Three days passed. Or at least, three days passed to everyone else. With Thad alternately slowing and speeding time, Jack estimated it had been closer to five for the two of them, but he was finally beginning to believe Thad was getting the hang of it.
"Let's try three at once," Jack said. "All different speeds this time. Seward, if you wouldn't mind?"
Lord Unne grumbled as he hauled himself out of his chair, but he seemed to be grumbling about his struggles with the chair's cushions rather than Jack's request that he help with magical experiments. Though Seward was not a fan of magic, it seemed even he had to admit that Thad's abilities were fascinating.
Jack handed the man a Cornelian gil coin. "Hold it here. Palm up," he said. "Wait for my signal."
Unne nodded. Jack held his own coins, one in each hand, and turned to Thad. The boy squinted in concentration. "Ready," he said.
Jack counted, and on three, both he and Lord Unne flipped their hands over, letting the coins fall to the ground.
Seward gasped as his coin flew from his hand, falling as quickly as if it had been thrown. It raced downward in a blur, hitting the floor with a loud crack. Jack's coins followed at a slower pace, one of them much slower, drifting like an autumn leaf as it spun heads-to-tails in a graceful dance. Unlike leaves, however, both of the coins floated straight down, the second landing almost silently as it settled gently to the floor.
"Remarkable!" Seward said. "Just remarkable! Why, the boy has complete control of time!"
Thad beamed.
"Not complete control," Jack said, making Thad roll his eyes. "You're only using the raw aether. You still haven't drawn on it."
Thad protested, "But when I fought the dark mage-"
Jack shook his head, cutting off the argument. "You emptied yourself, yes, but that only means you added your own reserves to the spell. It doesn't mean you drew from the aether."
"Don't let him discourage you, Thadius," Lena called from her table across the library. "You've made such great progress!"
Jack looked her way, caught one cold and disapproving glare from her before she turned back to her book. He still didn't know what he'd done wrong. For three days - give or take - she hadn't spoken to him, not really, except to rebuke him for being too harsh on Thad. For her to be this close yet ignore him utterly... Jack had never felt so lonely.
She did have a point, though. Perhaps he was being too hard on the boy. "You are making progress," he admitted. "Orin was pleased when I told him this morning just how far you've come. But you know Orin won't be satisfied until I can tell him you've mastered this."
Thad frowned, but then he nodded, setting his mouth in a thin, determined line. "I can do better."
"I know," Jack said, patting his shoulder. The boy would do anything to make the monk proud. But Thad wasn't the only one who lacked total control of his abilities. The only reason Jack had been talking to Orin that morning in the first place was because he'd needed another dose of aether to fill the hollow. Orin never seemed to begrudge Jack the inconvenience of having a bit of his soul ripped away, but Jack always felt guilty afterwards, always wondered if perhaps the old man was as disappointed in him as he was in himself.
He just felt so… so useless, so ignored. Redden and Kane and Orin had been planning something these past few days, but they'd left Jack out of it. Even Kane wouldn't tell him what they were up to. Jack tried to tell himself he didn't mind - it gave him and Thad more time to work - but it had also resulted in Leiden taking Jack's usual guards away, deemed a waste of resources if Jack was only traveling to and from Lord Unne's house every day. Jack never thought he would miss the presence of the hulking Corporal Clyne, but given the circumstances, he would have welcomed the gruff guard's company.
He patted Thad's shoulder again. "We both can do better."
The library door creaked open. Jack kept his back to it, kept his eyes closed so that whoever it was wouldn't see the corona, but he opened them again when he heard it was only Mina. "Lord Ipsen's here, sir."
Seward seemed surprised. "He is?"
"Yes, my lord."
Jack grinned beneath his scarf. "Still buying the old man's council votes?"
"Nonsense!" Seward said with mock indignation. "I would never! I simply invite him 'round for tea to remind him what good friends we are so that he remembers me whenever they vote on policies that would affect my mines!" He turned to the housemaid. "Is he early, or is it teatime already?"
"It's teatime, my lord."
"Good! Good!" Seward said. "I must say, I quite lost track of time - heh! - as I've been grazing all afternoon! Would you like me to have the kitchens bring more around for you?" He motioned toward the table that Jack had asked Liza to keep stocked with food in order to avoid a repeat of the week's earlier events. Today, it held light pastries and summer vegetables that Jack had yet to touch. Seward had eaten many of the pastries, but there were plenty left.
"We'll be fine," Jack told him.
"Excellent! I won't be long - Ipsen doesn't eat much these days!"
I don't either, Jack thought as the library door clicked shut. He wandered toward the food, contemplating the pastries, chose one with what looked like raspberries in it. He reached up to pull his scarf down, but hesitated. Lena had been so distant lately that he found he was embarrassed to show his face in her presence. He had only just begun to feel comfortable doing so, had only just convinced himself that perhaps she truly didn't care how he looked, but now...
He jumped as Thad seemed to appear next to him. Likely he had, moving too fast for Jack to have noticed his approach. "So what's next?" the boy asked around a mouthful of pastry. "Four coins? I bet I could do four coins. Or maybe the juggling again? I liked that one."
Jack shook his head, returning his uneaten pastry to the tray. "You're going to work on drawing the aether."
Thad's face crumpled. "But Jaaaack!" he whined. "That's booooring!"
"It won't be boring if you succeed," Jack promised. "Besides, it's only until Seward comes back, alright? We won't stay for dinner this time, not with that curfew in place."
Thad whined again, a wordless moan, but he returned to the corner where they had been working and sat in his chair, pouting, crossing his arms, but squinting in concentration.
Jack took one last look at the pastries before he turned away, heading toward the table in the corner where his own books and notes were scattered about. High Leifenish was coming to him more easily now, but there were still sections of the book of dark magic that eluded him, both magically and linguistically. Seward's dictionaries and reference manuals helped somewhat, but most magic books - this one included - were written in an informal style, having originally been copies of personal journals. The spells were written as reminders for the author, not as instructions for future mages. The language was more casual than other texts of a similar age; Jack could never be sure if an odd word here or there was something lost in translation or merely some kind of shorthand the author had used.
Despite the language barrier, Jack was learning. He had begun to notice how many of the spells and rituals in Astos's book relied on the phase of the moon. The aether was like water in many ways, like a tide that responded to the moon and the seasons. Jack had heard of mages using the timing and mood of the raw aether to their advantage, but it wasn't a common practice. Black mages shaped the aether however they wished.
Jack was beginning to suspect, however, that dark mages relied more on the aether already being the right shape, as Refial had, as Thad apparently did. It was the reason Jack's failures to understand Thad were so frustrating. He needed to understand. It was unhealthy for dark mages to draw the aether, Matoya had said, because dark mages lacked the ability to filter out the impurities that built up in it over time.
I am a dark mage, he thought bitterly, remembering the blind old witch, how she'd told him the aether had burned out her eyes. As much as he hated it, if he didn't want to end up like her, he had to start thinking like a dark mage. He hated that he'd drawn from Orin that morning, hated that he had to. But he wasn't finding anything in Astos's book about not drawing from other people. He wanted to be a black mage, he'd always wanted to be a black mage, like his father had been, the father he could no longer remember…
But he wasn't one.
