Crane rested his head on the iron bars of his cell, squirming. He had woken up in a cell after his clash with the man in greys.

The sounds of water dripping into a small puddle echoed in the dark halls of the dungeon. The air was damp and smelt like something close was rotten. Very close. Crane was almost thankful for the darkness. If it smelt this bad, he couldn’t even imagine how grotesque of a scene the darkness hid.

At least, the captors had shown the courtesy of not removing the caste Spera had left. They had simply cuffed him again over it. The vines, however, didn’t seem to be as fresh and full of life now.

He tried to hold them, but his hands were tied, literally. So, he touched them with his lips instead, feeling the coarse and cracked vines on his soft skin. Crane could only feel a husk of what it was merely a couple of hours ago. Or a day. He had no idea how long he had slept.

He kept feeling the vines and only with a little pressure, his lips sank into the vines in a crack. Like they were dead for a decade. Life sucked out of them just as it was being sucked out of Crane.

The new shackles sucked his mana like a leech. It must have done the same to the vine too, Crane thought. The vines were the materialized version of the little girl’s mana, the attribute of her soul. She probably had an affinity to nature like Crane had to fire, before whatever possessed her corrupted her soul.

That attribute was mana shaped into the mage's will. Without mana, there would be no physical form left. Only a husk, just like how it was with the wine now.

Iron bars trapped him inside the cell like a bird and the dark steel of the shackles tapped on his power, rendering him weak and pathetic. His broken arm had swollen, making it even more uncomfortable to move around. He needed proper medical attention, and he needed it soon.

With nothing to do for hours, he inspected the shackles as his eyes slowly got more and more used to the darkness. These proved to be stronger, still managing to keep him bound.

The only difference from the previous one was the runes inscribed on the steel, releasing the mana that dark steel stole from Crane into the air and not letting the shackles overload and break. He couldn’t quite make out the runes in the dark, but he again felt them with his face and lips. It felt like wedge writing. Carved on steel with a chisel and a hammer.

Nice craftsmanship. Crane thought. Probably worth a fortune. That man must really want me to keep here. Great. Just what I needed.

After trying to pull his wrists free again and utterly failing, he screamed in pain as the broken bones moved in torn flesh, the vines and his clothes slowly getting soaked in blood. His curses and screams echoed throughout the dungeon, only to turn back at him.

His heart beat faster and faster, his breaths deep and unsteady. It was not just his arm. He felt like the steel was around his neck instead of his wrists. Almost like a noose, slowly tightening around his soul. Crane lived as a mage his whole life. Even in his daily life where he practised little to none, he still felt his own mana and the world around him.

Now, he felt like he had lost a sense. Like his sight, hearing, his sense of touch. Oblivious to himself and the world around him. Something was taken and it disturbed Crane’s very soul.

He was hungry, depleted all his mana, and his wounds still ached. He couldn’t feel Azavel and it made him even more anxious. Just like all that wasn’t enough the world was ending while he was stuck in this cell. He imagined this journey to be a lot simpler.

Taking a large breath as his nostrils grew larger, his jaws tightly shut, he kicked the bars and cussed again. To this act, he didn’t expect a reply, but he had one nevertheless.

“You seem beaten up enough. I wouldn’t annoy the guard with that if I were you.” A pile of rags talked back to him from the next cell.

As Crane squinted his eyes to focus, he saw a black man in whitish robes sitting on the ground with crossed legs, reading a book. Wrapped around in an array of old blankets and curled up at the corner of his cell on a pillow, the man was easy to miss under all the cloth. Especially in the dark.

“You look… comfortable.” Crane raised a brow. Sweat trickled down his temples. “A lot more than you should be in a cell.”

“Lord provides even behind the bars.” The man smiled. Or Crane thought he did. He could make out the facial muscles moving but the man could very well be sulking instead. His voice was what made him sure he was smiling. He sounded happy. “I am Endov. You are?” He tilted his head in anticipation.

“Crane.” He turned back and sat resting his back on the bars. “Wouldn’t you rather he provided freedom over blankets?”

