The next day, Elzio and Syrene convened with Fathina, who had sent word for them in the early hours of the morning. They met with her in a dimly lit study, one smelling sharply of incense and herbs that made Elzio’s eyes water.

“I have been graced with a dream last night.” Fathina sat across from Elzio and Syrene, almost reclining on a sofa. Her eyelids were puffy and hung heavy over her eyes, and she pressed a bony hand to her forehead. “It was not… pleasant, but it was very telling. It was very real.”

Elzio leaned forward, his own wooden chair not providing quite the same comfort as Fathina’s seat, but then again, he hadn’t just had what appeared to be a very painful vision.

“What did you see?” he asked, keeping his voice low with her apparent headache in mind. “Did you get any read on the enemy heroes? Who they might bring to the battlefield? Did they see you?”

“Is there anything we can do to help with your affliction?” Syrene asked, her voice gentle. “Perhaps one of your healers?”

Fathina waved this off, though she smiled at the offer. “I will presently seek an alchemist to make me something to let me sleep undisturbed. However, I do have some content of interest to share with you. First, I’ve seen several glimpses of their map, and they appear to have dramatically changed the landscape from forest to a more dangerous setting. I saw flame, magma, desecrated land with violent steam fissures and even fire raining from the sky.”

Syrene’s silver eyes shifted to Elzio before returning to Fathina. “I imagine there wasn’t much brush in which to hide?”

“No, I don’t think there was a terrible amount.” Fathina’s eyebrows pinched. “I presume that would complicate your plans?”

It did. “Brush provides a good way to switch doppels with heroes,” he said. “Which is… I won’t say essential but it helps facilitate quick switches.”

“Isla has a Blinding Gale spell,” Syrene said, pulling out a scroll of spells. “And I can use an Illusionary blur to help as well. Martin has Smoke Bombs he can throw as well. So half of your heroes can create their own temporary low-vision environments.”

She was right, and he could work with that. “Good. In fact, we can even abuse this. Have you or the doppels routinely throw down those spells even when you’re not about to receive a swap. Keep them anxious.”

As they spoke, Elzio’s eyes occasionally darted back to Fathina, whose face slowly relaxed into a smile. “You’re not terribly concerned about the actual risk of the environmental dangers.”

“Conscious of,” Elzio said. “Obviously it presents risk, but there isn’t ultimately much we can do short of warn the team. Were the changes arena-wide or just on Deluuth’s side?”

Fathina’s eyebrows furrowed in pain and concentration as she dipped back into her memories. “Just on Deluuth’s side.” She blinked a few times, eyes clearing. “It would be expensive to change the entire map, right?”

“Inordinately.” Elzio let out a breath. “Okay, map down. What else?”

“As far as I’ve seen, most towers shoot one attack every few seconds.” Fathina pressed her hand back over her eyes. “At least, ours always have. Deluuth’s towers sent rapid fire attacks. I couldn’t tell if they were doing full damage with each, or if they were diminished because of their attack speed.”

Elzio looked to Syrene, but she was already scribbling this down. “Noted,” she said.

Again, Fathina looked relieved. Elzio and Syrene’s general stoicism in face of her visions seemed to be reassuring her, which was probably a good thing. The better the morale, the better their odds. Elzio had seen first hand how destructive bad energy could be to a team. Discouragement could tear a team apart.

“Finally, I have these.” Fathina pulled out a sheaf of papers. “I drew these from memory. I apologize if they aren’t terribly helpful. I couldn’t get words, so no stat blocks or classes, but I caught glimpses of the spells they cast and spent much of the morning attempting to draft them with the hopes that you might be able to recognize the spells and deduce something about their classes.”

It was a rather logical step, which Elzio appreciated. He took the papers, fanning them out across the oaken table. The first one his eyes landed on was of a dark skinned woman with wild black hair fanning around her while a huge fireball was summoned at her fingertips.

“Pyromancer?” Elzio said. “Simple enough—”

“She’s also a Hydromancer,” Syrene said. “Blue eyes.” She tapped the parchment, gesturing at the piercing sky blue eyes.

“Good catch.” One Elzio should have caught, but this wasn’t the time for that. “Anything else then? Is she holding any enchanted weapons or… or any weapons in general? Mages basic attack with bolts, but that looks like metal on her belt.”

It took them eight hours to analyze the dozen drawings Fathina had provided them with. After the first ten minutes, Syrene urged the woman to take her leave of them and recuperate on her own. Fathina didn’t want to leave at first, but soon it became apparent that she was simply delaying her own recovery.

