Ice enveloped all. Liron struggled to comprehend what happened. In a single second, the inn exploded in motion. Pillars of white stomped down, intending to impale all in their way. Liron jumped backwards, holding his blade in front of him. There was nothing he could do but hope to survive.
The cascade ended as soon as it had started. The air hung heavy with unnatural chill, freezing Liron's breath as it escaped his clenched teeth. He watched it, waiting for the realization of his death to finalize. But it never came. He had survived.
Slowly, he raised his head. He cowered on the ground, having fallen over as he had dashed away. Three spikes had cut him on the back, the pain dripping into his consciousness. They weren't too deep, but they lacked the sting they should have. Each fiber of his being should scream, but it remained a distant echo. Whatever Angin had done to him, it had worked. His body only informed him of wounds, the hellish agony gone.
Liron's limbs trembled, having yet to realize their luck. The entire floor had been free of spikes. He and Jean had destroyed the traps present here. The rest of the inn wasn't so lucky. The five men, all bystanders who were at the wrong spot at the wrong time, had died. Their forms were impaled on several spikes. Their deaths had been a quick but also savage one. All the suffering of an unjust end into one moment.
Jean had been forced to his knees. A dozen spells had slammed into him from above. He had no steam inside his body, all of it hovering around his head. The shock of the attack had pressed it out of his lungs. He had gotten his arms above his head in time, but with his missing heat, the spike had frozen over his limbs, binding them. Shackles of cold kept the Homunculus in place until he could activated his spell again.
Liron didn't notice Gabriella at first. He had thought her body to be one of the dead men. Only as she twitched, weak cries coming from her tortured body, did he realize it was her. She had avoided most attacks, bending around the spells. But she was only human after all. She had been impaled through her leg and gut. Blood had poured out of her, but the cold froze it. It kept her from bleeding out, but each motion tore at her flesh, ripping it open.
All of this done with such ease. Without Angin's and Zonis' help, they stood no chance against the assassin. Seeing the scale of what Magic was capable of, Liron understood his master's distaste for it. The horrors it could unleash, the lives it could ruin. All power promised such devastation, though. And the powerless were at the mercy of the ones holding it.
Gabriella was one such powerless person. In the dead silence of the inn, her cries were appropriate. The sound one would expect. Liron didn't want to look at her at first. Seeing her like this made it all reality. It proved that their situation was more than a nightmare, having taken his waking moments, escaping from his dreams. But as he struggled onto his legs, he got a better look at her.
She kept twitching, breaking the ice that bit into her body. Her cries came from her tearing her flesh to escape. She hadn't given up.
Gabriella pulled out a kitchen knife with shaking hands, hammering the handle into her frozen blood, beating against the spike pinning her to the ground. She yelled, her head jerking back. Her face was wet with tears. The cold emitted from the spikes had frozen them too, chains anchored into her. As with her other wounds, each little motion caused her flesh to rip, the ice refusing to bend to her will.
The skin on her face tore as she grimaced, bloody cracks forming throughout her features. As they emerged, they began freezing, trying to petrify Gabriella's current expression. But the young girl would tolerate no shackles. Harras Himself could demand her to bend, and she would refuse.
She bared her teeth, her face ripping further. Despite the dark and the distance to her, Liron saw her hatred. Her indignation was that of a highborn, but it was mixed with something primal. Since birth, she had learned to expect nothing less than perfect. She had wanted victory and was denied one. The audacity of the world to not twist around to her wishes. But her will was nothing to be ignored and spat on. She would have what she wanted.
As with Amor, it was nothing but a faint ripple. A gentle touch, a brush by the wind one had grown too accustomed to, they forget to be grateful. This time, Liron wasn't the one to receive an audience. Gabriella was.
Her eyes became distant. Her expression lost her rage, appearing utterly stunned. Seconds passed, and she returned into her body. She lowered her arm, staring at the dead nearest to her.
"Jean?" she asked, her voice weak. "Tell me, to cast a spell, I need a Conduit?"
"What?" Jean hissed. He struggled against the ice on his arms. "This is not the time! You need to remain calm and…"
"Answer my question, you ruffian! I need to connect a Conduit to my Gate to cast a spell?"
The fire still burning in her caught Jean off guard. "Y… yes. Only through a Conduit can you summon your Gate. The Conduit will influence what form your spell takes."
Gabriella's smile returned to her, split with frozen blood. "Thanks, my dear. That's all I wanted to know."
She took in several big breaths, jerking forward. She screamed, the spike ripping her open. The frozen blood sliced into her skin, countless knives tasting her pain. Gabriella endured it, twisting around to touch the corpse. The dead man's skin wavered, her shadow wandering into his lifeless form. It devoured him whole, his shape blackening until it vanished.
He wasn't gone for too long. The shadows around Gabriella moved, given life. Out of them, the man climbed again. His eyes were a complete white, no soul reflected in them. Everything human was drenched in black, a deeper one than Liron's smoke. Like a Sinner, whoever he was before was gone, replaced with a puppet awaiting its orders.
Gabriella's Conduit tackled the spike impaling her, tearing through it. With no care, he ripped out the shard embedded into her flesh, making her cry. "Good," she said, panting. She pointed at the windows, handing her shadow one of her knives. "Go out there and kill the assassin."
