He didn’t move. In the face of our boldness, the bastard’s body language told a story of bemusement. We were no challenge to him—a new summoner and her entity nowhere close to graduation. A rage suffused my limbs as I sought to teach him otherwise. Hefted my glaive so that the blade could carry the lesson through his heart.

An irony, as all the lessons of the day in summoner versus summoner combat fled my mind like so many birds taking flight from a rabid dog—my hatred for the man. One bird remained within my mind, a playful little pigeon of a thought. It was Amber. Smug and mischievous Amber from when she parked her lips near my ear and whispered the highest secret of combat: smart summoners gather enough information and cheat to victory.

That hateful little dog in my brain barked and barked. Its fangs threatened to shred this thought—this perfectly distilled memory—into a web of viscera. The pigeon didn’t care, and if it didn’t care why did I?

I blinked and felt my eyes moisten. The water disrupted whatever spell had drilled through my eyes. In the broken clarity of my tears I saw the Angler Knight properly. One hand clenched around his sword’s hilt, and the other pinched and upside down like his eel’s lures. Yet where was his entity?

“Nadia, stop,” Sphinx yelled.

Its teeth pierced the back of my shirt and whipped me backwards. I clattered to the ground along with my glaive. Rolled across the stone instinctively—like Mom taught me. Then stopped in a three-point crouch with Mother’s Last Smile propped up against the ground.

“He used some kind of lure,” I snapped.

Sphinx said, “Agreed. The foul fury ran from your spirit to mine. Now cast eyes to heaven, and see to what aim.”

My eyes flicked up and took note of the ghastly eel that the Angler Knight was bonded to. It swam through the air in sinuous teasing motions. Under the Omensight there was nothing playful in its movements. Its tendril-lures had extended out to the ground; ribs to the canopy of abyssal blue threads that ran from lure to lure. It was an umbrella under which the Abyss held absolute control.

“A field-spell,” I named it. “Amber did say those showed up amongst Barons.”

“He sought to snuff Revelation’s light from this world,” Sphinx said.

I looked down from the lures that formed the field to the ground itself. It was depressed, stonework reduced to dust, and sloped down to the Angler Knight who marked the deep end. He released the hand-spell that had injected mad fury into my veins and applauded.

“I appreciate the boldness,” he said. “Shame I couldn’t finish you the easy way.”

I said, “Are you sure it’d be easy? Way I see it, your control isn’t all that refined.”

He flipped me off—I knew I was right. The pressure was uneven, but no smile reached my heart. Sure, it was uneven, but with two spells in a matter of a second he nearly killed me. I had charged boldly toward the shadow of my death. The thought rested against my mind, a leaf on a tranquil lake, and I breathed. Blew the thought away and focused.

“Sphinx, how do we dualcast?” I asked.

It rumbled, “We act as we have. One of thought and action. Why?”

“Cause he tried to hit us from range,” I said. “If he wants to measure dicks then I’ll show him mine’s bigger.”

Then Sphinx saw what I did. The Angler Knight was half a cafeteria’s length away from me. Well within the distance of a Fivefold Atomic Glory—I wouldn’t even have to sacrifice any power. My glaive rested on my thigh as I raised my hands in time with Sphinx’s spreading wings. I felt the woven fabric that was us twist tight as a wet towel. Futures on futures dragged into the folds of this condensed moment. When Revelation would bring light.

“My serve!” I yelled.

For the third time in one day a star was born in the Abyss. It cleaved dark in ‘twain with the potency of Revelation that burned its bright tail in the world.

The Angler Knight bellowed with glee, “Beautiful! A shame it’s cold down here!”

The Abyss was endless and it was complete. Nothing would be born here, for it was the dark where all things died. Even Revelation.

With a turn of his hand, the Angler Knight ushered a glacier into existence. A curtain of condensed cold that could even trap a shooting star. My Atomic Glory was fixed shut within the ice. The flames erratic and stabbing endlessly outward, but unable to find purchase. Some infinities were larger than others I realized. As before me stood the cliff of difference between the links in the chain.

