by Sarah Lin
"There are more people than the two times I attended." Fiyu had been driving to let him soulcraft more, and now frowned along with Nauda. "They feel like an average group of soulcrafters, but they are much more tense than normal."
"Huh. I wonder if we're missing something."
That might be, but Theo didn't notice anything that struck him as substantially different. No Tythes, Esaire, or strange outsiders lurking in the crowd - more Fithans than usual, if anything. The House Teal official was the same Lady Baryara as always, standing in the same dignified pose. Fiyu was right about the tension in the crowd, however, which was visible in their faces in addition to whatever details she detected.
Fortunately, no one challenged the presence of Nauda and Fiyu. They'd probably be disqualified if they were noticed by Lady Baryara, but Theo didn't care about that in the slightest. He wondered if he could taunt some other soulcrafters to get them to come after him and increase the difficulty further.
"House Teal, in its wisdom, has decided to bestow a greater gift than our usual." Lady Baryara actually skipped her usual speech, a new tone of confidence in her voice. "We have increased the intensity of the whirlwind and the draining effect within the quarry, but we also offer a greater prize: a Chasm Invitation."
Immediately Theo's priorities shifted. He couldn't overlook the chance to acquire a second Invitation without a huge expense, even for the sake of training. As he took a second look at the soulcrafters around him, he realized that many were rough men and women, one large group even bearing weapons. No doubt some Houses had heard rumors of the prize and sent skilled soulcrafters to acquire it.
Fighting this many veterans might be beyond his abilities, but all he needed to do was win, and after nine hours in the whirlwind, Theo thought he had a chance. He turned back to his allies and spoke in a low voice. "Change of plans: don't enter, because I don't want to give them any reason to disqualify me. Stay alert in case anyone tries anything suspicious."
They nodded, and then there wasn't time for anything else, because Lady Baryara was clearly ready to announce the start. Theo stepped up to the side of the quarry as the whirlwind spun up to full speed. Unlike usual, nearly everyone else moved to the edge as well, some even putting a foot onto the slope, all ready for the signal.
"Begin!"
Theo leapt down the slope, like most of the others, but he also cast a gravitational field over himself. As a result, gravity pulled him down faster than the others, though several sprinted at nearly the same rate. He leapt across the base of the quarry, exerting his speed chambers to their fullest extent.
On the way, he lost ground to a Ruler who blazed forward. Some of the others might be faster than him, but that didn't mean they'd win. Theo was immensely familiar with the whirlwind by now, even in its intensified form, and he had never once tried to seriously win the competition.
He did now, slamming two gravitational fields down over the entire quarry as powerfully as he could generate them. Rocks began to plummet in their arcs and most of the others stumbled in surprise, but he hadn't applied it to himself. Instead, he cast the third field only around himself, reducing himself to a fraction of his normal weight as he sprinted up the side. A few rocks still spun at him, but he dodged with extra bursts of speed.
Then he was sprinting up onto the top, so fast that his reduced weight nearly sent him sailing off. He managed to stay back, releasing all his other fields. Around him, he saw a few who had managed to sprint through much of the whirlwind, but they had been focused on one another, not a lone Archcrafter who had ignored everything but the summit.
Seconds after the competition had begun, he stood in front of Lady Baryara, who stared at him in surprise. Since he'd stayed on the ground the entire time, she couldn't object, but she had clearly not expected the competition to end so quickly.
"Thank you for this opportunity," he said, doing his best Nauda impression. "Would you bless me with the Chasm Invitation now?"
The woman gave him a sour look, but she also pulled a piece of white marble from her robes. Other than being inscribed with the symbol of House Teal, it was identical to the one Fiyu had. That meant they only needed one more... but he had higher priorities.
Around them, one of the Rulers broke to the top to take second place. Many of the others fought with one another in the returning whirlwind, apparently interested in the monetary award, but he saw some of the strongest soulcrafters leaving. They could easily have reached the summit, clearly interested only in the Invitation. He could see the growing dissatisfaction on Lady Baryara's face and decided that his plans didn't need to change.
