“At least Rianne is still around,” I said, stepping into the room. My hand instinctively went to my jacket to check for the Liahona, only then remembering that it wasn’t there. Testing, I held out my hand and willed the Liahona to come to me—it appeared in my hand, a rush of energy surging through my body. When I dismissed it, the energy went, too. “Whoa.”

“I sensed it,” Aerona said. “Like bringing it here flooded you with Avalon magic. Could be damn useful, when the gamble is right.”

“What use is Rianne if she’s not here helping?” Steph asked.

“Excuse me?” Kordelia turned on her, the others also jerking their heads around to glare.

“Steph,” I said, stepping between them, back to the others. “You don’t know Rianne like they do, or even I do. Actually, do you even know who Rianne is?”

“No.”

“Ah…” I chuckled, glancing back at the others. “See?”

“Someone important, clearly,” Steph said. “In her own right, and to each of you.”

Aerona grunted. “That’s right. Very important.”

When they started to back down, I wrapped an arm around Steph’s waist. “She is the magical leader of their group. If she was gone, I don’t know—I barely knew her at all, but I’d feel like Avalon had lost its soul.”

“Exactly,” Ebrill agreed.

I told Steph a brief version of the story, of my interactions with Rianne, and her eyes went wide, taking it in. When I was done, she looked at the others. “I’m sorry.”

“We’ve all suffered losses,” Ebrill replied, and put a hand on Steph’s shoulder. But, as she did so there was a spark like static electricity, only it ended in a trailing red light.

“The connection,” Aerona said. “You still have it open, right?”

I nodded.

“Well, there you go. As long as you have us connected, it’s like our powers are on overdrive.”

“But…” Ebrill looked at me, head cocked. “To be clear, Jericho is the only one who can open the way to Avalon, but…”

“Others might be able to use the portals, too, if they find them,” Aerona explained. “This is all in theory. But yes, the risk is contained for now… until someone with powerful enough magic is able to find these lights in the dark. Finding them should be less difficult with more frequent or prolonged use. When the Liahona is in Avalon, it’s worse.”

“That’s heavy,” I said, trying to process it. “Is the risk…?”

“Worth it?” Aerona scrunched her nose as she debated, then shrugged. “I don’t suppose there’s any other way.”

Damn, the way she looked when scrunching her nose was cute. I kind of wanted to say something else, find another way to get her to scrunch her nose again.

“But to be as ready as we can, to move fast…” She looked around, then to the door. “Is there a room here we can mess up? Get in some training?”

Damn, opportunity for scrunched nose Aerona missed, for now.

I put my hand on the wall, rearranging the old family room. “There is now.”

She laughed. “Perfect. We should try it out. Know what we’re capable of, so when it’s time to use this connection, we’ll be ready.”

“But I shouldn’t keep it open long, right?”

“Just long enough for us to see how this works.”

Steph gave me a curious glance, then held out her hand while we headed for the door. Suddenly, she burst into flames—her entire body! She yelped and then put it out, but not before it spread to the rug. I was there with my ice blasts, which luckily did the trick of putting out the fire.

“Shit,” Steph said, and then laughed. “I like this extra power deal!”

“Keep it under control, please.”

“Sure thing.”

We made it through the door to see the others sniffing and glancing back.

“Just a little fire,” I said. “Nothing to worry about. Keep it moving.”

Steph chuckled, and we took the lead. The gargoyles made loud thuds with each step, shaking the walls, and Shisa came running halfway up the stairs to meet us. I knelt to rub its head, then told it to come along for training. ‘It’? Maybe I’d start referring to the little guy as a ‘he,’ because that made it seem more real.

“I’d love to see what else you’re capable of, when your magic is enhanced,” I told Shisa. The little lion-dog gave a bit of a bark-growl in excitement.

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“You’re starting to communicate!” Steph said, and laughed.

We made it into the old family room, and I glanced around, deciding to try something else. Usually, my transmutation didn’t extend to changing actual materials like real alchemy, or maybe I was limited by my mental ability to grasp such changes. But with the Avalon connection, I felt confident. My hand on the wall, I grinned as I felt the wood transform so that whatever substance I put there held a metallic gleam. My goal was something akin to the X-Men animated series version of their training room—although I couldn’t remember what it had been called or made of. Regardless, this seemed to work well enough. I stopped short of creating sentinels and the whole simulation aspect of their training room. We had real gargoyles and magic, after all.

“Holy hell,” Steph said, and glanced my way as if asking permission.

“Try,” I said, figuring I had a good notion of where she was going with that look.

She held up a hand and thrust, sending a massive blast of fire at the wall. It roared and the heat was intense, but when she ceased, there wasn’t even a scorch mark.

“While you’re at it,” Kordelia said, eyeing the wall and then Steph, “might as well do the whole house like that.”

Sometimes I hated when a badass idea wasn’t mine. Such as in that moment. I nodded, impressed, and said, “You all start training, but see that you don’t hurt each other. I’ll be a couple of seconds.”

“If anyone does get hurt, I can simply heal them,” Ebrill pointed out. “Usually, it isn’t too strong, but with this amplification, it shouldn’t be an issue.”

“There you go.”

