by Gage Lee
And then the rat exploded, and a spike of pain shot through my skull. I didn’t have time to catch my breath before another of the poor creatures died, then five more, then ten. The dragons had figured out what I was up to and switched tactics.
I was out of time.
The Borrowed Core technique dissipated with a thought. I couldn’t afford to spend any more time harvesting time aspects. I had to use what I’d gained, now.
My serpents darted along the perimeter of the ceiling, crafting a scrivening unlike any I’d ever performed before. It was difficult work, and I had no time to be careful. But I put my worries away and trusted my new experience and core to get the job done.
“Everybody gather in the middle of the room,” I commanded when I’d completed the circuit.
“There’s not enough space,” Dusalia protested. “We’ll be standing on top of each other.”
Abi shook his head. “Jace, what is happening here? I need to return to the shrine.”
It took me a moment to push down the frustration that the questions built up inside me. “Please,” I said. “Just do what I say. I’m trying to save you—”
“I didn’t ask to be saved,” Clem said, her voice harsh. “And you didn’t ask. What right do you have to push us all into... whatever this is? Tell me what’s happening.”
“If you don’t do this, Tycho Reyes and the other sages will kill you.” I shrugged. “Or the dragons will. Sometime in the next few minutes, they’re coming here, and if they find any of you, you’ll die.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Eric said. “Why would the sages do anything like that?”
It hurt to be questioned by my friends. There was a time when they would’ve jumped the instant I called for them. But they’d been burned one too many times, and they’d lost too much following me around. I peeled my robe away to reveal the threads of elemental power I’d woven through my body. “Look at me. Look at my core. And then listen to what I have to say.”
An uneasy silence filled the room. But I felt the weight of their attention on me, probing, looking at the golden mass of the sage-level core burning inside my body.
“By the flame,” Clem whispered. “What have you done?”
“This circuit will move you all to a time where no one can reach you,” I promised. “It’ll keep you safe there until the time aspects I’m about to load into it run out.”
“And then what?” Clem asked.
“This bag has enough talismans for all of you,” I said, removing the ratty container from my belt. “Use them, and they’ll take you back to where Dusalia’s been hiding the Shadow Phoenix clan.”
Eric raised an eyebrow at me. “How long will we be gone?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Probably less than an hour.”
Rachel stepped forward and put a hand on my chest. She looked up into my eyes and searched my face for something she needed to see. Her eyes burned against mine, her innocent gaze swallowed up by the black hole of mine. “What difference will that short time make? If we’re in danger now, we’ll be in danger then.”
“You won’t,” I promised. “This mess is almost over. When I’m finished, there won’t be any danger left.”
Abi spoke up. “You finally found the peace you seek?”
It was with shock that I realized I actually had. I’d been worried about what would happen for so long that it had clouded my mind. I saw the future now, clear and sharp, not with the Vision of the Design, but with a peaceful certainty. There were only two options ahead of me. Success or failure. And while the latter was far more likely, I couldn’t shake the feeling that, in some ways, I’d already won.
“Let’s do this,” Eric said. “An hour isn’t going to kill me, though my coach probably will for ditching out of practice.”
He laughed and elbowed his way in between me and Rachel to drag me into a bear hug. “You turned into a real monster, man. I always knew you’d be strong, but this is insane.”
I laughed. “You don’t know the half of it. All right, everybody. Time to go.”
Rachel bit her lower lip and looked at me for a moment as if she had something important to say. Then, she looked away and stepped into the very center of the room. Clem pushed Abi’s wheelchair next to Rachel, then turned back to me. She stepped so close we were almost touching, then took hold of the front of my robes with both hands.
“We could have been something, you and me.” There were tears in her eyes, and her cheeks were flushed.
“We will be,” I promised.
We stayed like that for long seconds. Finally, Clem nodded and stepped back to join my other friends and the growing number of Shadow Phoenixes.
Christina, the last of my friends, gave me an impish grin. “There’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time,” she said.
“What?” I asked.
She leaned forward and pressed her lips against mine. Her hands curled into my hair, and she kissed me for what felt like an eternity. There was a hunger in the act, a desperate need for something I didn’t understand. When we parted, my heart was in my throat.
Christina stepped back, making pew-pew noises while pointing gun fingers at me. “Thanks, cowboy. Where are you headed after you turn this thing on?”
The only answer I gave them was a brief wave, followed by a flood of jinsei and time aspects fired into the scrivening on the ceiling. A blazing wall of light surrounded my friends and clan as sacred energy raced through the most complicated scrivenings I’d ever managed.
The circuit worked. My friends disappeared. They were safe until the time aspects ran out. I let out a slow breath and answered Christina’s question.
“Beyond time and space.”
Another pulse of attention probed for my core, and I slapped it aside with a thought. I put as much effort behind that defense as I could and hoped whoever was searching for me suffered for their foolishness. I wasn’t prey. I was one of the sages, and my enemies should be afraid.
It was time to say goodbye. I pulled one of my final talismans out of my robes and fed it a trickle of energy. A familiar pang rumbled through my core at that use of jinsei, and I wondered how close I was to advancing again. I wasn’t sure I’d survive another so soon.
