Bel wasn’t even surprised that the old man threatened her in Mycenaean. His face remained relaxed, almost sleepy, and wouldn’t have been out of place on any harmless old man sitting down to rest his aching knees, but she doubted there was anything innocent or normal about him. He’s probably some thousand-year old monster who hunts down people like me for fun, she thought bitterly. Maybe he’s even old friends with Technis.
The old man moved quickly, making good on his words that she wouldn’t last much longer. He sliced his knife to the side and, in a flash of blue, it bisected a large lavacicle. Bel watched warily as he spun around the pointed rock, kicking it into the air as it tipped to the side. He juggled the spinning stone with a few more taps of his feet before abruptly launching it at her with a spinning kick. As Bel stepped to the side to avoid the seemingly harmless attack, he also launching his dagger at her before charging.
Bel quickly shifted her weight, putting stress on the long cut and reopening it slightly, but she moved in between the two projectiles, the knife on her right and the rock on her left, and took a low stance to intercept the old man’s charge. There was a loud crack to her left, on her blind side, as the rock hit another object. Bel reflexively turned to see what happened, but just then the old man put on a burst of speed. She turned back to him, and was hit in the side of the head by a chunk of rock.
She staggered backwards, disoriented. A cloud of blue bubbles travelled in the other direction, the divine magic of the old man’s dagger returning it to his hands. Without any other plan, Bel put her hand on the ground, once again threatening to cause an explosion that would injure or kill them both with her ability to destabilize bonds.
The old man danced to the side, jogging around her rather than risking her self-destructive attack. She frowned.
I thought he was just probing me, but all he wanted was to hit me in the head.
She pivoted as she followed his movements, and from her peripheral vision she tried to figure out how he had hit her with a rock despite missing. It seemed like he had gotten his missile to ricochet off of some other lavacicles and bounce back to hit her. Or perhaps it had broken apart, and just a small, sharp shard of it had come back to strike her. Bel barred her teeth with pent up frustration.
He’s just going to wear me down until I mess up and give him the opportunity for a killing blow. How shrewd.
Being able to predict how she would move and how a rock would bounce just so he could inflict a minor injury… His abilities were truly frightening. No wonder she hadn’t been able to land a hand upon him. Could she run? She doubted it.
Right now, the only thing I’ve got is the threat of blowing us both up. Maybe if I’d spent some time going through my abilities I’d be able to figure something out that would work against him, but not in the heat of battle.
As Bel’s mind raced for a new solution, she slowly backed away from the old man. She placed her bare feet cautiously upon the uneven floor, careful to avoid even a moment of instability, but her opponent moved casually over the ground, confident in his footing despite his blindfold.
He took a sudden step forward and jerked his weapon arm, as good as announcing his attack. Bel planted her feet as she dropped into a defensive stance. As her weight shifted, the ground beneath her right foot crumbled and her foot fell into a hole. She cursed angrily as the man took a threatening stride forward, forcing Bel to jump backwards, wrenching her foot in the process. The man didn’t attack, but a satisfied smile spread across his face as Bel limped backwards.
Are you kidding me? Bel screamed internally. He’s planning to trip me to death?
Bel glanced down to see what had happened with the floor and saw that it was bubbled and uneven. Something must have gotten trapped under the lava as it formed the floor of the chamber, filling the space under the cooling stone with gas, like the bubbles on bread. The bubbles were invisible to her, especially since she was walking backwards.
I’ve got to try to run, Bel realized, he’s just going to pick me apart like an old snapping turtle drowning a helpless duckling. Bel’s mouth went dry as she considered her chances. Even if he can predict the future, I may still be able to outrun him, she tried to console herself.
Bel tensed her legs and prepared to pounce, but the man moved before her thought had finished. He rushed forwards and hurled his dagger, clearly herding her in a desired direction.
Bel refused to be manipulated like that, and instead of jumping away from the spinning dagger, she jumped towards it. Kjar’s armor deflected the attack as Bel pounced a hundred strides away. She twisted her limbs to catch a glimpse of the old man as she moved, but instead of a look of surprise or dismay, his face was deadly calm as he recalled his dagger to his hand.
Bel twisted back around and braced for her landing, but her feet passed through the ground instead. Her body fell through a thin crust of solidified magma and she dropped into a dark chamber formed by a large air bubble. She could see just well enough to get her feet into position before she landed, but her twisted ankle and injured leg both burned with pain as she stumbled upon her landing. As she stepped forward, she also banged her toes into a step in the floor, dragging a string of curses from her mouth.
The air was stale and sulfurous, burning Bel’s nose and making her cough and gag as she inhaled after her fit of cursing.
I don’t have time for this – that old monster is going to drop in here at any moment.
She turned to take in her surroundings in a panic, her hands shaking as she clenched them into fists. The bubble had formed over the bare surface of the Pillar itself, and Bel was standing upon the smooth, metallic floor. There were steps to the metal, each a stride long and half a stride high. Bel guessed that the magma was supposed to settle over them and form some kind of curved side to the larger chamber, but instead the steps must have trapped something before the magma arrived. The resulting gasses released when the magma rolled over the area had created a dark pit a stone’s toss across and seven or eight strides deep at its highest.