“You know the saying. He works in mysterious ways, and I have stopped trying to figure it out.”

“Is that how you ended up in jail?”

“More or less. I helped someone I probably shouldn’t have. Lord preaches mercy to the weak, but his Order wasn’t happy that the weak one was a heretic. What about you?”

“Me? Oh, it wasn’t anything big. I was at the wrong place wrong time. Annoyed someone important I guess.”

“Considering the cuffs, you must be really annoying.” Endov laughed and moved a bit closer, still wrapped in his blankets.

Now that he was close, he could see the man better. His white clothes were full of dirt and blood just like Crane’s. The book in his hand looked as good as new. It was a small book, much smaller than the man’s palm, brown leather cover, corners reinforced with silver and a strange symbol in the middle.

What attracted Crane’s attention was the man’s smile and his eyes that shone with a light Crane had never seen. Anem was his only human companion on the island and was sullen at the best of his days. This man, however, looked full of hope even in a cell.

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***

As they talked, Crane heard the sounds of creaking wood and approaching steps. They got louder and louder, echoing from one damp wall to another. Each step felt like landing on Crane’s aching head. His limbs felt cold as sweat trickled down his forehead. Eilar! Crane cursed inside. He felt so weak that if it weren’t for the pain, he would have fallen asleep again.

“Ouch!” A man squealed in pain following something solid hitting the flesh.

“You hit me with that thing one more time and I swear I’m…” Crane heard another thud before the man managed to end his threat.

“Yeah love, I believe ya!” The guard chuckled as he hit the man again, and Crane heard the sound of the new inmate collapsing on the ground.

After a brief silence, Crane saw the approaching guard. He dragged the man to his cell, the one right across Crane. He had the man in one hand and a torch in the other.

When Crane realized that the guard was hitting the man with a torch, he could sympathize with the man. That looked awfully similar to Anem’s method of training. Anem almost burnt him hundreds of times and hit him with things much hotter than a torch. He would always argue that the fire within Crane would grow larger as his body got accustomed to fire.

He had always protested how cruel Anem’s method was but seeing the result he had no choice but to shut up. Crane was a Flamebearer now and could conjure fire at will. Still, the realization of being treated worse than a criminal in a dungeon made him question the sanity of his master. Or his love towards Crane.

The light dazzled his eyes, but he got used to it pretty quickly. It didn’t illuminate much, but it was enough. Crane now could see the things he half-saw and half-imagined before.

There were six cells, three on each side of the narrow corridor that lead to a small room with a staircase. There were no other rooms, no stone walls, just bars separating the corridor from the cells and cells from each other.

Other cells were empty, except for the one on his left. The was a pile of rotten flesh and bones which belonged to the last person who occupied the cell.

So that is the smell. Crane thought. A great way to make the dungeon even more unbearable. Unfortunately.

The guard was a bald man, as tall as the room and as wide as the entrance to the cell. Perhaps even wider.

Then, Crane realized that he overestimated the dungeon’s administrator. Or the guy. They weren’t making the conditions unbearable on purpose. The guard was just incapable of entering the cell and removing the corpse.

“You’ll do me a nice beating.” The guard continued with his thick accent, making it hard for Crane to understand him. “All you need is fallin’ asleep love.” The man laughed again as he threw the inmate into the cell across Crane and locked it.

Before leaving, the guard waved at the man next cell, the living one. “Oi me’Lord! Thanks fo’ the blessin’. Me blisters feel like gone.”

I guess that’s where the blanket and the pillow came from, Crane thought. A healer perhaps? Maybe the lord indeed provided. He was in urgent need of a healer.

To this, Endov only nodded with a smile. He had a stubble, at most a week grown. Was he going to stay that long too? Or as long as the shy guy on his left cell refused to talk?

After the guard locked the cell and left the dungeon to the stairs, Crane smiled at the priest, wryly. “I always thought the magic to be a blessing too. You sure you are not there for lying?”

