He crawled away from one of the small villages barely half an hour later, having retrieved a moldy boltshaft for his left hand. He took a long moment to admire the shimmering golden clouds high up above them before he let out a shaky sigh and began again, "So, this… Grivonym, right?"

"Mm-hmm?" Tirolith hummed, trotting along beside him.

"What's it do? Why's it so important for killing Algirak?"

A new voice chimed in, "It was very intuitively named the Dragonrender when it came into the hands of men."

"Caloria damned!" he gasped, shocked by the sudden appearance of Serkukan's physical manifestation at his side: a suit of curving red crystal with a smooth faced draconic helmet that exposed no flesh.

"He hasn't seen you yet? You're not following Rykaedi's Rule of Pawns, are you?" Tirolith looked confused.

Serkukan glared. "I found no reason to share more than basic trivialities with our mortal vessel. He will most likely not survive the coming battle."

"Can both of you shut up?" Cedric shouted. "I get it already, I’m going to die, and it won’t change no matter how many times we say it. And – can’t either of you bastards just fly us there? Aren’t you supposed to be dragons?”

"Only if you wish to be struck down by any number of mortal dragons in the skies above. The ground is cleansed by their frost; it shall be fast enough."

"Mortal dragons?"

Tirolith stuck out her tongue. "You really haven't told him anything, have you?"

"What difference does it make for the pawn to know? His journey to an early grave is no more augmented by knowledge."

Cedric turned away, suppressing a low growl in his throat, and carried forward. Tirolith shrugged, trailing closely behind him.

“If I had a pawn,” she pondered,” I’d tell him as much as I could, so we could mash our brains together and be synchronous in our fighting!”

“Then I pray you never gain a pawn; a pawn with knowledge is a danger only to their own kin.”

They traveled for hours more, eventually wandering past the tundra and into the clusters of glowing pyramids, bringing the glaciers at Kylinstrom’s peak within reach. The weather had become so frigid that Cedric could hardly stand it, and Serkukan had taken to spending their collected blood early in heating him.

"How long has it been? Where's this damn sword or whatever?"

Tirolith pouted beside him, "It shoulda been right around here… I thought I’d feel its energy…"

Serkukan growled, "You're wasting our time. If Llestren put Grivonym anywhere, it surely would have been wherever you've holed up."

"I wish that were true, but… Algirak already tore through our base here a few weeks ago. That was before he even knew about Grivonym…"

"But now he knows?" Serkukan glared.

"It wasn't us! Someone must have clued him in, but we haven't let it slip!"

"Then someone else is after us, too, as I suspected. Rykaedi?"

She shook her head. "We haven't seen her since the Collapse. It's not her."

He thought for a moment.

"Either way, we've got no time to lose. Let's keep moving–"

"I may know of a few mortal men who are no good at keeping secrets."

Cedric asked, "You know mortal men?"

"This is unfortunately not my first time on your insignificant rock. But that knowledge makes our plan no simpler, unless we've a way to travel back down south after all."

"How far?" Tirolith asked.

"I'm not sure. There's one in particular that comes to mind, and I doubt he'd be any good at avoiding this particular event. If he's keeping Algirak on our trail, then he won't be far behind. Cromer, maybe."

Cedric shook his head. "They'll have the whole town on lockdown. No way we're getting in."

"But there's no way he's getting out, either. How long until the clock is complete?"

Tirolith popped open her amulet and pouted at the shapes. "Thirty minutes."

"We've got to make every second count. Tirolith, you remain here for now. I'll contact you when we need you."

"Where are you going?"

His suit of armor began to glow. "I'm going to bide my time and wait for Llestren'vatis to reappear."

With a spark of light, his physical form shifted into that of a great red dragon. He bowed his neck for Cedric to climb on.

HURRY UP. WE DON’T HAVE MUCH TIME.

Cedric turned to a confused Tirolith with a meager shrug and mounted upon Serkukan's shimmering scales. The time for infighting was over. Thirty minutes remained before their final conflict would arrive.

A hopeless sickness twisted his stomach as they took to the wind, and the glowing, beautiful pyramids became sparkles of light behind them.

Cedric held close to Serkukan for the ride back to the newly-formed clearing where Llestren’vatis had vanished. He only opened his eyes from his unexpected nap when a howl hit the wind as they arrived.

“What in the Pit was that?” he lifted his head and glanced around sleepily.

Serkukan growled and plummeted suddenly.

“Whoa!” Cedric shouted, nearly falling from his spine.

The red dragon rammed into a smaller white dragon, tearing gashes across its flesh. Scales popped out from its skin and onto the wind.

Serkukan swept around to lay more slashes into its sides, then retreated to the ground as though he were dejected.

Before Cedric could leap off, Serkukan mutated back to his human form, tossing the boy into the snow. “What’s your problem now, you–”

The red dragon lashed at him, “Had I done that before I met you, he’d already be dead. You’ve weakened me, in mind and body.”