I watched them form pairs and start sparring, lightly at first and then harder as they tried fire and other spells to see how much amplification there was. After a moment of this, I went ahead and started making changes to the house. My gut instinct said to change it up and make it look as much like the Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyland or something while I was at it, but I had to curb myself—this was not for cosmetic reasons, it was vital defense of the house. And I couldn’t change the outside much, or passersby would get suspicious. Still, I decided to have a little fun and redecorate. I imagined a room that had reliefs in the walls that showed the story of our adventures and fights so far, and made the rugs rearrange themselves into tapestries to show my ladies in all their beauty. I wondered what they would think of that! The fun kept going until I heard an ‘Oomph’ from behind me and remembered the training, so I quickly finished changing the walls and whatnot to fortress mode.

Ebrill was on her back, wings pushing her up, and Kordelia circled her with a grin.

“Even our physical strength is amplified when tapped into Avalon,” Aerona said.

“Apparently,” Ebrill added, cracking her neck and flexing her arms. Watching her muscles like that, this almost nude, beautiful gargoyle, I felt something else amplified. Steph and Aerona went up against each other next, going spell-for-spell, and sure enough, I was like a horny teenager by the time they were done.

“You’re up,” Kordelia said, motioning me forward.

“Um, yeah… sorry.” I adjusted my pants.

She laughed. Ebrill smiled, and Aerona groaned.

“She meant ‘you’re up’ as in it’s your turn,” Steph explained with a roll of her eyes.

Kordelia pursed her lips, then said, “Get out here and focus.”

I held up a hand. “Let Shisa show us what he’s got first. If I haven’t had a downsizing by then, sure.”

They must’ve been curious, because they all stopped giving me a hard time and turned to Shisa instead.

“Do your thing,” I told the lion-dog.

Shisa shook its head, a mixture of stone and fur, and then stepped out into the middle of the room. It looked at each of us, waiting.

“Oh, we should send an attack,” I said. “Got it.”

Throwing out an ice blast, I watched as Shisa braced and an energy wall shot out around it, deflecting the attack right back at me! Steph hit the ice with fire, so that the result was me simply getting drenched as the remaining water hit.

“Your turn,” I told Steph, wringing out my shirt.

She shot out fire and dodged immediately, so that when it rebounded, it hit the wall and didn’t do any damage. We went at this a few more times, trying with Aerona and then seeing that the shield worked on us, too, and then watched as Shisa shot out energy attacks from its mouth and performed a wicked claw strike that left my shirt torn and some cuts that Ebrill had to heal.

“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, glad to feel that the water and pain had caused my boner to subside.

“What you’re ready for is a change of clothes and some rest,” Kordelia said with a laugh. “But… let’s see what you’re made of.”

I stepped into my best defensive stance. “Bring it.”

“Jericho,” Steph said, clearly trying to stifle a laugh. “You’re not going to be able to take her without magic.”

“But my magic would tear her up,” I replied.

“Fuck you.” Kordelia charged me, picking me up and slamming me into the far wall with a thud that knocked the wind out of me. “Do your worst.”

My eyes bugged, my lungs burning as I gasped for air. They couldn’t seriously want me to hit her with my magic, could they? She slammed me again, and this time it was instinctive—the Liahona appeared in my hand, the ice claw shooting out. It went for her arm but she released me, rolling back. As the Liahona formed into a glowing ball, my next attack came as a burst of those ice claws, shooting out at her and attacking from multiple directions with what looked like glowing chains connected to me.

She spun, knocking some aside with her wings while others hit her, covering her in sections with ice and scraping flesh in others. Her roar filled me with dread and I cancelled the spell.

Ebrill was there in a flash, hand to Kordelia’s head and green light pulsating between them. Kordelia’s wounds healed, the ice gone, and both looked at me with wide eyes.

“I—I’m sorry,” I said, hand gripping the Liahona tight.

“Don’t be,” Kordelia replied. “That was exactly what I wanted from you.”

“It was badass,” Steph added, nodding enthusiastically. “Even Aerona was impressed.”

Aerona nodded, stepping over to me, hand going to the Liahona. She ran her finger along it, then met my eyes. Apparently, she had realized how suggestive the situation was, and pulled her hand away as her golden cheeks turned rosy. I dismissed the ball.

“Again,” Aerona said. “Let’s see how it does against all of us.”

“It?” I shook my head. “Me.”

“Sure, okay.” She winked, stepped back, and then chanted a spell. Blasts of fire and striking light shot out at me, while Kordelia and Ebrill took the hint and leaped up, circling around me to follow up on the attack.

I had the Liahona again in an instant, parrying magic and shooting out a wall of ice, followed by yet another, then causing crackling electricity to leap from it with my elemental strike power. The electricity shot out and took Aerona in the chest to send her spiraling back, and then I turned to block a strike from a wraith knight.

“Not fair,” I said as six other wraith knights came at me, Kordelia and Ebrill along with them. Then again, it was pretty fair I realized as my magic energy surged. With a blast of energy, I sent them all back to the walls, where my magic held them in place.

“What now?” I shouted, playfully. Seeing that they weren’t looking amused at all at being frozen in place like that, I released the energy and then, awkwardly, the Liahona. The wraith knights faded.

Ebrill stretched her wings, glanced my way, and chuckled. “With that sort of power, I don’t think we’ll have much to worry about.”

“Never underestimate the enemy,” Aerona said.