‘comfortable’ with fighting with it was generous. It was what she knew. But she’d rather not need to use it at all.

That was a useless sentiment. This world had more than proved she had to fight if she wanted to survive.

But if you have any thoughts of changing your weapon of choice, now at the Gate is probably the last time you’d want to consider it, Salos continued. Much of your skills and Concepts can still change and evolve, but it’s hard to build a second weapon mastery unless you have a particular affinity for such skills.

She hadn’t exactly chosen to fight with a staff. It had just happened. Would she have picked something else if all the options had been equal?

You have a bonus to Staff Mastery’s growth, so abandoning it is something you should consider carefully, Salos said. But it is worth thinking about the fact that if you used a ritual blade instead, I could use my blade skills more easily when we swap.

A few ritual blades hung from the workshop’s walls. They were mostly short blades, only a little longer than the Erizen’s Blade Salos had gotten from one of the trials in Uvana.

There was an appeal in a sword. Heroes carried swords. Swords were cool. Her skills should work just as well with a blade as they did with her staff. She probably wouldn’t have to worry as much about a sword snapping on her as she did her wooden staff.

But Cass didn’t know how to use a sword. She could learn. There was no shortage of teachers. Salos, Alyx, and Marco would all be more than happy to show her.

But taking the time to learn would detract from the time she had to do things she actually wanted to do. Not that she should waste time on things that wouldn’t bring her closer to Kaye or Robin.

“I’m sure,” Cass said finally.

Approval and disappointment twisted across their bond. That is probably the right call.

Tabith started sketching some profiles of staffs, some of which had intricate heads.

“She can make it a glaive,” Alyx chimed in.

“Oh, right. You’re a spellsword,” Tabith said.

Right. That was probably an important detail for the smith making her new weapon to know. Her stomach twisted. Was there anything else she was forgetting to tell her?

“You’re bashing this around a bunch, then?” Tabith asked.

Cass nodded. “Usually, the summoned blade more than the staff itself.”

Tabith crossed out a few of her designs and started again, these all significantly less ornate. She tapped the Stormcaller’s stone. “Storm spells, I take it?”

“Skills, not spells,” Alyx interjected before Cass could answer.

Cass bit her lip. Right. Those were different. Same effect as far as she could tell, but different execution. But the execution probably mattered here.

“Oh. Sorceress then, not a wizard. Interesting. Then the staff-to-glaive spell is a skill, too?”

Cass nodded.

The sketching intensified. “Okay, big question now: What do you want this staff to do for you? Increase your oomph, your cast time, your control, or your capacity?”

Cass hesitated. Alyx looked at her expectantly. The smith tapped her paper, her enthusiasm billowing in her wide eyes.

Most combatants at the Gate probably knew what they wanted out of their equipment already, while she’d barely accepted that was her role.

Salos? Cass asked.

It’s your staff and your fighting style, he said.

But you must have some insight, right? This was going to be her weapon for the foreseeable future. She couldn’t afford to get this wrong.

This isn’t that different from choosing new skills or trial rewards, he said. Consider your victory conditions and your weaknesses and go from there.

Most of her victories had come from reframing what winning meant. Running and escaping with her life before impossible odds. Holding a superior opponent back while allies escaped. Throwing enemies against one another. Arranging for reinforcements to save her at critical moments.

Was that the only way she could win?

She wouldn’t have won a straightforward fight against any of her previous opponents, she knew that much. She couldn’t imagine beating the paladin captain one-on-one, no matter what kind of equipment she had.

An unconventional victory was the only way she could come out on top against that kind of opponent.

What would help her more with that?

“I think capacity is my priority,” she said. More Focus meant more uses of her skills. More chances to experiment. More time to find a way out of an otherwise impossible fight.

Too many of her recent fights had ended with her burning her Health to supply her skills with more Focus. It was a useful backup, but she was still feeling the consequences days later.

“You sure?” Tabith asked, her hand suddenly still. Waiting.

Was she? She already had a stupid amount of Focus, according to Salos. Maybe she’d get more out of her already deep Focus pool by augmenting the power of the skills she could already throw.

It’s a reasonable choice, Salos assured her. But none of them—except perhaps cast time—are poor choices.

“I was sure you’d pick oomphm,” Alyx said.

But is it the best choice? Cass asked him. Was she underestimating how much equipment could increase the power of her skills?

It isn’t a choice that will kill you, he said.

Salos! That was not a reassuring answer.

He snorted, hopping into her lap. Doubling down on your Focus advantages is a strategy. A good one, too, he continued. He was warm. Her hand drifted along his fur. And that’s all you can do.

Tabith scrawled something on her paper. “Only a small subset of mages focus on oomph.”

“Why are we calling it that?” Cass asked, trying not to cringe visibly.

Alyx shrugged. “She said it first.”

“It’s fun?” Tabith cocked her head to one side. More seriously, she said, “Spellswords often choose to maximize the power of their spells. Often, they are weaving in other martial skills with their magic, so they don’t need the same amount of Focus as a dedicated wizard. Also, they are usually trying to make up for more widely spread stats.”

But neither of those concerns apply to you, Salos said. Despite fighting at melee, you do so exclusively with Focus-based skills. Honestly, calling you a spellsword is somewhat misleading. Not wrong, but hardly representative of the standard either.

“But most of my pure mage clients eventually settle on more spell capacity. Unless you can reliably take out an opponent in a few spells, being able to cast more spells—or skills in your case—is generally more useful from what I’ve heard.”

It sounded like there was a lot of variety possible in the kind of combatant one could be. And she’d barely scratched the surface of what was possible.

Tabith began sketching again, outlining another set of elegant staff profiles on the paper. How did each of those differ? What was the significance of the angle of the wood or the shape and position of the crystal? How did her powers affect which of these the smith would make?

She wished she had time to learn. But Tabith was already moving on to the next question.

“Now, there are broadly two methods for increasing capacity.” Tabith raised two fingers. She dropped the first as she said, “One, you could add a mana reservoir to the staff. Doesn’t have to be on the staff, technically. But it’s better if it’s closely attached to the magic focus.

“The reservoir can be filled ahead of time, converting Focus to mana. Then, when you want to use it later, you draw on the stored mana to complete your skill or spell later. This is a popular choice because the reservoir can be as deep as you can afford to make it. I once installed a magic crystal that could hold a thousand points of mana for a client. Boy, was that a gaudy staff.”

In other words, they could stick a battery on it. Pellen had at least one of those somewhere. “Do we have anything here that we could use as a reservoir?”

“Silly question,” the smith said. She pointed at the pink crystals across the table. “Those are unprocessed mana crystals. This is the primary use of them.”

Oh. Cass tried not to look away in embarrassment. Pellen had said something about that before, hadn’t she? Asking questions was how she got answers. There was nothing wrong or unexpected with her not knowing. “These aren’t the weird ones we found in the backroom, right?”

Pellen or Salos had said something about the ones they found in the room with the Crystal Keeper were tainted with Concepts or something.

“I collected some from the sixth-floor mine on the way back out,” Marco said. “Those are perfectly ordinary.”

“Weird ones?” Tabith asked, her eyes widening.

Alyx waved her off. “I’ll tell you about it later. How much do you think you can store in those?”

Tabith picked up the larger of the pieces. It was about the size of her fist. “Mmm. Hard to say without shaping it, but it’s a good size. Probably about 50?”

“50?” Cass had 630 Focus. Fifty wasn’t even ten percent of that. That was one Wind Step. Half a Confounding Mists.

“I’d assume that’s a 25% to 30% increase in your Focus reserves?” Tabith guessed.

Cass shook her head. It was a drop in the bucket.

“Less?” Tabith stared at Cass. “You don’t look like a Resolve specialist.”

“Do Resolve specialists have a particular look?” Cass asked.

“They don’t.” Alyx rolled her eyes.

“They do,” Tabith insisted. “They’ve got auras that just kind of feel…” The smith waved her hands ineffably. “And yours is more.” She waved her hands differently. Neither gesture meant anything to Cass.

Cass glanced at Alyx. The swordswoman just shrugged. It was almost a relief that she wasn’t the only one lost this time.

Regardless, if that was all she could expect out of additional capacity, maybe she should give control or power another chance.

“Well, if you have that much, option two might be better for you.”

