The hunters climbed the rocky scree leading back into the saddle in silence. Despite the darkness, we had no trouble navigating the somewhat treacherous slope thanks to the flickering light of the dancing flames that roared behind us. Twin pyres burned brightly in the moonless night, their flames seeming to reach for the uncaring stars above, lighting our path away from the beach and no doubt sending out a signal to anyone within fifty miles that something was amiss.

The ship had been easy to burn, of course. Despite the salt water soaking into its lower hull, the tar staining its wood and sealing it against the sea’s incursion made it burn like an oil lamp. Aeld sent a fire spirit to race along the upper deck, igniting whatever it touched, and in a few minutes, flames coated the entire upper part of the ship. The second pyre hadn’t been as easy to light—the Oikies’ tents and clothing both seemed mildly flame resistant—and Aeld seemed to be down to the dregs of his casting ability by the time it finally caught. We all watched for a bit to make sure the flames really took—and to watch them consume the two fallen hunters whose bodies lay atop it. The hunters had tossed most of the Oikie corpses onto the ship since it was closer, but they’d placed those who fell early in the battle with their own, something that honestly surprised me. I wouldn’t have thought that the Menskies would be cool burning their own alongside their apparently mortal enemies. Fortunately, Aeld was happy to explain when I mentioned that incongruity to him.

“These are nothing more than the cast-off mortal shells of those who fell, Freyd,” he told me. “Their spirits, that which made them truly alive, have departed; I made certain of that before healing you and…” He hesitated. “And before performing that ritual.”

Apparently, the end result of the ritual had shaken Aeld pretty significantly. He refused to talk about it, but he obviously hadn’t planned for the ojain to die, and certainly not in such a painful and startling manner. His eyes were haunted, and he moved despondently, with slumped shoulders and an unhappy expression. I hadn’t really understood at first; at least, I hadn’t until I asked him something I considered relatively unimportant.

“So, where did their spirits go, then? You said you oversaw their departure; where did you send them?”

“I didn’t send them anywhere, I’m afraid,” he said with a sigh. “And no one knows where spirits go after death, I’m afraid. Some believe they travel to Enverthen, the void beyond our world, there to rest with the First Spirits. Others say they remain here, in our world, and are reborn in another mortal body, recycled endlessly.”

“And the spirits themselves don’t have anything to say about it?”

He smiled wanly back at me. “The spirits of this world can’t seem to perceive a mortal spirit,” he said. “At least, not unless they’re inside that mortal’s body. Something about our spirits is different from them. They seem to have no knowledge of the passing of our spirits.”

“I meant the spirits of those who’ve died,” I clarified. “Hasn’t anyone ever just summoned one and asked?”

He looked at me with a startled expression. “You mean, bind and command a mortal spirit? That isn’t possible, Freyd. The powers of a letharvis hold no sway over a mortal spirit outside a body. We can only perceive them when the body is at the cusp of death, in fact, and then only dimly.”

I frowned. “Then how could you oversee their departure?”

“They were close enough to death that my cleansing ritual would have sensed them if they’d attempted to linger,” he shrugged. “As long as the body has been dead for less than an hour or so, the ritual will give me a sense of their presence and help push them out. They had departed already, moving on to whatever awaits us beyond this life.”

He turned and gave me a grave look. “That’s one of a letharvis’ most sacred duties, Freyd. Sometimes, when a body dies, the spirit isn’t ready to move on, and it lingers, keeping a tiny flicker of life in the body. Our spirits weren’t meant for that, though, and a spirit that remains in this world beyond death becomes damaged, eventually beyond repair. If that happens, it simply dissipates, and everything that it was or might have been—is lost.” He practically whispered the last words, and as he did, his eyes fastened on the lifeless, unseeing face of the ojain’s body atop the pyre. At that, I understood.

“He thinks that he did that to her spirit, doesn’t he?” I asked Sara quietly.

