Henry patted down the pocket of the gate guard in a friendly manner. Feeling the shape of the crystal he had inserted there, the soldier saluted smartly and resumed his patrol, certainly not seeing a high-ranking Mage entering a restricted area.

The descent into the cellar led to a sloping set of stone stairs carved from volcanic rhyolite, the old bedrock of the city, and it led into the uncertain darkness.

“Sufina,” Henry called, and the Dryad materialised beside him.

“Liz is down here?” She asked.

“Yes.”

Henry had always refrained from summoning Sufina while Elizabeth was present. Though they are both dear to Henry, the two of them shared an antagonistic relationship. Sufina loathed supplying Elizabeth with her vitality, performing her duty only to protect and please Henry. Elizabeth did not like the way the Dryad acted possessively over her husband.

“What do you think she’s doing here?”

“Looking for vintage wine… I hope… ” Henry replied. “Let’s go.”

The cellar was extensive, spreading from the Rácz Gate to the Hatvan Gate, spanning over four kilometres. Toward the cross-road section lay the most impressive part of its medieval architecture, a seven by seven bisect of pillars. As a result, the chess table shadows cast by the lights made the intersection impossible to navigate by sight.

Sufina tracked the surroundings carefully, possessing a natural talent for finding signs of human passage.

“Here, this way…”

They arrived at a flooded section. A knee-deep layer of water permeated the ancient stonework.

“Are you certain?”

“I am.”

“Water Walk!”

Henry stepped over the stale water as though it were flat ground. He made it to the other side, then brought over Sufina with her Faery Lights. The signs of human passage were now visible; there were splotches of water here and there. Further in, he found a pair of abandoned sandals, too caked with dirt and mud to be useful. They belonged to his wife. He was close.

The duo proceeded down an unexcavated corridor for half a kilometre, finally arriving at a junction.

“Which way?”

Sufina tasted the atmosphere for the scent of sweat and human odour. Elizabeth was fond of sweet and fruity perfumes.

"She's-"

“Aaaeeeeeaegh!” A cry resonated through the tunnels, a female voice, hysterical with pain and panic.

“That way…” Sufina stated worriedly. Henry was moving before she had even finished.

“Long Stride!” The Magister intoned, suddenly moving like a man shot from a ballista. Sufina followed, extending her legs to match Henry’s supernatural speed.

They arrived at a chamber well lit by low candles, hundreds of them forming a cathedral. It looked to be an old shrine: the ceiling was arched, the chamber's sides carved from the volcanic rock. His wife was there, but she was not alone. It was apparent by now that Elizabeth was not seeking out lost caskets of Hungarian Merlot.

“Lizzy… “ Henry sucked in his breath, swallowing nervously, his hands trembling as he spoke. “What… what are you doing?”

Elizabeth was arm-deep inside the poor lass, her elbow protruding from a cavity just below her chest. She had a maniacal look in her eye, the very same look that Henry had seen on her face in the heat of battle, her pupils were dilated, pushing apart the baby blue of her iris. Her expression was euphoric, as though she was in the midst of a pleasant midsummer dream. A pool of gore had collected underneath her, staining her white dress a deep carmine, the tulip edge had been tainted garnet, turning the chiffon into bloody gauze.

The woman, a stranger, looked at Henry with pleading eyes.

Elizabeth tilted her head, her pupils retracting as they focused on her husband. Coyly, she put on the expression of a naughty little girl caught taking extra candy from the jar. With agonising slowness, she withdrew her hand, sliding it from the gasping girl as if drawing a sword from a bloody sheath.

“Sufina!”

The dryad shot towards Elizabeth and caught the girl, injecting a jolt of positive energy. The girl gasped, her eyes glazed over with a moment of hope, then laid still. Sufina looked up angrily at Elizabeth before turning to Henry, shaking her head slightly.

“Elizabeth… answer me. What are you doing here? Why-why this?”

Elizabeth looked as though she wanted to think of an excuse - but ultimately couldn’t summon the mental effort to do so.

“I was hungry,” she confessed quietly, her voice wet with desire in the darkness. “The desserts weren’t enough, Henry. You should have brought extra servings.”

“You’re not yourself,” Henry carefully moved toward her. “Who's... the girl?”

Elizabeth didn’t answer him. Instead, she lifted her dress and wiped her arm with the hem. It did nothing, for the blood was well congealed, set deep into the creases of her elbow, her fingers, the space between her nails.

“Do you hate me now? Henry?”

“How can I?” Henry said earnestly. “You need help.”

“Do I?” Elizabeth lifted her arms above her head elegantly, spinning on her back foot and moving towards Henry like a red-rimmed flower. There was something dangerously sensual about her.

“We’ll get you help…” Henry caught Elizabeth as she spun into his arms.

“Only if you kiss me,” she said, her lips parting.

Henry held his wife and felt his heart bleed all over. His mind was blank. For once in his life, he had no idea what to do. He had thought her getting better, healing, moving away from war. She was happy at the vineyard, wasn’t she? Didn’t they have a slice of paradise there? Wasn’t that enough?

He leaned in to kiss her. What could he do? He would have to get her help. Perhaps an asylum? No. Mayhap his old contacts at the Lyceum in Greece could help her. They had the world’s best healers there, surely somebody would know.

“Henry! No!”

Sufina’s cry jolted him from the lulling kiss. Henry felt a sharp pain entering his chest, easily bypassing his ribs and cutting into his lungs. Instantly, his body grew cold, all warmth stifled by the hand that now grasped his heart. He coughed - arterial blood sprayed from his lips, speckling Elizabeth’s white face with crimson blossoms.

Sufina transformed into her battle form. Her smooth wooden skin turned cruel with barbs and thorns, her face growing grotesque with a feral madness. Tendrils of ironwood formed into deadly arrows.

Elizabeth spun, still holding Henry, a rag-doll shield propped against Sufina’s retaliation. Immediately, the tendrils turned to soft vines, wrapping around Henry’s arms and legs, pulling him away from Elizabeth.

There was a sound of flesh tearing.

Sufina poured her life-force into its Master, though the Magister's world had already grown dark.

“Master…” Gwen felt her heart jolt when Henry stopped his story to take yet another sip of Sufina’s mead.

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“I am not Undead if that’s what you’re thinking,” Henry spoke with a tone of understated mirth. “I survived thanks to Sufina.”

Gwen shifted her attention to Sufina, her bark-like skin alternatively dark olive with light pine highlights, her face an exquisite art sculpture.

“Are you tired, Henry?” Sufina enquired worriedly.

“It’s fine… it’s fine. There’s a little more of the tale to go.”

The Magister continued.

“When I came to, I had no idea what to do. Was Elizabeth glamoured? Was she taken over by some treacherous spirit? How could my wife, the woman I loved, turn into such a monster? As I made my way through that cellar, I found more … evidence of her work. She had been taking people down here: mostly young Mages, sometimes NoMs. Mostly women, a few young men…”

“I had to find Elizabeth quickly. God knows what she was up to, what she could be doing in that state of mind. I called in help. There were only three other people in the world who knew the truth in its entirety, who cared enough about Elizabeth to want to help me save her…”

Henry surveyed the gathering around him.
Mark shot him a half-smile from behind the still shimmering Death’s Orb.
Agnes took on an expression of melancholy.
Surya crossed his arms and stared into the middle distance.
Gwen and Debora held one another's hands, their chests rising and falling arrhythmically.

“It took a few days to gather them. Thankfully, Elizabeth hadn’t gotten far. I pursued her each time she tried to rest, wearing her out, hoping she would come to her senses. The old party and I tracked Elizabeth across half of Hungary to Gyula, near the Romanian Border. Her killings went unabated the entire time, and she was beginning to earn a name for herself: 'The Bloody Countess'. Here was the old country; the peasantry was still superstitious. We were lucky that they had thought her a Nosferatu, a vampyre; for the alternative would have made things much more complicated.”

“We followed her bloody crumbs… She was becoming insatiable. There was only one death in the first town we reached, by the tenth, it was by scores of five or six, sometimes grotesquely arranged in some horrid ritual. We trudged on, Mark using a combination of Divination and Scry to try to locate where she could be, where she headed.”

“Finally… we found her by the Gyulai vár, the abandoned castle…”

“Arrghk! “

Mark staggered against the wall, one hand placed over his left eye. A trickle of blood appeared between his fingers.

“Mark!” Agnes touched his convulsing shoulders. The Diviner raised his free hand, indicating that he was alright.

“She knows we’re here. I’ve lost my Arcane Eye.”

“Sufina.” Henry motioned. “Tend to Mark. Where is she now?”

“North Tower,” Mark replied, allowing Sufina to mend his bleeding eye, restoring some vision to an otherwise swollen mess. The psychic feedback from the sudden dispel had shocked his optic senses, rupturing a few blood vessels, there was likely permanent damage. “She’s weak. I think we’ve harassed her enough. Made her use up too much vitality.”

“Let's not waste any time then,” Henry stated coldly. “Surya, do it.”

Surya produced several accessories the size of fingernails, each imbued with a diamond the size of a quail egg. Upon closer inspection, the crystalline forms were not mineral diamonds, but scintillating mana cores of some celestial creature cut and carved with brilliant facets. Surya felt the weight of the Creature Cores in his hand, their mass betraying their form. These were the Heart of Archons, each priceless on its own, carved and inscribed to shield against all types of negative energy. In the old days, Henry had them made to ward against Elizabeth’s careless AOEs. Surya affixed the accessories to their chests, then uttered the activation keywords. In the next instant, their bodies began shedding a dull glow.

“Think we’ll corner her this time?” Agnes asked carefully.

