

### The Sleeping Town

by F.A.R.

Text Copyright 2015 F.A.R.

All Rights Reserved  
Smashwords Edition

To Noemi,

Late again with deepest regrets.

### Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Between Lines – Rules of Engagement

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Between Lines – Jonathan Acker's Turn

Chapter 7

Between Lines – Erika Dahl's Preparations

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Between Lines – Erika Dahl's Turn

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

After the Lines – The End of Youth

Afterword

Support the Author

Other Titles by F.A.R.

# Chapter 1

Perspective is a funny thing.

At any given moment something terrible is happening in some part of the world. That is an undeniable fact. However, most people are able to lead their normal lives without guilt or worry.

Our world is small, our perspective limited. We cannot read every single piece of news. There are not enough reporters to write about every tragedy.

We just go about our lives, ignorant of the many dangers that exist in this world.

Until they are right in front of us.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

My name is Michael Walker, and I lived in the small town of Redfield. With less than four hundred families, Redfield was the type of town where everyone knew everyone. If not by name, then by sight. Many found it boring, my best friends included. Rob and Eric often told me of their plans to leave for the city as soon as they graduated.

Not me, though.

I had spent the bulk of my sixteen years of life within the town limits, and I had no complaints. Much like staying under a blanket on a cold winter day, Redfield was damn comfy. College could wait forever for all I cared. I was happy right where I was.

What can I say? Routine and I got along well. I liked hanging out with the same people, ordering the same food, and sleeping in the same classes. Usually Mr. Wagley's.

That Saturday was not supposed to be different from any other.

As usual, I woke up after ten. Half-asleep, I bumbled my way into the kitchen and grabbed something from the fridge which I'm almost certain went into my mouth. There may have been a shower involved afterward. I distinctively remember saying hi to my brown-eyed, brown-haired, dashingly handsome (if I do say so myself) reflection in the mirror at some point.

All in all, a normal Saturday morning.

In hindsight, I should have noticed something was up the moment I failed to find my mother up and about. I really should have, but I didn't. Instead, I just plopped myself on the couch and turned on the DVD player. I had plenty of movies to watch.

I will admit my utter lack of concern towards my mother makes me sound a little callous.

I could say I was absent-minded because my girlfriend, Dana, had recently turned into my ex-girlfriend, but that'd be a lie. It had been a pretty amicable breakup all things considered.

I'm just not a morning person. Seriously, I cannot be expected to keep track of everything that happens during the first two hours after waking up.

My mother was a different story.

I cannot recall a single day where I had managed to wake up before her. From Monday to Friday, she was always up by five in the morning. On the weekends, she was usually up by eight which was still abominably early.

Yet this time, I was up before her.

I was halfway through the first movie when the thought hit me for the first time. I did not give it much importance. After all, mom had come late from work last night. If anyone needed to rest, it was her. I was not about to ruin her well-earned sleep.

Like that, I dismissed the issue and kept on watching.

The thought did not occur to me again until I was about to hit play on the third movie of the day. This time I couldn't dismiss it.

Two extra hours of sleep was all well and good. Four going on five was a good way of messing up your sleep cycle. Besides, if she didn't wake-up soon, she wouldn't just miss breakfast but lunch as well.

Neither of us wanted me to cook. You can trust me on that.

I bit my lower lip before putting down the remote and leaving the comfort of the couch.

The things I did for love.

I slowly made my way to mom's room. Like the rest of our apartment, it was small. A bed, a nightstand, and a small closet took up the bulk of the space, making it hard to walk inside.

Fully buried under the covers, my mom slept curled into a ball. She was so small only the slight movements caused by her breathing identified her as a person as opposed to a particularly bulky pile of bed sheets.

"Hi, Mom! Time to rise and shine!" I said with excessive cheer as I walked inside.

For my troubles, I received no answer.

It would have been nice if it had been that easy.

"Hey there," I said, sitting by her side and gently shaking her shoulder. "It's late already. Time to wake up."

I repeated this a couple of times with no results.

I grabbed the covers and pulled to reveal her face. From her, I had gotten my hair and eyes but not much else. She was small, delicate even, I thought while poking her cheek, hoping to get a reaction. You wouldn't think this was a woman who worked two jobs while raising a kid all by herself.

Honestly, it almost made me feel guilty about having to wake her up.

Almost.

Grinning a little, I rushed to the kitchen to get a glass of water. It was only fair. She had done this to me several times throughout the years. I couldn't waste such a rare opportunity.

She would probably ground me for this, I thought while holding the glass above her sleeping face.

I would probably deserve it.

Worth it.

I let the water fall.

At once I leaped back, expecting angry screaming.

I got silence.

Not a shout. Not a yell. No movement other than her breathing.

Odd.

I frowned and put the now empty glass on the nightstand.

Really odd.

Mom was breathing just fine. I could see that.

She couldn't have been that tired, could she?

"Come on," I said, shaking her with more force than was necessary. "Joke's over. You had your fun. It's getting a little weird now."

She didn't react.

Acting on impulse, I reached out and put my fingers on her neck to check her pulse. There was little point in it. She was just fine. I could see that. Hell, she was breathing. She was just sleeping. That was all there was to it. No big deal. Just a deep sleep. That was it. I could see she was breathing so she had to be fine.

The feel of her pulse comforted me a lot more than it should have.

I sighed.

I was a heavy sleeper but this was something else.

Maybe, she was really tired.

Like, really, really tired.

Would it really be that weird? She was the breadwinner of the house. The only source of income, really, and her work schedule showed it. Having the entire weekend free like this was rare for her. Maybe all the work was crashing down on her. Accumulated exhaustion or something like that.

Maybe it was only that.

