Heretic Spellblade 6 - Ch11

Chapter 11

Once Nathan escaped Kadria’s clutches, he found himself back in Alice’s bedroom. Whatever conversation she’d been having over the wireless appeared over and she now sat next to Ciana on the end of the bed.

“I take it you found Fyre?” Ciana asked.

He frowned at her. “She didn’t come through here? I thought she…”

Trailing off, he probed for his missing prophet over their mental link.

Only to find that link to point directly at his fiancée, smiling innocently while kicking her dainty little feet above the carpet. He stared at her.

“Is something wrong, Nathan?” Alice asked.

Her voice sounded perfect, although the intonation was just slightly awry. As if somebody had stolen Alice’s voice but lacked the decades of her upbringing and vocal training an Imperial Princess would have undergone.

Fyre, after all, had been raised as a slave. While she’d spent plenty of time around nobility and had Kadria’s voice in her ear to help her with fiery speeches, that didn’t allow her to instantly match the exact way Alice spoke. Even the way they stressed their syllables differed.

Ironically, this made him wonder how succubi like Beatrice and their agents got through so easily.

“Fyre, why do you look like Alice?” he asked in as neutral a tone as he could manage.

Fyre—still in the appearance of Alice—pouted at him. “Aw. You worked it out too fast. I thought I’d hidden the mental link, too.”

“You can’t hide that from me. Champions are subordinate to Bastions.”

“Yes, but I’m Omria. Surely I can hide from you if I want to. I did during the civil war.” She seemed genuinely annoyed while Ciana giggled.

“Well, you can’t anymore.” Nathan paused, then checked his link. “It’s because of the palace, I think. You’re constantly drawing power from it through the link. That’s why I could find you inside my mind.”

Fyre tilted her head, but didn’t pretend to understand.

“You haven’t answered my question,” he reminded her.

“I wanted to see how you’d react if Ciana and I offered to have some premarital fun with you,” Fyre said with a wicked grin. “Well?”

“Not while you look like that,” he said. “Don’t ever use this trick in front of the others. We’re now dealing with multiple Messengers who will try to deceive us like this, and you’ll sow discord.”

“I get it.”

“Do you?” Ciana asked, poking her friend in the side.

The unicorn’s horn shined with darkness. It had been oscillating between light and dark with some regularity since she lost her arm, likely due to her fluctuating emotional state.

“Yes, I do,” Fyre snapped. Her body melted, as Alice’s appearance sloughed away into light and gave way to the winged horsegirl Nathan was used to. “Don’t look like that, Nathan. I just used an illusion. Charlotte used a bunch when I fought her, so I got a good look at how they worked.”

“You couldn’t use them before?” he asked.

She waved a hand in the air from side-to-side. “Sort of. She’s better at creating and modifying stuff, so that’s what I’ve been doing.” Fyre’s hands stroked one of her horns, which caused Ciana to stroke the other.

A gasp escaped the prophet and she bit her lip. The unicorn smirked at the reaction she caused and her sidelong look at Nathan suggested he might need to put a lid on any further petting before Ciana dragged him onto the bed.

He stepped forward and pushed the two apart. Ciana pouted at him, while Fyre shuffled to one side to make room for him to sit down. Once he did so, they cuddled up against him.

“By ‘she,’ you mean Kadria,” he confirmed with Fyre.

She nodded. “Yes. I think my powers are affected by what she’s good at. Charlotte can use those annoying glamours that bewitch people at a glance, but I can’t even make my voice enchanting. I’m better at… I guess I’d call it reshaping reality? She uses all these fancy terms for it, but they don’t feel right.”

“You mean the schools of ascended magic.”

“Kind of. I get those, but there’s something different about what I can do.” Fyre stretched her fingers out and stared into space. “She told you something similar, right? That reshaping was different to regular life magic. My spatial and life magic comes from her. But I think I’m getting my affinity for reshaping stuff from you. Or maybe I had it in me all along. I honestly don’t know.”

The topic grew almost too cerebral for Nathan. Especially as Fyre barely understood it herself.

Standing up, he brushed invisible dust off himself. Both women followed his lead. They understood his message.

“Where did Alice go?” he asked Ciana.