“There shouldn't be a single human soul around here for kilometres,” Mark replied for Henry. “Not after we told them the Vampire was holed up in the castle. She’s exhausted and has nothing to drain from, nows the time.”

Agnes again attempted to read their friend and leader's expression - but saw nothing but fatigue and misery.

“Let's buff up.”

“Mass Flight!”
“Iron Skin!”
“True Seeing.”

“Sufina, get started.”

A mass of vines sprouted from the Dyrad, spreading out as crawling tendrils up the walls of the castle and toward the North Tower. They watched as she encased the exterior in less than a minute.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Henry?” Agnes asked, her own eyes heavy with the accumulated stress of an oppressive conscience.

Surya’s face was a mask of raw emotions with nothing to hide.

Mark’s wore his usual calm and collected poker face.

In contrast, Henry’s stoic apathy sent shivers down her spine. She knew just how much he had loved his 'Lillybird', how much he had sacrificed for her. His sterling career, his fortune, a decade of his life, the prime of a Mage’s prowess, all given to the woman he loved so that she could feel happy and without want.

But the events of the last few months had made that dream stillborn. The crew had seen so much carnage while in pursuit of the 'Bloody Countess'; there was no coming back from that.

Elizabeth was mad, that was without question, but Agnes couldn’t help but wonder how much of it was the magic taking over, and how much of it was herself.

Henry's wife had been a slim, shy girl with brilliant eyes and a face made for portraits. She wore white dresses and liked to show off her slender, white legs. Lizzy had been a sister, a friend, a comrade. If Agnes felt such heart-wrenching guilt for what was inevitably to come, then what malevolent storms must be churning within Henry’s heart?

“Telepathic Bond!”

Agnes’s internal rumination was cut off by the sudden intrusion of thoughts from others, silenced at once by the activation of the shared spell. She whipped around to see Mark watching at them with that poker face of his. The Divination staple was an essential battlefield boon, but also served as a potential source of annoyance as it unwittingly shared strong emotions. The moment their mind’s had connected, Agnes had distinctly felt Henry’s doubt, distress, and misery. Her face flushed, Mark should have also sensed it, but the man's man was as cold as ice.

“You should have warned me,” she said, displeased, turning away from him.

“Sorry, I am a little tense,” Mark replied.

Their thoughts now connected, the group moved out.

Henry took the stairs, Sufina’s barbed vines sealing every passage as they went. Surya and Agnes took the outside: Surya made his way up the tower with Spider Climb, marking the window; Agnes encircled the same tower from a safe distance. Mark remained below, safely managing the flow of thoughts and information, feeding them the location and action of Elizabeth with Clairvoyance.

Henry entered the tower, making known his progress via means of mental commands. The other two were in position. Surya paused just outside the window of the tower, perched against the stonework of the old Ottoman fort. Agnes hovered on the other side, her body charged with motes of fire, ready to do her worst.

To Henry’s surprise, the ancient door, an iron-banded wooden relic, was unlocked. He pushed it open, his eyes adjusting to the silhouettes of light and shadow within.

There was a woman in a torn, white dress lying against a bleak and rusty facade. The smell of iron was heavy in the air. Henry had found his wife, the fabled Bloody Countess.

Elizabeth’s slim legs extended from beneath her soiled dress, bare but for dark stains of clotting blood that ran between her once white thighs. A trail of blood that led to Elizabeth, pooling underneath her like dark sangria.

Her face had always been frail and pale. But now it was ghostly, ethereal. Like a marionette with slack strings, she forced her head up. Underneath her dark locks were her eyes, the hue of baby blue untouched even by the state of her physical trauma.

“You came.” Elizabeth affected a warm smile on her cold lips. “I tried to save him you know. Or perhaps it was a she. I know you preferred girls.”

Henry's mind reeled, a wave of emotions washing over the Telepathic Bond. He staggered back against the door, physically repulsed by the realisation of what he had just witnessed, by Elizabeth's revelation. Within his mind, he heard cries of shock and dismay echo from his companions. In the next moment, Surya leapt from the crumbling brickwork of the tower’s window into the room. Agnes likewise entered by the south-facing opening.

“Elizabeth…”

“Oh God Lizzy…”

Despite their concern, Henry noted his friends kept their distance. The unbidden metaphor sent ice-cold tendrils of realisation throughout his body. His friends were right: they might feel for Elizabeth as her old companions, but their instincts as veterans of a hundred battles told them that she was a monster.

“How… how long?” he asked with trembling lips.

“A month? Two? One trimester? I am not sure anymore,” Elizabeth said weakly. “It made me feel so hungry. I just wanted to eat. I was just so hungry, all the time.”

She coughed. Sakura specs bloomed on her white dress.

“I could die for a Dobos torte right now…” she joked dryly.

No one laughed.

“I don’t suppose you could get Sufina to give me a hand?” Her breath was shallow now, weaker. Elizabeth looked toward Henry demurely, dropping her heart-shaped face before turning her eyes up and toward him.

Henry felt his chest tighten, almost allowing his lips to move before the thoughtless act became interjected by cries of ‘No!’ and ‘Careful now…’

Elizabeth was his wolfsbane.
He had no power before her.
He was glad he had his companions with him.

“No?” Elizabeth asked weakly.

Henry shook his head.

They stood in silence, watching the blood seep, watching her pale skin begin to turn grey.

Surya turned away.
Agnes wept quietly.
Henry stood, stoic as a statue.

“The vineyard… it was nice…”

“It was our piece of paradise…”

“…”

“I am sorry…”

Elizabeth’s head fell to one side, a parting smirk upon her lips.

There was a sudden shudder in the air.
A dark portal opened. A black hole. Lizzy's signature spell, the beginning of the end.

His companions dived for the windows. Surya's shoulder slammed into Henry, throwing him from the opening before taking flight into the air. Agnes let herself drop from the south facing opening, stopping only meters before the churning waters of the moat.

Mark watched from below. The top of the tower became instantly consumed by a dark mass, a sphere that drank in all light. It lasted only a second. When it was over, there was nothing left but exposed, ancient Ottoman stones that predated the Christian reclamation of the city.

“That.. is the long and short of it.” Henry breathed out as though a great burden had shed from his shoulders. “Which brings us to you, Mark.”

The group turned to look at Mark. It was time for him to provide the answers to his grand charade.

“Why did you endanger Gwen? Was it for your sister? Did you suspect that Elizabeth was involved in her death?” Henry demanded. "But you know all this; our minds had been linked."

Mark’s expression was unreadable.

“You think that’s the whole story?” Mark replied with a voice full of bitterness. “You think your Elizabeth went mad in Eger?”

The Diviner's face took on an expression of triumphant madness. He placed a hand on the Death’s Orb, watching Henry wince as he said his next words.

“Allow me then, to bring to birth; the monstrous light of truth!”


Mark’s voice trembled as he spoke, fully aware of the incarceration that awaited him, carefully enunciating every precious syllable.

“You see, while Henry was away trying to save his precious 'Lillybird', I too was beside myself with grief. To me, there was nothing more important to me than my sister. We were orphans: I was her brother, her mentor and her guardian. She was the reason I served with all of you in the first place. When we had succeeded in saving the Brisbane Line, I had her enrol in the Officer Cadet’s Program. It was supposed to be safe, the kids there were all from notable families, talented. They were supposed to go on milk runs, be coddled through the two years of mandatory service. Jane could then join me in the Intelligence Division. I could look after her - the war would end, we could settle anywhere we liked in the Frontier.”

“Then Noosa Heads happened, and all of my dreams crumbled to dust.”

He looked at his companions coldly.

“It’s a common story. I know, there were thousands like us during that time. Mages and NoMs, grieving together. Why the drama? What makes my sister’s death so special? I tell you what. I knew something stank the moment it happened because I knew about Elizabeth!”

Mark tapped his head.

“Telepathic Bond. Shared Thoughts. Mass Message. Once you tap into someone’s head long enough, a little bit of them rubs off on you. As soon as I heard the news, I suspected her. There was a madness in that woman. None of you believed me of course - not sweet, innocent Elizabeth! Not with her baby-blue eyes! Or was it out of deference for Henry? We owe him so much: our positions, our wealth, our influence, all thanks to him, right? We couldn’t turn against that! There was no biting the hand!”

His voice rose an octave; Mark was breathing heavily now, his excitement dispelling the cool and collected Mark they had known.

The others listened wordlessly.

Gwen and Debra held one another’s hand. So many skeletons raised from the dead. So many monsters were churning under dark and tranquil waters. She almost wanted to say that this was enough. No more. Elizabeth’s depravity. The loss of her Master’s child. Mark’s sister: what would lie at the tunnel’s bitter end? She thought of that old aphorism. He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster, for if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.

Mark continued, spittle flying every which way, his blood was up.

“Oh, I knew. I knew there was something underneath that sweet face. There was hunger there! I felt it! Inhuman, primal, terrifying. It wasn’t anything that could be satisfied by nature! She was born a man-eater, but now she would be an eater of men! Ha!”

“Mark!” Agnes shouted at him, her face full of upset and dismay. “Enough!”

“Enough?!” Mark howled at her. An arcane glyph opened underneath him. “I’ll have enough when I have satisfaction!”

Gunther moved between Mark and the group. Mark didn’t care; he continued his compound casting. Weaving spell after spell into the Necromantic relic.

“Astral Projection!”
“Greater Image!”

There was a pause as his face grew pale. The Negative Energy flooding into his body through the Death’s Orb was consuming his life-force.

“Commune with Dead!”

A vision began to materialise in the space between them into the form of a girl.

