Astra’s heart almost beat itself from her throat as Crow fought below.

Jaw clenched, lips peeled into a snarl, nostrils flared with eyes wide beyond a sane man’s thoughts and body moving in all the ways Deka had been certain it couldn’t.

Blood painted his teeth, glistening whenever a flash of lightning illuminated them. Casting the boy’s face in a sterile, haunting light. Making a phantasm of the features Astra knew more than even her own.

She felt tears well as the carnage unfolded, neither combatant backing down. Neither blinking as they battered and tore at one another. Both, she knew, holding victory above even their lives.

Racing each other to the grave.

Blood welled from dozens of cuts and splits, flowing faster than the rain could wash away. Still they fought.

One of Crow’s knuckles bulged unnaturally, appearing crushed like a fired musket ball beneath his skin and deforming further with each blow. Still they fought.

Teeth slashed one of Rajah’s hands open, gashing it from thumb to wrist and turning the rain red for moments more. Still they fought, and still the Sieve ignored the pair’s deteriorating bodies.

Astra found her temper rising along with her fear, panic stripping all thought but that of her brother’s life. Driving her to stand and intervene even as, dimly, she reminded herself that he’d not forgive her for it.

She was driven to her knees once more as the stadium shook underfoot.

At first Astra didn’t know what was happening, assuming, in her ignorance, that the battle below had somehow spilled out of the stage. She rose, straightened and looked out across the stadium.

Frowned as Crow and Rajah continued their fight, uninterrupted and suspended still in space.

Eden realised first. It was he who dragged her down a second time, angering Astra to a vision-staining fury as she scrambled beneath his tackle.

And saving her life when the blast washed over the air above.

Astra’s hearing was taken by the shockwave. It took moments before she heard even Eden’s cries as they reached her ears from mere inches away, roaring voice filled with a command she’d scarcely heard before.

“Touch your magic, you stupid slut!” He screamed, pushing Astra down to force himself up and disappearing from her sight. She lay stunned for seconds, mind slowed by shock as it sluggishly crept towards comprehension.

It took the screams, more voluminous than any others she’d heard in the Sieve and tainted sickly and poisonous with fear, to finally let matters settle in her mind.

The stadium, with all its thousands of occupants and hundreds of staff, was being attacked. Someone was turning magic against the heart of the Alliance’s eye.

Fear made Astra reach for her power with an uncommon haste, clawing desperately deep into herself, feeling as exposed as a newborn until its breath-stilling touch came to reinforce her.

She stood from behind the seats, driven from hiding as Cutaris urged her to see for her own eyes what was befalling the world. Fear fought back by Utalis, courage drawn from the power that spiced her veins. It held her steady enough to eye the chaos as it broke out across the stadium below.

Astra was thankful for the arcane touch, for she’d never have stomached what she saw without it.

People swarmed the stands below like maggots in a festering wound, practically crawling over one another to escape as fires broke out on all sides. Great splintered timbers raining and crumbling about them even as blasts of magical energy erupted sporadically.

The air was darkening with smoke so thick she thought it ought to have drowned the screams. It didn’t. Astra heard them still even as she stood immobile in her horror, sound piercing her magic and leaving her mind a clouded mess. Itamis only worsened things. At that infernal sphere’s touch, she could feel the misery unfurling as keenly as if it were her own.

“Astra!” Came a voice from behind, snapping her eyes backwards. Relieving her by giving something to turn to, besides the carnage unfolding below.

The Gemini was crouched low, magic burning as it moved beneath her skin. Eyes cautious where they fell on her. Astra could see the girl’s fear even as she listened to her words.

“Focus.” She snapped, turning to look over Astra’s shoulder as she spoke. The discipline shamed her, seen in one so young. Galvanising Astra with pride rather than fear.

“The people.” She shouted, staring back down at the atrocity unfolding underfoot. “There are thousands of them down there, we need to do something.”

“We do.” Came a voice beside her. Astra was surprised to see Unity was the speaker. Standing straight and staring out with a mix of anger and reluctance, he seemed nothing like the petulant boy she’d grown to tolerate.

He barely glanced at her, seeming far more focused on what was playing out beneath them. Directing the rest of them with nods, he continued his uncharacteristically clipped speech.