“He might,” she replied. “I don’t know how he senses spirits, but it’s obvious that he can somehow, and he might have felt the damage being done to hers. If he couldn’t perceive it outside of her body, though, he might not know that you bonded her. He might just think that her spirit vanished and assumed it was lost.”

“…savage beast…” That last thought rose from my newly acquired spirit, and I pushed it back down with a silent sigh. The ojain’s spirit kept trying to talk to me, especially when I looked at Aeld. I felt its anger toward the shaman—no, it was something deeper than anger, rage and hatred that I didn’t think sprang entirely from what Aeld did to it. Whatever the reason, though, it never missed a chance to berate the letharvis, and I had to work to ignore its constant muttering.

With the fires lit, we climbed off the beach and returned to the makeshift camp we’d built while waiting to assault the Oikies. I stopped at the top of the saddle and looked back at the blazing ship and burning pyre, wondering if I’d feel some sort of regret. I didn’t, of course. The Oikies had been soldiers, and while I didn’t understand their purpose here yet, I didn’t imagine it was harmless and peaceful. If I wasn’t sure of that, a single glance at the glowing band of light crossing the sea beyond the ship—and the subsequent lurching in my stomach—was enough to convince me.

What I actually felt was a tinge of amazement. Honestly, I was surprised by how well the battle had gone. Sure, we’d lost two hunters, but the Oikies lost a lot more than that. It would have been very different if they’d made even a token attempt to secure the beach. If they’d built a wall across the saddle—even a snow wall—and manned it with a few soldiers carrying some of the rifles from the ships, we’d have lost a lot more. Hell, if they’d simply kept guards on the ship’s decks watching the slope, they might have spotted us and put a few dozen of those darts into us on the way down. We could have skirted a fortification by going around one of the nearby mountains, but we’d have had to do it in the dark to avoid being seen, which would have made it as dangerous as attacking the pass. Plus, even if we succeeded, the descent to the beach from those angles was a lot steeper and more precipitous, and if we were spotted climbing down, we’d be dead meat.

The only reason the assault went as well as it did was that the Oikies hadn’t paid any attention to the mountains behind them. I could only guess that they hadn’t imagined that they would be noticed, or they hadn’t thought anyone would make a trek through the High Reaches to strike at them. Or, considering how relatively impersonal the camp seemed to be, they might have only planned to be there for that one day and were about to set off, so they didn’t see a need to set up a watch.

Whatever the reason, it was obvious that they weren’t there as a precursor to an invasion south. They had ample supplies—one tent had held crates of salted or smoked meat, dried fruits and vegetables, kegs of water, and so on, far more than the little group we’d found could use in a month or more, assuming they had months on this world—but they hadn’t brought any gear they could use to travel the mountains. We didn’t find any snowshoes, skis, or sleds, and while it was possible that the Oikies meant to carry supplies on their backs, I didn’t see any backpacks that would serve that function, either.

No, it was pretty clear that the Oikies were using the beach for its convenient access to the ocean and nothing more. I was equally convinced that this ship wasn’t the only one up here. Nothing in the camp smacked of being a long-term residence for the soldiers. There were no storage chests or trunks, no pictures or diaries, nothing that made the camp look live-in. I felt pretty certain that the whole purpose of the beach was to give the Oikies a place to resupply and rest in between voyages doing whatever the hell they were doing up here, and they hadn’t given the slightest consideration to the mountains or their possible access to the Haelendi.

I turned away from the beach with a sigh. Part of me wanted to hang around and see if the blaze drew another ship, but that was probably foolish. Anyone who came to investigate would be suspicious and watchful, alert for whatever destroyed the camp, and it would be pretty obvious that something intelligent had attacked it. As it was, they might send a scouting party into the pass to try and track us down, but I wasn’t really worried about that. Unless their scouts were a lot better prepared than the soldiers below had been, they wouldn’t make it far enough into the High Reaches to be a concern. Besides, the way the wind whipped around up here, after a day or so, there’d be no sign of our tracks in the snow to follow.