“Jesus, Jane…” Agnes covered her mouth. “Mark… what have you done?!
Oh, Mark, that’s your sister…”

Gunther’s jaw clenched with fury and barely constrained anger, his brows knitted. This old ‘mate’ of his Master had gone too far. It was time to put him down.

“Mr Chandler,” he intoned with absolute authority. “For exercising forbidden Necromantic practices and entrapping of the soul of a fellow Mage. You are hereby excommunicated from the Tower and marked for Isolation. I suggest you cease your magic at once and come with me peacefully.”

The Paladin raised a hand. Give him a second and Mark Chandler would be bereft of his limbs, awakening to a world of exquisite agony. The dabbler of Necromancy would enter a Stasis cell and never again see the face of men until the day of his natural death.

“Stand down, Gunther,” Henry commanded. The Radiant Mage regarded his master for a moment before stepping aside. “Let’s see what Mark has to say for himself… and for Elizabeth.”

The dark sprite had now coalesced into a solid figure. Jane's audience could see her speak, though her voice came across a half-second later, disjointed and hollow.

“Mark… where am I? It hurts! It hurts so much! Return me, return…”

“Jane…” Mark began. “Jane, we don’t have much time… tell them how you died.”

“Died… I died…” Jane mouthed, her face indistinct. Suddenly she cried out, a guttural, banshee’s screech that went on and on, sending slivers of ice down their spines. It was not a cry that existed in the material plane, for no particles of air had sifted nor moved. It was instead a sound that resonated within their souls, filling them with malice and dread.

“Murdered! I was murdered!”

“Show me,” Mark commanded in an eldritch voice tainted by the foulness of deathly hallows. He placed a finger in the space between his eyes.
The Third-Eye: the seat of a Diviner’s astral vision.

“Enter and show me… show them…”

Jane had been admiring Elizabeth’s tailored dress uniform when a sudden tremor shook the building, lurching the dining table sideways and sending the tea and cupcakes scattering all over. Outside, a siren blared. The speaker system in the mess hall also began to screech and scream.

'WeeeeeeEEEEEeeeeEEEEEE'

A long continuous wail meant the base was under imminent attack.
Jane’s eyes widened in horror. She looked towards Elizabeth, whose own lovely face affected a slight furrow of her exquisite brows.

“Not a drill, it seems,” she observed worriedly, though not forgetting to finish her tea. “You ever been in combat before? Jane?”

“No… never…” Jane swallowed. In a panic, the novice had dropped her cup; shattering the bone-china amongst a smattering of shortcakes. Like her bother, Jane was a Diviner, a caster with little to no offensive or defensive capabilities.

“Lizzy! What do I do?” Jane’s eyes were darting to and from with sheer panic.

The Acolyte saw the sea rise from the window. Something was moving from the shallows onto the shore, toward the base. A gargantuan tentacle rose into the air, then another and another. A tidal wave of white water washed over the compound. As the water drained, the dark silhouette under the water transformed into an armoured Kraken that towered over their four-storey HQ.

“Stay here.” Elizabeth’s voice rang out as she made for the exterior. “This is the only concrete building in the compound. If there’s anything that’s going to withstand that thing’s physical attacks, it’s the HQ. Don’t leave unless you have to.”

“Alright…” Jane answered doubtfully, both wishing to stay within the compound as well as enjoy Elizabeth’s protection. There were others here as well, but how could they compare to Elizabeth Sobel, the Hero of the Brisbane Line? Her most ardent desire would have been for Elizabeth to remain in the mess hall, accompanying her. Of course, that was wishful thinking, for her mentor had gone in the next minute.

From the safety of the HQ building, Jane watched with growing horror and apprehensions the creature finally made landfall. Mermen were cascading off its back, spilling from some strange interior chamber. There were all kinds, some in the classic humid shape of men with webbed feet and arms, while others were more fish-like or crustacean.

Jane paced uncertainly back and forth within the mess. She was on the fourth floor, secure, at least for now. Was Elizabeth right? Should she stay? The Kraken loomed too close for comfort, so much that Jane could hear the sound of fighting. The Diviner had never fought before except in sparring duels at the academy. She had never even seen a monster above tier 2 since her Field Exercise. Her brother had told her that this place was safe, that it was just a two-year milk run.

The more she considered her options, the more her mind became a soup of fear and panic. She wasn’t trained for this, or perhaps she was? She didn’t even know. The very thought of facing one of those half-fish, half-man beasts made her puke.

'Crink-Crack!'

There was a sound of structure failing under stress.

The ceiling began to crumble, the floor to ceiling windows vibrated for a split second before blowing out. A giant tentacle swooshed past the now shattered windows. A shower of glass peppered Jane, sending her crashing onto the floor. She frantically struggled to stand but dug her hands into the fragments that were now all over the carpet. Agonising pain burned across both her palms, her hands and fingers. She cried out for help. For Mark, for Elizabeth, to return and aid her.

She looked up. A fish-man was moving toward her! It was shouting something in a guttural tongue, sending out a spray of mucus that smelled strongly of the sea.

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“Jet Blast!” A watery missile materialised from thin air and struck the creature, pushing it back through the window. One Evocation spell was all Jane could manage, for already Jane felt her mind straining with her use of an unschooled Sigil. Any more and she would be retching all over the floor, incapacitating herself.

Another creature appeared from the window, having scaled the walls on its suctioned feet.

“No! No! No!” Jane uttered bewilderingly, waving her hands to muster another spell. Motes of water mana churned but no phenomena manifested. Jane felt a wave of dizziness overwhelm her, sending her to her knees. The half-lobster mermen bowled her over and pushed her onto the floor, pinning her arms. The thing likely wanted to capture her for some nefarious purpose.

“Mark!” Jane cried out. “Lizzy! Somebody!”

Her answer came in the form of a bolt of darkness cutting across the room. When it had struck, most of the Mermen was gone. Only stumpy claws holding Jane onto the floor remained.

“Elizabeth! You came! Thank god!” Jane rolled onto her elbows, doing her best not to puke from the smell of desiccating prawn. “What was that spell? It was magnificent!”

Elizabeth didn’t answer.

Instead, she stumbled towards Jane and ran into her bodily. Jane could see that Elizabeth's face was deathly pale, that she was bleeding from her right arm.

“Lizzy! You’re injured! I… I'll find a medic…”

“Get out of here!” Elizabeth took Jane’s arm and pulled her toward the window. Jane resisted, but even in her frail state, Elizabeth had overpowered her.

Jane screamed. They leapt.

They jumped from the fourth storey just as another tentacle struck the side of the building, sending out a spiderweb of fissures across crumbling concrete.

“Feather Fall!” The two of them slowed their descent, but still, they landed heavily. Elizabeth’s rushed invocation couldn't cover for both of them. With a heavy thud, they stuck the pavement below, and down Elizabeth went.

“Liz! Are you okay? Oh my God…”

Elizabeth’s dress uniform had come with unfortunately tall heels. She landed awkwardly, and now her ankle was twisted in a disturbing direction. Jane watched as Elizabeth grunted, her face turning even paler than before. Her fingers dug into Jane's arm with enough force to draw blood.

“Someone! Help!” Jane shrieked into the chaos. Cadets and Officers were running like headless chickens all over the place. Some were trying to flee; others tried to fight.

Thankfully, a blonde-haired youth ran up and helped Elizabeth to her feet, hopping on her good leg. From above came the sound of something whooshing through the air, crashing into the building and the wall behind them.

They looked up to see a purple-pink tentacle slither away, leaving behind a mess of human flesh, crushed into smithereens against the concrete HQ.

Jane screamed. She screamed and screamed; frozen to the spot.
Elizabeth swore. Jane glanced up and saw a silhouette loom over them. The writhing mass of the Kraken was now upon them.

“It’s seen us!” Elizabeth shouted and tried to move. Even with the cadet’s help, she couldn’t move fast enough. The Air Evoker cursed. She commanded the cadet to turn her around. Jane helped, bracing Elizabeth’s other arm.

“Blade of Wind!” Elizabeth threw up a hand.

The tier 6 Evocation hacked into their assailant.

'Thump!'

A massive tentacle landed not far from them, sliced clean off it’s now oozing stump. There was a sound of thunder as the creature raged, the ground shook violently.

“Well fudge, I shouldn’t have done that. It’s twice as pissed now.” Elizabeth remarked despairingly; her comely face pale, drained, deathly.

Without warning, the blonde Cadet dropped Elizabeth. He ducked under her arm, allowing her to fall, then ran for it.

Elizabeth fell awkwardly onto the floor and crumpled into a heap, screaming as her broken ankle hammered the tarmac.
Behind them, the cadet scampered past a fence, fleeing toward the uncertain shelter of the woods.

“Fuck! You ingrate asshole!” Elizabeth shrieked at him.

Jane was shaking now, her whole body buzzing with fright and hysteria. She saw Elizabeth turn to her. Something dark grip her heart, something full of yellow venom and selfish purpose.

“Jane…” Elizabeth began. "Don't-"

Jane ran.

She ran and ran and ran.

Behind her, Elizabeth was saying something indistinct, but Jane could no longer hear it.

“I am sorry… I am sorry Liz… I am sorry… please make it. Please survive…”

She ran. She fell, she got up, she staggered on.

She didn’t even feel the pain from her palms anymore. She just wanted to get away from the sea, from the monster, from the mermen, from Elizabeth.

Don’t look back! She told herself. You mustn’t look back.

Sickening sounds of destruction resounded from behind: wails of pain and horror both human and mermen.

An explosion rocked the base. Something had set off the mana crystals in the depot.

