By Kosta’s estimates, they’d tracked Clymere’s ashen sparrow—she’d dubbed it ‘Sparky’—across the mountains for an hour now. It propelled itself swiftly on smoky wings, pushing them hard enough that Kosta found the pace quite demanding, but he was too excited to complain. He knew Clymere was weary from shaping the creature, yet she bore on without a sour word.

He asked breathless questions instead.

“Can you form specific patterns in the smoke? It can be rather beautiful. Mesmerizing.”

“Haven’t tried,” Clymere said with a yawn.

“Does Headsman Linus know? He might want to—”

“Nope. Want to have it trained first. I’ll tell him if it comes up.”

“Will it burn past nightfall?”

The last question was the most practical, so the tired Clymere dignified it with a proper response.

“We have another hour at best.” Clymere shrugged as they climbed yet another peak. His legs burned with every step. This mountain was the largest yet, far from where they normally ventured on their expeditions, but Clymere had patrolled in the wild lands beyond. She told him that a small valley was cradled between this peak and the next.

Kosta was eager to rest his legs a bit on the downward slope. He was going to be sore for days!

“I only invested so much of my flame into Sparky. Once that starts to fade, Sparky will come home to mama. Or maybe not,” Clymere hedged. “I’m actually not sure how many more times I can bring Sparky back. He’s… fading.”

He? Kosta shook his head. Leave it to Clymere to personify a reanimated ash bird. “How many times have you rekindled it?” He rolled his eyes at the stubborn look Clymere tossed him. “Ugh, how many times have you rekindled Sparky.”

“Five? Six? I can’t remember,” Clymere admitted. “The first time was accidental. The second and third was just confirming that I could replicate the magic. But that bird was more bone than ash at first, believe it or not. I burnt it quickly so that it wouldn’t feel any pain, but I wasn’t that thorough. Every time I bring it back, the fires take a little more from it. More ash, less bone. Less than what it was before.”

It made sense in Kosta’s mind. When he worked, he invested power into a thing. Clymere’s power always bore a cost. It was ravenous. Her fiery magic consumed everything it could with its greedy tongues, be it her power or whatever it brushed against.

She’d experimented for a time with creating flame that would sustain itself forever, providing it with an initial spark and then training the magic to devour the rest from its victim to burn ever onward. Such a flame had failed, though she told Kosta that Headsman Linus thought the theory was sound. But even that had to devour its fuel source.

“So Sparky is on its last legs. Have you put any thought into what poor creature you’ll incinerate and bring back next?”

“Hey!” Clymere protested. She clutched her spear tighter, though at the moment it was more of a glorified walking stick. “I was trying to help!”

Kosta cast a glance at the ashen bird as it fluttered overhead. Now that Clymere mentioned it, the flames that sustained it did appear a little faint… “Remind me not to ask for your help anymore.”

“I’m helping you right now!” Clymere turned to wave her spear threateningly at him, although she was too disciplined to bring the tip anywhere near Kosta. “Believe me, you’ll be the first to know if I think you need a little more assistance.”

“Point taken.” Kosta looked pointedly at her bronze spear tip with a dumb grin. Clymere groaned, looked at him with disgust, and focused back on ascending the peak. They weren’t trying to actually reach the top, but their map did display a safe route around midway up.

Whatever retort she had was silenced as they rounded a curve and came to the other side of the mountain. He cast an errant glance down into the valley and felt a stupid smile carve across his face.

“Phaetra!” Kosta’s eyes gleamed. Fields upon fields of phaetra down below! The sun must fall upon this valley year round! Few trees dotted the large ravine, so the rosy-gold stone was free to sip on the sun’s bounty each and every day. “Look at all that! This is a motherlode.”

Much of the blazing phaetra was young. Even the greedy scavengers who had picked the rest of Dytifrourá’s mountains clean would find it unready to scavenge. But a few enormous clumps, stacked high upon itself like thick moss, rested in the valley’s heart. That would set him up for months… no, years!

He stared hungrily at it, thoughts of the gorgeous works that he could reveal within the stone filling his mind. Such a fortune might send him to Argyropolis years ahead of schedule!

