Andora was forcibly dragged across her property as she, her sister, and Bodelin distanced themselves from the other conflict. She saw two figures dart out the door and begin pursuing them.

Both were dressed in loose-fitting clothing and didn't seem to have any weapons on them, though one held a staff with some sort of crystal embedded in it. One was a beastkin man with flowing brown hair that was starting to gray at the ends, a focused but impartial look on his face as he hefted his staff before him. The other was an elven woman with a manic glint in her eye, robes similar to what you'd see on a priest twisted in horrible ways. The fabric was tattered and frayed, each flowing length of cloth smeared with what looked like dried blood.

Another one of Reverie's faithful, no doubt.

"Mages," Annora stated, "That lunatic took the time to examine our individual fighting styles as he stalked us on that train, which means these two will likely be coordinated against my movements. Lin, go get your brother. I'll take them on a little tour of the city, see if I can't lose them or deal with 'em somehow."

Bodelin nods before dashing off in a different direction. Neither mage changed course to follow.

"Sister, I can't protect you, so you need to-"

Andora had long since reached her boiling point. Being dragged by her rogue sister straight through the walls of the home that she'd come to love and adore was far more than the last straw. All the rage she felt at this moment and all the mental turmoil of the past month and more focused itself on the two figures that pursued them across her well-kept lawn.

"What? Go hide in a corner like some defenseless weakling? No, sister. You forget that I too was given the Seed. And unlike you, I have something to protect."

They leaped over the outer fence and felt the Area they'd been encapsulated in fade away. The street was filled with people following the sounding of the bells, from panicked servants to nobles who looked as though the smoke floating through the air was nothing more than a nuisance.

They took only a single step into the street before they both launched themselves over the crowd, Andora using magic to assist her movement and Annora relying upon her brutish strength. They landed on the roof of the building across the street, and there they stopped and turned back to face their pursuers as one.

Both mages halted their advance just outside the fence, content to limit the conflict to a staring contest as the crowd dissipated. It seemed at least as though this devotee held more sanity than his scarred compatriot. It was as though a silent accord was struck, if they engaged in battle now it was likely the crowd could get involved, resulting in a pointless slaughter.

"Sister, you told me before that I was holding onto empty pride," Andora said as she looked down upon the throng of people making their way to the outer reaches of the city, "But I beg to differ. I take pride in all that our people are, and all they have achieved. I take pride in this city that I have been given charge over, and all the people in it. Voset is not perfect. There is darkness in its depths and a tragic history behind its creation. And yet still it is my pride, and so I will protect it. So long as there is something worth protecting in this great wooden mausoleum my pride cannot be said to be empty."

Annora's face revealed no change, and she said nothing. But Andora knew she'd heard and heeded her voice.

You never were one for words.

The crowd's thinning was significantly hastened by the presence of the woman in the dried blood robe, and soon the street was empty. With reinforced hearing, she heard a brief banter from across the street.

"Just for the record, I don't want to end up with a seven-figure bounty across the entire damn country after this," The rather ordinary looking beastkin said.

"Yeah, yeah. Just kill the beefy one, I'll hold the mayor or whatever off," The woman in bloodstained robes said back with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

Before the mages had a chance to act Andora dashed to the side along the rooftop, distancing herself from Annora before her sister intoned, "Anti-Magic Area."

Just like old times.

Andora couldn't deny the feeling of nostalgia she got at that moment. The brief remembrance of training under the stone sky of the royal training grounds in the Mountain Home, the memory of a time when all her sisters had existed together in blissful harmony.

But that time was gone, and now her city burned. When they were young their mentors had taught them how to most effectively utilize their strengths. Annora was gifted with immense physical strength which could only properly shine within an Area. Andora wasn't strong, but she'd still been forced to learn how to fight.

Both the enemy mages dashed in different directions as the Area expanded. Staying outside the perimeter of the Area, each made their preparations.

"Domain Expansion, Through the Looking Glass," said the one with a staff, expanding his own sphere of influence.

The woman with defiled robes made two cuts on her upper biceps with imperceptibly small blades and said, "My will is the will of my Lord, my blood his to use in his dark desires. Come, oh lifeblood of mine, let us dance to the melody of war." Andora could faintly see blood drip off the tips of her fingers as she made a series of handsigns.

The beastkin with the staff used his magic to tear projectiles off the surrounding environment and launched them at Annora. Slivers of the hard wooden street, blasts of shattered glass from windows, anything that could conceivably be considered a weapon was thrown her sister's way.

This was the only real way for a mage to fight somebody who employed an Area. Unless a significant amount of mana was allocated to cementing a projectile in reality, an Area would usually dissolve it the instant the projectile entered the radius. It was awkward, annoying, and tedious. But it was also powerful.

