“Why have you done this? She was good to you. She watched over all of you!” he held her as the magic spread from the injury near her heart and spread through her. She crumbled to dust in his hands.

The coldness of the young man’s eyes chilled him through his core. “Because all of you are my enemy,” he explained simply, raising his hand up…

Silver twitched awake. The book page he had fallen asleep on stuck to his face, and he was sure there must now be ink all over him. Outside the cell, he could see the form of his brother and the other Myajacs within him, moving around.

It had been a long time since he had thought of home. He was tempted to look up, but here in the cell, he could not see anything but the stone roof. Of course, he had almost died on the day that haunted his dream. His brother had saved him. It was how he had a prosthetic eye… back when he had a body still. Poor Illadrya. They were so angry at us.

He had been thinking a lot about the problem of the “impure” magic. It had probably been that, and the fear of the shimmers, that had prompted this whole adventure of pooling magic in the first place.

He breathed out, got up, washed the ink off his face with a little help from his magic, did a few hobbled laps around his cell thanks to the chains, and hoped the nickname of Bound God that some of the mystics thought of him wouldn’t be a prophetic statement. He kept some attention on his brother and then drew in his notebook. He drew a T-shape, and in each quadrant, he put the type of magic his brother had tried to organize things into caelus (air), imber (water), terra (earth), vitae (life).

He wanted to keep it pure, just elemental. He almost wanted to try and stop anyone from having access to the life magics, Silver thought, as he slowly wrote the things that had gone wrong. Imber mages see the future, he wrote. Future sight was not meant to be a skill utilized by anything less than the Gods. Terra mages can manipulate the past. He thought of the day he thought he would have to save Rosalea from bad decisions in dealing with Kaylar, but she had somehow saved herself. The dragons have detected that there is a deeper way of handling magic that doesn’t involve utilizing it in its elemental expressions. In fact, Kaylar’s magic is nearly all that deep magic after his encounter with the Gods. The dragon had taught that existence to basically every human he had come across.

He thought of home again, and how unique magic could be expressed. It was one of their strengths in their roles of Gods, handing out boons and gifts.

The Lost Ones and I fell out of Bane’s unity because of the mystics. Bane didn’t want them. He didn’t want a creature that was so like what had gotten out of control at home. But Silver had missed the variety.

But giving mystics to Uryans as liana was the last straw for him and we fell apart. I stayed so the others could get away. Silver closed his eyes. But the magic is the same. No matter how we pull on it, the truth is under the surface, and we can only pretend it is covered up. The very fact that dragons are creating their own zones, spells, and creatures… it is proof that it was always there. Even humans with a low affinity to magic usually can at least see the presence and magic of someone else if they try.

Silver opened his eyes and turned to a fresh page. Then, he got up and did another circuit around the room. And now there is the problem of corruption in the mystic forest. No… they already tend to warp with time, slowly, since the magic I gave them is so unnatural. More like… what has been made is closer to poisoned magic, or maybe a curse. But, without being allowed to see it in person, I won’t be able to find out what it is.

There is always the option of sending someone to see it for me, but… he didn’t want to put any of his closest and dearest friends at risk. Perhaps the worst thing of all of this was… that Silver didn’t believe that his brother was right anymore. Even though he had been hurt, and he had lost his first love, and Bane had saved him…. Even though he loved his brother, he didn’t think he was right anymore.

I hope he doesn’t kill me, the rogue Myajac thought as he began to write out a very forbidden plan. He was going to unlock the old magic, the true magic, for his mystics.

***

The path of devastation made it easy to follow right back to where it had come from. It took him only days to reach a place where the forest… gave Taigan goosebumps honestly. Nothing was natural about it. The trees grew into giants with unusual flowers, leaves, and shapes. Some of them looked like they were two different kinds of trees in one with their two different barks and two kinds of leaves. Rock formations did not look right, artistic, and sometimes unearthly.

“We should consider getting on the road and going to the town that is across the river,” Taj said.

“Are you seeing all of this stuff?”

“Mystics live here, they look after and enjoy shaping nature to suit themselves. Many wondrous things, including liana, come from mystic work.”

“Is this your home then?”

“No, mine is from much farther west. This is the biggest group of mystics in the world though, I believe. If it were my home, I would not be allowed to come back here; liana are not meant to return with their familiars.”

Taigan felt some apprehension. However, it had been clear, if he was to remove the sickness that was growing on him, the green-yellow mark slowly expanding on his body, then it would take a Forest King to help. It was the only path forward. Since Taj recommended that he get up on the road, he would do so.

It was late though, so he turned his gelding Honor around and backtracked until the woods no longer gave him an unnatural vibe, and he made camp with Taj. They would cross the river and find the road in the morning.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

***

Rosalea cuddled Nauru and Sasha. Sasha was fading. She was so young, and it was hard for her to resist the spreading mark along her body. Even Raisa hung around more often.

But she had been absolutely forbidden from going to the greenhouse in Miron.

She had tried arguing about it.

She had tried sulking for a couple of days, and even though it made Amalia stressed, the wolves did not relent.

So, well, it was time to do what she always did when people wouldn’t let her have her way. It was time to sneak off.

She waited until they had a meeting with Connall’s pack again, though Raisa almost did not go. She had chilled toward Connall after what had happened to her and Sasha.

“All right Sasha,” Rosalea said as she tucked the poor sick thing into her blankets, “You watch over Nauru, all right? And Nauru, you watch over Sasha.”

He whined at her and tried to hang onto her pant leg. “No, it’s too important,” she said, patting his head. “Please stay here, I will be back later!”

And so, even though he whimpered and it broke her heart, Rosalea set off into the forest. She was wearing her darkest clothes, and she had braided her silver hair tightly and put it under a hood. She carried her knife… and as she clambered down rocks and scuffed her fingers and had to jump across ditches, she really missed her magic.