“Good boy!” Clymere sang up to Sparky. It fluttered a bit with its waning flames, unable to fly as high as it could before. Kosta doubted that it had any real intelligence beyond the directive that Clymere had imbued into it, but he thought it seemed pleased with her praise nonetheless.

The reason for its creation had been satisfied. Not all were so fortunate.

His exhaustion was temporarily forgotten. Kosta pushed forward with renewed vigor. He swiftly clambered over stumps and passed overturned logs, gnarled roots, thorny brambles, and all manner of vegetative obstacles without a care. Clymere followed closely behind, cursing as brambles ate at her exposed calves.

It wasn’t long before they stumbled upon a narrow goat path that led into a treacherous descent that would lead them down into the narrow valley. One missed step promised a twisted ankle at best, a fall down the mountainside at worst.

He didn’t mind such terrain. Kosta was a son of Dytifrourá. Steep slopes, sheer cliffs, and craggy stone were his birthright.

“Wait!” Clymere’s powerful hand snagged his chiton before he could follow the path downward.

“What is it?” Kosta asked impatiently. Didn’t she realize their good fortune? They’d just stumbled upon a veritable field of phaetra! Even now it blazed beneath the sunlight, searing with an inner core of radiant flame. Oh, the wonders he could wrought with such a large bloom…

This was the find of the decade!

“Tread carefully,” Clymere warned. “I don’t trust this. It’s a little too convenient, don’t you think?”

Clymere’s skepticism carved right through his maddened enthusiasm. He felt as if someone had just tossed a basin of ice water over him. “You think it’s a trap?”

“We aren’t that far from Dytifrourá,” Clymere said slowly. Her eyes were sharp beneath her helm’s bronze brow. She pursed her lips. “This lode must have been sitting here untouched for at least a year or two, probably more. Even if scavengers haven’t picked it clean, someone should have tried to sell the location. There’s a small fortune right here for the picking.”

He frowned, torn between his blind desire to rush down and stuff his pack with as much of the precious phaetra as he could carry and his deep trust in Clymere’s instincts. Clymere could be goofy and reckless, but she’d been tempered by long years of scraps and endless training. She’d paid close attention to those lessons, then lived to apply them.

Not all of Dytifrourá’s soldiers were so lucky.

“It doesn’t matter,” Kosta said. “I can’t begin work on the keystone without phaetra. Without the keystone, Dytifrourá’s wards are rotting. We need this.”

Kosta might have been guilty of making the situation out to be more urgent than it really was, but there was truth in his words. Dytifrourá’s defenses were still in acceptable condition, although they were steadily bleeding strength as the previous keystone weathered.

It was a priority, however. Headsman Linus had been quite clear about that.

Clymere’s eyes sharpened as she stared down into the phaetra valley. He awaited her decision. Part of her willingness to join him on these expeditions included the caveat that she was in charge when it came to risks like these. Kosta was fine to push and prod in an attempt to persuade her, but Clymere had the final say.

She finally made her decision. “We move quickly. How fast can you harvest the phaetra that you need for the keystone?”

“Five minutes.” Kosta pointed out a particularly thick bloom with an especially lovely rosy radiance about it. The keystone required an enormous capacity, and this was the best fit. “I could process it faster, but I don’t want to run the risk of damaging the core.”

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His sister nodded. “I think we can pull it off,” she said. “I’ll stand guard and investigate to see if I can flush anything out. If you see anything, let me know immediately. Understood?”

Kosta quickly agreed to her terms, aware that Clymere was only willing to take such risks because of their proximity to Dytifrourá. Fort Phylax was situated between two great mountain passes and guarded against the worst of the westward terrors. Dytifrourá had tamed much of their own lands in the past two decades, and a great deal of power had been invested into the grand bastion against the madness that had survived the Westscour centuries ago.

Nothing too terrible would make it past Fort Phylax, though some monsters still skulked in the mountains’ shadow.

“So we run if we see anything?”

“Unless it’s just an ornery badger or something.”

“Got it.”

With that, they climbed the treacherous slope down into the ravine. The goat path was overgrown, terribly narrow, and winded seemingly at random to make a complex network. Sparky fluttered overhead, flagging as the last of its strength began to wither, and it circled nearer to Clymere.