"If I understand correctly, your goal with this competition is to drain cantae for your ongoing mining operations. Since you have already kindled the whirlwind, would you permit me to train here until it fades? It would generate considerably more cantae for House Teal, so-"
"Fine." The woman pushed past him irritably, shooting one more glance in his direction. "If you steal so much as a single tornadogem, you will face House Teal's retribution."
That suited him fine. Theo looked across the whirlwind, which had restored itself to its full ferocity, and waved to Fiyu and Nauda. When he gestured downward, they understood, and both entered the quarry to meet at the bottom.
"I guess I need to get an Invitation now," Nauda said as they came together. Theo shook his head.
"Now that we only need one more, I'm sure we can find a way, even if we need to spend a lot to buy it. What I want to do is train like we planned. Between the new whirlwind and both of you, this might be a good test."
"Unlike the trial itself, which quailed before your might." Nauda smiled and spun her staff into a combat position.
Meanwhile, he realized that Fiyu had disappeared... so she intended to fire at him from within her stealth technique. A perfectly valid strategy, and even if it didn't match what Esaire would do, he wanted to test his limits. Theo leapt back away from Nauda's first attempt to bind him, landing on the side of the inner slope to get distance from both of them.
The intensified whirlwind whipped rocks more quickly than before, and he couldn't afford to ignore it or dodge on instinct. That meant his attention was split in many ways, plus there were still soulcrafters training or trying to achieve another of the lesser awards.
He almost put them out of his mind, before he noticed a group of Archcrafters moving in his direction. They looked experienced and a bit angry, perhaps intending to steal his Invitation from him. Not wanting to deal with that at the moment, Theo put a reverse field beneath them to send the group out of the quarry.
All five glowed with a cloak of blue cantae and charged.
In that instant, Theo realized that he'd miscalculated. The cloak around them was unquestionably Esaire's technique to nullify gravity, which meant that this was no theft. Esaire hadn't just been preparing himself, he or his family had trained local mercenaries for this precise hit. None of them looked like pushovers, either, so this could be bad.
Then a storm of light crashed into the charging mercenaries and one of those in the air froze in place, then smashed into the ground. Trusting in his own allies, Theo threw out a hand and hit the first of them with gravitational torsion.
Thankfully, the cloak couldn't shrug off such a complex twisting field, but the Archcrafter he struck wasn't just some pawn of the Armeau family. He kept charging, despite the fact that the torsion broke one of his arms, and reached out with a technique.
If he'd been as slow as he was a few months ago, Theo wouldn't have noticed the stone melting beneath his feet in time. As it was, he barely sent himself upward in time to avoid the liquid stone rising upward to wrap around his legs.
The emergency retreat gave him no time to defend, and a few rocks slammed into him, but then he was high above the whirlwind looking down. He saw Nauda exchanging blows with two of the mercenaries, keeping them at bay but giving ground. Fiyu flickered in and out as she rained more lightstorms against their opponents, at least
distracting them. Unfortunately, that left one focused on him and generating a significant amount of cantae.
Theo reversed his gravitational field and sent himself downward, a second before a beam of solid cantae tore through the air where he'd been. Unfortunately, the mercenary didn't look surprised, and he'd barely landed before he needed to leap aside from another solid beam. The sublime stone of the quarry wasn't immediately destroyed by it, but several boulders shattered and their fragments joined the whirlwind.
So their opponents were trained, prepared, and positioned facing the whirlwind. House Teal must have noticed, yet Lady Baryara had ignored the attack, perhaps as retaliation. As he dodged aside from the next cantae beam, Theo didn't like his odds.
Chapter 36
The mercenaries were good, better than Nauda had thought at first. Two or three of them could have overwhelmed her, if they hadn't been so singularly focused on Theo. She had assumed that they would be holding back, since murder was illegal here and any investigation would surely lead straight back to Esaire ai Armeau, yet they attacked with full fury.