I sat down heavily in the snowy camp, wincing as the movement aggravated my still-healing injuries. None of them were serious, and thanks to the one hunter’s decent stitches, they weren’t bleeding anymore, but they still stung. I leaned back against a drift and closed my eyes, then jerked them back awake as I felt sleep beckoning me. Now that nothing demanded my attention, I could feel the exhaustion flowing through my body. I hadn’t slept in two days, which wasn’t that terrible, but I’d spent that time climbing mountains, wading through snow, fighting battles, and painstakingly drawing a ritual. My brain was fried, and I could feel sleep beckoning me. I forced myself to sit up, calling up my notifications as I did.

Spirit Bonding: You have bonded an Ojain Spirit!

Spirit Rank: 5.3

Spiritual Power: 43

Spirit Type: Mortal

Benefits: Intuition +3, Charm +2, Reason +1, Hardy Spirit

Ability Gained: Hardy Spirit

Passive Ability

You gain a natural defense against any spiritual attacks. The strength of this defense is based on your Intuition stat.

Ability Upgrades

See Spirits

You can now perceive mortal spirits

Spirit Bonding

You can attempt to bond a mortal spirit that is free of its body. Warning: doing so is far more difficult than bonding a standard spirit, and a failed attempt may inflict significant spiritual damage!

In addition to the abilities, I’d gotten another rank to my Spears and Interrogation skills, plus 850 XP to Inquisitor—leaving me about sixty thousand XP short of another level. I’d also gained some XP to Spearman and Investigator, enough to push each up a level. That gave me a point each in Reason, Perception, Prowess, and Celerity, but no new abilities. I hadn’t really expected any, of course; Common and Standard professions didn’t provide a lot of abilities, and the ones they gave tended to be lackluster. Besides, the ability I’d gotten for bonding the ojain’s spirit seemed powerful enough.

“Why did I get that from the ojain, Sara?” I asked curiously.

“It seems to be an inherent property of her spirit, John,” she explained. “It’s more durable and harder to affect than normal. I don’t know if it’s something that all Oikithikiim share, or if it’s part of her being an ojain, but whatever it is, I was able to replicate some of it and give it to you.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Wait, would that make her more resistant to Aeld’s magic?” I asked.

“Direct magic? Probably not, no. Something like fire or lightning would still hurt her normally. It might make it harder for him to attack her spirit, though.”

“I wonder if that’s why she was so confident she couldn’t be compelled,” I mused.

“It’s possible. You could probably ask her, you know. I’m pretty sure she can hear you if you talk to her directly.”

“Yeah, not ready for that, yet. I’m fine with you in my head, Sara—more than fine, in fact—but that doesn’t mean I want to carry a whole crowd around in here.”

I turned my attention outward and watched as Aeld began his preparations to conceal and protect our camp. I activated See Magic and See Spirits, and to my surprise, a new hazy blob appeared within the shaman, a deep umber one that looked far more solid and coherent than the others filling him. His other spirits seemed connected to this new one, linked with glowing ties of white energy that held them loosely in place. Those ties pulsed occasionally as power flowed along them; small strands slid out of the brown mass into the connected spirits almost continuously, while in return, larger flows occasionally rushed down into the brown spirit and flowed into the circle Aeld built.

“Is that…?”

“Yes, John. That’s his spirit. After you caught the ojain’s spirit, I was able to analyze it enough to pick out mortal spirits from the background energy field. It isn’t easy—while they’re very powerful, they also almost perfectly match that background—but I can do it, now.”

“And those pulses; is that him drawing energy from his spirits and using it to fashion his circle?”

“Exactly. He’s drawing power from those spirits, funneling it through his own, and pouring it into the spell he’s casting.”

“So, can you use that to work out how he’s casting spells, then?”

“I’ve actually figured out quite a bit already, John. Honestly, another few days of watching him use magic, and I think I’ll know enough for you to start trying things safely—although it’ll be easier and faster if you can get him to teach you.”