She was in the valley before too long. She was glad Nauru had only whimpered and not started howling his anxiety and given her away.

She backtracked from there toward the river, finding it, and wrinkling her nose. It was true that she had seen more smoke from across the valley and in the town, but as she came up to the river and took in the metallic smell and the sludge that seemed to color the water. I wonder if they had tried to be kind to the townspeople whether it would have worked out or not with this sort of consequence from the mining. She felt self-conscious now about the metal in her knife… That is not fair to think, actually. She walked along the river until she found her old makeshift bridge. It was… bigger as if someone had expanded it.

She looked down at the ground, and for a moment, she was distracted by all the obvious footprints she could see. They used my bridge to cross over to something? She could not see what… but she wished she had never made them a bridge.

Then again, it was bigger now, someone had enhanced it. It probably would not have mattered if she was here. She breathed out, Surely among the mystics, there would have been some that could have helped them with mining in a way that does not have such an intense impact. Earth is just earth, and the minerals in it can be gotten with fire, but I am sure there are other ways to get it.

She had never studied metalwork in particular, however, so she did not feel confident. The facts of the situation were that the two sides hated each other at this point, and it might be too late for any kind of sensible resolution.

This situation is a lot simpler than what is going on with the prophecy and the Ieshans and Uryans. She made her way up onto the road. It had been hours. She was sweaty. She wished she had brought more with her than just water and enough for a single meal. Fact is, I have never traveled without access to earth storage, she thought as she felt rather unprepared for all this.

Still, she had come this far and no wolves had caught her. So, she was going to continue. I cannot approach the town from the front gate, they will catch me right away, and I should not openly approach where they can see me.

She looked up at the sky. It had been morning when the wolves had decided to meet, and it was late afternoon now. I do not think they will come for me if I just wait a couple of hours til dark. After all, all her best sneaking in the past had been after dark… and it was early spring still, it wasn’t that long to wait. She crossed over the road, settled by a mossy stump, and waited. She did what she always did when she was alone, she ruminated on how much she missed Lio and wondered what she was doing… and how much she wished she could undo her mistakes with Annie, Fen, and even Ulric.

She was relieved that as the sounds of the refinery slowed that no wolves had tracked her over here. All right. Let’s see if I can still climb like I did when I was a child.

She walked quietly down the road, feeling chilled from sitting still after her strenuous walk through the valley. She made it to the edge of the lights on the walls and saw one key difference from when she had been here before. The walls are all new stone. It reminded her of the Ieshan fort where Lio had been born. She walked slowly around the side closest to the cliff, guessing that if anywhere in the walls was weak, it would be the side that felt protected by the lack of land near it.

The strip of land got really narrow as the wall tried to follow the cliff side, but Rosalea found that she could just traverse it if she hugged the wall. It made her legs quake whenever she glanced down, she did not have her magic, and a fall from this height could be lethal.

Even though it was dark and cold, her palms were sweaty as she moved slowly along rough wall. She eventually found a gap in the wall. She felt around it blindly, and her fingers touched wood. They joined the new wall with the old wall. She wondered if the gap was big enough for her to squeeze through as she felt around it. She supposed they had decided to put the focus on the walls that mystics could attack from. She slowly eased herself forward - she could see lantern light through the gap. It wasn’t open enough for her to squeeze through, but as she pushed against the rotten wood of the old wall, she found that it had more give than she expected, compressing out of her way. If I get stuck, it will be so bad.

However, it was wiggle through here, or walk the other way around the wall and look for a spot rough enough to climb. So… she squeezed her way forward, wood bits getting in her hair and earning herself scrapes as she pressed herself into the gap. She managed to get her arm and shoulder through the other side, and then contorting a bit, she pulled herself the rest of the way through, landing a little roughly on her back on the ground, but she was in the compound.

She lay there, holding still, hoping no one had noticed, and then she would get up, dust herself off, pick wood out of her hair and clothes, and then take a deep breath.

She couldn’t see through most of the buildings, and she did not want to run into anyone. So, she quietly climbed up onto the roof of one building with a lean-to, and then looked around.

They have done a lot of rebuilding and cleaning, she thought as she looked around. It still looked horrible and poor here, but there was at least a sense of order. Near the north end of town, she saw what she was looking for, a glass building with a wood and stone frame. Let us see if we can figure out how they are doing all this poison.

She would get down and slowly make her way to the greenhouse… finding that it was under guard. A man stood by the only door into it. She felt a little panic go through her, of course, something with poison in it would be under guard, even if it was a greenhouse.

So now what? Do I attack him and hope for the best? She put her hand on Ulric’s knife in her belt and thought about cutting the man’s throat, and then felt sick. If she couldn’t kill Ulric, she couldn’t kill this man that was actively only minding his own business in front of her.

To her surprise, there was a bird cry somewhere overhead, an owl, maybe? But it clearly put everyone on alarm, and she supposed that made sense since they were fighting the forest and its animals. The guard moved to get to a higher vantage… so Rosalea just went for it. She ducked through the door, closing it silently behind her and crouching down to blend with the plants.

Food. There is mostly food in here, she realized instantly. In the center, there was a trio of trees that reminded her of mystic work - the core was one type of tree, and all the branches seemed different from each other, and bore different fruit.

“I had no idea you would just walk up to me like this,” a hard feminine voice said. Rosalea tried to turn and look, but a vine caught her around the wrist and pulled up so hard that she was on her feet before she could turn. A second vine wrapped around her neck, squeezing down. “Yes, blue mark on your hand. You are obviously the dragon spy. I am so pleased to meet you. I am Lady Beryn.”