Of course no one was coming to help them. She couldn't trust those who ruled here more than anywhere else.
Theo retreated through the whirlwind, casting his gravitational torsions, but their opponents were experienced and most had armament breastplates, so the strikes weren't devastating. He shifted to put Nauda between him and the mercenaries, which she thought was a cheap tactic... until she caught his gaze and a slight upward glance.
With her in their path, the mercenaries charged at her in a tight formation. She couldn't have stood up to them like that, but she didn't need to. Nauda hit them all with a wave of nullification, and in the moment their cloaks were disrupted, Theo sent all of them falling into the sky.
It was only a short time before they rebuilt their cloaks and dropped back down, but they fell surprisingly high in that time. Knowing that the landing wouldn't kill them, Nauda thrust out her staff and caught one, slamming him into the side of the quarry. The others landed heavily and were soon coming for her again, shoving aside an innocent soulcrafter who didn't understand that lives were on the line.
Just as Nauda began to strike for another of them, a nearby boulder snaked out, wrapping around her arm and hardening. She tried to pull free and realized too late that the stone was reinforced with her opponent's cantae. Even though Fiyu rained bolts down on the group, four of them peeled away to attack Theo and one came to finish off Nauda.
Her right arm was bound too firmly in place to easily pull free. Nauda grabbed at the stone with her left, pretending to be shocked, as the mercenary approached with a sword overhead. When he got close enough, she dropped her staff, catching it with her free hand and thrusting out.
The tines of it pierced his chest before the force bound him in place, leaving him frozen in that position of pain. Nauda tried to push him downward with one hand, but one of the other mercenaries clapped her hands together, releasing a shockwave that rippled through the whirlwind, sending innocent soulcrafters flying in all directions. Fiyu was caught as well, breaking free from her invisible sphere and tumbling back over the ground.
Nauda's opponent broke free and knocked her staff from her hands while she was still off balance, then swung down at her face. She barely managed to catch her staff with one foot and kick it back up, catching it just in time to freeze her opponent with his blade in front of her face.
Letting out a growl, the mercenary began to flood cantae through his body, breaking her binding and bringing the sword closer to her face. Off balance and with one arm still bound in the rock, it was all Nauda could do to hold him back, her strength ebbing as he leveraged his superior position...
Fiyu appeared behind him, her blade thrusting into the gap in his armor just above the neck. It wasn't a gory wound, but it must have penetrated deep, because the mercenary twitched and then dropped his sword. Its cantae dying, it deflected off Nauda and fell to the ground, though she couldn't hear it hit over the sounds of the whirlwind and the battle.
With a slight smile Fiyu moved beside her and tried to cut the rock binding her in place. After only a few attempts, it was obvious that even her focused cantae blade wasn't going to cut through the rock. She stepped back, dismayed.
There were four mercenaries still in play, so there was no time to hesitate. Nauda released a burst of nullification from her right arm and smashed her other fist into the stone where it looked weakest. She managed to break off the section that bound her arm, and as soon as it separated from the rest of the stone, it weakened enough for her to easily smash it apart.
"Fight from cover," Nauda told Fiyu. She left unsaid that Fiyu was at a disadvantage against such armored opponents, but she saw the sorrowful understanding in the other woman's eyes before she vanished into the wind. If only she had chosen her words better...
Where was Theo during all this? She was torn between anger that he hadn't helped and worry that the others had used their numbers to finish him... and then she saw him across the vortex.
A sphere of darkness hovered between his hands, thrumming with power, and this black hole was no training exercise. The other mercenaries sent out bolts of cantae, but they were all immediately sucked into the void. When the woman clapped her hands again, Nauda was forced a step back, but the force itself seemed to be consumed. Even the whirlwind itself was beginning to falter, a new pattern flowing around where Theo stood.