As far as Crane knew, people with nature attributes could be gifted healers. There were exceptions of course. The fire spirit in his medal could also heal but that didn’t change his point; healing was no blessing. It was just a spell.

“If that’s the way to help someone I don’t see the harm in little lies. He feels better, I feel better.” Endov held the blanket, looking warm.

“Fuck the fat fuck.” The new inmate spat, his words brewed with the hatred hailing from the deepest parts of his heart. His spit, however, had a metallic sound when it hit the ground. Like a needle dropping to the stone ground.

The new inmate held his stomach and slowly tried to get up then rested on the wall. He was a young blonde man around Crane’s age with a broken nose that arched sideways and a clean shaved face. He couldn’t see well now but had seen enough before the guard left with the torch. “I’ll shove that torch so far up his ass that when he smiles again, he will brighten our day.”

At least he is creative, Crane thought.

“Retribution hardly resolves anything, brother,” Endov commented without looking, his eyes fixed on his book.

“Yeah, but it will make me feel a lot better. Who says I’m looking for resolution?”

“Perhaps you should.” Endov smiled as he pulled a loaf of bread from under his blanket and split it into three pieces. He threw one at the new guy and the other at Crane. “Perhaps then you wouldn’t look as hungry”

Crane hesitated to eat it for a second. When the torch lightened the cells, he saw the blankets that Endov just pulled the bread from. The sour smell watered Crane’s eyes but being on the verge of starvation he pushed his sanitary questions aside.

He thanked Endov as he bit onto the bread, it was rough and mouldy. Unlike the ones he made on the Island. Still, he was thankful.

“Whatever.” The new guy took a bite from the bread after sniffing it. “I won’t stay here much anyways.” He lay down, still munching on the bread.

“How do you plan on doing that?” Crane asked.

“Well. I happen to have my way with the locks. They can’t resist me. With a few whispers and the right touch and they are quite easy to unlock. Just like women. Those and with this pin of course.” He then picked something from the ground that Crane couldn’t really see. It sounded like something thin and metallic.

“Is that how you got here?” Crane asked. “Because of some locks getting unlocked?”

“Well… this particular lock happened to be opening to a nice lady’s bed chambers. A lord’s daughter’s to be exact. He wasn’t awfully happy to see that I was spending some quality time with her.”

“Thievery I could understand but adultery… You might belong here, brother. At least until you repent.” Endov’s voice contradicted his words, being warm and welcoming.

“Don’t be like that! I was there only to pick up some stuff. I thought it wouldn’t be very nice of me to take something from a lady and not to give anything back.” The man giggled. “She was quite content until the guards arrived.”

“They aren’t going to be very happy if this one gets unlocked as well.” Crane smiled even in pain. He didn’t quite like the man’s deeds and how he embraced them but if it took a thief to unlock his shackles, he could endure him. “What are you going to do when they come after you? How are you even going to pass through that man?”

To that, the man thought for a second. “I’ll hope for the best.”

“I am what you hope.” Crane leaned forward, showing his shackles. “Do you know what these are for?”

“Not exactly. Something annoying for mages I suppose. Looks expensive though. Not fit for a shabby dungeon.”

“Neither do us fit here my friend.” Crane smiled. “The steel binds the mana, rendering a mage useless. What about you take these off me and I take you out? Safe and in one piece?”

“Looks like we have a deal. I’d shake your hand but…” The man pointed at the bars. “I’m called Fennec.”

“Crane. And that’s not a problem. My arm is kind of broken anyways. I’d rather not shake it.”

“What delightful news.” Endov joined. “Then I offer to join your deal. I can heal. Bones especially. A quick spell and we all can shake hands.”

“You were so judgmental a second ago though. What changed your mind?”

“I am merely accepting what the Lord provides. After all, he is the one who sent you to me. Maybe he brought you to me to get me out, and me to you to guide you.”

“Meh.” Fennec sighed. “Not the Lord but a Lord.” Fennec corrected him. “Anyways. I suppose letting one more prisoner out would make him even bitter. I say we have a deal.”