Binko's entire body ached as the toll that the battle had taken on her began to dawn on her. Hark's arm hurt like hell, Lakan remained unconscious as Seyrulan healers struggled to save his life.

While Hark and Lakan were supposed to be placed in the same hospital room, Lakan's bed was empty because he was in a surgery center where several healers tried to mend his butchered insides, Leaving Hark alone in the entire room.

There was a knock on the door to the room, a moment later Binko entered, uninvited. She walked slowly and heavily towards Hark's bed, and sat down beside him on one of the chairs. Hark grimaced at having to deal with her.

"I KNOW you're not here to talk about work." Hark said sarcastically, wincing at the pain his arm.

"I'm not going to take this insult by Ganz lying down." Binko said.

"Yes, I can tell, I'm the one lying down." Hark quipped

"Not funny, Hark." Binko said. "Lakan might not make it, and even if he does, he's going to be stuck here for a week at least, you really think those men won't find us here?"

Hark raised an eyebrow.

"What are you saying?" He asked.

"We need to get out of here." She replied with a tone of urgency.

"And Lakan?" he asked.

"As soon as hey finish fixing him up, if he's still alive, we have to take him." She said.

"To where?" He asked.

"To Aku'anda." She shrugged.

"Are you crazy?" He asked. "We could barely hold them back under a spell dampener, We'll be burned to a crisp if they find us outside a city."

"If they find us here, They'll attack with way more than three mages." she said.

"You don't know that." he said.

"Well I'm not a moron!" She snapped. "I can anticipate the actions of my enemies, you should too."

"Well I can anticipate field spells, and those are an instant death sentence if they catch us out there in this state. We are trapped here, Binko." He said.

She looked at him with a frown.

"You know I'm right." He continued. "And if they figure out that they can beat some Aku'andan mages easily with field spells, They'll want to go for all the Aku'andan mages."

"But if we stay here we're dead." she said.

"We can ask for security." he suggested.

"Did you forget the part where the security official for the entire kingdom is in cahoots with the enemy?" Binko exclaimed? "He just needs to arrange some sort of scheduling conflict to make us defenseless sitting ducks."

The two fell into exasperated silence.

"We'll call for reinforcement, from Aku'anda." Binko said.

"Who will come?" Hark asked.

"Someone better come." Binko said. "Someone better fucking come."

---

It had been a few hours since Lord Daron talked to the Mages in Saymor, so he decided to wave to them again, Starting with Lakan.

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Lakan did not respond, and Lord Daron's heart began to beat slightly faster. He waved to Hark, who didn't respond either, a bead of sweat broke out from his forehead, then he waved to Binko, who responded. He breathed a sigh of relief and greeted her.

"Hello Binko, are you out?" He asked.

"Definitely not," She replied.

She went on to narrate everything that had happened, and then asked for reinforcements to help them escape Saymor, He quickly promised to get her as many people as he could, then he dampened the wave spell, and paced around the room. Surely Dimar had revealed their location? But they were helped by the Seyrulan mages... so perhaps he was a lone actor? or perhaps he was part of a small cabal? he gritted his teeth wondering what Aku'anda's next move should be.

Then he started waving to all the war mages he could, to plead with them. For a split second he wished Aku'anda didn't have war mages be an independent body, Mullam almost immediately turned down the request. He was busy, he said. Altey said he had recently embarked on a journey to an Aku'andan village, Shuma didn't respond, Lara and Segi were out of the question...

After almost two dozen waves, Nobody wanted to go to Saymor. Getting war mages to do anything they didn't already want to do was an herculean task. He wished he could scream at them to go save their colleagues, but he inhaled to relax himself. He still had a few names to go and he would wave to every single war mage in Aku'anda. If they couldn't help, He would beg for help from Navon or even Pirun.

A few hours later, Regar, who hadn't responded at first, waved back to him and agreed to go to Saymor immediately. He also promised to convince at least two other mages to go with him.

The moment Lord Daron got an agreement from Regar, he realized he had been sweating the entire time, and the tea wasn't even cold, it was lukewarm, which was even more disgusting.

He sighed and invoked the small sunball, a fairly difficult but surprisingly common spell. A small magical ball, about an inch across, glowing a dull red with brown spots, formed on top of his fingers. It was spinning very rapidly. floating in place. The heat from the sphere warmed his hand. He dunked the sphere in the tea were it slowly mixed around the tea and heated it up until it began to steam.

The sunball did not have to be dampened as it quickly run out of energy and fizzled out, leaving a reasonably hot tea, which he sipped as he paced back and forth in his study, pondering his next move.

---

Regar was actually in the middle of having sex when Lord Daron had waved at him. He was in the middle of a third round with a home service chef whom he found extremely attractive. She shared the same feelings towards him and they'd been doing it for a while. She would bring his lunch every afternoon, watch him eat, and stay back for payment of... various kinds.

So of course he ignored the wave until he was finished. As she was packing up to go, She kissed him on the lips and pushed him to the bathroom to take a shower, He decided to wave to Lord Daron to find out what had happened, and was appalled at the news.

The shower took all of two minutes before he got out of the bathroom, jumped into a fresh set of clothes. He waved to the two most likely candidates, Deyion and Zefkan. Both of them declined, even after he screamed at them to not abandon their colleagues. Then, he decided to contact the oldest war mage he knew: Sir Manjun.

"Daron waved to me about this issue." Sir Manjun said tiredly. "I really don't think it's that serious."

Hearing Sir Manjun call Lord Daron's name without a title was jarring, but then again, He was more than twenty years older than the man.

"Binko is unscathed, as I've heard, Hark sustained a minor injury—" he continued.

"His elbow is torn." Regar interjected.

"It's a minor injury." Sir Manjun insisted. "With the help of modern healing magic, he will be good as new in less than two days. Back in my day..."

Regar rolled his eyes as the conversation continued, but he was eventually able to get Sir Manjun on board. He was unable to find anyone else, so he decided they should go to Saymor themselves. They met at the Entrance of Yemaye district and, invoking their speeds, ran off to Saymor at an inhuman speed.

Saymor was hundreds of miles away from Aku'anda, but with the speed, They were able to run there in three hours, They were totally exhausted by the time they got in view of Saymor, Regar bent over panting once they got to the top of the hill that overlooked Saymor. Sir Manjun panted softly, both of them were drenched in sweat.

It was in the middle of the Night and Saymor was dark. Save for a few lamps from a distance, the city was drenched in darkness, unlike Aku'anda, which often remained brightly lit throughout the night. Manjun waved to Binko to get her location, and once they had gotten a confirmation, they proceeded into the city.

"Welcome Regar, Sir Manjun," Binko said, wringing her hands. "I'm so grateful you decided to help us like this. I really won't forget it."

"That's fine, young lady." Sir Manjun said, giving a tight lipped smile.

Regar was concerned about Lakan. "How is Lakan?" He asked.

"He's currently unconscious. They patched him up a few hours ago, but he lost a lot of blood. I had to buy him blood from some donors." Binko said.

"They don't have blood reserves?" Regar asked.

"They don't have the expertise." Binko replied.

"I certainly hope Lakan has learned something useful from this." Sir Manjun said. "I like the little rascal but he's too complacent." Binko and Regar nodded in agreement.

"Let's all get some rest, then leave early tomorrow." Regar said.