AN: Gasp! It was him! Kudos to anyone who figured it out. Anyway, Part 4!
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, elements, or borrowed plot ideas from any source I acquire them from, specifically KingsIsle. I merely own any original characters I create.
"Blah" = talking
"Blah" = thoughts, writing, sound effects, or flashbacks
"BLAH"= Yelling
Jack Blackheart's breath crystallized and numb fingers found the strength to continue fingering through the playing cards in his hand. His eyes darted around. Gobblers, three or four, only one red. The stragglers had been banding together recently, but dwindling numbers halted any success.
"Pick a card, gentlemen." He held up five cards and spread them in a fan pattern. "Any card."
The greens stumbled forward. Only the red had the sense to avoid the obvious danger. When they entered his radius, however, a bubble for each descended from a high rooftop nearby, exploding as they touched on each of their foreheads and flinging them backwards. Startled, the red quickly made his escape, leaving Jack alone.
Annoyed scowl unhidden as Carla also descended on a bubble large enough to seat her. "Must you steal all my targets?"
"You're too flashy and loud with it." Jack ignored the blatant irony. "Have you seen Malorn anywhere?"
"No, why?"
She sighed dejectedly. "Me either. He was signed up for a shift tonight, but Captain Rosencranz says he never showed up."
Jack chuckled. "First Artur, and now Malorn? You'd think someone was kidnapping Journeymen." Carla's eyes widened in a fearful epiphany. "Kidding. I was kidding. He probably just forgot. Or went to the graduation tonight. I heard a few of his friends are in it."
She seemed accepting of the answer, and hopped off her bubble to join him on the ground before taking off after the escaping gobblers. But unbeknownst to her, Jack's own comment had his mind racing far more than he let on.
Because Malorn never missed an assignment for anything.
EXSEED
Twentieth Pip: The Darkest Night
The rain fell continuously, driving into the paved flagstones of the Commons. The clouds above, an unyielding canopy of grey drifting in from Triton Avenue, suggested a thunderstorm, though not a trace of lightning snaked its way throughout. Only the soft pitter-patter of raindrops brought sound to the alleyway area he traversed.
His hand ruffled out the water-logged brown strands that couldn't stay out of his line of sight. Not that it was easy to see regardless. The rain's intensity, mixed with shallow morning fog, blocked all attempts at anything more than thirty feet ahead. Spillover from the flooding drain nearby caused his boots to slosh through walkway's rising water level.
Making it harder to balance the sleeping blonde girl on his back.
Starvation over the past week made the weight and resistance unbearable, and he collapsed with a defeated grunt. His body braced her fall, but even that hadn't awoken her. She'd been like that for a full day. If not for scarce breaths, he could have sworn she'd already passed on.
Perhaps it was his time instead. He couldn't move another inch. His body was frigid and still. It was impossible to steal any more scraps of food. They'd taken from local stalls enough to put every shopkeeper on vigilant watch. The only family they had left lived off in Marleybone, too disconnected to help them.
His eyelids drifted down, as rain pelted his skin. Yes, it was time to go.
No one would miss two homeless, thieving orphans.
A sloshing footstep snapped his eyes open, and his neck stole enough energy to angle his head forward.
The boy couldn't have been more than a year older than him. Waterproof cloak swathing his form in black, umbrella shielding his grey-accented black hair and exuberant face. The two watched each other for the longest time, silently, without motion.
Then, the umbrella boy's gloved hand reached out. "Here, let me help you."
Ty collapsed to his knees as the memory flooded back. Eyes widened to tearing, pupil constricted to the width of needles. His whole body locked, swaying slightly, the crackling pips around him dissipating with his confidence and will to continue.
Malorn's grin split his face, and a haunting cackle drowned out the sound of flowing water around them. "And now you know everything. Funny, isn't it? How things can change just like that. How easily you humans betray each other."
The Diviner's head dropped, throat still too transfixed to allow a sound. Fate only now began to regain himself, bucking up amidst the fatigue wracking his body. "M-Malorn….why? Why would you betray us!"
"Betrayal?" The sudden softness in his voice surprised Fate. It was no longer deep and raspy, but his normal speaking tone. "I have betrayed no one. The only treachery here is that of your precious Ravenwood."