Right.

Five minutes went by as I sat by her side, trying to think what to do.

This was not exactly a 911 emergency.

Why was I even worrying so much anyway?

She was just asleep. That was fine. People slept. Every day even. Nothing weird about that.

Yet...

I bit the inside of my cheek.

I didn't like this.

I didn't like this one bit.

I... I needed to talk to someone.

I snatched the phone from her nightstand and dialed to call Mr. Wagley. My math teacher was consistently boring, but he was also consistently reliable. I brought the phone to my ear and waited to hear his voice.

I didn't.

There was only static.

I leaned away and stared at the phone with furrowed brow.

That was not right.

I hanged and tried again a couple of times. I checked to see if everything was plugged in right then tried again. The result was always the same. Static.

I took a deep breath and left the room to look for my smartphone. Maybe it was the phone company. Maybe something had happened to our phone line. Right. That could be it. If that was the case, I still had my phone. I had left it charging last night. I could use that.

My heart sank the moment I picked it up and saw the screen.

There was no signal. Not even a single, tiny bar. Even the Wi-Fi was down.

I moved around the apartment with my phone held up to see if I could get a better signal to no effect.

With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I went to the living room. I turned on the TV and switched the screen display to plain regular TV.

The screen showed nothing but static.

I gritted my teeth and flipped through the channels.

Nothing.

Nothing again and again.

...

What the hell?

Something was wrong with the antenna... and the phone company... and my cell phone company...

Maybe it was just some sort of freak accident!

Yeah! Some sort of weird static messing with all the signals or something. Maybe if I waited, things would go back to normal all on their own.

Yeah, right.

How did the words go? One is an incident. Two is coincidence. Three... three is a pattern.

A worrying pattern.

I really needed someone to talk to.

I vacillated for a moment before grabbing my keys and walking out of the apartment. I didn't like the idea of leaving mom alone, but I wasn't spoiled for choices at the moment.

The sooner I could get some help, the sooner things would be okay... or so I hoped. Besides, it's not like I was traveling remotely far.

Outside, the bright, summer sun shone on empty streets. I hadn't minded the lack of noise while I was watching movies. Now? Not so much. I took a deep breath and walked to the apartment next to mine, Mr. Wyatt's apartment.

Mr. Wyatt was not quite a friend, but we had said hello to each other enough times to qualify as friendly acquaintances. We even had conversations once or twice. The old man certainly felt comfortable enough with us to ask a favor every now and then.

I rang the doorbell and waited.

And waited.

After a minute with no reply, I tried again, then two more times with the same result.

I frowned. Was he not in? No. He wasn't exactly the outdoor type. Especially not under this heat.

Maybe he just couldn't hear me?

Regardless, I needed to get in. Tentatively, I reached under the welcome mat. It was kind of a long shot but to my surprise, it worked. I snorted as I pulled out a key from under the mat.

The key to Mr. Wyatt's apartment.

I suppose I shouldn't complain, but hiding the key under the welcome mat? Really?

Redfield was a quiet, little town but not that quiet. The old man needed a better hiding place. I sighed. Oh well.

I opened the door and walked in.

Mr. Wyatt's house smelled like old man and looked the part, which wasn't to say it was messy or ugly. Not at all.

It was just old.

Clean yet faded. That about summed up the state of the furniture. Someone had gone to great lengths to keep them in shape, but there was only so much one could do when faced with age. The newest thing in the apartment had to be a decade old at least.

Except for the TV.

50 inches. HD. Flat Screen. LED. The old man liked his movies. The few short conversations we had while waiting for the bus taught me that much about him. On Saturdays, he liked to sit on his aged couch and watch his favorites. I could call him a cliché, but as a fellow Saturday couch potato, I had no right to throw stones.

However, this Saturday Mr. Wyatt was not in front of the screen. He wasn't in the living room at all.

"Mr. Wyatt," I called out, raising my voice. "Hello! Is anyone here?"

"My. Wyatt!" I tried again, moving deeper into his apartment. "I tried the doorbell but you wouldn't answer. I... kinda need your help with something? Hello?"

As I went through the apartment, I started to think the place was empty. Then I reached Mr. Wyatt's room.

I found him there and wished I hadn't.

The sixty-one-year-old slept peacefully in his bed.

# Chapter 2

I rode my bike through the streets of Redfield as fast as I could.

Under normal circumstances, I would make sure to watch out for cars and people. I would slow down for intersections and keep an eye out for Stop signs. My mom had been teaching me how to drive lately. She said I was good at it, said I would be a really responsible driver because I always kept a good eye on my surroundings.

I didn't bother with any of that now.

I didn't need to.

These were not normal circumstances, a fact cemented in my mind with every passing block.

The streets were empty.

Utterly empty.

There were no cars speeding through the streets. There wasn't a single person to be seen. No dogs or cats. Not a single bird flying around.

Everything was just empty.

It was ridiculous.

I was already waiting for the moment when everyone would jump out yelling, "Surprise!" and point to the hidden cameras, laughing. This had to be some sort of joke. An elaborate prank taken to the next level and turned into a bizarre form of psychological torture.

What else could it be?

How did an entire town stay indoors?

I could try checking other houses. I was sure no one would stop me. I just didn't dare to. If I did, I would know for sure. I would know this wasn't just in my head.

I had tried waking up Mr. Wyatt. I really had.

I tightened my grip on the handlebar and sped up.

Just what was going on?

What should I do? What _could_ I do?

I had planned on going to the hospital to get help. I didn't know what was going on, but maybe a doctor would. It was a longshot but it was all I had.

The more I saw of the town, the less I liked the idea.

Before, my biggest fear was being laughed out of the hospital. Oversleeping was not exactly a medical emergency.