“I’ll work on it,” I promised. “In the meantime, what have you figured out?”

She appeared before me, sitting cross-legged in the snow. Her hair was a little longer, now, and looked neatly brushed rather than Skye’s usual tangle of curls. It had also darkened slightly from dirty blonde to a more golden color.

“Well, the main thing is that all of Aeld’s magic is essentially will-based, which makes sense considering that he’s casting only standard spells.”

“Standard? Sara, I just watched him rip out a woman’s spirit. That’s standard on this world?”

“Well, it’s standard on any world, John,” she laughed. “You see, just as your professions are ranked by their rarity, magic is ranked by its power level and what it can affect. Standard spells have the power to affect an area around the caster, generate a moderate burst of energy, or alter similar mass to a few human-sized objects. It’s called ‘standard’ because unless a Doorworld is very low in magical energy, at least some people on it can cast standard spells. In fact, those are what you’ve been using for the most part in each Doorworld.”

“Wait, so I’ve only been casting spells of the weakest type?” I asked, feeling slightly hurt. I have to admit, I was pretty proud of my magical talents, and realizing I’d been using the equivalent of kiddie spells stung that pride a bit.

“No, those are minor spells,” she corrected me. “Minor spells work on any world with even a little magic, but they’re just that: minor. Half the time, people don’t even realize they’re doing magic since they usually only work in touch range and tend to replicate things that people could do with sleight-of-hand. They could light a candle by touch, or calm down a simple animal, or maybe ease pain and promote healing without actually doing any healing of their own.”

She gave me an encouraging smile as she continued. “And you should be proud of your casting talent, John, because it’s not inconsequential. A caster’s talent isn’t just about how powerful a spell they can use, it’s how they cast it.

“You see, John, there are some basic principles of magic that do carry from world to world, and one is the essential nature of what you consider magic. Magic is nothing more than taking a local energy source and harnessing it with your will. Most people need help to do that; they have to use specific spells, rituals, and incantations to aid their casting. They can’t shape the power with just their thoughts, so they use those tools to do some of the work for them. That’s never been an issue for you—at least, not yet. You seem to be able to guide that energy instinctively and shape it however you want without needing those external aids, and that’s a huge advantage in any world. Your spells are faster to activate, more powerful in general, and far harder to predict than most, and that’s all due to your natural talent.”

“I thought that was just part of being an Inquisitor,” I said dubiously. “Or something that you’re doing to help me.”

“Not in the slightest, John,” she laughed. “It’s true that having a SARA helps all Inquisitors learn the principles of magic on any given world a lot faster than normal, but they still usually have to cast spells the same way everyone else does. That’s why I keep getting surprised by how easily it comes to you; I’m not doing it, you are. And you should be proud.”

Her explanation mollified me slightly, even as I realized I was being a bit childish about the whole thing. After all, compared to my life on Earth, I was freaking Gandalf and Merlin combined. As I considered her words, though, a thought occurred to me.

“Wait, so does that mean if I used those other techniques, I could cast more powerful spells?”

“Absolutely,” she nodded. “Everyone has some degree of talent, and everyone can use will-based magic the way you do to some degree. How powerful a spell you can cast that way is determined by your inherent talent—and by that world’s MR, of course.”

“The Magical Rating? Why does that matter?”

“The more magic there is in a world, the more adapted to it the minds in that world have to become. If magic is incredibly dense and plentiful, using it becomes second nature to people, and most everyone can cast standard spells with will alone. In a world where magic is so weak that it’s barely detectable, only someone with real talent can use even minor spells naturally—I think that’s where your Earth falls, by the way. In most worlds, though, an average person can use minor magic naturally, without even trying—and often without knowing it.”

“Like the Sun’s Peace and Moon’s Truce in Soluminos,” I mused, recalling the “greetings” of that world that were actually magically binding contracts.