“Nobles across the Empire are waking up and discovering that Doumahr is in peril,” Ciana said. “She’s calling an emergency session of the Princes College.”

He grimaced. “Summoning the dukes and archdukes to explain that we’re about to march into Trafaumh, huh?”

“Yes. I assume you’ll want to catch her before we leave?”

“Obviously.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I’m not used to this sort of political oversight.”

“Is there really any oversight?” Fyre asked. “Will anyone stop you?”

He shot her a sharp look, but she remained undaunted and instead flexed her wings.

“I’m yours, Nathan. And Alice is, as well,” she said, red eyes glowing dimly. “If you ask, nobody can stand in your way.”

For some reason, he could almost hear the Twins cackling in his head. They’d always talked about turning him into some dark lord that ruled Doumahr. Fyre seemed on board.

Hence why he responded in a low tone, “It’s not about who can or will stand in my way. It’s the principle. Just as Alice doesn’t want to steep Doumahr in a brutal holy war, I need lines that I won’t cross. I’ve preserved the Empire and its rule of law. If I toss it all aside and place myself above it, then what’s been the point of everything?”

“Saving Doumahr?”

“Maybe. But what did I save?”

She bit her lip and looked to the side.

“When we cross the border, we’re going to run into Marquise de Rosewald. She has some strong opinions about the difference between simply winning and winning while preserving the values that you fought for.”

“What if I’m not entirely sure of what I’m fighting for?” Fyre mumbled.

“Then you wouldn’t be the prophet,” he said flatly.

She winced. “Maybe. I just… I know what I want. But I also want you, Nathan.”

“Then work out a way to achieve both of those, just like I’m trying to save Doumahr without losing myself or what I love.”

He reached out and ruffled her hair and ears. Her tail wagged in time to each movement of his hand, even as her eyes remained downcast.

Looking at Ciana while keeping his hand busy, he asked, “Have you heard from Fei or anyone else?”

She shook her head in return.

“I’ll just have to check on them the hard way. Fyre, find Alice and stick to her. She might need your support as the prophet while dealing with the dukes and archdukes.” He stared her down when she pouted. “I mean it. We’ll be heading to Trafaumh within hours, so this is the least you can do to help her.”

“Fine,” Fyre whined, before trotting out of the bedroom.

A couple of Royal Knights poked their heads into the room, as if confused as to how the prophet had gotten in. Or perhaps they thought they might see the aftermath of some royal orgy, given they had likely seen Alice and Fyre exit the Empress’s bedroom this morning. They flushed when Nathan looked at them.

He looked back at his mental doorway, but stopped short of entering it. Reaching out over his mental links, he confirmed that Seraph was nearby. His other Champions had already split up, with some hundreds of miles away. Likely gathering the knights for their march.

“Let’s go. I need to take care of something before we leave,” he told Ciana.

This time when he walked through his mental door, he entered the usual control room. Only Kara and Reine stood around the central console. The monitor flickered across various fortresses, all of which appeared to be Imperial holdings.

“My Lord, good morning,” Kara chirped as she saluted. “I trust you slept well?”

“Well enough to march,” he said. “Just you?”

“I relieved Seraph a couple of hours ago. All invasions inside our borders have been crushed without any breaches, so I’m allowing most Champions and aides to rest or focus on local efforts.”

Ciana frowned and her ears flapped. “So what’s left? Other than Trafaumh.”

“Archduke von Salms is mustering his forces near the border, where Trafaumh’s rebels are, but we need to ensure his fortresses remain safe in case of further cascades,” Kara answered. “There is also the risk that the cascades currently taking place in Trafaumh may cause further invasions in our territory.”

Nathan shook his head. “We don’t need to worry about that. Once a portal has fended off an invasion, it can’t see another for a week or two. The demonic energy effectively flows through without being absorbed, as if the original cascade was still taking place. There is a risk that a lot of cascades might threaten the rest of the Empire, however.”

For some reason, Reine and Kara shot him concerned looks. His eyes narrowed.

“Reine, you’ve seen something,” he suggested.

She nodded. She’d slipped on her baggy robe at some point, but kept the hood down. Her wolf ears twitched nervously.

