“Does he obey you?” Amaranthine asked as she regarded the scaled puppy.

I let my eyes meet Havoc’s and sought a connection with him. I found it quickly, a dull sensation in the back of my mind, not dissimilar from the sensations that occurred when I dreamed of Katrina. The puppies emotions were transparently open to me, and when I willed him to run across the room, he did so.

Amaranthine gestured and another Briarhound appeared.

“Have him chase this one,” Amaranthine demanded. I relayed the command. Havoc seemed to be fairly intelligent, but without any basic education. I had to provide additional directions on taking short cuts with a straight line when the Briarthorn went with a wide arcing pattern that slowed him down because he followed it exactly. Once I provided an order with instructions though, he seemed to retain that knowledge, as Amaranthine’s summon went through more and more convoluted paths and even incorporated acrobatic manuevers.

“Can you dismiss and resummon him?” Amaranthine asked.

I frowned.

“How can I tell?” I asked. I hated to ask, it felt like I should just know this sort of thing, everyone else seemed to have a better intuition of their powers than I did, and I was an Enkindler, so it hardly seemed fair.

“Investigate your ability that spawned him,” Amaranthine suggested.

I looked inward, and found the name of the newest ability, and it wasn’t at all ominous. Lord of Chaos. It had three active modes. The first was entropy surge, which pushed things into a wild and chaotic breakdown. It seemed to be a mixture of disintegration and the ability to disrupt forces. This was what had created Havoc. The second mode was the ability to blast waves of chaos that bolstered my allies and hindered my enemies. The extra, or convoluted, mode of the ability allowed me to store results I liked and use them again later, and that included Havoc.

“Come here, boy,” I said, and the hound bound to me. I held up my left hand and Havoc flowed into me and disappeared. I could still sense him in the back of my mind, and it felt like he had a dim awareness of my activities while I had him in storage.

“Well done,” Amaranthine said approvingly. “You are on the cusp of Citrine.”

The black and gold diamonds of Corvusol and Arx Maxima floated into the chamber through the roof. They didn’t comment on the fact that Amaranthine sat straddling my lap. I felt a little bit like my mom had walked into my room and caught me being naughty.

“Not wasting any time, eh Amara?” Corvusol laughed at the situation, while Arx Maxima strobed multi-hued inner radiance and said nothing, unless the faint tsk I heard in my mind had been her. It was hard to tell.

“Remain upon the threshold of ascension to Citrine, Emery. Your final ability is one I would keep in reserve to counter any unexpected occurrences. Your familiarity with me has reached the level of unlocking it at any time, and in fact I am the one holding it back,” Arx Maxima said.

“Why?” I asked.

“There are three reasons. First, you will have Amaranthine with you. As a Sapphire Mist Lord equipped with remnants of the Stellarae Enclave she is unlikely to have an equal in the True World. The longer we can suppress other Mist Lord’s from knowing your true strengths, the better.” Arx Maxima spun slowly in the air as she spoke, and it felt strange to see my reflection in the crystal. Of course, it showed me straddling Amaranthine, but it was the first time I’d seen a reflection of myself as a Tenebrous Dragon that wasn’t a statue.

“Secondly, Mithras has more than a few followers with the abilities of enkindlers. They can read your abilities the same way that I can read yours, or you can read mine. If Arx Maxima wishes to keep something secret, it is best to not develop it until it is needed.” Amaranthine explained in an apparently correct guess, unless they had all spoken about this already. A real possibility, I had to admit.

“Finally, we don’t want you getting cocky.” Corvusol said mockingly, and a flash of light from Arx Maxima made Corvusol spin in a vertical 360-degree arc, again and again.

“Oh, fun,” Corvusol snidely remarked and ignored that he continued to spin. It didn’t have any effect on his ability to communicate, sadly.

“The real reason is because when you advance from Topaz to Citrine there is a brief surge of power where you rival a Citrine on the threshold of Emerald, that will give you a potent boost in combat. If things take a turn that even Amara can’t handle, you’ll need that boost more than the slight familiarity with one more power would give you.” Corvusol spoke the real answer with great reluctance, and disappointment no one enjoyed his joke.

