I become aware of voices speaking over me. Their tone is concerned but not urgent, so I continue slowly rising out of the blackness of unconsciousness.

  Then recent events filter into my recollection and I sit bolt upright, my eyes slamming open. I look around myself frantically, wincing as my various aches and pains make themselves known.

  Absently feeding Flesh-magic through my body, I sigh as the pain quickly fades from my back, my shoulders, my head, my hips…. Tuning more into it, I wince – I need to find some way of reinforcing my bones because slamming into a tree evidently broke or fractured eleven of them. I’m lucky that it didn’t stave in my skull, even though the bone was fractured in two places – though I remember needing to do magical brain surgery on myself before, I still had Lay-on-Hands at that point. I’m not sure Flesh-Shaping would work as well without my conscious mind directing it.

  Fortunately, it seems like the battle is done. If it wasn’t I’m sure that my companions wouldn’t be so relaxed. Well, relatively speaking – Bastet, Catch, Fenrir, Lathani, and Noir are currently hovering over me with varying degrees of anxiety emanating from them.

  “I’m fine,” I mutter, reaching out to stroke everyone but Catch in turns. “Are you all OK?” I ask, anxious in my turn.

  They rapidly reassure me that they’re fine, informing me in response to my follow-up questions that they have all had time and potions to recover from the fight. How long have I been out? I wonder.

  Feeling restless, I push myself to my feet as soon as my bones have knitted together enough to permit it, wincing again at the deep bruising that I haven’t yet healed.

  Now able to see over the top of everyone, I’m surprised to see that the clearing is looking remarkably different, enough that I almost wonder if we’ve moved while I was unconscious. But as I note the cliff off to one side and the tower off to the other, I realise that we haven’t. Instead, it must just be the effects of the battle that have utterly changed the landscape.

  There are far fewer trees, for one – a few remain standing but most have been knocked over. Tiria’s tower is in full view where it used to be hidden behind trees and wards, the ground is pockmarked with both holes and spikes, there’s what looks like the shattered remains of a wall, and most obvious of all, there’s no rift.

  What happened here?

  I must accidentally project that as Kalanthia answers.

  We did, she replies, then fixes me with a pointed look. And by we, I mean you. She continues by explaining the battle from her perspective. Realising how dangerous the steam dragon became when I turned it to ice, I feel more than a little sheepish.

  Sorry everyone, I apologise in the network, reflexively feeling for each individual Bond to make sure they are still present. My heart stops pounding quite so hard when I feel that they are, including all of those in Zlona.

  Kalanthia continues, explaining how it was actually the tattoo shields that saved several of my Bonded when the sky came falling down on their heads in the form of an ice dragon, and then the world exploded. She added that her own blast-shield and Artio’s plant vines had been part of it too – the shield deflected some of the force upwards and the vines stopped several of our companions from being thrown over the cliff. The Dragon team had been saved by Sorya raising a shield and Kalanthia isn’t entirely sure what happened to Tiria – as soon as the battle was over, the Mage hot-footed it back to her tower, evidently panicked that the explosion had done something to it or its contents.

  You were thrown against a tree, squashed against it by the alcaoris, actually.

  We were very worried for you, growls Bastet, giving me an angry look that I know is fueled by her concern. But you were healing and then the other Binder appeared.

  Nicholas was here? I ask, relieved that he heard my call and made it.

  I am here, Nicholas breaks in, his tone brisk but relief underlying it in the Bond. Look up.

  I follow his instructions and soon spot the massive griffin in the sky, followed by Calista, Lithos, and Arman. The four land and Nicholas strides over to me, his eyes searching.

  “You’re awake, good,” Nicholas tells me briskly. “Your body was already working to heal itself earlier so I thought it best not to force-feed you a potion.”

  I nod, understanding his point since learning about healing from Jermaine. I hadn’t realised that it could be dangerous to feed healing potions to healers while they’re unconscious. Healing magic that’s used to being directed by a conscious mind can end up clashing with the alternatively-directed healing magic from a potion. Jermaine is probably more at risk than me – his own magic is far more organised and strictly controlled than my own. But I can understand Nicholas not wanting to take the risk if it wasn’t a question of life and death.

  Nicholas’ Bonded are clearly concerned too. While Calista has been standoffish with me ever since I took her out of our very first fight by suffocating her, I’ve spent some good time with Arman, and Lithos, practising flying with them and Sirocco. Lithos coils around me, hissing with disapproval while Arman cards through my hair roughly with his beak. I wince and glare as he brushes against a sore spot and he croons in apology.

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  “I’m fine,” I murmur to them, knowing they will understand. Lithos glares at me as if to point out that I very nearly wasn’t and Arman pulls my hair a touch too hard again – this time, he doesn’t apologise.

  Then I shake my head sharply – the tree seems to have knocked my sense of priorities out of me.

  “Torrent – he was here,” I blurt. “Sirocco was following him. Did she tell you?”

  “She did,” Nicholas confirms.

  “And did you find him?” I ask, a little impatiently. The expression on Nicholas’ face answers my question before he does so verbally.