Then the stone beneath his feet rushed up, clamping around his legs. Theo grimaced in pain... and his hands swept closed.
When the black hole appeared in the center of the mercenaries, the vortex itself seemed to roar in pain. The soulcrafter that shaped stone was consumed instantly, Nauda seeing only a split second of their body being torn apart before it fell into the darkness and nothing remained. Standing nearby, the others tried to flee, but it seemed to pull them inward. Cantae began streaming from their bodies, fueling the black hole as it grew larger.
Though Nauda saw true fear in the mercenaries' eyes, they were strong enough to avoid instant death. One of them dug his sword into the ground to hold himself in place, another used a burst of force to push her out of range, and the third began crawling further away.
Nauda realized that they wouldn't make it... but that they would last longer than the others. All around the base of the quarry, innocent soulcrafters had fallen either in the whirlwind or during the battle. As the black hole grew in intensity, their bodies began to edge closer. If they were drawn in...
"Theo, stop!" Nauda leapt beside him, noting that he seemed completely mobile now that he had released the technique, breaking free from the dead stone and moving to attack. At first he didn't seem to hear her, and she hated the merciless gaze he turned toward the mercenaries. "This will kill everyone!"
Finally his gaze left his opponents and he saw the others. Unconscious soulcrafters were sliding faster now, some even lifting into the air. A few desperately attacked the black hole, their cantae only fueling it further. One young man screamed as he clutched the ground, his fingers turning bloody as he was dragged inexorably closer.
Nauda asked herself what she would do if Theo didn't relent and simply killed them all... but something shifted within him and he released the technique. The black hole collapsed inward and vanished.
For the first time since the whirlwind had begun spinning, the quarry was silent. A few groaned on the floor of the quarry, others wept or fled. The whirlwind itself seemed to have been destroyed, leaving the quarry filled with settling dust.
The mercenaries didn't hesitate any longer. A spherical shockwave hit them both, which they managed to push through, but they were immediately assaulted by a sweeping beam of cantae. Nauda managed to dodge aside, but it caught Theo in the shoulder and he was spun to the ground from the force.
On his knees, he raised his hands again to begin another technique, only to be knocked back by the next shockwave. Nauda thrust out her staff, binding the mercenary with the s
hockwaves in place.
Another lunged from the swirling dust and Nauda leapt back too late. His sword caught her side and part of her arm, opening a nasty wound.
Nauda cried out in pain, staggering back and trying to avoid the next thrust. The swordsman was caught by a twisting field of gravity that knocked him backward, but Theo was exhausted and couldn't apply enough force to finish him. He managed to get to his feet, but she knew that his soulhome was nearly depleted.
Theo didn't say a word about the fact that they would have won if she hadn't stopped him. They simply glanced at one another, accepted the odds against them, and turned to face the mercenaries.
~ ~ ~
It was cruel and unfair. Fiyu knelt behind a rock that provided some cover from the horrible wind, wishing that someone would step forward to help them. There should have been guards, or allies from the Houses, or relatives who would prevent this ambush from occurring.
But there was no one. No one but her.
A tear touched the inside of her mask as she realized how little she could help her companions. Even with her new bracers, her bursts of light were insufficient against the mercenaries with their defensive chambers and armaments. She had been little more than a distraction, her strikes frequently failing utterly. Even the lethal blow she had landed with Friend Nauda's help had very nearly failed to pierce the mercenary's defenses.
There was no one but her... she had no choice but to make herself into someone who could help.
Fiyu balanced her sphere of silence around herself and then plunged into her soulhome. She hefted the eldenwood on her roof and managed to stand it upright, quickly racing to attach more support lines.
It soon stood tall, driving into the heavens... but could she do the same? The top of the wood was beginning to crumble as the pressure tore into it. Outside, Fiyu could feel terrible forces racing across the battlefield, but she shut them out, focusing herself on this one thing.
