The General’s gleeful laughter filled the hall.

Vorr stepped around from behind the Queen’s throne, big and black-armoured and red-haired, unable to contain his mirth.

“Mother!” Nuthea cried at the top of her voice, and shoved past the two Manolian guards, shooting up the steps of the dais to kneel next to the fallen Queen. “Cid! Heal her!”

“Not so easily done!” Vorr laughed. “You are quite surrounded!”

On the balcony level that ringed the hall above them, soldier after black-armoured soldier stood side by side, each with a crossbow levelled at the party. They must have been hiding behind the guard rail when the party had entered the hall.

Ryn looked back at the dais. A deep red puddle seeped out from underneath the Queen where she lay on her front. Nuthea knelt with her hands thrown over her mother’s head, her face buried somewhere in the Queen’s shoulder as she sobbed uncontrollably. In between sobs, she whimpered, “Mother! I’m so sorry! I’m so so sorry! Please! Cid! Please heal her! Someone heal her!”

Ryn stood watching all this like a statue, numbing cold spreading in his belly.

Vorr calmed down from his outburst of laughter and spoke over Nuthea’s whimpers. “Nobody’s going to be healing her, unless they want a crossbow bolt through their neck too. Pitiful girl. Do you realise that you gave us the key to taking Manolia, to your own downfall? Once we discovered that as ruby-touched we had some immunity to the Lightning Crystal thanks to our little brush with you on the train, everything was easy! We didn’t even need to carry out an invasion! All I had to do was request a single diplomatic meeting, show your ‘Queen’ our immunity, and then I could force her to do whatever I wanted, without any fear of your little lightning tricks. Telling her that I knew where you were and would kill you on sight when you arrived here if she didn’t comply with my commands made her submit quickly enough. Most of her ‘guards’ have been following her orders without knowing that we were still here! In fact, the vast majority of your ‘Queendom’ doesn’t even know its been occupied by the Empire! After I’d got in here, all I had to do was wait for you to show up with your pitiful little ragtag band of vagrants--”

“--underestimated me,” someone else was whipsering nearby, Ryn became aware. Sagar. “I can take them. I can create a wind gust that deflects their arrows.”

“Don’t,” Cid hissed back. “You’ve seen how many of them there are up there. You saw how fast that arrow flew. You can’t take all of them, Sagar. Stand down. We’re better off letting ourselves be captured.”

“He’s not going to capture us,” whispered Vish in turn. “Once he’s gloated over us he’s going to kill us anyway. I’ve seen him do it a hundred times before. This may be the only chance we--”

Vorr paused mid-speech and frowned at them. “STOP MUTTERING!” he shouted, his voice cracking for a moment on the second word and going incredibly high, spittle flying from his mouth. “Listen to me when I’m telling you how I defeated you!”

Nuthea suddenly cried out in a high-pitched wail, but not at Vorr. She was still kneeling over her mother, her face soaked in tears. “She’s stopped breathing! You killed her, you monster, you killed her!”

Ryn stared at the lifeless body of Nuthea’s mother sprawled humiliatingly face down on the dais, her long dark hair a mess around her head, her blood starting to drip slowly down the steps.

Vorr had killed her, just like he had killed Ryn’s own... Mother. Father. Hometown. Found Vorr. Get Vorr. Kill Vorr. Avenge Nuthea.

“VORR!” Ryn felt himself light on fire as he ran up the steps towards the General and drew his sword.

Somewhere behind him he was vaguely aware of a rush of air and the sound of arrows pinging off the stone floor. But only vaguely.

He ran past Nuthea and her mother and swung his blade with all his might at Vorr’s head, holding and moving it as Cid had taught him to.

This time Vorr caught the hilt in one hand and the blade in his other, clasping his gauntleted fingers around it and holding it in place.

Ryn’s whole body went ice cold.

The General twisted his arms, and snapped Ryn’s sword in two as it came out of his hands. Vorr flung the useless pieces of the broken weapon away.

Before Ryn could recover from his surprise, Vorr reached out and grabbed him by the neck, lifting him up off of his feet.

A tight band of pain constricted around Ryn’s neck at once. He gasped for air, but found none. The General was crushing his windpipe.

Ryn clutched at Vorr’s fingers and looked in horror into the man’s hateful, bulging, red-veined eyes. All that came into his head were words of despair.

All that preparation, all that training in swords with Cid, and I still couldn’t beat him. I didn’t even have a chance. I just did exactly the same thing again. I lost control and threw myself at him. Now this is it. Here I am again. I’m going to die. I’ve failed. I’m a failure.

