Chapter 235: The Scythe of the Dead

Thank you to my beta reader and editor, GlassThreads!

Toren Daen

I toppled from the sky, blood streaming from me in waves. There was a strange lack of pain as I hit the muddy banks of the river with a simple thud, my breathing coming in gasps. I stared mutely up at the sky, trying to pull together a coherent thought. I could feel the ground underneath growing softer as the blood continued to soak into the sand. It seemed to swallow me whole. I was a corpse that was gradually being laid into its final resting place.

This isn't it, is it? I thought with a cough, my hands weakly grasping at my chest. My fingers grew sticky and wet as the blood stained my hands. I have… I have so much more I need to do… And–

I thought I could hear something in the distance. A mournful cry of pain and anger. I allowed my head to loll to the side as I watched Aurora's relic. It was slowly being torn apart by black wind, but there was nothing she could do. She screamed and raged, but nothing. I felt no connection over our bond. No soothing warmth or gentle caress to lull me to sleep.

Aurora, I thought headily, feeling empty. I didn't want to die, not out here. I needed to deliver Wolfrum back. I needed to talk to Seris again about her rebellion. I needed to see this world to its future. Aurora, please! Talk… Talk to me, I thought desperately as I slowly died. I pressed out desperately, using every inch of my power. Of my soul.

There was nothing. No response pushed through the haze in my mind. No helpful measure of warmth soothed my pains or told me I would be okay. My mother remained silent as I slowly succumbed to my wounds.

That was wrong, somehow. Aurora would never just… abandon me to my fate. But it was as if she wasn't there at all within my mind. Our bond was as empty as the deserts of Darv, and that made everything hurt even more.

"The Beast Glades are under my jurisdiction, Spellsong," a woman sneered from above. Scythe Viessa Vritra stared down at me with contempt as red slowly spread around me. Her teal and gray robes were a stark contrast to her deep purple hair. A string of vertebrae stretched from her hip to her shoulder, all strung through with silver cord. "The traitor is mine to take in; not Seris Vritra's." Her lips curled up into a slight sneer. "A shame you must learn that lesson with your life. Just in time to watch your beast get torn apart."

Her eyes darted to where Aurora's relic huddled protectively over Wolfrum's body. I watched in horror as her bronze form was slowly torn apart, piece by piece. I thought I should be able to feel her pain. She should be fighting.

My foggy eyes drifted to the gaping wound in my chest. A scarlet river flowed, but even in the depths of my Acquire Phase, I couldn't see the sparkling motes of aetheric heartfire that always lingered in fresh blood.

I couldn't sense the tether between me and Aurora. I couldn't sense Wolfrum's intent or hear his heartfire. That didn't make sense. I should be able to, but for some reason, I couldn't.

This is wrong, I thought with more conviction, reaching and grasping. Even if my body refused to move, my mind thrashed in growing vigor. I clawed and ripped and tore my way toward what should be.

And finally, I felt it. The touch of Aurora's mind on mine as clarity returned in waves. Our bond was as deep as our souls, and no petty magic could keep it suppressed.

Rage replaced my existential dread, the unnatural fog over my mind slowly banished by the rising fury of my Phoenix Will. I snarled as Soulplume enveloped my features, a scouring fire cleansing the taint across my mind. Aurora's touch slowly returned, enforcing my desire and fury.

Tiny spiderweb cracks spread across my vision, making everything I saw shift and warp unnaturally. I pulled those cracks wider with my mind, flooding them with my rage and fury. Burning red and orange suffused the crevices in my perception.

And then the world around me fractured like stained glass, the unnatural scene shattering. I only had time to see the illusory Viessa Vritra's eyes widen in surprise before it all washed away.

The illusion snapped. I was on my back in the dark, staring up at twin suns that burned with quiet rage. Aurora's relic wings encircled me in a cocoon of bronze, and I could feel the mana as it battered her like a fell hurricane. She rocked and stumbled with every strike as she sheltered me from the Scythe's assault, but motes of black power seeped past her every now and then.

She wouldn't be able to hold for long.

"The witch dared," Aurora seethed from above, her eyes flashing. "She dared to touch your mind. Dared to put you under illusion. But you are safe, my son. You are free."

My bond's fury stoked my own. Like two fires that fed each other, Soulplume burned hot in my channels as I snarled, rising to my feet. Adrenaline coursed through my veins as I realized what had happened.

