Vayra laid on her hammock in the contestants’ quarters, staring up at the ceiling and trying to get her heartbeat to slow down so she could sleep. It didn’t obey. Even though it was nighttime and pitch-black outside (with the help of a chunk of the Shattered Moon’s crust blocking the starlight and planetlight), she couldn’t relax.

She swayed side-to-side, trying to get the hammock to comfort her. It didn’t work. It didn’t have the same rocking movement of the officers’ quarters aboard the Harmony. She laid her hands on her stomach and exhaled.

‘Slow breaths, Vayra,’ Phasoné said inside her mind. ‘Try to use a basic cycling pattern. I’m sending Adair out to you.’

“You’d think I’d be better at relaxing after a fight…after all this time,” she whispered. Her door was closed, separating her from Glade’s room and the common room, where Nathariel was sleeping.

‘After…what, a year of being together? That’s not much time.’

Vayra tried cycling, taking slow breaths like the goddess had suggested. It only half helped, “It feels like a long time for me.”

‘Not for five-hundred-year-old me, sadly.’

“But it’s not like I haven’t been doing...stuff like this my whole life.”

‘What? Hunting gods and fighting in arcane tournaments? You’ve had a secret life you were hiding from me?’

Phasoné said it jokingly—Vayra could tell, and sense, that much—but it still had a hint of frustration to it.

“No, just running from the authorities. Or from Helpers. Or climbing buildings and sprinting through the streets, or getting into fights with other Discarded. I thought I’d sleep well still, but it’s been getting worse.”

‘Vayra, that’s called pressure,’ said Phasoné, her voice taking on a more comforting tone. ‘Before, it was just you.’

“Just me and Bremi.”

‘If you failed, it was just you two who would suffer. If you fail here—’

“Please, Phas, don’t remind me.” Vayra pressed her head back into the hammock. Adair emerged from the corespace, right in her hands—though he was much too big to fit in her hands anymore. He plodded up her stomach and curled up on her chest. At least he was still sleepy, or trying to relax.

‘Apologies,’ Phasoné said. ‘I was just trying to illustrate a point.’

“I’m not mad.”

‘I know. Now pet the cat and let yourself relax.’

“Working on it.” Vayra ran a hand down Adair’s spine. Conceivably, if he could transfer his reaction speed and cat-like instincts, it’d be possible to get other cat-like abilities. She’d always seen cats relaxing and resting in sunbeams or lazing around on windowsills, and Adair was incredibly relaxed at the moment.

She activated her spiritual sight and searched for the hair of his Arcara system, running along his back like spines, and when she found them, she ran her hand along his back. For a brief second, the calm, cat-like laziness bled into her, but then Adair’s fur spiked up and his head shot up.

Vayra pulled her hand away. “Sorry!” she whispered to the cat. “I didn’t mean to…are you alright? Did something happen? Adair?”

The cat sprang to his feet and jumped off her chest. He landed on the floor beside the hammock with a soft thump, then prowled to the door and scratched at it.

‘I don’t think he’s mad at you,’ Phasoné commented.

“Then what—”

Vayra cut herself off the moment the back of her neck began tingling. It was sharp and abrupt, like a new presence had just appeared, and she shut her eyes, trying to get her rudimentary spiritual senses to activate.

Her gut called out in warning, almost like an instinct—there was someone powerful nearby, and they’d just unveiled themselves.

Vayra jumped out of her hammock and landed in a crouch beside Adair. She cycled Arcara quickly, preparing a combat-focussed pattern. There was no time to grab her outer robe, but she snatched up her scarf from a hook on the wall and wrapped it around her neck. There wasn’t time to tie it properly. It draped down over her chest wrap and down to her breeches.

“Phas, are you—”

Before Vayra could finish, the wall in front of her exploded. Shards of stone and wood pelted into the room, and she had just enough wit to cast a Ward in the air in front of herself to shield herself. She dove and snatched up Adair, protecting him as well.

A group of four shadowy forms stood in the common room of their apartment, lit only by the light of Vayra’s Ward. They all wore tight black coats and had pale blue hair. Assassins.

As soon as they unveiled their spirits, Vayra assessed them. Three Second Lieutenants and a Commodore.

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Nathariel leapt to his feet. He had been sleeping in the corner, but there was no way he was resting through all that.

The Commodore pointed his staff at Nathariel. Arcara swirled on the tips of his fingers, then ran down his staff. He used a Reach technique, manipulating the wind, and blasted the still groggy, confused Nathariel into the wall behind. Nathariel smashed through the wall and tumbled into the hallway.

Not good.

The Commodore sprang forward and gripped Vayra by the neck, boosting himself with a puff of wind. The air swirled around him, enhancing his every movement, and dipping away when he needed, allowing him to move faster than the average God-heir.

Adair scrambled up her leg, then her back. A normal kitten might have disregarded her comfort, but Adair had enough intelligence to leap to her short breeches, then to her chest-wrap, then to her scarf, holding on with just his little claws.

The three Second Lieutenants all turned toward Glade’s room and kicked down the door. He’d probably be fine, but Vayra had bigger issues.