“And that is?” Cass asked.

“Skill discount!” Tabith said with jazz hands. “We can craft your staff to more efficiently structure the Focus pattern for your skills or draw ambient mana to augment your skill costs.”

“How much of a discount can we expect from that?” Cass asked.

“With these materials?” Tabith tapped her foot, humming to herself. “Using your existing staff as a base… I think I could get 20%. Maybe a little more for any storm skills, given we have that Stormcaller Stone.”

That was much better than the 7% increase the reservoir had provided and also promised to scale with her ever-increasing Focus pool.

“Luckily, you have those alke antlers. They accumulate mana like little else. I think if I powder those, we can add another layer of etchings to the existing ones, then fill all of it with a Soulsilver and Alke antler powder.” Tabith was drawing quickly, nominally speaking to Cass, but clearly more focused on the draft in front of her.

Cass watched, anticipation buzzing in her chest. The shape of the staff took form on the page, the sketched designs coalescing from a myriad of palm-sized thumbnails to a handful of full-sized designs. Each had swirling runes climbing the shaft and the Stormcaller’s Stone set in the wood’s break.

“Something like this,” Tabith said, tapping the paper.

That is promising, Salos said, peering at the page from Cass’s lap, his eyes barely clearing the table’s surface. A fitting partner for a young combatant such as yourself.

Cass traced the profile with a gentle hand, careful not to smear the charcoal lines. This was for her. The first equipment made with her in mind with her input.

Maybe she hadn’t chosen to fight. Maybe she hadn’t chosen the staff. But she couldn’t deny that these were things which were a part of her now.

And she couldn’t deny, she was excited.

“It’s perfect.”

Ch. 3: The Smith's

“We’re closed until next—Oh. It’s you,” Xri Relven said as Cass, Alyx, and company stepped into the Relven shop. It looked just like they’d left it the other day, weapons on display on the walls. A trough of ice water by the door. The tall xerenth engraver, Xri, at the counter inspecting something with a jewel loop.

Had it really only been a few days since Alyx had taken Cass here?

Alyx smirked. “Lock your door if you don’t want people wandering in.”

Xri rolled her eyes. Over her shoulder, she shouted, “Tab, Alyx is here.”

A loud bang reverberated from the back room and a bolt of white fluff shot into reception.

“Alyx!” Tabith Relven shouted, her body positively vibrating with excitement. “I heard! You won! You’re a knight now? Oh, look at you! Aris would be so proud. Her daughter, standing so tall on her own!” The smith grabbed Alyx’s hands, squeezing them tightly and looking up into Alyx’s eyes. “With a dragon and everything!”

Alyx squeezed them back. A glimmer of mischief flickered in her eyes. “You want to meet him?”

Tabith nodded vigorously. “Obviously! Let me see the little dear! I remember when our dear Kel was first bonded. Oh, the big eyes. The soft belly scales!”

Cass raised an eyebrow. Clearly, they hadn’t heard everything.

Alyx led the two craftswomen outside to the street, where Kelstor waited.

Dragon

Lvl 38

[A proud and noble beast, bonded to his knight. His soul reclaimed from the depths of madness.]

He was a huge creature, easily as tall as a giraffe, but with a much longer, heavier body. He was covered in amber scales that glistened in the afternoon sun. A mane of fluffy white hair ran down his back, curling like clouds. A pair of twisting horns adorned his head, one chipped at the tip, but both were plenty sharp all the same.

He lay in the middle of the street, his wings tucked to his sides on either side of the leather saddle he wore between his shoulder blades. A long tail curled around him, like a cat at rest.

“Kel, say hi to Tabith and Xri,” Alyx said, gesturing to the craftswomen.

He opened an eye and lifted his head. “Hello, Miss Relven, Miss Tordi.”

“That’s—” Tabith stuttered, her mouth hanging open, her eyes bulging.

Xri’s hands flew over her mouth. “No. But he’s—”

“They’re both Mrs. Relven now, actually,” Alyx said, her grin growing.

“Oh, Miss Xri confessed then?” Kelstor asked.

A laugh broke Tabith’s shock. “That’s what you’re concerned about? Boy, you’ve been dead for years, and the first thing you ask is if that dummy proposed to me?”

Kelstor cocked his head to one side. “Did she?”

Tabith laughed louder. “No. Of course not. I asked her in the end.”

Kelstor nodded slowly. “That makes more sense.”

Cass smiled, hanging back a step so as not to intrude. A flash of Robin and Kaye’s faces excitedly welcoming her home filled her vision. Soon, she promised herself. She’d find them soon.

“How is he alive?” Xri interrupted. “Was he not killed beside your lady, Tabith?”

“It’s a long story.” Alyx patted Kelstor’s side, her smile fading. “I’ll tell you later.”

“But, Aris is dead,” Tabith said. She looked up at Kelstor. “Then. You bonded with him?”

Alyx nodded.

“And in between?” Tabith whispered.

“I don’t remember much of it, miss,” Kelstor said softly.

Tabith bit her lip. “I see. I’m glad you’re alright now.”

“Glad to be back,” he agreed.

“Well.” Xri clapped. “We should move this party to the backyard before a neighbor complains we’re clogging up the street.”

The street was empty. Down the way, the sounds of Festival parties floated from some homes. Cass and company followed the craftswoman around to their yard, all the same.

Their yard was a dirt lot surrounded by a simple stick fence. A set of targets stood along one side. Training dummies stood along another. They likely let customers test out new equipment back here. But there was plenty of space for Kelstor.

Xri opened a set of large barn doors on the back side of the shop, revealing the workshop. “Come on in.”

“Are you finally here to celebrate your victory with us?” Tabith asked as they seated themselves around a table Xri and Marco had dragged into the doorway so they could include Kelstor, who didn’t fit inside.

Alyx shook her head. “Unfortunately, no, I’m here on business again.”

Tabith pouted. “But it’s the Festival! And you won! Take some time off. Relax!”

“I would,” Alyx said, her voice tired. “But my father finally worked up the courage to banish me.”

“NO!” Tabith shot to her feet.

Xri’s jaw clenched.

“Now?” Tabith paced the room. “That rotten, cowardly, shortsighted,” her insults rambled on, drifting into words that either Cass’s Jothi Comprehension was not high enough to translate or were in another language entirely. From the face Xri was making and the revulsion in the smith’s voice, it was fair to guess the profanity was considerably vile.

“Settle,” Xri admonished as the stream continued with no natural end in sight.

Tabith grumbled but shut her mouth, plopping back down at the table with a final huff.

“I take it you need new equipment before you ship out?” Xri asked.

Alyx nodded. “As quick as Tabith can make it for us.”

“How long do I have?” Tabith asked.

“Until the end of the Festival. Sorry to ask you to work on your vacation.”

“That’s a tight timeline.” Tabith shook her head. “You know all I want to do is make things. Especially for you. I’ll do my best. What did you have in mind?”

“Well, to begin with,” Alyx nodded at Cass.

“I may have broken the armor you made me,” Cass said, setting what remained of her chest plate and the rest of the set on the table. Deep rends were cut through the remaining pieces. One of the arm guards was missing entirely.

“You broke it already! This badly?” Tabith snatched the breast plate up, her fingers tracing the cuts in the metal, her eyes flicking between Cass and the cuts. “And you’re still alive?”

Cass shrugged, one hand drifting up to rub her shoulder where the paladin captain’s hand had pierced her pauldron.

The smith shook her head. “I was told you were a mage. What are you doing getting in range of swords?”

Cass hung her head. She also wanted to know why that kept happening.

“Alright, I’ll see what I can do with this. Clearly, we’ll need to reinforce it somehow. And without increasing the weight?”

“Ideally, yes,” Cass said. She was better suited to dodging attacks than deflecting or tanking them. The armor was insurance for when she was unable to dodge, but it would defeat much of its purpose if she were hit more often because of its weight or bulk.

“We have lots of materials for you to work with.” Alyx gestured at Marco, who started pulling the materials they’d collected from the catacombs and arranging them on the table.

The little smith squealed, dropping the mangled breastplate. “Oh! I love the Festival! Look at all this?” She picked up several black metal plates, holding them to the light. “Aventis Gopher plating? Dreadiron?” She picked up a length of silver wire. “Silversoul wiring?” She gasped and lifted a wolf mask from the pile. “A Soulbound Wolf head?” Cass wasn’t even sure when Marco had collected that.