Alright, he thought. We'll try it their way. He worked out how long it had been since the full moon, the days left until the new moon. He considered which spell he would attempt, finally settling on Redden's spellblade technique.
He stood, drawing his sword - Redden's sword - and moved toward the center of the room, telling himself it wasn't because that was closer to Lena but because he needed the space. He held the blade raised in front of him, closed his eyes, and looked through his aether sight.
He started with fire. While he could have drawn the aether and formed it into a fire spell as quickly as he could snap his fingers, he instead looked through the raw aether for the essence of fire. He had no trouble finding it - there were days, rough days after nights of restless sleep, when he saw fire everywhere he looked - and he drew that essence into the sword, fusing it with the blade. For a moment, he doubted it would work, but then the sword caught alight. The flame was small, but he was experienced enough with fire to adjust the intensity.
A thrill went through him. His reserves were untouched. He had done it with raw aether.
Pleased with his success, he tried ice next. That one was harder. Though he found plenty in the raw aether that seemed the right shape for it, he almost instinctively wanted to cast it from within. He had to work to shift his mind away from that inclination. The ice was inside him already; it seemed unnatural to pull it from outside. When he did finally manage it, the sword blade glittering with frost, he was sweating from the effort but he couldn't contain his satisfaction.
"I bet Kane likes that trick," Lena said.
He looked up from the sword, surprised that she was actually speaking to him, and found her smiling. It was a small smile, almost shy, but it delighted him to see it. Her smile deepened then. Jack felt more ice rising from deep in his gut and almost squashed his feelings down, but that smile stopped him. What if she was only smiling because she felt his elation? He tried briefly to hold back the ice without holding back his feelings, but then decided it was silly. He was holding a sword covered in ice, wasn't he? If the room grew a little colder, perhaps she would attribute it to that.
He stepped toward her, holding the sword across his palms so she could see it. "I haven't shown him yet," Jack said. "Last night he was…" He stopped, wondering how much he should tell her. Reports said another of those dead men had turned up in the White Quarter last night. Kane had gone to see the body, to see if it was Cole or Felder. It had turned out to be one of the other missing boys, but Kane's mood had been glum enough regardless that Jack hadn't wanted to bother him with parlor tricks.
It was exactly why Jack had allowed himself to draw from Orin again. With the constant attacks, people going missing, necromancers somewhere in the city, he worried what would happen if a fight went down and he didn't have total control. But he couldn't say any of that to Lena.
He shrugged. "Kane's been busy lately. We both have. Careful!" he added as she reached toward the blade. Even through his gloves, the metal chilled him. "More than a quick touch holds a real danger of frostbite."
She arched a skeptical eyebrow. "I can heal frostbite," she said flatly.
"I don't doubt it," Jack said. "But I would hate to be the cause of anything that required that of you."
Her smile brightened again. She nodded. "I'll be careful." She extended a tentative finger toward the blade's glittering surface. No sooner had she touched it than she drew back again with a gasp and stuck her finger in her mouth. "It's cold as ice!"
"Colder," he said. "It has to be or the ice wouldn't form." He extinguished the spell, sheathed the blade in one swift motion - he was rather pleased that he'd finally learned that move - and held his hand out for hers. "Let me see."
"It's fine," she said, though she did reach her hand out and let him take it.
Her finger looked red, painful, but even as he watched, a white glow rose around it and the welt receded. She grinned. "I told you I could heal it."
A plan took shape in his head. This is my chance, he thought. His heart pounded at the boldness of it. She was only just speaking to him again. He didn't want to ruin it. "You did say that," he said, pulling his scarf down, mentally stomping on the embarrassment he felt at showing his face. "But perhaps you could use this anyway." He bent his head closer, kissing her finger just where the minor wound had been.
When he looked at her face, she was no longer smiling. She didn't seem angry. She seemed… sad. Her jaw was set, but that didn't stop her lips from trembling. And were those… yes, there were tears in her eyes.
"My lady," he said, ready to apologize, but he didn't know what else to say.
"Are we friends, Jack?" she asked.
"Always," he said instantly, without thinking, but he meant it. "Lena, whatever I've done to make you question that, let me make it up to you."
"You said-" she began, then took a deep, shuddering breath. "I heard you say-"
She stopped as the door slammed open. Jack turned to it, prepared to draw his sword, but it was only Seward.
"I'm sorry!" Seward said, panting. "I didn't mean to take so long! Only, who knew the man could talk for three hours about his son's new hunting hound?" He held up a finger as he stopped to catch his breath.
"Three hours?" Jack said. "But you've just left!"
Seward shook his head. "No! That's just it! I assumed you'd gone already, but then Liza said you hadn't!"
"Jack!" Lena said, pointing out the window. The sky was definitely darker than it should have been for afternoon.
"Thad! What did you do!" Jack shouted.
"I'm sorry!" the boy said from his chair. "It's just you said to work on it until he got back, but it was boring, so I thought I'd speed him up a bit!"
"By three hours?"
"I didn't know it would take that long! I said I was sorry!"
"Jack, the curfew…" Lena said.
"I know," he said. "Seward, I apologize for our sudden departure, but we need to leave."
"By all means!" Seward said, staggering to his usual chair, still breathing heavily from hurrying back to them. "Don't let me keep you! You know the way out!"
Jack looked down at Lena. She'd been about to tell him something, something he was sure would have been important. It'll have to wait, he thought. Please let it wait. Again, he held a hand out for her, and he sighed in relief when she took it. He pulled her to her feet. "Let's go."
Kane sat perfectly still. He couldn't see how close he was to the edge. Well, he could clearly see the edge of the gently sloping rooftop, he could feel his body beneath him, but being Vanished skewed his perceptions, making it seem he could fall at any moment. Just when he thought he was growing comfortable with the situation, he would move - shift his legs, lean back against the chimney behind him - and the sensation of not knowing where he was in relation to the edge would hit him again and leave him frozen.
His father, likewise Vanished, paced nearby, the two of them keeping an aerial eye on their assigned warehouse. Soldiers hid inside of that warehouse, his father's soldiers, the handful of young men from the West Hills that Redden ordered around like his own small army. Though Kane was accustomed to seeing his father treated respectfully as a Cornelian lord, that respect paled in comparison to the downright hero worship these men paid to the so-called "son of Titan".
Stranger still, in Kane's opinion, was how respectfully the soldiers treated him. They were constantly calling him "my lord" or "young master Carmine". They sounded just like Orin when they did that, though none of the soldiers seemed to be much older than Kane.
He could hear his father's soft footsteps on the roof tiles, pacing up and back. It suddenly occurred to Kane that he didn't know how close his father might be to the edge either. Vertigo struck him and he pressed his hands flat to the rooftop. If he hadn't been sitting, he would have fallen there and then.
He must have made some sound, for his father spoke. "Try moving your hands."
"What?"
"Move your hands," Redden repeated. "Try to touch your pointer fingers together, or your pinkies. Try to find your nose without poking yourself in the eye. The key to moving while Vanished is to be aware of your body. You're a soldier - that comes with a certain amount of body awareness. You'll catch on."