Now? I was wondering if there would be anyone to laugh at me when I got there.

Should I try the police station then?

I toyed with the idea for a moment before sighing and throwing it away. As things were, it was all the same. Let's say I go to the police station and find someone. What then? What to say? Help, my mom and neighbor are asleep? Nothing is happening, and that is really creepy?

What exactly was the police supposed to do about it?

I was pretty sure they didn't cover this stuff at the academy. A doctor would at least be able to tell me if there was something wrong with mom's health... assuming there was someone awake there in the first place.

Something which was looking increasingly less likely with every passing block.

Come to think of it, were the patients in the hospital okay?

I am no doctor... or particularly smart as my grades can attest to, but even I know sick people need care. Some more than others.

I had to stay several nights at the hospital once a few years ago.

Rob and Eric came to visit me so there was that, but I really didn't like staying in bed all day. There was nothing to do. Worse, the insurance didn't cover everything so that was another expense we had to take care of.

Still, I couldn't say I was treated badly, just the opposite in fact. I received food and medicine, and my IV fluid was always changed on time. Yep, they took really good care of me.

What about now?

Some patients needed constant care. That much was obvious. Some probably needed to take specific medicines at specific hours.

If everyone was asleep then who was taking care of them now? If no one was awake... they could be in danger.

I frowned.

I couldn't let that happen. If there was anything I could do, I needed to be there.

With my resolve strengthened, I pressed on. The hospital wasn't that far away from my home.

However, nothing prepared me for what I found there.

The hospital was closed.

No, the world closed did not even begin to cover it.

There were signs all around.

Lots of signs.

STOP. Out of Bounds. Keep OUT. Do NOT Cross.

There were dozens of them planted all around the building like small trees.

The gates were open, but I did not see anyone there. Not even a security guard. I did not hear anyone either. There were just signs. Many, many signs.

I got off my bike, letting it fall to the ground, and walked up to the gate, drawn by the sheer oddness of the scene.

I tried to at least.

I got within five feet of the signs and stopped.

No, that's not right.

I didn't choose to stop.

I just couldn't move anymore.

There was nothing blocking my way. Sure, there were lots of signs planted on the ground but moving in between them was possible.

Except I couldn't.

I could not will my feet to move.

It was not a matter of being too scared to move. I will not deny the day's events had instilled some wariness in me, but what little fear existed was far outweighed by the burning need to understand what was going on.

This place was my first real clue. The signs hadn't appeared out of nowhere. They hadn't grown like plants. Someone put them here. Someone gathered a bunch of signs, brought them to the hospital, and put them here. It was the first sign of human activity other than my own I had seen since I woke up.

Someone had been here.

Someone may still be here!

The answer was waiting just ahead.

The distance to the gates had to be twenty steps at most. That was all that separated me from the hospital. I just needed to walk those twenty steps.

Yet I couldn't.

I couldn't move.

My legs would not answer. My body wouldn't budge. I couldn't even lift my hand to reach out to the signs. Sweat dripped down my brow, but no matter how hard I tried my body would not answer. It might as well have been a stranger.

It wasn't fear. It had nothing to do with courage or willpower.

Something was stopping me. Some sort of force was preventing me from getting any closer.

"There will be none of that, boy. Have you not read the signs? The area is off-limits."

I froze.

Had I imagined that? Was I hearing things now?

No.

It was real. A real human voice. With deliberate slowness, I turned around. Various outcomes flashed through my mind ranging from joyful to sad.

None of them came true.

Oh, I found a person alright. My heart swelled at the sight. He was no older than forty. As far as looks went, nothing about him really stuck out save for a head full of gray hairs. Nevertheless, he was a real person. There was someone beside me in the bizarre place my home had turned into. A real smile tugged at my lips.

Then I saw his clothes.

I stared. Gaped even.

Now, I am not the type that judges people by their clothes. I'm not. Really. I couldn't care less about that stuff. Anyone who knows me can confirm I rarely wore anything fancier than a simple shirt and jeans, not even brand name shirts and jeans at that.

Caring about what others wore was just silly.

However, this guy was something else.

The man wore an authentic three-piece suit, and this was not some cheap rental that was always either too big or too small. It fit him like a glove, and the fabric looked so smooth I was certain it cost more than everything I owned combined.

However, I would never wish for that particular suit.

The price and quality of the suit, no matter how high, were not the real eye-catchers. Oh no. It wasn't like he was the first person wearing an expensive suit I had seen. God knew Mayor Johnson wore them all the time.

No, the real issue was the color of the suit.

Orange.

Bright. Shocking. Orange.

The type of orange that hurts yours eyes if you look at it too much.

It was the type of suit only a real weirdo would own let alone wear.

I had really wanted to meet someone else. Now, I found myself remembering my mother saying it was better to be alone than in bad company.

I looked at the man from the tip of his black oxford shoes all the way to his head full of grey hairs.

My mother was a wise woman.

"Away with you now," Orange said, gesturing with his right hand. "Shoo."

It took me a moment to stop gaping and process his words.

"Wait!" I said, holding up my hands. Weird or not, this was still the first person I had found. I couldn't waste the chance.

"Please!" I said, clasping my hands in front of me. "You have no idea what I have gone through today. It's just... what's going on here? Do you know anything? Anything at all?"

I didn't wait for an answer. I kept going without even pausing to breathe, my voice gaining a few shades of hysteria. "Because I woke up and nothing was working and people aren't waking up at all! It's all empty and weird because you try and try, and they just won't wake up! There aren't even birds flying around! Have you noticed that? Not a single bird or dog or squirrel! And I just can't deal with this stuff anymore!"