My mind, I thought, flashing back to that darkest moment in the depths of the Central Cathedral. That horrible, horrible sensation replayed like a broken record in the recesses of my thoughts: where Agrona had violated my sanctum. She touched my mind.

Whatever illusion arts Viessa Vritra used, she couldn't replicate–or didn't know how to replicate–my sense of heartfire and intent. And neither did she understand the soul-deep intricacies of Aurora's bond as it helped pull me from that elusive darkness. She did not comprehend warmth. She did not comprehend companionship.

Beside me, Wolfrum was unconscious, unable to withstand the pulsing of power that radiated from me like an angry star. I didn't care.

I could feel it in the air, even beyond Aurora's protective embrace. The dead intent as it began to thread toward the corpses around me like snaking rot. I'd fought this before, once upon a time. Deep in the abyss of the Relictombs.

"I am going to tear her apart," I vowed with a snarl, the feathered runes that ran along my body pulsing. I could feel Aurora's mind as it drifted near my own, but with my blooming understanding of the soul, it was easier to keep us separate. Her rage was as white-hot as my own, the familiar violation stoking our anger higher than any mana could manage. "She won't get away with this."

The ambient mana twisted as Viessa began to focus more on her reanimation spell, the S-class mana beasts I'd just slain rising. Beyond the confines of Aurora's wings, I could see the veins of unnaturally gray heartfire wash away the red of a fresh kill.

Aurora and I didn't speak any longer. We didn't need to. We simply had a battle to win.

I erupted from the cover of my bond's bronze wings, a shroud of white fire protecting me from the gales of void wind that sought to decay everything. I saw Viessa there in the sky as she casually swung an arm, the purple-haired Scythe a living corpse as she tried to swat me down.

My shrouded plasma blade snapped outward, the white energy deflecting and dissecting the arcs of decaying wind as they came. I could see it now. See Viessa's unnaturally still heartfire. Feel her unerringly calm intent.

She couldn't hide anymore.

Shrouded wings erupted from my back as I surged upward, streaking for the Scythe in a controlled fury. She backed away with a contemptuous sneer on her face, undaunted by my appearance even as I closed the distance.

But instead of sinking my blade into her pale flesh, I was forced to deflect the swipe of a monster as it tried to attack me in my domain. The reanimated twinforce thunderbird—its feathers unnaturally dark and crackling with black lightning—snapped at my head with one of its beaks. The other skull had been torn clean off by Aurora in combat, but that didn't mean it wasn't dangerous.

I deftly avoided the bolt of dark electricity that erupted from its mouth, my red hair standing on end from the discharge. I watched the black electricity as it surged into the air beyond me, my teeth gritted as I built up my power.

This dread beast thinks it can have the skies, I thought contemptuously, that burning bonfire in my stomach driving my mana onward. Then let it face the master of the winds.

I retaliated with a wave of pushing force, focusing my mana around the creature's large wings. The S-class monster's intent was unnaturally empty as I swatted it from the sky like a bug, its wings crumpling as it smashed through a few trees below. But that distraction was enough for Viessa to vanish once more.

I dipped low as a cutting arc of streamlined water tried to take off my head, losing a few strands of hair in the process. The water hydra was disturbingly silent as its attack missed me before the beam of hyper-concentrated water slammed hard into Aurora's feathers. I'd obliterated all of its heads before, but that didn't seem to be a problem for it. New ones simply formed of solid water that had the appearance of bone.

The phoenix shade—still intent on protecting Wolfrum and working hard to keep our minds intact—was unable to do much other than brace as she was forced back through the mud. We both felt the annoyance of protecting multiple fronts as our enemy taunted us.

I couldn't let this dead creature, an abomination against all heartfire, hurt my bond. With barely a second thought, I blurred forward through the air, dipping under a swipe of the hydra's solid-water tail. My burning eyes focused on the thing's beast core embedded deep within its bulky body.

This weakness wouldn't have been so obvious to me before. But I could feel as the Scythe of Truacia's reanimation spell dug claws of murky intent into the core, using it as a nexus of control. If I could destroy the core, I would destroy the beast.

It wasn't exactly the same method I'd witnessed in the Relictombs, but it was close, adjacent enough.

I focused my hands, creating a twining current of pushing force that weaved around me. Just in time, the hydra's focused water-cutter beam erupted from two of its three heads, the attack powerful enough to easily slice through boulders.