At least the ravine held some natural appeal to admire as they descended to the valley below. It was long and narrow, relatively sheltered from the sun and elements except for the gaping patch that was so ideal for phaetra formation. Its vast walls expanded outward as they rose to allow the light to spill inward.

A dozen similar goat paths all led down, though most were far wilder and risky to traverse than the relatively safe trail that they’d discovered. Great trees towered over them, buds of new life sprouting from their branches. Aspen, pine, even a lone dendrac sapling gleaming like brass in the sun…

While the area that they’d descended to was well lit, shade drenched the deeper portions. The normal scents of the forest wafted into his nose, stronger and starker now that he was surrounded by it on all sides and above as well. Earthy soil, fresh pine needles, the moist scent that marked a nearby creek, and a dozen others rose in his perception. But beneath it all was a hint of something ugly, something—

“No daydreaming! Let’s go.”

Kosta nodded and hurried over to the phaetra. It felt sinful to literally step on the vast field of precious stone as he made his way to the largest outcropping, but he pushed on nonetheless. Rose-gold stone crumbled beneath his sandals. The phaetra was still fragile in its juvenile state.

He comforted himself with the knowledge that they could mark this location when they left, then return with a dozen men to harvest the precious stone without having to worry about a potential ambush.

All that mattered was that he got his cut.

Sun-spawned radiance blazed all around as the phaetra blooms sipped upon the golden rays. Kosta longed to cut each and every flake away to stuff his pockets with. While the larger cores and blooms were incredible for heavy duty construction and weaving in protections, the smaller pieces made a fine choice for jewelry and other trinkets. Few other materials made it so easy to imbue a self-sustaining effect.

He was no silversmith, but Papa might pay handsomely for a few. Perhaps he’d even deign to teach Kosta some of his tricks. It would be a good learning experience if nothing else, and he could always find other uses. A fine statue of marble, marked by brilliant phaetra eyes that lit the room—

“What did I just say?” Clymere asked, voice tight. She constantly scanned the valley. “No fantasizing! Work now, make me something nice later. Got it?”

Kosta snorted as he knelt atop the stone. He ignored the rock prodding his exposed skin and quickly set to work.

Grey magic filled his hand, shaped into a cutting edge, and he carefully worked away at the phaetra bloom’s thin stalk. Kosta couldn’t help but admire the gorgeous hue of the magic-laden stone and wished nothing more than to stare into its depths for hours. The phaetra promised secrets. No, more than that: Inspiration! Potential!

Years of his life.

Such dreams would have to wait. He sensed Clymere’s wary gaze upon him, though it soon left to rake over the ravine’s walls in search of whatever threat she sensed. Clymere stepped past Kosta and watched the distance, spear at the ready. She moved quickly to survey the area while he worked.

Her clear anxiety made Kosta cut faster. There was no way he would risk damaging the enormous phaetra core—it was the size of his fist!—but he didn’t allow himself to indulge in his usual meticulousness.

Clymere was right. Perhaps he was just feeling paranoid thanks to Clymere’s actions, but Kosta had the strangest sensation that he was being watched. It wasn’t long before the ravine and its motherlode of phaetra no longer seemed so welcoming or so beautiful.

Rather than a simple stroke of good fortune, the lucky find seemed treacherous. Every good trap needed bait.

Clymere had recognized this immediately, but Kosta wasn’t so martially inclined. It wasn’t until the walls of the ravine felt rather like those of a prison that it really struck him. Kosta mentally traced their route out of here, ready to run at a moment’s notice. He’d listened, but part of Kosta had dismissed Clymere’s warnings as her usual paranoia.

It wasn’t long before that paranoia was warranted.

“Oh hell! Human bones!” Clymere hissed just as he finished cutting away the stalk of the phaetra core. It was so warm in his hands, like holding his palms at the perfect distance from a fire, and eased his fears even with the dread that weighed down upon him like a thick blanket. “We’re leaving. Let’s go!”

He barely had time to stow away the heavy phaetra core in his pack before he was off. Clymere watched his back, spear raised and her open hand prepared to cast a great spray of fire—

Wham. Wham.

Kosta would have to thank Clymere for forcing him into spars all these years. His hard-earned reflexes were all that saved him as he sensed something crossing a vast distance in the blink of an eye. A Projected barrier was all that saved him.

