Alucent's vision swam, and the turquoise moonlight blurred into streaks that tilted and bent in ways that made no sense. His left cheek throbbed where the punch had landed, the heat spreading across the bone and settling deep, and he could taste copper pooling at the back of his throat. His legs felt unsteady beneath him, and the road seemed to sway like the deck of a ship.
His hand was still on the pouch at his belt, his fingers brushing against the leather.
The Journal was right there. He could feel its weight against his hip, could sense the faint warmth of the artifact even through the material. If he pulled it out now, if he activated it, the battle would change. The Journal never gave him straight answers, always speaking in parables and riddles and mocking observations that made him feel like a child grasping at concepts too large for his mind. But it would tell him something. It would give him an edge. It would show him what he could not see.
I should pull it out, he thought, his fingers tightened on the pouch. Once I activate it and use Record of All, it's possible I'll find out where he is and I could end this.
His thumb hooked under the flap.
But then he stopped.
Damn, I can't forget that Joy is still here.
The thought cut through the haze like cold water. Joy was standing by the cart, her blue eyes wide beneath the gauze veil, her gloved hands pressed to her chest.
I can't reveal it now, I've been trying not to allow her see what I possess. I don't trust her yet to keep her mouths shut and not tell the Green Council.
They already have reasons to watch me. Giving them more would be catastrophic, I can't allow that happen.
TheJournalstayedinthepouch.
Alucent's fingers moved past it and closed around the Reed-Caster instead. The brass was cool against his palm as he pulled the weapon free and raised it in front of him, the barrel catching the turquoise moonlight. His thumb found the release, and he flicked it open with a practiced motion. His other hand reached into the pouch and retrieved a casing.
A Thread 2 Kinetic-Banishment casing, he thought as he slid it into the chamber. With Piercing-Force Rune loaded inside. This is the best option I have for fast action, it should be able to meet this Tyranix person before he moves to a different position, even though he is invisible, he should still have a physical body.
He snapped the release shut and felt the mechanism click into place.
I've only got six casings total and four Piercing-Force. I hope this works. Because this is all I have with me, I need to use it in the best way possible.
He pointed the Caster at the empty air ahead of him and held it steady despite the trembling in his arm. The trees stood silent in the darkness, their branches reaching overhead like black fingers against the turquoise sky. The road stretched pale and empty in both directions. There was no figure standing before him, no shape moving in the shadows, no target to aim at.
He was pointing a weapon at nothing.
For a moment, silence hung over the road, broken only by the nervous stamping of the horses and the distant rustle of wind through leaves. Then a laugh came from somewhere ahead of him, low and soft, and it seemed to drift from the trees on his left before sliding to his right and then settling directly in front of him. The sound was everywhere and nowhere at once, and Alucent felt the hairs rise on the back of his neck.
"You're really pathetic."
The voice was calm, unhurried, and there was genuine amusement in it. Tyranix was enjoying this.
"Is this what you've created by your own will and intelligence?" The voice shifted again, coming from a different angle, and Alucent turned his head to track it even though he knew it was useless. "I'm sure the Green Council doesn't know about this thing."
Alucent's jaw tightened, and his finger rested on the trigger.
"How do you even call yourself a Scribe if you can't use your ability?" The voice paused, and when it continued, there was something eager beneath the calm, something hungry. "Or don't tell me... you've not passed the Acceptance phase of your Threadweave?"
Laughter followed, louder this time, echoing off the trees and the road and the cart behind him in ways that made no sense. The sound seemed to come from inside his own skull, vibrating behind his eyes, and Alucent had to fight the urge to press his hands over his ears.
Is he mocking me? Alucent thought, and anger rose in his chest, hot and sharp and for a moment he wanted to yell out "Fuck you!". Heknows I can't see him, and he's enjoying every moment of this.
"You're one to talk," Alucent said, forcing the words out through clenched teeth. He tried to steady his voice, tried to match the calm that Joy had shown in the cart, but the anger bled through despite his efforts. "You can't even show yoursel—"
The punch came before he finished the word.
It struck his left cheek, the same spot as before, and the pain flared white across his vision. He had not seen it coming, had not felt the displacement of air or heard the sound of movement. One moment there was nothing, and the next his head was snapping to the side and his teeth were clicking together hard enough to send sparks through his jaw.
Then something slammed into his stomach.
A knee, driving upward into his gut with enough force to lift his feet off the ground. His body arched backward, spine curving, and the air rushed out of his lungs in a single violent burst. Blood filled his mouth and spilled past his lips, spattering against the dirt road in dark droplets that caught the turquoise moonlight.
Theattackjustnow, it came from in front of me, Alucent thought, even as the pain screamed through his body. But I was facing forward. I should have seen something. I should have at least felt something.
