“I’d like to get a look at that vase, but not here. Too many people around to be safe. Russ, do you have a working area set up? With proper wards and-”

Serenity stopped and looked at Russ. Of course he wouldn’t have such an area; Russ didn’t do spellwork. At least, he didn’t think he did; Serenity knew that a fair bit of what he did in combat was at least similar to spellwork, even if it did use Essence instead of Mana. “On second thought … a safe place to secure artifacts?”

Russ shook his head. “I don’t keep them. If we think they’re dangerous, we either destroy them or store them elsewhere. I haven’t had to deal with an artifact in years, but the last time I did, I destroyed it on site, where I found it.”

That wasn’t a bad idea, but it also wasn’t a great idea. It was probably acceptable if the artifact was weak enough, but this one wasn’t. “We’ll need to get somewhere set up. The park, I think.”

“The park?” Rube sounded puzzled.

Serenity reminded himself that he needed to not call it a “dungeon” or mention Aki. “Yeah, Pelham Bay Park. The high magic zone - it’ll be a good, safe place to look at your arms and the vase. I can set up some containment and keep everyone nearby safe.” If he had to do something drastic, he might need healing. “Come to think of it, have you been through the Tutorial yet?”

Rube perked up. “Yes! It was great. I picked up an awesome Path, Sensitive. It lets me sense all sorts of things. Mostly magic, but all sorts of different magic! I can tell them apart, too. It’s how I found the box, it glimmered with magic. Really the vase did, since the lid was off.”

Sensitive? That was one Serenity had only heard of a few times. He was pretty sure it was one of the Paths that tended to lead to either a heavy research focus or insanity. “What sort of magic is it?”

Rube shook his head. “I don’t know! That’s what’s so interesting about it. It comes and it goes and I can see all sorts of different types of magic in it. They’re all weak and they’re not doing anything which is also weird.”

The description was familiar to Serenity, but he wasn’t certain why.

Serenity thought about Rube’s description during the entire drive to the park and the only thing he could come up with that was similar was the magic of the Origin. The problem was that he knew the vase was inimical to him; he wasn’t as sure it actually hated, since it didn’t have a mind Rissa could see, but it definitely didn’t get along with him. That made it unlikely to be the same energy.

What was the opposite of Potential? Was that even the right question?

:And exactly what are you bringing inside my dungeon?:

Serenity smiled as Aki’s acerbic voice rolled through his mind. :I’m not sure. It should be safer to examine it here with your help than elsewhere. There aren’t any sufficiently warded areas yet.:

:There probably are somewhere. This world is strange; the history is layered … : Aki trained off, but when she spoke again, she sounded amused instead of distracted. :I’m definitely looking forward to picking up something that will let you call me before you arrive. Since you can’t, I suppose I will forgive you this time. That still doesn’t mean I’m letting you look at that thing anywhere near anything important. Go northwest, that’ll get you well away from the established trails and not too close to water or anything I’ve built.:

Serenity suddenly remembered that he hadn’t expected Aki to notice anything; he’d expected to have to ask for a suitable space. :What are you sensing, anyway? I thought the box blocked it.:

:I can’t tell. I just know that there’s something wrong with the young man following Russ. He stinks of tainted mana and bad intentions, but it’s not his own signature.:

The box must be blocking the vase from Aki as well; Serenity was relieved to know he hadn’t missed something. It wasn’t reassuring to know that Rube’s arms still had magical residue, though it wasn’t surprising, either. It simply meant that he’d want to look at them first; they might give him a clue about how to approach the vase.

It took only about half an hour of walking to reach the area Aki had indicated as a safer place to work with dangerous magic. When they arrived, Serenity started to sit down before Rissa lightly thwacked him on the forehead and pulled a blanket out of her backpack. It wasn’t the same blanket she’d used before; that had disappeared when the Sterath child they found was sent to the hospital.

Serenity reminded himself he needed to check up on the child when he could in person; Janice was keeping tabs on him and said he was safe, but Serenity had only managed one visit to the hospital.

Rissa and Russ sat down on the far corners of the blanket, leaving the corner next to Serenity open for Rube. Rube set the box on the edge of the blanket, then sat down beside it. “This is a safe place to look at something magical?”