"Ravenwood?" Fate grew more angry and exasperated. "What are you even talking about? Have you gone insane!"
"No…" His face rose upwards to the emerald glowing canopy high above them. His hands soon followed, as if grasping at something, and the porcelain black of upturned sclera held a crazed glimmer. "I've been enlightened. This accursed school of order has committed its final trespass. And we will make things right. We will undo this abomination."
Fate paused, unsure of what to do. He could only think to keep him talking. "Who is we?"
Malorn siphoned out a breath, like steam rushing from a pipe. A malevolent, invisible energy began to build up around him as his arms retracted and his face lowered towards the green-eyed boy. His feet spread over the stones, and hands thrust forwards. "If you defeat me, perhaps I'll tell you."
"I don't want to fight you Malorn." The Exseed pleaded.
"That's not Malorn."
Fate's head whipped down to Ty, who still hunched on his knees. Voice kindled with fury and determination. "I don't know what that thing is, but it's not Malorn." A pip began returning to his side, as his head rose, purple eyes glancing to Fate. "Right?"
The boy eventually nodded, smiling at his friend's return. "…R-Right."
The Storm wizard jumped to his feet, cracking his knuckles. "So if it's not him, then we'll have no trouble bringing it down."
"Really, Ty?" Malorn scoffed. His left hand reached to the side, radiating a dark purple aura, and cut a downward swathe. A churning rift filled the space, and discharged a quintet of skeletal warriors, a motley assortment of corroded weapons in hand. Blackened eye sockets gazed into the two boy's souls, as if eager to devour them. "You believe you stand any chance?"
That portal unnerved Ty more than the minions. Rifts were by-the-book Witch magic, without exception. Was this the cause of Malorn's uncharacteristic betrayal? Had he been delving in witchcraft? If so, it set the Diviner at ease. There was a chance they could still reach him.
"Do you have a plan?" Fate whispered.
Ty nodded, gathering a second pip. "Don't die."
Fate spread his stance, grimacing as three skeletons advanced. "That'll work."
—o—o—o—o—o—
The silence was unnerving as Victoria and Tala slipped through the door of the mysterious tower.
The interior was as far a cry from the bright stonework of the exterior as it could be. It was dark, light from windows placed more for decoration than illumination. Only burning lamps and candles provided coherent navigation, and their number put the cathedral in Marleybone to shame. Old wood creaked beneath their careful steps. Dark stone walls were barren, save the occasional hanging rune symbol.
With no other idea in store, the strong smell of paper led them past the open foyer and up the spiraling staircase in the corner.
The second floor was no less dark and intimidating, only now there were places to hide. It seemed more a storage room than anything. Rows of freestanding bookcases comprised its surface area, broken only by desks, boxes, barrels, or granite statues. Candles had a smaller population here than below. It was difficult to see more than ten feet ahead.
The silence was painful by this point. They'd been in the building for five minutes, and there hadn't been one sound that they didn't make.
Tala spotted an eerie light down a particular row, separated from most of the other candles. His and Victoria's minds recalled a scarecrow amongst the minion's ranks. With a nod, they approached slowly, carefully, hands gripped around wands. Breathing stopped to conceal their presence.
Victoria jumped out first.
Just another lamp.
Tala walked out after her, both somehow disappointed and relieved at the same time.
A chill ripped up their spines as hideous rattling flooded their ears.
The blade came down just as they broke to either side, smacking its rusted edge into the wood. The two wizards came up from their rolls simultaneously, taking in the creature's form in a split second. It was the same one for sure: black armor, helmet, and shield rimmed with gold, tattered crimson cloth for a kilt.
His scimitar jerked back, then swung around for Victoria. The pyromancer leaned back onto the ground as it passed overhead, then aimed her wand. A small burst of flames, a fireball, leapt from its head, crashing into the ribcage. The force made him recoil backwards, but the flames did nothing to impede him.
"Victoria! Move!"
They did give her enough time to scramble and dash down the row, just as Tala called out from the row over. She was solely focused on her speed, so much that she didn't realize what was happening until she heard it moments later.
The bookcase dividing their rows began to tip over, gaining speed as gravity reared its head. Books slid off one by one, and the skeleton's hobbling proved too late. It crushed his body underneath in a deafening clatter, tenuous silence on its coattails.
