“I found it!” Glim floated over in her Missile form. “It’s the white one on the left.”

Elend gave a slow nod, never breaking stride as he and Irina walked down the sidewalk. The sky was dark, but the houses shone bright against the night, with warm light spilling out from their tall glass windows. The tropical air was warm despite the late hour, and gusts of wind blew in from the Cadrian Ocean.

As always, the west coast had an entirely different feel from the east. While the Inner Sea vibrated with the mana of distant storms, this place had a sense of peaceful tranquility. Nothing but water, salt, and wind. Even a group of non-Water Artists could go sailing here without risking certain death.

They still had walls, of course. Even without mana storms, the moons had no trouble pulling the tides a few hundred feet into the air. But such events were rare on this side of the continent, especially with Espiria's southern tip shielding them from the worst of it.

Elend crossed the street, following Glim’s directions toward their target. The villa stood three stories high, with white stone walls and a terracotta roof. A matching stone wall surrounded the property, with a sea of flowers and palm trees filling the inner courtyard. The driveway wrapped around a stone fountain, and Elend spotted over two dozen luxury vehicles parked around it.

“Security?” he asked as they walked.

“Just the usual warding Constructs,” Glim said. “Cameras by the gate, and a stern-looking guy at the door.”

“What rank is the guard?”

“Master,” she replied. “Only in his forties, too.”

“Might be time to pull out the silver tongue,” Elend mused.

“How’d that go with the Martials?” Irina asked with feigned curiosity.

Elend winced. He’d never live that down, would he?

“She has a point,” Glim said.

Elend cleared his throat and gestured a thumb over his shoulder. “I didn’t hear any complaints when I talked us through the outer gatekeeper.”

“You already had a mental model for that scenario,” Irina said. “But this has too many unknowns. We’ve never been to a cultist meeting, and one mistake could put them on high alert. It might even draw their leaders’ attention.”

“Very well,” Elend said. “Then what’d you have in mind?”

“No guards on the back doors,” Glim spoke up. “I saw a bunch of people going in and out.”

“Aye, but we can’t just fly over those walls.” Neighborhoods like these were warded against unauthorized flight, even at Elend’s level. And each property contributed to the warding scheme, with dozens of Masters adding their willpower on a weekly basis. Even Glim couldn’t break those wards with so many redundancies in place.

“What about the neighbors?” Irina asked. “That house on the right looks empty.”

Elend reached out with his mana sense and found she was right. There was plenty of mana inside the house, but no living things unless you counted the plants.

“Yep!” The Glimmissle bobbed up and down. “It’s empty! And there’s a shorter wall down by the beach.”

Elend hummed in consideration. “I suppose we could do Lovers in the Woods.”

“Might not need it,” Glim said. “The gardens are pretty thick. No one will see you climb over.”

“We could use Hungry Mana Beast as a diversion,” Irina said. “Just in case.”

“Aye, but that’s risky. Another Grandmaster might see through it.”

“Glim could be a ghost dolphin. They already use dream mana to make their pods appear larger. No one would question it.”

Elend shrugged as they made for the house. He’d never liked stealth missions, but he was clearly outvoted here. That happened a lot, come to think of it. It also seemed unfair, considering Glim had begun as an extension of his mind.

He’d already disguised Irina and himself as a Cadrian couple. Not particularly young or old. Not striking, but not unsightly. They were the sort of people you’d always find loitering in the background of any event. The sort of people you saw, but who never caught your eye.

They rounded the corner, and Elend raised an invisibility Construct around them. This would let them approach the house without alerting the cameras or the neighbors.

This house had no high walls or gates; the property’s warding Constructs were enough to keep out most ordinary intruders. But Glim had spent decades training on KU's systems, and it only took her a few seconds to cut off the outer sigils from the power supply.

From there, he and Irina stepped up to the porch to take on the next layer—a manatronic keypad next to the doorbell, and a mechanical lock on the door itself. For the keypad, Irina reached into her bag and retrieved a spray bottle of rossflare, an alchemical solution that mixed with the oils from human skin. She aimed the nozzle at the keypad and gave it a light squeeze.

With that done, Elend used dream mana to make an ultraviolet light, revealing glowing fingerprints on four of the keys. Tiny Missiles passed between Irina and her Second Brain as she worked out the most probable passwords, and she got it on the first try.