Jane hastened her pace, but the shockwave was too quick. It caught her in the next few seconds, sending her tumbling through the air, thrashing her flailing limbs against the asphalt.

When she re-orientated herself from the tumbling, she realised she was facing the wrong way.
She was facing the ocean. She was looking back.
Her face blanched, the blood drained from every inch of her skin.
Her eyes began to bulge, then bleed.
Jane began to whimper and cry.

“Oh, Liz… oh, Lizzy, save me. Save me…” she moaned incoherently. “I don’t want to die… I want to see Mark…”

A miracle imposed itself atop the girl's gibbering figure.

A solar eclipse.

A dark sun, a shadow of a shadow consuming all light, drinking up the world.

Tendrils of darkness, tipped with lamprey's lips, reached out from its centre, seemingly ignoring the distance and space.

Jane watched in horror as one of them seemed to find her instantaneously.
She felt the cold dark invade her skin, digging into her body, lifting her from the ground. The tendril effortless sliced through her non-existent mana Shield, through her uniform, slicing into her torso and legs, bleeding her.

“Arrrgh… Ah-ah… N-No, no, no…” Jane was mewing like a babe, her face a grotesque mask of pain and agony.

The gathering watched agog as the vision continued to manifest.

A dark sun bloomed in Jane’s vision: draining all light, all life.

The Merfolk, the NoMs, the Mages, all were caught in it’s embrace. It took in everything, friends, enemies, trees, grass, bits of concrete, even water from the sea. With each thing it consumed, it seemed to grow larger, bigger, more powerful. Dark miasma poured from its centre, forming long shadowy tendrils. Darker then black, they extended through the air, picking through the flotsam and jetsam for nourishing sweetmeats.

Jane cried out in horror.

She rose into the air, weaker and weaker, higher and higher.
When Jane had floated close enough to the centre of the dark sun, they saw.

They all saw.

Two women were silhouetted side by side: a ghastly parallel of the two women having tea only an hour earlier. There was no cakes and ices this time. Jane's body was a bloody mess, while a tenebrous miasma scattered from Elizabeth's body like fog rolling off a cold mountain.

They saw Jane’s unfocused dark eyes meet with Elizabeth’s irises of baby-blue, whose innocence betrayed no particular emotion. Elizabeth’s thin white legs extended from the churning shadows swirling across her body. Obsidian black and starkly white, a goddess of deified death.

"Lizzy..." Jane moaned, crying and sobbing, blood and tears pouring from her bulging eyes in equal measure. "Lizzy it hurts... it hurts so bad..."

Elizabeth gazed upon Jane without an iota of sympathy.

“Silly girl… you needn’t have died. You had nothing I wanted. You were useless…”

“Please… spare me…”

“You should have stayed a moment longer. I was telling you to run you know, playing the big sister.”

“Please… please, Lizzy!”

They watched Elizabeth force a hand under Jane’s ribs, piercing her chest in one swift, bloody motion.

“Now look at what you made me do...”

The vision ended.

Mark tore himself away from the Orb, falling to the floor, gasping for breath. When he raised his face again, he looked older, far older, as though he had aged a decade.

“Do you understand now?!” Mark uttered between clenched teeth. “This was your precious wife! I spent twenty years to uncover the truth! A decade to track down an Orb, and another decade to learn to use it! Did you know what I had to give, to trade, to find my sister’s soul?”

Henry’s pallor was paler than it had ever been. His wife - his poor Elizabeth. She hadn’t turned into a monster. She was a monster from the beginning. All it took was a single crisis; then the undertow took her.

Gwen recovered herself from the overload of emotion and information. There was so much there, so many answers, but still, she felt that Mark had left an important question unanswered.

“Well, do you have your satisfaction now, Mark?” She tried to keep her voice level and measured. “That still doesn’t explain why you sent me into that hell-hole to suffer, what could you gain from that? More satisfaction? Was it to see my Master suffer humiliation? Is it because I am a Void Mage that you wanted me defiled and betrayed?”

Mark laughed: a burst of insane, hysterical laughter.

“We always save the best for last, no?” he said to Gwen, grinning maniacally.

He turned to Henry.

“Your wife is still alive and kicking.”

Henry suddenly stood, his face a mask of anger and fury. Surya did likewise, his expression full of indignation for his friend. Agnes simply held a hand to her mouth in shock horror. It was madness, complete madness. Mark was consumed by it, by holding onto that secret and letting it fester in his chest, it fed on him, ate the man they had once known.

“You think me mad, don’t you?” Mark demanded, his eyes glowing with excitement. He stopped talking suddenly and gloatingly gazed at Henry.

“Whose soul did you think I attempt to raise at first?! Ha! It was Elizabeth! The woman I hated more than anything in the world! Why raise my sister, subject her to such soul rendering agony, when I could have truth and satisfaction in one fell swoop?! BUT do you know what happened? You know what happened when I tried?”

“She wasn’t there! Her Astral Soul had never untethered from her body! I may be a fledging Necromancer, but even I know that you can’t raise the soul of a being who hasn’t died!”

“Master…” Gunther stepped between Mark and Henry, cutting him off abruptly. “Perhaps it is best to end it right here and now. What good would more secrets serve? What’s done is done. We need to look to the future. This Necromancer was as good as dead the moment he trapped a human soul within that Orb. Gwen too should be free of his insanity."

As if sensing the end is nigh, Mark suddenly began to speak with great haste; a torrent of words poured from his mouth. His eyes were wild, his face contorted with the ecstasy of the reveal. All these years, all these years and now he had finally proven to Henry that he was wrong, that Elizabeth was responsible, that she was a monster and they were all fools! There was just one more step. One more step!

“I always knew, I just knew that Elizabeth had been up to something, but I could never figure it out. Let me remind all of you of that final climax, what had she said? You had nothing I wanted. What had she wanted? What could have she have wanted?”

Mark pointed to Gwen with an accusing finger. Her heart leapt to her throat in an instant.

“There’s your answer! At first, I couldn’t prove it! I couldn’t prove what Elizabeth wanted. Then you, Henry, sent me your apprentice! How fortuitous! How foolish! I couldn’t believe it when you told me that she was a Void mage! Is it poetic justice? I couldn’t believe my luck. Were you trying to repeat the past? You can’t repeat the past old friend! You can’t! All you sent me was proof! I couldn’t prove my theory, but with Gwen… with another Void Mage, I could! Your apprentice had killed a dozen Mages - I have… I have their dossiers here… see! Look!”

He pounced on the papers: pictures, files, records scattered all over.

“Put her in the Chamber, Henry! Put her in and you’ll- you’ll know why Elizabeth is still alive! Ha! You were all wrong! My poor Jane, if you hadn’t covered it up, Henry! if…”

Then Mark was suddenly silent. Without even incanting a spell, Gunther had reached across between them with his long arm, caught Mark by the hair, then slammed his head against the heavy oaken table. Mark’s body fell to the floor wetly like a sack of slack potatoes.

“Master.” Gunther knelt. “I take full responsibilities."

Henry’s eyes rose from Mark’s body. He nodded gently and patted Gunther’s shoulder.

His Apprentice was right; this farce had gone on long enough.

“Magus Mark Chandler is to be placed under indefinite quarantine,” the Magister spoke, gaining a measure of strength with every uttered word. “What say you?”

Gwen and Debra had nothing to say; their opinions counted for nothing.
Surya inclined his head imperceptibly.
Agnes looked away, unable to find the words.

“Good. Gunther. If you please.”

“Levitation!”

Gunther hoisted his human cargo with one hand.

“I am returning to the Tower, Master.” He bowed. “I’ll send a clean-up crew within the hour.”

Henry nodded toward his eldest Apprentice before turning to his youngest one.

“Gwen…” he began.

Gwen felt her heart lurch, at this rate, she was sure to develop an early arrhythmia.

“It's time we discussed your future.”


**Schools of Magic**

**Evocation** is a school that manipulate energy. It was also the most commonly awakened school of Spellcraft. These mages become the mainstay of the citizen-soldiers, wielding spells of fire, earth, water, and more exotic elements such as lightning or radiance. As Evokers grow, they become more specialise in their elemental affinity, taking up specialist equipment and enchantments, attunement and contracts. In the popular eye, the Evoker is the archetype Mage, the spell slinging, fireball blasting Sorcerer of yore, tapping into and drawing limitless power from the elemental planes.

**Abjuration** casters weaved spells that protected, blocked or banished. An Abjurer is a common but highly sought after profession. They were the mainstay of the protective barrier shells that shielded Human cities. An Abjurer possesses the special ability to also utilises restoration spells and a number of AOE combat buffs. Specialists in this field typically contracted elementals of earth, ice, and water, with exceptional individuals possessing more exotic quasi-elementals.

 **Conjuration** is a school that materialises creatures or materials for the caster. A Conjurer is a one man army when trained to a sufficeint tier of proficiency. Through contracting magical creatures Conjurers gain life-long companions that grow with the Mage in power. Due to this advantage, it is not uncommon for Summoners to become several magnitudes more powerful than Mages of equal tier. The disadvantage of Conjuration is the persistent mana drain caused by most of its sustained effect spells. Certain Conjurers choose to focus upon the summoning of items or beings. These valuable individuals are responsible for the Teleportation Circles around the cities.

**Divination** is a school that reveals information, highly prized for their cognisant abilities in detection and foretelling. Many diviners go on to become telecommunication specialists, becoming key intelligence and strategist operatives that served a number of roles. Other schools of Divination focused on disaster deterrence, by reading the threads of time and fate. Despite their lack of offensive capabilities, it is said that the most influential Magi on the U.N Security Council is the Oracle of the Acropolis. Though the Divination school has no preference for elemental afflictions, it is a school that synnergies well with subsequent studies of other schools. Many Diviners go on to become Magus or Magister.

