The five moved through the streets, looking for anywhere they could stay, or use to their advantage, or anything, really. Admittedly, most of them were making such a task even harder than it already was. Mark was softly banging one palm into his forehead, Horan was trying to stop his friend from legitimately damaging himself, Waia was listening to something on her phone, Omet was people-watching the monsters that they passed around, over, and under, and Quet was intently focused on a glyph in her hand and trying to get it to work.

“There’s nothing counteracting any effects, the initial thaumic emission is still occurring. It’s like… Yeah, it’s like the surrounding ambient magic is being redirected away from it. I should check my notes on ambient magic, see if I have anything in there on the Down Below.”

She was well aware that nobody was actually listening to her, but continued anyway. “But that means… Hey, any of you seen other people doing magic here?”

Horan noticed her. “What, like, like this?” He waved his hand and blinked as a sudden gust of wind blew into his face. “That’s magic, right? Soul, and all that?”

“No, I’m talking spells.” She held up her glyph. “Glyphs, Skywriting… Wait, you can Skywrite, right?”

“Know? Yes. Understand? Less so.” Horan made the gesture to summon a sword, but instead of the glowing trail of flowing sigils, the only thing he ended up tracing was thin air. “...Should’ve expected that.”

Quet nodded, as if perfectly understanding. “That’s what I thought. There’s no ambient magic here, so there’s nothing for you to write on, and nothing for my glyphs to channel into themselves. But…”

She tapped Omet on the shoulder. “Omet, buddy. Buddo. Pal. Chum. You’ve been doing nothing but spy on people walking past. You see any magic being done? Most likely of the rainbow seizure-inducing variety?”

“Oh, you mean like the magic that guy over there’s doing?” Omet pointed to an… interesting sight. Standing directly on top of a rainbow line that ran through the street, a vaguely spider-shaped monster crouched down and unspooled dozens of wire-thin tendrils from its broad, plate-shaped head. The tendrils all attached themselves to an ivory (at the very least, it looked like ivory) vase on the ground in front of it, while another monster looked on expectantly. The tendrils pulsed with the multicolored display of the Down Below’s magic, then immediately dimmed. The spider-like monster retracted the tendrils back into its head, then began explaining something to the second monster.

Quet took little notice of the monsters’ affairs, eyes fixed onto the Ley Line on the ground. She strode over, squatted to ground level, placed a single glyph onto the line and tapped it. Surely enough, the sigils on the glyph began to glow green, the air around it cooled noticeably, and the segment of the Ley Line directly beneath it took on a uniform green hue for a couple seconds.

Quet stared at the result for a brief moment, then quickly stashed the glyph and pulled out a glitter pen and notebook. Noticing that the other four were almost out of sight (except for Omet, who was gesturing for her to follow), she hurried back towards them while scribbling something down, occasionally stopping to think about what to write down and twiddle her pen. “Fascinating… The city’s infrastructure must be utilizing some form of ambient thaumic focusing mechanism to form some form of-of lattice, or some form of unfocused city-wide matrix in order to regulate the use of magic within the walls. We should see if we can find a library or something, yeah, right, guys?”

Omet nodded along, pretending to understand what she was talking about. “I mean, I kinda feel like getting into that castle so that we can find and save the entire rest of our family takes a couple degrees of precedence over your magic studying.”

“Right, right, of course. Spare time. Spare time.”

Mark had stopped his diet masochism to listen to Quet’s observations. “You figured all that out from looking at a glowing line for a few seconds?”

Quet looked up from her notes. “Actually, I just noticed that it functions similarly to the ideal, or at least intended outcome of a matrix I’ve had in the works for the past few months. Hey, maybe I could analyze the lattice to try and refine my own version!” She noticed Omet staring at her again. “Like I said, spare time. I know my priorities, Omet.”

“Also, you say ‘form’ a lot,” noted Horan.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Do I?” Quet shrugged. “Okay, then.”

Waia unplugged one of her earphones. The tinny sound of a guitar solo emitted from the dangling earbud. “Hey, if you guys are done talking about…” She leaned over to look at Quet’s notebook. “...hedge mazes, my battery, and more importantly my playlist, are running dry. We should find a place to hole up for… whatever our bodies decide constitutes the night down here.”