“Miserable whelp,” Vorr was saying to him. “Don’t you ever learn? For the hundredth time, I am touched by the Ruby and so invulnerable to fire, you utter idiot. You didn’t change your plan of attack once. I guess you just couldn’t resist me!”

“Boltaaaaagggaahhh!”

Ryn felt a surge of shock pass through him, but then it passed, leaving only the ever growing pain around his neck.

It was growing harder to think with every moment that he was unable to take a breath, but he realised that Nuthea had hit Vorr with a lightning attack.

Vorr’s gaze shifted down and to the side beyond Ryn. “Stop that, girl. Haven’t you learned your lesson either? I have resistance to lightning too. You just stay there and wait your turn. I knew that you knew more about the Jewels than I got out of you in Imfis. I’ll happily torture you to get the rest of that information. Just let me deal with this mongrel first.”

The pain around Ryn’s neck went tight as death.

Oh no. This is it. He’s going to kill me and kill Nuthea too. I’ve failed.

Darkness prickled at the corners of Ryn’s vision. He was passing out. He was going to die.

He was going to die bitter, unavenged and unfulfilled, full of hate and anger and misery.

As his vision faded, Ryn’s eyes drooped. The last thing he was going to see before he lost conscioussness was a pair of short silver chains that hung around Vorr’s neck, over his armour.

On one chain was a ring with a ruby set into it.

On the other chain was a pendant with a crystal set into it.

With the last thoughts of his life, he found himself remembering something Nuthea had said to him once, on the train to Manolia.

The Way of the One is to forgive, her words echoed in his mind.

Fine, Nuthea, I’ll try it your way. I’m about to die anyway. I’ve got nothing left to lose any more. I forgive you for revealing the location of the Fire Ruby to Vorr. I...forgive Vorr for killing my parents and burning down my hometown. And I...I forgive myself for failing to save them.

And then fire exploded all around him.

The grip on his neck loosened slightly, and some breath came into Ryn.

He opened his eyes and looked up.

Bright white and oranged heat enveloped him; a glowing ball of incandescent flame that grew from his heart and enshrouded all of him, all of Vorr. Unhindered by unforgiveness, Ryn’s fire burned brighter than it ever had before.

Through the fire, he saw fear in Vorr’s irises.

Ryn reached out his hand to touch the small transluscent round jewel which hung from one of the silver-chained pendant around Vorr’s neck.

It was still too far away.

He concentrated, willing the fire radiating out of him to burn brighter, hotter in one place.

The chain turned red, then white, then…

...melted.

Ryn caught the Lightning Crystal as it fell.

As he closed his hand around it a strange tingling sensation ripplied down his arm and through the rest of his body for an instant.

The fire around him disappeared.

If you touch a jewel you gain affinity with that element.

Before Vorr could react, Ryn had just enough time to lift up the crystal a few inches from where it hung around Vorr’s neck.

He touched it lightly to Vorr’s face, which had contorted into a puzzled frown, and let go.

At the same time, with his other hand he reached out and touched the Fire Ruby where it hung from Vorr’s neck, felt a familiar rush of warmth flow down from his hand…

...and flared.

His whole body lit on fire again, and the fire leapt from his hands and blasted forwards into the general, hitting him directly in the chest where he lay and spreading out over the rest of him.

“Aaarrrgggghhh!” screamed Vorr as Ryn’s fire flashed over him, no longer invulnerable to it because of his new lightning alignment.

The General dropped Ryn and he landed on his backside on the dais with a thump.

Ryn gasped for air, and at last he found it, taking it in in a huge hungry gulp.

His neck still hurt like hell as he rubbed it, but at least he could breathe again. Vorr hadn’t quite completely crushed his windpipe.

He got to his feet.

Ryn was dimly aware of the sounds of a battle still going on all around him, but only dimly. He remained focused on Vorr.

He walked the few paces to where Vorr lay and stood over the General.

Steam coiled up from the General where he lay on his back. The man’s eyes were shut in his round face. His skin was charred, red, even black in places, from where Ryn had burned him. He lay still, and Ryn couldn’t see his chest rising and falling.

Have I done it? Had he finally killed General Vorr? And in the end, he hadn’t even meant to.

He reached down and grasped the fire ruby on its ring, and ripped it from its chain. Links of metal scattered around the dais.

“Ryn, help us!” cried Nuthea.

Ryn’s head snapped round to see what was happening in the rest of the hall.