“Knowledge on repeated cascades is scarce, so I will bow to your wisdom on this matter,” she said.

“Get to the point,” he said, then winced at his harsh tone. “Sorry. I just don’t need you to suck up to me. We’re in unknown territory here, with these elite Messengers and the prophets. If something doesn’t match what I think, just tell me.”

Reine nodded, unfazed by his outburst. The monitor shifted to display a fortress in Trafaumh. A familiar one, held by Deverese Monet, Nathan’s friend and rival from his old world. In this world, Deverese appeared to detest Nathan.

Not a single soul stood outside the castle. The bright sunlight gleamed off the gothic outcroppings and cramped stonework.

Nathan frowned as he recognized the issue. “Deverese’s fortress is a stone’s throw from Prophet’s Hope. He would have been hit by an invasion within a few hours. There’s also no way he’s completely abandoned it, given it’s a major frontier fortress in a march that borders the Empire.”

“I can confirm that there has been no exodus of Inquisition soldiers,” Reine said. “Instead, a battalion arrived overnight to reinforce Bastion Deverese. Many other fortresses are in a similar state, and some actually returned to normal before the soldiers scrambled back inside.”

“Back inside…?”

“My assumption was that additional cascades occurred overnight, as we had assumed, and that the Inquisition is either fighting or preparing for more demonic invasions. But you just said—”

“Forget what I said.” Nathan ran a hand through his hair. “Damn. It’s possible the Inquisition is being overly cautious. They won’t know that cascades can’t trigger multiple invasions and communications are too slow. On the other hand, everything about this invasion and cascade is wrong.”

A tremendously powerful Messenger, Artemis, had somehow invaded a young portal that just saw another Messenger invasion months prior. The prophets had triggered everything in the first place. The cascade that resulted from shutting out Artemis was somehow larger than the one from closing one of the oldest portals on Doumahr.

Nothing made sense, so why would this? Nathan felt as though his enemy was changing the rules on the fly to suit himself.

Belatedly, he felt as if he should have asked Kadria about what the hell was going on. Failing that, he needed to see if Tarako knew something. She’d seen multiple prophets come and go, and somehow knew that this particular cascade was special. Perhaps the ancient fox knew something.

“Kara, you were right, keep shoring up our defenses,” he told his loyal Champion.

She nodded, her tail whirring behind her.

“With that said, it sounds like there’s nothing immediately important to take care of.”

Kara frowned. “Well, no. But—”

Ignoring her, Nathan strode up to the central console and reached beneath it. His hands withdrew an ornate chest. Within it dwelled every Champion gem in his possession. Enough wealth to buy a country with, especially in the middle of war.

“Both of you, come with me,” he ordered Kara and Reine.

They stared at him, but didn’t budge an inch as he walked toward the exit.

“Don’t just stare at me like confused puppies. Come on,” he said.

Reine tilted her head. “I am confused, but I have not been a puppy for many years.”

“He didn’t mean it literally,” Kara said. She gripped the Spymaster’s shoulders and began to push her toward the exit.

Once confident he was being followed, he reentered Alice’s bedroom. In there, he found Seraph. She raised an eyebrow at the chest in his arms.

“Need me to take over for Kara?” she asked even before the dog beastkin appeared.

“No. Gathering our forces is more important. Has Narime returned with Nurevia yet?” he asked her without stopping.

They formed a posse while walking through the palace corridors. A small team of Royal Knights elected to join them. Nathan made his way toward the courtyard in the rear of the palace complex.

Typically, he gemmed his Champions in the overgrown gardens, but that would take more time than he cared to waste today. Most of the knights were busy elsewhere and the nobility had been shooed away. The anti-scrying wards Nathan used on the palace itself would keep prying eyes and ears away.

Seraph nodded at his question. “There’s another new arrival that I’ve held my tongue over. Mostly because I know that Narime doesn’t have a sister.”

“Is that how she’s decided to hide herself? Although I’m surprised she bothered,” Nathan mused.

He received a sharp look for his vagueness, but simply shrugged.

“What about Vala? And Astra?” he continued.

“Vala is back, but absolutely exhausted. I can understand what you see in her now, but I also worry that she’s self-destructive,” Seraph said. “Astra’s glaring at Narime’s ‘sister.’ I take it they know each other.”

