The thralls were chaff. A few blades among them-knives, hatchets, axes-a few old guns, their bullets frozen in midair to my eyes, but nothing that could actually threaten the mages, let alone me. And I had a feeling Szabo was far, far more dangerous than he seemed.

The binder mages drew circles around themselves in the snow, raising transparent, shimmering forcefields. They words they spoke bent the frozen snow and air around the thralls, dragging them to the ground in chains forged from the elements, but the puppets kept moving. Wriggling, breaking their bodies in the attempt to free themselves. And why would they not? They weren't thinking like people anymore, if at all. There was only one mind in all those heads, and it seemed to feel their pain almost as much as it felt pity for them.

The old witch dropped down next to me, shears still smoking after stopping the lightning bolt. She didn't look at me when she spoke, focus held above her head like an executioner's axe. 'Break the storm, strigoi! I will cut their strings!'

Nodding, I pushed my will into the lead-grey clouds, only to find another one already there. I had thought Sofia had simply made the storm by moving air, then abandoned it, but she still seemed to be holding onto it.

I frowned. If enslaving human minds sharpened her focus and broadened her range, what did taking over the environment do?

I was only thinking about that with half my mind, the other half trying to wrest control of the storm from the little witch. I could feel her childish frustration in my soul, hear her shrill, soundless screams. In her mind-her inhuman, ravenous mind-I was the monster at the window, come to take away her friends and ruin her nightmarish little world.

In the end, neither of us prevailed. I staggered back as the storm broke above us, clearing the sky impossibly fast. As I blinked, out of habit rather than necessity, my arcane sense slipped over my sight, and I saw as mages did.

The trapped, struggling thralls were bound by thin strands of pale white energy, like a spider's web, like a corpse's fingers, which spun and wrapped around their hearts and spines and brains. Not truly, for the mana was immaterial and invisible. Just my still human-in the ways that mattered-mind's attempt to make sense of the unseen world. The old witch's power manifested as shears over each string, but, each time they were severed, they remade themselves, even tighter-wrapped than before. The shears' frustrated snapping filled the aether.

The strings also passed through the air, seemingly attached to nothing, and the buildings, though it did not truly touch them. And at the centre...

Ah. Clever girl.

I raised my hand to stop the hill-sized fist when it was scant metres from me. Sofia had not placed herself at the centre of the metaphysical web. Indeed, I hadn't truly seen her, or the shape of her magic, yet. The thing I'd thought I had seen at the centre had been a concentration of mana and will, and my dead eyes barely caught it before it plunged into the ground, then the mountain behind me.

As a strigoi, and ARC agent in training, I regularly had to deal with immense-as far as baseline humans were concerned-weights, distances and speeds. As a result, I had gotten pretty good at judging them.

The mountain that had torn itself out of the ground, given only the roughest humanoid shape by the witch's will, was around four kilometres tall, judging by the clouds halfway across its 'chest'. As for the weight-

I slapped the hand aside, and the shockwave turned the snow and ground beneath it to superheated steam for kilometres. The mages' forcefields rippled like someone had thrown a grenade into a still pond, while the matronly witch, not looking, held up two fingers glowing with mana and snipped through the shockwave as it reached her, leaving herself untouched.

The mountain, eighty billion tons of now-scorched rock, stomped down with blocky feet, so hard lava shot past the clouds. It would take an eternity, from my perspective, before it hit the ground, raining down like Hell's tears.

I shook my head, stealing a glance at Szabo's viewing spot, but the older strigoi was nowhere to be seen.

Of course, I thought with a sneer. Cruel bastards like that always run when faced with an actual challenge.

I jumped up to the mountain's chest as it futilely tried to slap me away, flames forming around me. Would this shake the witch's control?

My punch turned the mountain to eighty billion tons of steaming dust. To avoid damage to Russia-or, hell, the world at large-I focused my weather control power around the dust cloud, trapping it into a spinning sphere of air, condensing the particles until they formed a roughly human-sized lump.

And, while I was admiring my handiwork, Sofia reached out with her will, and grabbed at my lifeforce.

The raging ocean I had drank upon killing the Unscarred was both the first and last to go-after it slipped from me like sand between fingers, I clamped down on my remaining lifeforce with a growl, locking it into a metaphorical iron cage.

Clever, clever girl, indeed. I wasn't sure how much Sofia really knew about strigoi, but she was obviously aware of one of our weak points. While she could not affect me directly with her power, sufficiently skilled mages could take away a strigoi's lifeforce, leaving them as 'weak' as if they had just risen from their grave.

I tried to grab the Unscarred's life, but it slipped away once more, then poured into the dusty lump. With a flex of nonexistent muscles, the lump dispersed my air sphere, then was reshaped once more into a humanoid form.