Slamming her arms down on the God-heir’s elbow, she tried to break his grip and make him release her. Nothing worked. His fingers were too strong.

She just had to last until Nathariel came back, though. She Moulded her scythe, preparing to swing at the Commodore and keep him busy. The whirring, screeching head of Moulded starlight formed with a snap-hiss.

With an irritated grunt, the Commodore threw her. She Warded her back and smashed through the outside wall of the contestant quarters, but stone shards still left slices and gashes along her sides.

She plummeted a few hundred feet and fell to the risers below and landed hard, then tumbled down a few levels and crashed against the backs of a wooden chair.

Nearby, a small village of tents and ramshackle wooden structures waited in the stands, and mortal observers stepped outside to watch and stare. Some clung to the roofs, only silhouettes, and others stood just outside their tents’ flaps. They all knew not to interfere with a fight between God-heirs. They’d just end up dead, reduced to a red mist in an instant by a stray technique.

The Commodore floated down through the hole, suspending himself with swirling wind. His short hair fluttered, and the tails of his coat swayed. He held his staff straight out in front of him.

“Sister,” the Commodore said slowly, his breath airy and light. “Are you in there, somewhere? Can you hear me?”

Groaning, Vayra pushed herself up. As she rose, a chunk of the moon’s crust high above shifted, letting orange-tinted planetlight seep down to the arena floor. It washed across the Commodore, illuminating his face entirely.

Vayra brushed dust off her shoulder and coughed, then spun her scythe around into a fighting position. “I don’t suppose he’s talking to me?” Unless Bremi had gotten a lot broader, clipped his ears, and somehow gained a massive spirit potential, it couldn’t have been her brother.

‘Narrilé,’ Phasoné said. ‘I know him. He’s my younger brother, one of thirty…thirty-seven? Thirty-eight?’

Phasoné was originally a daughter of the Wind Goddess, and these assassins were using a wind Path. It made enough sense.

She manifested outside of Vayra’s body, standing in the crumbling stone risers a few feet to the side. “I’m here,” she said, audible to all around. The scythe faded from Vayra’s hand and appeared in the hands of Phasoné’s projection.

Narrilé landed three paces away from them. “Mother sent me to finish you off. She believes it to be a mercy.”

Phasoné snorted. “Does she?”

Vayra raised her eyebrows and looked at Narrilé. “If she thinks you can beat a god—”

Narrilé leapt forward, again using wind to boost his speed. Vayra passed mana to Phasoné, then activated the Astral Shroud. Phasoné’s apparition gripped her brother’s staff right in the center then threw him back, sending him crashing through the risers with a puff of white marble. His enhanced body absorbed most of the blow.

“He’s your favourite sibling, huh?” Vayra whispered.

“I was hoping for a chance to do that to one of them,” Phasoné said. “They were always slaves to mother’s will, threatening me and doing her bidding without question, and laughing at me endlessly for taking a different Path.”

“I don’t suppose you’ll have any aversion to pounding him into the ground, then,” Vayra said.

“He tried to kill us. He still will, if mother has requested that he do it.”

Already, Narrilé was standing up. He encased himself in wind, some sort of Bracing technique, and sprinted back up the risers toward them.

“Alright, now get back inside me, Phas,” Vayra said. They were stronger together.

“One second.”

Phasoné’s apparition dematerialized into a puff of sparks and raced back inside Vayra. The scythe re-appeared in Vayra’s hand, ready to slice and cut.

‘He is a Commodore,’ Phasoné warned.

“We have the Mediator Form,” Vayra replied. “And a cat.” She reached up and patted Adair’s back, absorbing some of his instincts.

‘He has his own—’

Before Phasoné could finish, Narrilé flashed toward them, crossing the distance between them in a heartbeat. A white light shone in his eyes, and an orb of silver beamed in his chest. A teleportation device? A treasure of some kind?

He lashed out and punched. Vayra dodged the first, dipping to the side with the help of Adair’s reflexes and the Astral Shroud, but he threw out a second punch with just as much speed, catching her off-guard. The strength of the blow flung her across the risers.

‘I was going to say that he had tricks of his own,’ Phasoné said. ‘A spatial transport treasure—a gift from mother.’

“Did you really think you could defeat me, sister?” Narrilé sneered. “Even in your godly form, when your overconfidence might have been warranted, you were weak! You’re still weak, and with this form, nonetheless?”

“Uh…she can’t hear you,” Vayra lied, panting and coughing.

‘Yes I can!’ Phasoné exclaimed.

“No you can’t,” Vayra whispered. “Just go with it.”

‘What? I can read your mind. You’re just making stuff up.’

“Look deeper! I’m stalling.”

There was so much about this relationship between Phasoné and her brother, this family, and the gods as a whole that Vayra didn’t understand. Couldn’t hope to understand. Really, about the whole galaxy.

But it was time to stop pretending she had everything figured out. A chill ran down her spine, and goosebumps rose all across her body. Her soul resonated in unison with her body and spirit.

Narrilé marched forward, twirling his staff behind himself. “You’re done for.”

“Then it’s a good thing I know my Commodore revelation now.”