The school of **Enchantment** remains the most difficult and expensive to train of all schools. Capable of imbuing items and buildings with protection, strengthening items and imbuing persist phenomena - enchanters are essential to humanity’s existence. The world's most successful manufatoriums are all operated by skilled Enchanters. Unlike regular Mages, enchanters seeks specifically the mastering of additional schools such as Transmutation or Abjuration for the creation of magical items. A dangerous school within-a-school of Enchanters are those whose abilities allow them to control, manipulate, and glamour the minds of others. These Mages are closely watched by government forces, and the misuse of mind-altering effects on others could lead to life-time imprisonment or banishment.

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 **Illusion**

is the school of Mirage, the altering of perceptions to create false visions. Many Illusionists go on to become involved in espionage if they choose the path of the militant. Many others however, have chosen to be involved in the media, creating spectacles for adoring audiences, crafting impossible scenarios, and even becoming superstars in their own right for their creativity and passion. Illusion spells which deal damage attack the mind directly, creating what is known as psychic attacks. Likewise, aftereffects vary by spell and intent.

**Transmutation** is an unusual school in that it changes the caster and the objects they touch, manipulating the properties in powerful ways. In the greater world, Transmuters become builders, architects and creators, working hand in glove with Enchanters. In combat, some transmuters choose to specialise in manipulating life itself, changing plants, creatures, and even themselves to become deadly and proficient in the art of war. It is said that Transmuters posses the most versatile school of all , and enjoyed the most lauded status after that of Evokers.

The dreaded School of **Necromancy** was banned after WWI following the Geneva Convention. Currently, the school is studied only by sects that are authorised by the U.N, having proven that the study of souls and the afterlife is intimately connected to beliefs of faith, culture, and religion. The irony of the matter is that Necromancy is most likely the most ancient school of magic that exist. Dating back to the Egyptian Pharaohs, in an age when man first uncovered magic. As such, it is more specific to say that the summoning, raising, and animation of the death is strictly forbidden, as much of the world was turned into ash and cinder following The Great War with the No-Life Kings of Middle Europe.

Finally, other schools of magic likely exist, but lay out of reach of the common man. These include various forms of item deification, ancestral worship, old world shamanism, naturalism, animalism, and so forth. By the same measure, rumours about of humans learning the magic of monsters, magical beings, and demi-humanoids. These are seldom taught or learned in Frontier Human cities though.

**Character Summary**


“We can talk in the grot,” Henry intoned kindly before giving Gwen’s hands a reassuring, fatherly pat. “There is much to discuss.”

The remaining members of the conference glanced at the empty desk, grimly reminding the party that they were now missing Mark and Gunther.

Unexpectedly, Henry turned to Debora. Gwen's classmate grew instantly rigid the moment the Magister's attention lingered, gripping Gwen’s arm a little tighter. It was an understandable reaction; for who wouldn’t be stunned by the full attention of Henry Kilroy, Head of the Ten, Master of the Sydney Tower? He was a legend, a rumour, a personage she had only seen in the newspapers, and now he was addressing her directly.

“Debora, was it?”

“Yessir!” Debora answered, she left Gwen's arm and stood ramrod straight, unsure if to bow or salute. “Debora Jones, first… soon to be second-year at Blackwattle Academy, Sir.”

“No need to be so nervous, Debora.” Henry likewise patted her on the shoulder. The Earthen Mage appeared as though Gwen had struck her with another discharge of static.

I know that look well. Gwen observed. Debora was starstruck, as she had been, to be interacting with a Magister, one of the most powerful Mages in the nation.

“You have been party to some rather unsavoury secrets, Debora. Including Gwen’s relationship with me,” Henry began, causing a cold sweat to break out over Gwen’s brow. “As a result, I fear I have no choice but…”

“Master!” Gwen interjected nervously.

They had just seen Mark hauled off like a side of beef. Perhaps her master’s blood was still up, feeling protective and paranoid from all that he had just witnessed?

“I am sorry Sir, but… please, please spare Debora. Mayhap a Geas spell or a compulsion? Or-or a tracking ring? She is innocent. I mean, Opa carelessly brought her! If anything, he should take responsibility!”

Surya appeared wounded, his face a mask of sorrow.

Henry performed a double-take before he began to chuckle. Surya joined him a moment later, their jovial mood upsetting the tension that had overtaken the conversation.

“Gwen… I was going to say that I have no choice… but to trust her in this matter, trust in her judgement, her ability to keep a secret.”

“Ah- Of course, Master. ” Gwen felt instant relief wash over her, flushing a bright red. Beside her, the blood returned to Debora's face.

“Can we trust you? Debora Jones?” Henry’s tone took on a more serious slant.

The question was rhetorical of course. What would a girl, whose father and mother were middle- class Transmuters, do against the request made by the highest power in the land? Refusing was out of the question, as were any glib or uncertain answers. Not abiding by the agreement was likewise suicide. The Tower was the highest authority on matters of the magic, overriding even the Frontier Government, including its Senate. Who could Debora turn to, if she wanted to reveal the truth to the world? She would evaporate, disappear, cease to exist overnight, just like Mark Chandler.

Debora nodded furiously.

“Yessir! You can trust me, Sir!” She added another Sir just in case. One could never have too many Sirs when addressing someone like Henry.

“Very good. You may go with Surya. Rest assured, you and Gwen will see each other soon enough.”

Debora moved away from Gwen reluctantly, taking a position behind her Instructor, Surya.

“I’ll see you back at the ranch, Gwen.” Surya waved at his granddaughter.

“See you later Opa.”

The remaining three watched them depart, their eyes following the bony old man and the tall, athletic girl as they disappeared.

Henry turned to the last remaining member of their erstwhile companionship.

“Agnes, I am sorry you had to experience all of that.”

“I am sorry too, Henry,” Agnes repined. With the incarceration of Mark came the death of their three-decade-long fellowship. Now, she could no longer speak with Surya nor Henry, knowing that by their will and intent, Mark was rotting away in a cell somewhere for the rest of his natural life. “May I go now?”

She framed her question with caution and aversion, indicating her desired distance.

Henry’s expression grew sullen; his sympathy died in his throat.

“You may go, Agnes.”

“Goodbye, old friend.”

The Evoker left.

Only Gwen and Sufina now remained. The dryad flittered about here and there without a care, examine curios that Mark had left behind.

“Shall we?” Henry made an effort to stand. Gwen moved beside him, slipped her arm under her Master's shoulder, aiding his movement. Her Master's arm felt far frailer than her grandfather's. Where Surya was all cord and cable, Henry's was more akin to a dried out branch.

She wasn't sure if he required her help, but the effort seemed to please Sufina. The two of them proceeded arm in arm down the narrow stairs towards the Teleportation chamber in the basement.

They stopped by Alesia’s apartment first. Gwen had been soiled by her misadventure, her dress torn here and there, her nails matted with dried blood. If they teleported into the Tower like that, tongues would be wagging, and lascivious rumours would travel the circumference of Oceania before they reached the levitation lifts.

Henry took a catnap while Gwen quickly showered and changed. Alesia was away with Yue, training her new apprentice in the art of ruin and destruction. Wishing haste, Gwen took the first item on the pile: a merlot spaghetti-strap dress, then slipped into a white cardigan, finally swapping out her tattered Mary-Janes for a pair of pumped sandals. Washing the dust and blood from her hair, she rolled her fringe to one side and was back to her usual regal self.

Once outside, Henry commented that Gwen made good use of Alesia's rather monotonous choice of wardrobe. The two joked teasingly at Alesia's spending of her monthly stipend on perishable items of clothing, despite the existence of flame-attuned uniforms,

The two then returned to the secret chamber below, where the Teleportation Circle flared silver and white, distorting space and distance.

Without Alesia’s presence, the guards were far friendlier. A few of them greeted Gwen and introduced themselves, keenly interested in the tall and lovely girl that seemed to have the Magister’s eye. Prior, she had frequented the Tower to see the Magister during her three months of training. Now, she was considered more or less a standard feature of the Tower Master's itinerary. Though the guards had no clue as to how she associated with the Magister, they could see from the manner of her filial intimacy that the two were close. Was she a relative? Perhaps the daughter of a well-connected acquaintance, or maybe, something of a companion? It didn’t matter to the guards, themselves Apprentices and Mages in training under various Factions. They were polite to her, and she was amicable to them. If she could curry favour for them in exchange for services rendered, it worked for the betterment for all.

The guards made smalltalk with Gwen as the levitation platform thrummed, complementing her with words of admiration. They introduced themselves as Williams and McKinsey, offering Gwen their services with bright, hopeful eyes. Henry nodded at the two young men as he and Gwen alighted the platform.

The grot remained timeless and unchanged. A mossy clearing with dappled sunlight, alternating between the seasons as Sufina’s moods shifted. The moment they reentered the pocket space, Henry's back stood straighter, his head held higher. By the time they had made the walk to the central chamber, he was back to his spritely old self, an ageing professor looking smart in his tweed jacket and cashmere vest.

They found a place under Sufina’s heart tree, where a slight cross-breeze brought summer smells. Sufina wrapped her arms around Gwen, affecting a sound of shivering leaves as the dryad took in her scent.

“You still have the Serpent’s life-force on you,” Sufina noted with great pleasure. “It’s vibrant and rich. I love it. I wonder how long it will last?”

A set of garden furniture grew around them as Sufina played the maid, returning to them with a stack of manna bread, two crystal glasses and a decanter of her famous Golden Mead.