When the water hit my conduit of white force—concentrated by an effort of will and my increased telekinetic abilities—it was diverted like a stream, the water following the path I set for it.

Directly toward another enemy as it charged.

The undead rhinoran had been stampeding toward me from behind, all six of its legs stamping in anticipation of my blood. That dark plate armor, like that of a stalwart knight, was tough enough to shrug off nearly anything.

But I didn't need to relieve the beast of its unlife just yet.

The redirected water cannon slammed into the rhinoran, causing it to miss a step in its six-legged stampede through the shallow river. It didn't make a sound as it slipped again, its maddened charge turning into an uncontrollable tumble as its dozen-ton body kicked up water and dug a furrow into the mud.

But the rhinoran wasn't my main target.

I surged forward with a flap of shrouded wings, ready to tear out the hydra's beast core. I was close and fast: far faster than it. All I needed was one good strike; one simple thrust with Inversion, and the hydra would feel the sweet embrace of the Void.

Unfortunately, the hydra would live a few moments longer. Viessa Vritra appeared beside me in a burst of shadows, a glinting dark dagger in her hands. The scarecrow-pale Scythe sneered with contempt as she thrust it for my core, the path of my trajectory perfectly positioned so that I would impale myself on the blade.

But I was no simple mage. My abilities in the air were those of the phoenix, and momentum was my ally, not my foe.

In a split instant, I lashed out with my telekinetic regalia, pulling on both the earth below and the water hydra itself to adjust my trajectory in flashes of white mana. I contorted at an absurd speed, the dark blade scraping along my telekinetic shroud as it missed me entirely.

Viessa's void-black eyes widened in shock as I avoided her blow with impossible precision, but I didn't give her time to recover. I lashed out with a corkscrew twist of my shrouded wings, the razor-sharp feathers burning and vibrating as I unleashed my rage on the Scythe.

The Scythe of Truacia was ripped apart as if she'd been savaged by a woodchipper. Blood and bone splattered everywhere as she was torn into tiny fleshy chunks.

Except it wasn't Viessa. It never had been. I'd known, even from the start. It was only a corpse wrapped in an illusion to look like her. The remains of one of the Bastards Victorious fell into the water in a shower of reflective crimson.

But Viessa was still out there in the skies somewhere. If I could only get the chance to focus, she would be unable to hide from me. Unable to hide from the sun as it peeled her protections apart and demanded its due.

Soulplume burned hot in my veins as I weaved away from another cutting arc of void wind that seemed to appear from nowhere. The blade of dark wind traveled through several trees, cutting a deep swathe through the ground. Despite my inner rage, I didn't let it turn me sloppy as I zipped away from a few more attacks, wary of the undead creatures as they sought my blood.

"Interesting," Viessa's voice reverberated unnaturally through the air. "To so casually tear apart my illusions… Seris really did find a fascinating specimen, didn't she? But I wonder if she truly knows you, Spellsong. Knows you as I will. I've already tasted the surface of your thoughts, and they were so full of flavor."

"For one granted the title of Scythe," I rebutted with an impassive expression, "you are fond of running and hiding. Like a serpent in the grass, you only sink your fangs in when you believe your prey is weak. But you know not what you have provoked, lessuran. So I will show you."

There was nothing we despised more than the conniving serpent. Nothing we despised more than the slithering creature that stole from the minds of others, uncaring of the boundaries set in place.

"Please, Spellsong," Viessa retorted casually from everywhere and nowhere, "you should be honored. Rarely do I ever allow myself to try."

A hurricane of black wind grew into existence around me, twisting and howling as it picked up speed at an exponential pace. The warm kiss of the sun was denied as a torrent of void wind blotted out everything in a fifteen-foot radius.

I only had a second to brace.

I brought my wings in front of me in a protective maneuver as the hurricane imploded, collapsing inward like the start of a supernova. It howled and raged, tearing and decaying my protections. My skin splintered and broke as I was thrown about, my shrouded wings weathering away. I was like a songbird in a thunderstorm–any adjustment I could make would only lead to more despair and anguish as the world itself raged.

But I refused to let this Scythe—this tormentor of minds—claim the skies from me. Even as cuts and tears opened along my body and my magic struggled to fight back against the gales, I wouldn't allow this creature the satisfaction. 

Because even under this torrent of cutting blades, I could still see. And I could still hear.

