Kyrillē was laying limp beside me, cracks blatantly visible on her skin. I could only describe her state as brittle. She was eerily still, the only reason why I was certain that she was alive was thanks to my new senses. Her lifeforce was leaking slowly but it was present still.

I decided to nudge her shoulder a bit.

“Are you awake?”

She groaned, slowly hauling herself up. I quickly lent her a hand as she was barely able to manage it on her own.

“Yes, that was… exhausting. I underestimated the efforts needed to do that.” She chuckled breathily, “At least it worked judging by your aura. You know, the ritual basically consisted of me using my essence to stimulate yours, a tiny shove to agitate your soul. But as it started growing stronger it,” She grimaced in discomfort, “It ensnared me and didn’t let me go. I’m fairly sure that robbed a few hours out of me.”

That was horrifying to hear, I made the situation even more dire didn’t I?

“I’m sincerely sorry for causing this, do you think we have enough time to get to the tree?”

“Maybe, it’s getting hard to concentrate, it’ll depend on your capabilities right now. Please tell me that you’re not suddenly a master sculptor.”

I snorted at that

“Who knows that might've been useful. But no, I have something way more in line with what we need. Take a look.”

I took my hatchet in hand and focused inwards. Within me lay the key to the issue we were facing. The ball of cold that I felt within my soul was only an impression of the real thing; in the physical world it felt more like a leak, energy trickling out of my heart in every direction. I could take control of it surprisingly easily, like a limb I always had, and push it out of me through my fingers. They visibly paled as white wisps floated out of them much like Sigurd, minus the scaly bits.

I needed to make it sharp, sharp enough to cut through a satyr if need be and for that I had the perfect thing in mind. Runes each represented a core concept, and through the application of the user’s intent when writing them they could produce a variety of effects. Sigurd was a warrior, and what he gifted me was his interpretation of them. Almost all of them were linked to battle in some way or another, which made it almost practical in this situation if it weren’t for the fact that Kyrillē was on a time limit. I couldn’t magically fix or stall her affliction without taking the risk of hurting her.

I pictured Hagalaz, a rune in the form of an eta meaning ‘hail’. It evoked concepts of destruction and chaos, but he mostly used it to enhance the destructive power of his weapons. I carefully began inscribing it on the side of the blade, it was precise work and a mistake would prove to be… unpleasant.

The biggest advantage I had in this endeavour is that I could wholly focus on the act itself, I had to coordinate the release of essence with the movement of my fingers and having to think consciously about the intent behind the rune meant that I had done a pretty good job for my first try. The well of energy I had diminished by a quarter compared to its original size, but it was replenishing at a fast pace. That wouldn’t be optimal during combat.

The rune on the hatchet looked like it was part of the metal. Its edge took a white sheen in my grasp, it certainly felt sharper as I presented it.

“A legendary warrior in my soul taught me magic.”

Kyrillē took an appraising look at my new and improved weapon.

“They taught you how to make it glow?”

“They taught me how to make it sharper.” I replied enthusiastically.

And to prove my point I swung lightly at the stone wall, the head bit easily into it and smoothly sank to the eye with a crunch. I unlodged it from the wall, it looked no worse for wear.

“Useful right?”

“You could say that.” She replied, looking dumbfounded.

“I can generate more effects if you give me time, I can’t cast anything on the fly without it probably blowing up on my face.” I wouldn’t have known at the moment but Sigurd’s light show consisted of him inscribing a rune with pinpoint accuracy with no medium, it was a feat of technical ability that I was far from achieving in such little time. “Do you have a plan in mind? You’re the one who knows the lay of the land.”

“We don’t have the luxury of setting the terms of the fight, we sneak in as best as we can and then take them by surprise, odds are we may find them drunk out of their minds.”

Well that wasn’t much but what choice did we have.

“Let’s just hope that Dionysus won’t take offence. Let’s go, can you walk?”

Her shaky attempt at standing up was enough of a response.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After some rest and more rune inscriptions, we, or more accurately I, retraced our steps. I held Kyrillē in my arms as she guided me towards her tree, doing my best to go as fast as I could; and much to my concern she was barely a hindrance to my movement. She weighed almost nothing and the cracks on her body were spreading more and more.

“Are we close yet?”

“Almost there, if you stretch your senses you’ll feel it too.” She replied in a mournful tone.

I did as she said, I could sense about 10 paces around me with no effort but I could double that radius when I concentrated.

The forest around us felt alive, it was brimming with life. But as I marched along the air was more and more… sluggish, the trees weren’t as vibrant, drooping towards a focal point; And The earth beneath me felt muddy, as if it was struggling to keep a compact form.

