7 minutes passed.
I stood guard, my stolen sword ready, my senses straining for any sign of approaching threats. Nothing moved. Nothing stirred.
Cinder opened his eyes.
The change was immediate. His presence, which had been dimmed by years of imprisonment and exhaustion, now radiated a quiet intensity.
He placed a finger on the ground, a technique I didn't recognize, some form of Aetheric sensing that allowed him to feel vibrations and presences through the stone.
A moment of concentration. Then his eyes snapped open, focused, alert.
"A strong one is heading towards us. Absorbing that Aether was the right call."
"I can't fight him," I said. It was the truth. My skills were impressive against normal humans, but against a true Aether-user, someone with decades of training and real power, I would be easily outmatched.
"Of course. I will deal with him alone."
"How are you gonna fight him?"
Cinder laughed, "Just wait and watch."
His confidence was reassuring. He had been imprisoned for years, but he was still a warrior.
"No, I'm not gonna stay here. Watching the fight could be a huge experience… but checking on those two is more crucial. Good luck."
Saying this I quickly went downstairs.
I could hear the faint sound of water.
The sound echoed through the stone corridors, growing louder as I descended.
Water Kin, huh? It would be beneficial to see how it works but… I can't be greedy.
Must be Cinder. Since I can't hear any combat.
But I couldn't afford to watch. I had other priorities.
It's not about his comrades.
The real reason was simpler, more selfish.
I CANNOT show my hair or face to anyone.
Well, I have, but those were only trusted ones. If the strong one sees me and escapes, House Theodore will use him to uncover what happened in the jail and try to take me back. Anonymity is survival. I need to escape without leaving evidence that I worked with them. If my father's forces find proof I led a prison break, they will hunt me. But if they think I died in the chaos—buried under rubble or killed by guards, they will probably stop looking. No one will know where I went… or if I even survived.
I darted downstairs.
—
I stopped at the place where we killed the three guards.
The bodies were still there, sprawled in the positions where they had fallen. Blood pooled on the stone, already darkening. I stepped over them without a second glance and focused my senses.
I concentrated on my senses. Two footsteps. Probably them.
Coming from deeper in the prison. Running… towards me?
I waited.
They emerged from the darkness moments later: Mirabel and Roran, both breathing hard, their faces streaked with sweat and grime.
Mirabel - "We have secured the prisoners. There is one though… We tried every key… but it didn't work at all."
"Does it have a different barrier?"
"Yes."
Cinder is up there. Alone. Fighting.
To have a safe journey we must defeat the strong one. Therefore, one of the two must be sent to fight alongside Cinder. With the threat inside eliminated, the stronger of the pair must be sent up.
"Roran. Go help Cinder. When you arrive the two will be fighting. Absorb the flowing Aether dissipated or released from their fight. Then join the fight when you have enough Aether."
Roran didn't hesitate. He nodded once and sprinted past me, heading toward the sounds of battle that were just beginning to echo from above.
Mirabel- "You're a heck of a leader. When we were twelve we did nothing but eat."
There was a brief period of silence.
The comment hung in the air, an odd mix of admiration and disbelief. She was right, in a way. I had been forged by circumstances that no child should face. But I didn't have the luxury of reflecting on that now.
"Anyways, there's only one prisoner left."
"Wait, before that I really need to go back to my cell.", I intruded.
The idea had been forming since we started this liberation. If I could alter the evidence of my escape, I could disappear completely.
I escaped that jail a few hours ago. If I can alter the runes of the barrier, tweaking them to show it broke a full day earlier, it will work greatly to my advantage.
Then if house Theodore checked the time I escaped, it would be a day before the official mass prisoner break.
Because of this there would be no evidence that I worked with Cinder and team or… no evidence of me being alive.
We reached.
My cell was exactly as I had left it, the shattered barrier still flickering, the walls that had held me for three years. It felt smaller now, less oppressive. Just a room.