Scythe Viessa would not escape me.

Thrusting a hand out, I focused on my magic, before slamming fire and sound mana together. A burning sphere of white hummed into existence on my palm even as my heartfire fought to heal me from all the abuse my body was taking. Like a single drop of white paint amidst a bucket of black, it swirled in a mesmerizing way, giving me something to focus on.

"You cannot hide from the light," I said under my breath, my eyes brightening. "It will always find you."

That sphere became a beam of white plasma as it cut through the black tempest without care, burning toward my target. The sight of it was enchanting and deadly all at once.

The hurricane of decay winked out as Viessa was forced to dodge, the line of white energy humming as it carved a path through her body. I could sense it as my attack landed.

I stared at the Scythe far across from me as the winds became as dead as her creatures. I turned up my chin as my wounds healed over under an application of lifeforce, the aches and pains washing away.

The Scythe winced as she clutched her stomach, a hole the size of a baseball drilled clear through her midriff, just barely below her core. Black blood dribbled from her chin as she stared at me with annoyance and pain. Her tassels of vertebrae swayed slightly, her trophies barely spared the fire.

"See your arrogance, Scythe," I said, my breath steaming as it left my mouth. "You will not–"

Something struck me hard along the side. My telekinetic shroud splintered as I shot down toward the riverbed, my senses in disarray for the barest moment. I skipped across the water several times like a stone before I finally had the wherewithal to adjust. I feverishly worked to understand what had hit me.

The water hydra, I thought, allowing myself to calm slightly. My rage focused me. It made me strong, made me determined. But it also blocked out my other senses–and the undead beasts were already difficult to detect by my standards. It has no intent and its heartfire is vague. It is almost a blindspot to my normal senses, and I allowed it to hit me.

"I always hated using beasts," Viessa's pained voice echoed from everywhere as she vanished once more, her tricky illusions and low-simmering heartfire making her a poor matchup for me. "So crude and emotionless. They have more power, but they are not interesting. Do you want to know what I prefer?"

Twisting my body, I reoriented with ease as I caught my momentum. I skated backward along the river as I kept my senses peeled for the vanishing Scythe, who had once again become less than a wisp of air. The undead hydra charged toward me without making a single sound, the water carrying it against the current. Its corrupted carapace drank in the light of the sun like a gaping maw.

It seeks my blood, I thought at the speed of the wind itself, but it will not–

But then something blocked out the sun above me. I only had a moment to feel surprised before the reanimated steelhorn rhinoran bore down on me, all six limbs ready to mash me into a paste.

I whirled with unbelievable speed, raising my hands and pressing outward with my telekinetic regalia just before those metallic feet came down like the hammer of a Sovereign. 

The river consumed me as the rhinoran stamped its feet, the mindless beast trying to trample me underneath what must have been over a dozen tons of bulk. My telekinetic shroud cracked and splintered over and over as the monster rained attack after attack down on me, bruises appearing all along my body as my bones cracked.

Water constantly streamed in around us, then was flung back again as the rhinoran tried to drown and crush me in equal measure. My aura of forced calm began to slip as each blow rattled through me. My heart beat thunderously in my chest, and Aurora's soul inched closer and closer to mine. My bones broke and then were reknit in equal measure by my heartfire as I fought not to succumb.

It's stronger than it was when it was alive, I thought with gritted teeth, rolling away from a foot thicker than the greatest Charwood Tree in Epheotus. I retaliated with a vibrating punch to its steel body, feeling as the sound mana traveled through its flesh in an exact mirror of what had slain it in the first place, but the monster didn't even flinch. Even as its flesh was pulped beneath its armor and its form gradually wore away, the corpse continued to thrash. A synergy between the corruption in its veins and the lessuran's horrid magics. I need to destroy the core! That is the only way!

It didn't matter how great a warrior I was; it didn't matter how many battles I had won. If this continued, I would become less than a red smear on the bottom of the river.

The rhinoran reared up on its rearmost legs, water crashing around us. The creature—easily greater in stature than many prey I had hunted—readied itself to finish this. Even though it had no intent or mind to guide it, I could almost imagine a victorious glint in its empty eyes.

I allowed more mana to flow from my core, my body aching as I prepared. Were this beast under its free will and not a reanimated corpse, I would have thought it worthy prey. A foe well bested, something to hold with pride.

