Sia hung back as Timi closed in, a hail of strikes preceding her charge. Unity danced away from them, blocking those which he couldn’t escape entirely. Gritting his teeth and retreating to keep the distance between them from shrinking.

The corner of his eye picked up magic glowing in the boy’s hands five or ten paces away. Energy building to a critical mass, ready to be loosed. Taking long enough that Unity could surely have intercepted were he not entangled with the mystic’s teammate.

It needled him to see such a simplistic strategy used against him. Needled him more to know he had few ways of countering it.

He stopped his retreat suddenly, grunting when one of the girl’s blows fell unguarded upon his armoured side, then closing the gap himself. Her eyes widened, then shut at the impact of his forehead as it left her nose flat and foaming with blood. Then Unity had his grip, hoisting the girl upwards just as he saw the light build to boiling ahead.

Sia hesitated as Unity twisted Timi between them, charging forth with the stunned girl sitll held between them. A shield made of flesh and magic, sturdier than wood.

The boy did what Unity knew he would, aiming low as he unleashed his magic. Missing entirely when Unity released his teammate and leapt high to let the blast detonate against the ground underfoot.

Timi fell, and Unity flew in a dive. He landed, moved to his feet, then pounced before Sia could think to open more space between them.

Unity’s wrist cried out in pain as he struck the boy, but the sensation was buried beneath the satisfaction of seeing him fall.

Just in time for Timi to rise at his back and close in again.

***

The world was eaten by light as Gem’s magic did its work.

Bottomless and unbroken, like the sun was falling to earth. There was no sight amid the photonic storm, no senses at all as sound and scent rose to match the blaze.

Heat touched Gem’s skin even from a half dozen paces back, itching and aching through her magical defences. Leaving her certain it would have blistered were she unguarded by the supernatural.

It was hotter ahead. Hotter by far in the attack’s epicentre, the focus for her unending rain of light. Landing with a force to send cracks growing outwards in the stone, burning with a heat to leave the stench of boiling air and melting tar in her nostrils.

Gem watched the devastation with an impassive face, doing all she could to hide the emotional tempest behind her eyes.

She hated herself for the fear and worry plaguing her still, hated herself more for the silent hope that Simona would perish in the conflagration. And still she watched, desperate for an end to it.

The magic burned for longer, taking heartbeats to finally relent in its onslaught of the ground. When at last the light cleared, Gem was greeted with a destruction that shocked even her.

A world made black and dead by her hand.

Stone was charred like coal, broken and burned. Deformed from its previous smoothness and wearing a new face as uneven as any dirt road she’d seen. Parts still glowed an angry red where heat clung to them, steam hissing from every inch and coiling through the air in tendrils. Mingling with the toxic grey smoke wafting upwards alongside it, gasses contorting around one another like fighting serpents.

The air still reeked, her eyes still watered. A stench left toxic for mundane lungs by the oxidised refuse clinging to every breathful.

She peered through the clotted air, running an eye along the ground. Soon finding what she sought amid the ruin.

Simona lay on her front, hair disheaveled, clothes torn and burned to a wreck. Ugly welts and weeping sores covering every patch of flesh that Gem could see, blood dribbling out to hiss as it congealed on contact with the boiling earth around her.

The girl spluttered and gasped where she lay, writhing with a strengthless desperation and moaning incoherently the way Gem had heard dying men did. Too weak to even bring her face up to stare at her, in spite of the clear effort she placed into doing so. Too weak to even defend herself from a worm.

Gem saw cracks and buckles aplenty on the back of her breastplate, metal rent and crushed in more places than not. Yet still, somehow, it clung to the mystic.

Holding just strong enough to keep her from translocating away.

Delight was Gem’s first reaction to the sight, then relief. Simona had been made a monster in her eyes, one with irrational power and unscratcheable resilience.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

That illusion had died the moment she’d laid eyes on her broken form. In its place, something new boiled. Familiar in nature, but all too alien in intensity. Gem’s hate had volume enough to feel like a new sensation altogether.

“Are you still in the mood for playing?” She asked the girl, running magic through her arms yet again. Something needled her as she did, an instinct in the back of her mind drawing forth thoughts of her father.

She silenced it, letting her power soar high and strengthen. Simona’s face finally rose, strength returning gradually to her battered form. Red eyes pleading.

They disappeared beneath the light’s return.

Sand coiled around Rajah’s feet with every step, lapping at his ankles like waves in a roiled lake. It was hard to imagine the destructive force contained in such docile constructs.

