Marek had never been more consumed by a goal than he was now. He had used up most of the Essence stored within his wand, and yet it wouldn’t be enough. He had cleared through two barriers, was close to breaching through a third, and it wasn’t going to be enough. It was enough to make him scream, but that would be wasted effort. Everything but working towards his objective was a waste of time.

Someone said something, but it was irrelevant. Nothing else mattered. Marek raised a hand and traced it over the floating aura that surrounded the staff.

“I’m close,” Marek said under his breath. He traced his hand over the aura again. It was still as thick as a wall, but it was weaker. Instead of requiring explosives or a massive battering ram to destroy, it now required a good axe and a strong man to break through. “So close to claiming what will be mine.”

“Marek!”

Marek blinked and turned back to Ako, who was looking at him with deep concern. “Marek, I’ve been calling on you for the last few minutes,” she said. Ako’s gaze went to the staff. “I worry for you, Marek. You are becoming obsessed with the staff. You were muttering under your breath, and I do not think it was a spell.”

“There is no such thing as spells, and I only have a day left,” Marek said, irritated. He appreciated Ako’s concern. He always did, but now her worry seemed superfluous. “I have only a day to work through what defences are left around this, Ako. It could happen at any time, let alone tomorrow. I’m in charge, and I must protect everyone. I won’t be able to without the staff.”

Marek turned back to the staff. Just as it always had, it was enough to take his breath away. Besides Claire, it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Just like Claire, it would be his.

Wait, Claire? Marek felt a shiver of cold fear run down his back at the thought of meeting Claire again. Just once was enough for her to almost make him attack and kill Ako, the most important person in his world. His sister, even if they shared no blood and came from different sides of the world. Claire was beautiful, seductive, and deadly. There was no telling what she could entice him to do if they were to meet again.

Marek began to channel through his wand again when a hand pushed his arm down. It was Ako’s.

“What?” Marek snapped. I understand you have concerns, Ako, but we don’t have time to be cautious. We need this—”

“I know,” Ako said quickly. She squeezed his arm and then let go. “I just wanted to tell you that I will be watching you in the corner of the room, just in case. This does not feel right, Marek. I feel the same way that I did before I was attacked, before Jakub…” Ako’s voice cut off as she swallowed and looked miserable. “Before he died,” Ako whispered. She shuddered and kept going, becoming visibly stronger as she spoke. “I trust you, Marek, but I do not trust this place. If it can, it will corrupt you.”

“Thank you,” Marek said, touched at her unconditional trust. “Thank you, Ako. I appreciate your company.”

Marek turned back to the staff and welcomed the familiar buzzing in his ears as he did so. It was like he was in a hive of bees, but it didn’t bother him like it had at the beginning. Now, it was a welcome thing because it meant he was looking at the staff.

Strange that I notice it now, Marek thought, but he shrugged it off. It was probably like how a frog wasn’t aware it was being boiled if you gradually turned up the heat. He had been working on breaking through the protections surrounding the staff day and night, and so he hadn’t noticed until his concentration had been broken.

Uneasily, he began to channel again. It was much easier than it had been a few weeks ago—he had been using his magic so frequently recently that he felt like he was at the Citadel again, channeling magic to his heart’s content.

Soon, I’ll have my heart’s content, Marek thought. The dome of magic surrounding the staff was like a thick sheet of ice that was almost impossible to melt. He was warming it slightly over time. With the third barrier soon down, it would be much easier going forward.

Like before, Marek gathered the energy that surrounded the staff and began to leech off it, pulling it off slowly like one would take wrappings off a wound. As before, the magic required from the channeling was too much for him alone to maintain without dipping into his own Essence. The wand was more than enough, but he didn’t know how much more he would need after this barrier.

Everything hinges upon this, Marek thought as he continued to drain from the third barrier. I cannot fail.

Just as Marek thought he would make it through the barrier without incident, the barrier flashed white, showing itself for the first time. Marek kept channeling, but he was beyond stunned at what he saw.

He was almost through the third barrier, but there were many more behind it. They were like pages in an unending book, piling up and surrounding the staff to such an extent that Marek quickly lost count at forty. It could have been triple that, and he wouldn’t know for sure. The only thing that he did know for sure was that he didn’t have enough left in his wand to make it through a half-dozen more barriers, let alone forty.