Alke antlers from the exit trial and pink crystals from the catacombs joined the table, too.

“Ah, if you have all this, why couldn’t you give me more time?” Tabith held the wolf head, shifting it so the sunlight glimmered off the metal. “I could have made so much for you with all this!”

“I know, but do your best,” Alyx said.

“Of course, of course. What else do you need?”

“This,” Alyx said, setting something down on the table.

A wooden staff, shattered in the center. Her staff. Broken beyond use.

Cass’s heart pounded in her chest.

It was just a staff, Cass reminded herself. Barely even a staff. Just a stick she’d found on the ground. She hadn’t even been in this world for a day. That was how little thought she’d put into choosing it.

It was just a stick.

Tabith frowned, picking up one half. “This is pretty badly destroyed.”

That was what Cass had expected her to say. Which was fine. Because it was just a stick.

“A shame,” Tabith muttered, inspecting the broken end. “Rare to see madrone wood this well cured.”

“There is a lot of Focus resonance through it, too,” Xri said, picking up the other half. “You’ve used this well.”

“Can you fix it?” Alyx asked.

Tabith hummed in thought. ‘No’ was written all over her face.

Cass’s hands clenched around the fabric of her robes. Salos’s soul rested close to hers, warm and soft.

I’m okay, she whispered. It’s just a stick.

There is no shame in being attached to your first weapon, he said. But all such partners are replaced, eventually. You’d long since outgrown that, and you know it.

“Well?” Alyx asked.

Tabith’s hum stretched into a reluctant, “Maybe? Maybe with more time. Maybe with a proper arcane focus.”

Arcane focus? Like—

“This?” Cass drew the Stormcaller Stone from her Bag. It was the fist-sized, unpolished gem that Cass had won from the Trove in the catacombs.

Stormcaller Stone

Class: Focus (Unrefined)

[A crystal formed in the ever-rolling storm that is the Elysian Gyre. It is a manifestation of condensed potential, bristling with the energies of the storm it was formed in.]

Tabith’s eyes widened. “Oooh. Nice. Very nice. Xri, look at this!”

The engraver took the gem from Cass. She rolled it between her hands, her eyes inspecting the surface carefully. “Yes, exactly like this.”

“So you can fix it,” Alyx said.

Tabith shook her head. “Not ‘fix’ so much as remake? The damage is much too severe to fix in the ‘seamless’ sense of the word. You can’t undo a break this big.”

Some changes were irreversible, no matter what she wanted. That was a part of life. She shouldn’t go attaching greater symbolic meaning to this. It was just a stick.

“But, I can definitely use the pieces of your old staff with this focus to forge it into something new,” Tabith added quickly. She was smiling forcefully at Cass. “And isn’t that better?”

Cass wasn’t sure. But it sounded like they were going to fix it for her, one way or another. It shouldn’t matter so much, but she found she could breathe a little easier all of a sudden.

“So, let’s talk details!” Tabith pushed the materials to one side as she spread a sheet of paper over the table, a charcoal pencil in hand.

Ch. 2: Rewards

Thaycer returned, pushing a cart into the room, upon which rested three objects, all of them glowing softly in Cass’s Mana Sight.

“These each hold ties to the Custodia,” he said with another low bow to his mother.

The duchess’s eyes swept over the offerings, a pensive frown on her lips. After a moment, she nodded. “Yes, you may choose any one of these three as your reward.”

“Any of them?” Thaycer’s eyes darted to the dagger at the far end of the cart.

“Any of them,” the duchess confirmed.

Cass cast Identify over the lot, trying to figure out what the fuss was.

The first object was a worn notebook with a fountain pen slipped into a loop along the spine. The leather was a dark green and engraved with a circle inside a downward-pointed triangle.

Secretary’s Journal

Class: Notebook

[The notebook of the Arcanum Custodia’s secretary, filled with the details of their meetings and business, if only one can read it. The book itself is enchanted to never run out of paper and the pen to never run out of ink.

Holding this book provides a calming sensation and reduces headaches.]

The second was a small lantern about the size of Cass’s fist. It had nine sides and was made of twisting bronze. A crystal lay dark in place of a candle or lightbulb inside.

Wayfinder’s Lantern

Class: Artifact (Tool)

[An artifact from the Arcanum Custodia, built to light the path for the Wayfinder. The light is powered by the user’s Stamina.

While unlit, holding this lantern aids in Focus recovery.]

The last was a dagger with a dark blade and a hole in its cross guard where the hilt met the blade. It absorbed the light of the room, a deep shadow hanging around it like a shroud.

The Table’s Athame

Class: Artifact (Tool)

[A ritual blade necessary for the rituals of the First Era, and found in the ruins of an Arcanum Custodia fortress. Legend says conflict over this blade split the Custodia and ended the last Era.

Improves power and stability of ritual magics.

Calamity follows this blade.]

It was sinister for sure, and certainly storied. The thing that jumped out to Cass, though, was the last line. Up to this point, system messages always followed the same general pattern: they started with ‘flavor text’—a fanciful description of the item or skill, maybe including a history or a physical description—then it would list the functional effects. The first two objects followed that pattern exactly. The dagger added one final line of text after its system effects.

Did that imply the description of ‘calamity’ wasn’t flavor or hearsay? Was it actually cursed?

Cass shuddered.

If it was, she understood why Thaycer wouldn’t want such an object wandering out of the Vault into just anybody’s hands.

At least she had no interest in it. A dagger—especially a cursed dagger—wasn’t going to get her home.

The other two objects, on the other hand?

“May I?” Cass gestured to the notebook.

“Please.” The duchess nodded.

Cass lifted the notebook from the cart. As Identify said, she felt a wave of serenity fall over her as she touched it. It was like a blanket had fallen over her mind. She was still aware of the things plaguing her. She hadn’t forgotten the urgency of finding Kaye or Robin. Fixing Salos was no less important. Finding her way home was no less her goal. But all of it felt lighter. Like she was floating above it all. Like it was all achievable in turn.

It was simultaneously a pleasant relief and unnaturally uncomfortable.

She pushed the feeling aside and flipped it open. Inside was scrawled penmanship. Cass couldn’t read ancient Jothi, but even she had a feeling the mention of ‘if only one can read it’ had less to do with the script and more to do with the handwriting within.

Can you read this? Cass asked Salos.

She could feel him recoiling in disgust. Abyss. That’s Jeris’s handwriting. It was never good, but this is even worse than their official documents.

But can you read it? Cass pressed.

Probably. With some effort. Flip to the end.

Cass did as he asked, flipping to the last entries.

A humming floated over their connection as Salos attempted to make sense of the script.

Anything? Cass asked.

Nothing good and nothing useful, he said. Nothing I didn’t already suspect.

You want to share any more details there? Cass poked him across their bond.

No. Salos grunted. But. He grumbled. The last entry is meeting notes from a discussion about stopping a demon uprising in Elben. My mistress agreed to go handle it. But I do not remember this expedition. And I would not have let her go on her own.

I see, Cass said softly.

Taking this isn’t a bad choice. I am sure if we inspect it closely, we will eventually find something useful inside. But it will be slow. Very slow.

Cass set it back down and picked up the lantern. With it, she felt a burst of clarity, her Focus quickening. She turned it over in her hands. Little symbols were drawn along the base of each panel, and another twisting symbol, reminiscent of an eye with wings, was engraved on the bottom.

How did she light it? Did she just—

With a little effort of Will, the crystal in the lantern burst into light, glowing a soft gold.

“Oh,” Cass muttered at the light. That was neat. Was it more useful than the flashlight still in her Bag somewhere?

Probably, if only for the Focus recovery function. But would this be the critical difference between sending her home or not? That seemed unlikely.

Is that—A searing pain flashed across their bond. Salos winced. No, the name is gone. They’re a god, too? Abyss, this era is in trouble. Salos shook aside the thought. I think that belonged to one of the Custodia I knew. Much like my mistress, it appears they’re a god now.

Do you know if it does anything else? Cass asked.