Annora immediately responded by dashing straight toward the beastkin, trying to force her Area forward so as to encompass him and strip away his ranged capabilities. The beastkin didn't appear to pay her any thought as he seemed to dance upon the winds, leaping from building to building and street to street. If a mage was talented enough to multicast they could maintain evasion and consistent fire simultaneously, and the beastkin was clearly skilled enough to do this with ease.

The resulting conflict was, in essence, a war of attrition. For Annora to gain the advantage she had to be patient and persistent, withstanding or dodging anything thrown at her as well as she could and continually pressing her advance. On the other hand, the mage retained his advantage so long as he maintained distance and retained enough mana to continue.

Andora grimaced as she watched a dresser ripped from a house smash and shatter against her sister, but she had her own problem to deal with.

As Andora did her best to keep up along the outer edge of the Area a projectile of blood shot past her ear as she moved her head to avoid the shot. She used magic to continue to propel herself onward, around her sister's dome of influence while avoiding the bead of blood that seemed to continue to home in on her.

It was easy to surmise her opponent's specialty. They'd taken the liberty of smearing it all over their clothing and even included it in their incantation. Still, it struck Andora that using one's own blood as a weapon must be highly inefficient. It was a true double-edged sword.

She conjured a projectile, a small steel dagger without any hilt or handle, and launched it over and around her sister's Area. The woman dodged it with ease, but Andora wasn't done. With a flick of her finger, she emulated her opponent's offensive style, sending the weapon flying after the target again and again. For a minute or so they seemed to dance like this, on opposite ends of an Area assaulting each other with controlled magic missiles.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

As she continued to dodge the red comet that pursued her she also emulated the beastkin's method of fighting, and launched anything not nailed down on the rooftops around her at her foe. Almost all of these attacks missed wildly, Andora too preoccupied with both dodging and manipulating different projectiles to focus on actually aiming the random assortment of objects she telekinetically threw through the Area.

She was met with success when a shingle flew close enough to her opponent that it distracted them for the split second she needed to score a gash across their face. She'd been aiming for the neck, but she took it as a sign of progress nonetheless.

Damn, but this is draining.

The chase was beginning to seriously wear on her stamina and concentration. She had to continuously move from rooftop to rooftop to keep up with her sister as well as continually skirt around the Area to the right as the blood manipulator kept trying to inch around the left of the Area to close the distance to her. Andora figured they had a sizable amount of confidence they could better suppress her in close quarters, and they were probably right.

As these thoughts ran through her head she felt the strain of mana from her controlled dagger reach something of a critical point. The longer she controlled the object at this distance the more mana it seemed to draw, to the point that she was concerned she would run out if the conflict continued for much longer.

She dismissed her summoned blade at the same time the blood manipulator frowned and summoned the droplet of blood back around the Area to flow back up, into their arm. She needed to think of something else, and she assumed the woman she faced was thinking the same thing. The mana drain of telekinetically manipulating something at range was significantly higher the greater the distance between the target and caster, and it cost more to maintain the same amount of force.

As they continued circling the Area, Andora noticed that the building her opponent stood upon was torn apart. Taking a moment to further look around revealed that they had traveled in something similar to a circle.

As Andora kept her distance away from the blood mage and the blood mage tried to close the distance between them, she'd unconsciously strayed toward the beastkin still lobbing whatever he could at her sister. This, in turn, had caused the beastkin to stray away from her, and as Annora continued to chase the beastkin like an animal gone mad this circular motion around the Area had caused them to travel in a circle. Andora glanced at the bell tower just outside the sphere of influence of their rampage and wondered if she could do something with it.

She also wondered if she could shift focus to attack the beastkin instead of the blood mage. Unlike the crazed woman, the staff-wielding man seemed to care for what tomorrow would bring, and refrained from attacking her even as he no doubt had had perfect opportunities to do so.

Her next leap took her to an exposed room of one of the ruined buildings. The broken mess of what may have once been a child's room around her struck another chord of rage deep inside.

My beautiful city. Damn you. Damn you all.

She forced herself to focus back on the conflict and began summoning another blade. As she did she noticed the blood mage seemed to be pouring a lot of mana into yet another bead of blood in their hand.

What is she-

The condensed bead of blood shot forward faster than she could perceive it, creating a sharp crack as it broke the sound barrier while passing through Annora's Area. She felt a sharp pain in her left shoulder and felt the warm drip of her own fresh blood soak into her clothing, in the front and back where there was an entry and exit wound.

In their duel of magic, Andora hadn't considered that her opponent would try launching something through the Area that stood between them. Magic dissipates in an Area, but her opponent wasn't using conjured blood, she was using her own real, genuine blood. Even so, unlike the physical objects Andora threw across the way, the woman's blood wouldn't have much of an impact if simply lobbed through the open space. Still, imbuing something with that much force was costly, and the unsatisfied look on the woman's face told Andora that she'd intended to hit something much more vital.