Through the blue of the glacier I could just barely make out his hand. It gestured to the. . . glacier? The icy shelf roiled before it shot towards me thick as a battering ram and pointed as a spear. I leapt to my feet and thrust forward Mother’s Last Smile to intercept. Glacial tip met glaive’s edge in violent argument.

For a perfect moment there was no winner. Just tip to edge light as a childhood kiss. Where you’d linger in that brief time hung between possibilities—unaware of which path the story would take. I’d love to say I was convinced of mine, but if you could walk around in that endless gap of time you’d see how wide my eyes were. Fear sparkled in the tears that had been forced back by the sheer pressure of what rocketed before me. My arms had just begun to slacken, and I knew that I wouldn’t evade death this time. Time. This moment was too long.

“It’s just long enough,” Sphinx said as the Godtime ended and it snapped its jaws tight around the glaive’s shaft. Its neck strained with all its muscles to thrust. The glaive. Forward.

“Always forward,” I screamed.

Together we thrust with the weight of our lives, my vengeance, its yearning to fill the world with Revelation. In that single thrust you could find the love I had for Melissa, the feelings that burned unnamed for Amber. You could find the faith I had in Sphinx, and trust it had in me.

Tip met edge—the glaive’s head glinted with an unnatural brilliance—and the edge won. Sheared through millennia old ice with the reminder that anything could happen. With one quarter-circle motion, Sphinx and I parried the glacial stake. It ran aground and exploded to the side of us—looking like half a hedgehog—while a heavy mist of snow filled the air.

I stood quiet within what felt like a localized blizzard. In the distance I heard the glacier grind out of the world. Despite the action I had maintained the Omensight, and through this snow screen the Angler Knight was clear to me. His posture was one of exaggerated examination; hand to head to block out a sun that wasn’t present so he could better appreciate his work.

“Don’t tell me it’s over?” he yelled. “Has your mettle run dry?”

As one, I raised my arm and Sphinx thrust aside a wing flinging clear the snow screen. We had a dualcast Twofold Atomic Glory prepared to shove up his ass.

“How could it?” I yelled back, “I am metal!”

They weren’t the glorious stars of a Fivefold, but they were four comets that rebelled against the dark. Faster in absence of a greater payload. Able to sneak past the frigid hands of the Abyss. The Angler Knight was caught off guard—there was no spell that’d let him escape fast enough—but the bastard was a knight besides being a summoner. He dragged his body with all the muscles of his right hand side. Moved the four inches that were necessary for the comets to go wide. They landed behind him and exploded in plinths of fire—we missed.

“As are these,” Secretary said.

The Angler Knight and I remembered they were there. They were always there. Just now they were there with an automatic pistol aimed for the head he so politely leaned in deference to the gun. Blam blam blam. He stumbled backward under the assault.

“Nadia!” Secretary screamed.

Tnk tnk tnk. The bullets rained against the ground—flattened by the thin layer of water that I only now saw. Ripples from where the bullets struck raced across the surface.

“I didn’t have to remember you to know that something swam in my waters,” he said.

Raised his hand—spell already cast—and dragged Secretary toward the sword raised in line with their heart. I was barely faster as I plunged the three of us into Godtime.

I leaped astride Sphinx and it flew-ran toward Secretary. Unlike the lesser members of the cult, their actions weren’t reduced to nearly imperceptible micromotions. They were slowed, but it was a pantomime of slowness. Like most aspects of Sorcery, those above you in the Chain suffered less from your power—so I made do with what I could.

Sphinx tilted into a wide turn. I thrust my hand out and caught Secretary by the back of their suit. Yanked and felt the three of us push against the pressure that tried to drag us in. Sphinx battered the air with its wings. We spiraled around and up past The Angler Knight. Secretary swung their leg to give him one last kick in the head. No water rippled on that one.