The shadow took the knife, sprinting at the window. He had the speed of a wild beast, surpassing all human. He leaped through the window, breaking the spikes. Out of sight, the sounds of battle followed. They didn't last long. Gabriella rolled her eyes, crawling to the next corpse. She lost little blood, as her wound was frozen over.
Upon her touch, the dead man rose, becoming her new Conduit. Jumping through the same window, the shadow rushed outside. Jean groaned, breathing in all his steam. He burned hot, trapping a firestorm inside him. His skin turned red, pulsating with a blinding glow. His muscles grew in size, ripping his flesh as it failed to contain it.
The ice shackling him burst asunder, Jean stomped forward. His new mass weighed him down, his run heavy and clumsy. The floor struggled underneath him. Each board he stepped on came close to death. Jean simply broke through the wall as if it was made of paper.
The smoke around Liron came alive as he readied himself. The assassin was a coward, fighting with traps while they were at a safe distance. Their only chance was to rush them.
Liron climbed off the railing, landing on the floor below. The spikes allowed not much room to navigate. He had to wiggle through them until he found the right spot to jump down below. His legs ached as he landed on a table. He lost balance and fell off it. As he stood up cursing, running outside, Gabriella was crawling to the next corpse. How she could move despite her injuries was beyond Liron. The thought alone made him dizzy. If he didn't know better, he would have thought Angin had lessened her pain.
Liron took the hole Jean had created for them. The Homunculus was on his knees, deep cuts covering his brutish form. Gabriella's second Conduit dissolved into nothingness as she had chosen a new one, jumping through the same window as its predecessors. Standing high above them on a massive spiderweb, the assassin looked down on them. The strings glittered with ice crystals in the setting Silver Moon. Like countless little knives woven into them.
As with Amor, the assassin didn't look the part. She was tiny. Her hardened face spoke of the years she had spent killing, but Liron would loom over her like a cat over a mouse. She wore clothes too big for her little frame, hanging off her. Liron had never seen a style like hers. White robes not too dissimilar from the ones the priests in Kupferrang had. Strange patterns were stitched into them, simple yet beautiful. Unlike the pants Liron was accustomed to, hers were wide, appearing as if they were filled with something beside her legs. Most of her face was wrapped in a blue scarf, her tired eyes watching them.
She pushed strands of her brown hair out of her face, her messy bun struggling to contain them. "Wizards travelling with an Alchemist?" she asked. Liron barely heard her. Her words were a whisper like she wasn't used to speaking to others. But something burdened them, too, dragging them and her down.
"Say, did you kill a man named Amor?"
Liron was quick and smart, but he wasn't that good. His eyes widened, and he took a step back. The assassin focused solely on him, a hawk having found its prey. "Found you then."
A string of spiderweb was attached to the tip of her pointy finger. She simply swung it, her spell becoming a whip aiming for Liron. He saw the attack coming, sending out a smoke sickle. The string cleaved it into two. The cat might loom over the mouse, but size mattered not in a battle between Wizards.
Liron held his black sword in front of him, but the assassin's spell tore it apart, separating blade from handle. He jumped backwards, but the string severed his right hand from his arm, cutting deep into his chest. Even numbed, the pain was fierce. Liron watched his hand fall to the ground, time slowing down for him, years passing before it touched the dirt. It had happened too fast. One motion of her finger, and everything Liron had was destroyed. Only as he collapsed, blood pouring out of his arm and chest wound, did he realize what had happened.
Tears blurred his vision, and he struggled to breathe. With trembling hands, he aimed the handle of his sword at the assassin, and his knife shot out of it. Unlike the wolf, the assassin expected such a strike, raising her hand, strings attached to each finger. A web appeared in front of her, blocking the knife. But as it made contact, the knife exploded into a cloud of smoke.
The assassin was taken by surprise, pulling herself out of the smoke by a string fired at a house wall. Despite being blinded and coughing, she created a new spiderweb between two houses, landing on top of it. With a burning pain spreading through his torso, Liron screamed as loud as he could. "FIRE!"
Jean looked at him, the corner of his lips twitching. "Fire! It's burning!" he yelled, joining Liron.
The fight had already attracted attention, people looking out of windows at the noise. But hearing the warning, the neighborhood burst into motion. Dozens of people either ran away or hurried to help, many still under the effect of the Bliss.
The assassin watched them with mild frustration. They themselves were no problem. But she had said it herself. They were traveling with an Alchemist. One who, before, should have been close to returning. Seeing the smoke rise from their inn and the shouts of fire would make him hurry.
Liron had called for help, and she knew it.
Liron's eyes grew heavy. The battle had taken its toll on him. Creating his new spell and having to use it to such an extent had tired him out. His new injuries did the rest. The assassin threw him a final glare before fleeing. Her eyes burned bright for a moment. Her timid appearance melted into a feral snarl. A promise to him. He might have escaped her grasp, but she had given him only a taste of what was to come.
In the blink of an eye, she was gone. The webs were the last proof she was there at all, and the spell had begun to wither away without her. As consciousness slipped through Liron's fingers, he felt Jean picking him up, hurrying into the inn to save Gabriella, too.
Their escape wasn't guaranteed yet, but Liron embraced the darkness knowing he had done his part.