Lyria

Brynn moved ahead of me down the dungeon passage.

He walked with a kind of deadly purpose and confidence I hadn’t seen in him before. The clothes he bought for himself in Riverwell were halfway shredded and filthy, showing bits of his skin beneath. He had the old, dented and scratched plate bracers strapped to his wrist. He didn’t even ask me to help get them on, anymore.

The illusion on his helmet made it look like a simple, horned helmet made of iron.

His perfectly clean boots and cloak were the only halfway respectable part of his whole ensemble.

Still… With the menacing Silver Scream bow held in one hand and the quiver on his back, he looked dangerous. It was in the way he moved. No fear. No hesitation.

“It’s close,” he said.

I nodded. I figured I had enough mana to use Gust and blow the enemy off-course if things got too hairy for Brynn. I also had Petrify.

Then again, I had caught a glimpse of Brynn during the fight with the escaped gladiator slaves. He dismantled that nightmaw and hardly broke a sweat.

I couldn’t quite blame him for his sudden confidence. He was already a different man than the bumbling, poison spraying person I had seen get impaled by a Rootling in The Black Wood. Little by little, I was beginning to understand the kind of potential he really had. If we weren’t on the same team, I might have even thought it was frightening. Was it the power of his prestige path? Or was it simply something in his nature? I supposed it could even be both.

Brynn raised his hand with the bow, urging me to stop. “Okay,” he whispered. “I think if you wait back here, it shouldn’t mess up the accomplishment. I’ll… make some noises if I need help.”

“Noises?” I hissed. “Like what?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a shrug. “You’ll know I’m in trouble based on the sounds I make.”

I threw my hands up in annoyance. What the hell kind of plan was that?

But Brynn was already jogging ahead.

I caught a glimpse of something moving in a dark spot between torches ahead. It was another nightmaw, and it was crawling on all fours up the tunnel toward us.

It raised its head, and I instinctively created a small Wind Wall just in front of both ears. A moment later, the beast let out a roar that shook dirt from the tunnel’s roof and made me stagger to one knee.

Brynn shook on his feet, too, but I saw a glowing ball of blue around his head shimmer and snap away once the sound was gone.

Same idea, huh?

The Wind Wall didn’t completely stop the sound, but I felt alright, other than a slight ringing in my ears.

Brynn blindly pulled an arrow from his quiver, saw it was one of the healing arrows, and then dropped it. He quickly reached for another and got one of the two Viperlilly arrows. He nocked, drew through his back like I taught him, feet planted correctly. His release was natural as he slid his fingers through the motion, sending the arrow zipping through the darkness with a thwack and swish.

The arrow punched into the nightmaw’s shoulder when it was roughly twenty feet from him. The beast snarled, gripped it, and ripped the arrow out of its body.

He needs to fire from behind, or these things just pull the arrows out.

Brynn danced backward, keeping distance between himself and the beast. He drew the last arrow, then formed an Echo of his bow behind the razormaw. It rotated, drew, and shot. The spectral arrow sank into the nightmaw’s thigh from behind.

It gave another angry roar, turning to look for its attacker as Brynn sent his bow and quiver to his slip space. The Echo of his bow snapped out of existence with a shower of magical sparks, and Brynn was already running toward the nightmaw at full speed.

What are you doing? Give the arrow some time to do its work!

But Brynn’s body language wasn’t that of somebody who was playing scared. He seemed like he was enjoying this.

Green energy coalesced in one of his hands. A wicked dagger that boiled with emerald colored magic formed with a burst of light. He gripped the dagger, flipped it mid stride to hold it in a reverse grip, and then activated his Abyssal Step just before he collided with the charging beast.

I realized I was holding my breath when he disappeared. Almost disappeared, that was. When he used his Abyssal Step ability, he became ghost-like and hard to see, especially in the dim tunnel. But I caught sight of his shape sliding beneath the nightmaw. Even though he would pass through it, I suspected he wasn’t in a hurry to find out what happened if he mis-timed the duration and re-appeared inside something solid. Instead, he ran between its legs.

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It was the same move I’d seen him use twice now, but this time, the nightmaw tracked his movements.

The beast skidded to a stop, planted one large foot, and threw itself back at him just as he reappeared.

Brynn’s eyes widened in surprise. Just before the creature tackled him with its massive weight, a thick rectangle of blue light slid up between Brynn and the nightmaw. There was a flash of blinding light as the monster smashed into the shield, webbing it with cracks.

The shield shattered like glass, but held enough to stop the nightmaw in its tracks and stagger it. Bits of blue magic dripped to the ground, dissolving in hissing wisps of light.

I stepped forward to help, but Brynn raised a hand in my direction, shaking his head—somehow still aware enough to tell me not to interfere.

Dammit, Brynn. My willingness to trust him not to get hurt had its limits. I would step in if he didn’t get control of the fight soon. He could be pissed at me if he wanted.