“Am I dreaming or is the forest actually…”

“Drunk? It appears to be so.” Anger quickly replaced the sadness in her voice, “Those fucking goats will pay for what they did to my grove.”

I could feel something poking at my arms, looking down I saw the thorns in her hair popping in and out.

I sure am the softest sword of vengeance.

I stopped walking, sat Kyrillē against a tree then crouched next to her.

“Why are we stopping?” She furrowed her brow at me, anger should not look this adorable on someone dying.

“You’re angry, and I get it but you're wasting what little power you have right now and we’re close to our goal. So, take a deep breath.”

She looked hesitant at first but an encouraging nod did the trick.

“Better?”

“Alexandria I am dying.” She grunted at me, but there weren't any thorns that I could see.

“But you're not losing your cool anymore so small mercies.” And I’ll need plenty of that when we get there, “So, we know there’s four of them but can you elaborate on that?”

“To make things brief in case you didn’t already know, satyrs are generally swift and hard to put down so do not let yourself be overwhelmed, lucky for us they’re idiots. The ones that attacked me had small wooden spears, probably magical in nature because they were made out of grape trees. The biggest danger is the leader of their group, he was the one who severed the link with my tree; He had the ability to destabilise my sense so he must have been sacrificing things to Dionysus for a while.”

A divine boon maybe? I didn’t know much about how that worked exactly but I didn’t exactly have the time to grill her on that.

“Okay then, take them down hard and fast.” I said, nodding gravely at that.

A pit sank into my stomach. While I knew objectively that the odds could be way worse, I did not feel ready at all. Fighting was something easy to me, a perk of being stronger than my opponents the few times I actually fought someone; But what I was facing right now were actual magical beings, anything could happen and I wasn’t so sure about my superiority.

But did I really have a choice at this point? Looking at the frail woman before me I concluded that no, I could shove my fears in a pyre because there was no use in overthinking it. Either I succeeded or she died.

I picked up a large stone from the ground then inscribed a Daggaz rune on it, committing half of my energy to it.

“Take this, if you graze it with your essence it will release enough light to blind anyone even during the day.”

She palmed the rock cautiously. This close I could feel her inspecting it, leaves enveloping a ball of dim light.

“We’ll have to talk about who you met during the ritual.” she said wondrously.

“If we survive this.” I got up, bow and arrow in hand, “Stay way back, I’ll take the lead and call you when it's done.”

I turned back, resolute in my course of action. I slowly made my way over to Kyrillē’s tree, the environment becoming more and more crooked as I advanced. Dionysus was known to be the god of madness, and I could definitely see why it was the case; there were some birds stumbling on swaying tree branches, giant bushes that were flatter than carpets and I could somehow taste an undertone of sweetness in the air that reminded me of wine. I snorted, well that fit the theme.

I soon began to hear chatter ahead of me, the deep voices of two, no, three men slurring at each other. I slowed my pace to a crawl as I made my way over behind a tree. I could finally see it, Kyrillē’s tree was twice the size of the others, a behemoth adorned with a sad bouquet of wilted flowers, grapevine drooping from the branches above.

Below it was a big barrel with a faucet at the bottom of it. They truly were making wine out of her…

I quickly brought my attention to the actual perpetrators of all this. There were three satyrs that I could see, they were short hairy men with a pair of curled horns protruding from their foreheads, their modesty preserved by the fur of their goats legs and a loincloth. They were drunkenly talking to each over a fire, laughing at something I was a bit too far to hear.

I stretched my senses over to them; They each felt like barely contained forces of the wild, purple thorns sprouting from the nexus of their being and ensnaring them. Dionysus’ influence? Maybe.

Out of the three that I could see one of them had the biggest presence. He felt old, and that feeling translated to the physical, as he had a much bigger pair of horns, or horn as one was shattered halfway through, a wound that felt… oddly briny.

But that was beside the point, I had my target and now I needed to strike while they were still unaware of my presence.

I got into proper aiming position, still kneeling I extended my bow arm, nocking one of the arrows I inscribed runes into earlier. This one was made to seek a target of my choosing, as not to waste the benefit of surprise. I tethered my essence to the arrow, it took a predatory sheen, tugging at my hand.

I took a deep breath, it was at this moment that my conscience decided to consider the morality of the act I was about to commit. I intended to kill multiple sentient beings, something I knew my dad would consider wrong; But they were the ones consigning an innocent spirit to death for what I could guess to be divine brownie points, they deserved it and I knew within me that I wouldn’t feel particularly bad after the act.

I aimed at the leader’s eyes, drew, then released.