Vayra and Bremi ran out into the street. They slipped between the rear of a carriage and a charging horse, then skidded to a halt. A wagon thundered past in front of them.

Vayra spared a glance back over her shoulder. The Helper pointed his pistol, and a puff of smoke leapt from its barrel. The shot whistled past. She didn’t see where it landed, and she didn’t care to find out.

They had to lose the Helper. As soon as she spotted a gap ahead in traffic, she dashed forwards. She and Bremi dipped between a pair of wagons, then spun around a bewildered peddler in a tricorn hat.

The sidewalk was just ahead. But before she reached it, her foot latched on a loose brick, and she tumbled to the ground. An elven man on horseback approached. Vayra scrambled out of its way just in time, dragging herself through a stagnant puddle and up onto the smaller paving stones of the sidewalk.

Vayra leapt to her feet and stared back at the window she’d come from. Everything was blurry, but the Helper was nowhere to be seen. Bremi, however, still stood at her side. He smirked. “You got shit in your hair, sis.”

“Not now.” Vayra’s head whipped back and forth, searching for the best escape. Everything seemed to smear together.

Bremi continued, “It ain’t a good look—”

“Hey!” came a distant shout, cutting Bremi off. “You two!”

Vayra’s attention snapped further down the street. Despite her clouded vision, she spotted a pair of scarlet-coated smears. She rubbed her eyes until she could add brown (their peaked caps and muskets) and blue (their pauldrons) to the list. They didn’t point their weapons yet. One of the men ran forwards and demanded, “What are you two up to, eh?”

Redmarines. In their attempts at policing, they only looked inches before their noses. The real threat was across the street. But they were persistent, well-trained, and more annoying than Gréno and his Helpers.

The marine brought his musket to full-cock, but the second raised an arm and said, “They’re just kids. Discardeds, by the looks of it.”

“Run!” Vayra shouted.

She and Bremi sprinted down the sidewalk, towards the taller buildings of the inner city, and back towards Tavelle’s Gorge. Lanterns whirled past her face like sparks. She wove between pedestrians and through processions of farmhands entering the city for the evening. The Redmarines chased just feet out of reach, twisting and turning to pass civilians.

Vayra pushed an emaciated man aside, then gripped onto the corner of a building to swing herself into another alley. She didn’t slow down in time, and her shoulder rammed into the wooden wall on the opposite side. Her worn-down boots struggled to find traction again on the paving stones, but once they did, she took off into the street on the other side of the alley. Bremi emerged just behind her, trailed by the two Redmarines.

“Vayra!” Bremi yelled. “What’s the plan?”

She ducked under an immobile cart, then pulled a wedge out from its side panel. Hay bales tumbled out, blocking the marines’ way. “We just need to get to Meynan’s Street, then back to the Gorge! Old Uckoe will—”

Something collided with her side, and the breath fled from her lungs. She tumbled onto the paving stones. She tried to sit up, but something pinned her to the ground. A dark shadow struck her in the nose, then an elbow pressed against her throat. She caught a glimpse of a pearlescent white mask, but her vision began to darken. Everything grew dimmer, and no matter how hard she thrashed, the Helper was too strong.

Suddenly, the pressure lifted off her neck, and blood flowed back into her head. She rolled onto her side, gasping for breath. Bremi pulled on the Helper’s coat. The man ripped his arms out of his sleeves, and Bremi stumbled back with an empty coat. The Helper swung his pistol, and Vayra heard a hollow crack. Bremi fell limp into the street. A trickle of clear blood rolled down his forehead.

Vayra snapped a hand towards her brother’s ankle, and she tugged on it as hard as she could. A carriage approached, and the driver wasn’t slowing down.

The Helper kicked her. Her ribcage blazed, but she kept pulling on Bremi’s ankle. She heard the carriage’s approaching rumble through the rush in her ears. Another kick struck her in the ribs, harder and sharper, but still she didn’t release Bremi’s cuff. She tugged again. Bremi’s body shifted towards the sidewalk, just barely enough to keep him out of harm’s way.

The Helper’s third kick forced the last dregs of air from her lungs. She couldn’t even gasp.

“Stop!” one of the marines shouted. He pointed his musket at the Helper. “All of you! Cease this at once!”

The other marine approached just behind, hay woven into the lapels of his coat. “Drop the—”

Another puff of smoke spat from the Helper’s pistol. The blast stung Vayra’s eardrums, and it felt like wind chimes rang in her head. One of the marines collapsed. The other fired his musket, but the Helper had already leapt aside.

Vayra scrambled behind a crate and pulled Bremi along with her. His chest rose hesitantly, then deflated moments later. She shook his shoulders. “Bremi, wake up! We need to run!” Her brother stirred and mumbled, but she couldn’t make out any coherent words. “Wake up!”