Orange blinked once then twice. Then, he looked at me. Really looked at me.

His eyes widened by a fraction of an inch. "Oh my," he said. Whatever he had found looking at me, it had been a surprise.

Please, someone tell me I had not weirded out the weirdo.

"So that's how it is," Orange said, bringing a hand to his chin. "Well, there is always one or two Irregulars. They are usually not quite as coherent as you, but there are cases. Oh well, the unexpected always keeps things fresh!"

Now it was my turn to blink. Whatever Orange was talking about, I understood none of it.

"Good sir," Orange said, "I advise you to retreat to your home for the rest of the day, perhaps even for the rest of the week."

I blinked. Two times now.

"What?"

"Well, perhaps not that coherent," Orange said, cocking his head to the side. "Go home, young man. There is nothing for you here."

Disbelief took hold of my face as I waved my arms around and spluttered. "B-but the people! They are all-"

"Perfectly fine and taken care of," Orange cut in. "I repeat. Go home. You will be safe that way. It would be a shame for a promising talent to suffer an accident."

Accident? Promising talent? What was he even talking about? No. Screw this. I needed answers.

"No." I stood my ground. "Look, it has been a long morning and I am not leaving this place until I get some answers."

Orange just looked at me for a moment before bringing his hands together. "Young man, it seems you do not quite understand your position. While understandable given your circumstances, it is also quite unfortunate as my duties do not allow me the time to explain it all to you. Already precious time has been lost. Just know this."

The man placed a hand on my shoulder and I fought the urge to shrink back from his stern gaze.

"I am the Arbiter," Orange said, "and you, young man, are going home. If you have any sense, you will stay there."

I had many objections to those words. I never got to voice them.

Because I was no longer in front of him.

In the blink of an eye, the scenery around me had changed. I was no longer in front of the hospital. I was no longer with Orange.

I was back home.

I looked around, unable to comprehend what just happened. I was in my living room, standing in front of the same TV I had been watching all morning.

My gaze caught something on the sleeve of my shirt, the spot where Orange had placed his hand.

Puzzled, I lifted my arm to see.

It was as if someone had stamped a seal on my shirt.

Return to Sender.

# Chapter 3

Almost half an hour passed while I sat on the couch, staring at nothing. My brain buzzed with questions. I could almost hear the gears in my head grinding against each other as I struggled to comprehend the events that had taken place.

Because, really, had that just happened?

Part of me still refused to believe it had.

Maybe I had just fallen asleep on the couch and never left the house. Maybe I was just confusing dreams with reality.

If only.

It had not been a dream, and I had the evidence to prove it. I glared at the shirt lying on the coffee table.

Return to Sender.

The moment I saw those big red letters, I had taken my shirt off as if the thing was on fire.

Those words had not been there when I put the shirt on.

I sighed.

They had not been there because Orange had put them there when I saw him at the hospital.

It was not a dream.

It happened.

That was... crazy.

I brought my hands up to rub my temples. There was a headache coming.

Calm down.

I needed to calm down and think, reason things out. Something crazy was going on, and I couldn't seem to wrap my head around it. Fine. All that meant was that I needed to break it into smaller pieces.

For starters, my mother's mysterious sleep. I had checked on her again after changing. Her condition was the same. I had not gone to see Mr. Wyatt again, but it was safe to assume the same could be said of him.

Then there was the rest of the town. I might not know why or how, but I did know what I saw out there, a ghost town. I didn't like it, but it was probably not wrong to assume everyone in town was in a similar state of unending sleep, just like my mother and Mr. Wyatt.

Except me... and Orange.

The man who had sent me all the way back to my living room in the blink of an eye.

I frowned. Just thinking about the guy was worsening my headache. How had he done it? Why was he even here? Was he behind this?

Argh, focus!

Phones didn't work. The internet and TV weren't doing any better.

Technology was down.

No, I thought, pressing my lips together. That was not quite true.

I couldn't see any channels, but I could still turn on the TV and watch DVDs. Other than not getting any signal, my smartphone worked just fine. The fridge was working. The house still had electricity.

Communication was the issue. I couldn't contact anyone on the outside, and no one on the outside could contact me.

I swallowed audibly.

That was not reassuring in the least.

Move on. Move on. Move on!

Orange! Right, the man in orange!

He was at the hospital. There had to be a reason for that. The place had been surrounded by signs. There had to be a reason for that too. What was so important about the hospital?

...

Right. Stupid question. It was a hospital. Had I not been worried about it in the first place? It was a big part of the reason why I had chosen to go there. With everyone asleep, something bad could happen to the patients.

Maybe that's why Orange was there? To act as a caretaker of sorts. He did say the people were being taken care of.

Of course, his presence, in itself, was all sorts of weird. The one day no doctor wakes up is also the day Orange shows up to take care of things. There was no way this could be a random coincidence. His presence was serving a specific purpose, a plan of sorts. The communication lines. The people asleep. The hospital. Everything was connected.

A ghost town had been created. Right now, anything could happen in Redfield and no one would notice.

Now, if only I could figure out the hows and whys.

I took a deep breath and exhaled, leaning back against the couch.

Come to think of it, Orange had called himself something, hadn't he?

Arbiter.

Arbiter of what?

Arbiters were supposed to settle disputes. What dispute was he settling? _Whose_ dispute was he settling?

Did that mean there were more people out there? He said the hospital was off-limits. That alone implied there were others out there. It also implied the existence of rules of some sort.

There was an Arbiter to settle things.

There was an off-limits area.

Like some sort of, well, game.

However, even if that was true, none of it explained me.

Why was I awake?

Orange said there were always one or two when talking about me, but even then he seemed surprised to see me. He called me irregular.