Once Fathina was gone, the two fell into a rhythm, one that arrested both their attentions, shutting off the outside world as the hours ticked by. It was a medley of intense conversation, their voices jumbling over each other as they extracted as many minute details from each image, followed by even louder silences as both racked their brains, trying to summon memorized abilities from Syrene’s mind while Elzio matched up visual hints to every class, subclass, stat, modification, or buff he could think of.

They took one break, two hours and twenty seven minutes in, to move to the massive library. From there, the pair prowled the floor, summoning books to their hands whenever a question arose.

Was there a nega-version of Deadly Fate? What was the cooldown on Veridian Slash? How many Opal Statues could be summoned at each rank? Which classes could cast Quick Dash?

With each question, a request was sent to the library staff, who would appear minutes later with a tome or two in hand—and the search continued.

It was headache inducing, and by the end Elzio wouldn’t have been surprised if steam was rising off his or Syrene’s head.

“So, we have a few things we know without a doubt.” Elzio looked over the sheet they’d populated. “They have a mage who’s at least level 18 who’s both a Pyromancer and a Hydromancer.” The size of the spell she was casting in Fathina’s vision was enough to indicate at least level 10, while in another image, she was engulfing an opponent in a Steam Shroud—a variant of Fog Cloud that was only available at level 8 Hydromancy.

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

“Then they have a Night Specter.” Syrene sounded almost reverent as she spoke of the rare class. Night Specters were a crossclass of Black Magicians and Blood Mages. They required an intense amount of training and discipline, as even taking certain skills could close off the class from a hero. In return, however, once they took on the crossclass, they became deadly. “The Twilight Drain is only accessible to them.”

Elzio’s quill hovered near the Night Specter on his sheet. “He has to be at least level 20. That’s when the crossclass opens. So that’s not good. But at least there won’t be any other tricks up his sleeve. Night Specter’s too restricted for anything else. We’ll know exactly what he’s bringing.”

Syrene nodded. “Then there’s the brawler. Axes, swords, and a spear. I’m not sure why he would take three different classes, all in melee combat. It’s just a way to spread yourself thin. Similar to what I’ve done, I suppose, but I don’t think this man is a teacher of much.”

Her comment was likely derived from the sheer lunacy that emitted from the massive man’s face in every glimpse Fathinia had given them. Then again, most of the Deluuth heroes looked unhinged. In every drawing, every sketch, on every face, it was clear to anyone looking that the Deluuth heroes were enjoying the battle. Not the challenge of a good fight, not the puzzle of outthinking their opponent, not the thrill of winning an engagement. It was pure bloodlust etched in their eyes. Even their support, a Blood Mage-Healer cross seemed to be relishing the deaths of her opponents.

“Someone taught them to be like this,” Elzio said. “So we have the Support, the Night Spector, the Mage, the Fighter, and then there’s the Crossbowman.” The last of the heroes had been the hardest to pin down intel on. They knew he held a crossbow, but none of Fathina’s images had him using any abilities. He just stood in the back of a half dozen images, standing almost still

Syrene rubbed her eyes. “You’re likely right, but the rot in their minds goes back far longer than any individual teacher.” She yawned. “I think it’s time to bring what we’ve discovered to the Genyl heroes. I think they’ll be rather pleased with our work.”

—

Syrene hadn’t been wrong. The Genyl heroes were almost in awe of how much the two had deduced from just a handful of drawings. Athin and Lin Chian especially seemed impressed.

“Ahhh, these little ones, they’ve given us an invaluable gift.” Lin Chian grinned, her voice booming across the hall. “We might live another day yet!”

Athin nodded, stroking his beard. “We’ll study these classes and the abilities you’ve identified. It’s not every day a hero gets a chance to analyze their opponent. From what you’ve told us of Deluuth’s machinations, however, I would guess it almost a certainty that they have spies among our walls.”

At this, Ilshe motioned to Athin, making a complex series of signs with his hands.

“Mmm, Ilshe says none among our immediate number.” Athin let out a breath of relief as he said this. “So while they probably know our classes and ranks, they won’t know everything we know.”

Elzio’s eyes fell on the waiflike man, who had motioned to Martin, communicating again in whatever sign language their team used.

“And you’re certain he can be trusted?” Elzio asked. It was a throwaway comment, barely even a half-baked thought. Pyrthet and Ythrel had seen enemies right up into their councils, so there was a scrap of possibility that Genyl had a similarly high-ranking traitor. Why not a hero?

