Ethan had never been to Brighton before, and as the barge pulled up to a dock on the eastern side of the river, he was not impressed. The city where they came to port looked smaller than Garashire and barely bigger than his hometown of Stonehollow. He could see a similar-sized village on the Talla side of the river, and remarkably, there was no bridge between them. But even if the two port settlements were combined, they fell far short of what Ethan expected.

“This isn’t Brighton,” Natasha said, standing behind him. “The capital city of the northland is another half a dozen miles to the east. They didn’t want to put it too close to the border for fear my people might attack.”

“Tough to do without a bridge,” Ethan argued.

“That is on purpose too, though now even the Tallashites don’t want a bridge because it would put the ferrymen out of work.”

Sera had also never been this far south and listened to their conversation with interest. After Brittany had settled accounts with the ship’s captain, the six party members got off the boat and wondered where to go next. They didn’t have to wait long.

Ferres recognized the supplicant’s gray cloaks and ran up to the group. He also recognized Brittany, as this wasn’t her first mission outside the temple. “I am at your service, Blessed Mother,” he said, dropping to one knee and bowing. A throbbing bruise on the side of his head acutely reminded him of what happened when he crossed one of the Supplanter’s women, and this one didn’t look like she would need a frying pan to knock him out. “I have information for your mission.”

“Not out in the open,” Brittany said, beckoning the man to rise and lead them to a more secluded place. Already, mule-guided carts were lining up to help unload the barge, and many more wagons and personnel crowded the busy port. Ferres led the group through the crowded dock area and onto a side street toward the port’s few eating establishments.

“Have you eaten yet this morning?” he asked.

They hadn’t. Ferres frowned, not expecting this large of a group. He had thought it would be one or two people, not six. This affected the choice of eatery he offered them, not that his group cared. They had been living off cold rations for the past two days, and anything hot that filled their stomachs was acceptable. They had over an hour hike to Brighton yet and were sure to see action when they arrived. Ferres filled them in with what he knew while they ate.

A few hours past dawn, Celaina heard the doorbell ring and wasn’t surprised when Gerhold was again standing at her doorway a minute later. Priest Kreig knew his place and quickly retreated to his room before either of the paladins spoke. Celaina was dressed in the same white and gold robe, the colors of her new adopted faith. The attire gave little indication of the figure that lay beneath, but Gerhold was willing to bet the woman had maintained her fitness at least as well as he had. Training others in swordsmanship had kept him trim. Living in Red Valley, Celaina had probably worked tirelessly in the orchards with the throzens, and the spry creatures would have challenged her to keep up.

Once the priest was gone, Celaina retook a seat on her bed, expecting Gerhold to take the lone chair in the room, but he stood still in the open doorway, wanting his posture to lend gravity to what he had to say. “I shouldn’t have left.”

Pain creased her face, and Celaina felt she should stand to embrace her husband but chose not to. This was a chance for them to talk. Physical contact could come later, if ever. “I know. You always fought harder for us than I did. I loved that about you.”

“Loved?” he asked, stressing the past tense verb.

“Gerhold,” her face tried to keep its composure. “We always knew our commitment to the Order and the Divine Savior was greater than our commitment to ourselves. This was a way to rip off the bandage in one pull, so to speak. Let someone else decide for us. A decision that we would eventually have to make anyway.”

“Like putting down that horse,” Gerhold said, pulling up the last fight they had before separating.

“Don’t start with me,” she said, anger creeping into her voice. “He had several good years left.”

“So did we.”

Celaina bit back her retort, having not seen the obvious parallel before.

Though it dawned on her now, Gerhold continued to explain anyway. “When I saw how you fought for that horse, broken leg and all, despite his pain and the excruciating recovery he had in front of him, and then I saw how quickly you gave up on us, accepting the Order’s request with barely any consideration . . . It broke my heart. I never wielded the Elemental blade I was given. I don’t even think I ever touched the hilt. But I could feel its emotional power reverberating in my soul. It took years to . . .”

He couldn’t finish, and now Celaina did rise from the bed and embrace him. How could she be so foolish? She remembered all the fights they had endured before their separation. His insistence that she wore her armor when she was about the city. It wasn’t him trying to keep her in line or abiding by some paladin code. He wanted to make sure she stayed safe. When they had argued over money and her refusal to accept tithes from the villagers and farmers she often protected from crawners and bloodhounds, it wasn’t because he was some greedy money hoarder, but he wanted her to be able to save up so that they could retire at some point. She had refused to start a family with him, but now she saw they were too old and had no legacy, no offspring that would live on in their name.

