Time seems to restart and sound floods back into the world as the mage’s leader falls, clutching his eyes – screaming but very much not dead. Partial success then. I gasp for breath and my hand burns as I draw it back – miscast the fucking spell again, useless. Fuck it, I glance at the man writhing at my feet. leader: taken out.

My heart rate and breathing still completely non-cooperative – got to find a spell to make running easier – I look down at the still-prone figure that had materialised in front of me. She stares boggle eyed back at me. We stare at each other blankly for a moment before a violet-black beam of magic misses me by a hair and explodes against one of the pillars surrounding the summoning circle. The huge crystal sitting on the pillar– what must be powering this lightshow – pulses once, then begins to rapidly turn from baby-blue to danger-red. That’s never a good sign.

Apparently just now realising that he was actually involved in this shit-fest, Emmet shouts out some valuable input for once.

“Lucien! Get back here; it’s going to blow!”

It’s never over is it? Possibly out of some misguided knee-jerk chivalry, I grab the girl and make a dash for exit, spells spiralling past us as we run. I spare a thought to the cultist guy, this bullshit was meant to be non-lethal, and an exploding ritual array isn’t really in the spirit of it – even if it is his fault. I glance back, but apparently, he’s managed to writhe all the way over to the stairs opposite ours. With a decisive flop he’s rolling down them and into the arms of his robed compatriots.

We reach the stairs down and I let go of the girl’s arm at the same time she yanks it away, hilariously making her stumble. David is standing at the foot of the stairs, gesturing for us - Emmet giving him a wide berth but apparently still alive. The girl draws herself up and glances back at the array, before fixing me with a decidedly ungrateful stare.

“Am I being rescued here?” she looks vaguely unsure – right behind you lady. Maybe she’s twigged onto the fact that we’re not with the robed guys who summoned her. The meaning of the headless bodies slumped around David is probably pretty clear.

“Fucking maybe!” I reply, shouting over a loud rumble as another one of the power crystals starts turning pink.

Probably liking her chances with us better than if she stuck around, she shrugs and hurries down the stairs – Right into the path of a grim-faced David and his upraised sword – shit.

Almost without thinking, I lunge forward and shunt her off the side of the staircase, just as his sword passes through the space her head would have been. Again with this chivalry crap? I swear, this better not be because she’s a girl – that’s just embarrassing. Whatever it is, I follow her, stumbling off the edge as flinch out of the way of David’s swing. I land heavily – add that to the list of shit that’s going to hurt in the morning – and limp over to the rock that Emmet has been hiding behind. oh, she’s here too.

“Why aren’t you running?” I hiss as I rub my bruised hip. I think the question’s pertinent – David has been fairly unambiguous about how he wanted this to go down.

“I don’t know. I have no idea what’s going on here,” she spits back with a touch of understandable hysteria. As if to punctuate her point, a stream of fire blasts against our rock, only to be immediately snap frozen in a blast of frost. “What the shit is that?” I ignore her as she seems to be more or less narrating my inner monologue. I crouch up and knock away the frozen fire with my elbow, giving me a clearer view of the chaos as I peek out.

“Reynard’s been pushed to this side of the temple thing. David’s with him, I think they’re stuck.” Emmet nods along, the girl just looks confused and irritated. I turn to her, pausing to let some weird green spells to crackle over us. “I guess you could go back to the mages over there, they probably summoned you for a reason.” A few more explosions rattled the ground around us, she moves away from the edge of the rock. We’re probably on the same wavelength on this one. “Though I’m not sure how you’d make it over to them in one piece.” I continue the logic for Emmet’s benefit.

“Is that magic?” She asks, apparently not on the same wavelength at all.

“Obviously. Keep up, would you?” Incredulity colouring my voice as the number of idiots around me increments by one. “Are you coming with us or not?” I ask before this gets side-tracked any further.

She glances towards the temple one more time before swallowing hard and nodding. “So, do you two have an exit strategy?” she asks. Her expression suddenly turning serious. I look at Emmet for some input– it’s about time he pitched in on this madness.

“W-well… I think the main tunnel is the only exit. R-Reynard kept making weird jokes about cats trapping mice in corners. I thought it was just a lame pun that I wasn’t getting… In retrospect they were probably just discussing their plan of approach”. He looks sheepishly between us before starting again, “Um, I-I don’t think we’ll be able to reach the main tunnel again though. There’s still a lot of them over there.”