“As if I chose for you to come to me!” he stood and came to face the dragon. “You or your moronic friend should have picked a different pawn, I don’t give a damn about any of this, you bratty damn demon!”

Serkukan’s armor flared. Before he could strike Cedric, the white dragon neared again, and he burst away to fight.

Cedric growled and drew his blade. “I’m not the weak one here, either… What have you done but watch me do all of the lifting?”

Serkukan struck the dragon’s wings with his gauntlets to no effect. His armor glowed stronger with every failed blow, every block and attack ignored. Claws sprung out from his knuckles and he rushed in again, leaving minor gashes across the same wings.

Just as the white dragon reared back to spray frost, Cedric slid along the ice to its stomach and rammed his blade upward.

“You...” Serkukan’s face contorted.

The dragon lifted up from the ground with the blade still stuck in his flesh and turned down, blasting his deadly ray of frost at Cedric instead.

Serkukan dashed and rolled over him, picking him up as he went. When the frost impacted the ground behind him, he released Cedric and laid a devastating blow into his face, sending him flailing to the ground.

He choked through his broken nose, sputtering wildly in pain and frustration.

“I would kill you for that, if killing you wouldn’t kill me. Jeopardize our task once again, and I swear to Azafel, to Evra…”

Cedric stood, swordless, and sprung toward Serkukan. The red dragon caught his meager attack and laid harsher punches into his chest, loudly cracking ribs.

The boy shouted out with pain.

“Stay put.” he demanded before he charged away again.

Cedric lay in agony, clutching his side, struggling to breathe. Serkukan faced the dragon with more vigor than before, though Cedric no longer cared to see the conclusion of the fight.

Algirak will be here soon… he can take this whole abomination of a world with him. What have I got left after this, anyway? Serkukan’s got the whole of the Hunters, the Knights, quite possibly all of Kasian’s Twelve hunting me down…

Unless…

His eyes struggled to focus on the red silhouette bouncing around the overwhelmingly white terrain. A wicked grin, familiar yet unpracticed, resolved itself to his face.

All it takes is one dragon…

Serkukan beat his wings against the wind as he came again at the dragon and toppled it to expose its stomach. Before he could correct himself, the red dragon swept back around to its throat and bit down hard. One final spray of blood, and the fight was finished.

He lowered himself just above the corpse and planted his foot upon it as he reverted again to his human form. “Too long. It should have taken seconds, not minutes. Now who can say how much time…”

Serkukan drew forth Tirolith’s locket. His eyes shot wide.

Cedric had nearly blacked out when Serkukan returned to his side. Almost immediately, his wounds were replenished and his pain diminished. His eyes flashed with a glint of red as he turned to face the cruel crimson armor standing above him. His hand was outstretched.

“Damn you.” Cedric swatted his hand away and stood.

“They’re here.”

The boy felt his face contort unexpectedly, “What do we do?”

The crimson man lowered his head and turned away. “I still haven’t found Grivonym.”

“You’re not even trying, are–”

Serkukan shot a glare that shut him up. “Cromer is a big city.”

Cedric turned his eyes to the aurora above, scanning the clouds between the forest and the tundra. “I don’t see them.”

“Algirak is most likely taking a moment to relish in his victory over Llestren’vatis. Decades, he’s spent waiting for this event, this moment.” he turned forlorn to the dark sky. A foreboding aura washed over them.

“Will he win?” Cedric asked, though he knew the odds.

Serkukan turned himself fully to face Cedric. “Not if you stay down and out of the way.”

Cedric scowled but did not speak.

The suit of armor extended a hand. Cedric did not grasp it, and the suit lowered it again. “I found him.”

“Who? Grivonym?”

He hung his head, seemingly entering a trance.

“Uhh, maybe a bad time for this? When Algirak is right over there, shouldn’t we… you’re already gone, huh?”

Serkukan said naught.

Cedric’s eyes bored into the stationary suit of armor. His eyes twitched. His hand became a fist around his hilt.

“It’ll all be over soon…”

A robed man carefully raised his head to a dusty window, then lowered himself down into the dark shop again. His fingers picked and pried at the knives and blades that had fallen from the toppled counter, some still dripping with blood from his latest encounter.

He frowned at a cracked rondel with a groan of distaste and cast it aside again. It was only when the blue firelights of a Hunter squad shone through the windows that he thought he saw the blood begin to creep along the wooden floor.

A leyline shifted. He leapt back.

The blood jumped after him and formed into the shape of a familiar suit of armor.

The robed man tore his necklace free. It transmuted immediately into a sleek black shield, tall enough to hide behind.

"Jirtu." Serkukan hissed and barred his claws.

"Ah, Serkukan, you haven't aged a day since–" he stopped to think. "Say, do members of your ilk age?"