But I allowed my sunlit eyes to stare into the empty sockets of the creature as I prepared my spells, and I knew it was but a puppet. A tool meant to be thrown away once its usefulness was done. There was no vicious shine of victory in its eyes, only an undead void.

Then the monster came down, tons upon tons of weight ready to bear me into the dirt. I raised my hands as I braced, my heart beating for one instant. Heartfire thrummed along my veins as I raised my arms in defiance, my mana channels widening momentarily. Strength almost like that I had once known flowed through me like liquid fire.

And I caught the creature's feet as they tried to crater in my skull. A shockwave rippled out as I was forced into the muddy riverbed, sinking up to my shins as I took the blow head-on. I growled as Resonant Flow thrummed across my body, granting me superhuman strength beyond what mana could normally provide. Beyond what my body was Sculpted to withstand. As my heart clenched, I pushed outward with a wave of telekinetic force more powerful than any I'd ever used before.

The rhinoran, which must have only known the restrictive grasp of gravity all of its life, finally earned the chance to fly. It surged dozens of feet in the air as my power rippled outward, forcing it up like a child's toy.

It hung there in the sky for a few precious heartbeats, its dark steel armor blocking out the sun above. Its grave-still heartfire didn't even fluctuate as I prepared to finish the monster off, Resonant Flow fading away as its purpose was served.

But then I caught something out of the periphery of my vision.

The undead rhinoran crashed into the riverbank with a thunderous rumble that made the very earth shake, but I didn't have time to capitalize on it. I whirled with my shrouded saber as I prepared to bisect the corpse that neared me.

And I froze, the humming white of my blade almost poised to cut my enemy in two.

Norgan stood there on the surface of the water, his short brown hair and mischievous eyes glinting. Not exactly as I remembered him—he didn't have that casual slouch I'd always known. He was more relaxed. An easy smile was on his face, an unfamiliar smirk there. I could see my burning eyes reflected in his own as I stared not in disbelief. Not in awe.

But in anger once more.

The thing wearing an illusion of Norgan's skin thrust a blood-iron spike into my thigh, but I didn't give the witch that puppeteered it the satisfaction of even a grunt. A wave of white fire, fueled by the depths of my hatred, burned the puppeteered corpse—no doubt another of the Bastards Victorious—to less than ash.

"So quick," Viessa's voice crooned from the winds. "So quick to burn your brother to dust, Spellsong. Such an interesting fixation you have with that one in all of your thoughts. You want brotherhood again so much, don't you? You want to know other people. To understand them. That's why you're so quick to latch onto them all, isn't it? Because you're just so lonely," she mocked with a faux-understanding expression.

My pupils burned as rage suffused my very soul, Viessa's words stoking a deep fire. A fiery hatred borne from both Aurora and Toren. This witch had invaded our minds. And now, because she had ripped and torn, she thought she knew me. Thought she knew us. She thought she understood us.

I had managed to quell my anger before. To keep myself calm and collected. But why should we be? Why should we not embrace this emotion, this power?

"How many more of your friends will you kill, Toren?" Viessa's voice said, brushing against my ear as I clenched my fists. "Who else will you condemn to death with your foolish actions? I want to know. Don't you?"

The water hydra was almost upon me, and I knew the steelhorn rhinoran was struggling to pull itself back to its feet. Viessa was somewhere around here, watching and stalking. Like an ambush predator waiting for its prey to succumb to their venom.

That intent of hers tasted like polluted river water now as she spoke. She thought herself superior. Thought herself the victor. But she was a fool.

I wrenched the blood-iron dagger from my thigh, already feeling the fatigue as it burned through my veins. I washed the wound away in a wave of orange-purple light. Resonant Flow was not a technique to be used lightly, and though I was able to manage it better now that I was in the white core, it still came with a cost that made my limbs feel like they were jelly. Keeping Soulplume active for so long was already taking its toll.

It was time I finished this.

I stood to my full height as I watched the water hydra approach through the shallow river, setting my jaw. "You have made a mistake, Viessa Vritra," I said with a voice as melodic as it was deadly. "Do you know what that was?"

I held my hands out, closing my eyes. For a bare moment, I allowed myself to drift away from the battle. From the charging beast in front of me. From the dangers and hopes and worries and fury.

And I allowed myself to hear. Heartbeats, the splash of water, the hum of mana… I heard it all in unerringly clear detail. I absorbed it like a man dying of thirst, incorporating it deeper and deeper. Aurora guided me along with steady hands as I quested out, the world itself seeming to slow.