Crow didn’t need imagination. He’d seen it first hand in the previous stage. He wasn’t sure he could have kept himself from backing away even if he’d wanted to.

Buy time. Deka had told him. Draw your battle out as long as possible, wait for the rest of the team to arrive.

The instructions had seemed simple, yet staring down the Jyptian’s magic once more, Crow couldn’t begin to think of how he might go about forming any kind of resistance.

“You know, I was hoping we wouldn’t end up fighting again.” The boy sighed, almost wincing. The sand remained sluggish and relaxed by his feet, but Crow eyed it no less carefully.

“I was hoping the opposite.” He answered. “You gave me so many useful tips last time, I figured if we fought again I might be a match for the Gemini afterwards.”

The boy grinned, but his face was no softer for it. Crow knew instantly he’d made a mistake.

“Right, the Gemini. She’s taking part in this task isn’t she?”

The boy paused, almost reluctant.

“I really can’t afford to fuck around this time. Sorry Crow.”

His Eye of Temporis peered through the veil of time before the boy had even finished speaking, and Crow’s hands curled into fists at the sight of sand exploding against his stomach.

He dove to one side just in time to see the snaking tendril twist harmlessly beside him, yet the second was moving before he regained footing.

Crow’s arms folded into a guard with barely enough time to keep the impact from striking his chestplate.

He flipped over and flew backwards at once, nausea seizing him as his innards sloshed from the flight. Landing hard and rolling clumsily, he’d barely stood when another Glimpse overwhelmed his senses.

He leapt just as both tendrils moved to close in, silicate limbs exploding against one another and leaving him scrambling away from the point of impact.

Crow shot a glance at Rajah, saw the boy muttering a curse as he drew the still-solid remnants of his instruments back towards himself.

It takes a moment for his sand to recollect. Of course.

The memory came to Crow like a flash of lightning, and he was running before it had even made its way through his mind. Charging for Rajah and drawing a shocked stare from the boy just before his sand shot outwards again.

Crow moved to roll, Glimpsing a last minute contortion that would leave him struck regardless and turning the motion into a leap as he soared over the tendrils. They doubled back after him, coiling around his body before he’d flown a yard and constricting his movements in an instant.

He flailed against the sand, thrashing and struggling impotently as it thickened around him. Curses falling from his mouth like rain from clouds.

Rajah panted slightly, hands outstretched as he eyed Crow.

“That was a close one.” The boy muttered. “Wasn’t sure I had enough sand to catch you.”

His hands began to curl inwards, and Crow suddenly felt a great pressure stabbing in from all sides. He gasped, struggling still yet finding no more purchase than before. Helpless as his enemy crushed him.

“I’m going to try not to actually hurt you.” The Jyptian muttered through gritted teeth. “Just crack open your cuirass. It’d be easier if you stopped struggling.”

So help him Crow almost considered it, but the animalism of Cutaris tipped him into action. He fought with a strength and frenzy redoubled, curses turning to snarls while he felt the weight bearing in around him grow ever more.

The creak of surrendering metal was a frightful sound in his ears, made worse as he felt his ribs quiver beneath. But still he fought.

He fought as he felt sand fill rapidly forming buckles and dents in the plate. He fought as he saw yet more grains slide along the ground to bolster his enemy’s weapon. He even fought as the pressure grew to the point of agony.

It was a losing battle, and Crow fought it until his very tendons strained under their own strength. Rajah’s hold remained.

Second by second he grew weaker, his struggles enfeebled. Efforts useless in the face of his enemy’s magic.

Crow’s resolve began to dwindle along with his energy. Each moment of failure leaving the trap ever more secure.

I’m sorry Galad. He breathed, despair closing in as the last of his strength left him. Crow felt the sand shift one final time to cover him entirely, breastplate practically screaming as the pressure around it grew ever higher. Desert prison swelling to smother his face, denying him sight and breath along with movement.

He cursed, waiting with an impotent fury for the end to come.

Instead he found relief as the sand parted, leaving him to drop onto his knees. Light touched his face with angelic relief, air rushed down his throat to quell the frenzied burning of his lungs.

Between choking coughs and retches, he glanced up at his enemy to behold a fear-melting sight. Astra, locked in a fierce battle with the Jyptian, magic and might both turned against him.

Crow allowed himself only seconds to regain some measure of composure, then he tore from the ground in a sprint to join his sister. She was no match for Rajah, he knew. Neither was Crow.

Yet the two of them at once may well have had a chance.