Ethan finished applying his last upgrade as the portals’ light grew brighter in the Nerve Tower’s safe sphere. Then, with a gush of dazzling light, they each belched out their occupants and closed up like wounds in time.

Kneeling before the Archon were his three loyal companions. Shaken, confused, and no doubt afraid of what was to come. But alive.

“E-Ethan?”

Fauna was the first one to look up and Appraise him, watching him warily lest he be just another illusion of the Nervestalkers.

“The very same,” Ethan replied. “And you’re the walking textbook Wildglance, Miss Fauna. Super special magic awesome teacher of Sanctum.”

The girl almost collapsed all over again.

“It’s you…” she murmured, tears welling at the corners of her eyes. “You – we – we made it!”

“’Course we did,” Tara murmured. “It’ll take more than a few bad dreams to get us down.”

Ethan turned to her, remembering the tormented nightmare she’d been through. He wanted to say something in the moment, but her eyes flashed the same warning at him as they had before. Now was not the time.

Klax was the first one to stand, helping his comrades to their feet with a reverent grin spreading across his furry face.

“I saw her,” he said. “The real her.”

Fauna blinked. “Jun’Ei?”

Tara was unconvinced. “How’d you know it was really her and not some trick of those bastard creatures?”

“Because this time,” Klax smiled, “she did not appear to me alone.”

They all looked to Ethan who met their bewildered glances with a sage nod.

“No shit,” Tara huffed. “You saw her, eh?”

“Yeah. And I know where she is.”

The three of them stood, unbelief smeared across their features.

“After all these years…I always suspected. But I didn’t know for sure.”

Fauna patted Klax’s mane gently as the old wolf sagged under what he’d seen.

“None of us did, Klax. How could we?”

Tara, Ethan noticed, was saying nothing. She had crossed to the very edge of the sphere, busying herself with her own System screen.

“And yet the place she is locked away is even worse than I could have thought,” Klax whispered. “Griffon’s Watch. The place where traitors are tortured and left for dead. A monument to man’s inhumanity on Argwyll.”

Ethan’s eyes met those of the wolf. He could sense the burning desire to leave and grab his old mate right now. Screw the Lightborn. Screw his duty. He had finally seen the one thing he’d really wanted all this time, and yet the knowledge didn’t bring him peace. She was going through pain the likes of which he could barely imagine. And as for Ethan – he had no clue what the did in that prison.

But from its appearance, he could infer the evils that probably took place on that island. There was a kind of darkness to its craggy, jagged walls and spiked turrets that betrayed the mentality of those who must dwell within.

So when Klax stepped forward and knelt before Ethan’s Host, the latter was taken aback.

“You have given me that which I could never find on my own, my Archon,” he said, much to the surprise of Fauna and even Tara. “From now until the end of time, know that I am yours. Your commands will I follow without question, and your edicts shall become my duty.”

Ethan double-blinked before rolling his eyes.

“Rise, wolfman,” he said. “I never once questioned your loyalty. You think I don’t understand that a man in love sometimes puts that before his King or Prince?”

The old wolf looked up with fierce, piercing eyes.

“All the same, I want you to know that I am with you, my Archon. No matter what course of action you decide, I am with you. To the death.”

Ethan put a hand on the Lycae’s sagging shoulder.

“We’re gonna rescue her, Klax. Make no mistake about that. After we’ve taken down old cranky Artorious up there, we’re gonna get Jun’Ei even if it means tearing that prison apart. And then – we’ll strike at our true enemy.”

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

“Kaedmon,” Fauna nodded. “I’m with you too, Ethan. We took on the Lightborn before, and we…we’ll fuck him up again!”

Everyone turned to stare at the Hopla’s sudden outburst – a statement that was accompanied by her pale cheeks turning a feverish shade of rouge.

“W-well?” she said. “We will, won’t we?”

Ethan looked at Klax before the two started laughing heartily there on the floor of the Nerve Tower’s neutral sphere. Even with the danger of certain death lurking above them all, they could still laugh. Even after witnessing the horrors of their pasts, their spirits still sang within their breasts.

“Y’know something?” Ethan finally said. “If our pure Hopla mage can say that, we can take down the Lightborn and his bitch commander.”

“After all,” Klax agreed. “We’ve been through worse already.”

“You sure about that?”

The party turned to Tara, who had suddenly spoken up and instantly cut through the jovial atmosphere. The thin sheen of energy that looked on to the city below reflected her face – totally neutral in appearance, betraying nothing of the tumult that was raging within.

And now Ethan understood how she could maintain that facade: it was something she had to get good at from the moment she was born.

“You all know what happens if we fail up there, right?” she continued. “Griffon’s Watch would be a mercy compared to what’ll happen to us and the rest of Sanctum if we make a single misstep. It ain’t just regular Greys we’re going up against. It’s fucking Carliah and her precious Lightborn themselves. There ain’t two people in Argwyll with more power in their hands than those two.”