“I assume so, but didn’t ask.” He hid his concern about the comments on Vala’s self-destructive nature.

Because Vala had never acted like that before. She’d wanted to prove herself and sometimes struggled to handle all the beastkin and talented Champions around her, but Nathan’s meddling with history had utterly changed the woman he loved.

Once he reached the courtyard, he dumped the chest on the ground. He summoned Nurevia with a message over the mental link. Or tried, as he wasn’t sure how well any of his Champions picked up on his mental messages save Fyre. Seraph and Ciana had reacted to his emotional state and mental prodding even before he’d actively used mental magic, but the rest were still learning.

Evidently something worked, as the dark elf appeared within a few minutes. She wasn’t alone, however. A familiar fox and Astra accompanied her, although Narime had gone missing. The fox only had six tails and kept her gems hidden using some sort of illusion.

He had wanted to nab Sen at the same time, but she was currently elsewhere. Then again, he still hadn’t gotten an explanation from her about her new magic. A gem might need to wait until he knew what she was up to.

While the others approached, he opened up the chest and thumbed through the gems. As the Empire had been preparing for war, his collection had grown, but most of it consisted of the standard gems. Amethysts, diamonds, sapphires, rubies, and even garnets and opals.

Not that he planned to use any garnets or opals on his Champions. He held onto them just in case.

Four gems stood out, however. Beautiful, purple alexandrite gemstones that held a luster unlike anything else Nathan had ever seen in any Champion.

Except, perhaps, in the fox who leaned over the chest next to him.

“What are you doing?” Seraph hissed, grabbing Tarako’s arm in an attempt to yank her away from the chest.

Tarako didn’t budge, and Seraph’s eyes bulged. Even with Tarako’s gems hidden, if Seraph hadn’t known she was a Champion before, she likely knew now.

Naturally, she danced backward and drew her tonfas. This caused Nathan’s other Champions to ready their own weapons. Astra merely glared at Tarako, who smirked.

“Oh my, is this how you welcome your newest ally,” Tarako teased.

“Nathan, what the hell is going on?” Seraph asked, confusion apparent in her eyes. “This fox is clearly a Champion, but you’re not reacting.”

“Calm down. I met her last night and claimed her.”

“Claimed…” Astra repeated, her green eyes narrowing. “Did you truly make this thing yours?”

Tarako cackled. “I see there’s still no love lost between us. But Nathan let slip a little tidbit about you last night, dear Astra. We’re not so different, apparently. Although I do wonder why Omria—”

The moment she said the goddess’s name, the fox froze and her illusion shattered. Her nine tails stood bolt upright and a shuddering breath escaped her. The zoisite gems gleamed with an unnatural light.

Nathan’s attention turned inward, however. That otherworldly presence returned swifter than ever. He felt it press against his mental wards, as if trying to shatter them with its sheer bulk and smother him.

Magic pulsed from the palace and along his link with Fyre, and the being vanished once again. A mixture of annoyance and worry shrouded his mind from the horsegirl for several seconds, before she left his mind alone.

Well, at least he knew that he didn’t need to be with Fyre to be safe from Omria, or whatever that thing was.

“Shit,” Tarako breathed out, eyes wide and terrified. “Is that her? Or what you think is her?”

“You felt that?” he asked her.

“How could I not? It was like the essence of the world itself swept across us, except it was…” She bit her lip. “I can’t explain it. I’ve spent more time than I care to admit in the presence of prophets, including when they use their powers. That felt like them, but distilled down. And not in a good way.”

While Tarako panicked about her mistake, every other Champion lost their shit about something else entirely.

“Nathan, is that who I think it is?” Seraph breathed out, pointing at Tarako with a shaking finger.

Kara’s tail and ears rose so high she seemed to be trying to float, while Reine seemed frozen solid. Nurevia looked between Astra and Tarako in a mixture of confusion and exasperation.

“This is Tarako, who is both who you think she is and not,” Nathan said.

“Nine-Tail Slash Tarako,” Seraph choked out. “That Tarako. The one with entire myths about her in Kurai and lines of fiction over here.”