Bel was just considering whether or not it was safe to jump out when the old man dropped inside. He landed gracefully on the floor and paused to wait for her next move with a calm, unhurried expression.
I need to threaten him before he can start pushing me around, Bel thought frantically. Threatening him with blowing us both up is good, but he’ll figure out a way around that eventually.
Bel sent a small amount of her attention into her core, searching for Kjar’s ability to breath divine flames. The energy of her Disorder Core was mostly spent, and Lempo’s abilities were too dangerous to mess with, but she understood Kjar’s attack. As her spiritual senses wrapped around the pattern for Kjar’s ability, the old man shuffled backwards slightly. His feet twisted as he prepared to run or jump.
Which means that there must be enough space in here for him to just run around my attack until I run out of energy, Bel realized. The man relaxed as Bel had her realization and gave up on inscribing the ability onto her core. Then Bel smiled.
It looks like I can threaten him with abilities before I even learn them. So what if Lempo’s abilities are hard to understand? He’ll let me know if I find one that’s dangerous.
Bel embraced the sudden feeling of reckless abandon as she reached for Lempo’s constellation of abilities. First she would try the one that would make her larger. She reached for the pattern, intending to engrave the ability upon her Upheaval Core. The old man calmly stepped back and threw his dagger in response.
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Bel was slightly distracted by messing around with her core. She moved away from the dagger too slowly and received another cut along her arm for her sloppiness. She hesitated over the first stroke of the pattern and gave it up. He could be feigning indifference, but if the ability had been really terrifying wouldn’t it have elicited a stronger reaction? The chamber was only dimly lit from the hole in the ceiling, but she hadn’t seen any sign of panic or concern on his face.
As the blue bubbles of the returning dagger drifted past her, Bel reached for the ability to make herself smaller. The man scowled and immediately rushed towards her, but he seemed more annoyed that concerned. She abandoned the ability as the man plucked his dagger from the air.
Magnetizing myself? Bel thought, reaching for one of the strange abilities. The man clicked his tongue and sheathed his dagger, but he didn’t seem like he was backing down. Bel abandoned that ability too.
He sighed loudly, and Bel could imagine him rolling his eyes if they weren’t hidden behind a wide strip of cloth. “Why persist in this juvenile behavior, child? I have defeated many powerful warriors; there is no shame in it.”
Bel laughed, a deep angry barking that quickly devolved into maniacal laughter. “So you want me to lie down and die? Really? Is this too chaotic for you?”
She reached for another ability: the one to blast a disintegration ray at things. She grinned when the man broke into careful run that would give him the speed to dodge her attack. He didn’t look worried as he ran a circle around her, just wary, so Bel gave up on that one. She would only get a single shot with it, and it didn’t seem like he thought she could hit him.
He halted his run even before she’d realized her decision to move on, and tossed his dagger at her, scoring another shallow cut along her leg as she cast her attention back into the constellation of Lempo’s abilities. Bel ignored the new line of fiery pain as she reached out to an ability that would mutate her body. She pulled back when she saw the man’s face wrinkle in disgust.
Disgust wasn’t fear. Not good enough.
He shook his head at her approach to the fight as his dagger returned to his hand. “When you die, your divine parent will gather your soul back to their embrace. Do you really want to face them after dying such a worthless death?”
He waved her forward. “Come! Face me with honor!”
Her body was shaking slightly with fear, but she forced herself to laugh so hard that she almost cried. “Honor! Hah!”
My mothers would love what I’m doing, Bel consoled herself.
She pulled her lips back and grinned crazily at him as she reached for an ability that would break the world around her, in some weird, fundamental way. She didn’t actually understand it, but she wanted to see what he would do.
The man’s reaction didn’t tell her much more about the ability, but he did back away. Bel hesitated, her mind just about to put the pattern onto her core.
No, she thought, something like this is good, but I want to see some alarm on his face. Even if the ability doesn’t end up being something I can control, if I can just get a good shot at him when he’s off-balance, maybe I can win.
Bel flicked her mind through some of the bizarre, incomprehensible abilities that her mother offered, quickly settling upon one of them that felt half backwards and inside out. She went over the first stroke of the ability, preparing to engrave it upon her Upheaval core.
And the old man paused before moving towards the hole in the roof of the room. Bel pressed the first stroke onto her core and rushed onto the second.
The old man sped up, his careful walk turning into a full-on sprint.
Either he’s trying to trick me, or this is going to be something crazy.
Bel rushed after him, half of her attention still on the strange ability as she slashed the strokes of its pattern upon her core. She pounced as he leaped for the exit, and then, midair, something strange happened to her.
It was as though her mind had tripped on the pattern, unable to get more than halfway through the ability. The strokes felt backwards, inside, upside down, and wrong – her mind slipped on them like bare hands on smooth ice. An overwhelming sense of despair rose up in her, but was cut through by an alien presence.