Seconds passed before she felt safe enough to relax, then she looked to Tala. His tattoos were in full force, visible due to a nearby oil lamp, and what she assumed supplied the strength to push the bookcase over.
He looked up to her, breaths haggard, and just after their eyes met, she caught a glance of a second candle materializing near him. It was odd, though. Its flame continued to burn brighter with each moment.
Until her eyes widened, and the flame burned bright enough to light the jack o' lantern's full head.
Tala sensed it as her yell went hoarse, and was already throwing himself to the ground. The stream of flames that poured from its pumpkin head flew over his head to the downed bookcase. Then, the scarecrow's body turned, and the stream whipped around to Victoria. She followed her friend's example, ducking first, then moving backwards as sparks and embers and heat and smoke burned overhead.
Tala rolled to safety, as did Victoria crawl, the two meeting up three bookcases over. They peered out and around, viewing the resulting destruction. The scarecrow's flame had ceased. Its fire consumed through much of the bookcases' dilapidated wood, crushing many caught in the crossfire. Even the air near them was singed and hard to inhale.
Then its pumpkin head stared blankly at the bookcase Tala had pushed over. And the figure pushing through books and wood from underneath.
Rattling sounded over crackling flames once more, the skeleton's entire body wreathed in leftover flame, burning like a demon.
—o—o—o—o—o—
Ty's lightning bats screamed through the air as the three skeletons charged. The bat's veered off to match each minion one for one.
The tactic succeeded for the most part. The front two didn't have the reaction time to avoid, and the electric creatures poured their fangs and momentum into the chest blow, knocking them off to the side and cracking bones beyond repair. The third skeleton, being in the back, escaped that fate. His double handed axe slashed an arc to pick off the remaining bat, knocking it harmlessly to the ground where it lost its charge and vanished in a flash of light.
His speed increased at his triumph, and the rusted weapon raised high once more. His target, Fate, stood just ahead of Ty, holding the staff the Diviner had brought and hoping to put it to practical use. He ducked under the first sweep, then sidestepped the overhand follow-up. As the axehead pierced the stone, Fate stepped forward. His staff bashed into the unprotected skull, freeing his bony grip and sending him reeling back.
He tossed the staff back to Ty. Then, his palms found the axe's handle, finding the piece much heavier than he assumed. The Diviner's request shook him from doubt and restraint. "Watch my back."
They dashed forward in tandem, side by side, blazing a path towards Malorn. To the necromancer's credit, he didn't seem fazed by the headlong charge. Instead, his expression was controlled as his fingers dexterously penned an inverted death symbol.
The three skeletons the boys had just dealt with sprung to a stand, forgoing damaged limbs, bones, and in Fate's case stolen weapons. The one of the two beside Malorn, wielding a spear, leapt into the fray as well. Ty and Fate came to a screeching halt as all four skeletons rushed from separate directions. On the Storm wizard's prior command, the duo was back to back.
Some skeletons had head starts on the others, but this only worked to their opponent's favor, allowing them to be picked apart one by one. Fate's axe work provided close combat finishing blows and Ty's reacquired staff let loose thin bolts of lightning from afar. Both dodged as necessary, most of the time by a hair's breadth. Their coordination was far from seamless, Malorn noted, but surprisingly effective. He also made a note of the strange trail of blood on Fate's mouth.
That same wizard's axe bisected the fourth skeleton in a diagonal arc, then his body was bee lining again, weapon reared back. Ty stayed put, descending to a knee and building up another pip.
Again, the necromancer was calm. Both hands flared with purple chaotic energy, and they thrust forward like a spear. Their separation parted the air like window curtains, wrenching open the largest portal yet.
Fate had a mind to stop this one. But the portal stabilized just as his axe swept horizontally.
And just as a bony hand emerged, catching the blade.
What stepped out and lifted Fate off the ground was nothing short of a monstrosity. Three gangly arms joined the fourth, followed by an eight foot tall hunched trunk and a quartet of supporting legs.
