“Jet!” Gideon jumped off the horse and grabbed Jet.

Eric clenched his jaw. He charged at Gideon. “Give me that coin!”

Gideon slapped his hand on his tome at Jet’s hip. His eyes glowed lightning-bright. A bolt flew from his hand into Eric’s side.

Eric toppled backward with a shriek.

“Gideon! Don’t kill, don’t kill,” Jet panted.

“Shit! Jet, you, you’re bleeding,” Gideon said, hands patting the air. He bit his lip, face pale.

“Don’t kill,” Jet insisted.

“I won’t, I won’t. I wounded him, didn’t kill. Collar didn’t activate, right?” Gideon said, grinning. Unlike his usual grin, it looked nervous, uncomfortable.

The taverngoers piled out of the open door, but stopped at the sight of the two fallen men. Eric rolled around, screaming and clutching the side of his chest, while Jet laid still, breath short, pushing his hands against the wound.

Gideon grappled at the straps holding the tome to Jet’s hip. They came loose, and he held it up. “Anyone else wanna try robbing me today? No?”

Tom chuckled. “Robbing you? That’s rich—”

“Eric has the last of your coins. I’ve only got what I came with, at this point. Your son just stabbed my fr… fri… this guy, and I’m not happy about it. If you want to fight about cheating, fight with me. Don’t take it out on my followers. Okay? So if you don’t want to learn why they call me Nightfellow, grab your son there and back your dumb asses into that tavern,” Gideon snarled.

Tom chuckled. He stalked closer, one step at a time. “You’re one mage. How many spells can you fire off before you have to reload? There’s more of us than there are of you. Go ahead. See how far you can get.”

The crowd began to boil. People cast shifty glances at Gideon and Jet, and a few dared to edge toward them.

Gideon grit his teeth. He took a deep breath. Lightning crackled around him, blazing from his eyes. The pages flipped in his tome. Clouds began to gather in the sky above, and lightning blazed between them. More and more, until the clouds seemed equally cloud as lightning, and the lightning replaced the sun, casting the night to daylight.

“One mage. Let’s find out what one mage can do,” Gideon growled.

“Don’t kill,” Jet repeated, his voice softer. Is this how he massacred that town? This spell?

The taverngoers backed away. A few touched two fingers to their heart or reached for the pendant of the High God, a three-loop spiral carved on a circular backdrop.

Tom narrowed his eyes. He grabbed Eric by the armpits and dragged him away. “Don’t think this is over, son. If we ever see you—”

“You’d better hope you don’t see me. No—hope this fucker doesn’t die. Because if he does, I swear. If it ends me, with the same breath, I will destroy this town,” Gideon growled. Thunder cracked as punctuation overhead, fierce and brutal.

Glaring, Tom backed into the tavern. Eric thumped through the door, and there was silence, save the crackle and rumble of thunder overhead.

“Gideon, this…” Jet murmured.

“Oh, this? It’s a feint. I can stir up the sky and make it look scary, but I can’t kill anything with it,” Gideon said easily.

“Oh,” Jet said, somehow relieved.

“Anything… that isn’t already flying,” Gideon said grimly, frowning at the sky.

“Birds?” Jet murmured.

“No. Dragons, obviously.” Gideon looked at Jet, then looked around. “What do I do, Jet? I… could try to cauterize the wound. I could… I didn’t mean to get you caught up in it.”

“If you had your tome… no, it still would’ve been a problem,” Jet said resolutely.

“Maybe,” Gideon admitted.

Jet cracked a smile, then frowned. Something… there’s something. Something that could save me. If I could just… remember it… it hurts, hurts too much…

The stable boy stood over them, hands clenched in his overalls. He shivered, afraid of the thunder, but didn’t run.

Gideon whirled. “What? If you want the—”

“Gideon,” Jet cut him off.

The stable boy lifted his finger and pointed. Up the hill, at the ramshackle church.