Streaks of orange filled the air, deflected away from Ryn’s friends and the two Manolian guards as Sagar stood at the centre of them and flung his hands around like a madman, drawing huge gusts of air across the hall that ruffled Ryn’s hair and made his eyes water. The soldiers had given up on shooting arrows, and chosen to throw down fire at the party instead. Vorr must have touched them with the ruby too. Sagar was doing a good job of turning the fireballs away, but sweat was streaking down the back of his head and he was having to move his hands incredibly fast. He wouldn’t be able to keep this up forever.

Ryn hadn’t even have time to properly acknowledge his own feelings at his victory over Vorr--a battle had begun, and he was needed.

Found Vorr. Got Vorr. Killed Vorr. Avenged Nuthea. Now what? Stay with Nuthea. Protect Nuthea.

Nuthea, who was about to be blasted by fire from the hands of an Imperial soldier who had somehow made it down to ground level, out of Sagar’s line of sight, about twenty paces away from her to the side of the hall...

Ryn sprang from the dais, clearing its steps in one leap, and pelted for Nuthea, getting in the way of her just in time for the soldier’s fireball to hit him instead of her, right in his chest. Ryn felt the flames ripple over him and spread out to the sides as his body took their full force. He remained unscathed.

The soldier’s mouth dropped open in horror.

Energy rose up from Ryn’s stomach, and the top of his head tingled.

He ran at the soldier.

The soldier thrust out both his hands on reflex and yelled in desperation, pouring a jet of flame at Ryn.

Ryn took the the flame-jet head-on, which did nothing to him, and kept on running, right through it, to the soldier.

By the time Ryn reached him the terrified man had finally thought to stop trying to fight fire with and fire and was reaching for his sword, but Ryn got to it first. Still clasping the Fire Ruby in his left hand, he spared some fingers from it to grab the soldier’s arm, then reached and grabbed the soldier’s sword hilt with his other hand. He drew the sword in a swift, clean motion, then stabbed it down into the soldier’s neck before the man even had a chance to react, pushing into the soft resistance that gave way at once.

Ryn slid the blade out of the neck of the man, who fell back to the floor. He looked at it for a moment, decorated red. The second time he had killed. [Is it?] Vorr, and now this man. Sickness turned over his stomach. He didn’t like it. But it had been necessary. This was life or death. He needed to protect his friends. He needed to protect Nuthea.

He looked back at the battle.

Sagar still drew the air around the room in a frenzy, pushing fireballs away. Cid had his eyes shut and was chanting something, with a hand outstretched towards Sagar. Elrann, Nuthea and Vish were launching shots, lightning bolts and The two Manolian guards stood among them, trying to hide behind Sagar. [Is Kathuna here?] They must not have lightning-projection like Nuthea did.

Ryn had an idea.

He charged back into the fray, unafraid, impervious as he was to fire.

“Here, take this!” he yelled to the first of the guards he came to, and threw the Fire Ruby to her.

She caught it deftly with her spear hand.

“What’s this?” she called over the noise of the battle.

“It’s a Primeval Jewel. It will make you safe from fire, and able to project it yourself. Go--get out of here! Touch all the other guards in the palace with it, and bring them back here to fight! I’ll cover you!”

The guard didn’t need telling twice. She nodded at Ryn, then turned and began to run in the direction of the hall’s entry doors.

At the same time, Ryn sprinted back to join the party, yelled “Watch out! Sagar, take a break!”

The pirate snapped his head round to look at him, mid-wind-projection.

“What?!” he yelled.

Ryn didn’t bother explaining further, but just stretched out his open palms towards the balcony.

“FIRAGA!” was the sound that he found himself shouting.

A few feet in front of Ryn, in the air, a huge sheet of fire appeared in and leapt upwards at the soldiers on the balcony. It obscured them completely, hurtling over them in a mass of orange and red heat that made the air around it shimmer.

Ryn kept up the stream of flames for a long count of five, then dropped his arms and exhaled. An ache throbbed through them at once. The flames subsided, revealing the soldiers blinking in confusion for a moment.

“What was the point of that?” Sagar snapped. “They have fire! They’re invulnerable to fire, you moron! When are you going to learn this?”

“No,” said Ryn calmly. “I wasn’t trying to hurt them, only to distract them for a moment.” He pointed towards the doors of the hall. [Kathuna] and the other guard were just reaching them. “I gave them the Ruby.”

Sagar frowned. Then, “Oh. Not bad, pup...”