“Some people already are doing something.” The boy noted. His words made sense of the sights for Astra, bringing a gasp from her as she realised there were pockets of resistance even amid the death and devastation plaguing the lower stands.

Of course. There’s a mystic down there for every dozen inepts, magic would be the first thing they looked for.

Making his way to the ledge before the front row of their area, Unity popped his neck with a grunt.

Astra stared as he leapt down, sensing the magic wrap itself around him while he fell.

***

Lichos cursed into the dust even while it tried to choke him, assailing him like a horde of locusts. Scraping, beating, making a nest on his skin and stealing what little light there was to be found in the dark, ruined abscess that remained of the Crux’s interior.

The magic in his veins was barely a help. It let him see the rubble, brought him the strength to shift stones the size of men. Still, he felt helpless.

No matter how strong the arcstock had made him, it would have done Kaiosyni no good at all. Every great boulder he tore away from the sloped mass was a stabbing testament to just how much had fallen upon the woman.

All landing while he stood mere yards away.

Lichos cursed again, then screamed his fury. Emotion proving too strong to be held in silence, demanding he give it form through his voice. Still he shovelled the stone, and still he felt his heart sink lower into despair.

He wasn’t sure how long he’d been eroding the pile when hope finally came to torture him.

Hair lay matted against one of the stones. Long like a woman’s, stained an unrecogniseable grey by grime and seeming to cover half the rock it was strewn across. Lichos stared dumbly for moments before the obvious occurred to him, redoubling his efforts as he continued excavating whoever lay beneath.

The woman was soon exposed to him, coughing as the open air met her and peering at Lichos through bleary eyes seeming no less attacked by the filthy atmosphere than his own.

Even through the congealed refuse obscuring her from sight, he recognised them. Their harsh focus, impossible distance sustained even feet from him. Vibrant, clear and golder than gold itself.

She coughed without a second’s pause, hacking up spit and phlegm, throat convulsing until the sound almost sickened Lichos to hear. He was well familiar with it from cannoneers. Somehow it seemed wrong in Kaiosyni.

“Fuck.” The woman breathed, her voice terribly cracked even as she shifted beneath the stones. Though piled feet high atop her legs, the mass moved with ease. Turned over like bedsheets by a mystic’s strength.

“Are you okay?” He asked, studying the woman for any sign that she was hurt. He’d seen no concussion in her eyes, nor did any breaks make themselves known in what he could observe of her limbs. Good signs, both.

“Don’t ask stupid questions.” The woman spat, then fell into another fit of wretches and coughs. Lichos buried his anger, felt concern overpower it as he watched his charge heave.

It was only several, terrible seconds later that she finished. Sending boulders rolling and tumbling back down the pile as she dislodged them with her arms. Eying Lichos cautiously.

“Did you see what happened?”

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“A big fucking explosion happened.” He snapped.

“This is no time for snark, soldier. If you saw nothing of import then merely say that.” She paused, inhaling sharply- fighting back shock, he guessed. “What about Pyrhic?”

Lichos didn’t miss the concern in her question. It struck him like a gutshot, hollowing him out and leaving conviction to bleed from him.

He’d expected she’d ask. Feared it almost as much as the discovery of her corpse, even tried to needle her in the hopes that she’d not think of the question through her rage. Hearing it extinguished what remained of his relief at not having failed.

“Dead.” He answered, throat dry, tone even. Face as unreadable as he could make it before the cocktail of sadness and fury that congealed in his heart.

Kaiosyni reacted just as he’d expected. Just as everyone did.

“She can’t be. You’re wrong.”

The denial might have been comforting at any other time. Irrational, thoughtless and accompanied by as drastic and genuine a show of pleading anger as any Lichos had seen. It was the greatest proof he’d yet received that Kaiosyni was truly human, save her outburst weeks ago.

It still struck him like a falling anvil, almost tying his tongue into silence. He could lock horns with her cold, crushing authority. Edge as close to the line of impudence as he thought he’d get away with and withstand the force of her imperious glare with almost no effort at all.

Facing what was before him was another matter entirely.

“I saw it happen myself.” He said, feeling himself detach from the words as they left him. “She was further than me, but it didn’t help. One moment she was there, the next she was gone. I’m sorry.”