Kane tried it. Though it seemed a simple exercise, he found it took him several attempts to stick his unseen fingers together. He worked through the others - middle finger, ring finger, thumbs - and though they seemed no easier, Kane found it did take his mind off thoughts of falling. "You can actually fight like this?" he asked.
Redden chuckled. "When I was younger, I was known for it. I wouldn't risk it now. I can move alright, sneak about. I could fight barehanded as Orin does. But if I drew a sword like this, I'd be as likely to stab myself as my enemies."
His voice grew closer, and Kane could hear him taking a seat, settling in beside him. Kane thought he could almost sense him, the warmth and movement of another body mere inches from his. Redden went on, "But that's the weakness of Vanishing, you see? Most mages don't fight, not physically. They let their magic fight for them."
"That's sort of the part I'm worried about," Kane said.
His father chuckled again. "They'd give themselves away if they did that. Black mages, if they cast anything, you'll see it. The concentrated aether of their spells, the same thing that causes a corona, it'll light their souls up like noonday. It's fast, but it can be just enough warning if you're alert. You probably don't realize how close a mage has to be to use black magic against you. You'll likely hear them. You may even see them: Vanish isn't perfect. A Vanished person still casts a shadow."
"I suppose you actually need light for that?" Kane said, looking west. The gray-curtained sky was losing what little brightness remained as the sun set behind a wall of clouds. Those clouds had unsettled him all day, reminding him of the fog, of the vampire… reminding him that the Brotherhood weren't his only enemies in Melmond.
"Well, yes, ideally," Redden said with a laugh. "But remember, Vanish also isn't much good against other mages. You have me. I may not be able to see their auras as Jack or Lena could, but I can sense them. Being invisible won't save them if I decide to light them on fire."
Kane nodded, then realized his father wouldn't be able to see it. "I'll remember," he said.
Bells echoed through the streets as men shouted the start of Pollendina's curfew. The secretary had arranged for criers at each major intersection throughout the city. The inspectors complained that the curfew was impossible to enforce in the Blue Quarter, but here in the harbor and in parts of the lower town, people were afraid enough that the streets were already empty.
Except… there was a man, a uniformed guard. He came from a darkened doorway and walked straight toward the warehouse. "Father," Kane whispered, trying to make out the man's features in the gloom.
"I see him," Redden said. "That's our traitor."
"Do we-"
"We wait," Redden said. "He's not alone. Get ready."
Kane took a shuddering breath. Trying to ignore the dizzy sensation he got from moving, he got his feet under him, waited in a squat. He shifted his belt around, trying silently as possible to get his sword ready to draw.
Beside him, his father whispered a rhythmic chant, an incantation to focus and enhance his power. In the street below, the traitor reached the warehouse door, pulled a key from his pockets. Redden chanted faster, finishing just as the man got the door open and stepped inside.
Kane felt the Dispel wash over him. His body reappeared in a flood of sensation, his balance, his perspective, all restored in an instant. He heard shouting in the street, in the warehouse, as the enhanced Dispel spread outward and four men appeared seemingly from nowhere, their own Vanishes stripped away.
"Now!" Redden snarled. "Go, now!"
They hadn't even made it out of the Blue Quarter when the curfew bells sounded. Thad winced, glancing back to where Jack and Lena followed him. Jack glared at him flatly, grumbling.
"Look, I said I was sorry, didn't I?" Thad said.
"Just keep walking," Jack said.
Thad sighed. Perhaps if he could speed them along…? But, no. Coins were one thing, but people were something else. He couldn't control it well enough yet. He was as likely to speed up everything else by mistake, and he would never hear the end of it from Jack if they didn't make it back to the manor until sunrise.
He'd made them late enough already. The sky was slate gray, covered by a thick blanket of cloud that left not a scrap of blue showing. There was a thin mist coming in. The air was sticky with it, the way it was before a storm, but it seemed… wrong somehow. Thad couldn't quite put his finger on it, but it felt to him the way he always felt when he saw lightning on the horizon, in those seconds before he heard the thunder. A counting feeling, a waiting feeling. Like he knew something was coming. Only rain, he told himself.
Aloud, he said, "At least if it rains it won't be so hot."
"It doesn't feel like rain," Lena said. She looked up at the sky, seeming uneasy, clinging to Jack's arm. It was the first time Thad had seen her touch Jack in days, but just at the moment Thad wished she was standing with him instead.
"No," Jack said. "But it does feel like something. Keep moving."
There were still people on the streets here. This part of town normally seemed to view Pollendina's curfew as a suggestion, as though he didn't really mean it for them. But this evening, people seemed to be taking the suggestion seriously. Well-dressed socialites hurried along, looking up at the sky, collars up in expectation of what felt to them like a coming storm.
They were still blocks from the business district. Thad scurried along, looking back often to be sure his friends were keeping up. Instinctively, he reached for the aether to make himself faster, but he recognized the impulse now. He and Jack had been working on that. He fought to keep from touching it, worried about making a mistake, but his mind brushed up against… something.
He stopped where he was. He looked back, but Jack had stopped too. His eyes glowed with a subtle hint of aether as he peered around the street, then he looked at Thad. "You felt it, didn't you?"
Thad nodded.
Lena looked between the two of them. "What is it?" she asked.
Jack shook his head. "I don't know." Gently, he took his arm from her, instead taking her by the hand.
Like he expects to have to run, Thad thought. Like he's afraid. The idea that Jack would be afraid of something stoked Thad's own fear to a blaze.
Lena held out her other hand for him and he went to her side.
Jack nodded as the three of them made an unbroken line. "Stay together," he said. "Thad, keep your aether sight up."
"What am I looking for?" Thad asked.
"I… I'm not sure," Jack said, shaking his head.
Somewhere out in the city, something howled.
Kane ran for the stairwell at the back of the roof, rushing down, taking the last half dozen steps in a flying leap. He ran down the alley, toward the street, keeping a mental picture of where the Vanished men had been standing. One had been… yes, he was still there, looking down at himself in confusion. Kane tackled him at full speed, bore him to the ground, dazed him with an elbow to the head.
He heard running feet: his father's rushing past him toward another target, some of his father's men from within the warehouse rushing out to join the fight. There was shouting, a crash as one of the mages threw a lightning spell before he was taken out.
Kane stood, looking about for another opponent, but the fight was over. One mage lay dead on the ground - the caster of the lightning spell, Kane guessed - two others were being bound and gagged by the soldiers from the West Hills. "Where's the fourth man?" he asked.
"Fled," said the young captain, the man his father called Killian. He pointed up the darkening street. "That way. Should we give chase, my lord?"
"No," Redden said. "Let that one go. I need all of you here." He turned toward the ruckus as the last of his small band of soldiers emerged from the warehouse, hauling the traitor between them. He didn't struggle against his captors as they forced him to his knees in front of Redden. He'd taken a blow to the face, and his eye was rapidly bruising and swelling, but Kane still recognized him.
"Commander Malcolm?" Kane said wonderingly. "Did you know he was the traitor?"
Redden nodded. "I suspected. That's why I chose to watch this warehouse. Why'd you do it, Malcolm?"