They always wore it on their hip. It would flash different colors sometimes. They refused to explain what any of it meant. The only thing I had figured out was it flashed red when demons were nearby. No idea if that was their personal skill or a trick of the lantern.

Is it wise for me to take the belongings of gods? Cass turned the lantern over again.

Depends strongly on which gods and which belonging. That they haven’t tried to reclaim it in all this time suggests it’s fine. Salos added the impression of a shrug to the end of his sentence. It didn’t exactly fill her with confidence.

Maybe it was safer to give this one a pass. Focus recovery would be nice, but—

Wait! Salos snapped. Look closer at the base.

Cass squinted at the lantern’s foot again. There was a simple design engraved on it, an eye surrounded by a set of wings. Someone’s insignia, perhaps?

You don’t see it? Salos asked.

Cass honed her Perception, forcing her eyes to sweep across every inch of the brass foot. The image melted before her eyes.

Around the eye and wings, a ring of runes appeared.

Arcane Key

[A runic circle that unlocks something.]

Any idea what this unlocks? Cass asked.

I have a few. Salos said. Finding any of them might be tricky. But we were looking for the places they’d be, anyway. And if anyone in the Custodia had a method of sending you home, the Wayfinder would be in my top three bets.

So, this or the notebook, which is a better option? Cass asked. A potential method of finding a Custodia stronghold or a tool for opening Custodia secrets once they were there? They both ignored the probably cursed dagger.

If we were sure the notebook would find us the bases, it would be no contest, Salos said.

But it might not do anything for us, Cass said.

There would have been little reason for Jeris to write a description of the Scholar’s Spire’s location in meeting notes. There may be other clues, but that is all they will be.

A definite key was better than the possibility of a map, even if the key didn’t necessarily unlock what she was looking for. “I’ll take the lantern, thank you.”

The duchess raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t look twice at the dagger. Are you sure?”

Cass shrugged. “Did you expect me to take the cursed knife?” That was probably ruder than was strictly wise. “Your grace?”

The dragon behind the duchess chortled. It was a deep, unnerving sound that Cass was only half sure was laughter because an amused smile had spread over the duchess’s face, too. “Well, rumors of curses often go hand in hand with great power.”

Was she trying to convince Cass to take the cursed dagger? Cass didn’t get it. “I already have a pair of very nice knives.”

Thaycer scowled, his eyebrows scrunched in a confused knit over squinted eyes.

The duchess waved the conversation over. “Alright, alright. I understand now. Wander back this way sometime.”

Cass didn’t understand this woman at all.

She likes you, I think, Salos said, his confusion no less than hers. The powerful can be capricious. It’s wise to bow to them, but perhaps she enjoys that you don’t? Or perhaps she just enjoys how you confuse her son?

I’m not a clown for her enjoyment.

Well, good thing we don’t have to come back then.

“Of course,” Cass said aloud. “If my journey brings me back.” Not a lie exactly, but she didn’t intend to come back if she could help it. If she never saw a noble again, it would be too soon.

The City on the Edge of the World Launch and Patreon Tiers

Hello everyone! We're back! The first chapter of Stormborn Sorceress book 4: The City on the Edge of the World just dropped! Thank you all for joining me and Cass on this journey.

With the release of book 4, I decided to update my Patreon Tiers. Up to this point there was just one, unnamed tier. That tier hasn't changed so if you like it please continue to use it. But it is named now. Hooray, you are all on the First Step!

(Technically, it gives two more chapters/two more weeks worth of content than it used to because of the schedule changes I announced at the end of Book 3, but that was happening regardless of the other tier changes).

Along side this base tier there are now three 'appreciation' tiers. These tiers don't currently have any additional content, but are there to give you more options if you wanted to support me more. They are named for the level stages in Stormborn Sorceress: First Step, Gate, Ascent, and Peak.

Regardless of your level of support, thank you so much. You all mean so much to me.

Please enjoy Cass's next adventure!

Ch. 1: Audience

The Grand Duchess was no less intimidating in the private of her audience hall than she had been before her people. Her obsidian eyes looked down on Cass as if dissecting a strange puzzle. She sat on high in a throne of black glass, her dragon sprawled behind her, head resting beside the throne, dark eyes matching the duchess’s.

The woman was dressed in satin blacks, silver embroidery decorating her long coat like stars. Her hair was braided in a fountain of tight locks, silver beads shimmering from amid the braids. A large sword hung from her chair’s back.

Cass found herself wishing for her staff. It would have been a kind of comfort to hold it close, as little good as it would do her if the duchess and dragon in front of her attacked her.

Grand Duchess (lvl 63)

Matron Dragon (lvl 59)

Cass had come a long way since Uvana, but she had only just reached the Gate at level 27. She wasn’t even half this woman’s level, and not even the advantages of being a slyphid would close a gap of that size.

Be careful. Be respectful, Salos whispered from her soul well. This woman isn’t someone you can get away with talking to carelessly. She is power.

I will, Cass assured him. His tension was taut across their bond, a vibrating fear, tightly controlled yet spilling out all the same. On one hand, it was a distraction, tugging at her attention and inciting her own worry. On the other, his mere presence against her soul was a reassurance far greater than her staff would have been.

I know you think you will, he muttered.

She suppressed a quirk of a smile.

The audience hall of the Grand Duchess was no less grand than any other room in her palace. High, vaulted ceilings of stained glass hung above them. Cold marble floors sprawled around them.

“Cass Yuan, mage of origins unknown.” The duchess tapped the arm of her chair in thought. “You have done much in your brief pass through my lands.”

Cass nodded politely, unsure what she was meant to say in response.

“You cleared Uvana with my granddaughter. You won a Blessing from Alacrity and saw your lord steal another from a far stronger opponent. You survived in a den of men over nine levels greater than your own and favored by a goddess.”

There were a few corrections she could make to that statement, but she decided now wasn’t the moment.

“You saved my Kaidrach’s children,” the duchess continued. “It is not every day a ruler bows her head in thanks, but for this,” the duchess nodded to Cass.

She made no mention of the grandsons Cass had rescued at the same time. Kohen and Ahryn had been in as much danger as the dragonlings.

“This is one such instance. Thank you again. We had lost too many in these past years. And not only did you save two, you returned another to us. Thank you.”

Cass smiled faintly, suppressing the urge to humbly dismiss the praise. She could say she’d done what anyone would have, that she had done it because she’d wanted to save herself, that she’d only gotten lucky. And all those were true.

But in this world, few would have stuck around to save them. Fewer would have tried to save Kelstor.

“In thanks, I would reward you. Tell me what you desire? Skills? Stats? Traits? Weapons? Wealth? Or perhaps something more?”

The duchess’s suggestions gave Cass pause. “You can give people Traits and Stats?”

The duchess smirked. “Directly? With the wave of my hand? No. But, there are a few that I can show you how to earn or direct you to a trial ground with the means of collecting them yourself. Is that what you want?”

Cass shook her head. She had very specific goals, and amassing more power was not one of them.

Rather, the question was which to ask about and how much context she should provide?

She had three goals in this world:

1. Find a way home.

2. Find her sibling who had also been kidnapped.

3. Fix Salos. Or, at least, find a stable way of separating him from her.

Of these, Cass was reasonably sure she could manage the second without a special favor from the duchess. With what she’d pieced together from her interactions with the gods and their followers, Cass could narrow down her search on her own.

Between options one and three, three was actually more pressing. Until she found her sibling, going home was off the table. And, until she fixed Salos, going home was ill-advised. She didn’t know what would happen to him if she went home while his necklace was still on her body.

But asking for help fixing Salos required significant context. Context like, ‘Salos is my demon partner, bonded to my soul’. And that information was unlikely to go over well with the duchess. Alyx had just spent the last week convinced that killing Salos before the duchess discovered him and killed them all about it was the right call.

Volunteering this information was a bad idea.

Which left option one.

“I am looking for information on interrealm travel,” Cass said. “Erm, your duchess-ness?”

‘Your grace,’ not ‘your duchess-ness,’ Salos corrected.

Oh. Oops?

Salos sighed.

“Interrealm travel?” the duchess repeated, an eyebrow lifting. “What would you want with that?”

Should she explain? It wasn’t a secret. It was just usually no one else’s business. “I’m not from here. Like, not from this world.”

