More than an hour later, I cried out in pure joy as I gathered wind beneath my tortoiseshell skysail and launched myself into the air beside the basalt cliff. I’d done enough in the swamp that it was time to return to the colony and give Hassina what I’d harvested.

I was returning for another reason. Moving about the swamp had been easy once I’d been able to cross great distances with my short-term flight, and I’d woven above and below the lower mist-layer with ease. As I’d done this, I’d noticed something strange with the higher layer, the one at a level with the colony’s cave: it was getting brighter.

I landed atop the cliff’s edge, my mana almost entirely depleted from the climb. This close, it was easy to see that the mist was getting more white as well as brighter, changing the way the world around me appeared by adding more color to it.

Soon I’d reached the cave, and I had to admire the growing fortifications. A dry moat was being cut out of the rock around the colony, and the face of the cliff that led to the top of the cave, where the stream came in, had been cut back to form a zig-zagging stairway.

Channelers tended wells of mana both inside and outside the cave, the circular pools naturally suited to the task of storing mana that we could use for defense. More broad stairways had been cut out of the rock inside, so that all the cave’s could now be safely and easily traversed.

I found Hassina speaking with some of the weavers next to a pile of skulls that I assumed had been brought down from the bone pile.

I offered her my hands:

- 181 621 Essence!

- 11 [Animal 1 / Body 1]

- 2 [Body 1 / Mammal 1]

- 3 [Body 1 / Wild 1]

- 3 [Insect 1 / Missile 1]

- 19 [Bird 1 / Body 1 / Wild 1]

- 18 [Fungus 1 / Life 1 / Mana 1]

- 4 [Life 1 / Mana 1 / Wild 1]

- 6 [Animal 1 / Surge 1 / Water 1]

- 12 [Armor 1 / Body 1 / Insect 1]

- 1 [Elemental 1 / Frost 1 / Mana 1]

- 16 [Amphibian 1 / Body 1 / Water 1]

- 2 [Animal 1 / Body 1 / Water 1]

- 2 [Body 1 / Water 1 / Wild 1]

+ 1 Limit! (23)

She blinked as she read through all of this. “Well then,” she said.

“Short-distance flight makes the killing faster,” I said. “And the swamp is full of scavengers—I got a lot just by backtracking. I’m two under my limit for level, by the way. They’re gap levels, though. Not going to make too much difference. Eleven thousand apiece.”

“Eleven thousand essence for fourteen to an attribute?” she frowned. “Hard to say if that’s worth it when we’ve got people with levels that cost a few hundred, still. Here.”

She offered me her hands.

+ 5000 Essence, 2 [Air 1], [Elemental 2], 12 [Bird 1], 17 [Body 1]

“Upgrade your [Air Magick] and [Might]. Then build [Avian Grace].”

“Right away, your holiness.”

[Air Magick 6] + 2 [Air 1] + 1000 Essence: [Air Magick 7]

[Air Magick 7] + [Elemental 2]: [Air Magick 9]

[Might 6] + 2 [Body 1] + 1000 Essence: [Might 7]

3 [Body 1] + 1000 Essence: [Body 2]

[Might 7] + [Body 2]: [Might 9]

3 [Body 1] + 1000 Essence: [Body 2]

3 [Bird 1] + 1000 Essence: [Bird 2]

- [Wild Grace 9]: 2000 Essence + [*Primeval 5]

[*Primeval 5] + [Body 2] + [Bird 2]: [Avian Grace 9]

[Avian Grace 9]

[*Primeval 5] + [Body 2] + [Bird 2]

+ 2.4×[Increment]×[Primeval Resonance] to [Agility] (69)

You can lighten yourself to 91% of your ordinary weight.

You don’t suffer airsickness when moving between altitudes.

Your gaze now detects birds, and both your gaze and threshold are easier to extend through such creatures.

It is easier to hide and defend yourself from psychic attacks using the [Wild Bond] skill and all similar skills.

“I already updated your skills on the board,” said Hassina, jerking her head to indicate where she’d had an earthshaper break away a huge section of stone, making a flat wall. She’d written all over this with chalk, including a list of my skills as they were—one that mimicked the script of the Verse.