The commander sighed, all the fight gone out of him. He seemed completely resigned to his capture. "There's no choice for mages in this city. You're either with them or you're dead."
"You're a mage?" Kane asked.
Malcolm said nothing.
"Your daughter," Redden guessed.
Malcolm nodded solemnly. "I serve them, they leave her be. I had to do it, Carmine. She can't help what she is."
"You could have gone to Leiden," Kane said, disgusted.
"Arthur wouldn't have helped him," Redden said. "Not to protect a black mage. That's what she is, yes?"
Malcolm nodded again.
Redden went on, "But I will. Her safety for your complete cooperation. You have my word."
The fallen commander nodded once more, his eyes squeezed shut. "I always knew I'd be caught eventually. Always wondered. It's almost a relief to have it over. I don't care what happens to me as long as Diana's safe."
"Get him up. Take him inside," Redden said. "Killian, you and Jameson take word to Pollendina. Tell him to send…" He trailed off, head cocked as though he were listening to some distant, half-heard whisper. On the ground nearby, one of the captive mages whimpered.
"My lord?" Killian asked.
"Something's not right," Redden said. "Be ready."
"For what?" Kane asked.
"Anything," Redden said, putting his back to the warehouse, moving closer to its walls.
Kane moved in beside him, sword out. He looked up and down the street, straining to see anything through the darkness. That darkness… had it been that dark a moment ago? Were the shadows thicker than they had been?
He saw movement before he heard the howl. The echoes gave it an inhuman sound, but Kane saw it was only a man, or had once been. Now, it was dead. The creature snarled as it shuffled toward them, slowly, inexorably. Behind him, two others followed, a fog rolling in at their feet as though they were dragging it behind them.
The dead made a straight, halting march toward the two mages, helpless prey. One of them screamed through his gag, his eyes white and rolling with panic as he struggled against his bonds. The other kept his head about him; his eyes lit with a corona and a line of fire flew from him, engulfing the enemy in the lead.
Kane swore as the spell streaked past him. The creature shrieked as it burned, a sound of anger rather than agony, and the other two surged forward, throwing themselves at the bound mage. Redden and the man called Jameson met them head on, swords swinging.
One of the dead fell, its head cleanly separated from its body with no sign of blood. The other went down in a snarling heap, still moving. Jameson stepped forward to strike it again, but another spell, hot and bright, streaked from the mage and fire bloomed up around the thing on the ground.
"Stop!" Redden snapped, grabbing the mage by his collar, shaking him. "Stop it, man! She'll feel it!"
She'll feel it. The words settled over Kane's bones like an ice bath and he knew: the darkness, the fog, she brought them. She was there. He looked into the shadows the dead men had emerged from, his heart pounding a frightened rhythm in his chest, and then she came into view, her tattered red dress glowing like an ember against the encroaching night.
She came forward in a graceful, predatory glide, dragging a limp figure behind her like a child carrying a doll: the mage who had escaped. His eyes were dead and staring, his throat ripped out in a tatter of glistening red.
"Inside!" Redden hissed, grabbing Kane's shoulder and pushing him toward the warehouse door. "Get inside!"
Killian reached down, toward the nearest of the captive mages, and Kane turned back for the other, but Redden's hand on his shoulder dug in, holding him back. "Leave them! It's them she wants!"
"Where is my son?" That voice, her voice, scratched through Kane's senses, piercing him, chilling him, sharp and clear as if she spoke directly into his ear, as if her lips were inches away, as close as a lover's, but those dark, dead eyes were focused on the mages and it was only to them that she spoke.
"You took him. I know you took him. Where… is… heeeee?"
One of the mages, the one who had panicked before, cried, rocking and shaking, breathing heavily as he began to hyperventilate. The other didn't move. He cast no spells now. His eyes were wide, lost. His nostrils flared with his fear. He looked toward the warehouse door, where Kane stood frozen, and Kane could see the plea in those eyes.
This man wasn't evil. Kane knew it as surely as if Lena had been standing beside him, reading the man's soul and whispering what she saw there. He may have been Brotherhood, but he wasn't evil. Maybe he, too, hadn't had a choice, as the commander had said.
The man's eyes stayed on Kane until the woman reached him. She tossed aside the body she carried, reached down, lifted the man from the ground. Kane couldn't look away. His heart thudded painfully in sympathetic fear, even as his father tugged at his shoulder, but he couldn't look away. That man didn't deserve this, Kane thought. Even a dark mage couldn't deserve this.
"Stop!" he cried.
"Kane!" Redden hissed, tugging him harder.
It was too late now. The woman had seen him. "You!" she said, dropping the mage once more. "Son of Titan…"
"No!" Redden screamed, throwing himself in front of Kane.
The woman dissolved into shadow and smoke. The cloud of darkness surged forward, through Redden, past him.
Kane felt pressure against his neck. The woman reappeared in front of him, hand around his throat, lifting him from the ground. He choked as she slammed him against the warehouse wall, his feet dangling.
"You're with them?" she shrieked in fury, in betrayal. "You're with them?"
Kane couldn't think. He couldn't speak. He couldn't breathe.
"Scarlet!" Redden screamed, grabbing her arm, pulling uselessly against it.
The woman turned. Kane struggled against her grip, both of his hands flailing at the one that held him. Her hold didn't let up as she regarded Kane's father.
"That isn't him, Scarlet! It's not Cid!" Redden shouted, his voice desperate.
Father, Kane thought. His father would save him. He couldn't breathe. His vision began to go purple around the edges, a fog far darker than the darkness this woman had brought with her, and her voice now sounded far, far away.
"Redden?"
"Look at him, Scarlet! He's too young!"
The pressure eased, then it was gone. Kane fell, his knees buckling under him as he wheezed. His head began to pound. He saw spots, then the spots cleared away.
He saw her looking at his father now. She spoke again, and her voice changed. The echo, the tenor, faded, so that she sounded like a frightened child. "Redden… Is it really you?"
"It's me," Redden said.
She let out a relieved sob, and then a wail. The wail rose, and the voice rose with it, becoming inhuman and terrible again. She leaped toward Redden, an attack, an embrace, and she faded to smoke as she did so. The smoke flowed over Redden, surrounding him, and when it flowed away up the street, both Redden and the woman were gone.
"No!" Kane croaked, his throat raw. "Father!"
He stumbled up, forcing his legs to move despite the throbbing in his temples.
"Wait!" Killian called, but Kane was already running.
The fog came on them so suddenly that Jack was glad he'd called up his aether sight. As it was, the only thing that kept him from running into buildings was the clear line of criss crossing aether trails showing him where the street was. There were spots here and there where lanterns glowed, but they did nothing to pierce the thick gloom. He held tightly to Lena's hand, keeping her blue aura and Thad's green one fixed in his mind, fearful of losing them both.
Another howl echoed through the streets, closer now, or perhaps the fog only made it seem so. Jack planned to stop at the west gate guardhouse rather than risk the open road to the manor in these conditions, but he had thought to reach the gate by now. Had he taken a wrong turn?
Breathing deeply to calm himself, he searched the aether, but the aether had no street signs. There was nothing in those bright traces of aura to tell him where he was in the city, only that other people had been there often and recently.