To Celaina, Gerhold had been a friend, a lover, and fellow man-at-arms, but he had never been her husband. As this realization washed over her, she sobbed along with him, their bodies shaking in the long embrace.

The bell from the door brought them to attention. Gerhold sucked in his emotions as he looked down the hallway and saw the priest leave his room and enter the narthex of the temple. The thin walls did nothing to prevent the raised voices, and Gerhold looked on in shock as Quarton suddenly appeared in the open doorway.

“Sir Gerhold!” the enforcer shouted. “Hand it over; no one else needs to get hurt.”

“No one else?” he asked, guessing the old priest had been ruthlessly tossed aside. “Whose side are you on?” There was no way Jenkins would sanction this brutal invasion. There was no way the head paladin would ever tell Quarton where the dagger was. This had to be something else. Behind the large man, Gerhold saw a woman of almost the same size standing ready. She wore the gray robe of a supplicant. “The Supplanter? You chose him over the Divine Savior?”

“I’m a betting man,” the enforcer replied. “Right now, he has all the chips. Or almost all of them. Give me the dagger.”

Celaina poked her head out of her bedroom and saw the large man stalking slowly down the hall. She retreated quickly and dropped to her knees to reach under the bed. She pulled out a small case, opened it, and then strapped the sheathed dagger to her calf under her gown. When Quarton made it to the small room’s entry, Celaina was standing again, her robe falling to the tops of her feet. She had kicked the closed case back under the bed and gave the brutal man an innocent look.

Quarton had been a paladin under oath when Gerhold and Celaina had been together, and a light went on behind his eyes. “You were given one to guard too,” he said, looking at the woman. “Where is it?”

The black-clad man charged her, but her husband stood in the way, having drawn his sword in the cramped quarters. There wasn’t enough room to swing the long blade, but he held it forward to bash the attacker. Quarton grunted, turning to absorb the blow with his shoulder and backing up into the hallway to give him room to draw his weapon. The two men attacked each other with abbreviated swings, mostly with their wrists, stealing Gerhold’s only advantage in this encounter: technique. Instead, the younger, bigger, and stronger man was able to overrun the older knight until he came up hard against the bed and fell backward.

The room’s outer wall proved to be just as thin as the interior ones, and after a crash of plaster and wood, Gerhold found himself rolling in the dirt outside of the small temple, looking back at a man-sized hole in the wall. He heard his wife scream from inside, and soon she also came tumbling out of the temple, breaking off new sections of the wall with her.

As Quarton proceeded to toss the room they had just vacated, undoubtedly finding the case beneath the bed, Gerhold ran to his wife and helped her up. “I’m fine,” she said hurriedly. “We need to-,” but she was cut off.

“Sir Gerhold!”

The knight turned at the cry and saw Sera and Ethan standing in the street with two other people he didn’t know. He figured out what was going on and quickly prepared for a fake attack if they needed to keep up their cover.

But Sera and Ethan were waiting for the right time to reveal who they really were, and this was as good a time as any. They both turned to Yori. The islander was surprised that these two youths would recognize a knight in the Elemental Order, and as he looked them in the eyes, he realized something else was going on. “What are you about?”

“We are with the Elemental Order,” Ethan said. “We are not assassins. We have been charged with recovering the Elementals and returning them to safekeeping. Hand over the spear, and we don’t need to hurt you.”

Yori backed away from the two youths, glancing over at Natasha, wondering where the woman stood in all this. She was removing herself from the trio, trying to keep her distance. Then he looked over at Ferres. The five of them had been told to wait in the street while Quarton and Brittany went inside the temple. The Tallashite merchant had a crossbow out and ready. He didn’t quite know where to point it at the moment, but he would at least be good for one shot.

Yori looked back at the pair before him and then at the temple behind them. Any moment Quarton and Brittany would be coming through that hole in the wall, presumably with the dagger. It would be four against four, assuming the older woman who had fallen out of the temple would fight and Natasha wouldn’t. The Supplanter side would have two of the Elementals, and the knights would have two. But the knights consisted of two youths and two much older paladins, while his side had three fighters in the prime of their life. Besides, the only money in it was to work with the Supplanter.