And finally, I heard the resonance of the mana itself.

I slammed my palms together in a resounding clap that rattled the world. An omnidirectional wave of sound magic rippled outward with an oil-like sheen, a warbling effect causing the light to bend and twist. It oscillated at a particular frequency, one I'd listened for. One I'd searched desperately to latch on to.

Suddenly, Viessa Vritra's illusions were torn away like water washing away a stain. As the frequency of my sound spell interfered and overrode the Scythe's spellform–composed partially of sound magic–she was stripped of her mask. The air fuzzed as the Scythe was revealed to plain sight.

I locked eyes with Viessa as the water hydra bore down on me. I weaved out of the way of its stale and predictable jaws. These beasts were dead, and they bore no capacity for intellect, no drive for creativity.

Every movement was rigid and rehearsed. And with simple observation, it became less than a challenge. I swung my shrouded saber as the water hydra tried to swallow me once more, imbuing my blade with every ounce of deadly precision I had.

An arc of white plasma sheared through the undead chitinous creature, the water boiling in its wake. On and on the energy went as it buried itself like a living thing, searching for its prey. 

And then it struck the mana beast's core, cutting it neatly in two.

I continued on, uncaring even as the hydra fell apart around me like a rainstorm. The solid-water monster could no longer bear the weight of its existence, the binding effect of its beast core finally absent as it collapsed in a sudden shower. The water sizzled where it touched my skin.

My body protested the continued use of Soulplume and my mana channels burned from exertion, but I didn't let that stop me. That rare rage pulled me onward, my aura flexing and the ambient mana churning around me.

The Scythe hovered far away in the sky, her robes unnervingly still. She looked like a doll, one that had a painted mask. Unlike Seris' facial expressions—which always seemed deliberate and graceful—there was something mechanical and enforced about Viessa's. Even her surprise and uncertainty looked like it was hauled into place by a machine.

"You feel fear, don't you?" I asked, tilting my head as I stopped for a moment. The lake was unnaturally still beneath my feet despite the utter devastation around me. "You know in your core, Scythe. You understand that you have touched something that you should not have."

Viessa didn't offer any inflection on her face as she stared at me, more corpse than human. Her black heartfire twisted in her chest. "So arrogant to presume you can best a Scythe, Spellsong," she said in challenge. "What, because you know a few parlor tricks, you think you can overcome me? You think I feel fear for you?" she said with a forced laugh.

I allowed a soft smile to stretch across my face. "You don't really fear me, even though you should, lessuran. No, you fear something else."

The air around us was dead, just as before. Empty. Devoid of purpose or will.

The flare of Viessa's nostrils was the only indicator my words had an effect. She waved her hand, conjuring an obscuring wave of black wind. In the same instant, I blurred forward with a mindfire stamp, my wings flashing as plasma thrummed along their feathers.

I tore through the Scythe's enshrouding wall with minimal effort, the dark wind popping and hissing where it met white plasma. Like a strange weave of yin and yang, the two battled and danced with each other before I finally surged through.

Viessa's eyes widened as she tried to backpedal from me. I swung Inversion, the shrouded saber searching for the Scythe's throat as I bore down on her. She hastily conjured blades of dark wind that tracked and cut, but my saber sliced through them with ease.

I pressured the Scythe backward. It was a dance of white fire and burning strikes, each attempting to pierce her heart. Viessa matched my every strike with a retaliatory torrent of power and decay, even as I kept on the offensive. The Vritra-blooded lessuran was fast—the fastest lessuran I'd ever fought. But with Soulplume in my veins and the guiding arts of the Asclepius Clan, this was a battle the Scythe was destined to lose.

Her power was in her illusions. In her undead minions. But once I tore that mask away and faced the wretch beneath, there was no contest. My shrouded saber scored a cut along her side. Then along her pale white cheek. And another beneath her hip.

For every two cuts I gave the Scythe, I received one in turn. My hands ached from how I clenched Inversion as blood streamed from my shoulder and chest, but I ignored it. I focused my attention on dominating this enemy in the air.

The purple-haired Scythe spun like a top, blades of wind erupting from her like a thresher as they tore through my magics. My eyes flashed as I saw an opportunity, the runes on my arms glowing brighter for an instant.