“We could try to slip around, while those robe guys are occupied by that crazy sword guy,” the girl interjects energetically into our impromptu huddle, seeming to be getting weirdly into this. I mentally move Emmet up my hierarchy of sensibility. At least he’s maintaining an appropriate fear and respect for the death beams streaking above us.

“… We could give it a shot” I hazard, rising to peek over the top again, before freezing. “Wait, has anyone seen that Archer?”

“Melanie?” Melanie! That’s what it was, knew I could count on you Emmet.

“Yeah, I lost track of h-” an arrow thuds into the soil, right next to my foot – which I quickly retract. “Never mind, she’s with the others,” I say, seeing a shadow flit behind Reynard and David again. That rules out sneaking around, we wouldn’t last a second.

“That rules out sneaking around, we wouldn’t last a second,” the girl steals my thunder. “So, we have to go through those crazies,” please specify miss, “the guys in the glowing armour I mean,” ah – those crazies. Emmet looks a little green, he’s known them the longest I guess, their capabilities – they did mention killing monsters earlier in the cave.

“We’d need a pretty big distraction, both for them and the mages, there’s a lot of empty space. Even then there’s no exit,” he mutters out. I ponder the problem as I sneak a peek at what is clearly a rapidly destabilising, high-powered summoning array. Five of the six power crystals around the pedestal are deep red – why haven’t they exploded yet? Could be a fail-safe, though maybe one more hit when they’re all red?

“Right, I think I have a potential distraction” I turn back towards the girl and Emmet.

“D-do you think it’s erm… survivable?” I think he’d seen me looking at the array.

“Aren’t enclosed spaces really bad for blowing things up?” asks the girl, an appropriate level of trabeation trickling back into her voice. I frown. Apparently, I’m not as creative as I thought. Though to be fair, there are very few factors to work with.

“As I was saying, I think I can destabilise the array if I charge up a firebolt.” I present my plan anyway, damned if I let them ruin my moment. “And anyway, it’s a summoning array,” both of them look blankly at me as if that didn’t mean anything. bloody non-magicals. “There’s got to be a super high mana concentration in those crystals – which is inevitably going to be very distracting. Plus, it wasn’t designed to be destructive – the intent for an explosion isn’t there”.

“Doesn’t that sound a little arbitrary?” the girl asks, catching on quick to the fundamentals of magic. “So, what’s going happen instead?”

“I don’t know. If we’re lucky, something helpful. If we’re not, hopefully we’re far enough away”. Emmet didn’t look thrilled at that, non-mages are always so sensitive about mana related randomisation. I at least like our chances.

“We still need to get past Reynard’s group” he pipes up. I think back to my magical experimentation, namely the goo-ified body from this morning and the explosive light spell.

“I’ve got a plan. Portal Girl, fetch me that head”. I point to one of David’s beheading victims near us. Her face goes pale as if just noticing the waxy corpses. She looks at me with a disbelieving expression. I just point again and turn back to start the casting process.

She hurries off, thankfully not complaining.

I catch Emmet with a sickened expression on his face, what a princess. I ignore the two of them and reach for my magic.

The other two groups are still duking it out, the wide coverage of spell fire sending a few straggling bolts our way as well. I lean back and aim my hand at the first crystal to turn red, and snap my fingers. I snap again for fire, then I keep going, focussing the mana towards my fingertips – which is actually much harder than I expected it to be.

The mana shimmers through the gradient, from its usual rosy hue to – at snap number five – a denser fiery orange. Red sparks cartwheeling merrily across my palm as the mana rapidly reaches critical levels. I grit my teeth, the tips of my fingers glowing red in a way that just cannot be totally benign. My hand shakes as the heat starts to burn, I try for snap number six, but a lurch in my mana stream warns me against it.

“READY!” I yell over the blood rushing in my ears. The girl is back with the head, eyes clenched shut and jerkily rolling the thing towards me. Emmet’s in position if something goes wrong. I hope this doesn’t hurt – please don’t hurt.

I line my hand up and flick at the power crystal. In a rush magic and sparks, a fireball explodes from my hand – along with the first two knuckles of my pinkie.

I fall to the ground clutching at my hand, probably screaming profanities through clenched teeth. I don’t know – I don’t have enough adrenaline for this anymore. Rolling over, I wave my poor hand vaguely at Emmet. Luckily, it’s all been cauterised – benefits of fire magic, I guess. He snaps away from what was probably an impressive impact and starts working his magic. Immediately a glorious numbness spreads over my arm, it’s moments like this that really sell religion. He turns and offer’s his services to the girl and I tune them out.

