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ADAMAR

Ash rains down from the sky, as Folas, Valkallyn and I chase the wingless figure through the streets. The very air feels weighted, heavy with warning and heat. He has recovered from his limp, or perhaps is ignoring the pain as he leads us through streets blackened with ash and blood. I cast a quick charm to help our boots keep traction, but it’s still insanely slippery, and I don’t know how he manages to not fall once. He skids around bends, shoving himself off walls and doorways, using signposts to round corners faster and tighter than we can.

I’ve never been athletic, and I can feel my blood pounding in my heat, each footfall sounding louder than the dragons overhead. Air feels like ice in my lungs, even as heat sizzles my skin from a nearby house fire. Suddenly a screaming mob rushes towards us. Behind them, I can see the dark red cloak of our mysterious thief, the bottom stained black with ash, disapear down an alleyway. Straining my magic, I blur my hands into a familiar set of movements as I whisper words that will let me jump over the lines of people rushing uphill towards us. But at the last minute I hesitate. Folas and Valkallyn, I can’t leave them behind. I don’t have the magic to take them with me though.

In that half a second, the magic snaps, my hesitation overworking my already suffering veins. I recoil from the backlash, it’s the first time in ages that I’ve felt the results of a magic-starved spell. My muttered words devolve into curses as I lose my footing and fall towards the mob. Valkallyn grabs the back of my cloak though, and then we’re surrounded, being carried away from our goal by a terrified mass of panicked people. We’re drowning in the mob. Lost in a sea of noise, hair, wings, arms and legs, all thrashing, all desperate. All running, running further and further away from our destination. When I’m spat out, I’m left gasping for breath, lost and bewildered, my head spinning. Where did we go? How far out of the way did that mob carry us? Folas is spat out next, somewhere behind me. I can hear him retching. Valkallyn comes over to me, as I study the skyline, trying to guess where we are, or even what cardinal direction I’m facing. But it’s useless. The sky is a blistering mix of orange flames and the dark blue of the night sky. Stars twinkle above, but I don’t recognize any of them. As I watch, one of the tallest buildings on the horizon collapses, consumed by its own flames.

We’ve lost the thief. We’ve lost ourselves. And if the item he tossed up in the square was a decoy, we’ve lost the scales.

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BRIARETH

I don’t know how long we’ve been wandering around down here. It could be just a few minutes, it could be over an hour. I have a terrible sense of time. Especially under pressure. And since the last few dead ends and easing of the headache have had to cause some serious backtracking, to the point that Faladel has mentioned he thinks we might have gone in a giant circle, I’ve been a bit stressed out. I know it’s somewhere around here. I can feel my headache getting worse by the minute. But there aren’t any tunnels going in the right direction.

I hiss in pain as I stub my toes on yet another uneven cut of floor. Glancing up, I see a wall in front of me. Collapsed stones that I’d swear weren’t there the last time we were here. Like Faladel suspects, we’ve been going in circles. He always was a bit slow to catch on to those things. I turn away, wary of more cave-ins. We need to find a tunnel that goes in the right direction, and soon. The light of Faladel’s torch flickers, over the uneven wall, casting strange shadows from small cracks and crevices. Suddenly I see something.

“Faladel! Bring that light closer!” I call out excitedly. The shadows make an arch, a perfect, six foot tall, arch. Scrap that, it isn’t perfect. But anyone hiding a secret door would never make their lines perfect, that would draw too much attention. I hold my breath as Faladel obligingly bends near.

“Briareth is something–”

“Hush!” I chide him. “I’m trying to think.” Now, if I was a secret door, how would I want to open? I run my fingers over the crack. “Some sort of sliding stone puzzle? No, too easy.” I mumble. “Not to mention this is all very hard in place.” Hidden locks would be nice, but quite difficult to carve out precisely in the stone. And equally difficult to hide. I hiss angrily. I’m missing something.

“Is this a door of some kind?” Faladel asks, studying the arch over my shoulder.

