Shift.

It’s all about shifting focus.

High magic is more than concentration. It is to understand the object so dearly, so intuitively, that its properties are not only clear but so clear that anything else not part of it is blurred and discarded.

Elemental affinity is beyond clear, it is understanding so deep it is deeper than bones. Understanding in the very self-being itself.

From Elemental affinity comes the ability to manipulate the force. While wizards could be infinitely more versatile than a Fae who used an element, they could never understand their subject so deeply and clearly.

So standing in the middle of the compass rose in the Dungeon of pale and fading yellow walls, the copies of the rooms each an unknown compass point, the former Heirling of the Red Sword breathed out, and let go of his control of the sputtering flames of the fire-flower.

Darkness fell, the lighting rod overhead flickering in and out as though it had not expected to be the sole provider of illumination once more, and the noise drew near. Lashing out, fast and swift, tongues gouging and shifting limbs reaching for the Servant.

Eyes half closed in the sporadic dimness, Daniel held the lightning in the bottle, the stopped crystal goblet held in loose hands.

The rushing groan of metal on metal of the long-limbed creatures joined the cacophony from the passageway that was no longer blocked by light.

Then Daniel breathed in, sharp and fast, his senses tied with the force of nature.

And as the world around him drew near to him in crazed shadowy violence, the metal-limbed featureless creatures, the newly spawned dread beasts, the other things that hid from sight, amidst all of that, Daniel felt as though the world seemed to stop for him.

It did not stop. But he could feel so much and process so much in that half second it seemed an age passed around him.

Lightning was everywhere. But invisible. It swirled and shifted. It was in a different form, one that no one even acknowledged. Others had rejected Daniel’s thoughts and beliefs: How could an element have another form? Ice and water were separate elements, even though ice gave way to water and vice versa. No one had listened to him before.

But here, at this moment, he could feel they were tied. Lightning could be made on a small scale, called electricity. But there was another, secret side to it.

And it made metal move.

There was never much metal around for that to be useful. Of the metal the Fae did use, few of it was able to be made into a compass. Thin, dull, brittle metal it was. With the power of lightning, Elswith had made copper, a metal used for pots and pans, attract other metals. Without lightning, copper was never sensitive to the pull of the North. There was never a copper needle used for a compass. But that changed when electric power was pushed through the wire.

It wasn’t exactly his eyes that saw it, but at the same time, it was.

Around him swam the world.

Loops and arching streams of…light but not light, swam around him. The metal-long-limbed creatures had large fields around them, thousands of strands of not-light arching between them. They were grouped together into fields.

Some strands were focused inward, as though it was ingrown into the metal, reaching inward but shifting through the solid material as if it was intangible. But others reached out, connecting with loose hanging motes of not-light energy and arching upward, like crazy strands of hair.

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Daniel smiled, briefly. In many ways, his lack of power allowed him to see the not-light more clearly. Before, his own power pushed it away.

The first dread beast reached him while he was still searching for North.

Daniel had trained for years in footwork.

All the swordsfaeship in the world was worthless without footwork. So as a multi-appendaged creature rushed him, he shifted backward, loose and dancing.

He had to stay loose. Lightning wanted to make things constrict and tight. To control it, he had to be loose and free. He needed to tune in long enough with the not-light all around everything.

Swarms of strands and fields flashed and flew in the sky.

Big field, in the sky. Millions and millions of not-light strands pulsing and pulling. That’s what he needed. Where was it? Would he discover it? He needed to see further, beyond the room. He was starting to see beyond the room, the swirling shifting fields outside.

A second being reached him to attack, a long-limbed creature.

Daniel kept loose, shifting forward then retreating at the last second, the dread beast and the metal creatures colliding.

He could see that the dread beasts themselves also had the shifting arcing not-light fields around them. If he could fine-tune this in combat…he may be able to locate enemies who were hiding in cover. Exciting.

He just had to survive this first, then the first round of the Game, then the subsequent rounds. Then defeat the person who stole his position, then settle matters with both his own old faction and his old enemies who had colluded against him, and then complete his maneuvering to be free of his Lordly Father’s terrifying influence. After all that, during campaigns, seeing the outlines of potential enemies would really help.

Swirling fields arced above him. Not-lights all perpendicular and crazy, fields not touching but pushing each other around.

A metal-limbed creature rushed behind him, trying to pin him between two other metal creatures.

Footwork would only take him so far.

Contact was needed.

He started to tense, and for a dangerous moment he almost unaligned himself to the lightning in the bottle. Stay loose. Finish up. He could not evade for long, and once the horde caught up to him, fancy footwork or not, he would be overwhelmed. Stay loose.

So Daniel risked it. He moved, one hand releasing the bottle to intercept the coming attack. His right exposed hand twisted forward like a snake, deflecting the metal-limbed creature’s grabbing advance. It was at least covered with metal, as he had suspected.

But it must not have been iron, for his flesh did not burn and smolder. More than once as a child he had learned to be careful in touching loose items. Those wounds had to heal slowly over weeks, little magic could be used to heal a wound inflicted by iron.

If he could touch his attackers, his odds had just improved.

The metal-limbed creature pivoted, trying to change its momentum. And it was strong.

Good thing he had learned to fight without needing to match force with force.

Daniel dropped his center of gravity, pushing the metal creature past him. He kept it in his inner circumference, staying so close that he could strike it and it would not be able to regain its position. Any fight in the world could go away, there was always an escape. He had no weapon, either a narrow dagger to attack the joints of the creature, or a heavy hammer to smash and dent it.

Stay loose, he reminded himself. One hand was still touching the lightning in the bottle, still feeling the world through its waves and affinities.

But he had his own strength. So as it turned and Daniel directed its steps forward, he then followed it like a shadow, until its footing was slack, and he shoved its shoulder hard. Top-heavy, the metal creature stumbled into yet another metal-limbed creature. He could see it both with his eyes and also the fields of the two creatures colliding and scattering about, like the fields were pushed away.

The two disrupted fields shifted then settled, and their overall flows reestablished.

The same way.

All the fields seemed like they were ribbons in a very very mild current. And it took the two large fields crashing into each other for Daniel to be able to perceive the difference between the disrupted state and the original state.

North!

He had north, which was behind him. He slid across the damp beige carpet, footwork loose and flowing around attacks. The numbers were increasing. But he had his heading.

He was now facing what he believed was North.

East was always right of North.

He turned one quarter, facing an identical room.

If he was right, this was East, and he was facing the Eastern Red Room.

Well, he better be right, because the number of dread beasts and narrow, long-limbed creatures was increasing.

“Eastern Red Room! Be ye there, this low-trodden has no chances to spare!” He said to the seemingly non-existent Law of Fae, old Lordling habits dying hard. And he raced forward as the true hoards of chaos dread, metal-limbed creatures, and the other things that were hiding in the shadows, surged in. He let go of his connection with the lightning in the bottle and charged into the uncertain future before him.