If I am the irregular, would that make all the people asleep the regular ones? Was this some sort of unique event or did it happen with some degree of frequency?

I frowned and decided to put that line of thought on hold for now. I needed to stop theorizing and just focus on what was urgent: the sleeping people, Orange, and the possibility of other people moving about. People who were probably related to the phenomenon.

I snorted.

Really, phenomenon? That's the best I had?

I shook my head.

No, I had been skirting around this way too much.

I really doubted someone had poured a bunch of sleeping pills into the town's water supply and waited for everyone to fall asleep.

On top of that, when I tried to get close to the hospital, I couldn't. My body had refused to move.

Just like the signs around it said.

A man had teleported me miles away with a touch. There was no getting around that one.

This was not the type of stuff you could explain away with smoke and mirrors. This wasn't a trick or clever misdirection.

It was time to call a spade a spade.

This was real.

Come on. Say it.

"Magic," I said in a barely audible whisper, my gaze darting around, half-scared the word alone would invoke another supernatural happening.

It didn't.

The world kept spinning. The town kept sleeping.

I was in the exact same position as before.

I just had a working theory, an explanation. Nothing more. Nothing less. It was not even a good one at that since it literally boiled down to, "A Wizard Did It." If anything, the explanation was a proof of how quickly I had given up on rationality.

I sighed.

Now what?

Let's say, I was right. What was I supposed to do about it? Orange told me everything was fine. That I should stay home. How much could I trust that statement? How much could I trust a complete stranger? Especially an oddly-dressed, suspicious stranger who might be a wizard.

I brought a hand to my hair and grabbed it so tightly it hurt.

God, I just seriously used the word wizard in a sentence, didn't I?

Okay. Fine.

I really needed to figure out what to do.

Staying here was out.

I could not trust Orange. It was as simple as that. I had no reason to. I didn't know enough to make a solid judgment.

And really, that was the problem.

I knew nothing.

I needed answers and... I think I had an idea of where to look for them.

If the hospital was off-limits then it stood to reason other places would be as well. Places which fulfilled similar requirements. Places with people in need of constant care.

If I looked for them, I might be able to run into someone with answers. Sure, Orange hadn't been in a talking mood, but maybe someone out there would be.

There was always a chance, right?

... just like there was a chance of running into someone dangerous.

This whole setting didn't quite strike me as the act of a Good Samaritan.

I sighed.

I had to try. There was no way around it. The alternative was doing nothing at all. Mom. The people in town. All asleep while some people were doing who knows what in our home.

I frowned. That just wasn't right. The others might be fine or they might not be. I didn't know, and I couldn't risk it. Everything kept coming back to that.

Dangerous or not, I knew what I had to do.

I just needed to find another bike first.

# Chapter 4

People had grown way too reliant on the internet. Mr. Wagley always liked to say that in class.

He would often go on and on about how things used to be when he was in college. Back then, people had to carry books. Thick, heavy books. They had to visit libraries. They had to go through hundreds of pages to find what they were looking for.

Today, you can fit several books' worth of content in your pocket. Most of the time, you don't even need to use a book. You just type what you want in the search box.

Not going to lie, I like our way better. In fact, the day had served to remind me of how superior it is.

The internet was down. As it turns out, that was a big inconvenience when one needed to look for something. I knew there was at least one nursing home in town. That did not mean I knew its address. In the end, I was forced to rely on the yellow pages like some backwater savage.

It was awful.

On the bright side, I did find what I was looking for and made a list. At the time, I thought it was a pretty good list.

With forty-five minutes gone by and all names scratched off, I was being forced to reassess my list-making skills.

It wasn't that I hadn't found anything. I found something alright.

Signs.

Every place I went to had signs just like the hospital. There were five to ten of them planted around each of the buildings. Considerably less compared to the hospital but the effect was the same.

I could not get close to them.

Once I got within a certain distance of the signs my body just refused to move. I had tried getting around the problem. I really had. I even tried to knock down the signs by throwing things at them from a distance but the moment I aimed my body would just stop.

I suppose learning the signs were there was useful in its own way, but all in all the experience had not yielded any noteworthy positives.

It was annoying.

Really damn annoying.

Worse, going from one place to another using a (temporarily borrowed without permission) bicycle was tiring.

I should have taken the car. I really should have.

As the sun blazed above me, I could not help but think this had been a really bad time to care about not having a license. The back of my shirt was already soaked with sweat. I was going to need to change again once I got home. Maybe take a bath too.

Sadly, home was not exactly near.

I was on my way back from the last place on the list, a hospice home in the west side of town.

"Next time, I am taking the damn car," I grumbled under my breath.

The moment the words left my lips someone grabbed me by the back of the neck. My eyes went wide as I was yanked back with enough force to lift my entire body into the air. The bicycle fell to the ground. Panicked, I reached for the hand grabbing me as my legs uselessly kicked at the air.

I found nothing.

There was nothing holding my neck. I could feel the individual fingers of a hand but there was nothing there when I touched.

There was nothing there but my body was being held up at least three feet above the ground.

"Well, what do we have here?"

I heard the voice and my body went cold.

That wasn't Orange.

It was someone else.

Just like I'd hoped to find.

It did not make me happy in the slightest.

I heard his footsteps before I saw him. They were the slow steps of a man who had all the time in the world. My heartbeat quickened. Nothing about this situation indicated he was friendly.

In hindsight, I really should have listened to Orange.

After what seemed like minutes, he entered my field of view.

I was... underwhelmed.

He was a rather pudgy man in his late thirties. His clothes, a pair of black pants and a white shirt at least one size too small, were dirty and had traces of food on them. He had something in his hand but I couldn't quite make it out from my position.