“A church? What’s that going to…”

Jet blinked. That’s right. I saw her earlier! “Priestess! There’s a priestess there. She can heal me,” Jet said. He coughed, and tasted copper on his tongue.

Gideon tried to lift Jet, but failed. He turned to the stable boy. “Can you… I need help.”

The stable boy nodded. He ran off.

Gideon reached after him, then sighed. “Dammit.” He slowly hefted Jet upright.

“Ow, ow,” Jet murmured.

“Sorry,” Gideon replied.

Rattling and rumbling sounded out. Gideon turned. The stable boy ran toward them, drawing a wobbly wooden cart behind him. Moving quickly, he harnessed the cart to Gideon’s horse, then gestured toward Jet. Gideon held the man out to him, and the stable boy hefted Jet into the cart. He nodded at Gideon and pointed at the church again.

Gideon looked at the boy, then glanced behind him. Seeing all the taverngoers hidden away in the tavern, he drew out the large coin and slipped it into the boy’s hand. “Keep that for yourself.”

The stable boy’s eyes widened. He looked at the coin, then Gideon, then smiled and stuffed it into his belt.

“Use it to get out of this ratty old town. There’s more to the world than this.” Gideon stared into the distance, his eyes faded. For a second, Gideon looked old, even ancient.

Thunder rumbled startling him from his reverie. He shook his head and grabbed Bluebell’s bridle, leading the horses up the hill. Jet rattled along behind in the cart, hands pressed to his gut. The stableboy watched them go, clutching his overalls tightly.

Atop the hill, the priestess turned her head up at the sound of rolling thunder overhead. “A storm? But there wasn’t supposed to be a storm tonight…”

Rising, she began to close the shutters, when heavy thumping came from the church’s doors. She turned. A serene smile spread across her face. “As I foresaw, they came.”

Gliding to the doors, she opened them wide with a smile. “Humanity’s Hope, what can I d—”

“He’s dying! Heal him!” Gideon shouted, dragging Jet toward the priestess.

“Eh… huh?” the priestess said, stumbling back on instinct.

Gideon hefted Jet at her, dragging him by his armpits. “Come on! Heal him!”

“I, er, my staff,” the priestess said, patting her skirts. She turned around in a circle, glanced all around her, then ran off. Her footsteps echoed through the empty church as she ran past the pews, toward the altar of the High God. She stopped there, desperately searching behind the altar, then turned a sharp right and vanished into a deeper part of the building.

Gideon stared after her. “Can this girl really heal you?”

Half-conscious, Jet muttered something.

Gideon slapped his cheeks. “Come on. She’s almost back. Stay with me.”

“Right, here it is. Here it is.” She ran back toward them, carrying the staff under her arm like a baton. Skidding to a stop, she brandished the staff toward Jet. “Healing light, heed my call! Heal this poor, lost lamb. Close his injuries and bring him back to life!”

White light streamed from her staff and settled over Jet. Blood flowed backward, and his flesh began to knit shut.

“He isn’t dead yet,” Gideon pointed out.

“Huh?” the priestess asked.

“You don’t have to bring him back to life.”

“It’s… just part of the incantation,” she said, taken aback.

Gideon opened his mouth.

Jet clawed himself upright and glared. “Gideon. Shut up.”

The priestess smiled. “You are… Jet and Gideon, right? Humanity’s Hope?”

“We are… huh?” Jet frowned at her.

She waved a hand. “In time, it will come to pass. The High God occasionally gifts me glimpses of what is to come.”

“Wait, what did you call me? I like the sound of that,” Gideon said, smiling.

Jet climbed to his feet, pointedly ignoring Gideon. He wobbled and looked around, then bowed to the priestess. “Thank you for saving my life.”

“Don’t exaggerate. I only helped a bit.” She smiled, then looked at them. “Would you accept… if I came along with you?”

“I couldn’t put you in danger like that,” Jet said, at the same time that Gideon said, “Absolutely!”