“I’ll be back in a couple hours,” Ranvir told Frija and Vasso, taking a knee to stroke Menace’s neck. “By then, I’ll know if it’s safe for you to come over as well.”

Frija crossed her arms and pouted. “That’s so long!”

“It’s necessary, Firehearth,” Ranvir whispered to her, pulling her close, even as she fought him to get free. He kissed her on the top of her head, delicately scratching her neck with his taloned hand. She shivered and sighed at the touch. “Even if it’s not safe, I’ll go get my parents, so you’ll meet them either way.”

She screwed her face up and turned to look over her shoulder. “You’ll come back safe?”

Ranvir smiled and nodded. “Not a scratch on me.”

She sniffed and nodded, turning away again, crossing her arms over her chest. Ranvir smiled and let her go. Still kneeling. he straightened and put a hand on Vasso’s shoulder and nodded. Vasso returned the gesture, glancing once at Esmund and Kirs standing off to the side. Winking at him, Ranvir rose to his feet and swept them with a gust of wind from his wings.

“See you,” he said and joined his friends.

The travel-space slid open right in front of them. Kirs startled and yelped, jumping back a step. Esmund, having sensed him reaching out, stayed calm.

“Sorry,” Ranvir muttered to her as he stepped inside. As the two entered after him, he turned to Esmund. “You can guide us back?”

“I sure can,” Es said confidently as the pocket closed. “I’m not sure how to guide you there, however,” he grinned and scratched at the back of his neck.

Ranvir nodded. “I will trace through your tether-sense.”

Es’ brows drew down in focus before he turned toward a wall. Ranvir sensed his spirit reaching through the wall and into the Liminal. “That way.”

Ranvir carefully traced Esmund’s guidance. It took longer than normal, as Ranvir over and under corrected. Es’ tether-sense wasn’t quite as developed as he’d been expecting it to be, causing a few misses when Ranvir accidentally overwrote Es at the edges of his sense.

But finally, after half an hour, the space butted up against a worldshard. Letting them through slowly, Ranvir found a warehouse. Dirty workers milled about in rough clothes, lit by glyph lamps.

“A warehouse?” he asked, to be certain.

Kirs stepped forward, finally having something to do. “Yes. We didn’t want to put it in our house, since we didn’t know if someone might find the beacon. Similarly, the Queen wasn’t comfortable with us using the palace, nor the academy. Finally, we petitioned Grevor, and he got us a corner in the warehouse.”

“Petition?” Ranvir asked, opening the space. Kirs startled as light and noise rushed in from outside. Men laughing and yelling, throwing and lifting. Scents too flooded toward them. Hay and sweat and dirt and old wood and stale rainwater.

“Well, he can’t just give us the space, but he convinced his brother to let us use it.”

“Ranvir,” Es said, stepping forward, sensing a different question in Ranvir’s tone. “We’re not as close as we once were. Everyone kinda went their own ways once the academy no longer bound us together.”

A knot of tense yellow and dull orange strung itself together inside Ranvir. Flecks of purple knitted through it as well. Fear, anger, rejection mingling in his chest. He shook his head. “That’ll have to wait.”

Pulling out an iron plate from storage, he handed it to Kirs. “My beacon, put it wherever you think is best,” then he dropped onto his rear and coiled his tether-sense into a thick bundle before him.

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Dispersing it wide rather than precise, Ranvir gazed the lines.

Vednar, much like Belnavir, didn’t have a direct copy of Korfyi’s lines. But similar to Belnavir, the flows of mana throughout the world still showed themselves to Ranvir when he pushed hard enough.

Forcing the world’s mana to coordinate itself to his whims sapped the energy and strength from his spirit. First, he noticed the direction of mana. It was falling from the skies, raining down on them in thick rivers and streams. All of it seemed to come from a singular source emitting power across the entire plane.