Henry waited until Gwen had settled into the elfin garden chair with its elegant curves and leafy woodwork. Gwen crossed her long legs comfortably, tucking an ankle behind a soft, mossy chair leg. Henry raised a glass, and Gwen met him half-way with a clink. She took a quick sip and felt the revitalising energy of the mead suffuse her weary mind.

They made more small talk, some Spellcraft theory here and there, a few anecdotes about Surya's scandalous sculptures; easing into the weight of their conversation.

“Gwen, how do you feel right now?” Henry finally began, starting with a simple question to test the waters.

It was a loaded question, and Gwen felt the need for measured answers. After all, she had just witnessed a man dragged away to be incarcerated for the entirety of his natural lifespan. The stories of the last few hours had informed Gwen about much of her Master’s quirks and idiosyncrasies. He was a sentimentalist, an idealist and a romantic. As a leader he was a man of the middle path, dreaming of an improbable balance between power and accountability. As a companion, he was trusting and honourable, collected and composed. As a teacher, he was experienced beyond measure, an able teacher who produced two peerless proteges. As an arbitrator, Henry was relentless, capable of putting aside his emotions, even for the woman he loved more than anything in the world. If Henry had a flaw, it would be his preference for patience even in matters of urgency.

So how should she approach their ‘talk’? Her master's silence had gifted her time to ponder her options. According to the sordid chronicle of Elizabeth, Gwen possessed an element that would inevitably invade and corrupt the mind of the user. To Gwen however, the revelation merely pointed to the fact that the war itself might have unhinged Elizabeth. Depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder were common symptoms which plagued the war-weary of her world.

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It was shocking to her to know that in this world, where death in the service of survival was commonplace, there was no such thing as psychology clinicians. Here, the treatment of mental health never seemed to have progressed past the apathy of The Great War. There were no Pavlov, Skinner, Jung, and Maslow to explain the inner world to the traumatised survivors of horrors both natural and supernatural. If there were, they'd be sanctioned Mind-Mages, offering no balms for the inflamed mind.

She was out of time.

"Guilty," she replied, ending the silence between them. "I could feel my victim's cries knock against my heart when Caliban's mind rejoined my own. I even felt empathy for Bozza and Farez, the slavers, even though Gunther was trying to teach me the dangers of careless mercy and naivety."

The frankness surprised Henry, but other than a gradual raising of the brow, her master's eyes betrayed nothing.

"I see..." Henry mulled over her words. "How do you feel about Mark? His accusation?"

Another loaded question, Gwen thought.

"Angry, indignant," Gwen stressed her vowels. "I don't wish to offend, Master, but I am not Elizabeth."

"No, you are not."

To her surprise, her Master smirked.

"You told me once, Gwen, that the abuse of Greatness is when remorse is disjointed from power. Do you feel... remorse, Gwen?"

Gwen considered it. She couldn't be the perfect sociopathic combat Mage nor a perfect inquisitorial agent like Gunther. She couldn't even be ruthless, doubtless battering ram like Alesia.

"I do, Master," She confessed, laying it out there with a sense of come what may. "I find no pleasure in harming others. I find scant desire in taking the lives of my enemies."

Henry tapped the table thoughtfully.

"What of your Credo, Gwen? Had you not wanted the power to punish those who would wrong you? To harry the foxes, frighten the wolves, and slaughter the tigers?”

"Perhaps not so much the slaughtering, Master."

Henry chuckled, the girl was more mature than he'd anticipated.

"A pacifist then? A rare bird in these dark and winding woods, Gwen. A dangerous choice."

"The woods are dark and deep, Master, but I have to walk my Path, even if it's a road not taken."

"The road less taken can easily lead you astray, Gwen, perhaps to a precipice... Do you know what lies at the end of that Path?"

"I don't know, Master, but I have to try. To accept that I would be a killer... that's - impossible for me."

Gwen shook her head, her voice trembling. Perhaps she was revealing too much of herself? What if her Master saw her pacifism as a dire weakness? What if he chose to abandon her? Was the loathing of murder a weakness though? Was it not Gandhi who said that there was not a single cause he would kill for, and yet overturned four centuries of colonisation? Was it not Socrates, whose wisdom built the modern Republic, who said that one ought not to do evil, no matter what the suffering? Perhaps that was too excessive; this was not a world where men could negotiate with the forces that threatened them. But surely, against one's fellow man, as a shared condition of survival, there were grounds for men to show mercy and compassion to kin and kind. If anything, her old world had proved that it was possible.

"Do you want to be a pacifist, Gwen? How do you hope to survive without harming your enemies?"

Her Master's voice was becoming sterner. There was an edge of criticism to it now. Gwen's thoughts raced through her memories. She recalled the grand conclusions reached by men who were responsible for splitting the atom, for engineering the end of human civilisation on earth. The context was a little off, but it would have to do.

"I do not wish to be merely a pacifist, Master," Gwen spoke carefully, her voice measured and vibrant. "I am saying that I wish to be a Militant Pacifist. I am willing to fight for my pacifism. For the only way to end violence, is for our enemies to refuse violence themselves."

The oxymoronic logos caught Henry off-guard. He stared at her with an expression of bemusement before the words slowly digested.

"You want to be so powerful... that your enemies quake and shudder at the very thought of war?"

Gwen smiled coyly.

"Is that not how the Mermen and the Saurian conflict ended, Master? Peaceful co-existence for the next three decades?"

Henry suddenly snorted, slapping his knees.

"You're right!"

He laughed, a burst of rip-roaring laughter uncharacteristically stretching his usually stern face.

"The path of Militant Pacifism! Ha! What a strange and twisted mind you have!"

He tapped the table excitedly.

"No killing then?" he questioned.

"No unnecessary killing, Master.”

“What would you call your Path then?”

"It is Humanism, Master, the Path of the Humane."

Henry mulled overt Gwen's rather unusual Credo.

"What if you find yourself again in the same circumstance, Gwen? About to be violated or harmed. Would you again show careless mercy?"

Gwen was ready; she wasn't about to dismiss the hard lesson from Gunther.

"We must be cruel to be kind, Master," she answered with the words of wiser men.

"How wonderfully complex that answer is!” Henry allowed his mind to have the slow luxury of abstracting her logic. "What of Noblesse Oblige? For the NoMs, I mean."

"I cannot begrudge those whose most distant horizons are tomorrow. Not when so many of their problems can be resolved by bread, water, and shelter,” Gwen answered smartly. “They will have their part to play, as do we. If possible, I would like to build a world wheres NoMs are just as important, no different from Mages.”

"I see... A noble goal."

They then spoke of her experiences in the Slums, of the condition of NoMs, what she had seen. Ultimately, the conversation arrived at its predestined topic.

"How you do feel about Caliban then?" her master asked suddenly.

Gwen swallowed a little nervously.

"I am... afraid of it, Master."

Henry nodded sagely.

"I see... I see. Do you mind bringing out your familiars? Ariel first, if you could."

Gwen incanted the spell for Conjuring her familiar. Ariel appeared on the table in its passive form. Henry reached out and ticked the creature's fur, sending out sparks of static.

"EEee! EEee!" Ariel rubbed its snout on his hand. It made a begging motion with its paws, first towards Gwen, then towards Henry.

"Are you afraid of Ariel?" Henry asked, producing an HDM crystal, watching the marten stuffing itself, its cheeks puffed with mana.

"No," Gwen admitted.

"Why?" Henry asked softly.

Gwen considered Henry's question. The obvious answer was that Ariel wasn't a thousand-young horror, but that was sophistry.

"I am... not sure," Gwen mumbled."Perhaps it is because Ariel listens, and I feel in control.”

"Does Caliban not listen?"

Gwen shook her head. Caliban did listen to her, even in the heat of battle it had done so. It was her fault that Caliban had 'leaked' out, she was the weak one, not Caliban.

"Then what's the problem?"

"It's the Void magic, Master... Caliban induces in me an unyielding hunger. I feel it enticing me, demanding that I satiate it, yet the more I fed it, the hungrier I become."

"A question of temptation then," Henry nodded. "A test my wife failed horribly. What are your thoughts then? Would you cease using Void magic entirely?"

The honest answer was self-evident, but Gwen struggled to find the right words.

"Caliban is essential if you wish to embark upon the path you have chosen," Henry added. He could feel Gwen's dismay, taste her hesitation. The girl was too obsessed with the right answers; for all her wisdom, she didn't know that in life, correct answers were scarce indeed.

"Bring out Caliban, Gwen."

"Caliban..."

Gwen winced as the vitality drained from her, drinking the blood from her pink cheeks.

The serpent appeared from the nether space of the void, landing with a thump on the mossy floor. Instantly, the vibrant moss wilted and died, leaving behind a patch of brown and black. It reared its head, scanning the room and sniffing the air.

"Hiss! Hiss!" It uttered, slithering toward Gwen joyously.

Gwen's body stiffened with revulsion. Seemingly sensing her hesitation, Caliban stopped apprehensively, looking wounded by its master's rejection.

"Caliban, over here." Henry produced an HDM Crystal and waved the sparkling stone before it.

The creature wanted to leap toward it immediately but hesitated when no consent came from Gwen.

"It's fine, Gwen."

Caliban slithered onto the table, leaving behind a trail of wilting, desolated wood.

To Gwen's astonishment, Henry placed his hands upon Caliban's smooth exterior. There was a sizzle as his flesh made contact, acrid black smoke rose into the air. Gwen almost called out, but Henry's hard, grey eyes met her own.

"Calm your emotions, control your fear, don’t let your weakness bleed into Caliban.”