“I’m afraid you’ll have to take it off me.” He pulled his twin swords and got in a ready stance.

Sera and Ethan had only ever seen him use his bow before and had no idea what to expect. Sera swung her oversized shield from her back and drew her sword while Ethan pulled his blade. The islander struck first, picking on Ethan and moving to the young man’s left, away from Sera. The woman had to scramble around her friend to try and find a way into the fight, but Yori kept dancing to his left and right, keeping the bigger Ethan in the way.

Ferres lifted his crossbow to get an angle but wasn’t confident he could hit the right person and held his shot in check, backing away from the action. Natasha drew her slender blade but didn’t have the experience to trust herself in any kind of flanking maneuver against Yori and just waited to see if she could help.

Gerhold and Celaina picked themselves off the ground at the sound of the battle and watched Ethan frantically wave his sword around, desperately fending off the dual attacks. They were about to lend assistance when they heard Quarton shout an order at Brittany to keep tearing apart the room while he ensured the paladins didn’t escape. Soon the big fighter was leaping through the hole in the wall and charging at the couple.

The protective husband stood before his wife, brandishing his weapon but knowing he was not strong enough to repel the rushing bull before him. In addition, his side, which had felt fully healed, was screaming at him now that it had its first taste of serious action. Quarton feinted left, then right, catching Gerhold off-balanced and deflecting his sword while shouldering him to the ground without fully swinging his weapon, leaving it cocked and ready to swipe at Celaina, defenseless with nowhere to dodge. The blade cut hard against her torso, shredding her robe and spinning her to the ground. Quarton continued to run past, taking several steps before he could halt his momentum.

Gerhold saw the attack play out in front of him, and he cried out in anguish, knowing a cut like that would kill his wife in mere seconds. He rolled over, trying to find the strength to stand, but only managed to crawl over to Celaina, who lay moaning on the ground. “No, please, no,” he pleaded as he leaned over her prone form, refusing to look down at the gaping wound on her stomach.

“I’ll be all right,” she replied weakly. “It’s not too bad.”

Even in this grave situation, Gerhold couldn’t help bringing up their old arguments. “If only you were wearing armor.”

“But,” she grunted in pain. “I am.”

She pushed her husband away, reached down to the tear in her robe, and ripped it wide open. Underneath, she was wearing a fitted metal breastplate that now had a prominent scratch at the bottom but no blood. She also had a short sword strapped to her thigh, and she pulled it now and rolled over. Unbeknownst to the grieving husband, Quarton was charging back in, and his strike hit the dirt where Celaina just was, and then the enforcer had to leap back as the woman swung out at his leg. Gerhold recovered quickly and popped off the ground, slashing back and forth at the bigger man, forcing him even further, giving Celaina a chance to stand. She discarded the rest of her ruined outer garment and stood ready for battle, a knight in shining armor.

Meanwhile, Sera stopped trying to get around Ethan to stand side by side and instead sprinted around the fighting pair entirely and came up behind Yori. The trained warrior couldn’t miss the small woman with the massive shield and was forced to retreat before the team could flank him. They were soon on the same general side but far enough apart that Yori couldn’t attack one of them without putting the other at his back. Thinking quickly, he sheathed his left sword and pulled his bow. In a move he had obviously practiced, the archer kept his right-hand fingers through the full knuckle guard, so the sword hung on his hand as he reached over his shoulder for an arrow.

Sera saw what was coming and raced toward Ethan. Yori had the arrow drawn back and aimed at the young man just as Sera arrived, and her massive shield was up in time to deflect the shot. After the attack, she waited for two heartbeats, peeked over her guard, and raised the shield again as a second arrow ricocheted to the ground.

The fletching of the second arrow brushed against her exposed leg as it spun to the ground, and an odd sensation coursed through her. Images of feathers and flight cascaded through her mind, and her body suddenly felt light. A picture of her flying through the air above the giant vulture from several days ago played in her head, but then the scene suddenly flipped, and she was the bird.