“Where to now?” I asked.

Secretary kept an arm around my waist and pointed to the bright yellow skeleton of metal that framed the elevator the AoSI team had re-designed the Staircase into. Sphinx beat its wings as we flew toward it. I released Godtime and the Omensight. Shuddered as I felt the muscle-clenching poison of stress melt from my body. Exhaustion took its place— Secretary’s hectic screaming woke me before sleep had shuttered my eyes and loosened my grip.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“Why isn’t he chasing us?” I asked Secretary.

“How could he?” Secretary asked. “I kicked the memory of us out of his head. Along with his ability to perceive anything until sunset tomorrow. Though with how annoying he is to fight, he’ll probably be fine a little after the train arrives.”

I nodded as if that made any sense to me. We flew between a gap in the metal paneling, and then shot upwards toward Realspace. Until we arrived I kept my eyes on the facility. Lingered on the ruin my battle had made of the courtyard—if I was nice I’d call it a draw. The Angler Knight was only one link above me and I couldn’t beat him—couldn’t even force out his defense. My thoughts were interrupted by Secretary’s chin against my shoulder.

“The mission was a success,” Secretary said. “Don’t try to find a loss in a win.”

* * *

Blotomisc stood ready for us when we emerged—he still had my Dad’s face. I was too exhausted for anger to kindle, and slumped against Sphinx. Barely looked around at the place. We were in a large cave—probably a mine before they discovered the Staircase—and all around us were cultists still as stones. They stared off into nothing with the same glassy eyes as the cultists I found in a trail to Secretary.

“Oh, this is your field-spell,” I mutter.

Secretary plays with my hair. Hums in semi-agreement. “It’s a way of using it. That’s all field-spells are Nadia; a canvas to express the truth of your Court.”

“Indeed,” Blotomisc said. “Secretary and myself are hardly brutes, so we delay acknowledgement—a minor memetic formation—from occurring. They can’t hurt what they can’t be aware of.”

“So we have no need to hurt them,” Secretary added.

Sphinx and I didn’t say anything in disagreement. It may have pissed me off then, the idea that they’d just play in minds, but the people they came across at least got to live. Most of mine wouldn’t even be remembered by those who loved them most. I knew which was crueler.

The four of us—Secretary and myself riding Sphinx and Blotomisc jogging alongside—made our way through the mine’s tunnels. Up into the loading bay where our truck had rolled into to make its way down to the elevator below. Any cultists we passed were glassy eyed in moments. Unable to remember the seconds it took for us to escape from sight. It was in this way we fled from the nondescript building for some old mining operation that the Lodge—and now the Lurkers in the Deep—had claimed as a base to advance their ends.

Sphinx didn’t slow down until we fled the grounds and were over the gate. The horizon kindled as the sun made embers of the treetops. I could feel Secretary relax behind me—there was nothing like Realspace after all—and listened when they directed us down to a hill.

“This is where we part ways,” Secretary said.

I said, “I can’t just leave you in the middle of nowhere.”

“Sweetie, I hate to break your heart, but I have ways to travel far faster than your cute sphinx.”

I rolled my eyes. “Better statement, I’m not leaving you without whatever token or document I need to guarantee my exemption.”

The tired that was in me was apparent, but I had enough energy to clench my glaive. I’d paid my wage of blood. They owed me. Secretary cocked their hip and tossed back their hair.

“You know you shake a lot?” Secretary asked.

“No.”

“Well you do,” they said. “Look at you, waving around your hurt and rage like a knife. Screaming, ‘better do what I say, I have a knife!’”

Their hips rolled in gentle waves like wine in a glass. Eyes bright and teeth a smidge too sharp.

“But that’s the thing, the only people who shake as they hold the knife are those who don’t want to hold it at all. Quivering in fear of a thing they have control over.”

They laid their hand over mine—I was shaking?

“It doesn’t change what you owe me,” I said.