Finally, Irina pulled out the Master Key—the same key Akari had borrowed for her aspecting ritual. The artifact moved like flowing quicksilver as the mana passed from her hand to its metal surface. Slowly and deliberately, it reshaped itself to fit this specific lock.

“Get ready,” Elend told Glim. “We might only have a few seconds before the inner wards—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Glim said. “I’ve got this.”

Irina inserted the Master Key and twisted it hard to the left. The door shuddered as if awakening from a deep slumber. The alarm let out a series of beeps, and the Glimmissle darted inside the gap.

‘Ohh!’ Glim said in Elend’s head. ‘I like this house already. Did you know some people worship mana spirits?’

‘No.’ Elend groaned. ‘You’ve never mentioned that.’

‘It’s true! They have a shrine and everything. I’m definitely rewarding them when I take my rightful place as empress.’

The alarm beeped faster.

‘Elend’s eyes and ears!’ she exclaimed.

He furrowed his brow. ‘What did you say?’

‘They had a decoy power source! I had to follow the conduits to the real one.’

‘Not that,’ Elend said. ‘Did you just swear by my name?’

‘Oh yeah, that was Akari’s idea. You created me, so it’s only fair, right?’

The alarm beeped even faster, then it faded like a dead bird’s song.

“Finally,” Elend said as he stepped through the door.

“Watch your step,” Glim hollered from somewhere inside the house. “There’s a bunch of dead bodies in the former living room. Looks like a mass suicide to me.”

Irina froze in the hallway, eyes widening in horror.

Elend kept on walking. “Might want to cycle some knowledge mana, love.” His wife had adapted to Glim’s sense of humor over the years, but Glim had adapted to her adaptions.

They stepped out onto the back deck, through a garden, and down to the beach. There, they penetrated the adjacent yard’s wards and scaled the brick wall.

Glim was right about one thing: these gardens were a thief’s dream, and the diversion proved unnecessary. They followed a veritable maze between landmarks, including statues, pavilions, and fountains. Finally, they emerged in the center of the yard, where a massive infinity pool stretched all the way from the house to the ocean.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

The back doors hung wide open, with guests coming and going as they pleased. Still disguised, Elend and Irina strode forward and melted into the crowd. The size exceeded Elend’s expectations, boasting several hundred people. And the guests weren’t just locals. At least a quarter of them were Espirian or Shokenese. He even spotted a few half-dragons among them. Almost everyone wore black, but no one would mistake this meeting for a funeral. They were dressed too casually for that. The dim lighting cast an air of intrigue over the event, hinting at something sinister beneath the surface.

The main hall was sparsely decorated, save for a single bronze dragon that hung prominently in the center. It was the same dragon he’d seen on Lena Cavaco’s necklace back in Creta. However, the Solidor clan sigil was hardly enough to reveal the meeting’s true purpose. The Solidors might be famous in theory, but they’d kept a lower profile than their fellow Aeon, Lyraina Trelian.

Lady Trelian had come to this world around fifty years ago. Elend couldn’t remember the exact date, but he’d definitely been a student at that time. In just a few short years, she’d amassed a following of thousands, and invented one of the most powerful aspects in history.

Meanwhile, the Solidors had been far more subtle. They’d ascended from Aeondom, but not by choice. They didn’t seek to rule this world, or even to disrupt the power system. On the contrary, they just wanted to return home. To help the people they’d left behind.

Whether those rumors were true, Elend couldn’t say. He hadn’t heard from the Solidors in several decades, and not for a lack of effort on his part.

They continued scanning the rooms, looking for any sign of Sozen Trengsen. Elend could have maintained their invisibility, but that would be a mistake. First, there was the obvious issue of navigating a crowd. No one stepped aside for invisible people, after all. But it was even more complicated than that. What if a floorboard sank beneath your weight? What if your foot caught the edge of a rug, causing it to wrinkle? At that point, you’d need to extend your illusions to the environment.

Rule number twelve of dream mana: a web of lies is the most inefficient way to work.

Instead, Elend layered a simple misdirection Cloak over their disguises. This would encourage everyone’s eyes to pass over them as if they were houseplants or coat racks. Elend used the same trick with his office door at school. Sometimes, he did it to keep the upperclassmen on their toes. More often, he did it keep away those pesky committee members who tried to dump extra work on his lap.