How it snarled without vocal chords, he couldn't tell. But that was the least of his worries. Gripping the handle tight and hanging in the air, he used all his might to twist his stomach and legs up, delivering a sharp kick at the creature's wrist. The action was forceful enough to dislocate something there, or at least to loosen his grip, and the boy fell the short distance to the ground, reaching out to absorb the impact.
He had no time to celebrate. Two arms hooked from his left, twice as fast as any of the skeletal warriors had been. He threw himself into a roll under them, escaping a right arm cross that hit his previous position. Out of chance, he caught sign of Malorn. He and the creature moved in tandem, arms with arms, stepping forward as the wizard did. Controlling it like that must have increased the speed and reaction time.
Something he regretted as one fist found his cheek, and a second to his gut sent him careening onto the ground dozens of feet away close to Ty.
Malorn wasted no time sending his summon in to finish them. But as the creature took a step, his controller felt a strange rumbling from under his feet. And an even stranger hiss.
His eyes flew up to Ty, just as the flaring head of a lightning snake emerged from the ground behind his minion. It lurched around the final skeletal minion that tried to impede its path, managing to sink its fangs into Malorn's right shoulder. A surge of electricity jostled his body, but before damage could escalate, the final skeletal warrior's broadsword cleaved the serpent in half, dissipating in a brief flash of light and electricity.
The action incapacitated him for nearly ten seconds. When he regained himself, he found Ty kneeling beside Fate, his mouth near the boy's ear, shaking his shoulders in an attempt to raise him.
The black haired boy looked out for the count though. More blood from either the last blow or earlier stained his chin and neck. His eyes seemed to take much of his energy staying open and alert. The rest purchased a staggering stand, with assistance from Ty.
It was a short lived transaction. Fate's eyes went wide as every inch of his body trembled. Vision blurred to near blindness. It was here again.
"You are not complete."
At the worst time.
Ty's confused yell didn't reach his ears as his body collapsed to the ground. "Fate, Fate get up! We have to move." Malorn's grin grew, and he walked forward around his four armed minion. "Fate! Come on!"
"Don't worry about me, Ty." The boy somehow cracked a weak smile. "Just get out of here."
"Are you stupid!"
"I think that's an intelligent decision." Malorn downgraded to a smirk. "Cut your losses, right? Just like you humans always do. 'Sacrifice for the greater good', or something like that."
"Shut up!" The Diviner roared, pips bursting into existence with his temper. His staff swung around, a single fork of lighting leaping from its amethyst jewel towards Malorn. The necromancer quickly made his skeletal warrior move ahead of him, then raise its broadsword high in the air. The lightning arced downward towards the weapon's tip, lighting the framework of bones with blinding torrents.
Ty was already planning ahead of that redirection. Storm sigil after storm sigil materialized and dissipated, the same with his pips. Both giving birth to lightning bats from a swirl of dark clouds before him. The now dozen and counting creatures' cries sang with thunder, encircling the Diviner high above his head. When he'd amassed enough, his raging yell sent them slicing through the air at once.
Malorn, face surprised for the first time since the battle began, shoved his skeletal warrior from his path and dove at his four armed monstrosity. The bats arrived just then, circling around their position like ravenous vultures but with the speed of a cyclone. The electricity wreathed around them singed the air, and as the few stragglers joined, they dove in and let loose all their power.
The voracious sparks gobbled up the air around their target, a buzzing torrent that spread for at least a dozen feet. The cloud of smoke and debris followed seconds after, shielding the exhausted Storm Wizard's view. He could only wait now, and watch.
And pray to Bartleby it had been enough.
"Really now?"
The raspy, more strained voice dashed his hopes. The smoke wafted away to reveal the four armed skeleton, bones blackened by the attack. Its ribcage was now much wider, and any gaps were filled with condensed bones. The cage cracked open from the front, and the black swathed form of Malorn Ashthorn stepped out. Worse for wear, burned by electricity in places, but still very much intact.
He continued. "A valiant effort, but did you think you won?" That line made Ty realize how similar all this was to the attack in Victoria's dorm. Fate was out for the count, he himself was on the verge of exhaustion, and the necromancer's skeletons had saved him from another last ditch effort. "There is no hope for you. You will never surpass me."
The four armed skeleton stalked to the Diviner, too drained of energy now to even stand, and brought two fists around to send the wizard into the air. He smacked into the ground with a heavy grunt, rolling like a rag doll to a stop.
