Sook floated there, too stunned to speak.

“You don’t have to choose the path of excision if you do not wish it,” Wor said gently. “You could be reincorporated and given another chance at life, one not racked with the turmoil which has led you to this point.”

These words seemed to break Sook out of her shock. “Excision? I would no longer be a deep denizen. I would be nescient, less than nescient.” Her eyes traveled across the cold faces of the Collective and finally came to a rest on Pali. “Do you think I am such a danger that you wouldn’t even reincorporate me?”

“Quite the opposite,” he said. “That is why I suggested they excise you. Your work is too important to be brought to an end so suddenly. And your work does not require you to be awakened.”

“But my awakened mind is what makes me a deep denizen. I can’t lose that.” It was as if she were pleading with Pali, begging him for an alternative, but although his eyes were sad, there was no pity there.

“As I said,” Lexington said. “She is not mad enough to accept this course of action. We will proceed with the reincorporation.”

“Sook,” Kayden said, her dagger still clutched in her hand. Sook’s eyes flashed away from Pali’s and over to her, surprised to see her. “Don’t let them reincorporate you.”

Sook’s eyes widened.

Ragast spoke up. “Don’t interfere, human. You do not understand what is being asked of her. Imagine if we were to ask if you wanted all your limbs removed. Would you be able to do it?”

Kayden kept her eyes off Sook. “I don’t care. As long as I could keep being myself, I would pay whatever price.”

She was thinking of Uptown and how they had treated her. Not until she had broken away from the had she been able to find herself. And she had paid a large price for that. She had lost everything: her father, her home, her future.

But despite all of that, she wouldn’t change it if it meant that she had to go back to the way things were. Sook was like her in that regard, and she had to believe that Sook would make the same choice, otherwise, it put into question her own choices. It would cause her to doubt everything. She had to believe her rejection of Uptown was worth all of the pain.

“Don’t let them control you,” she begged the small, floating creature she had only known a short time.

Sook held her gaze.

“Enough of this,” Lexington said, “The human has had her say. This matter is resolved. Alak, take them from here.”

“Okay,” Sook said out loud, so softly that Kayden and Alak were the only ones close enough to have heard.

Alak did not move. His purple eyes gleamed behind his helm as he watched his sister.

“Alak!” Lexington shouted.

Alak’s eyes flickered to Lexington then back to Sook.

Sook turned to the Collective and spoke again, this time in the minds of everyone so that they could hear her. “If it is the only other option then I choose to be excised.”

Silence followed. Pali smiled sadly at his splinter.

“Daughter,” he said, this time the meaning of the word was much closer to how a human would mean it. The emotion accompanying his thoughts full of deep love. “I am proud of you. You will not travel down this road alone. I will be there to guide you.”

Sook set her face, Pali’s words adding strength to her stance. She looked like a soldier going into a battle that they were doomed to lose but rose valiantly to the challenge nonetheless.

The Collective had recovered enough to express their shock. The room erupted into dissent with Sook standing resolutely with her eyes locked onto Pali’s.

Alak turned his back on Sook and to Kayden and Ruth. For a moment there seemed to be a glimmer of confusion in his gaze, but when it found Kayden it hardened into anger. He floated toward them to carry out the order Lexington had given him.

As he neared, he looked at the dagger hanging in Kayden’s hand at her side and lifted his mace. The message was clear, are you going to cause more trouble?

Kayden was about to lift her dagger back up to a defensive position. She wasn’t about to leave Sook now after she had made her choice. She was going to stand with Sook to the end. But Ruth placed a hand on her arm and shook her head.

“There is nothing more you can do,” she said. “It is time for us to go before we cause more trouble between the Collective and Nikiphero.”

Pali who was still near to them also spoke, “Your friend is right, the rest is up to Sook. We will contact you when it is done. I believe your purpose in coming here was to seek out shadow magic. Perhaps we can reach a mutually beneficial agreement. If the Collective permits of course.”

The Collective were still arguing among themselves and weren’t paying their group any attention.

Kayden shook her head, still determined to stand with Sook through whatever she was about to go through. “I want to help Sook.”

It was Sook whose words were necessary to defuse Kayden. “Thank you for what you have said, but they are right, there is nothing you can do. Please, do not take this the wrong way, but I think it would be best if you left.”

It must be strange for this girl Sook hardly knew to be standing up so strongly for her, but it wasn’t really about Sook. It was about Kayden standing up against an institution that would control someone unjustly. With Sook’s words, she realized that they were right, she had done all she could in this instance. The rest was up to Sook.