!—Aziriel’s Skills:

0: [Sable Grace 20]

0: [Primeval Power 30]

0: [Life Magick 7]

2: [Avian Grace 9]

4: [Air Magick 9]

6: [Primeval Mana Hide 14]

8: [Might 9]

10: [Surge of Might 9]

15: [Wild Bond 6]

20: [Lightning Magick 8]

B: [Conjured Missiles 7]

B: [Primeval Mana 7]

B: [Surging Power 7]

“I’m thinking we should just rank up your [Might] a little more,” Hassina said. “Looking ahead, I mean. You just lost some [Strength] from [Wild Grace]. And with where you’re probably going, you’re going to want arrows that can pierce.”

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“Where I’m probably going?” I asked, intrigued.

She jerked her head toward the skulls that I’d seen earlier. “Mirio said he wanted you to look at them. Said that mutations mean they’ll be a little different on this world than on Aranar and Thanaxes, but that he’s certain they’re still wyverns.”

“Wyverns,” I breathed, moving closer to the skulls. Each of them was as long as my arm or longer—large beasts. I hadn’t seen any on my hunt across the fields, but wyverns preferred to hunt other aerial predators to ground-based life. On this world, they probably had plenty such prey.

“I know they’re dangerous,” said Hassina. “But I don’t know what’s so special about finding them. Mirio clearly thought this conveyed a lot of significance that’s lost on me. He said that this Palefang fellow likely killed the most threatening wyverns on top of the nearby peak. He also told me to tell you to be careful.”

“Heh,” I said. “Good Mirio. He didn’t say he needed to talk to me?”

“Only if you felt you had the time. Zirilla, Seriana and I also wanted to talk to you about our [Air] aspects.”

“There’s a lot to be said on that front,” I said, nodding. “None of the flying lizards or birds I’ve killed have granted an [Air] key. Not one.”

“That’s not good,” said Hassina. “Siphoning air isn’t something that most of us can do for sixteen hours out of the day. The windcallers are motivated, but they’re starting to reach their limits. Sieving the air, holding it inside, pushing it out once it’s been stripped for an [Air] key… mental exhaustion is starting to take its toll. We can still make progress, but we’ll be lucky if we can get the keys needed for your [Kite’s Grace] by the storied hour.”

I nodded. I’d hoped for a little more, but even if we could trap [Air] keys at fivefold the rate we already were, it would still be too slow. “We have hundreds of elves that we need to build for flight,” I said. “When the wildhearts come fully into play, that’s hundreds more. Almost a thousand in total. Considering that the attributes they gain from skills won’t be nearly as high as mine, they’re going to need keys. Many abilities requiring [Air 3] keys, at least one each. A comfortable goal is sixty thousand [Air 1] keys, though of course we can work with less. And at this rate, we’re making between ten and twenty a day.”

“That’s more or less what we figured in terms of the numbers,” said Hassina.

“And we need to cover a wide area to know where to hunt for the aspects that aren’t abundant, here. [Weave], [Creation], [Sight], and [Mind] are most important. Beyond that—[Death], [Change], [Lightning], [Fray]... the list goes on. But the first four are especially critical when it comes to the high elves. Much more can be said on this, but I have the general thrust of Seriana’s concerns, yes?”

The lightest of smiles graced Hassina’s face. “The general thrust, yes.”

“We’ll talk again tonight before the storied hour, but many things are becoming clearer and clearer to me,” I said. “Soon Valir will send our hunting parties forth. First his own, to be sure they won’t trigger a convergence. Then all our ready hunters will go, and I’ll stand watch above them all, ready to fly to their aide. I have one more trip outside the colony to make, and I’ll be going far, though Zirilla will still know how to signal me.”

“Up the mountain, then?”

“I must reach the summit,” I said. I looked down at the skulls of the wyverns. “Something is stripping the air, and if it’s intelligent elementals, it’ll be best to find that out as soon as possible.”

“Zirilla said as much,” said Hassina.

“It could be a good thing,” I said. “Or it could be very, very bad. Whatever the case, we need to know. When I return, I can stay with the people and help us settle in while Valir and his people go out.”

“Zirilla said something else,” said Hassina. “Something rather curious. She said it to me—not for me to pass along to you.”

“About music.”

Hassina cocked her head, clearly curious. “Yes. What are you two thinking?”

“Have you played for air elementals before?”

Hassina laughed. “No.”

“You may be, soon.”

“You’re serious.”

