By now my teammates are in the swing of things, even Larianne is involved. Deep ruby ichor drips from her fingernails. They've gotten some experience fighting against The Blind, and they're showing a better effort this time.

  Tiviti found my side. "Confess and admit, Lady Harigold: this was your true objective, to fight more of the vile Blind, this time in the open air and sunlight where their putrid airs can be diffused, and where we may finally see what it is we slay."

  "This mission had lots of objectives," I said. "It ties in to many goals. But killing these bastards is definitely on the list. And so is training a cadre of people how to fight them."

  Larianne shot me a harsh look. "You've fought these things?" But before I could answer, she got a sudden flash of comprehension. "Oh! This is what you keep doing at night! I understand now why Elica was complaining about the stench."

  Tiviti smirked. "Far more odious in confined spaces."

  "You know her roommate thought Natalie was having an affair, for a bit."

  Tiviti's smirk broadened. "Well, maybe if she had ever taken me someplace nice."

  I had to defend myself. "You like killing monsters! This is nice!"

  "I can like different things also," she taunted me.

  Behind me, Licard and Maspers were talking. "See, when I tell you someone is a hardened adventurer-"

  "Yeah yeah."

  And then we hit another Blind patrol and surged into action. Quarl wasn't using his crossbow for this, he had a pair of long knives that he wielded blade-down, folded tight against his forearms. Thumper was not trying for deep precision strikes any more, she had found out exactly how much effort was needed to kill these creatures and she would use that much, no more and no less. Tiviti was using her sword in its bowfishing configuration to fill Quarl's support role. Larianne moved fast and confident at the forefront, getting kissing-close to the monsters before she savaged them with her glowing talons. Kimothy used his fog as a spear, blowing a hole through a monster's body with hardened vapor. Nux hung back, sulking, while Licard healed what seemed to be a dislocated shoulder. Maspers stood back and appeared to just be watching, but when the creature Kimothy had attacked used its last energy to slash towards Larianne, the knight stepped forward and swatted the flailing arm with his sword to deflect the desperate attack. Just the right amount, at just the right time.

  I waited until there was relative quiet before I spoke- only the far-off screams of villagers in terror. "All right," I said. "There's a group at the foot of the temple, and then the boss fight at the peak. Kimothy, you're still listening for my signal. Nux, you'll get your chance. Larianne, damn good work. Sir Maspers, thanks for holding us all together. Thumper, hold still, your sword is near to breaking." I mended the steel, repaired the cracks that would sunder it soon. "All right. Base of the temple, it's a big fight but it's the same thing we've already done. When we get to the top, be ready for mages and monsters and surprises."

  "What does that mean?" Sir Maspers demanded.

  "I can explain, or we can get there in time to save the hostage," I said.

  He cussed under his breath but he led the charge towards the temple, the last few streets. We formed a flying wedge behind him. I conjured steel and formed a big, long-handled double-bitted axe like you see in cartoons, and tossed it to Nux Gysmo. He lit up with joy: he had a weapon and permission.

  Thumper glanced over at me. "These barbarians.. they're just people?"

  "They're people, they can be affected by the tree's toxins," I said. "They've got their own language, traditions and culture. They have more affinity for magic and combat than the people you know, but aside that they're just as human as anyone."

  This next group was braced for us. I could see them from a distance, over two dozen of them, and they looked strong and focused, only slightly sickened by the missing mutton. Casters, mana warriors, soldiers, and one that looked like a healer.

  But unlike the other groups we had fought, they were posted out in the open and away from civilian noncombatants. "Taste the god particle, bitches," I muttered, and tiny black specks appeared in the air, ripping winds into them. Three black holes all in a row. Thumper slowed. "Is that Target Two?"

  "Not this close to us," I said.

  The barbarians saw my casting, and backpedaled away from it. One of their mages chanted and brandished his staff, fingers playing over it like a blues guitar. His spell canceled mine, dispelling my singularities.

  Which, of course, is a big mistake. The shockwave knocked them back off their feet, and tumbled their soldiers to the ground. They were dazed, pummeled, and off-balance when my team smashed into them. The barbarian mage clearly was moving to cast again when Quarl gave him twelve-hundred foot-pounds of Mage-Begone on the steel point of a two-foot shaft. Another caster moved to pick up the slack but he abandoned his spell when I hurled a hundred steel daggers at him. There is a mana warrior focusing on his shield, backing away from the fight, but everywhere the light of his shield spread, Kimothy's mists drifted like normal fog. My own flying blades were dropped by his shield technique, a defensive move that was nullifying our best magics. We lost control in that area, I could not move or shape or control any essences where his shield was pointing.