She finally let her dagger dissolve into black mist and gave Sook a nod of farewell, letting Ruth take her arm to guide her out of the room. Alak brought up the rear.

They left the room and found the human servant waiting there, standing silently alone in the dark hall. Kayden had completely forgotten about him. He didn’t say a word, only relit the lantern for Kayden and Ruth’s benefit, then led them to the elevatorless elevator shaft.

Alak didn’t accompany them down. He only watched as Kayden once again experienced the discomforting sensation of being lifted up by an invisible force and carried down the dark shaft. The last thing she saw before the darkness consumed her view was his purple eyes reflecting the lantern light.

*****

When they returned to the Nikiphero training compound after their eventful outing, they found Rem waiting for them. The gym had been cleared out and he was surrounded by a coterie of soldiers.

His eyes bored into Ruth’s when she entered. “Where were you?”

“Did you tell him?” she asked, unabashed at his anger.

Rem stared her down. “What would I have said? That you took her--” he didn’t look at Kayden--”and vanished somewhere without a word about it to anyone, after he expressly forbade you from attempting to utilize her death element.”

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“We didn’t use her death element. He wanted her trained in shadow magic so I took it upon myself to do just that.”

“You are stretching his orders and you know it.”

“Am I? He said himself that he wished he could find someone to train her in shadow magic, and that is what we did.”

“You found someone with shadow magic, who?

Ruth shrugged like it was no big deal. “The deep denizen.”

The look on his face was answer enough as to what he thought about that.

“Are you mad!” Rem exploded in fury. “After what happened the last time we worked with them! Those creatures are not like us!”

Ruth had the decency to look a little embarrassed. “It worked out in the end, I think. Although the Collective was angry with us at first.”

Kayden had never seen Rem scared before, not even when he was fighting for his life against Mistech, but now his face went completely pale. “You spoke with the Collective? Do you know what this means? They could destroy us, destroy Nikiphero.”

Ruth was sweating a little bit by now because of Rem’s reaction. “Oh, come on. They didn’t seem that powerful to me. Sure they're strong, but I would have been able to hold my own against them by myself. Against all of Nikiphero, they wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“You fool,” he said. He wasn’t angry, he was shaken to his core. “It isn’t about their strength. It is about the strength of that thing they control.”

“Thing?”

Rem’s eyes had taken on a faraway look, his eyes stricken with pure terror. “I saw it with Cassius the last time we struck a bargain with them. It’s ancient, a horror that has existed perhaps even longer than this world.”

He shook himself free of the vision which had overcome him. “Why do you think even the Academy is afraid to interfere with them? The Academy, who regulate all magic in Mitros, just allow the deep denizen free range to use their abilities without oversight? No, they are allowed their secrets and independence because they have the power to retain them, a power that if unleashed could destroy Mitros. And you antagonized them.”

Ruth swallowed. “Why wasn’t I told any of this?”

“Cassius commanded Nikiphero to not interfere with them. That should have been enough. He doesn’t need to explain every little command to the likes of you. How could he have known you would destabilize the balance of power for something as idiotic as learning shadow magic for that girl? What did they say to you? Quickly, so I can mitigate whatever damage you have caused.”

She could see that this wasn’t the time to test Rem and so she recounted in as much detail as she could the events which had transpired with the Collective.

“Okay,” Rem said, pacing. “It might not be irreparable. We will have to communicate with this Pali and give our apologies for the two idiots stepping in where they do not belong. We will prepare gifts--”

Rem continued to ramble on, mostly to himself until he gradually began to wind down. “Okay, this can work. I’ll deal with the two of you once I have had a chance to speak with Cassius. Hopefully, this isn’t serious enough that he has to return and ruin our plans with the East.”

Ruth looked sufficiently chastised and nodded in acceptance. Rem finally acknowledged Kayden’s existence with a quick glance.

“I can’t imagine you will be able to remain once he learns of this. The elf at the very least provides something beneficial to this organization that makes up for this serious lapse of judgment, you on the other hand provide nothing but trouble.”

Kayden felt her heart drop.

Without another glance or word to the two of them, Rem hurried out of the compound to begin repairing Nikiphero’s relationship with the deep denizens.

Kayden and Ruth stood stricken for a long time in the silence of the gym, both contemplating the serious consequences of the actions they had taken.

Kayden couldn’t blame anyone but herself. This had all been her doing. It had been her suggestion to go to the deep denizen for help.

She couldn’t even blame Rem for being needlessly biased against her in this case. If the ramifications were as serious as he said, which from his reaction she believed he was telling the truth, then there was a high probability that she would be thrown out of Nikiphero like Spax.