“Exactly. That’s about the limit that most people in most worlds can handle on their own, though. To cast anything more powerful, they need assistance, and that’s where what you consider spells come in.”

As she spoke, she began waving her hands, drawing glowing sigils in the air. “The most common type of assistance of that sort is incantations. By moving your body in specific patterns, chanting a particular phrase, or both, you shift some of the burden of control away from your mind and into your body. That lets you handle a larger power flow and create greater effects.” She waved her hand, dismissing the glowing sigils, and a long staff suddenly appeared in her hand. “You can do the same thing with specially prepared objects, using them to shoulder the magical load, so to speak, and let you manipulate greater amounts of energy. I think Aeld’s staff is like that, although there’s more to it than that. It’s a source of power in its own right somehow.”

She shook her hand, and the staff vanished. She sat in midair, crossing her legs, and a glowing circle appeared around her, decorated with arcane sigils and runes. “When incantations aren’t enough, a caster can use a ritual to increase their control and power. A simple ritual will not only carry a larger magical burden than an incantation, it lets several casters join their wills together to create a single effect, and it can be created to draw power from an external source, giving you a larger pool of energy to work with than your inherent magic. If you can cast a standard spell by will alone, you could probably use a ritual to cast a major spell.”

“Major spell?”

She nodded again. “A major spell is much more powerful than a standard spell, affecting a very wide area and creating effects that might be considered impossible by those who only use standard spells. Kamath’s Mythic rune was a major spell; Ilinca’s ritual was a major spell bordering on a greater one that can affect an entire planet. Of course, they both had to use grand rituals to cast them.”

“I take it that’s for when a regular ritual isn’t enough?” I guessed.

“Exactly. A grand ritual typically takes years to create, sometimes lifetimes. It requires special materials and often the energies or lives of hundreds of casters. They’re extremely complex and delicate, but they let a caster handle orders of magnitude more power than they should be able to, drawing in all the magic from a vast area and concentrating it in one place.”

“So, is that why Aeld uses those circles? To increase the power of his spells?”

She shook her head. “No, those are different. The only actually magic being employed when he does a ritual like that is a minor spell to empower the circle and another to contact the spirit inside the circle. He isn’t using magic to actually communicate with the spirit; that seems to be an inherent ability he possesses.” She gestured toward the shaman, walking around the camp with his eyes closed. “Aeld also seems to be pretty talented. So far, the only spell I’ve seen him need anything other than his will for is that Ritual of Chaining.”

“Was that a Major spell, then?”

“No, just a moderately powerful Standard one. Technically, it might be within your ability to replicate without needing the diagram; it’s hard to say until you actually start casting spells. Even so, the fact that Aeld can cast most of his spells just with will is pretty impressive—although I think his staff has something to do with that, as well. It’s an external focus and a source of power, and I think it’s why he can cast so many spells without getting tired.”

I refrained from nodding, even though I’d guessed something similar already. It seemed that Aeld could draw power from his valskab through the staff somehow to make himself stronger than he should be, at least magically speaking.

“Okay, so the upshot is, I can use incantations or rituals to make more powerful spells, right?”

“You can, yes, John. Of course, there are downsides to casting spells that way, too.”

“Well, they’ll certainly take longer,” I chuckled silently. “I can’t see myself squatting down and writing out a quick ritual circle in the middle of a fight.”

“No, that probably wouldn’t work,” she laughed. “And it would likely be dangerous since a badly done ritual or incantation won’t hold the power you’re trying to funnel into it, and it’ll all come back on you in a surge. However, there’s another downside: your will-based spells are a lot more flexible. Once you’ve created an incantation for a spell, it’s harder to adapt it to do something different without rendering it useless. Altering a ritual is even harder, and trying to change a grand ritual…” She winced. “Well, you did that to Kamath’s rune in Puraschim, and you saw what happened there.”

“Boom,” I said grimly.

