“Level Twenty-eight, are you serious, Finn? Maybe I should have joined you on the outside,” Daros said mentally with a gentle touch on Finn’s upturned wrist.

Finn’s old Fire Lodge friend had led them away from the streets of the citadel and through the open doors of one of the many hallways. Everything was smashed and broken. There were scorch marks where fires had raged and radiating cracks that Tobias assured them were strikes of Earth power.

“Well, we could have used you on the outside, for sure,” Finn said with a weary grin. His head was still singing with tiredness. When was he ever going to get some sleep?! “But where is Premier Sasha?”

Daros was mute, having had his vocal cords burnt out by Instructor Lem. They were resistant to healing, but he had the ability to transfer his words by touch. Finn had never thought that was much consolation, but it was something. He touched Finn’s arm again.

“Sasha has…fallen,” he said.

Finn gasped and came up short in the middle of the cracked hallway. “But… How?!” He remembered the stocky, blonde leader of the Fire Lodge as stalwart and unstoppable. He remembered her dismantling him with ease on the one occasion when he’d been stupid enough to challenge her. With a start, however, he remembered that she had been a Level 26 back then. He was a higher level now than she was then.

Daros looked warily through the broken windows and a dark look came over his face. He shook his head. “We must go. It is unwise to be out during the day.”

Finn relayed that to the others.

Rosa looked confused. “Surely it’s better than to fight the undead at night?”

“You don’t know what prowls during the day here,” Daros said. He climbed over some rubble and turned into the gallery beside the open-air courtyard, leading them to a stack of smashed wooden chairs and doors. He heaved them aside with ease, showing a crack in the paving slabs that led into a dark tunnel.

Finn remembered the tunnels. The entire citadel was a spire of bedrock suspended magically by the Asai of Time, and tunnels wove throughout the entire base.

Daros said no more as they climbed downward. This tunnel had paved floors and arched, reinforced walls that Finn guessed must be some kind of warehouse route. The Fire Lodge Defender waited for them all to come through, and then he resealed the entrance. The tunnel plunged into total darkness before Daros summoned a ball of fiery light to illuminate their way. It was only when they had crossed several other tunnels and made several turns on their downward track that he reached out to continue the conversation.

“It happened suddenly. All of the premiers sensed it and said something was coming and then…it came.”

“What was it?”

Daros looked up warily again, but Finn could only see rock.

“Death comes on dry wings,” Daros began cryptically. “An immense monster appeared, seemingly from nowhere, and attacked the citadel. The four premiers could not defeat it, though they did drive it away. Even so, the Fire and Air Premiers fell in the process.”

Finn didn’t know what to say, and Rosa was also visibly shocked after Finn relayed what he’d been told. It just seemed too impossible to be true.

“But that wasn’t even the worst. That came later. All of the people that the monster had slain…came back,” Daros continued. “The monster’s breath could kill but it also left that terrible curse on its victims, and every time they are cut down, they return but stronger.” Daros shook his head in disgust.

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It was like a twisted version of the game of celestial ascension itself, only instead of ascending by defeating enemies, the undead advanced through dying.

“How many survive from the original lodges?” Tobias asked as they trudged through the darkness.

Daros winced. “All of the lodges still stand, but they are like you saw them earlier. Without their premiers, they are lost. They will not band together, and they are constantly under attack by the undead. I fear that the citadel is falling, and there is nothing we can do about it.”

“Well, stuff that,” Finn said immediately. He had been through too much to consider defeat. Not now.

But are there enough to help Malvas? They were trained Defenders. They all had powers and had to be at least between Level 12 and 18. It should be enough to make a difference.

“The Citadel Guards?” Rosa asked.

“Once the premiers fell, the guards returned to the Tower of Time, which is sealed, and they haven’t come out since,” Daros said, shrugging and pausing. “We fear that the Asai of Time either doesn’t know what is happening or has abandoned us.”

“Impossible,” Rosa said. “The Asai of Time sees everything, so there’s no way they aren’t aware of what’s happening here…” The alternative, however, was not a happy one.

“They must either be unable to intervene, or they see this as a challenge,” Finn said, remembering his encounter with that deity. They had been eager to punish those they deemed to have broken the rules of the Celestial Engines, but it would not intervene in anything else that happened.

“The problem isn’t the Asai of Time. The problem is Vheti,” Daros explained as they turned a corner. There was lamplight and hushed voices at the end of the corridor. “The refugees from the other lodges. I have been doing my best to protect them here.” Daros led the small group through the tunnel into a wider hall with pillars supporting the ceiling and many archways leading into smaller, alcove-like rooms.

The place was full of people. There had to be fifty, maybe even a hundred, and they came from every race of the celestial ascension that Finn had yet seen. There were scaled Lamakai and small Verdainians, the blue-skinned race that Finn didn’t know, and many human types that Finn guessed were from Tierra, Old Earth, or some other human-standard world. He saw gray, tusked trolls and winged zephyrs and others with bony, crown-like growths on their heads.

“The order grew while we were gone,” Finn commented as Daros was greeted with cheers and grateful voices. Finn’s friend, who had once been considered the lowest of the Fire Lodge, was now regarded as a hero. Finn was pleased for him.

Food and water were put into their hands, and there were flares of gentle green energies as they were healed. This was unlike anything that Finn remembered from the Celestial Order, where every day was one of rigorous training and challenges. This was kindness and courage.

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> You have received 150 Health.

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> You have received 150 Mana.

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Finn found himself surrounded by other Defenders—from all four elemental lodges—who appeared eager to know where he and his friends were from and how they’d come to be here, but cold silence and avoidant looks met him whenever her tried to talk about the ‘death with dry wings.’

While Rosa and Tobias enjoyed this small respite, Finn sought out Daros again.

“You said the problem was this Vheti. Is that the monster? Who are they?” he asked, hunkering down on a blanket next to his mute ally as the other Defenders hurriedly got up and left.

Daros looked at Finn with his big, serious eyes. “Vheti calls himself the leader of the Fire Lodge now, although he is no premier soul. You saw him earlier, with the red topknot?”

Finn nodded. He remembered the coward who had led his forces away rather than help fight the undead.

“He has taken in some of the others, those who begged enough or abandoned their own lodges, but he refuses to help the others unless they acknowledge him as the new instructor.”

“What?!” Finn was surprised. Surely only the Asai of Time could appoint an instructor.

“Indeed. So, all the lodges are under attack by the undead, and no one will help each other. Their numbers are getting whittled away and adding to the undead when they could be working together,” Daros said sadly.

Finn glared into the middle distance. Why was it that those on the Fire Ascension Path so easily turned out to be bullies?

“Then I’ll just have to convince him to help, won’t I?” Finn said.