Ranvir felt then the typings of mana. Obsidian, ice, light, smoke, warp, and space. Though the last two didn’t linger long enough to be felt, Ranvir knew them for their impact on their surroundings. As mana traveled to him, Ranvir sensed the ripped and torn edges of other typings that came into brief contact with warp. He sensed the filled in holes, disturbances, and ripples so heavy and wide they practically touched every facet of the other typings.

Space was perhaps the loudest mana type Ranvir’d ever heard seen. Except maybe sound, which seemed to have a similar impact on the Lines.

He took long minutes, feeling the slight strain of holding the world’s perception, to acclimate to the nature of Vednar’s mana. Then he delved into the echoes of powers traveling towards him. Those rebounding and echoing off others, those returning from the edges of the plane.

This was a far more strenuous exercise than simply gazing the Lines. Sweat shimmered on his forehead and Ranvir knit his hands into fists. The academy ran heavy with mana, the hundreds of students and dozens of Masters weighing heavily on the Lines.

Ranvir steadied his breath, taking in air in long deliberate movements. Tension would not help him in this. He needed to remain calm to gather his insight. Images started forming, then Ranvir got a feel for the academy’s training methods as they washed over him.

He let them pass him by, idly noting only a few of their most impactful moments. Advancements and lesser breakthroughs in understanding. It struck him as so… primitive. Compared to Korfyi, they barely understood what they were doing.

The patterns grew older, less detailed, rougher. A pulsing headache took up in the back of Ranvir’s head, seeming to swim into his spine, turning it soft and malleable. His breaths, though controlled, were coming out in hisses through clenched teeth.

Let go of the pain, Ranvir told himself. Even as it seemed to settle in deeper than ever, clawing at his skull and spine. He slumped forwards, somehow still sitting despite the weakness creeping into him.

Power had surged in the city, beyond what any one Master could’ve possibly matched. That same force ignited two other places at a similar time. The academy and somewhere far beyond the capital.

Ranvir didn’t care about them. He sought what happened after the surge in the city. It traveled away. Saleema’s path came to him in mountainous waves, impacting the other typings. He followed them directly into the biggest force yet. A culmination of nearly two dozen powers clashing so violently, images came to him.

Saleema hunched forward, clutching an old woman by the throat. Half of the monstrous Fourth-Stage’s leg was missing and someone had taken a chunk out of her stomach.

A palace laying in ruins, the city beyond it on fire. People were fleeing for their lives as the powers that destroyed their home dispersed to the wind. He sensed all the powers leaving, only fifteen left now hiding in all the corners of the world.

He followed Saleema, her path clearer than ever. Images came to him of a cave in a country far to the south of Ankiria. Techniques too feeble even for a Sword. Her mind was broken by the occurrences, her spirit too feeble to keep it together.

She was dormant now, half a plane away, having barely stirred in the last two years. She couldn’t have strung her powers together to weave a shield, let alone sense him from so far.

I could find her. A thought snuck into her head. She’s vulnerable. Weaker than she’s been in a century. I’ve seen her greatest weakness, the cracks in her spirit, shattered yellow eyes veined with purple.

“Are you okay?” Esmund asked, touching his shoulder. “You stopped using your tether-sense.”

Ranvir groaned and swayed on the hay strewn floor. “I’ll be okay. I just need a moment.”

“Are you sure?” Es asked, looking around. Following his notion, Ranvir too scanned the area. Kirs was gone, as were the workers. “I don’t fully understand what I just got from you, but Ranvir…” he shook his head. “What happened to you? That wasn’t like anything I’ve ever felt, even from a Master.”

Ranvir grimaced with effort as he raised a hand to clap his oldest friend on the shoulder. “That’s a very long story, but I’ve had a lot of training. Training we weren’t even aware was possible when I left. Help me up?”

Es looked at Ranvir’s arm. He’d unconsciously offered his friend his bird arm. Straightening, Esmund clasped it and pulled him to his feet. “Come on, you need to recover quickly. Your daughter didn’t look like the patient type.”

Ranvir chuckled. “She’s not,” then he frowned. “How did you know I was bringing them?”

Es laughed. “Give me some credit, I know you. I still do, even after all these years. You aren’t that hard to read.”