“Yes, that’s me,” Tarako chirped. “I’m guessing from the reactions that you’re all fans?”

“Fan isn’t quite the word I’d use,” Nurevia said.

“I am no fan,” Astra ground out.

“Oh, hush you.” The fox rolled her eyes. “Besides, I’m the one with reams of smut written about me and you aren’t, so boo to you.”

A strangled noise escaped Kara.

“Tarako, please don’t make things more confusing,” Nathan said. “Narime introduced us last night and given the dire situation, we’re working together until—”

“Until?” Tarako shot him a look. “I don’t remember there being any time limits.”

Undeterred, he pressed on. “We’re working together to deal with the current mess. I’ll explain some of what I learned last night later, but you can get some of it from Tarako herself.”

“Hmm. How much do they know about you?”

“Enough.”

“Got it.” Her tails nodded along with her head. “Anyway, I think I understand a little better why you don’t say the goddess’s name. The only other being that ever refused to was…” A strange expression overcame Tarako and she seemed to look at Nathan differently. “Huh.” Her fingers ran over her gems, particularly the one granted to her by her creator.

Nathan took the opportunity to move on. “Before we move on Trafaumh, I need to hand out some gems. I won’t have the chance to do this to two of you for a while, otherwise.”

His assembled Champions calmed down and sheathed their still drawn weapons, before lining up. Except Tarako, who tried to stand beside Nathan.

After some mental prodding, she at least took some steps to the side and stood with Seraph and Astra. The fox rubbed her temples in annoyance. Meanwhile, Astra put a dozen feet between herself and Tarako.

“As you all know, I’m about to march into Trafaumh to deal with both the cascade and Falmir’s invasion. It might be weeks or months before I can spend much time here,” he explained.

“But you can teleport around,” Nurevia said.

“Yes, hence ‘much time,’” he drawled.

The dark elf winced. Like Astra, she had the same dark skin of her race and loved showing off her delicious curves with an outfit that screamed for her to take superficial injuries in combat. Shoulder-length lavender hair shimmered in the sun, but her purple eyes seemed better adjusted to being outside than her kin. Many of those at Krepost Forselle had visibly struggled with being outside for any length of time.

“I’m going to work in reverse order of complexity,” Nathan continued. “That means you’ll be last, Reine. Your gem is extremely special.”

Reine’s robe shifted, indicating her tail wagged vigorously inside it.

“It certainly is,” Tarako said. “Even among foxes and dragons, alexandrite was difficult to work with, and even harder to acclimate to. You realize you’re condemning your cute wolfgirl to life as a monogem, right, Nathan?”

Hushed whispers escaped once she spoke of dragons, but he ignored them.

“I’m confident in my abilities as a Bastion,” he said.

“It’s not about being a Bastion,” Tarako insisted. “Every gemstone reflects a different element of magic from… the goddess.” She bit her tongue to avoid saying Omria’s name. “Shorter-lived races can’t acclimate to gems that work with purer sources of her power.”

“Purer?”

She tapped her own gems. “Zoisite handles gem abilities far more powerful than anything a sapphire can handle, such as my Nine-Tail Slash. Emeralds are the life magic gem, capable of healing magic on par with immortality. Alexandrite? It allows the user to channel the very power of the prophet. Or so we believe.”

Emeralds and life magic, huh? Nathan tried not to look at Ciana, who instinctively rubbed the side with her missing arm.

He recalled that Astra was often mythologized as possessing emeralds, likely due to her long lifespan. Humanity lacked the ability to work with emeralds anymore, but some had existed in myth. Presumably, Omria created them herself or they’d been purchased from the faeries.

“Inquisitor Baudelaire told me a similar story about alexandrite. That the faeries believe it’s a pure conduit of the goddess’s power. She used some to create a relic with mental magic,” he said.

“That cane of hers, yes?” Tarako clicked her tongue. “I refused to have anything to do with Trafaumh once I saw that thing. Yet it seems you know how she creates those relics. I can guess why. But, yes, I agree with that belief. Alexandrite is special.”

“Well, so is Reine.” He looked pointedly at her eyes.

The wolfgirl flushed and turned away, but the fox merely grimaced.