He used his Forge Echo ability on his dagger as he backed away from the recovering nightmaw. A ghostly version of his Elemental Spike appeared behind the nightmaw and immediately danced forward. Usually, the Echo moved like Brynn was pulling it by a string, causing it to look jerky and unnatural.

This time, it bounced, almost as if an invisible form was carrying it. It swung with an arcing pattern, as if the invisible figure raised it overhead and slammed it into the nightmaw’s back.

Had Brynn already become so much better at using the ability since the last time I saw him do it?

Green poison jetted out of the wound.

The nightmaw reached one arm back in surprise, letting out a roar as it turned to face the new attacker.

Brynn didn’t hesitate. He ran forward, jabbing his knife up at the nightmaw’s back again and again.

In a split-second, the fight that had looked like it was spiraling out of control was turned on its head.

The sheer quantity of green poison flooding out of the wounds was choking the nightmaw, who was drunkenly swinging at the Forge Echo.

I was starting to relax when it suddenly spun, backhanding one huge arm toward Brynn.

He didn’t see it coming.

The blow hit him with the force of a sledge hammer, launching him into the wall with a sickening crunch and a cloud of dust. The blue bubble of his Ring of Protection flared up, protecting him from the worst of the swing. But it was already gone by the time he smashed into the wall.

I started running, but Brynn cracked open one eye and actually shook his fucking head at me.

He was smiling, too, even as I saw blood drip down through the openings in his helmet.

I skidded to a stop, unsure of what I should do.

But I realized the Forge Echo was still stabbing and the nightmaw must have figured Brynn wasn’t a threat anymore. It turned its attention back to the phantom dagger, swinging and growling in frustration as poison leaked from between its tangled teeth. It was bleeding and leaking more poison from dozens of grisly wounds.

Within seconds, it fell to its knees, swinging between heavy, strangled breaths.

The dagger started jabbing at its face when it got lower.

One stab.

Two.

The third seemed to crunch straight through the skull, and the nightmaw went limp.

Gods. That was terrifying power. How had he kept his concentration on the ability when he was wounded so badly?

I rushed over to Brynn, skidding on my knees beside him. I was already pulling my Field Kit from my slip space when I saw him stand up and roll his shoulder out, as if testing it.

“What?” he asked, almost sounding casual. “Did you forget I can heal myself?”

I stared up at him, annoyed and impressed at the same time. “It took you forever to heal Thorn, though. I thought—”

“Thorn doesn’t have nearly as much mana as I do,” Brynn said with a shrug.

Sure enough, he was moving more normally by the second. He walked over to his Echo and leaned forward a little. “Good job, Boy. Thanks.” He did a strange gesture where he lifted his fingers to his forehead, held it for a few seconds, then brought his arm down in a chopping motion. “Until next time.”

The echo of his dagger raised itself, almost as if an invisible figure was copying the gesture.

What the hell?

Brynn turned to face me. “Alright. That was good. Next time, I’m going to try not to get backhanded into a wall, though. That part was not fun at all.”

I grinned. “No shit. I already tried it earlier. I could’ve told you to avoid it, if you had asked for my advice.”

“Your turn,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“There’s another enemy a little further down. I’ve got enough mana to do another one, but I think you should try. I bet you’ll get a ton of experience for soloing one, and I’m planning to hit Iron soon. We’ve got to catch you up.”

I stared. “You want me to solo a nightmaw?”

“Soulbound,” he whispered in a silly voice.

“I’m not certain about that,” I said, even though I wasn’t sure how the hell else I could explain it. Using my Sword corestone had always felt like I was trying to tie a knot with my toes. No amount of practice or training ever made it seem easier.

The moment I equipped my Shield stone, there had been a sudden flash of insight and understanding. It was like being handed a tool I had used my whole life.

“Besides,” Brynn said, “I have Mana Shield. I’ve got Healing Potions to spare. And I could always jump in and help if you can’t take him.”

His sharp green eyes met mine as he watched me from the eye slits in his helmet. There was so much intensity and confidence there—not just in himself but in me.

I told myself not to be influenced by him, but it was almost impossible. Knowing he believed I could handle myself was also making me believe. I was struck by a sudden, disorienting awareness that I was looking at Seraphel. Maybe he didn’t remember what he had done, but he was one of The Nine. Something in his nature had allowed him to climb so far beyond the natural limits of power that he had reached the finish line.

I still couldn’t believe I had gone from guarding a random frontier town in the middle of nowhere to taking turns soloing monsters with Seraphel. And now one of The Nine was telling me he wouldn’t let anything happen to me if I tried this.

Damn it.

I sucked in a slow, calming breath, then nodded. “Alright. Fine. I’m not even close to full mana, though.”

“Good,” he said. “Practicing when conditions are less than ideal is good for us. You lead the way,” he said with a small smile and gesture.

All I could do was shake my head and start walking.