Four small minds – her original snakes, Bel realized – grasped onto the ability and etched the remaining strokes onto her core. Like they were made to do this, Bel realized.
Then the ability activated, just before she slammed into the old man in a graceless midair collision. He awkwardly slashed with his dagger, completely missing her, and Bel gasped with debilitating pain as the ability did horrible things to her body.
I think I’m dying.
Bel and her opponent tangled together, and her momentum bore them into the rocky wall. They slammed into it in a hopeless tangle before rolling back down to the exposed metal floor of the Pillar.
The old man forced himself to his feet quickly, lashing out with his foot and catching Bel in the stomach. She groaned in pain and doubled over, barely noticing when the man ripped his blindfold from his head. He turned frantically from side to side, and he made a noise of relief when he spotted his dagger nearby.
As he dove for it, Bel tried to force herself to her knees. Her body felt weak, as weak as she’d ever been in Technis’ temple, and none of her regular abilities were working. The new pattern that her snakes had helped her scratch onto her core was pulling in essence and putting out something strange. A new kind of energy that wasn’t essence, but almost felt like it, was emanating from her and clogging up everything else. It got into the rest of her cores and sat where her energy should be, but didn’t behave as it should, refusing to circulate through the patterns there.
As the old man triumphantly lifted his dagger, Bel realized that the same thing must have been happening to him. He turned to her with a vicious grin, clearly intending to end her and her annoying ability with violence. Bel rose to a crouch as he charged, but her first awkward attempt at movement filled her with vertigo. Her attempt to ward off his blade instead earned her another deep cut through her forearm, but his first attack had been oddly weak so the cut was shallow.
Without her blood coagulation abilities, the wound immediately flooded with deep, red blood.
The man lifted his dagger for a second stab and Bel awkwardly fell onto her back. He corrected his downward slash to follow her, but his weapon bit into Kjar’s armor rather than through her neck.
The blade snapped with a loud, metallic ping.
The man stared at the shattered weapon, his eyes wide. As the pieces melted into harmless water, Bel lifted her foot and kicked him between his legs and then kicked him again in the stomach for good measure.
She wanted to laugh with triumph as he staggered backwards, his face red and his eyes nearly popping out of his skull. Instead, she rolled over and retched. Her new ability may have disabled her opponent’s abilities as well as her own, but Bel felt as though she was dying.
She grabbed onto the edge of the wide steps to pull herself upright, but the metal of the Pillar crumbled beneath her weight. Bel cried out in dismay as she fell onto the floor again, buried in a large pile of tiny, metallic cubes – the concealed building blocks of the maze.
The man recovered from his earlier shock, quickly striding towards her, but in the dim space he didn’t see the growing pile of loose cubes, or didn’t understand what they were. His foot landed on them and he slipped, joining Bel on the floor.
Bel’s arms flailed as she fought for balance in the increasing chaos spreading around her. Something red flashed before her eyes and she paused, worried that she’d torn open yet another wound. Instead, when she lifted her hand to her face she realized that the old man’s blindfold had gotten tangled around her arm.
A weight hit her hard on the side as the old man took advantage of her distraction to tackle her. They rolled on the floor, and he pushed her back to rain awkward punches down upon her. His attacks were weak though, and he was hitting the ground just as often as he was striking her face.
An old memory rose up in Bel’s mind, a memory of the time before her core had been restored. Beth had been teaching her how to escape from larger assailants, in situations just like this one. As the man awkwardly leaned forward, Bel twisted her hips, lifting his body enough that she could squeeze her leg between them. With her foot on his abdomen, she heaved again, forcing his body up so that he spilled over her and landed heavily on his back.
Bel desperately needed to catch her breath, but she forced herself to move anyway. Her limbs were going numb from pain and exertion, but she awkwardly stretched out her arms to wrap the blindfold around the man’s neck. Then she rolled over him so that she was behind his body and leaned her weight into the long length of silk cloth, pulling it taut around his neck.
The old man choked and sputtered, thrashing against her, but Bel refused to let go. She could see spots filling her vision, and her entire body was trembling. If she couldn’t finish him now, she would die.
The old man’s hands grasped around his neck as he tried to loosen the cloth, then they dropped to his side as he searched his pockets. He pulled out something as long as a hand and stabbed it into Bel’s side.
She whimpered in pain, but she didn’t think that the object hadn’t pierced her body. He jabbed it into her repeatedly, and Bel wondered why Kjar’s armor wasn’t protecting him from the attacks. With horror, she realized that Kjar’s armor was dissolving into ash, the divine energy that had sustained it driven from the material by Bel’s ability.
She leaned harder on the silk cloth as pain bloomed along her torso, and eventually the man’s movements weakened. Bel didn’t release her grip, even when the object he’d grabbed – a small, wooden dagger – fell from his fingers. She mindlessly pulled on the silk longer than necessary, until she finally passed out from pain and exertion. As everything faded to black, Bel cut the energy flowing into her new, horrible ability.