He did not think about what to do next. His body moved on instinct, and his finger squeezed the trigger.
The Reed-Caster fired with a sharp crack that split the night air, and a needle-thin beam of amber light lanced out from the barrel. The concentrated Runeforce was bright and precise, cutting through the darkness like a blade, and for a moment Alucent felt a surge of hope.
The beam passed through empty space and dissolved into nothing.
One, he counted.
He adjusted his aim toward where the voice had come from and fired again. Another amber beam. Another miss. The light flashed and vanished, leaving no trace of its passage, no indication that it had struck anything at all.
Two.
"Ahh," the voice said, and now it was behind him, close enough that Alucent could almost feel breath against the back of his neck. He spun, but there was nothing there, only the empty road and the dark trees and the pale turquoise moonlight falling across it all. "Do you really think that thing will do anything against me?"
He'snot just invisible, Alucent realized, and the thought sent ice through his veins. He's not standing where his voice comes from. He's somewhere else entirely. I've been shooting at nothing this whole time.
He fired again anyway, aiming at the sound, knowing it was useless but unable to stop himself. The amber beam sliced through the darkness and struck a tree trunk twenty feet away, leaving a small scorched mark on the bark.
Three.
"I had expected more from you," Tyranix said, and the voice was to his left now, calm and pitying, like a teacher disappointed in a promising student. "I heard about you, you know. The Scribe who advanced from Thread 1 to Thread 3 in three months. Such potential. Such promise."
Alucent turned and fired. The amber beam cut through empty air and faded into the night.
Four.
"Seeing this now," the voice continued, and it had moved again, drifting to his right, "I am deeply disappointed. I thought this would be a satisfying fight."
The first punch hit Alucent's neck before he could react, snapping his head to the side and sending white sparks across his vision. The second punch struck his chest, driving the breath from his lungs and making his ribs creak beneath the impact. The third caught his ribs on the left side, and he felt something crack, a sharp snapping sensation that sent agony radiating through his torso. The fourth hit his cheek, the same cheek, the same spot, and the pain was so sharp and so familiar that his legs buckled beneath him.
He staggered backward, barely keeping his feet, and the Reed-Caster trembled in his grip.
The punches came from different directions, he thought, and his mind was racing even as his body screamed in protest. Front. Left. Right. Behind. He's hitting me from angles that don't make sense. He's not just invisible. He's not even where I think he is. This doesn't make any sense.
I can't perceive him. I can't predict him. I can't fight something I can't even find.
He raised the Caster again, but his arm was shaking badly now, and the barrel wavered in the air.
Five, he thought. I've used five.
One left.
---
Twenty feet away, Raya knelt on the dirt road with her arms wrapped around Gryan's shoulders, holding him against her chest as if she could anchor him to reality through sheer force of will.
He was still smiling. That wrong, proud smile that did not belong on his face, that made him look like a stranger wearing Gryan's skin. His mechanical arm hung limp at his side, the rune-lines dark and cold, and his eyes stared at nothing, unfocused and empty. He did not respond when she shook him. He did not respond when she called his name. He did not respond at all.
"Gryan," she said, and her voice cracked on the word. "Gryan, please. Come back. Please."
The scar on her cheek pulled tight as her face twisted with desperation, the old wound aching in a way it had not ached in years. Her chestnut hair had come half-undone from its tight bun, strands falling across her forehead and sticking to the tears that were rolling down her cheeks. She had lost people before. She knew what it felt like to hold someone and feel them slipping away. She could not let it happen again.
Behind her, she heard another crack from the Reed-Caster. Another amber beam. Another miss. She heard Alucent grunt in pain, heard the sound of fists striking flesh, and her stomach clenched into a tight knot.
I can't help him, she thought, and the helplessness was worse than the fear. I can't even help Gryan.
She turned her head toward Joy, who stood by the cart with her hands folded in front of her chest and her blue eyes fixed on the fight. The gauze veil stirred against her face with each breath, and her expression was calm, but there was tension in her shoulders that betrayed her composure.
"Scribe Joy," Raya said, and her voice broke on the words. Tears blurred her vision, and she blinked them away fiercely. "Is there perhaps a way you can help heal Gryan? Alucent can't fight that being alone. We need to quickly revive Gryan so we can go help him. Please."
Joy turned to look at her, and something shifted in her expression. The calm cracked, just slightly, and what lay beneath was soft and regretful, almost ashamed.
"Unfortunately," Joy said, and her voice was quiet, barely above a whisper, "I can't."
Raya stared at her, uncomprehending. "What do you mean you can't? You're a Scribe. You're a Thread 3 Scribe. Surely there's something you can do."