Her hand moved up to her eye, remembering how ruthlessly Cassius had stabbed Spax and imagined him doing the same to her. Without Nikiphero, what would she do? Where would she go?

It was true that she still had the trust Cassius helped her set up. She had hardly accessed it other than when she had tried to bribe the police. It wasn’t like she was completely dependent upon Nikiphero for her well-being.

But that had never been the reason she came here. She had come here because they could get her the one thing she really wanted, revenge.

If she tried to do it without their aid, she wouldn’t know where to begin. She would only make more mistakes. She would probably end up dead, like in the tunnels of the Abyss if Nikiphero hadn’t been there to save her.

Everything was coming crashing down because she had been impatient, because she had disobeyed Cassius’s orders, because she thought she was too important to face repercussions. Despite everything that had happened, and all that Cassius had done for her and promised her, she was still acting like she was doing it on her own.

Rem was right. Why would Cassius want to keep her around? All she had proven was that she was a liability. Mistech, training her, Spax, the Collective. He had sacrificed so much for her benefit, and what had he gotten in return? Only trouble.

Rem’s antagonism no longer felt unfounded. It made sense why he would want to cut ties with her. If anything, Cassius’s benevolence didn’t make sense. What did he owe her?

Cassius was all about leveraging risk against reward, and Kayden was a huge risk with no reward. If Kayden was in his shoes she wouldn’t keep herself around.

She had only caused him suffering. He had lost his closest ally because of her. If she had never gotten expelled from the Academy and gone in search of her father, Xolan would still be around. Cassius would still have her father’s strength by his side.

Then, when Cassius attempted to honor his fallen comrade by reinstating Kayden into the Academy and giving her access to a vast fortune, she basically spat in his face. No wonder he had reacted the way he had when she first approached him in his office.

Did she regret her course of action? No. She had no desire to remain Uptown, no matter her father’s wishes, not after everything they had done to her. But she was beginning to see how reckless, foolish, and selfish she had been.

Hadn’t Cassius said he was going to make Uptown pay? And yet she was acting like she was fighting a one-woman war. If anything, he had more of a justification for his hatred against Uptown than she did.

Cassius was only including her in his plans because of her connection to Xolan. And now she was going to lose her opportunity to play a part in it. And she couldn’t say it wasn’t justified.

When she had first gone to Cassius and demanded he avenge her father, she hadn’t believed him when he said that he would. Now that she had gotten to know him better, she knew he was not only serious about it but probably the only one capable of carrying it out. But she had somehow convinced herself that it was her destiny.

How stupid could she be? She was just an ignorant girl, stumbling about like a kitten getting stuck in a tree and lashing out at anyone who tried to rescue her. Every time she thought she was done making mistakes, she brought herself to a new low. She would laugh at herself if she didn’t feel so pathetic.

It should comfort her that even if she was kicked out of Nikiphero, Cassius would still carry out his revenge. One way or another, her father would have justice.

But it didn’t comfort her. Because she realized that it wasn’t just about avenging her father. If it had been, then it would be enough to let Cassius be the one to do it. No, she had to be the one to avenge Xolan.

She had descended into the Abyss because she didn’t believe anyone else would find her father’s killer. It may have been a foolhardy decision, but at least it had been understandable.

Since then she had learned the depth of Cassius's desire to make Uptown pay for what they had done, not just for what they had done to her father but for what they had done to all of Cliffside. She was no longer working alone and yet she had continued to act like she still was.

Now she understood what was truly driving her forward. It wasn’t that her father needed to be avenged, but that she needed to be the one to avenge him. She needed to take back the power that had been robbed from her. And she needed Cassius and Nikiphero to do it.

They didn’t need her. Cassius didn’t need her. This was not her story. It was his. And he would leave her behind if she didn’t fall in line.

When he gave that speech the day she defeated Spax, he had asked for their obedience. Not because he needed it--he would be great with or without their help--but because if they followed him then they would become great too. His vision would carry them to greatness.

But just like Spax had been blinded by his greed, Kayden had been blinded by her pride. She needed to stop doubting Cassius. He was the only path toward her desire. If he forgave her, she swore she would never disobey him again.

Ruth had left with a simple and forlorn goodbye. Neither of them had felt up to much more than that. Kayden had gone over to a punching bag to vent her frustration, kicking and wailing at it without much regard to form, channeling as much of her aura into her muscles as she could.

When some hours had passed and she was drenched in sweat, she heard Cassius speak as if he were right beside her. “I am gone for a day and you almost start another war. What am I going to do with you?”