  Nux's axe whirred in the air with no technique and no regard for his own life, but his long long limbs could swing that axe in a wide wide arc that gathered momentum through the whole swing, turning from the hips and twisting from the waist and pushing with his shoulders. That axe was brand new and had the thinnest, sharpest blade I could fabricate by harnessing the essence of steel itself. The barbarian mana warrior gripping a thunderbeast femur moved to block, and the axe chocked deep into the bone weapon, severing some of the sigil sequences. Mana lights flickered and dimmed, and the berserk Madman yanked the axe back for another clumsy, erratic swing. A crossbow bolt hit the mana warrior and light flashed from his bracers but he did not fall.

  Thumper was trading stings and swings between two barbarian fighters, Maspers was trying to draw two more out of position. Larianne ducked under a stabbing spear and reached up with talons spread, and tore the man's arm to ribbons before he could withdraw his blow. Mana lights poured out from her fingernails, and the simple pieces of jewelry that she wore at her wrists and neck. The barbarian mage flung his staff to stop my barrage of blades, and then cracked the staff down to the ground.

  Flames ripped through my team. Fire, crackling, hungry, hateful fire burst from the ground, sending Thumper diving for cover, Tiviti screamed as her outer clothing burned away. The barbarians surged forward to take advantage of this opening, weapons raised, their faces twisted in sadistic triumph.

  I only had one second before they were going to die.

  I made it a very long second.

  Channeling lightning, I cut a path through the air in front of me and flew to close the distance. I tried to think, quickly, now! - I needed something that would hit hard, but I could not use the singularities; one of the barbarians was practically on top of Maspers, knives closing on his throat. If I tried to conjure steel or throw it, it would take too long to get there. I needed something that moved as fast as I do, but hits hard. A spear in my hands won't do the trick, not unless I'm channeling steel-

  Shit.

  There's no time for a better plan. Any attack of mine would take too long to arrive at the target, and my lightning attacks can only stun for a moment. I need to move like lightning and strike like steel. Full strength, full speed. I have enough time to flood the mana channels a second time, the two essences mingling. and then I'm there, swinging.

  I break both hands of the barbarian that lurks over Sir Maspers, bones cracking. I swing at the spear-carrying soldier that nearly has her weapon pressing into Tiviti's stomach. I break weapons, I break arms, I smash aside bodies.

  I don't even remember conjuring a hurley, but that's what I've got. I'm taking on barbarian mana warriors like they were the half-forwards on a camogie pitch. The heel of the bas caved in the mage's throat, and my backswing sundered his staff. I could feel the connection break, the fires started to lose their source. It would take a half-second for the invoked flames to end, and from where I was standing that half-second could last a long time.

  But there's a problem: I'm bleeding mana like a punctured wineskin, the points are dropping fast. I'm channeling lightning and a grounded conductor in the same mana channels, and my mana is following their rules. Elemental magic is flinging out of me in every direction, arcing away to ground itself in every source around. Weapons are overcharged, sigils light up, the air around me burns with cast-off magic, I am wreathed in an aura that whips like lightning and infuses my energy all around me.

  While I'm demolishing the enemy, my reserves are running down fast. Three points. Two points.

  I can't waste a moment and I jet through the fight to do as much damage as I can. Freight-train impacts, split-second speed. By the time I come to rest, the very first impacts are just being felt. I tumble to the ground, exhausted, and a dozen bodies fly away, pinwheeling in the air, flopping end-over-end in boneless sprawls. Thunder rolls through the village, a sonic boom off my oaken hurley. The fires are blown out, and the fight is on. Now it's a battle in the mud, wounded barbarians sprawling with battered warriors, hard-knuckled and merciless. Someone has grabbed Larianne from behind in a choke hold, but she strips all the flesh from their arms to break the grip. Thumper is rolling over and over with her enemy, too close to use her sword so she had grabbed up a knapped-stone knife and is pushing it at his jugular.

  Helplessly I stare. No more magic and no more energy, I'm tapped out of mana and stamina, I can do nothing but to stare and hope they make it.

  The barbarians have a healer, and he's trying to mend his team, bring them back to fighting strength. Licard steps over a wounded body and punches the savage shaman in the side of the head, removing that threat. Our healer is tougher than their healer.

  Quarl darts in from the unexpected angle, and this time he's carrying two long daggers with long tapered points. They are not shaped flat like normal blades, but are square in cross-section like needle-sharp railroad spikes. He thrusts into a neck, and the wound pours out blood when he pulls back, the square wound holds itself open and gushes a stream of crimson that cannot be staunched. Anywhere a barbarian pauses, held in place or stymied by my allies, Quarl is there to slide a knife and finish them off in an instant.

  The eye of the hurricane arrives again, all is quiet. We won. We have killed every enemy between us and the staircase. But we're going to lose. My affinities are out of reach. My mana is gone, my essence depleted. And we are only at the base of the pyramid. I'm out of this fight, and next is the boss fight.

  I lay on the ground, crumpled. "Fuck."