A second dagger finished materializing in her hand. She ignored the pain in her shoulder and launched it at the person she'd so far ignored. It sailed in an arc around the Area toward the beastkin as he launched yet more rubble at her sister.

Just as the dagger was about to reach its target the beastkin's eyes slid to her. It struck her how calm and composed those eyes were as he leveled his staff at her, and for the briefest of instants saw one eye through the crystal embedded in the wood. She slammed into the wall of the child's room behind her with enough force to almost knock her unconscious.

He telekinetically moved me directly? Oh shit.

She realized too late what had truly occurred as she felt the Area encompass her. Telekinetically moving a person, especially a mage, was impossible due to the person's innate domain resisting the effects of foreign magic. So the beastkin had simply moved the upper level of the building she was standing in. She knew her conjured dagger would have disintegrated as soon as she entered the Area as well, making her attempt to change the situation to their favor meaningless.

As the structure carrying her along struck the ground Andora was thrown out. She felt the hollow thud of the wooden ground as she rolled into the debris-covered street, and she felt pieces of the structure behind her rain down upon her as the remains of the building exploded against the sturdy wood of the street.

Before she could get to her feet her sister was there beside her. Andora heard a grunt as she pushed herself up on one knee. Looking up she could see blood running down Annora's arm where a hole was pierced through it. Without looking down at her, Annora said, "Get ready to run."

"What?"

"I said run!" Annora shouted as she collapsed her Area, intending to give Andora a chance to use magic to distance herself.

Before Andora could even decide what to do, however, they both heard a voice over the sound of the last of the debris raining down around them, "Move."

And then he was there, standing next to them. The beastkin stood behind Annora with his free hand stretched out behind him, touching her back, as he held his staff away from her.

"Burst," the beastkin intoned, and as he did a blast of energy blew Andora off the ground and across the street, where she once again rolled to a stop. Looking up, she saw the beastkin standing alone in the street, baggy pants and oversized tunic wildly flapping about his figure.

She glanced away from him, in the direction her sister had been, and saw the bell tower in the near distance, the roof near blown completely off. She knew somewhere inside the structure, or maybe beyond it, lay her sister. She couldn't bring herself to consider Annora being anything other than knocked unconscious by the impact, but she shuddered at the power in that blast.

"Now," the beastkin said slowly, his words drawing her attention back to his calm and cool gaze, looking as though nothing exceptional had happened, "What next, baroness?"

"What?"

"Will you continue this fight, or concede? I have no interest in drawing out a conflict that serves no purpose. Concede, and we will end our engagement here. Persist," His calm and cool eyes took on a cold and ruthless visage as he raised his staff toward her, "And I'll end your life, right here and now."

The blood mage looked slightly annoyed, perhaps irritated that her quarry had been stolen, but said nothing. Andora had assumed the fanatic would have been the leader of the duo, but it seemed they lacked the will to resist the beastkin's authority.

"I…" She started, but trailed off.

Andora knew logically there wasn't even the slightest chance she could win against both of these mages. She wasn't even sure she could have beaten the blood manipulator if she was honest with herself. The gulf between those who possessed talent but no experience and those who had actually lived by the blade was simply too large for her to cross alone.

She heard a crash in the distance as the bell tower started to fall apart, seeming to collapse in on itself.

She gathered her resolve and looked into her enemy's eyes as she said, "I am the baroness of Voset, it is my-"

"Yes, I heard you speak of pride before, and your sentiments were just," The beastkin cut her off, "However, before you finish that statement I urge you to consider this; Your death here and now would serve no purpose, none at all. We, us two before you, are not interested in causing this city harm. We are not raiders or pillagers, we were not even the ones who lit the fire in the depths. If you would simply concede this battle you would be free to go and actually be of service to your city. You could lead evacuation efforts, be a symbol of stability to the fearful people. I tell you again, dying here would be no more than empty self-gratification and pride."

Andora bit her lip in frustration, knowing the man spoke the truth, even as he was the target of all her anger and rage. She knew further resistance against these people would be the height of folly. But even so, she struggled to force down the instinct to strike back against the group that was responsible for her city's despair, if even a little.

The beastkin seemed to take the look of tortured frustration on Andora's face and the blood running down her chin where she'd bit through her lip as a sign of resentful surrender. He lowered his staff and stepped away, "Farewell, baroness. I hope your city comes to know more peaceful- Gah!" His sentence was interrupted by a large metal band colliding with the side of his head.

Andora looked toward the bell tower, where the object had come from, and saw her sister, clothes completely ruined and bloodied from a multitude of wounds, stalking out of the open double doors at the base of the tower. In one hand she dragged the massive brass bell behind her and in the other she held the bulky length of chain that connected to the bell.

"Oi," Annora said with a look of stoic determination, "You and I have unfinished business, mage."

The beastkin let out a long sigh as a small trickle of blood crept down the side of his head, seeming only mildly perturbed that someone he'd assumed dead had survived his attack.