For a moment Kaiosyni just stared at him, eyes wide, jaw tight. Face twisted combatively. He took a half step back on instinct, such was the fury she displayed. Then her rage melted.

Head lowering and eyes tightening around welling tears, Kaiosyni wept.

***

Ajoke roared as the magic left her in a wave of hateful flame. It hid what it hit, as always. Heat bleeding into light of far too great a density to allow her eyes any purchase.

For once she was glad of the fact. It had always needled her that she burned people, even as she practiced the path of fire by choice. The pain flames brought, the scent of sizzling flesh, had been as much a price for Ajoke as their instability.

That she was spared the sight of men turning to nothing before her was some small mercy amid the Eclipseum she found herself surrounded by.

Limbs flailed and bodies whipped by as men and women ran, fell and flew in all directions. Faces universally terrified, hands unerringly closed tight around the grip of weapons.

It was a damned warzone.

Something struck hard from behind, staggering her for the briefest moment before she turned to see a frenzied man wielding a club.

He panicked as their eyes met, apparently realising his mistake in striking a mystic and beginning to turn. Anger moved Ajoke faster than thought.

Before the man had taken even a single step, she’d struck his knee with a low kick. The joint buckled instantly, fragile as dried bread before her strength. She didn’t watch to see him crumple, merely moved on.

The fighting continued around and about her, made hectic by spectators pouring through the stadium’s centre for escape in the tunnels. Ajoke could barely make out the differing sides.

Fisher alone stood out to her, his size making him obvious even among the chaos surrounding him. His sight bringing a flash of comfort to still her fears.

Ajoke made her way towards him almost without thought, arriving just as the boy hurled a knife-wielding man down to leave a crimson puddle beneath his skull.

“Stick together, boss.” He grunted, turning as another neared. “And watch your back.”

She heeded his warning just in time, ducking back as a cleaver swatted for her face. It moved swiftly even to her arcane eyes. Not swiftly enough to contend with a mystic.

Ajoke’s strike rendered the attacker still and prone at her feet, but she didn’t allow herself to relax. Eyes still peeled, senses still sharp, she looked around hastily for the next threat. All too aware how numerous the enemy was.

Three more fell to her hands before Fisher barked out the obvious.

“Look at their clothes.” He grunted, hurling one like a child. “They’re all dressed similar, all have that damned band around an arm.”

It took only him saying that much for Ajoke to spot it too, cursing herself as she wondered how it had escaped her notice to begin with. All those who attacked seemed dressed different, if similar. Clothed like workmen, greys and browns, ragged and disheaveled. Notable only in the red cloth wrapped tight around their biceps.

Recognising it let her see just how inexhaustible the attacker’s numbers were, her heart sinking like a stone.

The conflict was without end, two men replacing each one she cast down. Her back feeling exposed even as it pressed against Fisher’s.

For a minute the battle was easy. Trivial. Magic proving such an advantage that soon others flocked to join them, faces Ajoke knew from the Sieve. Contestants disqualified in its earliest stages, recognisable by youth even when she’d not laid eyes on them before.

Young, weak and untrained mystics without even the talent that let her partially compensate for the fact. Nonetheless they each proved their worth to be a score of the men attacking.

Ajoke almost let herself believe there might be some resolution to matters, that victory might come without a struggle. Then the explosions started anew.

Two contestants were thrown back by a blast, scorched stone marking where they’d stood. Another disappeared to what Ajoke barely realised was a tackle, sent scraping along the ground and quickly disabled as her attacker rained fists upon her.

Horror reared its ugly head as magic touched the edge of Ajoke’s senses, making itself known from all directions. In moments the Sieve’s contestants were pressed more closely together, backs against one another, bundled almost like soldiers in formation with ranks five or six bodies thick.

The numbers might have brought a sense of security, were they not eclipsed by the sight of yet more banded strangers drawing near. Faces far less panicked than the others, bodies almost aglow with magic.

Each was an adult, and that fact alone proved their formidable power. Ajoke’s mouth was dry before they even descended, foxes falling upon a chicken coop.

But not focusing on her, and with just enough of a gap between them that she might barge free successfully. Her blood ran cold at the realisation of what was happening- how perfect a chance she’d been given to disappear, and let the world think her dead.