I sit back up against our barricade, gesturing for the head. Neither of my companions make a move but I find it at my feet either way. I palm it and – wow, they’re always heavier than you’d think – and look over at the crystals. Yep, direct hit. The crystal’s sparking all kinds of colours and the entire array has completely bypassed the deeper shades of red – right through to dark purple. It’s probably got like, 30 seconds before that does something impressive – I hurry up with the next step.

“I don’t know if this is going to work,” I warn them. “Just start running if the temple does anything useful.” The other’s nod and get ready to run, while I start pounding this poor soul’s skull full of the most delicious flavour of mana – death. The skin immediately turns waxy and starts to glisten translucently – not great. I bring my other hand over, channelling the magic with both in the hopes it stabilises the process. Somehow that seems to work, the head stops threatening to melt in my hands, and wisps of darkness start trailing out his nose – excellent.

28 seconds later, the crystal array pulses, and implodes into a solid black sphere that quickly begins expanding, violet lightning arcing from its surface. The roar of the explosion keeps building as a whining feedback drowns out the battle around us. Robed figures and psychotic imperials alike flee before the encroaching darkness. Those who are too slow are swallowed, the battlelines well and truly scattered. The sphere grinds to a halt and a moment later retracts to the size of a marble. I let out a shaky breath, we were far enough away. A beat passes, then beam of pure energy blasts from the centre, boring an enormous tunnel, into the side of the cave.

The girl shouts something that my ringing ears don’t catch, taking off with Emmet towards a cluster of reeling robes – including Reynard’s group. Unfortunately, they are the ones who seem to recover first, more so that they seem to prioritise killing us over facing off against the robes again. Gods, I hope this works.

The three of them turn to face us as we run, at the same time as a few of the robes behind them include us in their new firing arc. Just as we reach them, I throw the skull. Now I’ll never claim to have a particularly strong throwing arm – quite the opposite actually – so I’ll have to credit the perfect parabola right into Reynard’s face to the inherent instincts of mana to cause maximum possible mayhem.

The head, once outside of my enforced stability – pumped to bursting point with mana as it was – explodes in gore, pus and calcified sludge, showering the combatants in more diseased flesh than could possibly have been stored in that skull. Most of them cringe back and slip over, half of them throw up – David included. None of them are able to do anything as we skid over them and race for the exit.

We reach the mouth of the newly formed tunnel – no heat from the energy beam, as if the rock had simply disappeared – and see light at the end. Praise be for that. Not dropping pace for an instant, we run down the tunnel, desperately trying to keep our balance on the perfectly polished walls and floor of the passage. Feeling a rumble in my teeth, I glance back and see thick black cracks snaking across the ceiling.

“Mother above, run!” Emmet shouts, and I’m right behind him as rocks start falling behind us and cracks start spreading out ahead. 50 paces, 40 paces, 30, 20, lungs burning, I run harder than ever before, the other two right beside me. I let out a wordless gasp, lost amidst the collapsing tunnel, and give one last desperate push, chunks of falling ceiling dogging each step. With a crash, a cloud of dust and a wall of rubble, I’m left sprawled out, sunlight above me and grass below.

“Oh Christ! Holy shit!” loud noises from my left means the girl made it out. I squint to my right and – yep, there’s Emmet groaning in a bundle. Ha! We’re okay. I’m okay, I melt into the grass, not having felt relaxed since I entered those bloody caves.

Even with all the energy beams and explosions of the last half hour, the sun is still blinding after hours of dank caves and mortal terror. I bury my face in the muddy grass – who even cares anyway? I just lie there waiting for my mana to stop churning in my gut. Father would skin me alive for meditating like this, but I can’t seem to care – any more action right now and I think I’d throw up. Too many firebolts, too much mana channelling – too many bloody miscasts – it’s a wonder I managed that final stretch really.

The image of Reynard’s stupid, surprised face as he’s showered in pus floats across my eyelids. Heh, how’s that for distracting? Apart from shocked that it had worked at all, that none of us had slipped and that so many of the bastards had been clustered so tightly, the most shocking thing was how stable the damn thing had been when I threw it. Prior experience had the head straight up melt as soon as I had poked it – it looked that way this time as well. At first. What was different this time around?

I twitch my right hand, complete with fresh pinkie finger, and think back to when the head had gained its strange stability – the first step to real necromancy. Huh, maybe Emmet really was useful.