But at the mere suggestion that the team’s Support might be a turncoat, the entire room filled with silence—the kind of menacing silence that echoes through a room.

“My brother?” Isla’s voice was cold as ice, and her acid-green eyes burned. “Is that what you’re implying?”

Ilshe was a Psionic. It was this Psionics magic that let him link his team’s minds together, that let him know with full certainty that one was a traitor. So of course the same logic would apply in reverse—the team knew with full certainty that Ilshe was not a traitor.

Realizing his mistake immediately, Elzio held up his hands. “Idle musing, one that makes no sense, of course. Please, forgive me.”

“We don’t—” Lin Chian started, her voice grimmer than Elzio had heard thus far, but Athin held up a hand.

“The boy’s experienced a lot of treachery these past few months,” he said, his voice even. “In most cases, it would be a valid question.”

From Isla’s face, it was clear the woman was biting back words more toxic than her abilities. After another second, Ilshe motioned sharply for the door, and the twins stalked out. The rest of the team followed immediate suit, save Athin.

“They’re a protective group,” the lead said after the room had been cleared. “Isla is the worst of the bunch. The twins were born in Deluuth to parents who had once been citizens of Opyan, a nation conquered long before you were born. Deluuth takes great pride in damaging their conquered citizens, and it was for that reason that the twins were taken from their parents and put to work at a mill hundreds of miles away.” He grimaced as he swept up the sheets, tapping them to straighten the stack’s edges. “After it became evident that Ilshe couldn’t speak, he was considered defective and would have been… culled.” Athin’s voice dropped as he spoke, and Elzio could only imagine the words were even harder to say than hear. “That’s when Ilsa broke them both out in the middle of the night and fled. They just ran. They ran for days, not stopping to eat, not stopping to sleep. Whenever one would falter, the other would carry or drag them until they caught their breath enough to continue. Finally, they managed to cross Deluuth’s borders and found themselves in a small Genyl village.”

“How old were they?” Syrene asked, her voice equal parts gentle and hushed.

“Nine. Looked maybe half that.” Athin slipped the notes into the folder that held Fathina’s other drawings. “Because I have to respond to a lot of the councilors and masters of the city, it’s important I not let my emotions drive me to loyalty over reason. I am very close with the team, but I have to hold them slightly more at arm’s length, to protect the objectivity that comes with planning a battle. But they’re fiercely, viciously defensive, especially of Ilshe. Even twenty-five years later. Implying that one of the twins is working for Deluuth, well…”

Syrene nodded, her eyes soft with concern. “Our comments won’t trouble them too greatly, I hope. Nor will it turn their hearts against us?”

Athin shook his head. “Not at all. It’s just something to keep in mind when dealing with them. And don’t worry about your planning putting them at risk, either. They know the dangers of nexus battle. When it comes to strategy, they are your tools, and they know that.” With this, he gave a curt nod and left the room, jogging slightly to catch up with his team.

Elzio watched him go, a cold pit in his stomach. He knew Deluuth’s reputation but barely had even heard tales, rather less work so closely with people who’d faced that. In fact, Elzio had never really met anyone who’d dealt with Deluuth beyond the traitors they’d executed. Tylin’s butchering had been a bit of an awakening, but even facing a man strung up in his bed chambers didn’t disquiet him the way hearing the twins’ story had.

Separated from their parents just as a show of power. Forced to work hard labor as children, just to keep them helpless. Escaping death at such a young age, death for such a pittance of a reason. No reason at all, really.

It was this last one that stuck with him. Not just what the twins had escaped, but what so many hadn’t. The culling of anyone deemed ‘defective.’

“I can’t think about this.” This time when Elzio spoke, he barely registered that the thoughts were half-formed. They just fell from his lips as his overactive mind took grip of the tale and whirled through his brain. “I need to focus.”

Syrene put a hand on his shoulder. “I know,” she said. “I often have to remind myself just how young you are, just how little you’ve really faced. And these things, they take time to really permeate your brain. Right now, you’re tired. Your mind is beyond fatigued, and it grows late. Get some food and get some rest. Try to avoid rumination, though I suppose if you must…” A thoughtful look crossed her eyes. “Maybe speak to Echo. I think she may have a different enough perspective, it might help you process.”

Elzio nodded but didn’t say another word as he headed from the room. It was good to remember exactly what they were up against and why. Deluuth’s cruelty would make this battle so much easier than the last two in one important way.

He would have no mercy for the enemy heroes.