Malorn approached his summon again, stopping before its ribcage. Then, facing forwards, he backed into it as the bone-like hoops pried open, then closed around him. Its torso raised to stand straight, the necromancer's body suspended at the center as if wearing the creature like a suit of armor.
Ty's head rolled over in his haze, and spied the skeletal warriors they'd defeated before. Their bones began to unlatch one by one, pulled by some unknown force to join the Malorn-minion combination.
But more than that, what saddened and frightened the Storm wizard the most was his crazed black sclera, shining with sadistic glee.
He somehow found his way to his feet, using his staff as ballast. Then, a mixture of anger and betrayal twisted his face, lips letting loose a quiet voice. "What happened to you? This isn't the Malorn I know at all."
"You say that, but did you ever really know him?" That sentence set the Diviner off. Not what he said, but how he said it. The 'we' from before, and now this. This lack of first-person words.
"Yes I did. Yes I do know him." He corrected himself, voice still calm. "He's a great pianist, even when I tell him his music bores me to tears. He's the most famous Journeyman Wizard in all of Wizard City. He's the one who took Victoria and I in when we had nowhere else to go…" He paused, gulping once, near breathless. "And he's the man that I've always chased after. That I've always wished to be like. "
Ty split his feet and began twirling the staff like a fan blade before jutting its tip into a crack near him. His palms thrust out to the left and right, head down. As still as the calm before the storm.
"Whether you come quietly or I have to drag your body. When you come back, don't tell Professor Balestrom about this. He doesn't like when I get ahead of the curriculum." Malorn's face grimaced slightly at the appearance of a pip. Wild and exuberant. Golden. "I've saved this spell just for you."
The necromancer's eyes wrenched as far open as possible. A second power pip joined the first, right next to Ty's trembling, pain-wracked body. But that was impossible, at least for an Initiate like Ty. Even Journeyman wizard's like himself had trouble maintaining two power pips. They didn't overstay their welcome, bursting out of existence with the finished storm sigil.
The sudden absence of anything set Malorn on edge.
Then, Ty's ear-splitting roar failed to outdo the sudden onrush of wind, rain, and electricity from every direction, converging at a point ahead of him. The frenzied mass spiraled into the air, climbing until they spread out at the ceiling, forming a tornado of dense clouds. The water beside the bridge churned and roiled with excitement, and the winds whipped at everything not anchored down: glittering leaves, skeleton's weapons, clothing.
Thick, scaled, purple arms jutted suddenly from the turmoil's center, then swung into a thunderous clap that tore the tornado in half and brought silence once more.
Toughened muscle layered under scales and every inch of its upright body. Electric streamers danced over and around, and its long, finned tale waved away a patch of leftover cloud. Solid white eyes held primal majesty incomparable to anything Malorn had witnessed in a long time.
Even with the overwhelming strain of maintaining his Kraken, Ty kept a firm stare leveled at the necromancer.
Malorn's face changed from fear to a victorious grin as an epiphany struck him. "Superb. Absolutely superb, Ty Stormwhisper. Even we won't be able to withstand something like that."
The Diviner watched the skeleton sweep an arm low on Malorn's command, lifting something from the ground and holding it out before him.
Fate. "But I wonder, could you sacrifice your comrade to do it?" The Exseed lay somewhere below full consciousness, eyes lidded, head bobbing with the skeleton's slight movements of its hand. However possible, Malorn's grin widened. "Can you do it, Ty?"
Ty made no move, no twitch.
And then said the one thing the necromancer didn't expect.
"Sure I can."
His arms flared out, energy building around him. In response, the Kraken glared at its target and reached a right hand high into the air. A flood of energy pooled around the spot from its entire being and the air, forming a wild ball that thinned and straightened into the shape of a lightning bolt.
"Are…you a fool?" Nervousness entered the Death Wizard's voice. "This. This is the Exseed! You would sacrifice him for a small victory like this!"
"No. I would never do that." The Kraken spread its webbed feet, and cocked its right arm back, holding out the left for aim and balance. "Fate won't go down from something this small."
Malorn disbelieved that. The Diviner was bluffing for sure. He wouldn't really fire.