"I'm still at Thread 3," Joy said, and she looked down at her gloved hands as if they had disappointed her. "I've passed the Acceptance phase, yes, but I can't heal. Healing requires Thread 4." She paused, and when she continued, her voice was even softer. "And I don't want to advance to Thread 4. I don't know if I can handle it."
Raya's grip on Gryan tightened. "But surely—"
"It took me six years," Joy said, and now she looked up, meeting Raya's eyes with an expression that was both gentle and heavy with old weight. "Six years to advance from Thread 1 to Thread 3. And then it took me another three years to finally achieve and pass the Acceptance phase while at Thread 3. Nine years in total."
Raya went silent.
Nine years?! she thought, and the number settled into her mind like a stone dropping into still water. I took Nine years to reach where Joy stands now.
And Alucent did it in three months.
She looked back at the fight. Alucent was staggering, blood on his lips and chin, the Reed-Caster raised in a trembling hand. He fired again, and the amber beam cut through empty air and dissolved into nothing, striking nothing, changing nothing.
Three months, she thought again, and she did not know if what she felt was awe or fear or something else entirely. How is that even possible?
---
Alucent's chest heaved with each breath, and every inhale sent pain lancing through his cracked ribs. His left cheek had gone numb, the nerves overloaded by repeated impact, and the blood in his mouth had thickened into a paste that coated his teeth and tongue. His legs trembled beneath him, threatening to buckle with each passing moment.
The Reed-Caster was still in his hand, but it felt heavier now, the brass weighing down his arm like an anchor. One casing left. One shot.
Five spent, he thought. Oneremaining. And I still don't know where he is.
He tried to activate Thread 1 perception ability again, tried to perceive the Runeforce around him, but there was nothing. The amber outline he had seen earlier was gone, scattered into wisps of energy that had dispersed into the night. Tyranix had disappeared completely, erased from his perception as thoroughly as if he had never existed.
I can't see him. I can't hear where he truly is. I can't feel him approaching. He is death to my senses, and I hate to admit, but I am blind right now.
The weight of it pressed down on him, heavier than the pain in his ribs, heavier than the exhaustion in his limbs. He had studied for hours in the Scriptorium, had trained with the Journal, had learned about Threads and phases and the structure of the Weave. He had advanced from Thread 1 to Thread 3 in three months, a feat that took Joy nine years. He had the Bloodmark. He had the Journal. He had abilities that other Scribes could only dream of.
And none of it matters, he thought, and the bitterness of it was sharp in his chest. Allthat power, all that potential, and I'm still just a man swinging at shadows.
The thought sat heavy in his mind, and for a moment, the fight faded away, and there was only the cold truth of his own inadequacy.
"You're thinking very hard."
The voice came from inside his own head, vibrating behind his eyes, echoing in his skull as if Tyranix were standing inside his mind. Alucent flinched and nearly dropped the Caster, his heart lurching in his chest.
He's in my head, he thought, and panic clawed at the edges of his thoughts. He's speaking from inside my—
"You have to accept," Tyranix said, and now the voice was outside again, drifting from somewhere to his right, calm and unhurried and utterly certain, "that whatever you've created won't work against me."
Alucent turned toward the voice and raised the Caster, his finger hovering over the trigger. The barrel shook in his grip, tracing small circles in the air.
The Caster? Alucent thought. Is he talking about the Caster?
"You know what you're carrying," Tyranix continued, and there was something sharper beneath the calm now, something knowing. "You know it's a Heresy. That's why you've kept it a secret. That's why you hide it from your fellow Scribes and the Council."
Alucent's grip tightened on the weapon.
Heresy. The word echoed in his mind. He thought of Raya's face when she had first seen the design, the anger in her voice when she had called it crooked. Pre-etching runes in safety and comfort, then firing them later when there's no mental cost. You're trying to cheat the fundamental principle of the path. That was what she had said. A crooked line is a crooked life.
And she had been right. The Caster was a shortcut. A cheat. A violation of everything the Threadweave stood for. He had created it anyway, because he needed an edge, because he was incomplete, because he could not rely on his abilities alone.
And now it was useless.
"But if you don't want to part with it willingly," Tyranix said, and the voice was closer now, much closer, close enough that Alucent could feel the words brushing against the back of his neck like cold breath, "then I'll make sure I help you part with it permanently."
The turquoise moonlight fell across the empty road in pale, uneven bands. The wind had gone still. The horses had stopped stamping. Even the distant rustle of leaves had faded into silence.
Alucent stood alone, bleeding and battered, the Reed-Caster raised toward nothing, one shot remaining in the chamber.
And somewhere in the darkness, unseen and unperceived, Tyranix was smiling.