Gwen exhaled deeply. The sizzling ceased. Caliban's presence no longer ate into the living wood. Her Master was right, how could he not be? He was a Magister level Conjurer. He was right; the weakness was Gwen's.

"Good."

"Do you fear it still?"

Gwen considered the sleek and dark creature before her; its carapace had split to reveal a lamprey's mouth, now busily slurping at the crystal.

"Less so," Gwen confessed, her heart wincing as Sufina’s positive energy slowly healed Henry's fingers. Caliban looked at Sufina with great interest, flicking its tongue. Sufina winked at the creature.

"There is always a temptation in possessing great power, Gwen. The more potent the source, the more it tempts you to use it. Do you believe Sufina powerful?"

Gwen nodded.

"Do you know how powerful she is?"

Gwen did not.

Henry smiled sagely.

"Allow me a quick demonstration. Sufina, if you please."

The gathering turned to observe their Dryad maid. Ariel cocked its furry snout, Caliban hissed, Gwen swallowed another gulp of mead.

Suddenly, Sufina's face turned cruel. Her smooth skin erupted in thorns and barbs, her body elongating into a nightmarish shambler covered with malevolent vines that writhed and churned, baying for violence.

A terrifying sight. Ariel and Caliban both began to bark and hiss, moving in front of Gwen to defend her against this uncertain foe.

"Force of Nature!" Henry invoked, charging Sufina with a distinct cocktail of primary elements only he possessed.

Suddenly, the Dyrad was everywhere. She expanded massively, almost filling up the entire chamber. Her form was no longer even that of a terrifying hag but something inhuman. She became a shambling behemoth, where she stood, the mist of deep swamps and dark forests cascaded from innumerable fishhook barbs grown from numberless vines. From a tenebrous mass, two glowing eyes stared out, her gaze as pitiless as the blistering sun. To Gwen, the power and pressure she exerted, was insane.

Her face and lips grew as pale as sheets, her feet cold and frozen, her arms arrested to either side.

Ariel cowered and whimpered, suddenly turning over on its belly and tried to play dead.

Caliban shrunk its profile closer to the floor, coiling to strike. Unlike Ariel, it had known no existence before its summoning - it felt no terror, knew no fear. So long as Gwen was alive, it could exist again.

"Sufina, enough."

Sufina shrunk, now once against a shy maiden, albeit brushing off dangerous, razor-sharp thorns from her leafy dress. She gave them a reassuring smile, her sparkling gemstone eyes twinkling.

"Are you afraid of Sufina?"

Gwen nodded, then shook her head.

"A valiant defence, Caliban," Henry complemented the serpent, throwing it another crystal. Ariel rolled over guiltily and begged at Gwen's feet with both paws upon her knees. Gwen patted its fur, feeling its remorse through their Empathic-Link.

Caliban raised its head smugly, rearing its head and wagging its tail. Gwen reached out gingerly; the serpent coiled around her leg, finding purchase on her calves before crawling into her lap. Its cold touch was ticklish, like ice dabbed against one’s skin. It rubbed its cheeks on her hand, the opening around its forehead carapace leaving a snail-trail of grey fluid across her fingers.

"It is a good Path you have chosen, Gwen, but you cannot walk it alone. You will need allies. Ariel and Caliban of course, but also others who would support you. You will need friends, family, advisors and associates. It is not your spells that you need to fear, but the isolation brought by its abuse."

"The Spell of the hand," Gwen pondered aloud. "Against the Spell of the heart... I will try, Master."

For a second Gwen wondered if Henry would interject with 'Do. Or do not. There is no try.' but the old Master merely nodded affirmatively.

"Gwen," her Master's next words took on quiet solemnity. "Please accept my apologies for what happened with Mark..."

Gwen awoke from her inner dialogue with a start.

"Master, you shouldn't have to!" she interjected. Sure, it was poor judgement on Henry's part, but who could have known Mark's madness?

"Oh, but I must." Henry's voice possessed a painful note. "I am afraid I sent you to him with selfish designs."

"Master?"

"You see Gwen - until Mark had told me the truth, I hadn't truly understood why I was so eager to take you on, why I felt such a desire to mound and shape your Path."

"Sir..."

"Let me finish." He waved a hand in front of her. "You see, Mark was right. I did want to repeat the past. A part of me always wondered what would have happened if I had stopped Elizabeth - if I had recognised her weakness, her suffering. I guess when I saw you Awaken to the Void in that chamber, I saw it as my redemption, to resolve a past I hadn't truly understood."

He took a deep breath.

"Can you... forgive an old man for doing such a selfish thing?"

Gwen placed a slender hand on top of Henry's own, feeling his paper-like skin.

"I forgive you, Master..." Gwen said earnestly. She was angry at first of course, beyond indignant, but her anger had been anaesthetised by Marks maniacal face, his spittle-charged gloating, his slump body as Gunther took him away like a leg of lamb. He who hunts monsters should beware - the old aphorism offered a good lesson. “I will not fall to the hunger like Elizabeth. Master, you have my word.”

Henry nodded appreciatively, seemingly having reached another conclusion.

"Would you like to know what Mark meant? What he was accusing you of?"

Gwen felt her throat constrict slightly; she had an inkling as to what Mark suspected. Did she want to know? Gwen did. She would prefer to be armed with knowledge than flee from its burden.


“You are certain?” Henry asked again. “If my suspicions are correct, then there is no turning back from this, Gwen. There will be no shield of ignorance left to protect you from the full force of temptation. Caliban's supernatural hunger would hardly compare to what allure this knowledge could hold.”

'I won't turn from knowledge, Master."

Henry drained the last of his mead.

“Then let us proceed to the Greater Cognisance Chamber.”

The same guards were on the platform as when they had left, enviously appraising Gwen’s luck to be visiting the chamber with a mentor the magnitude of the one of the Ten. Toward her 'Seniors', Gwen acted both coy and friendly, the three of them sharing pleasant banter while Henry kept himself occupied by meditating.

“They like you,” Henry noted when they stepped into the privacy of the Chamber. “You could do well here if you choose to return after your studies. The Tower always needs young blood. Oceania is a volatile region.”

“I’ll consider it, Master.” Gwen smiled anxiously, she would worry about her future after her moment of truth.

With a thrum, the Chamber activated. Gwen stepped into the centre as the glyphs completed their arcane circuits. Below her sandals, her Astral Soul projected outwards, the entire floor becoming a mirror plane splitting the material world above and the Astral world below.

Henry proceeded in a perimeter around Gwen, muttering to himself as he did so.

“Try to activate the Sigils as I call them out, Gwen.”

“Yes, Master.” Her heart pounded. What was Mark so interested in and what had he uncovered regarding Elizabeth Sobel?

Her illusory Astral Body was alluring as usual, a delicate art sculpture of the female form with long and elegant limbs, radiating motes of light and darkness that alternatively expanded, then consumed one another.

“Evocation.”

Gwen channelled mana through her conduits. The sigil of Evocation blazed before her, brighter than she recalled.

“Your proficiency has yet again improved, Gwen. Making good progress towards tier 4.”

“That’s…” Gwen felt a dark premonition begin to rise from the back of her mind. “That’s impossible, Master… I was only Tier 3, two months ago! The training times are exponential! I couldn’t be tier four even with relentless training for the next twelve months!”

“I see,” Henry replied with no particular emotion, not even a hint of question or curiosity. “Let us proceed.”

“Conjuration.”

Gwen switched to the other Schools of Magic by using well-practised minor incantations. Not far from her blazing Evocation Sigil, her Conjuration flashed a bright silver.

To her disappointment and relief, it was the same as when she had been last tested. It had grown a little, but the difference was nothing like the sudden spurt of the Evocation sigil.

“Abjuration.”

The light of the Conjuration sigil faded. Gwen constructed with meticulous care the Abjuration Sigil used for the activation of the Shield Spell. She was well-trained, but even so, it would take at least a second for her to manifest.

Then, instantly and without warning, the Sigil for Abjuration formed.

It glowed warmly beside the others, a gunmetal Sigil of protection.

Gwen regarded the arcane symbol before her with disbelief. No. The spectacle can't be real; it couldn't possibly be real. Was there a problem with the Chamber? Was the illusion showing her falsehoods rather than a resonance?

“Master…” her voice trembled, from fear, horror, or excitement she could not know.

“A poorly awakened Abjurer too, I see…” Henry again commented without any particular emotion. “Pay it no heed, continue.”

Her back grew sodden with sweat, soaking her cardigan.

“Yes, Master.”

“Divination.”

Another dim glow, this time weak and ineffective.

Gwen was almost choking on her discoveries now. What did it mean? What could it infer? Was this what Mark was trying to expose? If so, she was in far more trouble than she had thought.

“You’re going to need a bit more training to start using Message spells. Attunement to Divination Towers is an art unto itself.” Henry was relentless, commenting upon each shocking surprise as though they were dishes at a degustation.

“Master…” Gwen moaned, she was almost afraid to continue. What if it was true? What if it was real? Void Magic was a Pandora’s box! It was stealing fire from the Gods! How can anyone with an ability like this end well?

“Illusion…” Henry commanded.

“I… I don’t know how, Master,” Gwen breathed out a sigh of relief. It was true. Illusion had been too difficult for someone so practical and lacking in imagination.

“Fine. Transmutation.”

Gwen had to take a moment to stifle her quickened breath and allow her heart to return to a cadence that allowed for the concentration necessary to maintain cross-class Sigils.

In front of her Master, she drew the Sigil within her mind, first the minor incantations, and then-

It blazed, a deep-purple luminosity that was visible, clearly defined.