" Tweak the runes so that the time of escape should be a day earlier. Tweak the primordial rune, not the mordial one. Tweak it 30 degrees to the north-east. "
It's easier to find changes in the mordial rune but extremely hard to find it in the main primordial ones.
This barrier works through a formula. Slight alteration in formula, time of escape becomes earlier.
Mirabel approached the barrier controls, her fingers tracing the glowing symbols as she practically did what I asked.
"It's a couple metres from here," she muttered, adjusting the primordial rune. The runes pattern shifted slightly, its internal clock resetting to show a failure time twenty-four hours earlier.
"Now the prisoner. The fact that the barrier is vastly different and no keys that unlocked it, alone gives an idea of how strong the prisoner is. Is he at the deepest part of this jail?"
"Yes you're correct. And it was hidden too. Not well hidden like we were but it was decent."
This prisoner was either incredibly dangerous or incredibly valuable, possibly both.
"Is he conscious?"
"You're correct again."
Conscious. Aware. That meant he could communicate, could potentially help us understand his barrier.
I took one of the dead guards' clothing and put it on my face and hair.
The fabric was rough, stained with blood, but it covered my distinctive golden hair and obscured my features. No one that I don't know about should see my face.
We dashed.
—
The deepest part of the prison was exactly that—a final level below even my cell, reached by a hidden spiraling staircase that seemed to descend forever. The air grew colder, damper. The walls were slick with moisture, and the only light came from the pulsing green barrier that awaited us at the bottom.
The barrier was quite different.
Not the opalescent shimmer of the standard cells. This was something else, a sickly green glow that seemed to pulse with a slow, deliberate rhythm. It looked alive.
I knocked on it. Nothing much happened.
Just a solid surface. No give, no reaction.
I prepared to punch.
My knuckles hit the barrier.
And immediately, something changed.
The barrier didn't just resist, it gripped. My hand was trapped, held fast by a force that seemed to pull at my skin, my muscles, my very being.
I forcefully removed my hand from it.
The effort was immense. I had to use my entire body to pull free, and when I did, the barrier responded strangely. The energy went around the barrier like a wave. A ripple spread from the point of impact, circling the green surface before dissipating.
"I cannot break this barrier through punches. If the prisoner… helped from inside… I could figure out the deal with this barrier."
Mirabel stepped forward, pressing her face close to the green glow. She tried to communicate with the prisoner. She spoke, but her words were muffled, distorted by the barrier's properties.
The voice of the prisoner was very low. I could barely hear it, just a whisper, a murmur, something that might have been words but was too faint to distinguish.
"Wait! Don't say anything."
I focused on my hearing.
I filtered out the ambient noise, the drip of water, Mirabel's breathing, the distant echoes of battle and focused on that faint voice.
It was speaking. Repeating something. A phrase, over and over.
"The barrier is Sculptie. Hitting it won't work!"
Sculptie. The word meant nothing to me, but the desperation in the voice told me it was important.
"Only Aetherless objects can move freely through it!"
Aetherless. That was me. That was my entire existence.
I put my hand gently on it.
This time, no grip. No resistance. My hands pushed through.
The barrier yielded like water, parting around my fingers, my wrist, my forearm. It was warm, viscous, but not painful. Just like a Non-Newtonian fluid. If they are hit it will become a solid but if gently touched it will act as a liquid.
A brilliant prison design. For Aether-users, any attempt to break through would be met with solid resistance. But for someone like me… it's just walking through water.
I pulled my hand back, the barrier sealing behind it instantly.
How would I pull the prisoner out?
The problem was clear. I could enter, but the prisoner himself had Aether. If he tried to pass through the barrier, it would solidify and trap him.
I needed a solution. A way to use my Aetherless nature as a bridge, a path, a shield.
The prisoner's voice came again, weaker this time. He was running out of strength, out of hope.
I looked at Mirabel. She looked back, her eyes asking the same question I was thinking.
How do we save a man who can't touch the only exit?