He still staggered backward from the force. Kosta gawked at the sight of twin spikes embedded in his shield, each the length of his forearm and ending with a deadly point sharp as any arrow. They were rather reminiscent of an overgrown hedgehog’s spines.

“Kosta!” Clymere roared, a lance of flame bursting from her speartip. She allowed black plumes of smoke to explode from her palm, shrouding Kosta from their stalker. It cleared away soon enough, but Kosta heard thump thump thump as more spines hammered into his shield with enough force to send him stumbling. His forearm ached.

Panic filled him. His barrier would crack soon!

The smokescreen had offered enough time to rebuild the shield, although he didn’t think that the trick would work again. Whatever hunted them could fling those spikes with unerring accuracy.

They continuously backed away to the goat path, but Kosta wasn’t so optimistic about their escape. Clymere might be able to clamber out alive thanks to her armor and superior strength, but he suspected that their hunter would pick him off easily. Even his Projections wouldn’t last forever against those spikes.

Kosta whispered as such to Clymere. Her knuckles tightened around her spear until they were white.

“Then we turn and fight. Escape if you see the chance. Understood?”

So he readied himself. Kosta held his Projection, uncaring of the slight drain upon his power so long as he didn’t get a giant quill through his throat. The exhaustion of climbing peak after peak seemed irrelevant now. His limbs filled with resolute strength as his body readied to battle.

That didn’t stop him from recoiling as their hunter dredged itself out of a well-hidden cave less than a hundred feet away. The subterranean tunnel was shielded by thick vegetation, its mouth mostly blocked by a great boulder, but the deadly creature which emerged still had a good view of the entire ravine.

A misshapen beast dragged itself from its den. Heavy paws scraped the earth and accompanied a slight wheeze as the rest of its enormous frame came into view.

Aretans above, it was ugly!

The beast’s body was that of an enormous lion, long and lean, almost gaunt, and the thin patchy fur that blanketed its shape was more tawny than gold. A dark mane guarded its neck, grown not from fur but from protective quills to ward off bites and blows.

A long, wicked scorpion’s tail flicked upward behind it, so fast that it was little more than a blur at first. The tail stretched luxuriously to its full length— perhaps seven feet long—and revealed a dozen more of those spikes atop its barb. Steady drops of vile venom drip drip dripped from the wicked hook at the end of its tail and landed upon the forest floor. Leaves and stone boiled away, devoured by the cruel toxin.

That was magical, no doubt about it.

“It’s wounded,” Clymere murmured. He checked and soon realized that she spoke true. The monster favored one side heavily. At first its angle hid the injury from view, but as it shifted to leer at them he was able to see that one of its feline legs, its front left, had been removed at the knee, probably ripped off in a territorial dispute. Half the stump was ragged and the other half a bit cleaner.

What sort of beast had managed to inflict such a wound on this terrible creature?!

Then Kosta made the mistake of looking from its leonine body to its face. That was the worst of all. Ugly.

Rather than a dumb beast watching them with ravenous eyes, it was a man. He watched them hungrily. His face was bare of tawny fur, kissed brown by the sun, and just as gaunt as the beastly body. The man’s skin was stretched painfully taut across his skull, so tight that his sharp cheekbones threatened to tear through, and his golden eyes were set in deep black hollows.

They were so bright.

So intelligent.

So cruel.

He—no, it—grinned back, delighted with their presence, and Kosta felt a little sick as rows upon rows of wickedly sharp teeth revealed themselves in the recesses of its maw. They fell back deep into the blackness of its throat, twisting in a corkscrew and curved like cruel fish hooks.

Kosta could only imagine the agony of its victims as their flesh was scraped away. What a terrible fate.

“Fuck.” Clymere growled.

“Fuck.” Kosta agreed.

Sparky’s crackling song whistled overhead. Kosta imagined that it was whistling, Fuck, as well.

Kosta had never witnessed one in the wild, but Kosta knew this twisted feline shape, the chimeric mismatch of man and lion and scorpion. It boasted paws mighty enough to knock a man’s head off with a single blow. Its scorpion tail would flick and leave a man’s head rolling on the floor, or impaled a hundred paces away. Its mind was canny as a man’s and vicious as a beast’s.

They’d found themselves in the den of a manticore.