Ethan’s cry brought her back to reality just in time to see Yori, back to holding his two blades, charging at them again. Sera only partially separated herself from the daydream, allowing the sense of flight to inhabit her body. She felt the physical essence of the vulture inside her, awoken by the arrow’s feathers, and she let the Elemental build upon that feeling. Yori was only a dozen feet away when Sera jumped, leaving the massive shield on the ground and impossibly flipping up and over the sprinting warrior.

Yori was stunned by the sudden flight but managed to redirect one of his attacks, sending a blade back and deflecting Sera’s strike from above, delivered high as she landed behind him. That attack was defeated, but Ethan was greeted with only a loosely held left blade, and he swiped easily through that and delivered a vicious cut to Yori’s left shoulder. The desperate islander was effectively flanked and had to frantically fend off two skilled sword fighters, receiving a cut to his right leg from Sera and then a gash on his left hip from Ethan.

The friends grinned at the sudden momentum change in the fight but then froze when they heard Gerhold cry out. Ethan had his back to the other battle behind them, but Sera saw that Quarton had delivered a massive cut to their old mentor, and now Brittany was exiting the temple carrying a heavy mace that she had just used to smash up Celaina’s room without finding anything. Ethan didn’t see the action but interpreted the look in Sera’s eyes. “Go, I’ve got this now.”

She didn’t need to be told twice and sprinted across the hard-packed street toward the paladins. Sera wanted to help Gerhold and the woman he was with, but, despite the wound the knight had just taken, they could effectively fend off further attacks. Sera was disturbed by the amount of blood she could suddenly smell, but she pushed that to the back of her mind as she ran past the three fighters and intercepted Brittany before the woman could tip the scales.

“As it was meant to be,” the tall supplicant said, tossing off her robe and holding her heavy mace in one hand. “I never trusted you.”

Sera suddenly wished she had her shield with her as the massive head of the blunt weapon swept toward her. However, it was a good thing she didn’t have it, for if she had tried to block the powerful attack with the guard, it would have thrown her across the street and into an adjacent warehouse wall. Instead, she had to duck and was suddenly happy for her small stature. As the mace swung above her head, she struck low with her sword, and Brittany had to step back, giving Sera a chance to stand up.

They waded back in quickly, exchanging strikes a few times before Sera realized how overmatched she was. The mace wasn’t a weapon designed to parry sword strikes, but it was far more capable of intercepting the cuts and jabs she offered than her sword was of blocking the concussive blasts delivered by the larger woman’s weapon. Each parry jolted her whole body, twisting the blade in her grasp and forcing her to stumble backward.

Still, Sera’s performance was better than the physical supplicant was expecting. “You have it inside you, don’t you?” she asked, taking several more tremendous swipes with her weapon that Sera danced away from. Brittany wasn’t really trying to hit her but was looking instead at the axe that hung inside her cloak. “I knew I sensed a power inside you.”

Sera tried to up the tempo against the distracted woman, coming in fast behind the massive swings, but her opponent wore metal bracers on her arms and held up her left to deflect the strike. She then punched under the block with her right arm, the mace’s head leading. Again, Sera tried to block the blow with her sword, but the weapons clanged together uncomfortably, the vibrations jolting the blade from her hands. The smaller woman didn’t allow the stun of the attack to hold her for long and leaped back on instinct as Brittany brought her weapon back down again on the smaller opponent.

Sera flew up and back, allowing the feeling of flight to flow through her again, and she landed twenty-five feet away from her opponent. Brittany tried not to be impressed by the jump and smiled when she saw what the young woman was holding. Sera followed her eyes and looked at her right hand to see she had instinctively drawn the axe from its sheath.

“Good,” Brittany said. “Now, when I kill you, the Elemental will return where it belongs.”

The bigger woman charged again, and Sera reacted on instinct, bringing the axe above her head with two hands and hurling it at the rushing opponent. Brittany was shocked by the attack and tried to sweep her mace in front of her at the last second but was only partially successful. Instead of cleaving her head in two, the axe was deflected to the side and buried deep into her shoulder. She cried out in pain but couldn’t control her momentum, and Sera had to dive out of the way as her crippled foe stumbled passed her.

Sera found her feet quickly and ran over to the downed fighter. She was sprawled on her back, the mace several feet away and the axe sticking out of her shoulder like it was embedded in a chopping block. Sera wasn’t one for quippy one-liners; she reached down to pull the axe free and then finished the job.

The jolt of energy that rushed in through the weapon sent her to her knees.