  “No. That was why I wasn’t here when you woke up – we flew as quickly as possible to try to find him. Sirocco reported that he had vanished from her sight so I tried to see if I could find any trace of him.” He shakes his head, annoyance creasing his brow. “He seems to have been thorough.”

  “Pity,” I sigh. “What do you mean he vanished from Sirocco’s sight? He didn’t seem to have any Stealth Skill from what I could see.”

  “Skills aren’t the only magic available to a Great Lord such as Roland,” Nicholas reminds me. “There are several options he could have used to enable his escape – and maybe he even used multiple of them. That would explain the lack of trace.”

  I sigh with frustration. A high-pitched screech to my side draws my attention in that direction.

  You let him escape! the yelna accuses, glaring at me. You held me back and then let me escape!

  Do you think you would have done any better? I ask sharply, my frustration spiking. He cut through your vines easily enough. He’d have cut through you if you’d faced him.

  The yelna screeches again, but falls silent without sending any more thoughts along the Bond.

  I look back at Nicholas, the injustice of the situation making my stomach churn.

  “We can get him on this, though, can’t we? I mean,” I gesture to where the rift was, “he was definitely doing something to the rift.”

  Nicholas hesitates and I get a sinking feeling.

  “We don’t have any indisputable evidence of wrong-doing.”

  “I saw him here!” I exclaim, my voice rising. I become aware of the members of the Dragon team – and how ironic was that – looking uncomfortable, but I don’t care. “He was here, he did something with the rift, then he attacked me and my Bonded!”

  “A powerful Water Mage was here and attacked you and your Bonded,” Nicholas corrects me. “Or did you glimpse the whole of his face?”

  “No,” I reply angrily, “but I know it was him…don’t you believe me?” My question is far more plaintive than I’m comfortable with but I can’t help feeling a little betrayed.

  “Of course I do,” Nicholas replies as if it wasn’t in question and that little niggle vanishes. “But it’s not about what I believe, but about what we can prove. You cannot say, in front of a truthteller, that you are certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that Roland Torrent was here. Thus we cannot force Great Lord Torrent to answer a judicator’s questions. The rift is gone, the beasts that emerged from it, slain. If he had been caught at the scene red-handed, that would be one thing. The little evidence he has left behind makes it far more uncertain.”

  “What about the power of the water magic he used? Surely there can’t be that many Water Mages who could create a whole damn dragon out of steam for heaven’s sake!”

  “Circumstantial.”

  “Well…what about those magical signatures you were talking about on the journey here?” I’m grasping and I know it.

  “Again, circumstantial – they would prove he was here, not what he did. Anyway, with all the magic that has been thrown around here, any magical signatures would be muddled and barely identifiable. A good orator would point that out and have the evidence dismissed.”

  I grind my teeth together, furiously thinking through what happened and what evidence of Torrent’s wrongdoing there might be.

  “Wait! I stabbed him, would that work as evidence?”

  Nicholas is cautiously hopeful.

  “If you have blood that can be indisputably identified as his, that could work. But, as we know from the last blood you brought me, there are ways of hiding blood’s origin.”

  As I check my spear, I realise that it’s not going to be possible anyway. A visit to the spike on which Torrent had been impaled tells the same tale. It’s still intact, surprisingly, but its cold and rough surface is clean, albeit a bit damp. Perhaps a Water Mage might have some control of his blood given how much of it is composed of water – that seems to be the only possible explanation for why both are clean.

  I sigh angrily, trying to look on the bright side.

  “At least we’ve dealt with the rift,” I murmur. It’s a victory, but it doesn’t feel like one. “Zlona should be safe.”

  “Indeed,” Nicholas replies warmly and then claps a hand on my shoulder. “Do not bemoan the situation overmuch, Markus. We might not have a case to bring to court, but I suspect that our friend will not escape completely unscathed.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask, sending Nicholas a sideways glance.

  “Remember that the king is the ultimate arbitrator and, where the safety of his country is concerned, he will not refuse to act just because there has been no judicator-verified confession. I have no doubt that when he reads my report with everything you saw and experienced, he will come to the same conclusions we have and act accordingly.”

  I decide to withhold judgement for now. At least I got in a punch and a couple of stabs, I sigh to myself.

  “Now,” Nicholas continues, summoning a very familiar shape from his tattoo. “Shall we return to Zlona and give them the good news?” I smile and lift my hand to scratch at Tempest’s neck as he dips his head over my shoulder, his enthusiastic greeting almost knocking me over.

  After giving Tempest his due – and Lathani, and Noir who come to receive their own scratches – I turn my head to glance at the tower.

  “I just need to go and call upon a Mage – see if she’s coming with us too.” I would say that Tiria’s innocence in terms of the rift has been decidedly proven.

  Nicholas sends me a curious look, but then nods and strides over to the Dragon team who have moved to start processing the carcasses that my companions haven’t already feasted from.

  “Of course. But don’t take too long. The sooner we get on the road, the sooner we can return to Whalehost.”

  Even as I stride quickly to Tiria’s tower, the reminder of how close our departure looms now sends a flicker of nerves through my stomach.

  here!

  here!

  here!

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