Klax and Fauna looked at each other in confusion.

“I’m surprised at you, Tara,” the wolfman said. “Here we are, giving you the authority to destroy two humans with as much prejudice as you like, and you’re getting cold paws?”

“Those ain’t regular humans, Klax,” she snapped back. “And you know it.”

“What else can we do, Tara?” Fauna asked genuinely. “Ethan’s more powerful than last time. We’re stronger than last time. Together we can –“

“This is always what it’s been like,” Tara interrupted, arms crossed, still not facing them. “We always think we’re gonna win right up until the final moment. Our great-grandparents thought it, our parents thought it, and now we’re thinking it, too. But we’re walking right into their trap, aren’t we?”

Klax looked like he was about to fly for her, but Ethan stopped him with a firm hand.

“What’s your plan then, Tara?” he asked her. “We’ve come this far, what would you have us do?”

The Minxit shifted slightly. Her tail drooped sheepishly.

“…We’ve got what we came for, really,” she said. “Let’s get out, bust out Jun’Ei, and then lead those two fuckers back to Sanctum. They won’t know what hit them.”

This time, Klax was up in arms.

“You’d put our fellow hybrids in danger?”

“They know what they signed up for.”

“But – but some of them are kids, Tara. They can’t help u-“

“They’re growing up in an evil world, Faun. No matter what you teach them – they gotta face reality at some point.”

“That’s not fair and you know it isn’t, Tara,” Klax growled. “Don’t put your brothers and sisters in danger just because you’re afraid, at the end, to be a real hero.”

She turned from the spectral window as soon as she heard that word, racing up to Klax with murderous intent in her eyes.

“Is that what you wanna be, Klax? A hero?”

“Tara, I’m not your enemy.”

“No,” the Minxit scoffed. “You’ve already got what you want. It’s easy for you, isn’t it?”

“Alright, enough,” Ethan interrupted massively, standing and coming between the two. If he was being honest, he was getting fed up with these altercations. Even if he did understand what was going through Tara’s head right now.

She knew it, too. She looked up at him as if she was about to say something before turning again and marching to the end of the sphere to gaze back out onto the uncaring city below.

“Look, let’s take five here,” Ethan told everyone. “The Lightborn can twiddle his damn thumbs up there a little longer.”

Fauna and Klax agreed warily, both eyeing Tara with sadness before they retreated to their own parts of the protective sphere. They left Ethan to walk up to her and stand at her side. For a while he said nothing. But he could tell that she was shaking.

“Well?” she said. “Go on and tell me that I’m just a little girl still scared of her master’s whip. You know everything now. Might as well get it over with.”

He glanced sidelong at her with his crimson hat-eye – the part of him that he liked to think was a window to his real, human soul.

“I’m not gonna blame you for anything or tell you you’re wrong to be scared of what’s waiting for us up there” he said. “And I can’t force you to stay here and fight with us.”

She seemed, as far as he could tell, surprised by this admission. That fact alone told him everything he needed to know about how she saw the world – and that she still saw him as a human, despite it all. Complete with all the dark convictions she held about his species.

“I mean, yeah, I could tell you to get over your fear, and push through the experiences that have gotten in your way since you were a kid. I could tell you that you’ve already done that, in a sense – that the Tara I’ve seen has been fearless, devoted to her cause, and won’t ever submit to anyone ever again. I could say that pushing through that darkness is what’s made you strong. It’s what’s made you who you are.”

“It’s done nothing,” she said quietly, pressing her head against the thin sheath of their little bubble. “…nothing but hurt, all this time. And I can’t ever get rid of it. Some scars…they just don’t heal, Ethan.”

“That’s why I’m not gonna tell you how to feel,” he replied. “Instead, I’m gonna ask: what do you want?”

She looked at him through pained, bloodshot eyes.

“Why don’t you just give me a fucking order? Isn’t that what the Archon’s supposed to do?”

“Probably. Would make my life easier if I could just tell people what to do. Thing is, that’s not what I’m here for. I’m here to break the Law that keeps you guys as slaves. Not make a new one.”

She eyed him warily, but she said nothing at first. Her tail kept flicking between her legs. No longer was she shaking, now.

“So, what do you want, Tara?” he asked her again. “Come with us and change this world, or leave and kill as many humans as you want. I won’t hunt you down if you do. And I won’t tell you you’re wrong.”

For a few moments, she still didn’t reply. They watched the city churning beneath them – everything within its bowels working as intended, every creature laboring away at some divinely ordained order it couldn’t deviate from. All of them never having once considered the question he’d just asked her. The only question that ever mattered at all.

Tara heaved a heavy sigh as she then pulled away from the window and fixed him with the same sad smile she’d worn in the dark void of her dream.

“I bet you already know what my answer is, don’t you?”