He and Irina split up and did a broad sweep of the lower floors. Many of the guests had broken off into smaller meetings, discussing whatever cultists discussed. Elend couldn’t barge into those rooms without making a scene, but his mana sense let him see the rough outlines of people’s souls. No sign of Sozen anywhere.

“It’s possible he hasn’t arrived yet,” Irina said when they met on the second floor.

“Possible …” Elend scratched the stubble on his chin as he watched a pair of Grandmasters ascend to the third floor. The house’s upper level was warded against any form of scrying, and a pair of guards stood at the bottom of the staircase. The wards were far more intricate than the property’s outer layers, and Glim couldn’t even touch them without tripping an alarm.

Irina followed his gaze. “You think he’s already up there?”

Elend shrugged. “This trip’s gone far too smoothly. I figure we’re due for some bad luck.” His last comment earned him a flat look from his wife. In all honesty, Elend didn’t believe in luck, either, but he couldn’t resist teasing her.

In that moment, he felt a pair of eyes watching them from across the room. They pierced right through his misdirection Cloak, sure as any Missile.

Footsteps approached before he could react, and a familiar voice spoke. “Hello, Espirian.”

Elend spun to see a woman in a formal black dress, her olive skin glowing against the fabric. A dragon necklace hung around her neck, its intricate details catching the light as she moved.

Lena Cavaco. The Ethersmith who’d helped him escape Creta.

“What brings you here?” she asked.

He stared into the woman’s dark eyes, searching for a sign of her intention. Her gaze was wide and curious, as if she were genuinely surprised to find him here. But those same eyes pierced his illusion, and he felt the pressure like a heavy stone. She knew exactly who he was, and he wouldn’t convince her otherwise. Not without dream mana, at least.

Elend shot Irina a glance, but she’d already assumed a guise of casual confusion. The sort of look you’d expect from someone who’d just been approached by a stranger. Clearly, she intended to let him handle this.

He forced a smile and relaxed his own posture. Then he wove several strands of mana into the illusion, letting her see their actual faces. “What tipped you off?”

“Your spirit friend,” Lena replied. “Glimmar, was it? Her patterns are denser than most mana techniques. More like a soul.”

Elend’s brow furrowed. Even the average Grandmaster would struggle to see that level of detail, and Lena was only an Apprentice. Then again, she was also an Aeon, and Aeons didn’t play by the rules of this world.

“Did you track me here, Espirian?” She raised her wine glass to her lips, but her eyes never left his. “I thought I made myself clear—”

“No.” Elend held up a hand. “I didn’t come here for you.”

“Why then?”

“We followed someone else. A lad named Sozen Trengsen.”

Her eyebrows went up at that. “Sozen?”

Irina cleared her throat and stepped between them. “Perhaps we should take this somewhere private?”

She was right, of course. Elend still had his misdirection Cloak active, but it wouldn’t work as well with Lena here. Especially if someone sought her out.

Lena hesitated for a moment, then nodded down a nearby hallway. “Follow me.”

Elend followed her through a wooden door, half-expecting to find a bedroom on the other side. Instead, she led them into a small study. A table and chairs sat in the room’s center and a tall window dominated the western wall. Leather-bound books lined the shelves, but they felt more like decoration than anything else.

Irina followed him inside, shutting the door behind her. Then she swept the room for bugs while Elend raised a sound suppressor.

“Same question,” the Ethersmith said once they’d settled in. “What do you want with Sozen?”

Elend rested his hands on the back of a chair and considered his options. Perhaps he had no need for secrecy? Sozen might be from Arkala, but Elend’s own intentions were pure enough. “He’s related to one of my students.”

“Related?” Lena echoed.

“Kalden’s long-lost brother. He got a job at my school this year, and he just happened to bump into Kalden on the first day of classes. If that’s not strange enough, imagine my surprise to find Master-level Constructs on his soul. Not to mention his ties to shady organizations.” Elend gestured around at their surroundings, but he gave Lena a gentle smile to let her know he was half-joking.

She gave a slow nod. “You’re right to suspect him. Many of us agree with you.”

“What do you know?” Elend asked.

“Sozen is a member of the church’s inner circle, but no one will say why. All the other members are Masters or Grandmasters.”

Interesting. They’d suspected the lad might be more powerful, but why hide that power from his own allies?

“He also took a trip to Creta this spring,” Lena said. “A few weeks after we left.”