"I couldn't help but notice the shard you've taken to wearing around your neck. How convenient it must make your position."

"You're accusing me of meddling, aren't you? I should have known." he shrugged. Serkukan couldn’t tell if he was making an effort to smirk, or if that expression had always been stuck to his face.

"What's the end goal? Another Tome, then another and another until our time's end?"

He shrugged, "Pretty much. I figure you leave the thinking up to Llestren anyway, so, does it really matter what I want? Now, if you had asked, why does Jirtu want the Tomes…"

Serkukan blinked forward to the shield. Jirtu shoved it at him, predictably, giving Serkukan the momentary space to swipe a claw against Jirtu's upper arm.

He yelped and stumbled back, tripping over one of the dropped daggers and collapsing.

"I would never ask such asinine questions; I'm here to kill Algirak. Nothing more. And certainly none of us are here to toy with you, you insignificant, worthless worm of a man."

Jirtu still wore his ego on his face. "So you say, but here you are."

Serkukan stomped on one of the blades, flipping it up and catching it by the hilt. "With nothing to stop me from ending your life."

"How about Grivonym, for a start? I could most certainly cut you a deal if you're willing to… bend reality for me, ever so slightly."

Serkukan's eyes narrowed.

I FOUND IT.

“Loud and clear.” she received the location in her mind immediately, and swept toward the ground to scan a peculiar outline across the face of one of the pyramids ahead. “Can you open a gateway for me to get back?”

I HAVE NO CHOICE, ALGIRAK IS HERE. OR AT LEAST, YOUR CLOCK WOULD HAVE US BELIEVE HE IS.

She launched snow as she hit the ground and rolled, shifting into a human frame as she came to her feet once again.

"How'd you figure it out? I didn't think we were… Jirtu? But you didn't… oh, you did! What happened to Rykaedi's– I know she does, but…" she seemed to argue with herself as she approached the grandiose doorframe, embellished with glamorously glowing crystals. "How does he even know about this? How does he always get so involved?"

The ice within the doorframe melted as she neared. She continued in. The corridor expanded deeper and deeper with every step. The shifting colors of the walls and floor gave an ethereal, spectral aura to the hall.

And once she reached the center, where a huge black blade stood proud in its glowing pedestal, a dark aura struck her more profoundly than she expected.

The surface of the hulking blade shifted and glistened in the crazed fluttering of lights. It seemed to whisper unto the air, mimicking Algirak's own speech patterns. She hesitated.

THE GATEWAY IS OUTSIDE WHEN YOU’RE READY.

Serkukan released his trance to be faced again with the desolate wilderness around his physical form. A torn forest just a few paces north, glistening, swirling pyramids tucked away behind the height of the trees… and a bare tundra for miles to the south, with nothing but destroyed and frozen villages to cover small portions of the land.

He turned to Cedric, who sat in the snow just a few feet away.

The boy sat idly in the snow with his back turned to the red dragon.

Serkukan watched him intently for a moment, then turned to watch the swirling, ethereal portal beside him. Large, full of stars and space. He reached his hand in and felt the watery surface. "This portal is hardly one of my own powers. To use such command over space, I must sacrifice a blackened scale. I must waste away the energy of an Etherian."

Cedric didn’t speak.

“That was my last blackened scale. That leaves only Algirak with power over space. Not that I had very much to begin with…

“To me, my burning red aura, goes the power of reality. A binding force between space and time. That's why I am the bastard child, the true firstborn, the creator of man and the soul.

Llestren’s intrigue is branded upon me, his eight-pointed star inflicts… this upon me. Curiosity. Thought. Wonder…

And he controls time.”

The snowflakes that dangled down froze suddenly, suspended around them. Cedric gagged as his body suddenly ceased to function.

“Don’t worry about breathing, nor the rate of your heart. A pawn can survive most debilitations, just by virtue of their binding to an Etherian.”

“I didn’t know that you could freeze time…” he stood.

“I cannot.” Serkukan raised his fingers and pointed to a dark spot in the forest to the north.

“Then… Llestren?”

He nodded.

“What does it mean? That he’s still alive?”

“Perhaps that he’s merely holding on for dear life. Or, perhaps, that Algirak has left him alive so he could stop us from collecting Grivonym.”

Cedric stood. “Then it’s finally time.”

Serkukan chuckled. “The third element that you should know about is the black element. Algirak is the manifestation of horror. Bleak holocaust, silent death, and endless terror. He thrives off of fright, torture, the corruption of a mind.

And he controls space, through sound.”

Time unfroze. Tirolith emerged from the gateway.

“Shrkukhn, I–” Grivonym was locked between her teeth.

And then her wing tore itself free. She released Grivonym to scream.

Water sprayed into the air.

The sound from the Algirak's invisible attack came a moment late, just as Algirak reared his hideous, oil-slick head from within the shadows upon her skin...