The duchess’s eyebrows rose again. “You are a Traveler?”

Cass shrugged. “Maybe? Am I still a Traveler if I was kidnapped?”

“An unwilling Traveler,” the duchess muttered. “Then you search for a way home?”

Cass nodded.

“Interesting,” the duchess hummed to herself. “This was not the boon I expected to grant.”

“Then you have a way of granting it?” Cass latched onto the possibility.

“If it is possible, it is possible for me,” the duchess boasted. “The question is if it is at all possible.”

“And is it?”

The duchess drummed her fingers over her throne’s arm in thought.

Cass shifted her weight from foot to foot. Could this really be this easy?

“Summon Thaycer,” the duchess shouted over her audience hall. The air rippled. There was a feeling of movement, displaced and unattached to any particular object.

Cass shivered. Had someone else been listening? Definitely a good thing she hadn’t brought up Salos’s condition then. This was just a reminder there was always someone with more skills than she possessed.

“As Warden, he should know if our Vaults have anything that might help you,” the duchess explained.

“Should I come back after—”

“He will be here soon,” the duchess interrupted. “No reason for us not to finish your business today. I dislike letting owed favors linger.”

He was going to drop everything to come at his mother’s call? That was the power of the duchess.

Cass stared at the floor as they waited, a tentative hope rising in her chest. Maybe the duchess would have some rare artifact in their Vault which Cass could use to return home? Maybe there would be an ancient spell collecting dust for this purpose. Maybe this first task would be simple, and she could focus on finding Robin or Kaye.

In a matter of minutes, the audience hall’s doors swung open and Thaycer Delim Veldor strode in, his head held high, his dark eyes stormy.

“I greet her grace,” he said with a low bow as he stepped past Cass.

“Yes, yes,” the duchess said. “Interrealm travel. Can it be done? Do we have anything in the Vault to facilitate it?”

He flinched as he straightened. “Interrealm travel? As in the legends?”

The duchess shot him an impatient glare.

He coughed and shut his eyes. Something pulsed off him. Faint and indistinct. Not mana exactly. Mana Sense didn’t even stir. “No. The Vault contains nothing with such a power.”

Cass’s heart dropped. This was a dead end? After everything?

Some part of her had known it was a long shot. Travelers were the stuff of legends and distant ages. Salos had warned her.

The duchess tapped the arm of her chair, displeasure filling the wrinkles between her brows. “Perhaps it is time to expand our Vault stores again.”

Thaycer opened his eyes, and the something pulsing off him stopped. “I look forward to our next campaign, your grace.”

The duchess snorted. “Eager to send your boy out in your name already? Or will you stand and fight on the front with your siblings this time?”

Thaycer didn’t quite flinch, but something inside him flickered.

His soul.

Cass closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The strange soul sight had neither left her nor coalesced into a proper skill. But she had no doubts that was what she was seeing.

Even with her eyes closed, she could ‘see’ Thaycer’s soul beside her quivering under the immense pressure of the duchess and her dragon. His was a slick grey, seated just above his heart and little bigger than her thumb.

The duchess’s loomed before them, radiating power like a Tesla coil, the core a pitch black and as smooth as polished onyx. A thick tether ran from it to her dragon’s identical soul. Power didn’t so much pulse between the two; instead, it was filled to bursting.

“Enough,” the duchess said, ending whatever sidebar they had continued down while Cass had gotten absorbed in staring at their souls. “We don’t have a means of interrealm traversal.”

“That is correct, your grace,” Thaycer said.

“Well, you heard him,” the duchess said to Cass. “I find myself humbled again. Yours is a reward I cannot grant. But my debt to you remains. Choose another boon. What can I offer you instead?”

Cass took a deep breath and considered the question. If the duchess couldn’t get her home, who could?

“The Custodia,” Cass muttered. That was her next best lead on both finding a way home and fixing Salos. “Was there anything in the Vault about the Arcanum Custodia?”

“The legendary world leaders of the last age?” The duchess shot Thaycer a look.

He closed his eyes again and, again, something pulsed off him. A moment later, he nodded. “Yes. I think so.”

“Well, go get them,” the duchess snapped.

He bowed deeply and power walked out of the room.

As the door closed behind him, the duchess said, “In truth, I would rather poach you than send you away.”

Cass’s eyes widened. What? Poach her? As in, “You want me? Why?”

Cass’s mouth snapped shut. She looked away. A woman like the duchess was unlikely to appreciate the disrespect in the questions.

The duchess snorted. “I have been known to collect combatants that catch my interest. Your lady’s mother, for example, was a knight who I picked up on my travels because she possessed promise. She took up my sword skills like a bird to the open skies.”

Again, Cass restrained herself from correcting the duchess. She seemed to be under the mistaken impression that Cass had sworn some sort of allegiance to Alyx. That they were just friends and traveling companions did not seem to have occurred to the woman.

“She was an excellent knight in my service up until the end,” the duchess continued. “And, though she bore the blame for losing a generation of dragons, her talent with the blade was unmatched. I see the potential of promise in you.”

“Thank you, that is heartening to hear.” Kind of. It was also a little macabre for her ‘promise’ to be compared to a woman the duchy had reviled as a failure for years. “But I really am only a combatant out of necessity. I don’t think you should—”

“Necessity is the forge,” the duchess interrupted. “And you are good steel.”

Cass restrained herself from grimacing. She had no interest in being forged into a better weapon.

“You are young yet,” the duchess continued. “And are growing at a pace which few match with little sign of slowing. Your ability to handle opponents far above your level is not to be ignored. I have heard of some of your exploits, and your willingness to seize victory through unconventional objectives is admirable. Enviable, perhaps.

“I imagine you will be pushing the mid-30s in the next few years. Perhaps you’ll even hit 45 in the next nine. It would be all but guaranteed if you joined me.”

What had the duchess heard?

But more to the point, “I intend to go home.”

The duchess waved her hand. “So you say. But consider this offer as well. You, Cass Yuan Veldor, First Mage of my court. Hm? A promising future, no?”

Cass blinked. “First Mage?”

“Not right away, of course,” the duchess continued. “You are far too young for the title. Your rivals would devour you alive if I named you such right away. But I could support you through the Academy. You could claim those levels I know you capable of taking. In nine years, you might be one of the most powerful people in Vaisom. Why wouldn’t I want such a person to bear the name of my house? Why would I withhold a title rightfully earned?”

Cass shook her head. “I’m not interested in marrying into your family. I’m sorry.” There were probably other options, but she certainly wasn’t about to marry Kohen, and Ahryn was far too young.

“Marriage? Oh. You come from such a culture.” The duchess shook her head. “No. I was suggesting I adopt you. It’s been a while since I’ve adopted a Veldor.”

Cass’s eyes widened again. “Why?”

“My children, and by extension their children, have grown complacent,” the duchess said. “Competition is the only way to hone one’s strength. Otherwise, it languishes.” There was something almost bitter in her voice.

The dragon nudged the woman’s shoulder. She reached up to stroke the dragon’s cheek.

That was how the duchess saw family? As honing blades for one another?

“Are you worried you will stagnate if you stay?” the duchess asked. Cass wasn’t, but the duchess continued as if that was the hesitation. “I could promise you missions to areas well suited to your current power. Missions that will push you to your limits and accelerate your growth.”

Cass shook her head. “I’m just trying to go home.”

“What opportunities does your place of origin have that I cannot meet or beat for you?” the duchess asked.

“That isn’t—”

The duchess clicked her tongue. “What if I reversed Alyx’s banishment?”

Cass stiffened. “What?”

The duchess rolled her eyes. “You think my idiot son’s power is greater than mine?”

“Then you could reverse it now?”

“I could.”

Cass stared at her expectantly.

“Not now.” The duchess waved the idea away. “If the girl had asked me to as her boon, I would have done it in a heartbeat. She didn’t.

“But she’ll be back eventually, banishment or no banishment. Her Kelstor won’t want to leave forever. She’ll find some achievement I can’t ignore. Much like this incident with the dragonlings. She knows what it would take to return. When she’s ready, she’ll be back.”

Cass frowned. The duchess was so flippant about it. As far as she was concerned, Alyx could only return triumphantly or die in shame. Convenient if she lived, unimportant if she didn’t.

