Natalia arrived next, carrying a bulky case that clinked loudly as she set it down. “I brought everything I had to hand. Has it got worse?”

Kai wordlessly showed her his arm, and Natalia inhaled sharply as she saw the dark veins, sharing a worried look with Verdan.

“Don’t worry, I have some ideas, but let’s wait for the others,” Verdan said, passing her a cup of coffee and putting the case of potions to one side.

The four of them waited quietly, snacking on the few remaining biscuits until eventually a heavy rap came on the door and Gwen sprang up to answer it.

“I’m sorry that I took so long. We were sending messages out,” Zhalia said, stepping inside and off to one side as Branwen entered behind her. “Branwen offered her aid as a Cleric, assuming that this is a healing issue?”

“It is,” Verdan said, nodding to Kai. “Kai was injured in the fight with a Gormagyr’s Thrall.”

“Cursed things,” Branwen growled angrily. “My brother mentioned you encountered one. My thanks for killing it.”

“Actually, Kai killed the first one,” Verdan said, nodding to the Sorcerer. “The second was more of a group effort.”

“It sacrificed all of its Thralls to gather enough energy to power a single, incredibly dangerous Thrall. Whatever that thing was, it was so much more than the others.” Kai explained, Branwen nodding along with approval.

“I’ve heard of such things in the past. It must have been the pinnacle of what it could make, or else it would have had the power to keep it active along with the others. That is a problem for another day, though. What is it you wish us to do with Kai’s arm?”

“Before we get to that. Gwen, do you remember if we cleaned the wound?”

Gwen blinked in surprise, but nodded. “Yes, I remember you cutting into the shoulder to make sure it was even and clean.”

“Yes, I do as well, but what about the other side?”

“I don’t know,” Gwen said, staring off to one side in obvious thought. “No, I don’t think we did. Is that a problem?”

“Well, we’ve cleansed the corruption several times, but it keeps coming back. Adrienne said something earlier that made me think, what if that’s because there’s something in there that keeps corrupting the arm?”

“Like with the Thane,” Kai said, looking a little queasy at the idea.

“Exactly, but that poses a problem.”

“How to look and find out,” Gwen said, shooting Kai a worried look as she reached over to rest her hand on his leg reassuringly.

“That’s why you want us,” Zhalia said, moving around to get a better look at Kai’s injured arm. “You’re going to open him up and look.”

“Potentially,” Verdan said quickly, before Gwen could object. “I was hoping one of you could figure out a better way first. One that didn’t require any surgery.”

Branwen frowned thoughtfully. “I could narrow down its presence. I can’t get it out, but I can confirm it is there and roughly where on the arm.”

“Yes, that would be great,” Verdan said, clapping his hands together. “How soon can you do it?”

Branwen laughed and stepped closer to Kai, motioning for him to hold his arm up so she could lay her hands around his upper arm. “Lord of the Earth, lend me your guidance to find that which corrupts and does not belong.”

A slight glow of gold leaked out from Kai’s arm as Branwen ran her hands along his arm, eventually stopping at the shoulder joint and nodding. “Here, there’s a shard of something dark and foul within.”

Verdan breathed deep and let it out slowly as he considered their options. “Thank you, Branwen. That narrows down our options nicely. In the end, though, this decision is yours, Kai.”

“Alright, what are those choices?” Kai asked, reaching down to grip Gwen’s hand with his uninjured one, despite his calm expression.

“We can amputate your arm, remove whatever the issue is, and attempt to reattach it. Or we can try to cut out just that piece of bone and then use healing spells to regrow that section.”

“Alright, and which would you recommend?”

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Verdan said truthfully, spreading his hands. “The first is the most severe, but it would give us the easiest access to the damaged part.”

“I see, and which would I recover fastest from?”

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“The second, assuming that we can retrieve whatever is there without too much issue. If it gets messy, then who knows. There are risks with both.”

Kai nodded, his expression giving none of his thoughts away as he considered the two options Verdan had given him.

“Do the surgery. I don’t want it taking off again,” Kai said eventually, the tension in the room rising as the surgery became a real concept.

Adrienne chose that moment to arrive with food for them all, which took the form of whatever Henry had to hand that could be picked at, along with a small mound of sandwiches.

“Before we tuck in, I just wanted to ask if everyone here can stay so we can do this tonight?” Verdan asked, looking at the two Clerics in particular. “We need to get whatever this is out of Kai as soon as we can.”

“I have all evening. My magic is at your disposal,” Branwen said firmly. “Undoing the work of a Gormagyr is a reward in itself.”

“I will help as well,” Zhalia said, snagging a sandwich as she spoke up.

“Good, thank you both,” Verdan said, relaxing a little. Now he knew he would have both Clerics on standby the surgery didn’t seem quite as daunting.