  Captain Maspers rolled over, just a few feet away. He was covered in cold mud, and it looked like half his skin was singed away. Licard was pumping his healing magic in as fast as he could, grimacing the whole time. The guardsman knight locked eyes with me while our healer tried to save his life. "Lady Natalie," he said, in a surprisingly crisp voice. "I presume this went different in your predictions?"

  "If I could predict outcomes and not just set-ups, I would have a very different gift," I mumbled. "Why is it that having unique abilities only ever seems to make me aware of their limitations? Prophecy, sorcery, it's like I can't get by with what I have." I sat up, and my hair was in my face. It was not tucking itself away and sorting back into a braid. In fact, several strands of it were in my mouth. I had to use my hand to hook them out. I had blisters on my hands from my hurley, but the wooden paddle was gone.

  Quarl stumbled over, half-carrying Larianne. She had one arm over his neck and her legs were only partially holding her up. "Well, if we can just get to the top of the temple, we're good to go?" We all turned to look at the thing.

  The temple was almost a ziggurat, a stair-stepped pyramid. But all of those I've ever seen had four sloping sides, and this one had three. There were carved staircases with human-sized steps, in between the titanic blocks that comprised the rest of the temple. At the top, a flat surface open to the sky, and a sacrificial altar. And the high priest and priestess, their sorcerer acolytes, the mana-warrior templar guards, the monsters they had enslaved to help them. We should have waited. I pushed too hard.

  This was not supposed to happen. I'm not supposed to take chances. I had a plan. I was proactive. I prepared... and I failed anyway. And now I'm improvising. Again. God I hate this crap.

  Everyone else was mustering around. I pulled myself to a sitting position. Fuck, I've pulled my everything, haven't I?... "Who's dead," I asked, numbly.

  "Nobody," Thumper said, plopping down next to me. "Was someone supposed to die?"

  "Not supposed to," I said. "I just assumed. This did not go right."

  Kimothy staggered over. He looked unhurt, but he also looked more scared than any of the rest of us. "I'm calling it," he said. "I'm done. I don't need my share of the treasure. Just get me home. I invoke the escape hatch."

  "Bad news," I said. "I'm out of juice."

  "What?" he said.

  "No mana. No essence. No sorcery," I said. "My magic's gone. I used up everything I had."

  "You can't have," he said. "Sorcery doesn't..."

  "My most powerful abilities have a price to pay, and this one was dire," I said. "I did not have time to think of a better plan."

  Kimothy grimaced. "Oh. Well, fuck. So, no portal out of here?"

  "I'm afraid not," I sighed.

  He was silent, watching as the rest of the party was healed, one at a time. Licard looked very tired. I've never heard of a healer running out, but after the last two days, I couldn't blame him.

  Kimothy spoke up again. "I've got mist and giant geese. I can pick up... some of us, and fly us out. Out of this jungle, at least."

  "Skywhales," I reminded him. The massive flying creatures that eagerly picked off any living thing that breached their aerial domain.

  "Fuck."

  "So, forever?" Thumper said. "You're just... not a sorceress anymore?"

  "Well, not until I've had a -"

  I froze.

  I considered.

  I grinned.

  "All right," I said. "I've got a plan. A new plan. It's not as good as the original plan, but it's got a chance."

  Tiviti slumped to the ground. She was healed, but her clothes showed the charring that had almost killed her. "I think perhaps this is not time for plans," she said.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  [ Tiviti Wirrel ][ Love Interest ][ Antagonist ][ The Huntress ]

  Her tag had a strikethrough. She was almost lost as a love interest. I looked around, panicked. Kimothy was barely hanging on, almost everyone was partially lost. I have been losing them all day, everything depends on this quest. Fuck.

  Upgrade point, Charisma. Let's try to pull this out. I might just have a chance still.

  [ Natalie Harigold ] [ Level 7 Sorceress ] [ Rival ]

  [ Strength 10 ][ Stamina 7 ][ Intellect 11 ][ Charisma 5 ]

  [ HP: 13/13 ][ MP: 0/17 ]

  [ Essence Gathered : Select to Expand ]

  [ Condition: Untethered Essence (can fully bind Essence 100%, can bind Essence more easily) ]

  [ Signet of the Seer ]

  [ Disguise 1, Awareness 4 ]

  I took a deep breath, and let it out. Then I pulled a sigil card out of my pocket. "Tiviti, can you activate that shield that one guy was carrying? The one that shined that weird light. Your role is to nullify their mages. Kimothy, the high priest and priestess are currently full of cooked goose. Anything with wings is holy to them. So I need you here to cripple them just as we attack. Someone hand this card to Sir Maspers, he's going to need it when we get up there. Thumper, I'm going to give you the best job of all."

  "What's that?"

  "You're gonna knock me out."

  Kimothy stared at me in utter bewilderment. "The hell kind of plan is this?"