Marek felt a bead of sweat travel down his forehead. It dripped and fell onto the floor as Marek gripped his wand tightly. So tightly that if it had been any other time, he would have been afraid of snapping it. Instead, Marek’s vision turned red as he began to shake out of anger. He looked down at his wand, which he was still channeling through.

“Is this a joke?” Marek growled, finally cutting off the magical flow through his wand. He glared at the wand and then looked up at the ceiling. “Do you enjoy giving and then taking hope away from people, Claire? Is that what this is all about, you lying bitch?”

“Marek—” Ako’s voice was uncertain and sounded like it came from far away.

“Don’t,” Marek growled, cutting her off as he snapped his head back to glare at her. She flinched back, but he didn’t care. He was too angry to care about anything other than what he had just lost. “Don’t, Ako.”

He wanted to storm out of the room and never acknowledge the staff’s existence again. Yet it was still there behind him, taunting him with its presence. It was so close and yet hopelessly far away.

Hopeless. This was a hopeless endeavour.

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Marek looked back up at the staff, snarled, and then drew as much magic from himself as he possibly could. He was pacing and staring at the staff. He was a caged animal promised freedom, only for the key to be thrown away before his eyes, just out of his reach.

“Marek, stop,” Ako said. She sounded quiet and afraid. Marek ignored her. He stopped pacing and threw up his wand, hurling all his magical power at the protections surrounding staff. He was no longer going the safe route. He no longer cared about being safe. He would smash through the protections surrounding the staff or die trying because death in here was better than death by torture through Yarran.

The staff glowed white as Marek’s magic struck its protections. Marek smashed through the third barrier, then the fourth, fifth, and sixth. He was halfway through the seventh when he felt himself begin to tire.

“No,” Marek said. Like in the battle at the edge of the Huzha Desert, he felt gloriously alive, like the king he was meant to be. With the staff, he could carve out his own kingdom as he saw fit. By Azmar’s Ruin, I could conquer the world.

Throwing caution to the winds, Marek kept channeling. He could feel the wand in his hand warming up again like it had in the Huzha. Like then, he didn’t care. Another barrier fell, and then two more. Marek’s breaths were coming fast, his chest pumping like a bellows. He was covered in sweat, and he raised a sweaty hand to wipe his forehead as he kept channeling.

“STOP!” Ako was now screaming at the top of her lungs. “YOU MUST STOP, MAREK!”

“Never,” Marek slurred as two more barriers fell. Why was he feeling so weak when he had never felt stronger? Marek shook off his dizziness and kept going, words flowing out of his mouth like a torrent of rain.

“I must have it,” Marek said as he kept pushing into the staff’s protections. He cackled as another barrier gave way. “I must have the staff. I will claim it. Now. I must claim it. I will get it. I must. It will be mine.”

“MINE!” Marek shouted, pushing as hard as he could again. The buzzing in his ears was nearly all that he could hear. There was a crack, and Marek felt a burn in his hand as the flow of power was almost halted entirely. Gritting his teeth, he pushed his Essence into it. It didn’t matter if he aged, only that he had the staff in his hands. That was all that mattered in the end.

Something grabbed him, and instinctively Marek began to use that as his Focus. There was a scream, but it had a note of raw panic that Marek had only heard on the battlefield. He turned to see that Ako was holding onto him. She was aging rapidly, turning from a young woman to someone ten years older, then twenty. Her hair was greying. Wrinkles appeared on her face. Her forehead was becoming lined, and she was slowly shrinking, stooping as the weight of her years was suddenly pressing down upon her.

“NO!” Marek roared, trying to stop the flow of magic. He couldn’t. Like in his dream, he had overextended himself and was caught in the barrier’s trap. He was forced to keep going until the barrier had taken what it wanted.

Marek struggled, watching disbelievingly as Ako aged into an old crone. She was staring at him open-mouthed, her bright brown eyes dulled by age. She was struggling to speak, but she couldn’t. A single tear rolled down her face.

“No,” Marek repeated weakly. “Ako…”

Ako shook her head. Her grip on his arm was firm, but it somehow became firmer as her fingers tightened. Marek only noticed now that the channeling had finally stopped, the barrier having taken enough to satisfy itself for the moment.