She heard a thud, then a clang. The surviving marine blocked the Helper’s rusty, handmade knife with the barrel of his musket. They scrapped, and now was the perfect time to run. But Bremi was too heavy to carry. She yelled, “Stand up, Bremi!”

Bremi lowered an arm and placed his hand against the paving stones. The stone cube tumbled out of his pocket and towards the gutter, but Vayra stuck her foot in front of it to stop it from bouncing into the puddles. It hit her boot. She felt an urge, tugging at her blood and guiding her hand. It wanted her to touch it.

The ringing in her ears disappeared. In its place, she heard a woman’s voice whisper, ‘Pick me up.’

The voice had spoken inside Vayra’s head. Even though it was just a whisper, the words raced around her skull and vibrated through her bones. She pressed a hand against her forehead, but the voice returned.

‘Accept my help.’

There was a soft thud beside Vayra. The Helper skidded along the ground and came to a rest beside her. Instead of the voice, she heard the crowd’s screams crescendo. She looked up. The marine marched forwards, fastening his bayonet to his musket as he walked. If anyone was caught participating in organized crime, the punishment was death. Most marines didn’t bother letting the accused reach their trial.

“Bremi! You have to get up!” Vayra looked up at the Helper. Half of his mask was shattered and his nose bled red, human blood. He met her gaze, then scrambled towards her and Bremi. She tried to kick the Helper away, but he caught her foot and flipped her.

The Helper wrapped an arm around Bremi’s neck and pressed his knife to the boy’s throat. “Stay back!” First, he held Bremi between him and the marine, then he turned to the marine. “Both of you!”

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“Don’t!” Vayra yelled. “You’ll—”

“I know what iron and rust does to your kind!” The Helper looked at the marine. “Drop the musket, or I’ll kill the boy!”

“Drop it!” Vayra pleaded. She raised her arms and showed the Helper her open palms.

Once more, the stone cube drew her eyes. It tried to assert its will on her, and she tried to resist it. But her fingers felt loose. Slowly, her pinky stretched towards the cube.

‘I know what you are too, Vayra,’ said the voice again. ‘I know you are a phoenix. I know you nurtured your brother’s egg for five years before he hatched. I know you would do anything for him.’

The marine didn’t lower his musket, nor did he turn the bayonet away from the Helper. He ordered, “Let the boy go!”

“If you don’t kill me here, it’ll be the gallows!” said the Helper. He pressed the knife closer to Bremi’s neck. Bremi blinked, and muttered again. His head lolled forwards, then it sprung upright, eyes wide. He must have realized what was happening.

“Please, sir!” Vayra added, urging the marine to lower his musket. The marine didn’t yield. He raised his shoulders and pointed the bayonet.

‘If you want to save him, listen to me!’ the cube’s voice begged. ‘Touch the Seekerstone.’

Vayra scrunched her eyebrows. And then what? Sudden movement would make everything worse.

‘Your raw, unpurified mana will fuel it. It will cause a distraction, Vayra!’

Great. It could read her thoughts, too.

‘I can. And I know what you need to do right now! Take it!’

Vayra leapt for the cube—the Seekerstone. She fell hard against the sidewalk, and she pressed her hand down on top of the cube. The moment her skin connected with it, something fled out of her hand. She didn’t understand the feeling. Somehow, the cube was pulling on an element of her body, something that ran in channels beside her bloodstream. It passed through her fingers and the palm of her hand, and—

And then a bright, colourless light overtook everything. She fell, but not to the ground. The uniform whiteness was a void, and she plummeted. If there was ground below, she couldn’t see it.

Vayra thought she screamed, and she knew she heard her own voice, but her mouth wasn’t open. There was no one else around to hear—not Bremi, the Helper, or the marine.

“Be calm.”

It was the same voice that she had heard in her head, only it seemed younger and less confident—and more real. This time, she wasn’t so certain that she was hearing it in her head. Vayra tried to follow the voice’s instructions. Against her instinct, she held her arms and legs still. The falling sensation stopped.

“Turn around,” the voice ordered.

Vayra couldn’t feel anything firm beneath her feet, but when she tried to spin—as if she was standing on solid ground—she felt herself turn. The source of the voice emerged in her peripheral vision. A shadow against the void, vaguely human-shaped and only an inch taller than her.

Vayra breathed, “What…what’s—”

“You are safe,” the shadow whispered.

“Where am—no, it doesn’t matter. Let me out of here!”

Colours bled into the shadow. They filled out the shape of a woman. Vayra spotted two eyes so vibrant and brown they seemed to emit light. Lastly, an olive-skinned face and dark brown hair. Vayra leapt away.