"Funny, I thought the boss and I had already taken care of everyone," he said, studying me with beady eyes.

I did not like the look of him, and I definitely did not like the implication behind his words. There were only so many ways in which 'taken care of' could be interpreted.

"Look," I said, holding up my hands. "This is all just a misunderstanding and if you just let me down we can ta-argh!"

The man waved the object in his hand, a stick of some sort. At once, my words were stopped. The invisible hand holding me grew until it was big enough to go all the way around my neck, throat included. I struggled as my air supply was cut off, but it was a useless effort. Whatever force held me went one way only. It could touch me but I couldn't do a thing to it.

"Don't talk," the fat man said, still holding up the stick. "I can't stand it when they talk."

I tried to kick him but he was too far away. I could only float, helpless to do anything.

"Stop it. You're just hurting yourself by fighting it," the man said. "I could crush your throat. I don't want to. Just stop fighting and take a nice, long nap."

I wanted to tell him where he could shove his nice, long nap, but try as I might I couldn't breathe.

Damn it!

My struggles grew weaker as air began to run out. Dark spots began to appear in my vision as less blood reached my brain. I was not going to last much longer.

Then it happened.

Even now, I cannot find the right words to describe it. Being choked had something to do with it, but even if I had been on my best condition I don't think I would have been able to find the right words.

What happened next was just... a void.

For a single instant, there was no sky or land. There was no vertical or horizontal. I am not even sure if there was even a me during that tiny eternity.

There was just the Void.

When it was over, I was on my knees gasping for air, and my attacker was out cold, lying on the ground just a few feet away.

"It seems I arrived just in time."

I lifted my gaze, following the voice, and found my rescuer.

He was neither too tall nor too short. His face could not be called anything other than plain. If I didn't know better, I would have dismissed him as a regular office worker. He certainly looked the part with his black suit and black-rimmed glasses.

Compared to Orange and the fat guy, this one was offensively normal.

Except he wasn't.

That thing, that Void was not normal. I fought the urge to shiver just from recalling it. I had no idea what it was, but that was the farthest thing from normal I had felt all day.