“What?” Elend’s heart rate quickened, and his fingers clenched into fists. How had Sozen kept that a secret? He’d never sensed any hostility or deception from him.

“Does he travel there often?” Irina asked.

“No,” Lena said. “This was the first time we know of.”

“Then it can’t be a coincidence.”

“Unlikely,” she agreed. “And your comment about shady organizations is more true than you realize. Are you familiar with the Sons of Talek?”

“Aye,” Elend said. "They’re a bunch of fundamentalists, set on returning the world to its so-called glory days.” They were also hypocrites, spouting words of equality, but quick to hoard knowledge once they came into power themselves. Dragonlord Antano was just one recent example of that.

“They also oppose your kind,” his wife added. “As beings from a different world, Aeons represent change more than anyone else.”

“Exactly,” Lena said. “They call us the anti-Angels. Demons, if you will.”

Elend frowned. “Seems a bit melodramatic, doesn’t it?”

“They mean that in the traditional sense,” she said. “The demons from Shokenese mythology could drain a Mana Artist’s power, advancing faster than ordinary humans.”

Elend had heard of Aeons who could absorb energy and dismantle mana-based techniques, but absorbing another Mana Artist’s power? A part of him wanted to ask how true their claims were, but it wasn’t a priority right now. “You think Sozen has ties with this group?

“We can’t say for certain, but his movements indicate a connection. It’s possible that he’s double-crossing us, feeding them information.”

“Where is Sozen now?” Irina asked.

“He’s upstairs,” Lena said. “Or rather, he was.”

Elend’s gaze flicked toward the ceiling. “What’s up there?”

“Portals,” she replied. "Gateways to the church’s other locations.”

“Bloody hell,” Elend muttered. “He could be anywhere on the continent by now.”

Irina put a reassuring hand on his arm. “We can head back to Koreldon City after this. It’s unlikely he’ll beat us back.”

Unlikely, but not impossible. The others could be in danger right now. In fact, this could all be an elaborate plot to distract him.

‘Hey,’ Glim said in his head. ‘Deep breaths!’

Elend followed her advice, and his thoughts came a little clearer. They already had enemies in Koreldon City, and he’d already trusted Raizen and Truewater to keep his students safe. Nothing had changed in the last few minutes.

Irina turned back to the Ethersmith. “You can see through my husband’s wards, but not Sozen’s. Why is that?”

The other woman showed her palms in a helpless gesture. “I’m afraid there’s not much to say. Whoever designed Sozen’s Constructs did it with Aeons in mind. No surprise, considering the company he keeps.”

Elend nodded, having already expected as much. They could interrogate Sozen on their own if it came to that. They’d certainly learned enough to justify that. However, they’d taken this trip for more than one reason.

“Do you remember Relia?” he asked.

“Of course.” Lena didn’t so much as blink at the sudden change of topic.

“Her time is running out,” Elend said. “She only has a few more weeks to reach Artisan. Maybe a month if she’s lucky.”

“What’s her mana count?” Lena asked.

“Twenty-seven hundred.”

Her mouth made a thin line. “I can’t help her close that gap any quicker. Maybe if she were already a trained Aeon, but no … such training would take months.

“Aye,” Elend agreed. “She needs soulshine.” He and Irina had discussed this issue countless times, and they’d always reached the same conclusion.

“I can put you in contact with a local dealer,” Lena began.

“We already know the recipe,” Irina said. “And we have access to all the ingredients. The hard part is convincing her to take it.”

Elend nodded his agreement. “Relia thinks her parents abused soulshine before she was born. Now she’d sooner die than follow in their footsteps.” They could have forced Relia to take it, of course. He could even make her think it was her idea. But that was a slippery slope—one he’d slid down many times before he’d finally learned his lesson.

There was a moment of silence while soft music wafted it from the villa’s main rooms.

“I’ve heard rumors,” Lena finally said. “Things you wouldn’t hear outside these walls. She’s Ashur Moonfire’s daughter, isn’t she?”

Elend shrugged. “I already told you, that’s not my secret to share.”

She nodded as if that were a confirmation. “And you don’t think soulshine caused her condition?”

“I have my suspicions,” he said. “I’ve had them for years. But I’ll need proof if I want to convince her.”

“Proof,” Lena said. “Yes … I think I can help you with that.”