“It’s all we’ll have to offer them,” I said. “And it’s your orchestra, your holiness.”

“Oh.” Hassina’s expression fell somewhat. “I know that they’re said to love music….”

“Obsessively so,” I said. “We may have to build our first settlement near the summit of a tall mountain just to be able to maintain contact.”

“That’s….”

“It’s good,” I said. “That’s the good outcome.”

“And the bad outcome?”

“It involves lightning.”

“I see. You understand, of course, how many [Air] keys must have been extracted from the atmosphere, here?”

“A number so high that it would lose all its meaning, I’m sure.”

“Yes.”

“I’ve met storm lords before. You can only push so much power into one body, no matter how big it is.”

“Is that… true?” Hassina asked hesitantly.

I shrugged. “One more question before I go—the mists.”

Now Hassina shrugged. “Luthiel has apparently determined that the light shed by the brighter clouds is sunlight.”

“All right. It looks that way, at least.”

“We don’t know anything else. Seriana has some people watching the cloud outside.” Another faint smile graced her face. “An important task, to be sure.”

“All right. See you soon.”

“Good hunting.”

I grabbed a few things before I left the cave, however, clipping them to the front of my flight suit.

The first was a slayer’s axe: an axe meant for killing larger creatures, built to be used with [Surge of Might]. The axehead had both a front-facing and an upward-facing bladed spike sticking out of it, so that the weapon could be used much like a short spear or a warpick. The head was single-sided, and below these spikes the curved blade was detached from the haft. Altogether it was made so that one could bury one of its points in a creature’s body, grasp the haft below the axehead, and then use [Surge of Might] to tear the point free.

The second thing I grabbed was a set of wooden pipes, a lightweight musical instrument that I knew would appeal to any elementals if I met them.

Apart from that, I grabbed a facemask and a set of goggles. Knowing wyverns, I’d likely be glad I brought both.

Then I left the gate and began to run toward the mountain I’d seen earlier, my mind on the skulls that I’d seen inside the cave.

Wyverns.

Wyverns are natural apex predators. Their skill core is [*Wild], and all of them have [Air Magick] as a granted power. These two things allow them to grow large without compromising their speed in the air, and their long lifespans and lack of natural predators mean they can grow very, very powerful.

Regeneration, heavy armor, swift flight, psychic detection and cloaking via [Wild Sight], silent movements thanks to a sophisticated use of [Air Magick]... wyverns were difficult creatures to bring down.

They rarely ate each other. It wasn’t out of any true sense of social bond, but rather a simple assessment of risk and reward. For a wyvern, everything is easier to kill than other wyverns, so why bother with them? Because they shared nesting grounds, their real competition was in fighting each other out of the prime real estate—a process which rarely resulted in death.

The presence of wyverns on this world, and so close to our landing site, complicated things. Open air settlements were an added risk when just considering the lizards and birds I’d met. With wyverns, living on the surface would guarantee constant attacks. A wyvern would happily tear the roof off a hunting lodge to get at the delicious, gooey meals inside.

There was also the issue of scouting. I wanted squads of windcallers to explore the surface of this world, but the skies had just gotten much more dangerous, and I still hadn’t assessed the air elementals.

Still, we had some things to look forward to.

Like most of the complications I’d encountered so far, it was a curse that we could turn to a blessing. They would be targets rich in essence, and easy to bait. And while they might have been some of hardest creatures to tame, elven wildhearts were more than up to the task—given enough time.

For now, though, we simply couldn’t coexist. Any nearby wyvern population needed to be depleted if I planned to move two and a half thousand elves across the slopes of these mountains in any direction.

There was also the the primeval convergence to consider.

Wyverns learned to fly within days of being born. Juvenile wyverns could range over dozens of kilometers within weeks, and they needed to: the hatching season would quickly see the lands around the nesting grounds stripped bare of all the small birds and critters that young wyverns fed upon.

And yet I’d seen no young wyverns when fighting in the swamp. The older wyverns, like the six-legged frogs I’d fought, would have only been called when the convergence reached its climax.

To my mind, two possibilities existed. The first was that we were far from the season when the eggs hatched, and there were no wyverns small enough to have been called. The second was that the youngest wyverns hadn’t reached me because they were in a different psychic range, a different primeval convergence.

Mirio’s words rang in my mind as I set out in the direction of the peak.

Be careful.