"Thad, can you tell where we are?"
"I thought you knew the way?" Thad squeaked.
"I do! That is… I did… I can't see."
Thad looked around. "I can't see either!"
Between them, Lena's breathing was unsteady. Jack struggled to remain calm, hoping that his fear and Thad's together wouldn't overwhelm her. "Alright, calm down," he said to Thad. "We'll ask someone."
He felt his way to the nearest building, to the door, and he knocked, though he could see within moments that no one was inside. His aether sight, enhanced by a dark mage's ability to see other souls, showed him it was empty. The business district, he thought. They'd left the Blue Quarter without him noticing, had reached the part of town that was mostly offices and shops. The businesses would be closed now. It meant they were close to the west gate after all, but it also meant they were unlikely to encounter another soul between here and there.
And yet, the aether moved. It moved as a man did. Something ahead of them, something vaguely man-shaped, moved slowly through the fog. "Lena," he whispered. "Do you see that?"
"I can't see anything," she said hoarsely. "Nothing at all."
It wasn't alive then, Jack thought. Lena would have known if it was alive. "Thad?"
"I see it," Thad said, his voice trembling.
"We avoid it, alright? Creep along this wall, back the other way."
"Alright," Thad said.
Jack let Thad pull them along, keeping his own attention on the thing behind them. It didn't follow.
Thad turned a corner. "I think I know where we are," he said.
"Good. Let's-"
Several streets away, someone screamed, long, loud, utterly terrified. The scream cut off abruptly, but not before it had startled a small cry out of Lena and a foul word from Thad.
"Shh! Quiet!" Jack hissed.
Back the way they'd come, the aether moved toward them, a slow march. It had sensed them.
"Run," Jack hissed, taking the lead.
The thing in the darkness snarled, moving faster than it had before.
Jack ran. He didn't know where he was going, but he ran. He clung to Lena and he ran. The thing lurched after them, snarling, growling. Jack started to turn up another street, to put a building between them and their pursuer, but the aether moved there too. More of them, Jack realized. There were more of them. He turned the other way. Both creatures followed.
He heard other screams. Lena cried out with each one so that Jack wondered what she felt, whose pain and fear, how strongly. He would keep her safe.
He came to a corner he recognized, pulled his friends into the alley there. If they could make it to the end of the alley and turn left… He released Lena's hand, grabbed Thad by both shoulders, looked him in the eyes. "Whatever these things are, we need to be faster than them."
"I can't!" Thad squeaked. "I don't know how! I'll mess up!"
"Try! Please, try!"
The aether moved. It was one of those creatures, a dead man filled with raw aether and twisted into some semblance of life. Jack had known it would be them, but the sudden sight, the horror of it, still jolted him. The creature appeared unexpectedly at the mouth of the alley, steps from them. It snarled, threw itself forward. Lena screamed.
Jack reacted. He shoved her behind him, willing every scrap of his reserves into defending her. Ice formed in front of him with a speed that shifted the air, taking his breath away, a solid wall of cold blocking the alley. It glowed with a faint, blue-white light as the concentrated aether faded.
He could see the creature on the other side, the dead man. It shuffled forward, heedless of the ice in its path, then growled as it bumped into the obstruction, roared as it beat the wall with its unfeeling fists. Cracks formed where its blows landed.
Jack cursed, covering the spot with his hands, pulling more ice from within himself, shoring up the damage as quickly as it appeared. But then another creature arrived, and another, the ones who had followed them catching up at last. They hammered at the wall of ice, tireless and unrelenting. Jack couldn't let go, couldn't move his hands.
"Thad," he said, jaw tight as he strained to keep the spell in place. "Take Lena and run."
"No!" Lena said.
"Don't argue. Just go."
"Jack, you can't fight that many!" Lena said.
He gritted his teeth. "I can buy you time."
"No! There has to be another way!"
"Can you Teleport us?" Thad said.
Jack cursed. "I could have, if I hadn't done this first." He jerked his head toward the ice wall as the beasts on the other side pounded it in fury. Why hadn't he thought of Teleport? Why hadn't he used the raw aether instead of his reserves? The thought that all three of them could die because he wasn't a good enough dark mage…
Except… he was a dark mage. He was meant to use the raw aether. Teleport could be done with the raw aether - Matoya had done it. He'd seen it. Could he do it?
He scanned the aether, his attention split by the wall, the beasts, the need to protect what was his. Seeking something, some piece of aether, some trace of aura from elsewhere, from away...
There.
It was small. Too small for all three of them.
"I can get you out," he said.
"Jack, no!" Lena said.
"Hold on to her," he said to Thad. "I don't know where you'll end up."
"Jack!" Lena said again, lunging toward him, hands grasping.
Thad threw his arms around her middle, clung to her.
Jack formed the spell.
She called his name again, an anguished sound that faded into the fog as she disappeared.
Her feet jolted under her, finding new ground, as if reality were merely surf shifting sand beneath her. Her belly clenched as her body rebalanced. In her soul sight, the after-image of Jack's bright blue aura was all that was left of him. Gone… he was gone!
"No!" she said aloud.
Thad squeezed her, quickly, a tight hug, almost reassuring except that his fear nipped at her edges. "We have to go!" he said, grabbing her hand, pulling her.
She stood firm, unmoving, unwilling to take a step without Jack… but it was no use. She didn't know where Jack was. "Go where?" she asked.
"This way! To the ship! We're in the harbor - I know where we are!" Thad said, pulling her roughly by the hand. "Come on!"
She could feel it now that he mentioned it. She could sense the sea. There was life out there: fish, people, the pull of the water. She couldn't sense anything else in this accursed fog, but she felt the call of the sea.
She ran, letting Thad guide her, their feet squelching in the muddy streets until they came to the wooden planks of the docks. She could make out the edges of buildings as they passed, vague shapes in the mists. Sometimes Thad would turn toward a street and then suddenly veer away, as though he'd seen something, but even with her soul sight active, Lena could see nothing, only Thad's green aura quivering in scarcely suppressed fear.
She could hear things, though: shouting, fighting, the silken whisper of swords. She saw another aura, one she didn't recognize, but it was someone alive out there. "Wait!" she said, pulling at Thad's hand.
But then there was a scream and the aura winked out. "Nu-uh," Thad said, pulling her away again. "Not that way!"
They came to another cross street. Thad aimed to their left, but then skidded to a stop, veering right instead before he stopped again. His breath caught. He looked back the way they came, his eyes wide with fear. "We're surrounded!" he said.
A figure lurched out of the shadows ahead of them. Lena tried to put herself between Thad and the thing, but Thad shoved in front of her. "No!" he said. "I'm supposed to guard you!" His hands shook as he drew his little sword, facing the figure down. Lena felt his terror.
And then the shadowed figure came within view and her own terror reached an unbearable peak. It was a man, but he wasn't alive: he had no aura, no soul that her soul sight could detect. It reached for them with only one arm, the other ripped off at the shoulder leaving a massive hole, half its rib cage showing through the tattered skin, the blood-stained remains of a shirt. No one could have survived such an injury. This was necromancy.