Hahen appeared through the gate I’d opened, his whiskers twitching. A tiny kitten, its belly so fat I was surprised it could stand up in the palm of the rat spirit’s hand, meowed at me.
“Tycho is furious,” my mentor said. “His seers know where you are. A strike team is coming.”
I bowed low to Hahen, my eyes stinging with unshed tears. “I’m sorry we don’t have more time to say our farewells, honored Master.”
Hahen put his hand on my shoulder and lowered his head.
“It is just as well,” the rat spirit said. “My time has grown short at last.”
My mentor’s words hit me like a punch to the heart. For a moment, I couldn’t catch my breath, and I wanted to run, as far and fast as I could, so I wouldn’t have to hear the rest of what he had to say.
“Do not be afraid,” Hahen said. “Our roads ran together for longer than I had any right to expect. Now, they part. But you have taught me so much, Jace. I am forever in your debt. Whatever happens, know that I am proud of you. You are stronger than you know. Never forget that.”
I kneeled in front of Hahen and slowly, gently, suffused his spirit form with sacred energy from my core. His eyes went wide as power filled him, allowing him to fully manifest after all this time. Years seemed to evaporate from his wrinkled face as the spirit accepted my gift and let it give him a body, if only for as long as my jinsei lasted. My mentor’s translucent shape gained solidity, and within a few moments, I felt the warmth of his pulse emanating from his skin.
“What have you done?” Hahen asked.
“I wanted to thank you, Master,” I said, my voice choked with tears, “for all that you’ve done and everything you’ve taught me. For being the father I never knew I needed.”
I
wrapped my arms around him and held the little rat close. His kitten yelled at me, irritated at being squished between us.
Hahen returned the hug, then whispered, “You have given an old rat new faith and meaning to a long life. Goodbye, my friend. Perhaps we will see each other again on the other side.”
I clung to my mentor for as long as I could, until he released the jinsei I’d given him and let his physical form unravel. His body shrank in my grasp as he let go, dwindling to nothing. I felt more than heard a faint sigh escape him, and then he was gone to the rest he’d earned. I’d miss the cantankerous little spirit, but his time in the mortal realm was done.
The kitten mewed plaintively from where it rested in my hands. It twitched its whiskers at me, then leaped down to sit in the middle of the now empty floor.
It turned around twice, then closed its eyes and went to sleep.
“Keep an eye out for my friends,” I said. “Be sure to tell them I’ll miss them.”
A faint crackle in the air warned me of an opening gate just outside.
I laughed, raised my hands overhead, and pushed back against it with all of my might.
“Not today,” I said, unraveling my attacker’s assault.
And then I pulled out a talisman and vanished.
The Island
MY SPIRIT SENSES FOUND a dragon line nexus below the cottage. Some genius had used it as a power source to keep the house running with a wide variety of scrivenings as safeguards. The sorcery didn’t draw too much energy and attract spirits, or too little energy to keep the pocket dimension manifested.
It was an amazing piece of work that I would have loved a few days to really examine. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be long before Tycho and the dragons showered me with bad guys. All I needed was one piece of information, and I’d be gone.
My serpents wove threads of energy straight into the heart of the nexus. I pulled jinsei and elemental aspects with wild abandon, surrounding the cottage with a storm of manifested fire and pockets of water. The flames heated the water to the boiling point, forcing jets of superheated steam in toward the cottage.
When Tycho’s hit team showed up, they’d be in for a very nasty surprise.
“Are you through playing with nature’s might, manchild?” Nexignus’s voice boomed through the air. “I have found what you requested. Would you like to see it?”
“Um, sure,” I said. “How?”
“Open your mind to me, manchild.” Nexignus’s voice came from all around me. “I will seed the location of Ultima Thule into your mind’s eye.”
That made me hesitate. This sounded a lot like the Borrowed Core, and I knew from experience that was a powerful technique that could do a lot of damage in the wrong hands. I needed this information, though. An idea occurred to me.
“Open your mind to me,” I said, “and we will share the location that way.”
Nexignus didn’t hesitate. “You are right to fear my power, manchild, but do not think you can dominate me. Join our spirits, and learn what you need.”
The Borrowed Core snapped into place the instant I activated it. Nexignus’s core was stronger than any I’d ever seen, wild and primal and wholly untamed. Borrowing that ball of power was like sticking my fist into the Earth’s core. There was nothing I recognized as thought within the creature. It existed on a wholly different level than mortals, and its perceptions were utterly alien.
Nexignus lived within the dragon lines that encircled the Earth in a network of power. In many ways, the elemental was the lifeblood of the planet, a sentience that watched over the dragon lines to ensure they were not abused. That’s why it had come running when I’d drawn enough power to light up a city. The jinsei that flowed through the dragon lines was not mine to control. It belonged to all mortals.
“Yes,” Nexignus agreed. “It has been overlong since a mortal has dared to disturb the flow of sacred energy in that way. But what you have done is nothing compared to the damage wrought by Ultima Thule. Look upon the works of men and dragons, mortal, and weep for the carnage they have wrought.”