Ryn watched as the guards wrenched open the double doors…

...and there was Elpis, the lady Shadowfinger, stood waiting for them, dressed all in black, with her horrible painted female-face mask on, twirling a length of chain with a metal ball on the end, covered in sharp spikes.

The Shadowfinger’s arm twitched, and all of a sudden the spiked mace shot out of its rotation at a tangent, pulling the chain along with it, and flew straight into Kathuna’s face. The Manolian screamed and dropped to the floor.

Nuthea cried out in grief.

Ryn sprinted for the doors, [drawing his sword--does he have one at the moment?], calling over his shoulder “Just hold them off for a bit longer while I take care of this!”, even as new fire came down from the balcony, and Sagar threw up his hands to gust it to one side. I’ve come so far. I’ve killed Vorr. I’m not about to let the Empire kill all my friends and me now.

As he approached her he flung fire at the Shadowfinger, who had been rounding on the [second guard], but she saw him coming and leapt to one side, out of the way of it.

Before he knew what was happening, her mace hurtled out towards him and hit him in the stomach.

Pain sang from Ryn’s abdomen from un-countable needle-points as the spikes pierced it.

Stupid boy, Ryn thought to himself as Elpis yanked back her chain and he put his hands to his stomach to clutch at his bloodying tunic, you’re invulnerable to fire, not metal. This is really dumb way to die.

He sat down on his backside, stunned by the wound.

Elpis twirled her chain and brought her arm up and round again, about to whip it out at Ryn again for the finishing blow.

Ryn shut his eyes.

Metal clanged loudly against metal.

Ryn opened his eyes.

Vish stood in front of him, black sword drawn and out to one side. The spiked ball of Elpis’s [flail] lay a little way away at the end of its chain. Vish must have deflected it with his blade.

A frustrated growl came from behind Elpis’s mask and she flicked the ball back towards her along the chain, then span it back into its deadly dance, around her head, then flung back out again, not at Vish this time but at one of the Manolian guards who had made another run for the door. She caught the woman on the side of her helmet this time and the ball bounced off without sticking in. The Manolian cried out and hit the floor, but then rolled and came back up on her feet. She backed away from the door, wary, but still alive.

Elpis wasted no time and pressed her attack. No sooner than the ball had rebounded off the Manolian’s helmet, she pulled back on the chain and span, bringing it around herself and back at Vish, who had been running towards her, but now had to duck and roll to one side to avoid being impaled by the spikes.

A dance had begun. The lady Shadowfinger fought like some sort of demon, shouting with rage as she leapt and span and flung her spiked ball at Vish, the guardswoman, Vish, the guardswoman, never letting up, not letting them get any closer to the doors. Her opponents were managing to dodge or deflect the attacks, but they couldn’t keep this up forever. She was so vicious, so wild, so persistent.

The pain throbbed in Ryn’s stomach and he let out a moan. He doubled over, and looked down, unable to concentrate on the battle any more. Blood was leaking through his fingers, running down over his hands. Cid. I need Cid.

He managed to twist his head round, then grimaced at a protest from his stomach muscles. Cid and the others were still clustered at the centre of the hall, pinned down by a barrage of fireballs from above which Sagar was still holding off with gusts of wind. Cid had his eyes shut and a hand held out towards Sagar, his lips mumbling something. Ryn had no idea what he was doing, but it must have something to do with the reason that Sagar was able to keep up his defence for so long.

“Cid!” Ryn called out in a weak voice, but just loud enough to make Cid open his eyes and look over. Cid’s mouth dropped in concern and he started out in Ryn’s direction, then stopped when a fireball crashed down in front of him, missing him by inches.

“Wait!” a female voice cried out from somewhere behind Ryn.

Ryn looked back round.

The last Manolian guard lay in a heap on the floor by the doors, her breastplate cracked, blood trickling out from underneath her.

A few paces in front of her stood Vish, his sword held out straight, pointed at Elpis. The lady shadowfinger’s spiked ball was on the floor next to her, severed from its chain, which lay like a sleeping snake at her feet. Vish must have cut the ball from the chain. Instead of it, Elpis now held a black-bladed sword of her own in front of her face in a defensive stance.

“Wait!” the lady Shadowfinger said again. Her voice sounded surprisingly delicate, almost like Nuthea’s. “Don’t do this, Vish.”

“You may be skilled with that flail of yours,” Vish replied, “but I’ve bested you now, and I was always your better at swords. Give it up. You can’t win.”

“You don’t know that,” said Elpis. “You may favour blades, but you didn’t beat me every time we trained. And...I can give you poppy.”