“A secret door, leading exactly where we need to go.” I confirm, my brain coming up with more and more ridiculous ways to seal a door, one even using tree resin, which reminds me of that special wax Smay had, which in turn makes me think of dragons’ fire as a key which…

“Perhaps this is the back of the door, and the opening mechanism is on the other side?” Faladel offers, staring at the door. “Although how we’re supposed to open it from this side…” He frowns. “I don’t think we can break it down, but I don’t see any other obvious way. It’s fitted quite cleanly into the stone.”

I gape at him. Of course, there isn’t any lock or bolt. We are on the inside of the box. This door leads into the general caverns, it isn’t meant to be accessed from this side. “How are you such a genius?” I ask, pulling my bow from my back. “Now, you should probably get back.”

“Uhh… Briareth, what exactly do you plan on doing with that–” Faladel begins as I pull the string back. I didn’t get the chance to test it like Adamar had suggested earlier, and I’m relieved when the arrow of pure light appears on the drawstring like magic. I remember the first time I ever used it. I’d been confused, enthralled, and delighted by the chaos surrounding me. We’d been at Mossblossom Central, and there had been an undead monster on the loose chasing my friends around Master Cellica’s greenhouse and effectively kicking their buts. Nothing had damaged it, but when I pulled back the bowstring I saw strings of brilliant white light coming out of the creature. Adamar had told me to aim for them. And when I had shot them all, the creature had collapsed. The one arrow that had gone astray had done massive damage to the surrounding area. I’ve used the bow only rarely since, but we need that blast damage now.

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“You could bring the whole ceiling down on our heads, Briareth!” Faladel exclaims, fear flickering in his eyes.

“I won’t!” I say confidently. “But you should probably back up a little more just in case!”

“That’s not exactly reasur–” Faladel begins, but I don’t need to hear the rest. I fire the bow, and the arrow of light rips its way from my hands and into the rock before me. It crumbles to dust without a sound, the arrow’s light winking out. I gasp, all air suddenly gone from my lungs, like I forgot to breathe. But it takes barely any time to recover and stow my bow.

“Come on!” I shout at Faladel, charging into the tunnel that yawns beyond the broken doorway. He quickly follows me, his long legs making up for the speed of my reckless charge. Behind us the whole tunnel rumbles, and then it shakes its way through the ground we’re standing on and out into the wide T-intersection in front of us. Faladel stops.

“Left or right?” He asks me. I grin wildly, adrenaline making my every cell feel like it’s about to burst with life. That was amazing. I should really use that bow more often!

“Right! I respond confidently, my feet already moving in that direction. I slow down to a loping pace, trying to conserve my newfound energy. Faladel moves ahead a bit, his light leading the way. This tunnel is much better crafted than the ones we were in before, the floor is smooth, no rocks litter it, and the support beams look more recently built. Someone put a lot of effort into this. But before I can question anything, a loud twang snaps from behind us. Something long and slender whips past my face, shaving my hair, nicking my ear. My hand goes up just a half second too slow to grab it. My gaze follows its trajectory, straight to where it landed in Faladel’s side. His face twists in shock and pain as he spins around. I spin as well. Someone is attacking us. Faladel has dropped his torch, but its flickering light reveals long curly blond hair and a familiar pair of blue eyes. I gape. It can’t be Adamar, the hair is too long, the clothes aren’t right, not to mention, this is clearly a woman. Her dark clothes hug her curves.

“Too low and not enough force! I knew it was shoddy workmanship!” She spits, dropping her crossbow. Barely realizing I’ve already drawn my sword, I charge at her, fury making my vision go red. How dare she shoot Faladel. He’s my Faladel! I’m supposed to protect him! His parents told me to protect him!