“Doesn’t it?” they asked. “Learn to enjoy the comfort of the knife, my little brute, or you won’t survive the exam.”

They pressed their lips to mine. Their fingers glided mine down the shaft of my glaive. Broke my grip gently and pinned my wrist to Sphinx’s fur. They were both so soft. Then I felt the cool tease of wind against my face. At some point my eyes had closed, and Secretary had left.

“What happened?” I asked.

Sphinx rumbled, “They played a deep trick on your mind, Nadia.”

“Was it real?”

Sphinx’s head spun backwards to face me—it looked strangely upset.

“That’s for you to decide if you want, my summoner.”

The regression to calling me “my summoner” tipped me off as to the trap my ignorance had triggered. I muttered telepathic apologies to Sphinx as we flew back to the station outpost.

* * *

I saw Melissa first. Still clad in her chimeric form she sat atop the inn and kept the wilds in view. At the sight of me she stretched up and waved with both arms—there was something so cute about a ten foot chimera clad in nature’s arsenal of weapons leaping up and down in joy. She clambered down the building’s surface and leaped to the ground. As we landed she mutated down into the Melissa I was familiar with, and tackled me from Sphinx’s back in a crushing hug.

“You’re alive,” she said. “Oh my gosh you’re alive.”

“Did you expect me to die?” I asked.

Melissa pushed up to only be straddling my waist. Tears ran in fat waves down her cheeks. She pawed at her eyes to try and stem the tide. I hated watching her cry because soon I couldn’t see—tears of my own occluding my vision.

“I know Secretary would’ve left you to die,” she said.

I couldn’t tell Melissa how many times I nearly died—she’d probably cry even harder—but in the picture show of near deaths that played on the carousel of my mind I couldn’t find a single one that I could truly blame on Secretary. They had led me by the nose into being tortured, sure, but there was no guarantee I’d be killed. The Angler Knight hadn’t killed any of the researchers or the examinees the cult had kidnapped. Even when we fought the Angler Knight, they hadn’t abandoned me to an impossible battle—arguably they trusted me to fight him. Force him off balance so they could get what they saw as a kill shot.

No, Secretary was a manipulative jerk, but they weren’t the type to break their toys. The only person who broke anything—killed anyone—was me. Melissa reached for my hands in concern at whatever she read in my face. I snatched them back.

“Please, just get off now,” I said.

Her expression hardened as she rose and stepped away. “Train’s here. Amber’s holding him up for now.”

I found my feet and laid my hand on Sphinx. Let it help me carry this newfound weight. We passed through the lobby and down into a hallway that led to the platform behind the building. There we found Amber handing over one of the token pouches she had claimed as her, “saved your life fee.” There were already three pouches in the conductor’s hands.

The conductor was shaped like a train’s whistle with a white comb-like mustache. He spotted us as we stepped onto the platform, and tried to snatch that last pouch from Amber’s hand. She was faster and plucked it back.

“Thanks for doing business,” she said.

Turned to face me, and her smile dissipated—was I that easy to read?

“Temple, glad to see you’re back. You wouldn’t believe how much it costs to stall a train. He charges in thirty minute increments.”

“Your donation is accepted. Now, we really can’t delay the schedule any further. All aboard!” he hollered. His voice was thin like a train whistle too.

We grabbed our bags and made-to-board. Melissa asked—of course Melissa would ask, “Nadia, what happened to the examinees?”

I bought her off with a pained smile. “Things were difficult down there.”

She had enough care in me—trust in whatever goodness I used to have, that I fear hasn’t crossed over into this version of me—that she didn’t pry. Instead she nodded with as much care as she could and dropped it. Confident, I think, that one day she’d hear the full story from me. I wasn’t confident I’d ever tell her, but at least this way I didn’t have to lie to her.