“Hey, Saruman” I feel an irritating presence standing above me. Mustering the few remaining flecks of interest that I could give; I roll over and squint up at the girl.

“Who?” I try to inject all the irritation I can into my reply.

“Saruman, the White Wizard, because of your hair,” she pauses, “and your skin I guess – wow, do you ever go outside?” Even through my squinting, she must have noticed my blank stare, “eh, probably giving you too much credit with that anyway.” Why do I feel vaguely insulted?

I close my eyes again and ignore her until she wanders off with a huff. I spend the next few minutes relaxing in the afternoon sun. I hate for her to be right, but I’ve never been one for direct sunlight – I burn easily. For once, the warm sunlight just feels nice and comfortable. I dig my hands into the loamy soil, the cool mud dulling the phantom stinging from my recently healed burns. All in all, it’s remarkably pleasant – I should do this more often.

Time quickly becomes distractingly arbitrary and I crack my eyes open, having lain here for anywhere between six seconds and a millennium. Or maybe I’d fallen asleep. With unfocused eyes I spot Emmet, similarly comatose, and the girl, standing alone a few paces away. She looks a little like she’s waiting for something – switching between Emmet and I, trying to establish eye contact. I make the mistake of doing so and she perks up, edging towards me.

“Did you need something?” I ask, knowing that I should probably be making some effort to get up.

“Yeah, actually,” She starts, standing stiffly and rubbing at a bruise on her arm, while bending her neck uncomfortably to converse with my prone body. I surrender to civility and grudgingly get up. “I guess I’ll start with, ‘where are we?’” she asks, moving back to give me room as I stumble elegantly to my feet.

“If the tunnel let out where I think it did, we’re on the other side of the hill I came in from – a few hours from town,” she frowns, looking unimpressed. “Weld, the village is called Weld.” She motions to keep going, “North end of the Caithurt Empire?” She stops me – good – geography was never my strong point.

“So, this isn’t Earth” a statement more than a question, “and you guys have magic and all that crap? Proper swords and sorcery?” I shrug and flare a bit of mana – you bet this is ‘proper’ sorcery. Her arms drop to her sides and she turns a bit to look at the countryside in silence. She’s in a bright green, short sleeved shirt thing as well as a pair of black pants. Too clean (excluding the mess from today) for a peasant and not quite the right fit for a noble or an adventurer, she does look out of place.

The silence lingers, no words come to mind that seem any more suitable than nothing at all. She starts to wander away without properly finishing our conversation. I’m left standing awkwardly next to a stirring Emmet. I’d be more irritated but the feeling that I’ve probably been a bit too sharp with her starts to creep around my stomach. One doesn’t exactly use a portal to move short distances.

O – O – O – O – O

A black bird – small, with a red feathered throat – hops around at the foot of a tree. Can’t say I’ve ever seen one like it, but then again, I can probably name like four species of bird – tops. But there’s the rub isn’t it? A tree with leaves that look close enough to an oak, a yellow flower that might just be a daffodil, and the bird’s probably just a sparrow or something. It’s all pretty normal. The tree isn’t purple, the flowers can’t walk around and black sparrows still eat earthworms – not even a whiff of magic.

On the other hand, this morning I had been slumming it at Easy Al’s and now I’m in the middle of the woods – ignoring the whole magical lightshow for now. That kind of thing doesn’t just happen. Bolts of purple lightning and neon particle effects flit through my thoughts. Presented as actual magic, the entire battle feels ridiculous, high octane and completely un-survivable – they can’t possibly expect me to buy that can they? Overfunded LARPers the lot of them. Magic isn’t real. A grin slowly worms its way to the surface, spreading across my face. But it is. I can still feel the weird chilling from whatever the priest dude did, literally before my eyes. That soft glow erased the burns and scrapes I had gotten from magic spells in an honest to god magic battle.

And the albino fashion disaster – black leather pants. Really? – he can use real magic. Straight up fire balls and explosions – the good stuff. Could everyone do that? Could I? I reluctantly tear myself from that train of thought. I can’t just accept all this lying down.

The grassy glade seems to widen around me, and the warmth from the sunlight stops reaching me. Goosebumps travel up my arms and I shiver as a sliver of reality pops the germinating bubble of fantasy and excitement. I turn back to the wizard, who seems to be awkwardly rocking on the balls of his feet. I meet his dull brown eyes and images flash involuntarily through my mind.