The elemental wrenched my mind through the lines beneath the earth, showing me the intricate clusters of blazing power that marked their intersections. We soared beneath oceans and deserts, through fields of magma and ice, until we reached the end of a dragon line.
The severed conduit looked as raw and fresh as the wound I’d ripped through Tycho’s side. It wept jinsei into a black pit that churned with a storm of chaos. That darkness made my mind ache. It wailed like a banshee and filled me with a sense of unease and nausea. In many ways it reminded me of the filth I’d cycled for Tycho. Unclean and foul, a perversion of the natural order.
I tried to imagine how long Niddhogg had known about this place. The poor cursed dragon had been charged with watching, waiting for any sign the Five Dragons would return. It was ironic that now that he’d finally earned reprieve from his curse, I’d come to do the very thing his people feared the most.
“Thank you for your help, honored Elemental.” I prepared to use one of my last talismans to return to the island that held the School of Swords and Serpents. From there I’d be able to put my strength to best use. “There will likely be a very great disturbance soon, but it should pass quickly.”
“Be careful tampering with forces you do not fully understand, mortal,” Nexignus said. “Though you may be powerful beyond most reckoning, you are not invulnerable. The Earth remembers the Five Dragons. Their anger was terrible, and their punishment was in some ways deserved. Why would you disturb their exile?”
“The Empyrean Flame told me they have something I need. I’m going to get it,” I said. “Hopefully without a fight.”
The elemental chuckled. “Humans are so optimistic. There will be a fight, and it will be ugly. But if this is what you must do, I will not dissuade you. Because I find your hope interesting, I will grant you one further boon in return for the payment of Ultima Thule. Summon me wisely.”
“Thank you, that is more than I dared to ask,” I said. “I will part ways with you for the moment, but expect to hear from me again soon.”
“Good luck, manchild,” Nexignus called. “Do not die before you pay me what is owed.”
I opened my eyes to find myself still surrounded by flame and steam. I pulled a talisman from my robes and used Kalani’s technique to alter it as it unfolded and carried me away. A moment later, I stood on a rocky outcropping south of the School. From this new vantage I saw the academy’s outline and marveled at how small it looked from up here. I knew the façade hid the true size of the building, but it still seemed so quaint and vulnerable. My eyes shifted away from the place I’d called home for so many years, out to the ocean, vast and alien, its churning body stretched across the horizon. I sat down on the cold stones and let my eyes drift out of focus as meditation showed me the Grand Design.
If Nexignus had not pinpointed the Design for me, I’d never have found it. The Design was simply too vast, the number of connections too numerous. But with the elemental’s knowledge, I could pinpoint the gap where Ultima Thule had once been.
The spell used to exile the Five Dragons had been woven directly into the Design. The scrivenings didn’t completely remove the island and its inhabitants from the world, but shifted them. If the Grand Design was a vast map laid out on an infinite table, Ultima Thule was a piece of that map sliced away and raised several inches above the table. From certain angles, it could still appear whole. But the gap prevented any contact between the island and the world of mortals.
I held the scrivenings in my mind, my sage’s core expanding to contain their vast complexity. My head burned with the enormity of my task. If I’d had to redraw even this small portion of the Design, it would’ve been impossible. But all I needed to do was bridge the gaps created by the scrivenings.
One thread at a time, I healed the wound in time and space caused by the exile. The effort strained my core and burned my mind, the power I wielded threatening to tear my
channels apart. But I held on, tying my spell over the holes in reality.
I didn’t intend to bring Ultima Thule back to the world of mortals. The Empyrean Flame had told me to anchor the Grand Design beyond time and space, and that was exactly where Ultima Thule was now. I only needed a bridge from where I was to—
The patches I’d created allowed jinsei to flow freely into the nexus at the heart of Ultima Thule. The power rushed through my spell and filled my channels with lightning. For a moment, I wasn’t seeing the Design, I was part of it. Power, greater and purer than any I’d ever known, flowed through parts of the world that had long been dead.
The void glowed like a sun.
That was going to get some attention.
My connection to Ultima Thule dragged me from the stony outcropping and to the island’s shore before I could cut myself free from the spell. The white grains beneath my soles were finer than any I’d ever seen, and heavier. Like dense talcum powder, soft and yielding, but immune to the wind that would’ve otherwise swept it away.
I turned back, and found the world beyond the island hazy and indistinct. The bridge I’d created remained, so I could still go home.
“After you deal with the dragons,” I muttered.
I unloaded the container of cores I’d been lugging around and buried it on the beach. It would be safer there than strapped to my back while I faced down a bunch of dragons.
I strode inland toward the towering forest that rose from the edge of the beach. I had no idea what the Empyrean Flame thought I’d find on this island, or what the Five Dragons had to offer, but the only way I’d find out was to start walking.
It took me much longer to reach the forest than I’d anticipated. The trees were much larger than I’d expected, bigger than redwoods, which made them seem closer to the water than they really were. Even with my sage’s speed, it took me a quarter of an hour to move past the tree line, and a half hour longer than that before I found anything interesting.