This one was much smaller-only twice my height-and more compact, but it still weighed as much as before. It fell straight through the lava upon landing, but quickly made its way back to the surface, jumping at me so fast its rocky form glowed white-hot. The land around shook so as far as I could feel, and I would later learn all of Eurasia had.

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It was starting to look like the Unscarred, too. Same long, spiky tail, same muzzle. Did Sofia know about the reptilian or my fight with it? Or did her magic simply inform her about the things she pushed her will into?

It was not as fast as the albino had been, though. The little witch must have still been getting the hang of it. Still...

I caught the hypersonic punch with one hand, and the resulting flash was only scarcely less overpowering than the sound it preceded. That day, people had their eardrums blown out from Mongolia to Ukraine. Thank God for His priests, and for those who healed, though they did not follow Him.

A mountain's weight packed into that relatively tiny frame was nothing compared to what would happen once the witch learned to fully control the Unscarred's lingering strength. It had turned me to red mist dozens of times when it had seriously hit me, despite the fact enough force to turn mountains to gravel couldn't even bruise my skin.

Leaning to the side to avoid a headbutt-the witch might have not known how to fight, but I wasn't about to take her minion for granite- I wrapped both arms around the monster's torso, and with an earth-shattering, crashing sound, threw it skyward and flew after it.

Then, I cocked back my fist and struck it square in its faceless, triangular head. It flew away from me like the world's heaviest rocket, and I followed, faster than lightning, wary of another trick. But none seemed to be coming.

The rock monster crossed Siberia so fast, it parted the land kilometres beneath itself like a ship breaking through ice. It kept flying, then landed in the Pacific like a skipping stone on steroids. Japan's national ward, extending far beyond its borders, seized the waters just as the ocean threatened to turn into a geyser, and forced them back into stillness.

Completely unharmed, the monster leapt back at me, as fast as the albino had been. I braced myself, but, when it was only a metre away from me, I saw red.

I didn't lose my head, or something. I literally saw nothing but red...then dust, again.

Turning in disbelief, I saw Szabo floating where the monster had been, a satisfied grin on his face. And, extending from him and far beyond the horizon, was a series of scarlet afterimages.

Redshift. The bastard had reached us despite our headstart, and jumped between us almost as fast as light. Furthermore, he had turned something as heavy as a mountain, and maybe as durable as the Unscarred, to dust with one strike. I looked at the strigoi with new eyes.

Literally. His aid had pulped the last set as a side-effect.

'Congratulations, little brother! You are almost strong!'

***

Where the village had stood, there was now nothing but a jagged obsidian plain, the lava forcibly cooled by the same mages who were now securing the former thralls. The destruction of her strongest minion, into which she had put so much will and focus, had shaken Sofia's concentration enough for the old witch, codename Anastasia, to sever her connection to both her thralls and her magic-though the latter would not be permanent.

The girl would be taken away for containment, therapy and rehabilitation, as would the villagers, until we could be sure they were once more normal people, not sleeper agents.

Sofia had been put into cuffs, but she did not want to go into the armoured Strangeguard van. Instead, she sat on the ground, a gangly, shivering mutt wrapped around her. The dog-the only being in the village she hadn't taken over, for it had always been nice to her-had been preserved by her magic, and did not want to leave her side, either.

'Allow me,' Szabo smiled, a hand on the stiff Strangeguard officer's shoulder. Smile widening, he walked to the little witch and her dog. The child who had broken five hundred minds looked up, thin blonde hair falling into red eyes.

'I don' wanna,' she croaked, throat raw from crying. At what, she herself hadn't known.

Szabo nodded as he squatted down in front of them. 'Aren't you hungry, Sofi? Come with us. There's nothing to eat here.'

She shrugged. 'No. Not without him,' She jerked her head towards the mutt.

'Well, of course! But don't worry, love. Uncle Szabo will solve both of your problems, at the same time.'

***

Subject Illych, Sofia (age 10, mage)-suspected food poisoning after trying to swallow raw dog meat for unknown reasons. Agent Szabo claims insanity, but we know his inclinations. I Suggest fast-tracking Silva's training. We need a balance to that grinning monster.

-[REDACTED], Head of ARC'S Crypt division, to [REDACTED], Director of the Romanian Branch.

***

-Attention, citizens of the Russian Republic: A classified, but lamentable event involving an atrocity perpetrated by a young, rogue mage has occurred in the Ural Mountains. Using the blood spilled and the symbolism of the acts that took place there, Chernobog has gained a foothold into our world, manifesting himself where a desecrated church once stood. The Black God claims Odin's mishandling of Mimir's head is a sign of incompetence, irresponsibility and lack of interest that threatens the world as we know it. Chernobog is ready to do "anything I must, to restore order to the neutral ground of this world. My rivals of the other realms can stand at my side or die at my feet, but there will be war. We have been too lax in dealing with the uncaring Aesir. Chaos will not reign."

***

-'WAR BETWEEN THE GODS?! For more information, check out page...