His expression as he boiled that handsome guy’s eyes out of his skull – completely blank, 100% focussed. Setting off that explosion when he must have known the people were going to get caught in the blast. Not to mention the way he casually weaponized that person’s head. This guy could be dangerous – hell, the priest seems to know him, they could both be crazy.

I look at the priest, he’s sitting against the cave-in, content to relax in the shade. The mage has gone back to idly kicking at clumps of grass. Both of them covered in mud and grime. Neither could be much older than me, early twenties at most – not exactly seasoned veteran of anything, much less professionals. This whole thing is such a mess, I realise I don’t even have the beginnings of a grasp on who these people are and what was going on in that cave.

The priest starts a little as I approach, smiling widely. I feel the mage’s eyes prickle at my neck as I walk by.

“We haven’t had much of a chance to introduce ourselves, have we? I’m Evelyn.”

“Oh, hello Evelyn. My name’s Emmet.” He looks a little nervous. What? Isn’t he allowed to talk to girls or something? “Do you need anything?”

Oh boy do I. I chuckle good naturedly as I continue, “well I guess I’m still feeling a little lost. Maybe if I start with… who were those robed people?”

“The ones who opened the portal?” I nod, “Oh – I don’t know.”

Okay, fine. “And the others? That swordsman?”

“I’m not sure I know either. Not anymore anyway.” He physically wilts as he says it, a cocktail of negativity palpable in his expression. But weren’t they working together? At least for a little bit. My smile slips.

“But why were you there? Why was anyone there? I literally–” I stop myself and start again, calmer. “Look, this is all wildly out of my comfort zone. I’m just a little lost here.”

A beat passes before he starts and focusses on me. “Oh, oh sorry – I’m just a little tired. A little confused myself truth be told.” He stands to speak, remembering his manners faster than the mage. “Well, the other three – David, Melanie and Sir Reynard – came to the church yesterday with a quest from the Empress herself and in need of a priest – I was chosen.” He perks up a little at that, then deflates, probably remembering that they were psychotic. He pushes on, “I was told we were going to purge one of the cave systems around town – Weld that is – I just assumed we were after the rat monsters.” Monsters as well? Hot damn. But still isn’t entirely helpful. I take a deeper breath to quash the hollow feeling in my stomach.

“So those wizards were the real target then?”

Emmet wilts again, turning away slightly, “Ah yes. Sir Reynard made this speech and attacked with Melanie. Then David took Lucien and I around the side; David told Lucien to kill their leader – he didn’t want to, said he couldn’t – and… and I just watched.” Is Lucien the wizard? Emmet burrows in on himself again.

I remember the mage’s – Lucien’s – black robes. “Was Lucien with these cult guys?” I keep my voice low and lean in. Emmet shakes his head vigorously.

“Lucien? No. We found him in the tunnels being attacked by monsters. Sir Reynard forced him to come along. I really should have realised something was off then” he scowls, trailing off again. “Stupid.” I breath a sigh of relief. Emmet comes off as disarmingly honest and I let him brush away a lot of my earlier fears. He interprets my silence as judgment, or something, because he bustles on. “I mean, he was the one who got us out of there in one piece. I should give him more credit, and Sir Reynard is a professional.” I stop him.

“Wait, so he’s not with the robes? He’s just a nobody?” Emmet shrugs uncomfortably, not sure of which part of the question he wants to agree to.

“I wouldn’t say I’m a nobody.”

Oops, the white wizard stomps over to us – any intimidation factor undermined by his mussed hair, and the mud all the way down his front. Emmet starts placating immediately, I just raise my eyebrow condescendingly. It doesn’t help the situation – true – but he’s probably just being difficult. It’s not like he wasn’t listening in enough to get the context. What a princess.

He seems to get over himself fast enough, not missing a minute before he starts talking – quickly as if rehearsed.

“Emmet, I’m going back to Weld, but I’m planning on heading up to your monastery – wherever that is. I might need access to some of the writings there – for a personal project. Do you think you can make that happen?” he pauses for an answer.

Emmet blinks at the verbal onslaught, but musters a maybe, “Er, we’re always happy to spread the word,” he pauses as well, “though it would be only the basics.” Lucien nods.

“That would be fine.” He half turns and side-eyes me, “E-Evelyn. I doubt you have any plans. I assume you’ll tag along?”

I stare at him, trying to contain a huff of amusement. Evelyn? How long was he eavesdropping on us?