Finding the source of the noise didn’t take much work, as almost everyone seemed to have headed in that direction. Jake and Harvey arrived to see two human men squaring up to each other. Both were shouting and gesturing, although what it was about, it was almost impossible to tell.

As Jake pushed a little way through the crowd to see what was going on, one of the men drew a sword and the other followed.

“This is getting out of hand quickly,” Harvey commented, following after Jake. “I’m surprised someone hasn’t stepped in.”

Before Jake could reply, the room was suddenly blanketed in darkness. After a few seconds, flickers of light could be seen around the room as people used spells or potions to create some light.

Jake heard a grunt that seemed to come in the opposite direction to the fight and something collided with him, knocking him off his feet. He shouted out and heard other shouts around the room.

Then there was a massive burst of light from one side of the room and the darkness was pushed back to find chaos.

The first thing that Jake saw was Harvey. He was lying on the ground, hands clasped on his chest. For a second, Jake couldn’t make out what he was seeing then it dawned on him what he was seeing. Harvey was dead.

Jake pushed himself up and across to where the gnome was lying. He tried his pulse on the neck and couldn’t find one.

The chaos around the room continued to grow. Jake stood up, looking to see if he could see who had killed the gnome or someone in authority to get some help. He immediately noticed that there were another two clusters of people crouched over in different parts of the room. One was where one of the two men involved in the fight was standing. The other was almost on the opposite side of the room from where Jake was standing.

“What’s going on?” Drak asked, appearing at Jake’s side. “Who’s this guy?”

“Harvey. Did you see what happened?” Jake said, realising he sounded a bit shocked.

“No idea. Looks like he’s not the only dead guy,” Drak said, looking around the room. “What the hell?”

At that moment, Lirien Highsong appeared in the sphere of light. “Everyone, calm down!” he said, his voice enhanced in some way and instantly cutting through all the noise in the room.

Almost all eyes turned to him, the noise level in the room dropping considerably.

Lirien looked around the room, his stare stopping on the MENU operative Flair and then again on the military commander, Arctorian. He called them both to him by name and both moved through the crowds to where he stood. A slight shimmer surrounded them for a moment as someone used an illusion to prevent anyone from hearing their words while a blur covered their lips.

The trio spoke for a few minutes. “Any light or shadow essence users in the room?” Lirien called, his voice returning a little more to normal but still strong enough that everyone could hear him.

Jake glanced at Drak, who shrugged and raised his hand along with three other people around the room.

“Come over here,” Lirien added, gesturing to his side. “Also, do we have any alchemists in the room?”

Jake raised his hand, as did two other people. Again Lirien gestured for them to approach where he was standing. As he reached the area of effect of the sound dampening field, he felt a slight tingle across his skin.

“Okay, everyone, this is the situation,” Flair, the MENU agent, said as everyone gathered inside the sound dampening field. Her tone was matter-of-fact, as this was clearly the kind of thing she was used to handling. “The wards of the property are raised so nothing can get in or out. We are facing a possible terrorist attack using some form of creature. We have not identified it. We know the darkness is magical in nature and so far, the only two things that push it back are light essence or someone shaping it with shadow essence.”

“We have a few clear objectives,” Arctorian said. “One group will go to check out the wards to get a message to the outside world. We need another group to go throughout the house and find the people spread around, bringing them back here to protect them. My men will go with these groups to offer protection.”

Lirien then cast another smaller sound dampening field that encompassed himself and Flair with the three alchemists.

“Which of you can create Tier 3 potions?” Flair said to the alchemists who had stepped forward.

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One held up her hand. “I’m only at Tier 1,” she admitted, looking concerned.

“That’s fine, please step outside the field with the rest of the guests,” Flair said with a nod. “You will provide accurate information on your abilities. This is a serious situation and there are legal repercussions for not providing accurate details.”

“I don’t think I need to disclose what my abilities are,” the second alchemist said with some indignation.

Lirien turned to the man. “You will tell us what we want to know,” he said speaking slowly and menacingly. “This is not a request but a demand. If you don’t want to spend your days rotting in Raven-Grave prison, so answer the question accurately.”

The man opened his mouth as if to argue more, then decided maybe this wasn’t the best option. “Tier 2,” he replied petulantly.