"Allow me to introduce myself," Glasses said, offering a short bow. "My name is Jonathan Acker, Secretary and General Adviser to Lord Edgar Arundel. Although the circumstances are not the best, I am pleased to make your acquaintance."

~~~

Don't talk to strangers.

It's a pretty basic rule all parents teach their children. It doesn't matter how nice the stranger may seem, kids shouldn't talk to them. Certainly not follow them.

Jonathan Acker was a stranger.

Sure, he had saved me. That did not mean he was a good person. If anything, the way he had saved me proved beyond a shadow of doubt he was part of this whole thing. What had happened back there was not remotely natural.

That had been Magic.

Jonathan Acker was related to the phenomenon keeping everyone in town asleep.

Following him was dangerous.

At the same time, he had trivially dealt with someone who had kicked my ass. I did not want to offend someone with that kind of power. Parents tell you not to talk to strangers but they also tell you not to poke the bear.

Maybe not with those exact words, but the message is what's important. Don't piss off someone who could squash you like a bug unless you have a damned good reason.

When Jonathan Acker told me to follow him, I obeyed.

We walked in silence for a couple of blocks before entering one of the houses. Acker did not even bother looking for a key. The moment he reached for the doorknob, I heard the sound of the door unlocking itself.

The house was one of many in town. Bigger than my small apartment and seemingly devoid of people. If I went upstairs, I was positive I would find the owners asleep just like everyone else in town.

"The owners will not mind if we use this place for a while," Jonathan said, as if answering to my thoughts.

He motioned to one of the chairs in the living room. "Please, take a seat. There is much to talk about."

I did as he asked, and he took the seat opposite to mine.

"You have seen much," Jonathan Acker said. "You have experienced much. No doubt you have many questions, but before that we cannot overlook basic courtesy. As I have said, my name is Jonathan Acker. Though the circumstances are regrettable, it is a pleasure to meet you."

It took me a while to realize he expected me to reply in kind.

"Oh," I said, still confused. "Michael Walker. That's, uh, my name."

"Good. Rest assured I mean you no harm, Mister Walker," Johnathan said, accurately interpreting my nervousness. "In fact, I wish to help answer the questions you no doubt have. I cannot imagine today has been a regular day for you."

I snorted. I couldn't help it.

"That's one way of putting it," I said, my voice a little louder and more bitter than I wanted. "I woke up but no one else did. I got teleported by some weird guy in orange. Someone choked me with freaking telekinesis! Yeah, you could say my normal days involve none of those things."

If Jonathan Acker was offended by my outburst, he didn't show it. To be honest, his expression had barely changed at all. His blue eyes reflected nothing but bland acceptance.

"Understandable," Jonathan Acker said. "Still, I must say you are surprisingly accepting of your situation."

I stared.

Just. Stared.

I pointed to my face. "Does this look like acceptance?" Nervousness, sure. Panic, yes. Approaching a full breakdown, absolutely.

Acceptance?

Literally where?

"I mean no disrespect. However, teleportation and telekinesis are interesting word choices," Acker said as way of answer. "Most people in your situation would avoid those words. They would just ramble, unable explain what had happened to them. They would start doubting their senses and sanity before using those words."

I blinked. "Why?

"Because using those words usually means one has given up on rationality," Acker said, giving me a look I could not decipher.

"Oh." What else could I say to that?

I mean, it was true, wasn't it?

You hear about it sometimes. You might even see it on the news. A guy who saw a ghost. People claiming they got kidnapped by Aliens. Really crappy pictures that are supposed to be Big Foot or a blurry video of the Loch Ness monster.

But it's all bogus. It's completely removed from normal, everyday life.

I had never heard a door opening when no one else was home, no noise I couldn't explain, and no monster hiding under my bed. That stuff wasn't real.

That's what I had believed until a few hours ago.

Giving up on rationality? What other words could I use? It was the only rational thing to do.

"It is not a bad thing," Johnathan assured me. "If anything, it makes things much easier."

"In fact," Jonathan said, bringing his hands together. "Allow me to dispel any and all doubts you may have. A single fundamental force lies at the root of the phenomena which have befallen your hometown. That force is commonly known as Magic."

I let out the breath I hadn't known I was holding. I could almost hear the capitalization in Acker's words.

There it was. Confirmation.

I suppose I could ask him to demonstrate just to be sure, but at this point it would just feel superfluous.

The important thing was that I was not going crazy.

Magic was real.

I was not quite sure how to feel about that.

"I am not quite sure how to feel about that," I admitted, rubbing my forehead. "Does that make you people Wizards then?"

"Wizards. Shamans. Mages. Sorcerers. Druids. The exact term does not matter. We are nothing more and nothing less than individuals who can manipulate the fundamental force known as Magic," Jonathan said. There was a teacher-like quality to his voice, though I could not recall the last time a teacher had ever evoked this level of interest in me.

"Most people are unaware of Magic," Johnathan went on. I fought the urge to take notes. "Regardless, the teachings live on, passed down through generations."

I blinked. Well, that was something.

"I know it is hard to believe, but I trust today's events have provided perspective," Acker said.

I found myself nodding. He could tell me pink elephants existed, and I would probably believe him. It was as likely as everything else that had happened today.

"There are entire communities made up of people who are aware of Magic, all of them hidden from the eyes of the world," Jonathan said, pushing up his glasses. "We try to live a peaceful existence, but like all communities, we are not without troubles."

"Are those troubles the reason why everyone is asleep?" I asked.

"Quite," Jonathan replied with a grave tone. "Mister Walker, it pains me to say this, but your home has been chosen as the site for a duel between Wizards."

# Between Lines – Rules of Engagement

The following are the rules agreed upon by Lord Edmund Arundel and Lady Adeline Duval for the purposes of the duel between their heirs under conditions of _Spolia Opima_. These rules have been ratified by an Arbiter of the Council who shall oversee the proceedings to ensure no infractions are made.

1. As is the norm, the duel shall take place in a randomly selected location.

2. Lord Duval and Lord Arundel shall each have command over twelve wizards during the course of the duel.

3. All participants must be volunteers. Coercion is not allowed. Volunteers must present themselves to the Council for inspection and final selection.

4. The Arbiter has the final say in all matters of selection. Both families are allowed to appoint one special assistant to their heirs. This assistant shall count as part of the twelve.

5. Should a person lose consciousness during the duration of the match, he or she will be considered disqualified. Falling asleep once per day is allowed.

6. The duel will end after either Lord Duval or Lord Arundel is disqualified. There are no other victory conditions.

7. As per the terms of _spolia opima_ , disqualification shall result in loss of Magical Ability.

8. As per the terms of _spolia opima,_ those who have been disqualified before the end of the duel will receive nothing should their team win. The spoils will only be given to those who remain once the duel is over.

9. In the event of at least ten members from each team being disqualified a tie shall be declared.

10. Leaving the duel grounds while the duel is in process is forbidden.

11. Involving people unrelated to the duel is forbidden.

12. Acting against team members is forbidden.

13. Forbidden actions shall result in immediate suspension. As the Council's representative, the Arbiter has the final say in all sanctions.

# Chapter 5

I stared at the document Acker had given me. There were lots of words and fancy signatures at the end of the paper, but I ignored them in favor of the thirteen rules.

The Council. Spolia Opima. Victory Conditions. Disqualification. I was missing some context, but what I did understand was painting a picture I did not like at all.