Arx Maxima ended her spinning of Corvusol.

“So.. what do I do until it’s time to go?” I asked with absolutely no ulterior motives at all.

“You should spar with everyone. The more abilities you are exposed to, the more formidable and versatile your ability to Create Vector will be, which will in turn empower Ira Draconis,” Arx Maxima instructed me.

Of all the answers I wanted to hear, that fell somewhere around number fifty on the list of things I desired to do.

Amaranthine stood up gracefully, although her nose brushed against mine, and her hair tickled my snout in the process. Dark energies flowed over her, and the slinky corset dress was replaced with the tight leather combat outfit I’d first met her in. The combat outfit honestly concealed less of her body than the dress had, so I wasn’t at all disappointed by the change.

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“You can start with me,” Amaranthine said with a vicious smile, her tongue flicking along the top of her lips. “You should be able to pick up important aspects from Evernight’s Embrace, Introduce Instability, and Breath of Nightfall at the very least.”

“You want him to run before he has learned to walk? He should be learning the basic elements from the Kitsunes first.” Corvusol disagreed with her suggestion, it seemed like.

“Spar with your betrothed for now. When the others are ready to work with you I will return. Come, Corvusol, you will help Remy upgrade Arcane Mastery.” Arx Maxima spoke with the non-nonsense tone of a mother.

“Ugh, but I detest magic so. Fine,” Corvusol relented, and the two crystals floated through the walls much the same way they had arrived in.

“Stand up, and prepare to defend yourself,” Amaranthine commanded.

I, for a fraction of a second, thought that maybe she’d want to bail and spend time with me elsewhere, but her red eyes were full of determination. I bound to my feet and used the Belt of Diana to replace my enclave uniform with my armor, and pulled Delirium of Ruin into my right hand.

“This first skill is called Evernight’s Embrace. My enemies suffer a slowed temporal effect, while my allies enjoy slightly increased temporal perception, action, and a sharp spike in regenerative capabilities. Focus on the nature of my ability and block my blows if you can.”

A moment later, it felt like the world became molasses. Amaranthine became a blur of motion I could barely follow with my eyes, while every single one of my movements became sluggish. Even my thoughts felt slow, and moving felt glacial. The disjointed nature of thought and action, the out of sync speed of Amaranthine, and the subtle feeling that reality frayed around me combined to push me to the edge of wanting to vomit.

Amaranthine punched me in the face, and I went tumbling backwards into a pile. The blow hurt. A lot. Then the world sped up. My mind felt a boost in clarity, my disjointed muscles felt recovered and ready to do some acrobatics, and the scales on my face healed with barely any influence from Constant Maintenance. It felt like I’d taken one of those boosters the alchemist guild tried to sell adventurers.

I had gotten so distracted in the elation, the clearness of mind and thought, the lack of being trapped in sticky motion slowing power, that I didn’t notice Amaranthine’s fist hit me in the face again, sending me crashing into a wall.

I quickly got up and righted myself, Constant Maintenance and the regenerative effect of Evernight’s Embrace.

“Did you learn it?” The fey demanded an answer.

Amaranthine’s red eyes met mine, amusement danced in her eyes, and she licked a splatter of my blood off her gloved knuckles. I considered the list of Vector’s available to me.

“Yes. Slow,” I answered and prepared to be struck again. Amaranthine didn’t close in on me this time.

“That’s the important one. Next, Breath of Nightfall,” Amaranthine said as she lifted her hand and blew across it. Black wind gusted up out of no where and carried black flecks that almost looked like dark sand storm. The dark grains of sand pelted me, battered me, and while they did almost no damage, I could feel them sapping at my strength. The storm did not relent until a minute later, when it simply vanished.

“Well?” Amaranthine asked, waiting for my response.