We stepped onto the train and found ourselves inside a photo of some fancy Old World hotel. The floors were a glittery marble, and the check-in desk the same rock but in a light-consuming black. We crossed the lobby to find a muscular woman with a buzzed head and rail tracks that wound and spidered across every tract of bare flesh. Her finger traced across a transit map that covered the desk. She didn’t look up at us for about three minutes. Amber reached for the service-bell, but the woman raised her finger, one moment.

It was two more minutes before she looked up. Her face a scowl directed largely at Amber.

“You’ve delayed me, so I delay you,” she said.

“We delayed the train,” Melissa said confused.

The woman crossed her arms.

“You’re the train?” I asked.

She snorted. “I’m Every Train And Its Rails. Is this the first time you've ridden me?”

Melissa and I nodded. Every Train beamed at her admission of being a locomotive virgin, but when she looked at me she shook her head.

“You may have grown, but I never forget a passenger,” she said. “Hands.”

Melissa, Amber, and myself held our hands out like supplicants. Every Train swiped her finger across our palms—a key manifesting in our hands. Three keys for three rooms. As my fingers wrapped around it, I felt the information of the train’s layout sketch inside my head. There was simply too much to smoosh into my mind—when I blinked my eyes I could see the margin notes of the layout, it said something about, “sixth-dimensional spatial compression,” techniques. From Melissa’s expression I could tell it was also a bit much for her. Amber, of course, was fine.

“Please note, your ticket confers you to a local instance of myself. As you are the only three riding today, do have fun and take full advantage of my amenities. Whilst you may not visit any other instance—provided you have not paid to upgrade your ticket—it’ll be unlikely that anyone shall visit this. . . minor branch of myself. Enjoy the ride,” she said.

Amber and Melissa took off to enjoy the opulence of this “minor” branch of Every Train. I watched their reflections in the marble floor as they raced toward the elevators—it was really Amber racing first, but she had this way to pull undiscovered pockets of childishness from you. I watched them leave and turned back to Every Train. Who hadn’t looked away from me.

On the desk was a small photo album. The cover, a monochrome picture of Mom and Dad at a small table with Every Train while a waitress brought out a baby-sized cup of pudding. It was for a baby-sized me that was held by Every Train. I leaned forward and drank in every detail of the photo. My dad was younger and looked so tired that just smiling seemed to drain him. His eyes shone with the kindness I was used to from him. That didn’t keep me from noticing the massive sword that was laid across the table—the pudding sat on it. Mom looked different as well; imperious but like she was trying to let it go and be someone else. The sight of my weird scrunched baby face was already softening her. You’d nearly miss the dark gray that stained her hands and was splattered across her khaki shirt—blood. It even flecked across Dad’s sword—I never knew he had a sword—in striations of age. They were killers.

A crooked smile cracked my face and out seeped the cool ooze of relief. It’s morbid, but I hadn’t expected to get another moment where I’d bond with my parents. Maybe they would’ve still loved me despite everyone I’ve killed. They could’ve taught me some secret method to stop feeling so bad about it.

“It’s your album,” Every Train said. “Kareem left it from his last trip. The end of your first year of life. If I may ask, where did Kareem end up?”

I dragged the album to my chest. Hugged it like I could shove the whole tome into myself.

“A good place. Peaceful. Didn’t have to fight anyone. Then it wasn’t, and now he’s dead. Mom too,” I said.

“So they were successful,” Every Train mused.

“My parents?” I asked.

Every Train shrugged, “I suppose. Success is hardly infinite when you seek to live in a single state endlessly. Fate has a tendency to wander if not exercised. Anyways, feel free to ride whenever you need to—Kareem left a hefty balance in his name with you as the inheriting benefactor. Even the personal suite is yours.”

“Thank you,” I said. My voice was too weak to carry anything but the words.

“Keep them. All according to the covenant,” she said. “And the agreements of old friends.”

I waved goodbye using the photo album, and stepped into the elevator with Sphinx. My eyes locked on the two people in that picture as I tried to decipher how they became my parents.