“Big boom. Grand rituals carry a lot of power, and when they go wrong, that power usually escapes destructively. You were lucky that Kamath’s spell was only on the weaker end of a major spell; if you’d done the same thing to Ilinca’s spell in Soluminos, you might have wiped out the entire capital. Only the fact that it had already discharged much of its energy into shattering the moons kept it from killing everyone for miles when it collapsed.”

“Got it. Be careful messing with grand rituals.” I paused. “So, what does all this have to do with spellcasting in this world? I think we’ve gotten a bit far afield, here.”

“Yes, we have,” she agreed with a smile. “However, it’s all germane to the discussion, because the entire point is how to manage the magical energy you take in. I can see how Aeld is doing that—he’s using verbal incantations and his staff to help him—and I’ve even worked out a few of the patterns that will work to guide magic on this world. The more spells I see, the more I can extrapolate—but it doesn’t matter in the slightest. I’m missing the most important part: how to get the power in the first place.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, mildly puzzled. “I’ve always just gathered ambient magical energy and used it. Can’t I do the same thing here?”

“No, you can’t,” she shook her head. “While Sojnheim is fairly rich in magical energy, very little of it is free to be used like that. Almost all of it is bound into spiritual energy, meaning you’ll have to figure out how to unbind it before you can use it.”

I almost asked her how to do that, but I realized that if she knew, she’d obviously have told me. She didn’t, and that meant that there was really only one way I could learn. I had to ask Aeld.

“I—I could show you.” The ojain’s voice in my head was quiet and hesitant, barely heard over my conversation with Sara, but I focused on it immediately.

“What?” I asked, suddenly excited. “What do you mean?”

“I know how to tap a spirit for power,” the ojain replied in a small voice. “I can show you—if you promise to let me go afterward.”

“Let you go?”

“You’ve bound me. I don’t know how, but you did. Promise to release me, and I’ll teach you how to tap the power you have within you.”

“Sara, can I just unbind her like that?” I asked silently.

“I’m not sure, John,” she replied in a troubled voice.

“I can’t promise you that,” I told the ojain with a sigh. “I’m not sure if it’s possible. Do you know how to unbind a spirit?”

“I don’t even know how you did this in the first place,” she replied, her voice quiet and fearful. “Maybe that beast that did this to me can help you, I don’t know. His arts are very different from mine, after all. But you have to promise that you’ll try, and if you learn how, you’ll do it.”

“After you’ve taught me what I need to know about magic,” I hedged. “As well as about your people and their society—and whatever you were doing up here.”

“Why do you care about that?” she asked in a bitter tone.

“Because something bad is happening, and I want to stop it. The more I know, the easier that will be. Do we have a deal?”

“Yes,” she sighed. “We have a deal. I’ll teach you what I can, and in return, you find a way to release me.” She paused. “I don’t think I can teach you much about Henguki, though. None of the redeemed elders have ever been able to learn it. There’s something about you all that keeps you from doing it.”

“Well, we can try,” I said with a mental grin. “I suppose the place to start…”

I stopped as Aeld completed his preparations and walked over to squat down in front of me. The ojain’s spirit practically growled in rage at the sight of him, but I pushed her down and focused on the man. His face was tired, and he looked like he needed a good night’s sleep.

“You should get some rest, Aeld,” I told him. “You look exhausted.”

“I am, Freyd,” he admitted. “And we all need sleep. The journey back will be difficult.” He looked over his shoulder at Bregg, who let out a grunt before looking away. “However, first, you’ve once again placed the valskab in your debt.”

“I’m not sure how,” I chuckled.

“By killing the kateen, you broke the Oikithikiim resistance,” he sighed. “You were also the one who questioned the ojain and gathered what little information we did from it—and who had the thought to do so in the first place. Once more, we’re in your debt, but this time, I have a way to pay some of it back to you.”

“How?” I asked suspiciously.

“The time has come to deal with what’s inside of you, Freyd,” he said solemnly. “It’s time to face the spirit dwelling within you and bring it to heel.”