“Safer,” Serenity allowed. “It’s not set up the way I’d prefer, but the higher level of stable magic will help. Stability’s very important; working with dangerous magic on a ley line, where the magic is continually moving, isn’t a good idea at all.”

He’d done it, but he knew what was safe and what wasn’t. Some of that knowledge came from experience, but more of it came from others’ mistakes. You had to learn from others; some mistakes weren’t survivable.

“Before I start on the vase, though, I’d like to take a look at your arms. If you’ve been cursed or have too much magic contamination, it can prevent or slow healing. How’d you injure them in the first place?” Serenity didn’t think Rube had mentioned that yet.

Rube looked down at his bandaged hands. “Scraped them a little getting the box free. I didn’t think much about it; it wasn’t anything I hadn’t done before. Only the scrapes didn’t heal, they got worse and spread. Put some antibiotic ointment on the scrapes but when it didn’t get better I went to the doctor. He’s not sure what it is. The first antibiotic he tried worked for a few days, but then it came back worse.”

Serenity frowned. That sounded more like an antibiotic-resistant bacteria than a curse or magic contamination, but Aki sounded confident there was something there. “Can you show me?”

Rube glanced over at the Tutorial backpack he’d carried out with them, frowning. “It’s probably about time to replace the dressings anyway. I’ll need help ...”

Rissa leaned over; the blanket was small enough that she could reach Rube without moving far. “Yeah, I bet it’s tough with your hands wrapped like that. Stick your arms out, I’ll help you get the jacket off.”

While Rissa eased the jacket off Rube’s shoulders, Serenity took a good look at the boy’s hands. It was worse than he’d thought at first glance; quite a bit had been hidden under the coat. Rube’s right arm was bandaged past the elbow; it disappeared under the sleeve of the T-shirt he was wearing. The wrapping on his left arm didn’t go nearly as high; they stopped about halfway down the forearm.

Serenity focused on the mana in the area. He hadn’t seen any when he looked for the source of the feeling earlier but there had to be something. He knew he should be able to sense anything Aki could, even if it was faint enough he hadn’t noticed it earlier.

He didn’t see any mana moving immediately, so he decided to check the local Essence instead. There was something moving in and around the young man’s arms. It wasn’t a spell the way he was used to; there didn’t seem to be a central core around which things were happening. It also didn’t look like the stale Essence that accrued around a dead core; he was pretty sure that was what someone who overdosed on cores would look like, as well.

Instead, it looked warped and continually changing, doing something that was simply wrong. In some ways, it reminded Serenity of building a spellform but it wasn’t that; there was no sign of anything or anyone directing it. It was doing whatever it was doing on its own and it was simply wrong. Serenity turned off his Essence Sight; the unguided motion was unsettling to watch and simply felt wrong somehow. “That’s not a curse, but there’s definitely something there, and I’d bet it’s related to the vase.”

Russ nodded. “That’s why Dr. Rasmussen called me; he thought there was a possible connection. I let him take pictures of the vase and the box to see if he could identify them, but that’s all. The vase feels like an artifact of some sort, but that’s all I can tell. Normally I’d get someone like Red to take care of it, but she took one look at it and told me to call you.”

Why would Red not want to look at a magical artifact? Wasn’t that exactly what she enjoyed doing? “Did she say why?”

Russ held his hands out in an overstated shrug. “All she said was that she needed to check some references and I should call you. Then she left.”

“She was pretty rude,” Rube noted. “Wouldn’t talk to me, as if I weren’t even here.”

Serenity didn’t know Red well, but he could believe it. “She must have been preoccupied with the vase.”

“Maybe.” Rube sounded doubtful.

Serenity couldn’t argue with him; he’d had to make a point to Red about ignoring him when he met her, too. She was interesting to talk to but very focused. Serenity was fairly confident she was worse with people than he was, and that was hard to achieve.

Rube pawed at his left arm; after a moment, the gauze wrapping came loose from where it was tucked under itself. He started unwinding it from his arm.

Serenity was about to say that removing the bandages wasn’t necessary when he caught a glimpse of what was hiding under them and decided that perhaps it would help after all. It definitely wasn’t a normal infection.

The area under the bandages was a swirl of green, pink, and orange.

The only reason a doctor would be trying to treat that with antibiotics had to be that he had no other idea what to do.