“While I abhor the things done to her, shoving the harvested power of dead Champions into someone doesn’t make them capable of handling that power,” Tarako insisted.

“Trust me,” he said.

She crossed her arms. “Does it matter if I do?”

“I’d prefer if I don’t have to constantly tell you every reason I do something, if you’re going to dredge up ten thousand years of history to tell me how wrong I am.”

“This is more like twenty thousand, but fair. Give me some hint, at least.”

He looked at the assembled Champions. They appeared to be a mixture of confused and annoyed, mostly at Tarako for drawing this out.

“While I never saw it, I have multiple Messengers who have told me that Reine is often the key to Trafaumh’s experiments if Maylis fails to bring her to the Empire,” Nathan said. “Baudelaire effectively creates a false prophet. Fyre even confirmed that Reine has some sort of connection to her and reacts whenever she uses her power in close proximity.”

Tarako’s jaw dropped, which wasn’t the sight Nathan expected to see today.

Unfortunately, he’d also shocked his other Champions. While he’d known about Reine’s alternate path in history for some time now, he’d never talked about it. Seraph looked away, rubbing her arms.

Yeah, he needed to have a good chat with his closest subordinate about this and many other things. Nathan had been keeping too many secrets, and Tarako’s ability to force him to reveal them due to her own knowledge put his other Champions at a disadvantage.

“Alright, I’ll trust you,” Tarako begrudgingly admitted. “I don’t like this whole alternate worlds trick you can pull.”

“Get used to it,” Astra grunted.

“Is that sympathy?”

“No.”

Rolling his eyes, Nathan tried to focus on his work. “Kara, you first.”

Kara trotted up. She rocked back and forth on her tiptoes. “Um, I’m happy with just an amethyst. I never even expected to become a trigem at all. This is almost a dream.”

“Are you happy with one, or do you actually want one?” he asked. “I can give you whatever you want, except the alexandrite.”

She bit her lip, then shook her head. “The amethyst is fine.”

In the corner, Tarako muttered something about mixing and matching gems and how this shouldn’t be possible. Seraph simply tapped on the sapphire in her chest, nested between her jades.

“Kara,” Nathan pressed.

“I…” For some reason, the dog beastkin looked at Ciana. She gulped. “I’ve always dreamed of having diamonds. The amethysts work so well whenever I’m actually fighting demons, but…”

He waited patiently.

“Diamonds, amethysts, and sapphires form the trinity of Champions, right? The bulwark, the fighter, and the mage.” Kara looked at the stonework by her feet. “Maybe I’m a fighter. But I see myself as your bulwark, my lord. That I’ll always be by your side and supporting you, even if you’re elsewhere, so that no matter what happens, there’ll be something to return to. It might not be the right gem, but I’ve always felt it should be mine.”

How funny that Fei burned with jealousy that Kara took “her” amethysts, while Kara herself desired the diamonds that Ciana wore. The unicorn gave Kara a gentle smile.

“I understand. He’s somebody you want to support with everything, and that means you need to be able to give even more with your gems, right?” Ciana asked.

Kara nodded repeatedly, her long dog ears flapping up and down wildly.

“Done,” Nathan said. “It’s a good choice, too. A diamond will ensure you’re independent and can take care of yourself while I’m away.”

Her face lit up. All that remained was sorting out exactly what power she wanted, which took a few minutes. Unlike Fei, who needed a detailed explanation, Kara knew her strengths and weaknesses inside and out, so Nathan just needed to offer some ideas and then conduct the ceremony.

Once finished, his subordinate ran her fingers over her third gem in disbelief. “When I left the academy years ago and failed to be chosen as a Champion, I never even thought I’d become one at all. Yet alone a legendary trigem. I can’t thank you enough, my lord.”

“You deserve it.”

She bounced back into position, only for Nurevia to take her place.

“An amethyst,” the dark elf said, striking a pose as if daring him to disagree.

“Somehow, I expected nothing else,” he said drily.

She blinked at him. “What, not going to disagree?”

“No. You’re all about strength and brawn. Barely thinking, and definitely not protecting yourself.”

“Hey! I do think.”

“About dicks,” Astra added.

“Maybe a little,” Nurevia grumbled. “I’m being stereotyped.”