I moved to rub at spots that felt like they had sand built up, but not a single speck remained. My motions were slow, as if all my energy had been stolen, and the forces of the world seemed so much stronger. Simply walking felt like a challenge, but with each second, I could feel my speed and coordination returning to me.

I checked my growing list of Vectors.

“Speed Drain? How many abilities do you have that slow your opponents?” I asked in surprise, shocked she had two powers with such similarities.

“Only the two, and both work in different ways. Temporal manipulation works great against lesser foes, but enemies of my rank almost always have a counter to it. Drains are difficult to resist and more emphasis is placed upon defense against mana and life drain than upon attribute drain. Thus they are a robust choice even against foes with strong resistances.” Amaranthine seemed to enjoy instructing me on these things, but something seemed to be bugging her.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Your resistances are strong. No Topaz, not even a Citrine, should be able to resist my attacks, and yet you continuously lessened the effect of that ability until it had nearly no effect.” Amaranthine arched a brow at me, seeing if I had any kind of answer.

“Thanks to being a blank, magic has to work twice as hard to have effects on me. Then two pieces of my equipment have potent magic resistance, and I have an Ability called Citadel Adaption that allows constant adaption against threats. Plus, there’s my armor. That’s a lot of resistances, even if I am only in Topaz.” I grinned, proud of my endurance.

“That isn’t all,” Amaranthine said. “Everything about you seems to regenerate abnormally swiftly. Your passive ability in Envoy, perhaps?”

I had never looked that deeply at Wealth of the Enclave. I had shaped it to allow me to stay safely within Katrina in a dream, and never really thought about it too much afterward. Did it help restore drained attributes on top of the vast energy replenishment it gave me?

“I’ll have to study your endurance more thoroughly,” Amaranthine said with a wicked smile, and I swallowed hard. Why did she have to constantly dance the line of temptation and danger? Or why couldn’t I resist it? Every single time, without fail, I fell deeper into my infatuation with her, and she clearly knew it and took a twisted satisfaction in wiggling the knife to agitate me even more.

“Last one for now,” Amaranthine said, her voice refocusing my attention on her face.

“Introduce Instability is, perhaps, one of the most dangerous abilities in all the Gossamyr, and one of the most powerful abilities that can be gained from Corvusol’s concept of Entropy. It is for use against enemies who seem unbeatable, with impenetrable armor, perfect evasion, instant teleportation, or any other annoying power.”

Amaranthine bit her lower lip.

“Focus, please. I don’t want to risk using this ability on you twice.” The shadows in the room writhed and went insane, and then Instincts of the Gossamyr told me I had to move. I ducked, rolled, and hundreds of shadows in the shape of petals hit where I had been, and just barely missed me. More volleys of them rose from my own and Amaranthine’s shadow, and as I focused on how to dodge them with the help of Instincts of the Gossamyr, a black-red hue surrounded Amaranthine, and suddenly she was in front of me.

Amaranthine’s open palm hit my forehead, sending me bouncing and rolling into the wall, and when I came up out of my roll, Instincts of the Gossamyr was muted and sluggish, but still there enough for me to shift my head slightly to the side, and avoid a hammer kick from Amaranthine that left gouges in the wall and floor, but it didn’t prepare me for her hand grabbing my hair and pulling me up into the air.

I couldn’t keep up with Amaranthine’s vastly superior physical abilities, and with Instincts of the Gossamyr going quieter and quieter in my head, I couldn’t even use it to try and bridge the gap. Her hands released me, and she helped me stand up, but she didn’t take a step back, she was still pressing close, and I smelled the strong scent of roses, Amaranthine, and my own blood.

“Did you learn it?”

“Instability,” I croaked out.

Warm lips pressed against mine, briefly, then Amaranthine stepped back.

“Good. Your abilities will sort themselves out within an hour. Where are your quarters? That is, if you trust yourself all alone with me?”

I felt like steam might be seeping between my scales, that’s how hot the flash of warmth that ran through my body felt.

“Now?”

“Now.”