“Not… your fault…” Ako said, all but gasping out the words. Every breath she took sounded like a death rattle. What hair she had left was white, with the rest having fallen off onto the floor. She was skeletal-thin. He gently laid her down on the floor. She was practically swimming in her clothes as her eyes closed lethargically.

“Ako,” Marek said, gripping her shoulders. He reached with his thumb and wiped away her tear. Her skin was rough like bark. “Ako, please…”

Ako’s eyes opened. Her eyes were still dull, but there was a faint glint of intelligence in them. She raised a hand, her arm shaking from the effort, and ran a thumb down the side of Marek’s face. Marek’s shoulders shook from repressed emotions as he Ako’s lips curled upwards, and then gasped out a final breath.

“No…”

Marek let go of Ako and stumbled back away from her. Ako was dead. Through his greed and arrogance, he had killed her. Ako was dead, and it was his fault. His sister was dead.

Marek screamed. He grabbed his hair and began to pull at it, trying to rip it out. He kept screaming until he couldn’t, and then he fell to the cold stone floor. Marek curled up in a ball, weakly sobbing as he crawled to Ako and curled around her.

“I’m so sorry,” Marek sobbed to Ako’s corpse. My fault. All my fault. He wanted to kill himself to end this pain. His heart felt like it was going to be ripped out of his chest. Marek screamed again, but it came out more like a groan as his voice gave out.

“Marek.”

Marek shook his head, curling up around Ako’s body more tightly. She was still warm. “Go away,” Marek rasped. He scrubbed at his face, and his hand came back soaked. “Leave me here to die or kill me. I deserve nothing less.”

“I won’t leave you here to die, Marek,” the voice said. It was patient and caring and full of love, like a mother to her beloved child.

Marek looked up from the floor groggily to see Claire standing above him. She crouched, going to one knee. She ran her fingers through his hair, and Marek closed his eyes at the feeling.

“Get up, Marek,” Claire said. “I need you to get up.”

Marek gently disentangled himself from Ako. It took a great deal of effort, but eventually, Marek was on his feet, swaying before stumbling back to the wall. He stood there, leaning against the wall and staring at the other wall. He didn’t want to look at either the staff, Claire, or Ako. He didn’t want to look at anything.

Claire stepped into view, and Marek took in a shuddering breath. For once, she wasn’t smiling, looking deathly serious as she took his hands into hers. She wore the same see-through white robes as she always did and looked as delectable as ever. Marek tried to pull away, but her grip tightened, and he found himself pulled closer to her.

“Your work is not yet done, Marek,” Claire said. They were close again, too close. Marek wanted to push her aside and to run away, away from Claire, the staff, and this Diev-forsaken castle. Instead, he stared at her in disbelief.

“My work is not done?” Marek croaked. He shook his head, wincing as his entire body ached at the movement. Everything throbbed. If he fell to the floor and closed his eyes, he probably wouldn’t wake again for half a day at least. “I don’t have a wand, Claire. There are still many barriers surrounding the staff, and Ako—” Marek turned away, unable to finish. He had killed Ako through his own stupidity and arrogance. He should have taken his chances with Yarran days ago. No price was worth losing Ako, not even a staff made of Dominion Wood. I’m so sorry, Ako. Forgive me.

Claire brushed her hands along Marek’s face and down to his chin. Turning Marek’s head back toward her, Marek shuddered at her smile. It was sympathetic, but there was a glint in her eyes that made Marek want to run and hide.

“You are so close, Marek,” Claire whispered. “So very close. Do you still want the staff?”

Marek opened his mouth to protest violently, but Claire shifted again so that she moved even closer to him. Her breasts were pressing into his chest. He wrapped his arms around her instinctively.

“I do,” Marek admitted hoarsely. “I want it, even now.”

“And there’s nothing wrong with that,” Claire breathed. Her lips were close to Marek’s, and they brushed against his. “There’s nothing wrong with taking what you want.”

“Help me, then,” Marek said. He couldn’t remember why he had been so upset. Nothing mattered in the face of his goal. “Help me claim the staff.”

“I will,” Claire said, smiling broadly.

Marek kissed her.