The necromancer caught a glimpse of Fate for a moment, just as the Kraken was rearing back a little more, to the edges of its joints. As Ty kept speaking. "You've tried to kidnap Fate before. Did you think we wouldn't prepare for a hostage situation?"
He didn't absorb the full weight of those words until Fate's faint, weak smile caught his sight. And a purple, metallic shield materialized in the air right beside the boy.
Or rather uncovered.
"A cloaked storm shield!"
Everything happened all at once. Malorn forced the skeleton's body to turn and run. Ty screamed out once again and unleashed all the pent up energy around him. The Kraken followed through and released its attack. The lightning spear screamed through the air like a banshee. Detonating as it hit the skeleton's spine and exploded in every direction, consuming Fate's storm shield and the area around them in debris, dust, electricity, and air.
—o—o—o—o—o—
Everyone within the black, swirling dome was quiet. They'd long since calmed down over the thirty minutes since they'd been in, thanks mostly to Ambrose and the professor's guidance. Lights, not candles, had been passed around for visibility, and anything that burned oxygen was quickly put out. Professor Balestrom did his best to assist in supplying more through his magic. Some people hunched in the feeble position on their chairs, more cowering in the arms of friends or loved ones, and others' eyes roved, searching tirelessly for a way out.
To no avail. The dome, its edges, even the floor below them was completely obscured by the dark, impenetrable energy. As Ambrose had explained earlier to the crowd.
Witch portal magic, a kind he'd seen before and had hoped to never see again. All portals were meant for transference of individuals or objects, but this particular one was used for capture instead, locking its victims within the torn dimensions of a portal. Creating an entry point, but no exit.
How their current assailant could manage one so large was a mystery to the old wizard. One he planned to figure out soon. Something this size could not be maintained for long, no matter its creator.
"Is there anything we can do, headmaster?" Herbert Runewarden asked from beside him, watching a Cyclops on the far side bang his fists against the dome wall.
"I'm afraid not." He worked his jaw, answering after a time. "We do not yet have a way to counteract portals. Only time will decide our fate now."
The minutes passed by again, without any real sense of how many. People began to wander around just for the sake of it, anything to break the monotony and fear creeping upon them. Every second began to look like the last.
Sometime later, something caught Cyrus Drake's watchful eye at the very apex of the dome. A swirling discoloration, another portal perhaps? He wasn't sure, but over the seconds it began building and spreading, opening what he assumed to be a hole to the outside.
Only a voice projected from it. "Greetings, my friends."
Every professor and assistant professors' eyes went wide, and they all spun towards the source, faster than the rest of the masses could turn. Each of them knew that voice.
Ambrose's calm but subtly enraged voice caused a flood of whispers. "Dworgyn."
A pleasant chuckle. "Ah, you remember me Ambrose. I'm glad. That'll make all of this much easier."
"So it was you that escaped from Briskbreeze." Professor Greyrose stated, the warmth in her motherly voice all but gone. "And I presume this portal is your work as well."
"More or less. I may have a part in it."
"What do you want, Dworgyn?" Ambrose picked up. "You would be wise to explain yourself now, while I am incapable of annihilating you were you stand."
"At ease, Headmaster. I bring no harm. I am actually on your side." The silence confirmed their disbelief. "Honestly, I am. I'm here to bring you the truth."
"Truth?" Cyrus scoffed with a scowel. "And you find it necessary to imprison us to do so."
"Not that you'd give me a chance otherwise. But make no mistake, Cyrus." The Myth professor was surprised how he divined his identity so easily. "This barrier is not to imprison you, it is to prevent his escape."
"His?"
Dworgyn mirth dispersed. "The traitor, of course."
"Traitor?" Dalia Flamea stepped forward to take her turn, arms crossed, voice lacking none of its usual flame. "Someone in your position has quite the nerve to call treachery. What makes you think any of us will believe what you have to say."
"Oh you're right, none of you will. That's why I brought him."
There was a momentary pause, interspersed with the shuffling of feet and the timed pounding of a walking stick against the floor. All eyes stared up into the portal above, most skeptical of the necromancer's claim. Until they heard his voice, firm and unwavering as possible.