A glance at Fisher’s strained wildness, the blood gushing from other mystics as blades and bullets flew, dragged her back to the moment.

She cursed herself, wishing she’d been born just a shade more cowardly. Wishing her friend was just a hair less good.

Gem stumbled as the mystic struck her, his arm holding a strength almost matching her own. She backed away, hands raising as magic coiled inside. Unity moved before she got the chance to loose it.

A single flash of red lightning registered to her eyes, then the mystic dropped away with a scream and visceral misting.

The artificial seemed beyond hesitation as they moved, charging just a foot behind Gem. Hunched low and sprinting quick like a predator about to pounce.

Certainly, his magic made a serviceable set of fangs. The fleshy ruins left in their wake would attest to that much. Enough that it had soon caught the eyes of others.

Within perhaps a half minute of entering the arena they were swarmed, inept attackers falling back and making way for the mystics among their ranks. The attack's intensity compressed them; Gem, Deka, Astra and Unity all forced inwards to cover one another.

Then the other contestants caught sight of them, flooding in to consolidate the position. Sensing the safety to be found in their resistance.

Gem was almost more amazed by the sight of order bleeding into battle than she was by the attackers’ audacity. A single glimpse of hope had drawn allies in like moths to a flame, and as the pressure from enemies grew, so did the resistance rise to meet it.

It didn’t take long before both sides could be distinguished at a glance. As obvious through position as they were by armbands or youth.

Magic flew in every direction. Streaks of light, jets of flame, great boulders wrenched from the very stone underfoot and tossed like leaves in a gale. Mystics flew and tumbled as they wrestled, striking one another with a lethal force and filling the air with ear-aching sounds as their flesh clashed like landslides.

Gem almost lost herself amid it, barely thinking as she acted. Maintaining the awareness only to ensure she remained close to her team and removing everything that came to stand in their opposition.

Blasting energy hurled enemies back, light stunned them to leave openings for crippling blows. Nihil, even, left them weakened just as another struck- Cutaris killing the guilt that came with causing such carnage.

Her emotions were a dangerous distraction, crushed beneath the terror of battle. Fear and adrenaline meeting in a lover’s embrace within her.

Gem didn’t smile, even as the thrill grew. Her nerves remained paralyzed with tension. As if her body wished to conserve its action for movement.

There was no Gemini Menza amid the conflict around her. No silver haired phenom dancing among blades and bludgeons, no world-renown prodigy righting herself from enemy blows and retaliating tenfold.

She was just one fighter among a hundred others. A single set of limbs contributing to the chaotic melee..

Gem fought, finding the conflict unending. Given pause only as smoke caught her eye.

The black cloud bifurcated the horizons, peeking out from over the seating area of the stadium and reaching high as if to skewer the clouds themselves.

Almost without thinking she gave consideration to its location, adjusted her mental map of Udrebam and felt terror twist its knife deep into her as she realised where it spewed from.

Udrebam’s Crux was burning, the tendril of fumes she’d seen was emerging from the strongest building in the city. A fortress lit alight, doubtless by the very people who lay siege to the stadium around her.

But more than that, the Crux was where Lavastro stayed. Where she worked, more often than not. Where she was.

Fear shattered the hypnotic grasp Gem’s battle held on her, letting the terrible sounds and sights pour in through mental floodgates. The thought of Lavastro lying dead was too great to even allow room for them to drown her.

Gem flew without another second of thought, throwing back magic to kiss her shadow and letting it bring the sky downwards. In seconds she was a hundred paces up, seconds more saw her cross the threshold of the stadium. Projectiles of magic sizzled beside her as she flew, while those of black powder and lead screamed into the wind. All missed.

In the skies, she was beyond the reach of anyone. The power of an adult was nothing to her domain. Gem didn’t have time to even appreciate that victory, fear turning to haste as surely as ice did water.

Even Udrebam flitting by below did nothing to steal Gem’s focus.

She saw buildings crumbling, streets growing charred and cracked as magic and musketry ripped through them. Carriages flipped, windows shattered. Corpses left to lie where they fell.

Still she flew, barely even glancing around for fear of slowing herself with a lapse of focus.

Charging on for Lavastro, even as Udrebam burned beneath her.