“Uh huh. Do you even know what sort of power you want?” he asked.

“One that lets me kill things. Don’t start explaining all these options. You’re the Bastion. Come up with something useful.”

Giggles escaped the other Champions, while Astra mimed strangling her compatriot. It truly was a mime, as her gems didn’t glow. Her psychokinesis meant Astra could strangle Nurevia from afar without trying.

“I’ll give you what you want.” Nathan grabbed an amethyst and approached her. “I thought that’s what you wanted in life? For a man to dominate you and give you what you want?”

As he loomed over her, gem in hand, Nurevia stared up at him and gulped. “A little. But I think my desires are a little more specific these days.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.” She placed her hands on his hands. “They’re mostly about you dominating me. So stick it in me.”

He did exactly that. The gem, that is.

Her mind proved to still be a bit of a mess from his time in Straub, but he pushed through it to cement the gem. But seeing her state reminded him that he needed to keep an eye on her. For some reason, images on Artemis showed up in her thoughts and emotions quite a bit. The dangerous Messenger lingered in Nurevia’s mind.

Picking a gem power proved difficult. Amethysts exceled at physical power, but Nurevia preferred ranged combat. As much as he hated Tharban, the old bear was a pretty good Bastion to be able to give Nurevia a duogem ability that enabled her to be effective at range. Nathan needed to capitalize on that.

More than that, he wanted to best the old bastard.

Fortunately, an idea eventually came to him while he floated in her mind.

He returned to reality to find Nurevia practically grinding against him. Astra yanked her off him with psychokinesis.

“Oh, fuck off,” Nurevia yelped. “Let me enjoy the moment.”

All three of her gems glowed as she pointed at Astra. Nothing happened.

“The fuck? Is this thing defective?” she asked, glaring down at her boobs. Her gems began to glow again. “Nathan, I need you to—”

Whatever she tried to say was lost to a burst of gibberish. Nurevia’s head and hands moved in a blur of motion faster even than Artemis’s movements yesterday, and Nathan feared that the dark elf’s hair might catch fire.

Then her gems returned to normal. She blinked, noticing the confusion on everyone’s faces.

“What?” she asked. “Did something happen?”

“Did you just give an amethyst trigem time dilation?” Tarako asked, her eyes glazing over.

So she even knew about that Bastion power.

“Not quite,” he said. “She just moves really fast, but there is some measure of time dilation involved so she can keep up with her own speed.”

“Speed?” Nurevia’s gems glowed and she turned into a blur of movement. “Oh. Oh, I think I get it. You’re blinking really slowly. And the wind barely moves your hair. Holy shit, I…” She screwed up her face. “Um, how does this affect my crossbows?”

The dark elf drew her handheld repeater crossbows.

“They should work. The magic extends to them, and you can’t hold onto the effect for more than a couple of seconds,” Nathan explained. “Just be careful. Not all Messengers are affected by time dilation. Beatrice will probably be immune when we fight her. I don’t know about Artemis or Bauer. Siv isn’t.”

“Lots of knowledge about Messenger weaknesses, too,” Tarako muttered.

Seraph placed a hand on the fox’s shoulder. “Seems you didn’t know what you got into.”

“I figured he was powerful, but he knows more than anyone ever has in history.” The fox bit her lip. “This is different than I expected.”

Speaking of different…

“Reine, your turn,” Nathan said.

- - - - -

Commentary: We're getting to the point where I'm uncertain about the balance between Nathan taking care of important stuff (e.g. gemming, taking care of his girls) and getting back to the action. Part of the issue is that if I need to gem Kara and Reine now, so I may as well do Nurevia. I also need to handle Tarako's introduction, lay the groundwork for some Fyre stuff etc.

This has frustrated me a lot, as the idea was to launch into the Trafaumh action quickly. But there's always this huge amount of stuff that needs to be handled outside the action, and whenever I put it off, more grows. Champions to gem, politics in reaction to crises, new crazy magic stuff, character development to establish before it becomes pivotal to their arc or the plot, sex scenes etc. I feel it's a situation nobody will be happy with, as I'm either not getting into the combat quickly enough, or ignoring "obvious" events that Nathan should take care of before picking fights.