The woman said, “Here, a fraction of a second becomes minutes. So long as your mana fuels the void, that is. You have—”

“Let me out!” Vayra yelled. She stared into the blank whiteness where Bremi and the Helper had stood moments before. She had to get out and help her brother. “Why am I here?”

“For now?” The woman shrugged. “Just to make a bright flash. A distraction.”

“With mana? I’ve got no magic!”

The woman grimaced. “That’s not entirely true. Not anymore.”

“I—” Vayra cut herself off. It didn’t matter. “I need to get out!”

“You may leave,” said the woman.

“How?”

“Open your eyes.”

Vayra tilted her head. Her eyes already were open!

“No, they’re not,” the woman said. “You shut them when you touched the Seekerstone.”

Vayra remembered touching the stone cube and reflexively snapping her eyes shut at the white light. She had never opened them again; this vision was inside her mind. She concentrated on her muscles, and begged her eyelids to come apart—to be released from the vision.

Vayra’s eyelids snapped open, and the white void retreated with them. All that remained was a spectral glow and white sparks—residue of a great flash outside the void. She leapt towards Bremi and the Helper, and pulled her brother free from the man’s loose, shocked grasp. “Run!”

“Vayra?” Bremi asked.

Vayra ducked under one of the Helper’s frazzled swipes and pushed Bremi down as well. Her brother gasped in pain. She tugged him out of the Redmarine’s way.

To Bremi, Vayra shouted, “Can you run?”

“Yes!”

Vayra pulled her blouse’s cuff down around her fingers and picked up the Seekerstone, careful not to let it touch her skin.

The Helper grunted. A spike of silver and red pierced through his greatcoat—the marine had impaled him. Next, the marine would chase after her!

Vayra pointed down the street; there was an alley she and Bremi could slip through. They sprinted along the sidewalk, pushing through the onlookers who sheltered at the edge of the street. Bremi was first into the alley. They both stopped halfway and ducked into an alcove. She was certain her brother understood the plan. They’d done it before.

A lantern bumped against her shoulder. They couldn’t hide in the bright light. She threw the lantern to the ground and pressed her hand against it to quench the flames. A half-phoenix’s skin was still naturally resistant to heat—and that was the only gift she’d inherited from her parents. Not magic.

Once the lantern went out, they both held perfectly still. Vayra pressed her back against the wooden wall. A knot of wood pressed into the small of her back, and it began to sting. Every muscle in her body tightened, and her stomach rose.

The marine ran down the alley. His musket was cocked, and Vayra was certain he had loaded another shot. He stopped for a moment, then he ran past, into the crowded street on the other side of the alley. He didn’t look back.

Vayra and Bremi stayed silent. Slowly, the crowds on both sides of the alley began to wander cautiously and stare at the aftermath of the skirmish. A dead Redmarine and a Helper? The city would talk about it for weeks.

Vayra nudged Bremi out of the alcove. On the first step he took, he threw up. She looked into his eyes and observed them carefully; his pupils didn’t dilate, even in the light. “We’re gonna get back to the Gorge. Old Uckoe’ll know what to do.”

“Sis, it’s…” Bremi staggered along the alley and into the street. He turned his shoulder towards her, revealing a gash in his sleeve. Below it, his skin was torn. Clear blood seeped from the wound.

Vayra pressed her eyes shut. Then, she offered a smile, and while it felt like a lie, she laid a hand on her brother’s shoulder. “It’s fine,” she whispered. It wasn’t fine. “He didn’t get you bad. There’s, uh…probably no iron in it.”

They walked down the street. Vayra looked up to find her bearings. The Eternal Stream rose to the west, and now, the setting sun rippled through it. To the east, mountains climbed up from the coast. If she and Bremi headed due south, they would reach Tavelle’s Gorge—it cut through the center of the city, and was impossible to miss.

Vayra made sure to walk slowly and to keep her head down. A procession of Redmarines ran down the center of the street, but she made sure to stay hidden behind a layer of pedestrians.

The sunlight dimmed and the sky darkened. Starry pinpricks appeared in the sky, and as they did, the Seekerstone grew heavier in her hand. It threatened to slip out from her sleeve, and she tightened her grip. She couldn’t ignore the sense—the instinct—that told her a third person was walking with them. When she looked behind her, she saw no one. “Bremi? Did this cube thing call to you?”

“Huh? I…uh…no. I just thought it might be interesting.” He rubbed his forehead, then his eyes.

A huff escaped Vayra’s lips before she could resist it. Why her?

She stared down at the cube. She didn’t dare to touch it again—not out in the open. But, as it had before, it didn’t need her to touch it to speak with her. The woman’s voice rang out in her head: ‘The Seekerstone called to you because you are the Mediator. And the galaxy needs your help.’