Omet watched a monster open the front door to their house, which revealed a fleshy corridor filled with hundreds of razor-sharp teeth. “Ideally somewhere that isn’t alive. Being digested by a house is pretty low on my bucket list.”

Mark noticed that the number of neon-striped coats flashing in the crowd was beginning to pick up. Those guards from the castle were congregating around them. “We can worry about that in a little. We’re being followed. Keep your heads down.”

Horan looked around, trying to spot something to give away Mark’s suspicion. “Really? Who? Where?”

“I said keep your head down. And who do you think could be following us down here?”

Waia grabbed the straps of her backpack and growled. “The fuzz.”

Salazar appeared in front of the five on a street corner, a good distance from the nearest Ley Line. “That’s right. It’s me, Officer Salazar Fuzz.”

Quet looked out from behind Mark and Waia, who had both instinctively stepped between Salazar and the other three. “Wait, is that your actual name?”

Salazar looked between the two in front. “Okay, so, I guess the humans are speaking for the Primoi? I’ve seen weirder, I guess. So, which of you two’re in charge?”

Mark and Waia looked at each other. Waia shrugged and gestured for Mark to take the lead.

Mark stayed alert. He was pretty sure he saw more guards in the crowd. “So, what’s the issue? Something to be sorted out at the station, or..?”

“Actually, it’s, uh… I don’t really know, actually. You folks know Yang? The cat who just walked in and took over the city? Yeah, she asked that I track you down and bring you to her.” Salazar looked between Mark and Horan. “Constantly bored-looking, eyepatch… Yeah, she gave me descriptions for you two specifically, but I was told there were others with you. I’m just meant to bring all of you in.”

Horan huffed. “Yeah, knowing our… history, I figure a straightforward execution would be lucky. Suppose we don’t feel like just walking in and saying hi, what happens then?”

Salazar sighed. The quills covering his body bristled imperceptibly. “Of course, it’s never that easy… Bud, I’m a cop. Take a wild guess.”

Noticing the scene that was forming on the sidewalk, the passers-by began giving the six people a wide berth, revealing two or three extra guards surrounding them. Now that the neon flashes could have faces assigned to them, it became clear just how big the other guards were. Most were well over seven feet tall, and were bulkily built at that. Salazar seemed puny in comparison.

Waia glanced over at Mark again, who nodded with the faintest hint of hesitation. She looked back at Salazar. “Yeah, no, thanks but no thanks.”

Salazar raised his arm right as she lunged for his throat. But she was just a little bit faster. He flexed the instant after her arm shoved his upwards, sending a quill flying into the building next to them. The barb went off, shattering a support beam and releasing a deep groan as the corner of the building began to topple onto the street.

Thinking on his feet, Horan released a blast of wind which sent everyone nearby flying away from the collapsing brick and wood (or vaguely wood-adjacent material. It was completely coal-black, after all). Almost everyone, that is. Given that her backpack was still filled with rocks, Horan’s gust didn’t do as much as it should have, and she ended up buried under the rubble.

The crowd saw that things were escalating and quickly hurried down the surrounding streets. Salazar, meanwhile, was the first to get up after being thrown onto his back. He gestured for the other guards to help him round up the targets, then dived at Mark.

Mark didn’t have time to think of anything beyond a gut response. He caught Salazar’s gut with both feet, pushed him over his own prone body, then shoved the Ka-Sala over his head into the wall behind them. While Salazar was still recovering, Mark leapt to his feet and looked at the Aztecs, the only ones who had landed on the same side of the mound of rubble as him. “Move!”

Mark’s cry stirred Horan from his delirium. That gust must have been a bit much, because he saw dark shapes swim in his vision in front of the pavement a foot from his face. He looked up and saw two more guards closing in on him. Horan fought through the pain and sudden exhaustion and launched himself into the air.

Ugh, that was really starting to hurt. Horan hadn’t been on his A-game since Thel, and every move had to be Amped if he wanted to keep pace in a fight. This was why he got Mark to do all the heavy lifting nowadays. At least what little magic he knew was as strong as it had always been.

Quet saw Horan fly up above the rooftops. Her first thought was to reach into a bag for something to use against the rapidly-encroaching aggressors, but she remembered that anything in there was useless without a Ley Line to set it off. Unlike Horan, she was stuck on the ground.

Hang on a second.