The unnatural creature stumbled toward them with malice in its glazed eyes, a gurgling moan issuing from its lips. Lena screamed.
Kane ran. That fog, that cloud, shifted and billowed ahead of him, soaring on wings of shadow. Kane's feet pounded beneath him, his breath coming in heaving gulps through his injured throat, but he pushed on, pushed on, until he couldn't keep up with it anymore. He stopped short, peering into the darkness as the fog grew thicker still and the cloud of smoke that had once been Scarlet Carmine blended seamlessly into it.
He roared, slamming his fist into the wall beside him, letting the pain wash up his arm and give him an outlet for his frustration. The fog brought his own voice back to him, dispersed and thin as the lamplight on the nearest corner.
Killian stopped beside him, placed a cautious hand on his shoulder. "My lord! You have to turn back. The others-"
"Screw the others!" Kane shouted. "If they're all so loyal, why were you the only one who followed me?"
Killian's eyes narrowed. "We had our orders."
"You're meant to serve my father!"
"We serve your father's house," Killian said. "Your house. Not your father. Our orders were to secure the traitor."
"Then go back to him and let me get on with it!" Kane said, striding up the street again, though he didn't know where he was going now. Forward, he thought. Just keep going forward.
"I can't let you go alone!" Killian said, hurrying after him, grabbing his shoulder again just where Redden had grabbed it trying to pull him into the warehouse. "My lord, please-"
"Stop with the 'my lord's already!" Kane snapped, trying to shake him off. "I'm not my father!"
"But you are his heir," Killian said, his grip tenacious.
"What difference does that make?" Kane shouted.
"I should think it was obvious!" Killian exclaimed. "You're the heir to his house! The Carmine house! The West Hills are yours!"
"What?" Kane stopped so suddenly that Killian ran into him. "No! My father renounced his claim to the title!"
"He can't," Killian said, rolling his eyes. "Melmond law doesn't work that way. Unless your grandfather produces another legitimate heir, if your father dies, the title's yours!"
"No," Kane said, but the words pierced his heart. "The title's yours…" Everything I ever wanted… "No!" he shouted. He couldn't think about it, not now. He had to focus.
"My lord, please! I can't let you risk-"
"You listen to me!" Kane shouted. "I don't care! I don't care half a gil about your laws and titles. I care about my father! Now, either you're with me in this or you can-"
A flash of movement, a snarl, was the only warning he had before a creature in the darkness launched itself at them. Kane got his sword up and around before Killian could even turn toward the noise. He wouldn't be fast enough - neither of them were fast enough…
But with a snap and a spark, the beast caught fire and fell shrieking at their feet, writhing against the flames. Kane peered through the darkness as a man holding fire in his hands came into view.
It was the mage from the warehouse, the one Kane had saved by shouting, the one Killian's men had tied up before. The rope was still around his wrists, but burnt in half and dangling. The man was older than Kane, somewhere in his twenties, thin and rangy, face dark with stubble, eyes glowing red.
Killian surged forward, sword ready. The mage raised his hands in surrender, the little flame he carried winking out. "Stop!" Kane shouted, amazed when Killian obeyed.
"He's one of them!" Killian snarled.
"He could have killed us twice over," Kane said. "That spell - he could as easily have used it against us. Isn't that so?"
The mage nodded.
"What do you want?" Kane asked.
"I can help you," the man said. "Please."
"Why should we trust you?" Killian asked. "Who are you?"
The mage stood, unmoving, hands raised, but despite the thick mists that surrounded them, Kane could see the haunted expression in the man's eyes. "Someone with a lot of atoning to do."
"Can you track my father?" Kane asked. "You can read the aether, can't you? Can you follow his aura through this?"
The mage nodded again. "I can."
"Alright," Kane said. "Then I want you to take me to-" He stopped when he heard the scream, high and shrill and nearby. He knew that scream. Even warped by terror, he would have recognized that voice anywhere. "Her!" he shouted. "Take me to her! That voice! Now!"
The cold was seeping through his gloves, into his arms. Jack shivered, but he couldn't move his hands. As he watched, the beasts pounded his icy defenses yet again, sending a line of cracks spider webbing out in frost-like patterns. He snatched at the aether, reinforcing the wall, but cursed as he did it wrong again.
My reserves, he thought, berating himself. Why do I always reach for my reserves? They wouldn't last much longer, he knew. He'd tried to use the raw aether for this, but he'd instinctively drawn the ice from within. Even now, in this desperate struggle, his soul pulled it from within.
He shivered. Gods, but he was freezing. The dead hammered at the wall, unphased by the cold. Jack looked over his shoulder, up the alley. No, his reserves wouldn't last much longer. He would have to make a break for it. If he could get to the end of the alley before the things broke the wall down…
He cursed as another of the things entered the alley behind him. It shuffled toward him in slow, limping steps, dragging one leg slightly. It fixed one white, cloudy eye on him, the other a mass of red like a crushed fruit.
I refuse to die here, he thought to whatever gods were listening. Do you hear me? I refuse. He turned, leaning his shoulders against the ice, reinforcing it with the last scrap of his reserves. Hands free, he drew his sword, held it in front of him as he searched the aether for the essence of fire.
His sword burst into a sputtering red flame. It was small, but yet... I can work with that, he thought. He stoked it with his will, watched it shift from red to yellow to a near-invisible blue. The blade glowed. The creatures behind him roared their tortured rage, slamming into the wall. The one at the end of the alley growled as it continued toward him, stumbling in its crooked gait.
Jack took a deep breath, muttered a prayer to Ramuh, and charged the thing, sword held high. He heard the ice cracking behind him, once, twice. On the third crack, he heard it shatter. He didn't look back.
Lena screamed, clutching at Thadius, trying to pull him back. He was so scared! And the beast was so close. She cast Protect, but there was nothing else - nothing! - she could do.
And then, in a yellow flash, an armored man rushed in behind the thing. With a shout that was almost a roar, he swung a sword, slicing deep into the thing's open shoulder. The creature fell, cut in two.
"Kane!" Thad cried, and Lena could see that it was the guardsman's pale yellow aura shining like a beacon against the fog.
"What are you two doing here?" Kane asked, breathing hard as two other men fell into defensive positions behind him, facing out into the mists. "You're halfway through the harbor!"
Lena couldn't speak, the fear that she felt from him and Thad and those other men catching in her throat.
Thad's fear didn't stop him from speaking for her. "We lost Jack! He's still out there!"
"Where?" Kane said.
"Fifth and Sunrise, near the moneylender's."
Kane swore. "We'll find him," he said. He looked at one of the men, a strange figure in a dark robe, and Lena realized with a start that he was a mage. "Can you get us there?"
The other man, a Melmond soldier, shook his head. "My lord, please, he's only a-"
Kane snapped, "If you say 'bastard', I'll kick your teeth in." He looked expectantly at the mage, who nodded.
"I can get us there. This way." He raised his hand, held aloft a ball of flame to light their way. As he did so, the other man, the soldier, raised his sword, cutting down another of those beasts in the darkness, one Lena hadn't even seen coming.
"Stay close to me!" Kane said, following after them.
Thad shouted, "On your left!"