Susie's elated scream sent gasps running over the crowd like wind across grain fields. "Artur! You're okay!"
"Yes. I'm alright." His voice seemed pleased to hear her, but quickly returned to business. "Headmaster, everyone inside please listen to me. Dworgyn is speaking the truth. Please allow me to explain."
Whispers and murmurs roiled again, but with Ambrose soon quieted them down. "Go on, Artur."
"I'm sure many of you heard about the attack in Gobbler dorm a few months before. A few of our students were attacked by someone with witch magic." He carefully pieced the tale together, avoiding specifics and details associated with confidential information. "Recently, we were able to find traces of the escape portal, and I was sent to follow and scout out its end. I was captured by the assailant's group at their headquarters, but Dworgyn was the one who freed me and secretly brought me along."
"See, I told you." Dworgyn chimed in.
"Artur, where was the headquarters?" Ambrose nudged after more whispers quieted down. "What have you learned? Tell us, quickly."
An uncomfortable pause. Cyrus prodded this time. "Quickly, boy. Is the culprit within the dome, as Dworgyn said?"
"Yes. Before I was captured, I caught a glimpse of the headquarters' address." They could hear a deep breath, and then Artur steeled his voice. "…Thirty Nine Gwydion Way."
Everything lost sound instantaneously, the address ringing through each professor's mind. Gwydion…a fairly high class street in the commons, home to many accomplished wizards and even a few Ravenwood faculty. Most notably—
Cyrus's body made a complete spin, just in time to see Malistaire Drake slam his staff into the ground.
—o—o—o—o—o—
That was it.
Ty was spent. Completely and wholly spent. Every last bit of mana in his body, every ounce of energy not keeping him breathing.
That last attack had taken everything out of him. And hopefully out of his opponent. The Kraken's lightning spear had marred the bridge stonework beyond recognition, and the four armed skeleton was nothing but vaporized husks of bone as black as a moonless night. Malorn's body lay buried beneath them, unmoving. Fate tossed and turned in pain some ways away.
Its mission accomplished, the Kraken glanced back at the Diviner. Electricity wafted from its scales, taking pieces of its body until the creature vanished into nothingness, and its final roar of bestial pride left Ty as awestricken as its first.
But he chose not to dwell on it. "Fate. Fate!"
He couldn't even crawl, resorting to worming across the ground. Fate regained some control over himself, enough to roll and face his friend, but looked just as exhausted and powerless as the Storm Wizard. Parts of the outfit he'd bought for graduation were singed beyond repair, and there were small electrical burns in places, but the Storm shield they'd hidden on him did well to hold up against the Kraken's might.
While Fate charged forward, Ty found the time to coat the shield before getting the Lightning Snake off, and Malorn's recovery after that gave them the time to place it. But to think Fate suggested it blew the Diviner's mind.
"Ty."
The breathless whisper sent fear ripping through both the boys. Their eyes shifted and laid sight on the last thing they wished to see.
Malorn sat upright, only his knees holding up his swaying body, staring somewhere afar off. There were a few things different about him though. His voice had sounded youthful and unstrained. His eyes were no longer blank slates, but filled with the exuberance Ty had always witnessed in them. That alone gave the Diviner hope. Hope that the boy in front of them now had returned to his senses.
"Ty."
"…Malorn?"
"Ty, please." A tear fell from his right eye. "Please save me. Don't let him take me again."
Before Ty could even think to respond, Malorn's voice erupted in a wicked, mindless scream. His head reared back in excruciating pain, palms trying to contain his temples, face the color of death.
A sinister shadow began to pour out from his body, through his mouth, eyes, and the pores of his skin. It snaked upwards and back, hissing with burning malevolence, and coagulated behind the boy. Seconds passed before it began to take shape and mass.
The bones from all the summoned skeletons not only converged again into a single frame, but returned to their ivory luster as well. Supplemental shadow formed a black wispy cloak, ghostly blue radiating in eye sockets from underneath the hood. Two onyx raven wings stretched to either side, and the resulting gust of wind managed to push Malorn's now-unmoving body down to the ground, his usefulness depleted.
As the long shaft and blade of a scythe materialized before Lord Nightshade, Ty and Fate both understood that this was the end, and that there was no hope.