“But if you wanted to stay, if you wanted to join me, I could expedite that for her,” the duchess continued.

All Cass needed to do was say yes and their futures as powerhouses of Velillia would be assured. Cass and Alyx could both be favored by the duchess. Alyx could become a notable dragon knight. Cass, a powerful mage.

If nothing else, it was what Alyx wanted, wasn’t it?

Did Cass owe it to Alyx to accept this deal?

It’s not a bad plan, Salos said. It’s a dangerous world to survive in without backing. But there was a hesitance to his words. If you stayed, you would have a lot of cards to play.

He was approaching something he knew she wouldn’t like.

Savior of the dragonlings. Friend of two of the duchess’s grandchildren, grandchildren who are dragon knights themselves. His soul pulled away. Here it came. Master of Kohen.

There it was. He isn’t a card to use.

He is, though, Salos whispered. He’s yours. Pretending he isn’t is a waste.

None of this bothers you? Cass’s disgust crept into her voice. She doesn’t have to make this conditional, much less on me.

It’s the powerful playing their cards, Salos said. It isn’t about Alyx.

Cass’s teeth ground together. That was the problem. But she couldn’t just shout that at the duchess, even if the heat in her chest demanded it.

“No,” Cass said. The word was sharper than she’d meant. A manifestation of her rising frustration. She inhaled, forcing her voice to soften. “Thank you. But no.”

The duchess’s eyes narrowed.

Cass got the distinct feeling the duchess was looking at something deeper than her face. Like she had access to the leanings of her thoughts. A skill for reading people, perhaps? Or maybe it was just the experience of decades? Maybe a little of both.

Cass met that gaze as if daring her to dig into the less-than-polite thoughts running under the surface. Maybe that was impertinent. From the tension coiling in Salos’s soul, it probably was.

“I see. Interesting.” The duchess smirked. “If you’re sure. Who am I to pressure young talent already so sure of their path?”

Salos shivered. Must you challenge all of them?

I was very respectful, Cass protested.

Which part of that staring match was respectful?

What else was I supposed to do?

Sometimes it’s wiser to bow your head to power.

Within reason, Cass agreed grudgingly.

Behind the Character: Kohen and Ahryn

I’d like to talk about Kohen and Ahryn today.

I went back and forth on whether Alyx should have one or two brothers. I had initially penciled in two more because the ‘female lead’ with two bratty brothers is a little bit of a trope in the noble fantasy romance stories I read. To be clear, Alyx is not a ‘female lead’ in that way, but if you are familiar with that kind of ‘oh no, my father/family hates me, how will I escape this house with my life?’ settings in trashy romance manhwa, you might see some surface parallels in initial setting.

I initially had little stake in there being two of them, but it promised to make the dynamics of their family a little more interesting, so I left it.

As I progressed with book 2, I went back and forth on whether to cut Ahryn. There is a general principle in writing not to have extraneous named characters. It’s better to not make your readers need to remember more names than you need to. Also, combining similar characters into one usually means that you can have fewer more fleshed out characters. I’m not very good at following this principle. But, as it stood, I didn’t have a strong reason to keep Ahryn.

And then I accidentally wrote book 3.

Let me explain. The end of book 2 did not come to me easily. I wanted to wrap up the Dragon Festival and all that, but no matter how I tried, the ceremony around binding with the dragons felt anticlimactic. So, in a deadline fueled fit of mania, I wrote this extended mini arc about Cass getting kidnapped and Alyx coming to rescue her at the expense of her chances to get a dragon. It was rushed and messy and full of plot holes, but I liked the direction and that (after a lot of rewriting) became book 3.

But book 3 made Ahryn necessary. For one, he became critical not to Alyx, but to Kohen. Kohen as a character only makes sense with the existence of Ahryn. Sure, without Ahryn, he would still be a classic ‘Arrogant Young Master’ (this was the start and end of his character when we first meet him in the family guest room). But to see the way he’s struggling for affection or even attention from his family when his mother’s entire focus is on taking care of the sickly Ahryn and his father is so indifferent and demanding paints a picture as to how he ended up the way he did.

Ahryn also became critical to exploring the world and themes of Stormborn Sorceress. A lot of progression fantasy uncritically watches characters amass power for the sake of power. There isn’t anything wrong with that in escapist fiction. I don’t point that out as a critique of the genre. It can be a lot of fun.

But exploring why people might chase power, what they might lose as they do, what a society that values that above all else looks like, that could be fun too. Ahryn is an example of someone who has little self-worth because the society he lives in has told him he will never have the ability to accumulate the thing that matters: power. And, in bonding with Emenes, something he is only able to do because he was weak but tried anyway, he gets that power anyway.

My plans for Kohen didn’t survive the end of book 3 the way I had intended. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say he survived book 3, despite my intentions.

In my initial plans, Kohen was going to die. Cass was going to kill him. It was going to go over about as well as you imagine.

But then I started writing Kohen POV chapters, and I said, wait, hold on, writing this brat is kind of fun. He was so arrogant, but also so soft yet prickly to his brother. And then I got to the part where Cass needed to kill him. And I’m as soft as Cass. I couldn’t do it.

I am only mostly joking about that. There were a lot of reasons I decided killing him there wasn’t what I wanted to do. For one, I legitimately had a hard time arranging the situation such that killing him would be in character for Cass. If I was going to have her kill him, I wanted her to decide consciously and intentionally to do it. Doing it accidentally or even in the heat of the moment wasn’t going to work with the angst I wanted the fallout of killing him to be.

This is something I would have eventually figured out if I was committed to this plan. And, even if I ended up having her kill him with less intentionality, that was something I could have worked with.

But, as I was working on this, I realized that Cass handling the emotional fallout of killing Kohen was not the most interesting thing I could do with his character. This man, whose soul has been compromised in this way, was more interesting to me alive than dead. The parallels I could use him to draw with at least one other character were too tempting to let him fall here.

So I inflicted a fate possibly worse than death on him. And I don’t regret it.

Look forward to book 4 and the fallout of Kohen’s condition.

Behind the Character: Alyx

Very early in the creation of Stormborn Sorceress, I knew I wanted Cass to have companions. Side characters are almost always my favorite characters in other stories, and I knew there was only so far I could personally take a solo character before I ran out of ways to maintain the narrative, so I always intended for Cass to slowly build up a team of friends around her.

Alyx was the first of these.

In my earliest notes, she is just called the ‘dragon princess’. She was going to be a rigid and upright character, putting a lot of value on ‘honor’. This original Dragon Princess leaned heavily on tropes of knighthood and honorable nobility. This was going to contrast with a slightly more cynical—or perhaps practical—Cass. In these early sketches of the characters, Cass was supposed to be more of a reluctant hero, who talks herself into heroics for ‘practical’ reasons. Central to that idea of Cass was a mindset of not particularly caring about promises or lying if it serves her goals and saves people. In contrast, Alyx was much more concerned about upholding her word and maintaining honor.

Obviously, these are not the characters I ended up with. Cass, in that first draft, became increasingly idealistic, especially from her continued interactions with Salos. I embraced that so she could contrast much more strongly against the larger world of the Fractured Skies. But this meant that Alyx didn’t need to maintain that original honor streak either.

As I developed her backstory, I was increasingly sure that she wasn’t going to work as a ‘princess’ the way I initially envisioned, either. I wanted her to be someone on the edge of her society. She needed to be someone at odds with her family, enough that some of them could be willing to have her killed. This led to her bastard status. But, a bastard on the outs with her family had no reason to be strictly honorable. In fact, it would probably be a disadvantage.

This pushed her to be a craftier character, willing to compromise on a lot of aspects of ‘honor’ if it means her survival. She became someone who would happily provoke a fight if it would help her, ruthlessly digging at the weaknesses of her rivals if it serves her (consider any of her interactions with Kohen for an example, such as in Book 2, Chapter 29: Banquet). She became a sharper and more guarded character, someone who needs to hold strangers at a little bit of a distance.

And yet, she aspires to uphold the loftier ideals of nobility, especially those around the powerful caring for those under their power (perhaps most obviously seen in her desire to see the unnamed village taken care of after she and Cass rescued it from fire and monsters in book 2, Chapter 22: Arrival). The strongest piece of her original characterization to survive is her determination to pay back debts, something you’ve seen her cling to from the moment Cass saves her to the end of book 3. She is someone with a soft core, who cares about people and wants to see the world better than it is.