Kane turned without hesitation, striking out just as another of the undead launched itself at him. He cut it down just as easily as he had the first, his teeth bared in a snarl.
Before it had even hit the ground, Thad called, "Another!"
Kane attacked as Thad directed, his trust in the boy absolute. Ahead of them, the strange mage and the Melmond soldier worked similarly as a team, clearing a path, the mage calling out directions to guide the soldier's blade.
Soon, the dead stopped coming. Lena and the boys ran, crossing several streets, whole city blocks, without encountering another foe. "Are they gone?" Lena asked. "Have you beaten them all?"
The mage shook his head. "No, they're still out there. There's some other mage - a strong one - throwing spells about. If we keep our heads down, they'll go for him and leave us alone."
Kane looked at Lena, eyes wide, but she'd realized it too. "Jack!" she said.
The soldier grabbed Kane's arm. "Wait! You mean to tell me the bastard's a… Aw, hell!"
"Jack! We're coming!" Kane called. "Where?" he asked the other mage.
"You're insane! There's half a dozen of those things moving on him!"
"Where?" Kane repeated.
The mage spat an oath. "This way."
Rushing, flying, the air surging past him, Redden lost all sense of direction. There was only movement, only speed, but then there was direction, and that direction was down. He fell out of the shadows, perhaps three feet, and landed with a pained cry, squelching into mud that unfortunately did little to soften the blow.
Scarlet appeared in front of him, coalescing like a vision in a scrying bowl. Her back was to him. She stood for a moment, head cocked, then walked forward in halting, uncertain steps.
"Scarlet!" he called. "Wait!"
She turned, startled, eyes angry, but she made no move toward him. "Redden?" she said, and it was clear to him she'd forgotten he was there.
"You don't have to do this, Scarlet!" he said.
She stared at him, but didn't move. The longer she stood there, the thicker the fog became. Redden took stock of his surroundings while he still could, realized he was still in the harbor district but they'd moved closer to the White Quarter, to what had become her normal hunting ground. "I was looking for something…" she said.
Redden shook his head. "You're confused! They've broken your mind!"
"They…" she hissed, her voice edging into strange harmonies once again. "They. Took. My. Son." Her outline grew hazy, blending into the night.
"Scarlet, no! Wait!"
"Where is my son?" she cried, the cry fading rapidly. She was gone.
Redden, still on the ground where he'd landed, rolled painfully onto his side. He'd made it to his knees before he heard the thrum of running feet. "It's Lord Carmine!" someone shouted.
Uniformed inspectors surrounded him, Pollendina at their lead. That was why this place had looked so familiar; another of the warehouses was over this way. The traitor, the trap… Redden had nearly forgotten what he was doing out there in the first place. "What happened?" the secretary asked.
"The vampire," Redden said.
"Are you injured?"
"No," he snapped, shaking free of the hands that helped him up. No, he wasn't hurt, but she was. She was still in there - he'd seen that. If he could reach her…
He extended his senses into the aether. Her aura was pale, faded, but it had still been her aura. He closed his eyes, broadened his mind. There was magic there, someone casting spells far, far to the west. That was where she was going, looking for mages. She would kill them if she found them.
Good riddance, Redden thought, swiftly rebuking himself. Not all mages were evil. He himself was a mage. Thad. Jack.
Jack…
He wouldn't be out after curfew, would he? Concentrating, Redden sent his senses into the aether again, focused on those distant spells, focused on identifying them.
He recognized his own spellblade technique. "Gods damn it!" he swore, taking off at a run. Pollendina cried out in alarm then ordered his men to follow.
Lena ran, keeping the strange mage's smoky rose aura ahead of her, along with Thad's green one, the soldier's darker green, and Kane's starlit yellow. Soon, she heard more fighting, the sounds of it echoing in the fog so that she couldn't tell where it was coming from, but then there was a light ahead of them: a sword of steady blue flame, and with it, a blue aura, bright and broken.
"Jack!" Kane called, rushing forward, defending Jack's flank just as one of the beasts made it past his guard. The Melmond soldier fell in on Jack's other side slicing at two more of the creatures. The mage followed, raising one hand over his head, snapping his fingers. At his snap, fire engulfed another two of the dead men.
It was over.
Jack lowered his sword, breathing heavily. He pulled his scarf down, gulped a deep breath, then he turned to Lena, eyes lit by a corona of the same fire that danced along his blade. He opened his arms to her and she threw herself into them, choking back a sob.
"I told you to run," he said, but he held her tightly.
"There was nowhere to go!" Thad said. "If Kane hadn't found us…"
Kane clapped Jack's shoulder and the two exchanged a wordless look over Lena's head, then Jack turned to the other mage. "You have my thanks," he said, looking the the man up and down, taking in his black robes. "Dark mage?" he said, raising an eyebrow.
The man shook his head. "Black." He turned, looking up the street.
Jack looked too.
"What is it?" Kane asked.
"Something's coming," Jack said, his grip on Lena growing tighter.
"It's her," the other mage said.
"Who?" Lena asked.
Kane swore. He turned to Jack. "Can you make my sword do that?"
Jack closed his eyes, making a sign with his hand against Lena's back. With a muffled "whump", Kane's sword caught alight, as did the soldier's. Jack said, "I can't hold that for long."
The soldier cried out, staring wide-eyed at the blade. "You really are a mage!"
"Is that a problem, Killian?" Kane asked, though his tone suggested there was only one right answer.
Killian composed himself, sword held firm. "I told you. I serve your house. As long as he's a Carmine, I don't care what he is."
"She's here," the other mage said.
Jack gave Lena one last squeeze, then coaxed her back beside Thad. He and Kane and the other two closed ranks, facing the end of the street. In the narrow space between them, Lena could see the woman in the red dress, the witch of the White Quarter just as Kane had described her. She glided toward them, her feet hardly seeming to move, as though she floated just above the street.
"Where…" the witch hissed.
Lena clutched her stomach. A wave of sickness flowed over her with that voice. She could feel it. This woman was dead, but her emotions… her emotions were still alive. No mind, no soul, only pure, raw feeling. And what she felt was loss. Rage. A cold, seething, all-consuming anger.
"Where. Is. My. Son?" the witch shouted.
Lena fell to her knees, hands flying to her ears, but she couldn't block out that voice.
It seemed Jack couldn't either. He staggered. The flaming swords sputtered. Jack's blade shook before him, his arms trembling. Lena felt his concentration as he tried to hold the flame. How tired he was, how hard he must have had to fight to survive until she could find him again.
She had to help him. She tried to cast Cure, but it was only then Lena realized how tired she was herself. Exhaustion and terror dulled her abilities until forming the simple spell became as difficult as tying a ribbon inside of a sack.
"Your son died!" Kane said. "It was a robbery, more than a year ago!"
"No!" the woman screamed. "No, Cid! They took him! The mages took him!" She turned her gaze on Jack. "Where is he, mage? Where is my son?"
Jack shook his head. Lena felt his concentration intensify, the buzz of it, just as she often had when she watched him study. She saw the flame dance on the edge of his blade, growing weaker. She focused on her own spell, on the Cure he needed.