Shadows dance from the fallen torch. My eyes can’t adjust. Sometimes I can see her, sometimes I can’t. But I don’t hesitate as I chop where I saw her face just a few seconds ago. My sword hits wood, and I yank it out violently to parry her blade that flashes in front of my eyes. A clang. A long, suffering, screech as steel bites and slides against steel. My breath comes hot and fast. A slash. Another parry, I lunge and jab, not caring about the misses, only the strikes that land. I drive her back, determined, desperate. She snarls at me, and spits. I jerk my head to the side so it doesn’t go in my eye. It lands somewhere on my cheek, cool against my fever hot skin. I press down, using my leveraging my bulk and weight against her slim form. Her sword bends slightly. Her wrist trembles. For just a second, my heightened senses catch a whiff of oleander flowers from her cloak. I bite the inside of my cheek, using pain to dismiss the thought.

It doesn’t matter what she smells like. She dies today.

I step forward, moving my left hand from the hilt of my blade all the way up the blade. I don’t care that the edges cut into my palm, that my own blood runs down my sword. I care that there is now fear in her eyes. I press down hard, grating my sword against hers as she buckles under its weight. My lips pull back from my teeth. I’m not sure if I’m smiling or growling. She will die.

Rumbles start behind me, but I’m so close I don’t pay attention. Only when the walls behind me collapse, and the roof caves in, and the torch goes out, and I can’t see do I spin, realizing what’s happening.

Faladel is wounded. Faladel is on the other side of the cave-in and he’s wounded! Behind me I can hear the woman scrambling away, abandoning the fight, just as I have. Desperate, I dig at the collapsed wall.

“Faladel are you okay?!” I scream, trying to loosen some stones. I can’t see any of them though. I can only tell by touch which ones are small enough to pry away. But Faladel can’t have been caught under it, he just can’t.

“I’m fine.” His voice comes through to me. His voice is slightly higher than normal. He coughs, and it’s not a pleasant sound. “Well, as fine as I can be considering I just got shot with a crossbow quarrel. But the cave-in was far enough away that I didn’t get too caught in it.”

“Just hold on.” I beg, “I can find a way through, or perhaps I can blast it like I did with the secret door.”

“NO! Don’t blast it Briareth, you’ll bring the whole place down!” Faladel sounds serious, and then he coughs again. “You destabilized it enough with the first blast, and then your fight took out the support beams. If you blast it again, this whole section of hallway might come down.” He says, more calmly. “I’ve already removed the bolt from my wound. I’ll bind it as tight as I can, and then I’ll continue. We were getting pretty close right?”

“It should be at the end of this tunnel.” I admit defeatedly, taking my hand off the wall separating me from my wounded friend. “I’ll find some other way around. Some way to come find you.”

Faladel chuckles, and this time it doesn’t end in him coughing. “No Briareth, it’s probably best if you don't try and find a way to me.” His voice turns firm. “You’d be better off finding whoever was following us, the person who shot me. We need to know who they are and who they’re working for. We can’t have any variables show up at this point. We’re missing something if there is still an unregistered player on this chessboard.” I glare stonily at the ground, suddenly noticing that there is a small amount of blue light that makes my toes visible. I give them a half-hearted wiggle.

His logic is infallible, as always.

“I’ll go and dispose of the magic-disrupter on my own.” Faladel continues. “That was our original plan wasn’t it, you lead me to it, I dismantle it? Well, you’ve done your part, now it’s time for me to do mine.” I can almost hear his grin.

“Promise me.” I say, leaning on the stone wall between us. “Promise me you’ll be okay.” It’s the only way I can leave him. I can’t leave him alone.

“I’ll be fine, I’ll just bind this wound up as tight as I can, and then make my way down the hall. It can’t be that hard right?” He offers. I stay silent. I’ve had to bind my own wounds before and it definitely was hard. And it hurt like hell.

He hears the meaning behind my silence. He hears my doubts. “I’ll be fine, Briareth.” He promises, quieter, but just as clear. “I’ll see you on the other side.”

Grimly, I pull my bow from my back, the runes carved into its side glow a faint sickly teal. “See you on the other side, Faladel.” I reply.

And I set off to hunt.