In addition to Alyx, I knew she needed some companions as well. In the earliest sketches of her character, she was supposed to have an entire team around her for her trip into Uvana. In those early plans, Cass was supposed to save Marco and perhaps other members of Alyx’s party as they escaped Uvana. However, as I was writing it, I realized the story was stronger by limiting the focus to just Salos and Alyx instead, giving them the space they needed to develop before I started adding others. This cemented the rest of Alyx’s original team as villains (making them mercenaries hired to kill her) and forced her loyal subordinates to wait for her outside Uvana.

As ‘dragon princess’, I always knew she was going to have a dragon. How exactly that was going to work has changed a number of times over the development of the story and setting. Initially, I didn’t even know if dragons were going to be people or if I was going to be just beasts. You can see where I am preparing for the possibility of them being just beasts in the item description of her crown:

Aura Crown

Class: Accessory

[A circlet crafted to broadcast the wearer’s aura in a defensive halo and projects peerless confidence to all who see it. This is an artifact from another age, knowledge of its construction has long been lost.

Increases Effective Frt by 20% in areas covered by the Aura.

Increases Effective Frt by 5% over rest of contiguous body.

Increases the effect of Aura, Leadership, and Taming-related skills.]

But, by the time I finished book 1, I had pretty much decided I wanted dragons to be sentient beings. It was just the more interesting of the options.

This led to the Festival of books 2 and 3. There is a lot I can say about the design of dragons, why I went with dragonlings over eggs, why they are cursed the way they are, but I think I’ll save that for a future behind the scenes. What is relevant is the number of dragons I decided to put in play. I knew having one dragonling available for binding was the least interesting option. The math for any savvy reader would easily calculate to a perfect victory for Alyx. By introducing two, there would at least be the question of which of her family would get the second and what that might mean for Alyx.

In truth, there was originally only going to be the two dragonlings. In the earliest sketches of books 2 and 3, Alyx and either Fioreya or Ahryn were going to win dragons. But as I was writing book 3, I was increasingly sure I wanted to highlight two mindsets: the default of this world with Velkora adhering to what her teachers told her, picking someone who is strong; and something softer and more human with Emenes choosing her friend Ahryn in order to save him. This is a choice that is echoed in Alyx’s actions. She could have won the Festival the traditional way and she would have bonded with one of the dragonlings (adhering to the wisdom of her teachers and choosing strength). But in doing so, she would have lost Cass and Kelstor (losing human connections she values far more than strength).

Deciding that Ahryn and Fioreya both got dragonlings meant I needed a third dragon for Alyx, and that could only be her mother’s dragon. Overall, though it wasn’t the plan when I started book 2, I couldn’t be happier about where we’ve ended up.

It’s funny how things change as ideas develop. This Alyx is so different from the “Dragon Princess” I started with, and yet, this Alyx wouldn’t exist if I hadn’t started there. I’m looking forward to seeing where she goes from here, especially with Kelstor now at her side.

Behind the Scenes: System Design - Stats and Concepts

Today I’d like to talk about the system of Stormborn Sorceress, its inspiration, and some of the earlier iterations.

The system is inspired by other systems of the genre, particularly the stats of Unbound by Nicoli Gonnella and Beneath the Dragoneye Moons by Selkie Myth and the Aspects of He Who Fights With Monsters by Shirtaloon. I will be talking about these three to a certain degree, not to the degree I would consider it spoilers (no plot points are mentioned), but enough that if you have a zero spoiler tolerance, you may want to skip this (one of the protagonist of HWFWM’s very early powers is mentioned as an example of that power system).

Stats are possibly the deciding factor in determining if a story is a LitRPG or not, so perhaps it is unnecessary to attribute any particular inspiration to anyone in particular here, but it was Unbound what I was reading when I started thinking about what stats would I pick if I was to design my own system.

In Unbound, there are (primarily) eight stats: five physical and three mental. It is not the first to have physical and mental stats, but it was the first one that made a point about them falling into these categories, and I liked that. But it bothered me that the divide was uneven and got me thinking about how I would organize stats into more even categories.

I had considered borrowing from Beneath the Dragoneye Moons, which also has eight stats. In that universe they come in four pairs, which balance and oppose one another, and these pairs could be divided between physical and magical. The way the magical stats are outlined in particular appealed to me, the four being something along the lines of power, control, mana, and recovery. But I also knew I wanted a defensive stat and I like symmetry. I wanted a Stamina resource alongside a Mana resource. That meant if I wanted to use such a scheme, I would need at least five stats for both the physical and mental categories. This was already becoming unwieldy.

My other issue with this arrangement was I was struggling to find interesting build variety in this kind of structure. It was too rigid, with each stat being a little too tightly related to one another, yet also having a gaping divide between physical and mental. Stats are not overly important in BtDeM, rather build definition comes from classes and the elemental system instead. The main interest in the stats of this universe is the way they oppose and simultaneously synergize with one another, for example, too much Strength cuts into your effective Dexterity, while not having enough Dexterity for your Speed can leave you running wildly out of control. It is a system that encourages a kind of balance that makes it hard to imagine what someone specializing in a given stat would look like.

It’s perfect for underpinning the much more complicated elemental and class system present in BtDeM, but wasn’t exactly what I was going for.

I wanted to have characters who specialize in one stat and are forced to compromise in other places to do so. At the same time, I wanted there to be stats that rely on each other such that you can’t just dump all your points into a single stat. It was a difficult balance, and BtDeM was a good place to start, but not where I wanted to end. I wanted a system that it would be easy to get very different fighters depending on the prioritized stats.

The Paladins of the Copper Crescent are a good example of what I wanted my system to be able to make. They are Fortitude specialist with ungodly amounts of Fortitude. Their leader, the Captain, also has quite a lot of Perception to counter the loss of pain reception that naturally comes with high Fortitude. He is an example of how one would build a traditional tank archetype under my system. His focus is first and foremost on mitigating enemy attacks. Not explored in the text, but it would have been a good idea for him to also have Endurance to maintain his defense longer or Vitality to recover faster between engagements. Alternatively, he might have prioritized Strength to more easily wear heavier armor and deal more significant damage with his sword.

The many other paladins on the other hand have poorer distribution of Perception to their Fortitude, at least against a fast and stealthy spellsword/sorceress like Cass, and she is able to exploit that imbalance to hide from them or deal damage before they can evaluate the danger. This is meant to show the difference between the Captain and his soldiers is more than just level.

I wanted a system where any stat was viable as one’s primary stat and where one’s priority in the other stats could redefine how one’s fighting style.

Iterating on these ideas, I eventually came to a grid of nine, with three rows, each representing a domain of influence, and three columns, each representing an approach to what they modify. In other words, Physical, Mental, and Body; Power, Control, Depth. Stats across a row are closely related; stats across each column are moderately related.

I had the structure in mind, and the kind of variation I wanted to be possible, I just needed to fill in the names for each slot. The physical and body rows were set pretty easily. Strength, Dexterity, Endurance are all pretty standard game stats. The only real question there was if I was going to use Dexterity or Agility. In my mind these are the same, but Dexterity leaned more into the ‘control’ direction I had in mind, so that was what I picked.

I picked out Perception fairly early on, and it slotted easily into Body-Control. That left something healing related for Body-Depth (Vitality) and something defense related for Body-Power. I remember struggling with naming Fortitude for a while. I can’t say why now, because I can think of two other names I could have given it that did not occur to me then (‘Defense’ or ‘Constitution’). I’m happy with my decision in the end, though. I think ‘Constitution’ would have overlapped more than I wanted with ‘Vitality’. And ‘Defense’, while serviceable, is a little lackluster compared to the other stat names.

Overall, the mental row is the one that gave me the most trouble and underwent to most changes from the first draft to serialization. The initial draft called them Mind (Mnd), Insight (Ins), and Will (Wll). I knew from the beginning I didn’t want any of them to be ‘Intelligence’ because I didn’t want to have to write a character who got ‘smarter’ in that way. But that left me floundering a little on what increasing these stats meant. I think this is still a weakness of this story, unfortunately.