Vish hesitated a moment. “So what? This traveling party have poppy too. And they give me it whenever I want.”

“Yes,” said Elpis, “but they will all be dead in a moment and their poppy will belong to the Empire. I can give you two poppy seeds right now, if you put down your weapon and return your allegiance. Come back to the Empire, Vish. All will be forgiven. Whatever led you astray temporarily, the Emperor will understand. He is most merciful.”

She held out her hand. Two small round seeds lay in the centre of it, even darker than the black of her glove.

Vish didn’t reply.

“Oh no,” Ryn said aloud. “Not this again.” His stomach hurt so much, and it hurt to talk, but if he didn’t he feared he would bleed out soon, so he had nothing left to lose. “Don’t listen to her, Vish! You’ve been here before! You’ve resisted before!”

Vish threw him a quick glance, grey eyes wide with anxiety, then returned to facing Elpis. He was still for a long moment, and for a while Ryn could only hear shouts and cries and gusts of wind behind him.

Vish put down his sword and held out his hand.

“No!” Ryn whimpered.

The lady Shadowfinger handed Vish the two seeds. He put them in his mouth, then fell backwards with a moan of pleasure.

Elpis let out a cry of glee from behind her mask and leapt over Vish’s body towards Ryn, raising her sword high.

As she did so, Vish’s hand shot out and grabbed her leg, pulling her down to land face first on the floor with a smack.

In the same movement, he stood up with his sword and thrust it down through Elpis, literally stabbing her in the back.

Elpis screamed, twitched a couple of times, and then abruptly went rigid.

“How…?” Ryn said to Vish as the Shadowfinger ran over.

Vish showed him the two black seeds in his free palm. “I only pretended to ingest them. I will save them for later.” He stowed them somewhere in the folds of his garments.

“Vish, quick!” Ryn said, the urgency of their situation pulling him back. “There’s no time! The guard--take the fire ruby from her and get it to the other Manolians.”

“You are hurt,” Vish observed.

“Yes! You can’t do anything about that now! Go!”

Vish nodded, sprinted to Kathuna and picked up the ruby ring from where she had dropped it, then pelted out of the double doors.

One God, please let him find help quickly, Ryn found himself praying.

He wrenched his head around again and black spots filled his vision; the pain in his belly screamed.

“Cid!” he called again, with everything he had left.

This time Sagar heard him too, catching a quick wide-eyed glance at Ryn in between blowing back the fireballs.

“Hold on, pup!” he shouted back.

Sagar bit his lip, then made a jumped to one side, away from Ryn’s direction.

What’s he doing? He’s going to leave the others exposed if he goes that way!

Sagar thrust out his hands…

...at Cid, Elrann and Nuthea.

“Go!” he shouted at the same time, and blasted the trio with air.

Ryn’s eyes watered as the healer, engineer and princess were swept off their feet by the blast of wind and sent flying down the hall towards him.

Nuthea put her hands out and managed to ride the wind more or less gracefully. Elrann curled into a ball and shot past Ryn, tumbling and cursing as she went.

But Cid turned head over heels in the air and crashed right into him.

Excruciating pain in Ryn’s stomach as something tore.

He was on his back, but he barely knew that, the pain was so bad.

“Cure!” Cid’s voice said.

Oh, thank the One, Ryn thought as the pain finally ceased, replaced by soothing warmth as the wound in his stomach closed up.

Cid helped him sit up.

“That was a close one,” Ryn said, “Again.”

Cid’s brow remained knotted in concern. “Quick, lad! I don’t have much mana left; I was lending mine to Sagar, he can’t have much left either!” He pointed back towards the centre of the hall. “You’ve got to help him!”

With only Sagar left as a clear target, the soldiers on the balcony above were focusing all of their fire attacks on him at once, pouring a series of flame-jets at him.

Sagar was on his knees, both hands held up, holding back the flames with air, his jaw clenched tight, a vein bulging in his forehead.

Ryn wasted no more time.

He dashed back across the hall, leapt in front of Sagar, facing him, and stood with his arms held out in the air to either side, taking the flame jets in his back. Again, he actually felt them replenishing him and giving him energy.

Sagar groaned and lowered his arms, at last able to drop his defence. He was red-cheeked and drenched in sweat, his ponytail clinging to his neck.

“Thanks, pup...” Sagar said with just a hint of reluctance.

The flames at Ryn’s back calmed down. The soldiers must have realised what was happening. Shouts of “Get down there! Find a way down!” from the balcony.