Viessa must have seen the glint of victory in my eyes, because I finally sensed her intent crack. I weaved through her wind blades, then lashed out with my shrouded wings, which I hadn't used before this moment. Caught entirely by surprise, Viessa's hands–both outstretched to project those blades–were speared through the palms in a splatter of crimson.

The Scythe's arms were forced apart, my wings making it seem as if she were being crucified. Black liquid too dark to be blood ran in rivers down my crystal clear wings as I hefted the Scythe upward, preparing to drive my shrouded saber forward and through her core. It approached as if in slow motion, humming with power as it sought her chest. And finally. Finally, I sensed the purple-haired scarecrow's delectable fear. Viessa's void-black eyes widened as she saw doom.

Viessa screamed. Her locks of purple hair flared like snakes as she defied my killing stroke. A tempest of fell wind erupted from her center in an exponentially increasing riptide. I was blown backward as the expanding sphere of decaying wind slammed into me, sending me hurtling back down toward the river. As I went, however, I deliberately wrenched my wings free, unwilling to let go of my prey so simply.

I evened out over the water, taking a deep breath as I funneled white fire along my wings to free them of that tainted blood. I stared upward impassively, even as my core ached.

Viessa glared down at me with a snarl on her face, her hands torn to bloody, unrecognizable pulps and a single burn mark right over her sternum where she'd barely avoided being impaled. She snarled like a rabid animal as soulfire cleansed over her many wounds, her true emotions breaking free at last. The Scythe panted for breath as she finally seemed to recognize the danger she put herself in. At last, she understood that if we were to continue it would be to the death.

"You are foolish, Scythe," I said evenly. "Do you see it now? Your illusions are nothing. Your craft is nothing. You will lose this fight."

And as this battle finally reached a pause, I gave myself time to think. Time to plan without that effervescent rage coursing through my body. And I reached an unfortunate conclusion.

I tilted my head, staring up at the Scythe. I didn't let it show, but I felt the burning in my limbs. The ache in my mind and pressure in my soul as I fought to keep Aurora and I distinct. "Leave me to my task, Scythe of Truacia," I ordered, clenching my fists. "Or I will be forced to kill you."

Viessa's breathing finally evened out as she glared at me, her mask returning. Beyond me, I noticed that her undead beasts yet unliving—the rhinoran and thunderbird—did not attack. They waited under the silent command of their master at the edges of the riverbank like loyal hounds.

I wanted to kill Viessa. For touching my mind and the deep violation it had caused. I wanted to tear her apart for daring to violate my sanctum, for daring to make me remember the putrid touch of Agrona.

But as I thought of it more, I realized that I couldn't afford to, not unless I was forced into a corner. I had no doubt the power we were putting off could be sensed by relevant parties across the Beast Glades, and that meant if I managed to kill Viessa, which I was confident I could, then there would be no doubt as to who had done it. That would bring undue scrutiny not just to me and my mission here, but to Seris.

"Petty threats from one so small," Viessa sneered, but I could see the mirrored calculations behind her eyes as she debated the value of continuing this battle. "Are you willing to die to keep your prisoner?"

"Are you?" I countered sharply, shifting my stance.

Silence. The doll-like Scythe considered me for a long, long moment as she hovered in the sky, and my fingers twitched in anticipation. The world held its breath as I prepared to end the Scythe if necessary.

Finally, Viessa did something I hadn't expected. She smiled forcibly, her aura receding as she reigned in her mana. She stared at me with a look that made goosebumps trail along my skin. "An interesting man you are, Spellsong," she said slowly, "not like most. So much more complex. I only scratched at the surface of your thoughts, but I could taste the roiling inner demons you have. And I want to know why a simple peek inspired such anger."

I narrowed my eyes as the Scythe lowered herself slightly. She wouldn't let herself simply back down. She sounded like she was done with this fight, that she wouldn't push it anymore. But there was another catch here. "You saw what happened to Jaggrette," I replied angrily, my hair flaring slightly as my limbs ached. "Touch my mind again, Scythe, and yours will burn. I care not for what petty reasons you have. What justification you believe you bear. I will scour you from the face of the earth if you approach my sanctum."

Viessa's expression didn't change as she finally settled across from me on the water. "Your sanctum?" she questioned, her eyes widening slightly, like an interested cat. "It's nothing so grand, Spellsong. Minds are made to be picked apart. They are made to be dissected. And yours is no different."