  "It's a really damn good plan. Do you wanna leave? Or do you wanna find out how this ends?" I asked, smirking with an edge of challenge, provocation.

  The strikethroughs began to fade.

  He looked hesitant, nervous, reluctant... and then resigned. "All right. I want to hear about this plan. And it better be damn good."

  All nine of us ascended the staircase. We moved slowly, because they were waiting on me. I was having a very hard time moving my legs and keeping my balance. I had practiced walking, but I had not practiced climbing stairs. It's a challenge, and this is not the ideal conditions to be learning new tricks.

  Behind us, I could see that the villagers, the noncombatants, have run from their homes to strip the field of anything slightly edible. They would yell at each other to demand bigger portions or better cuts, but it never seemed to come for violence. None of them were willing to lash out, even if it meant going without.

  It had not been easy to convince everyone to continue on with us. Larianne was the last one I could talk around, I had to give her some hints what was coming up before she'd decide to tag along and loot what there is.

  One foot at a time, I wobbled up the stairs, carefully counterbalancing myself as I moved from step to step.

  "So much easier to just carry you," Licard grumbled.

  "With the way our luck has run today?" Thumper scoffed. "As soon as your hands are full, that's when all hell breaks loose."

  Also, I need some time to hone my new affinity. I haven't tried it out yet, and I want to familiarize myself as much as possible. I run the essence through a few times, get the feel and the shape of it imprinted. My mind and body are exhausted, no more mana to spend. But I did have a few more points hidden away in my soul. All I needed was to go to sleep and free them.

  And that's why I had a lump from the pommel of Thumper's sword on the back of my head. Now that I was unconscious, we could win this fight.

  But as we mounted the stairs, I could feel the pressure increasing. A thrum in the air that felt like a strong wind or a solid sound. It resisted my soul's attempts to push through it, forcing me to whip around in a flickering cloud around my body, pushing back and moving erratically.

  "You all feel that?" Kimothy asked.

  Nobody answered out loud, but the looks they exchanged said it all. We all felt it.

  It was nearly noon. The sun was high. We crested the last few stairs, and I stood swaying at the top, my team forming up to either side of me. Sir Maspers was right at my shoulder, holding the sigil card.

  An altar, with manacles to hold the sacrifice in place. The high priest and the high priestess, both in thin sleeveless robes, both with wildly colored faces and limbs, accented further by face paints and metal piercings. They wore bangles and chains threaded with feathers, most of them brand-new goose feathers but also some ragged ones from long ago, decaying now. He carried bottles, she carried a shiny silver spike. Printed tablets were set into the stone blocks that made up the floor here. A dead body lay to one side, face down, with blackhart-stained legs. A living body, wide-eyed but unmoving, was chained to the top of the altar-slab.

  And around them, mages in robes, carrying staffs. Around those, a company of mana warriors. And at the edge of the temple dais, ringing the other two sides of the pyramid- nailmonkeys and highbrow centaurs. The centaurs were far more human-looking, save their extremely elongated faces and the contorted shape of their upper torso, their shoulders facing backwards. They stood, staring, with a supercilious and condescending air about them. The monkeys were quiet, still, staring, with a predatory watchfulness.

  Everyone staring at us. The priestess held her shiny spike in the air over the chest of the manacled victim, looking like we had interrupted her. She was annoyed, her lips pursed. Our intrusion was not appreciated. The priest spoke something, and so did the sigil in Sir Masper's hand. The priest spoke a barbarian's language. The sigil said, "You are not to interrupt the calling of the sky. Our gods will not be defied or ridiculed."

  "Tell us what you are doing," Sir Maspers said.

  "The calling," the priestess said with a rapturous smile. She was old and haggard, but her hair was a glorious rich deep green, and stripes running up her arms and legs were silver-blue that matched her eyes. "Those who have fallen to the forest are gathered, and brought. The veins are cut, and then the manacles tightened until all the blood is forced out. With alchemy and secrets, we distill it until the dreaming soul is pure in its flask. The messengers of the gods cannot resist this aroma, and will come to us. Then the messenger will take us from here, to live in a land where love can flourish."

  The priest was staring at me. "Something is wrong," he said, staring. "I sense the adversary. I sense the bane, the scourge, the downfall. I can tell! It is here!"

  He was casting something, but it was fast and I was off-guard. I did not react in time. A light flared around me, and then away. The others, the party, they turned and stared at me. At me. Sir Maspers stared at my bared soul, and Thumper, and Kimothy. Larianne, Nux, and all these barbarian cannibals were all staring straight at my untethered essence. The whipping, formless cloud of myself that filled the space and wreathed entirely around my physical body.

  Well, no point delaying any longer.

  "Now," I said, carefully enunciating the word for Kimothy so the word would be coherent from my numbed, sleepwalking mouth. And then I summoned my newest weapons and attacked.