Under this original scheme, the idea was Mind has to do with memorization and organization. High mind helped with methodical, logical thinking. Insight, which at various points I considered calling Inspiration instead, was about spontaneous connections and creativity. Will was intended to be a defensive mental stat, about resisting outside influence.

However, this is a hard thing to depict and, as I worked on the first draft, I liked it less and less. For one thing, I kept using Will in more offensive contexts. I wanted to use it actively, rather than let it act passively, so I moved it to the Mental-Power position, letting it be more about one’s ‘force of will’ than anything else. That meant I needed a new name for Mental-Depth. I fluctuated between Resistance and Resolve for a while, before settling on the second because it was more specific. It kept the intended defensive nature of its predecessor.

But these changes left Insight feeling out of place, and I still didn’t have a good way of demonstrating how Insight worked as an increasing stat. Also, I wanted the Mental row to more closely match the Physical one. This lead it to be replaced with Alacrity, a stat more about processing speed than thought process. This better matched Physical’s Dexterity and created an interesting bridge between Physical and Body. It has since become my favorite of the mental stats.

The other big influence on my system was He Who Fights With Monsters. In it, characters have four stats and four Aspects, each Aspect binding with one of the four stats. What Aspects you have determine the magic powers one unlocks. For example, the protagonist has a Dark Aspect and so gets a skill fairly early on called ‘Cloak of Night’ which, among other things, lets him wear shadows. The skill design is fairly extensive and very creative. It’s an easy system to capture the imagination.

But, I always felt that binding Aspects to the initial four stats was under utilized. I wondered what would it mean to have Dark-bound Speed? How could that be different from someone with, say, Wing-bound Speed? HWFWM is not interested in this question, and that’s fine, not every power system is going to explore every corner of its potential expression, but I knew this was something I wanted to explore in my story, leading to the creation of Stormborn Sorceress’s Concepts.

Concepts also pull on the broader ideas of Dao more common to the Cultivation subgenres of progression fantasy. This is more unconscious influence or converging evolution that intentional design as I don’t actually read much cultivation progression fantasy (though if you have favorites, leave me your recommendations, I haven’t looked particularly hard through that branch of the genre and I would like to explore it more). But the idea of one’s powers being a reflection of your beliefs and ideals makes for excellent character exploration.

I look forward to diving into the Concepts of the larger cast and on exploring how Cass’s will change in the upcoming books.

Behind the Scenes: Writing Process

Hi all, today I wanted to talk about my writing process so you have a better idea what I’m up to all the time.

Each book starts with a first draft. I’m a Discovery Writer, which means I don’t do a lot of planning when I write my first drafts. Discovery Writers are also sometimes called ‘Pantsers’ because we write by the seat of our pants (a play on the saying ‘fly by the seat of our pants’). Steven King is probably the most well-known author who writes in this way.

This doesn’t mean I have no plan with this story! With each novel I start with a general direction I know I want to push Cass and Cass’s own goals provide some structure as well. I have a general idea of what the ‘end’ looks like and several key plot points for the series that we are working towards. But we are finding out the details together.

This means that my first drafts are where I figure out in detail the problems Cass runs into and the direction her power set grows. But, there are usually problems, especially with pacing, motivation, or logistics in these first drafts, but I’ll get into that more in a minute.

During this first draft phase, I write around 10,000 words a week. At top form, when I have a particularly clear image of the scene I’m working on, I can do 1,000 words in an hour. This is primarily accomplished through writing Sprints.

Sprints are a writing practice where one sets a timer (usually 15 or 20 minutes) and then writes as much as they can in that window. The goal is not to stop writing for anything. That means no looking things up, no stopping to agonize over names, no staring at the page wondering what’s next. For me, stepping into this mindset pushes aside doubts that might otherwise slow me down. Sometimes this produces subquality work. Sometimes I discard what I wrote entirely after I finish the sprint, as I find the direction I ran in isn’t going to work. But, either is better than a blank page. Subquality writing can be edited into something usable. A wrong direction forces me to better define what exactly I’m trying to achieve with a scene.

Once I have the first draft complete, I toss my work at a writing friend of mine and I don’t look at the draft for two weeks. This break is important to get some distance from the writing. It’s hard to see what needs to be changed if you are in the same head space as when you wrote it. Ideally, I’d like to spend more like a month away, but I haven’t had the time for that under the schedule I’ve been working under up to this point. I hope I can give book 5 that kind of decompression with the new posting schedule.

When my break is complete, I start the Developmental Editing process. This starts by rereading the draft and the notes from my friend and making my own notes as I go. I don’t change the text at all in this first pass. Then, with my notes, I make an outline of the book and then make structural changes to that outline.

Thankfully, because of the more free form nature of adventure stories, I’ve never had to move too much around, though character motivation and foreshadowing are common things I need to change.

As an example, in the first draft of Book 2, Cass initially did not want to go with Alyx into the Catacombs while Alyx just assumed Cass would. There were legitimate character reasons these two would act this way (Cass hesitant to jump into more danger, Alyx assuming Cass as a combatant would jump at a chance to grow stronger) but it made for a very passive narrative with Cass being dragged through the plot against her will in an unsatisfying manner. Swapping Cass and Alyx’s opinions here (Cass wanting to help her friends, Alyx not wanting to increase her perceived debt to Cass) turned into better character building and gave Cass a much more active role in the story.

For another example, in the first draft of book 3, the high priestess isn’t mentioned until the ritual starts. When I was doing my editing, I decided it made more sense for her to have been involved earlier.

I also often do balance adjustments during this phase of editing, altering the listed levels of enemies to better match their displayed power. Usually, this means lower the level of enemies a little bit. The paladin captain, for example, was originally level 45 in the first draft, but I decided that was too high for where he was socially and for Alyx to beat the way she does, even with all the debuffs he’s under at that point.

Occasionally, characters get renamed in this phase also, usually to make them fit with existing names better, but also sometimes because the original name was stupid. Ahryn, for example, was Ahray in the first draft, which I still like written but unfortunately sounds entirely too much like the word ‘array’ out loud that I couldn’t justify keeping it.

I have allocated about a month to this process for the past books and when I don’t need to change the structure too much, this is a tight but doable timeline. Book 4 has forced me to reevaluate how long I need to give this process.

But, if all has gone well, my Developmental Edits end as my between book hiatus ends and we enter phase three together: Line Edits.

Line Edits involve checking grammar, spelling, and general flow. This is where I try to catch typos and remove any remaining awkward or unclear phrasing.

Historically, I have tried to be as far ahead of Patreon on these edits as Patreon is ahead of Royal Road. Recently, I have fallen behind and am often doing those edits the day of… This is another reason for the upcoming slower schedule; I am hoping to get (and stay) ahead again.

And that’s it! That’s how it goes from a glimmer of an idea to 120k+ word books. It sounds so straightforward when I write it out like that, doesn’t it?

In summary, while you were reading book 3, I was writing book 4. And while you begin book 4, I will be starting work on book 5.

That’s it for this week’s behind-the-scenes. I’d love to answer any questions you might have about my process, so feel free to drop them in the comments below, or if you have any other requests for behind-the-scenes content, please leave your suggestions there too.

In the meantime, it’s back to the editing mines for me!

Announcement: End of Book 3 and Future Schedule

Hello everyone!

We’ve made it to the end of book 3! Can you believe it? I can’t. Thank you so much for coming on this journey with me and for all your support along the way.

I will be taking a short hiatus here to finish preparing Book 4: City on the Edge of the World. The story will return here on Patreon on July 8th, and on Royal Road on August 5th.

With the launch of Book 4, I’ll also be shifting to a new release schedule: two chapters a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. To make up for the slower pace, Patreon subscribers will now receive eight advance chapters instead of six, putting you a month ahead of Royal Road instead of just two weeks.

During the break, I’ll also be sharing some bonus behind-the-scenes posts! These will include thoughts on my writing process, worldbuilding insights, character design notes, and more. I’m aiming to post one each week throughout the hiatus. If there’s anything specific you’d like me to cover, feel free to let me know. As long as it’s not a future plot secret, I’d love to dive into it.

These extras will be exclusive to paying Patreon members as a thank-you for your support.

Thank you again for being part of this story. Your support makes all of this possible, and I can’t wait to share the next chapter with you.