Ryn had an idea.

“You got anything left in you?” he asked Sagar.

The pirate frowned at him. “Maybe a little. Why?”

“Could you do what you just did to the others to me, to get me up to the balcony?”

“What, like a wind-assisted jump?”

“Yes. Exactly.”

The pirate’s eyes glimmered. “Now you’re talking.”

“Do it.”

Ryn span to see the soldiers above turning and running up the sloped balcony, making for exit doors in the far walls.

He crouched.

“Now!” he yelled.

Ryn jumped, and hung in the air for a moment, propelled only by the meagre strength of his legs.

“WIND!” shouted Sagar.

The air beneath Ryn rushed up to meet him, so forcefully it lifted him up further, his body going weightless, his stomach dropping out below him, as he flew towards the balcony rail

Only he wasn’t quite going to reach it…

He was going to fall short of it, and come back down!

Acting on instinct, Ryn focused on the soles of his feet and willed fire from them.

He felt his feet catch alight and project jets of flame downwards…

...with enough push-back to get him up over the rail.

He landed on the balcony clumsily, smacking into one of the benches and taking a nasty hit to the shoulder, then bouncing off it and rolling on the floor between them.

He came up as quickly as he could.

The soldiers who had seen him threw fire at him on reflex.

Ryn simply absorbed it. It made the top of his head and his fingertips tingle as it gave him more ‘mana’, as Cid called it.

He drew his sword and rushed at the nearest soldier.

“Cleasor!” he yelled.

He parried away the soldier’s first blow, knocking it to the side, then followed up with a thrust to the soldier’s neck where he knew the Imperial armour had a gap.

He withdrew his sword and the soldier toppled over.

All that practice with Cid was finally paying off.

Another soldier was on him at once, making him raise his blade and block high, middle, low, high again. He saw an opening and tried a slash at the man’s chest, more to drive him back than anything, but the soldier blocked it in kind, and Ryn was forced to respond defensively to the counter-attack.

Another soldier joined the fight.

And another, and another.

Ryn had to move faster to block and parry more cuts and thrusts from each side as more soldiers got near to him, driving him back towards the balcony rail. He could barely keep this up.

The soldiers pressed in on him together, collectively targeting him as a priority threat to eliminate.

Panic seized Ryn’s heart, and he began to block and parry more manically, backing closer and closer to the balcony rail.

There was no way he could defeat all these soldiers at once. What had he been thinking? When he had absorbed the fire attacks aimed at Sagar it had given him a boost of energy, but he had gotten carried away. How had he thought he could fight all of these soldiers by himself in weapon to weapon combat?

He needed the others. He needed Vish. But the others weren’t fire aligned--they were still vulnerable to the soldiers’ flame attacks.

“Argh!”

A flash of pain in Ryn’s leg, and he dropped his sword and went down, rolling down the last few steps of the balcony and thudding into the rail at its edge.

He clutched his leg tight. One of the soldiers had finally found his mark and caught him a vicious cut to it.

Probably the same one one that was standing over him now, desperate hate in his eyes visible through his helmet-visor, pulling back his sword for the killing thrust.

“For the One!” shouted a chorus of furious female voices.

The soldier above Ryn froze, then turned to see what was happening.

Ryn stumbled up too as a wave of gold crashed into the soldiers on the balcony.

A stampede of Manolian guardswomen coming through the balcony entrance.

The Imperials tried to hurl fire at them at first, but their fireballs simply dissipated on contact, without causing any harm.

He did it, thought Ryn. Vish followed my plan. He gave them the ruby.

Ryn heard pistol-shots. Elrann was with them as well.

The soldier who had been standing over him screamed as he flew off his feet, through the air, then over the balcony, pushed off the balcony by a targeted gust of wind. And there’s Sagar. And that black streak of black death was Vish.

The others had found their way up to the balcony, and now in the chaos the Imperials couldn’t work out who was invulnerable to fire and who wasn’t. Ryn just needed…

“Young man, do you think you could just stop yourself from being grievously wounded just for a few moments?” said Cid as the old man arrived at his side.

Ryn chuckled, but then stopped and closed his eyes at another wave of pain from his leg.

Cid crouched next to him and laid a hand on the leg, whispering a cure, and the pain departed.

“Well, I think that’s about all I had left in me,” Cid said. “Come on, we better make sure nobody else gets wounded.” He drew his own sword, then helped Ryn up by the hand.

Ryn retrieved his dropped blade from nearby and rejoined the fray with Cid.