I sneered in disgust. "Except we both know that's not why you try to torment us," I retorted sharply. "For one who can feel barely anything at all, it must be so tantalizing to be able to see all that everyone else knows," I taunted with an impassive face. I savored how Viessa's eyes widened in growing rage—one of the only emotions I'd been able to sense over her intent—as my guess was proven correct.

I allowed my shoulders to relax as I laughed mockingly, the Scythe standing rigidly across from me as if frozen by aevum. "I can sense all you feel, witch," I laughed darkly. "Imagine my surprise at how dull it all was. At how little you felt."

At first, I'd believed Viessa to be like Seris. Utterly in control of herself and her emotions, able to project whatever she needed. But that wasn't the case, was it?

Something in Viessa's mind was broken. Altered. Corrupted in some way. And like an even more twisted Frankenstein's monster that sought true human company, Viessa Vritra sought to tear understanding from the minds of others.

"So try, Viessa Vritra," I said. "Try and touch my mind again. I guarantee you that all you shall find is fire. You will feel only the flames of hell."

Viessa's nostrils flared in suppressed rage as she stared at me, her mana churning darkly underneath the surface. But we both knew she was at the end of her reserves. She would be unable to act on any threat she made.

"You think you understand so, so much, Spellsong," she sneered, her purple hair flaring around her. "You think yourself so knowledgeable. You've figured out everything, haven't you? It all fits into place in your wretched little skull. But you know nothing. Scythe Seris knows nothing."

Her eyes were black as coals as they promised retribution. As they promised me a miserable, horrible death. "This war has changed, Toren Daen. The objective has changed. And you will only learn of the glorious purpose when it is too late for our kind."

A forced smile curled along Viessa's lips as she forced a corpse-like grin onto her pale face. "I will savor your end, Spellsong, and I will crucify your corpse."

The mana around us echoed with the threat, and despite my confidence, I found myself considering if I should end her here. If I should take the risk to Seris' operations and my cover and simply drive my plasma blade through her chest.

Before I could make a decision, however, the Scythe spun on her heels, allowing the mana to carry her away. Her undead beasts followed after her, before eventually, an illusion washed over them all and blocked them from my sight.

I watched the direction in which they'd gone for a long, long time, my ears hyper-attuned to every shift in the breeze as I listened for any indication that this was a trap. As I searched for the oscillating buzz of sound magic or the whisper-quiet thump of Viessa's heartfire.

When I was certain I was alone, I finally allowed Soulplume to retreat back into my core. I immediately fought against the urge to collapse. Like a man who had grown accustomed to carrying a heavy weight only noticing his exhaustion in the aftermath, it washed over me all at once. My limbs felt like mush and my heart ached from using Resonant Flow that single time. My mind felt foggy from the constant effort of keeping Aurora's soul from eclipsing my own.

I sagged over the water, blinking sweat from my brow, Viessa's parting threat sitting darkly in my skull. I turned tiredly toward where Aurora's relic still waited.

I floated closer, feeling a complicated churning of emotions in the depths of my mind. The ominous words of Viessa Vritra stuck with me like a pervasive itch alongside a dozen other questions. Why had she been here in the first place? Was she tracking me, or Wolfrum? What was her goal, really?

I constantly questioned if I had been in the right or not, allowing her to leave. Should I have thrown caution to the wind and simply driven my blade through her heart? If I did, could I effectively cover up our battle? And if I tried, could I still catch up to the retreating Scythe and finish her off right now?

I felt as if I'd been the puppet of some sort of play, but I didn't know what part I'd acted or what the play even was. The entire clash felt wrong, and though I knew Viessa hadn't counted on me being so powerful, I questioned why it had happened in the first place.

"I agree with you," Aurora thought to me over our bond as she stared at me from forty feet of soulcast metal. "It is unusual. The Scythe's stated motivations were the capture of the traitor I shelter beneath my wings, but her true intent was always you. She wanted to kill you from the start, but we did not allow it."

I leaned against Aurora's wings for a moment, giving myself a few minutes to breathe as I went over this in my mind. I need to tell Seris about this, I decided, because something is wrong here. I don't know what Viessa truly wants, but her statement at the end… I felt she really believed it. She believed that Seris knew nothing. She held it with conviction.

I only allowed myself a minute of respite before I began my trek back toward Burim with my prisoner in tow, my thoughts uneasy and my steps burdened.