“Then leave,” Lirien replied, waving his hand dismissively.

Attention turned to Jake. “Yes, I can make Tier 3 potions, but I don’t have any gear on me to make it.”

“I have an alchemy laboratory and the ingredients you need,” Lirien said.

“But you don’t have an alchemist?” Jake queried hesitantly.

“I did have an alchemist.” He gestured to where Arctorian’s men were moving the three dead bodies to one edge of the sphere. “That would be him. And it seems that the other competent alchemists are also over there. I need to go to look at the wards,” Lirien added, looking at Flair. “I need someone to take them to the lab.” He began looking around the room for someone.

A flash caught Jake’s attention for a moment and he looked to see a familiar face entering the light dome. Silt looked pissed, with one arm sheathed in ice while the other crackled with fire, causing the slight flashes that had caught Jake’s attention.

She was wearing an evening dress with a strap on one side and a short sleeve on the other. It had a full-length skirt with a split mid-way up her thigh to allow for easy movement. Her hair was pulled into a bun at the back of her head. She wore ballerina shoes.

She also looked a little disheveled, as if she had been fighting.

She stormed across to where Lirien stood and raised her hand, about to say something. Lirien made a gesture and while Silt’s lips were moving, not a sound came out.

“She can take you to the lab,” Lirien said.

Silt had stopped ranting, clearly realising no one could hear her. Then she saw Jake and Drak and her frown deepened even more.

Lirien made another gesture. “Take these two to the alchemy lab,” he said to her.

She glanced at Lirien, then returned her attention to Jake and Drak. “What the hell are you two doing here?”

“Asher…” Jake started to say.

“Forget it, I can imagine,” she said crossly, shaking her head.

“The potion is called Shade Lily Lake potion,” Flair said. “I will accompany you to protect you while you are making the potion.”

Flair and Lirien moved over to speak to Acrtorian for a moment, then returned to them. “Let’s go.”

Drak raised a small ball of light that pushed the wall of darkness back to illuminate the area just around where the four of them were walking. “What are you doing here?” Drak asked Silt as they walked. “And why are you in such a mess?”

She glared at him. “I was attacked, that’s why. Something came at me in the darkness and I only had enough time to defend myself before it was gone again.”

“Did you get a clear look at it?” Flair asked.

“Not clearly,” Silt replied. “They were more like an area of the darkness that moved and came at me. They weren’t hard to beat with fire, but there were lots of them.”

“And what are you doing here?” Drak asked again, going back to his original question.

“I live here,” Silt replied. “Where else would I be?”

“You live here?” Drak repeated in shock.

She gave him another glare. “Yes, I live here.”

Jake made some quick mental connections. “Lirien is your father.”

She shrugged. “Unfortunately.”

“And you live here?” Drak said again, a little louder.

“Can you be quiet?” Flair snapped, stopping and glaring at Drak. “Where were you when you were attacked?” she asked Silt.

Drak gave her his best smile, which clearly had no effect at all and was about to say something probably that made things worse.

Flair held her hand up. “Silence,” she hissed.

Ahead of them, there was a patch of darkness that seemed to be darker than the rest of the corridor. Then another, moving closer to them. They didn’t look like anything in particular but more like a bad drawing of each thing.

“And behind,” Silt said quietly, looking into the corridor behind them.

Flair raised her hands and streams of fast moving flames began firing toward the shadow creatures ahead of them. Each bolt of flame seemed to wrap around the creature for a moment before it vanished. But there were more appearing behind it. And there was no sound, everything happening in eerie silence.

Silt took aim with her fire essence at the ones behind them. Jake used his water essence to fire pebbles of water at where he thought the head would be and each impact caused the shadow to disperse. But there seemed to be more of them behind them than at the front as if the shadows wanted them to move forward.

“There’s a turning just ahead on the left,” Silt said.

“They seem to want us to go there,” Jake said, turning his attention to the shadow creatures at the front to help clear the way they wanted to go.

“That can’t be a good thing,” Drak said from the middle of the group.

Flair increased the ferocity of her attacks, but the shadows seemed to increase their numbers to match.

Then suddenly, they were all gone.

“What the hell?” Drak said, turning from one side to the other.