It was another moment of certain death.

From my prostrated position on the floor, it seemed inevitable. Looking back, the voice had never seemed entirely panicked. In fact, it had seemed quite certain that a solution to my Danefer problem would soon unfold.

Yet I felt none of that reassurance as his blade lunged forward. All I had was a certainty that this was my final moment. I had the tiniest flicker of regret that I hadn’t fled from Danefer rather than confronting him. He had nearly matched Magneblade—a Griidlord many levels stronger and many decades more experienced than I. But I’d killed Hordesmen, slain fiends of seemingly indomitable strength. How could one man stand against a god such as I?

The blade plunged just as the dust suspended in the air recoiled from a sudden motion. It was too fast to see. One moment there was Danefer—there was certain death before me. The next moment, in the barest flash of purple, he was gone. My ears registered the sharp impact of something hard striking flesh, but the action was too fleeting for my eyes to follow.

Masonry exploded as Danefer’s form, tangled with the shining purple shape, smashed into the wall. The streaking figure had burst through the open doorway, sending dust blooming through the air and blocks clattering to the ground. A beam of sunlight speared into the space from the damage, its path traced by the clouds of debris. For a moment, I was hypnotized by the clouds pulsing and swirling along the beam of light, almost organic, like the fleshy surface of a jellyfish undulating and pulsating.

Then I was on my feet, my sword in hand. The dust began to part, and I became aware of a figure standing beside me.

A Griidlord. The armor was purple, trimmed with gold. The form was slight, lithe, coiled like a snake. The hands were claws.

This was an Arrow.

An Arrow from Minneapolis.

“Racquel?” I couldn’t keep the shock from my voice. “What are you doing—”

“Shh,” she hissed at me. “Later. We have a bigger problem right now.”

As the dust thinned, the glowing line of Danefer’s sword, dimmed but visible through the haze, appeared first.

He came at me, using the dust for cover, his sword a relentless demon flurrying at any point it could find. My sword covered and parried the attacks. He was pressing harder than ever, some of his reserve for self-preservation abandoned to something else. Rage at the surprise assault? Desperation to slay me before his chance slipped away?

As I held him off, Danefer's side was exposed to Racquel. She lunged, her clawed hands flashing in the light from the broken wall, cleaving through the swirling dust. He turned to block her attack, and I didn’t hesitate to step into the opening.

My sword missed his neck by a hair. A thin red line appeared—enough to remind him that, relics or not, his flesh was mortal, and he could die like anyone.

He leapt back from us, unnaturally far, landing easily at the other end of the room. I blinked in surprise at the feat.

He seemed more agitated now, twitching with nervous energy. "You sent her, I suppose, Enki? Think this will save your little prince? I will set the people free, Enki!” His voice took on a strange, melodic pitch, almost like the wail of a crying child, rising distortedly as he finished each phrase.

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"I’ll best you, Enki! I’ll best him and anyone else you pick as your key. I’ll bring your terror to an end. It’ll take more than some toddling girl like her to stop me."

He pointed his sword at Racquel. She muttered, “I think he’s talking about me,” sounding more tired than angry.

Danefer let his sword sway until it pointed back at me. I held tightly to POWER and readied my SHIELD, prepared to pulse at the slightest sign of an attack.

“Tiberius,” he said, “you can still leave the suit. I have no desire to slay you, but as long as you walk in the suit—as long as you’re Enki’s creature—I have no choice. If you come to me without the suit, then I will protect you. I’ll teach you. I’ll…” He trailed off, his mad eyes darting, as if debating whether to finish his thought. Instead, he shook his head and looked at me with intense regret. "I’ll come for you. I have no choice. It’s not personal; I take no pleasure in it. But you have to know that as long as you’re his tool, I have to end you. For humanity."

Racquel had been circling the room, trying to get an angle to attack him from one side while leaving his other side open to me. Danefer rolled his eyes at her movement. His hand flashed, and colorful smoke erupted around him, filling the room in an instant.

I took a step back, anticipating another attack.

Racquel cursed. “This smoke… it’s a relic or something. I can’t see through it.”

“Of course you can’t,” I muttered. “It’s thick as gravy.”

“No," she replied. "I have advanced sight. I can see through smoke and thin barriers, but… not this."

“Listen,” I said, focusing through the chaos.

She stopped. I knew she understood my instruction to mean using HEARING. I did the same. The sounds of battle continued beyond the room, but they had reached a lumbering ebb—fewer clashes of steel, fewer bodies left alive to scream.

I could hear my heartbeat clearly with HEARING. I could hear Racquel’s, fluttering like a butterfly. But there was no heartbeat for Danefer, no sound of boots, breathing, movement. He was gone, just as he had disappeared from the battle with Magneblade.

“Come on,” Racquel said. “No point hanging around in here in case he’s got another trick up his sleeve.”

I followed her back through the smashed doorway and into the sunlight. The smoke from the house poured out behind us in thick, rolling clouds that seemed almost solid, like cream turned to gas.

Dirk stood nearby, his power axe over his shoulder. He dipped his head with familiarity to Racquel. “Lady Moonclaw.”

She let her helm peel back, revealing her ivory skin and those intensely blue eyes. She winked at him and said, “Banished Burghsman.”

This provoked a peal of laughter from Dirk and some nearby warriors. An old, hulking Burghsman laughed even as he drove his huge steel axe into the struggling form of a Green Man pinned beneath his feet.

Dirk eyed us both for a moment, then turned to stalk through the ruins, hunting survivors, gathering his men, and taking stock of the battle's toll. I looked around. There were bodies everywhere, but not a single one wore the rough leathers and furs of the Burghsmen. It hardly seemed possible that they’d taken down a larger force without losing a single man, even with the element of surprise and superior skill.

I glanced back at the longhouse, smoke still billowing from every opening. “Do you think he’s gone?” I asked.

The experience unnerved me—my first defeat since winning the suit, the closeness of my brush with death, and Danefer’s haunting promise.

Racquel’s body had unwound from the deadly tension of a coiled snake ready to strike. Now she slouched in a liquid, languid posture, one I’d seen before. It wasn’t exactly ladylike, but something about her confident ease, the way her hips thrust, her shoulders cocked, and the curves of her armor presented themselves, made me not mind.

She said, “He’s gone. He had no chance against two of us. And he values his life and his mission too much to make a martyr of himself.”

I looked at her, curious. “You sound almost like you know him.”

Racquel arched an eyebrow, that endlessly devilish smile playing on her lips. “Oh, I know him.”

How small the world felt that she’d know him too. Then again, if he had an interest in Griidlords, that population was small enough.

“How do you know him?” I asked.

She shook her head, her silence answer enough.

“How can you be sure he’s gone?” I pressed.

She cocked her head to one side, baring the curve of her pale neck to the light. “The Green Man doesn’t take chances.”