It worked. Jack stood straighter as her spell hit him. The fire brightened, grew, until Lena could feel the heat of it. The other mage turned, regarding Lena with wide eyes, but Kane and the soldier swung into action, slashing at the woman.
The woman stepped smoothly out of the way. "White mage?" the witch cried. "White mage?" She melted into smoke, and the smoke flowed quickly. Jack and Kane both swiped at it, but even Jack's fire had no effect. The woman reformed behind them, knocking them forward with one easy swipe of her arm. Jack's sword clattered from his hand and the three blades went out.
The vampire turned on Lena then, grabbed her shoulders, shook her. "Why would you help them?" the woman asked. "Why?"
Lena screamed. The woman's touch burned. She could feel the twisted spells that formed her, could feel the evil of them. She screamed, but she couldn't get away.
Fire bloomed in the woman's face. "Let her go!" a man cried. It was the mage, the other one, the stranger.
The woman screamed in rage, but the stranger cast again, and again. The woman charged him, slashed him across the chest with her cruel claws, so hard that he flew into the nearest building with a crash. She faced him, screaming wordlessly, her skin smoking as it healed on its own.
"Scarlet! Scarlet, stop this!"
The woman turned at the sound of Redden's voice. He stood just up the street from them, surrounded by a small army of Pollendina's inspectors. The thin secretary stood to his left, holding a thin-bladed weapon of his own.
"Redden?" the woman said.
"It wasn't your fault, Scarlet. None of it was your fault! I know that!"
The emotion changed. The woman, Scarlet, was so… lost… Lena sobbed. She sobbed so hard she couldn't breathe.
"Redden… Why… why am I so angry? Why?"
Lena couldn't breathe. It hurt. It hurt so much.
"You're dead, Scarlet," Redden said. Lena didn't have to see the tears in his eyes. She felt them. "Those men… they killed you. I'm sorry."
"They… killed me…" The words squeezed around Lena's heart as if she herself had died, but the pain grew and grew. The woman wailed, "They killed my son!"
"I'm so sorry," Redden said.
The woman looked down at her own hand, at her terrible long nails, so very like claws. Lena felt the moment she realized what she had become, the shame, the loss, hard emotions, painful emotions. But then, more beautiful and painful than all of them, came another. "They killed… my son…" the woman wept. "I loved him. I remember… I loved him…"
Lena sobbed. She sobbed as the witch of the White Quarter began to glow. White magic came from love… Lena could see it. It was Cure, but not quite. The woman screamed, in pain, in grief. She covered her face in her hands. Black smoke rose beneath her touch, the glow of her own white magic surrounding her, burning her. She screamed, and Lena wept.
Then the screaming stopped. The pain and grief stopped, but the love remained. Even as her body fell, the love remained. The woman who had once been named Scarlet looked normal, and human, and not burned at all, and the love remained.
Lena wept.
"Shh," Jack whispered, gathering her up. She hadn't noticed him crawling over to her. "I'm here," he said. "I have you." His arms surrounded her, but still she wept.
Kane was there as well, on her other side, and Thadius. The three of them held her, and she wept.
Her crying faded, stopped. Kane touched her face, concerned, but Jack whispered, "I made her sleep."
Kane nodded. "Likely for the best."
He stood, looking for his father. Redden stood over the body of Scarlet Carmine, his face lined with grief. Kane went to him, glad to see he was still alive, but he fought off the urge to embrace the man. Now wasn't the time.
"I hated her," Redden said. "All these years, I hated her."
"You didn't wish this on her," Pollendina said, beside him.
"No," Redden said. "But it happened nonetheless."
"My lord Carmine!" Killian called. "He needs white magic!"
Redden turned, and in no more time than it took him to turn, his face had become an emotionless mask. He hurried to the soldier's side, knelt over the fallen black mage who had tried to save Lena.
He was covered in blood. Those terrible claws had laid him open. One of his arms was twisted and broken from his fall. He breathed rapidly, shallowly, and with clear difficulty.
Redden bent over him, hands glowing, then sat back, shaking his head. "It's too late."
Kane swore, taking his father's place beside the mage. "Damn it!" he said. "Damn it, no! You only just got free of them. You said you had atoning to do, remember?"
The mage sputtered. "She… safe? White m… m…"
"She's safe," Kane said. "You saved her."
He smiled weakly, his face pale. "To build… to guide… to… guard… but n… never to… harm…"
"You guarded her," Kane said, clasping the man's hand. "You did."
"In service… of… Life…"
"I never even asked your name," Kane said.
The man said nothing else. After a moment, Killian reached over and closed the man's eyes. Kane and the soldier looked at each other, then both stood, leaving the body behind.
Pollendina's inspectors spread out, checking over the area. It was full dark now, but the fog was gone. Several of the men had lanterns, and there were street lamps nearby. Pollendina asked both Kane and Redden about the events at the warehouse, but when he heard they had captured none other than Commander Malcolm, he stopped them, waving toward some of his inspectors, barking orders. "Send a runner!" he said. "Tell his lordship. And get Merrill in here. We'll need reinforcements from the house. Go!"
The inspectors nodded sharply and ran off, some to the warehouse where Kane and Redden had captured the commander, some to the other two warehouses that had been guarded by Orin and by a sailor named Bayard. Pollendina watched them go, then turned to Redden. "You needn't stay," he said, his voice kindly.
"The body," Redden said.
"I'll deal with the bodies," the secretary said. "All of them."
Redden nodded and motioned Kane ahead of him. They returned to Jack and Thad. Kane offered to carry Lena, but Jack was determined to do it himself. "When you get tired," Kane said.
"I won't," said Jack.
They'd only gone a few steps when one of the inspectors ran up to them, a man Kane recognized as one of the secretary's runners.
"My lord!" the runner said panting. "My lord, I've just come from the dockside warehouse. The vampire…" He stopped to catch his breath.
"Out with it, man!" Redden said.
The runner nodded. "My lord, the vampire, she struck there first, before she fought with you at the south row."
"What happened?" Redden demanded.
"Lord Orin was injured in the fight," the runner said.
"No!" Thad cried. "Where is he?"
"They're taking him to the manor as we speak. We've sent for potions, but he may need healing."
"I'm on my way," Redden said.
"Come on," Kane said, pushing Thad ahead of him. "Let's…"
His eyes landed on one of the dead, motionless now that their mistress had been defeated. A young man, skin as pale in death as his white-blond hair. The thin scar on his temple was nearly invisible against that pale skin.
"What is it?" Jack said, craning to see around Kane. "Oh… Oh, gods…" he said, burying his face in Lena's hair. "Is that…?
"Yes," Kane said. "It's Cole."
Author's Note: 9/7/18 - This chapter (which I've been thinking of as "the fog fight" all this time) was another one of those that I couldn't wait to get to. I could picture it all so clearly in my head: Lena blindly following Jack and Thad through the fog without the aid of aether sight, Kane appearing at the last second to save Thad and Lena, Jack just visible through the gloom as only a pair of glowing eyes and a flaming sword… I sincerely hope you enjoyed it.
I'd like to take a moment to thank all the people who left such lovely comments after my last update. It may seem a small thing, but your words really brighten my days. Slowly but surely, I'm feeling better.