“What about me?” Natalia asked, tapping the case she’d brought with her. “I’m not sure what I can contribute to this that you can’t manage with magic. Of course I’m willing to stay, I just don’t know that you’ll need me.”

“I was hoping you would have potions to slow bleeding or otherwise fortify Kai’s body, so that we could focus on the corruption.”

Natalia frowned thoughtfully before getting up and grabbing her case. “I have some reagents stored here that I can use with some existing potions to get the effect you need. The lifespan will be short, so once it’s ready, it will need to be used within the hour and will last for twice that long.”

“How long will it take you to make it?”

“Thirty minutes, as a rough estimate. I’ll be modifying something existing, not making a new one altogether.”

“Okay then, let’s take thirty minutes to plan our approach while Natalia makes the potion. Once she’s back, we’ll begin immediately. Questions?”

There were none, so they got to work on planning how to best identify whatever the source of this corruption was.

When Natalia returned some time later, she was carrying her case and a blood-red potion.

“Alright, let’s move to the other room.” Verdan got up and led the way to the room in the workshop that was best set up for this kind of situation.

Kai got up onto the long table in the centre and a second was brought round for him to rest his arm on as Natalia fed him a colourless potion, followed by the blood-red one.

Verdan’s medical equipment was still here from when it was last needed, so he busied himself getting ready and ensuring everything was sterile.

Kai was blinking sleepily when Verdan was done, but he had enough presence of mind to grip Verdan’s wrist. “Get it out of me, whatever it takes.”

“You have my word,” Verdan said, waiting patiently as Kai slipped into unconsciousness. “Alright, let’s be about it.”

Branwen acted first, casting a spell on Kai to strengthen his body, which would help him recover from the operation.

Once she was done, Verdan braced Kai’s arm before making a deep cut near the shoulder. To his surprise, only a small amount of blood seeped out, and he glanced over at Natalia questioningly.

“The potion I gave him slows his heartbeat to a comatose state, while providing fortification to the major organs to prevent injury.”

“Exactly what we needed,” Verdan said approvingly, before turning back to the surgery and nodding to Branwen for guidance.

The Idrisyr leaned over the unconscious Sorcerer and helped spread the edge of the wound. “It was here, deep enough to be in the bone.”

Verdan probed deeper as best he could, looking for something obvious that would be their target.

“Lord of Hunts, guide the Wizard to find that which is unnatural,” Zhalia said, golden energy flowing from her hand and into Verdan.

Focus and clarity settled over Verdan and he pushed on with confidence, widening the incision as he did. Eventually, Verdan found what he was looking for in the form of a stub of something metal wedged into the bone.

The bone of Kai’s arm had grown around the foreign object, but the bone itself was strange and discoloured.

“Do any of you know much about bones?” Verdan asked, hesitating to remove the shard.

“I do, and that’s not right,” Natalia said, joining Verdan and staring down at the grey-coloured bone of Kai’s arm. “How much of the bone is like that?”

Verdan shared a worried look with the alchemist before taking a steadying breath and lengthening the incision in each direction so they could see what they were dealing with.

As best Verdan could tell, the area around the initial corruption was fully transformed, while the rest of the arm was partially changed over.

Even with Natalia’s potion and Branwen’s magic, Kai was losing a lot of blood like this, so Verdan went back to the source of the corruption and cut it out.

Examining the source of the issue, Verdan realised it was a melded piece of bone and metal. It must have been stuck in the flesh of Kai’s arm and migrated down to the bone, causing whatever this condition was.

“What do we do about the bone?” Natalia asked once Verdan had removed the source of the corruption.

“Well, the sections that are altered bear no Malfease that I can detect,” Verdan said slowly as he used every sense at his disposal to examine the bone. “We can’t remove so much without crippling Kai, so we have no choice but to leave it in place.”

“Let me try my detection spell,” Branwen said, repeating her incantation from earlier and running her hands over Kai’s open arm. “No, everything here is responding as part of him and natural.”

“Remove that section,” Zhalia said, stepping forward and pointing to the mostly converted portion where the fragment had been. “If it regrows that way, then the damage is to his soul.”

Verdan wanted to ask more, but this was hardly the time. Cutting free a large section of bone, he cast the strongest healing spells he could on the healthy sections on either side and a fortification spell on the small amount that still connected them.

That done, he began to close everything back up, with both Clerics casting layered healing spells as he did.

Natalia was the handiest with sutures, so she took over from that point, carefully sealing up Kai’s arm before then binding it to a length of wood so he wouldn’t accidentally damage anything.

The bone in his upper arm was severely weakened, and while it would regrow quickly with all the magic acting on it, it would still take time.

Enough time that Kai wouldn’t be coming with them to fight the Cyth, or would be relegated to an advisory position if he did.

Knowing Kai, the second option wouldn’t last long, so Verdan would try to make sure he stayed behind.

“Alright, thank you, everyone. I think we did as much as we possible could here. Hopefully, it will be enough.”