“Ah-h! Tier 1 already! How fortuitous. A useful and versatile School, Gwen.”

“Oh… Oh Master, I… I…” The moment the sigil triggered, Gwen felt her chest constrict, her body shook, quivering with both ecstasy and distress.

“One final School… Gwen.”

One more? One more! How could she stand yet another school? It was too much! It was overwhelming. Her life was already turned upside down by her Void Magic, and now it was going to gift her with even more boon and bane? She began to hyperventilate, her guts knotting and churning as she fought the panic. Within her stomach, not even the Golden Mead was staying down, she wanted to hurl, but she was in the midst of a Cognisance Chamber, Lord knows what would show up in the illusion.

“Calm Emotion.”

A refreshing wave of clarity washed over her quaking mindscape, replacing her anxiety with a quiet, contemplative peace.

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“Thank you, Master.”

“Don't thank me yet." He smiled weakly. "Enchantment.”

She attempted the final school.

Thankfully, there was nothing. There was barely a glimmer.

She exhaled.

"Now for the elements." Henry motioned for her to get on with it.

Gwen froze on the spot.

"No! That's impossible!" Gwen whimpered.

"That was an ill attempt at humour, I am afraid." Henry smirked uncharacteristically. "It warms my heart to see that even the infallible Miss Song is capable of anguish."

"Master!" Gwen flashed her hazel eyes.

Henry chuckled.

"I believe we have proved Mark's pet theory, no?"

"I am... fortune's fool," Gwen weakly reflected upon her new gifts as the Cognisance illusion faded.

"Aye, Fortuna is indeed a strange and fickle mistress..." Henry concurred; his voice heavy with uncertainty.

"What now? Master?" Gwen inquired carefully.

"I saw those dossiers which Mark had thrown out when Gunther took him in." Henry shook his head. "I believe he was... scrying on you the entire time you were trapped, and Caliban was active."

Gwen felt a shiver run down her spine. He was watching her being captured, tied, packaged, readied for shipment. He was watching Caliban butcher those poor prisoners.

"I dare say he had a list of the prisoners, and... it adds up, I am afraid. There was an Abjurer in there, a few Evokers, two Transmuters..."

Gwen felt sick, her blood abruptly cold with dread and wretchedness. Those new Schools of Magic she had gained, they were not hers. They were the talents of people who were murdered by Caliban. She was a thief, a plunderer, a grave robber. Her knees felt giddy and weak. She had to find an open space and sit, try to orientate her bearings.

"Indeed... what now?" Henry pondered as Gwen hugged her knees, looking forlorn on the floor of the all-white chamber. So many secrets, he mused to himself; they keep piling like soft snow on the mountaintop.

But secrets and Magisters made good companions.

Henry knew not a single Magister who did not have some dire intrigues of his or her own. After all, was not his wife a mass murderer who'd mutilated almost a hundred souls? The Bloody Countess of Eger who terrorised the Hungarian countryside? Small secrets were like gnats, always wearing one away, but big secrets? They were more like a whetting stone that kept one sharp and focused. The life of a Mage seeking the Path was already akin to living on a blade's edge, one slip and there was only death or disgrace. Furthermore, if and when Gwen came into the power she desired, how trivial would all her other secrets be? She merely needed to hold one close to her bosom, and that as enough.

The problem was how to bring Gwen to this understanding? She had just professed to embark upon a righteous path of not murdering her enemies. Yet, her rare gift demanded that she consume human lives to fuel her Path of idealistic pacificism. Such complex contradictions! What absurd reflections of reality and life!

To Gwen's surprise, her Master stood by her side, radiating a sullen melancholy.

"I believe that the greatest mistake we had made was keeping Elizabeth's secret," Henry began, smoothing out his wrinkled jacket. "I don't intend to make that mistake again."

"Master?"

"I have consulted with Surya on this, and we have concluded that only when the world recognises your ability, allowing it to glitter over all faults - would you would be safe."

Gwen gazed at her Master uncomprehendingly.

Henry chuckled.

"Have you heard the story of the Heart of Flames, Gwen?"

Gwen shook her head. Her family was not exactly one for sweet bedtime stories.

"The short of it is that an Arabian Sultan once found the most coveted Creature Core in the world, uncovered from the nest of a long dead Ancient Red Dragon. The core was astoundingly beautiful, and when channelled, provided control of the fire elements equating that of the highest Djinn."

"As one can imagine, the Sultan was afraid, terribly afraid of others finding out about his possession, so he hid the core about his person, only producing it in times of war, as well as in the dark of the night, gazing upon it lovingly and calling it his most precious."

"But, secrets never get buried for long, and many came to covet the Sultan's greatest prize. First, the Sultan became the target of larceny and theft, but when that failed, his foes turned to his family. His sons, daughters, his wives: one by one, enemies from within and without took them. Still, the Sultan refused to give up the core. Ultimately, it was only upon his deathbed, still holding that stone, that he realised his Sultanate was at its end. He had no more heirs. The Core could not pass on his legacy."

"Centuries later, when the Heart of Flames eventually passed into the hands of the Britannic Mageocracy, Queen Victoria made an important and unusual decision. She did not hide the core, but instead declared it a national treasure! She split the core in half, mounting the larger portion upon her sceptre, and the minor portion her crown. She called them her most precious objects, openly declaring to an adoring public that if they wish to see the stone, they merely needed to pay homage to Queen and Country before the Royal Palace during the annual celebrations."

"Did that deter the thieves? I doubt it; such is human nature. But the brilliance of that core now shone with such light, that no shadow could approach it, for an entire nation acted to protect it! The Heart of Flames! The symbol of the Empire! How could anyone dream of theft? Something so debased and unscrupulous! It would blemish and discredit the very heart of a nation! Do you recall our passionate, nationalistic jingo?"

Gwen shook her head.

Henry cleared his throat and began to sing.

"Bring me my wand, of burning gold:
Bring me my arrows of Desire:
Bring me my Stone: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Heart of Fire! "

"Who could dream of violating that? The stone was sacrosanct!"

Henry eased over to give Gwen a reassuring pat, his hands hovered here and there, before finally resting on her cheeks.

"Do you understand, child?"

Gwen nodded. She understood - she finally comprehended why her notebook placed such emphasis on winning the Inter-High competition, on getting into Sydney University with the most prestigious of scholarships. She was to be a panda bear. For despite its world-renown desirability, if one tried to steal, assault, or even molest a Panda, one would anger an entire nation. So what if she had powers far exceeding the average bear? Rarity was leverage.

The keynote was becoming an existence both indispensable and unique. That would be Gwen's metaphysical double-glazed shield. So long as the powers desired the utility of her talents, so long as she could be their beacon of hope, she was safe. Factions conflicted amongst themselves, and many would have selfish designs on a Void Mage, but that competition was leverage. Just look at Elizabeth. What greatness could she have achieved without her madness? Even in her guilt as a mass murderer, she had been ironclad. At the end of a dark day, no uncertain threat from an insane Mage could remotely match the certainty of extinction from the Wildlands.

"But... my consumption ability..." Gwen felt her heart and mind racing; there was one last barrier to dispel, one last knot to untie.

"I am afraid there are no good answers to that," Henry confessed. "Yet that is precisely the point, no? You must own up to your choices, be accountable for your actions. For the abuse of Greatness..."

They said the next few words together, Master and Apprentice achieving a kind of cognitive resonance.

"... is when remorse is disjointed from power."

The shackles of doubt fell from Gwen's wrists, replaced by a feeling of liberation suffusing her body. Driven by impulse, she embraced Henry.

The act seemed to surprise the old man; who for a moment had not known what to do with himself. Their intimacy persisted though, Gwen digging her face into his shoulder, at which point he sensed a wet warmness upon his collar. Was it her breath? Or perhaps a few drops of his Apprentice's rare emotions?

He returned her embrace, her body young and supple; his, gnarly and knotted by time.

Meanwhile, Gwen had recovered from her impulsive moment and was now burning with embarrassment. In her old world, people would have mocking called it a paternal complex. They would be right, of course, but was it her fault she had never had a father-figure across two lifetimes? Morye had been mostly apathetic, somewhat aloof, and positively allergic to responsibility. Meanwhile, Henry untied the knots in her chest, untangled her worries and opened the floodgates of gratitude. There was a welling of emotion that she never really understood; before she realised, she was in her Master's arms, finding catharsis and resolution.

They separated; the old man looked just as embarrassed as she was.

"I am thinking of announcing to the Tower that you are my Apprentice, Gwen," Henry informed her suddenly. "After the Inter-High competition."

Gwen smiled. There was no need for words.

Henry made an effort to straighten his posture, groaning at the burden of physics involved in the act. Gwen shifted on her knees to brace her venerable Master.

"I supposed now you should return to Surya and enjoy the rest of your Summer Break."

She blinked. Summer Break? Good grief! It was still the summer holidays! She had a whole month of December before school resumed in mid-January. With all that had happened, it seemed as though a lifetime had passed since she left for Mark's office!

"Will you go?"

Her Master had a point. She couldn't go back to the dorms yet; no one else was home. She couldn't go back to Morye's, Helena's, or stay at the Tower - there was only Surya's.

"Yes, that's a good idea. You should look into solidifying your new Schools of Magic. I'll speak to Surya, and we'll get you some basic Transmutation and Divination spells. Keep this between the three of us. No one must know until the right time, not even your friends."

Gwen nodded again, looping her arm around Henry's waist like a faithful granddaughter. Arm-in-arm, the duo made for the levitation platform, the doors to the Cognizance Chamber closing behind them silently.

The platform descended; down and down, round and round, plunging towards the uncertain embrace of Lady Fortuna.