My eyes locked on two of the names. Duval and Arundel. I had no idea who Duval was, but I was positive Acker had mentioned working for someone named Arundel.

"What is this?" I asked, after putting down the paper.

"The rules," Johnathan Acker replied, stating the obvious in the most unhelpful way possible. Taking mercy on me, he added, "A few weeks ago, my employer, Lord Arundel, challenged Lord Duval to a Wizard's Duel. What you have read are the rules agreed upon by their families during the ensuing negotiations."

I blinked. My eyes shifted from the document, to Acker, and back to the document, incredulous.

"So the guy in orange...?"

"He would be the Arbiter, a representative from the Council sent to make sure both sides follow the rules. No doubt, he teleported you to ensure your safety." Acker sounded sure of himself though I had barely mentioned my encounter with the Arbiter beyond saying a guy in orange had teleported me.

Then again, how many guys in orange could there be? Distinctive didn't begin to cover it.

"And the guy who attacked me... he thought I was part of the duel so he tried to knock me out," I deduced, bringing a hand up to rub my neck.

Acker did not say anything, but he did not need to. I was starting to understand what was going on.

"You put an entire town to sleep because two guys wanted to fight?" I asked, disbelief plain to see all over my face.

I had to have heard that wrong. Right?

Who did that?

It was like buying all the seats because you wanted to see the movie alone. It's just making a whole lot of trouble for no good reason.

Couldn't these guys just fight somewhere else?

"Couldn't these guys just have their fight without inconveniencing everyone?" I asked, waving my hand around.

Acker sighed.

"Unfortunately, it is not that simple." He sounded resigned, tired even. Completely different from the vision of power I had seen not even half an hour ago.

In a moment of clarity, I understood that for all his power Jonathan Acker was a butler to some rich jerk.

Meet the Magic World. Same as the Regular World.

"Lord Arundel challenged Lord Duval to a special type of duel, one seldom used among us, _spolia opima_ ," Acker said.

"Yeah, I read that part," I said, waving the piece of paper. "Loser gets his Magic taken away or something, right?"

"Quite," Acker replied. "However taking away someone's Magic is not an easy task. It requires tremendous preparation."

"And putting everyone to sleep helps?" Doubt crept into my voice.

Acker nodded.

"Why do you think darkness has long been associated with the occult?" He said. "Have you ever heard of a story where the witch works in broad daylight?"

That... was true. For the most part.

But those were just stories, right?

"A full explanation would require several hours, but suffice to say when people are asleep, Wizards have an easier time manipulating Magic. This allows for much greater ease with the preparations this duel requires," Acker said. I had a feeling he was really dumbing it down for me.

I wasn't sure whether to be thankful or insulted.

"Couldn't you have just waited until everyone was asleep?" I said, trying to look for another alternative.

Night was a thing.

It happened everyday even.

"That would have worked in the past," Jonathan said, his tone gently chiding like a primary school teacher about to correct a student who got the answer wrong without trying to hurt his feelings

"However, life no longer stops after dark." Acker looked right into my eyes. "Even in a small town like this, many stay up all night. Besides, it is unlikely for a duel of this magnitude to be over in one night. Having the entire town asleep for our activities and waking them up once we leave is more practical."

It sure as hell wasn't practical for me.

I sighed and leaned back into my seat.

So this was it, huh?

These guys were going to have their little feud in my home, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I wasn't an idiot. If everyone here was half as good as the fat guy, I would only be getting in the way at best.

At worst, getting choked into unconsciousness would have been lucky.

A bitter smile appeared on my face. "So I guess I should have stayed home then? You guys are just going to do your thing and leave. I would just be getting in the way."

The words left a bad taste in my mouth. They made me sound so... useless. Something amazing was happening, but I was just outside looking in. I couldn't do anything to help my mom or my friends.

"That would be the most prudent course of action under normal circumstances," Jonathan said, giving a short nod. "However, these are not normal circumstances."

Huh?

I blinked. "Huh?"

"Mister Walker, I am disappointed," Jonathan said. "You have yet to ask the most important question."

I frowned. I wanted to tell him where he could shove his disappointment, but I didn't dare to. Fear was only part of the reason. Although he was vague and long-winded at some points, I did owe Jonathan Acker. After all, he had... saved me...

I looked at him. "Why did you save me?"

I hadn't been in danger. I understood that now. Fatso had seen me walking and assumed I was part of the other side. I understood his words better now. He would have just knocked me out.

There was no need for Jonathan Acker to save me back then.

"Why did you bring me here?"

He didn't have to. He didn't need to tell me any of this. He could have... should have knocked me out and be done with it. I shouldn't be up in the first place.

"Why are you explaining all of this to me?

Jonathan Acker smiled. It was not a big smile. It did not have much in the way of emotion behind it. It was a thin, weak smile that could not be called anything other than polite.

I wanted to run from that smile. Badly.

I didn't.

I wish I could say it was bravery but that'd be a lie. I just knew it was futile. I had enough sense to know I wouldn't be able to escape.

Not from this man.

"Good," Acker said, pleased. "Normally, I should have modified your memories and ensured you remained unconscious for the duration of the duel. That would have been the proper course of action."

My muscles tensed. My hands gripped the armrest of my seat. My eyes darted for the door in spite of myself.

This was not about fight or flight. Neither was an option here.

"Mister Walker, rest assured I mean you no harm," Acker said, noticing my discomfort. "If harm was my objective, we would not be having this conversation."

It was true. If he wanted to harm me, he'd have already done it.

Unless he was a real sadist, but I did not think that was the case.... I hoped

"Do you remember the man who attacked you, Mister Walker?" He asked.

"F-fatso? Yeah. Kind of hard to forget" I said, cursing myself for the stutter. This was not the time to be scared. No matter how many good reasons I had.

"His name was Kevin Grant," Acker said. "He was participating in the duel under Lord Arundel's banner."

The gears turned in my head.

"Isn't Lord Arundel your boss?" I asked, pointing at him.

"He is," Jonathan Acker replied with a firm nod. "Mister Grant and I should be on the same side, which makes his attack on you an oddity. Lord Arundel ordered us to stay put. In spite of that, you were attacked. In spite of that, several of our members are not where they should be."

A cold feeling started to take shape in my stomach. Recent experiences helped me identify it as dread.

"In fact, you can imagine my surprise when, while doing a light patrol less than an hour before meeting you, someone who should have been on my side tried to attack me," Jonathan went on. "He was unsuccessful, of course."

I could only imagine the fate of the pitiful guy.

"As you can see, this is far from a normal situation," Jonathan Acker said. "I find myself unable to trust those who are supposed to be on my side. Even now, I risk a lot by leaving Lord Arundel unprotected, but I believe running into you was a stroke of good fortune. Given our respective situations, I believe we can help each other."

I snorted. I couldn't help it.

"Right. Because I did so well against that Kevin guy," I said, with sarcasm as thick as molasses. "Sorry, but I'm a bit out of my depth here."

"Mister Walker, why are you awake?" Acker asked instead of addressing my words.

"Huh?"

It was not a question I was expecting, though it was certainly something I had wondered more than a few times. With all the talk about Magic and duels, I had almost forgotten about it.

"You must have wondered," Johnathan Acker went on. "Why are you the only one not asleep? What sets you apart from your family and friends?"

"Orange... the arbiter said there was always one like me," I said, latching onto the only explanation I had.

"Like you? Not at all." There was an intensity in Acker's eyes I was not quite sure I liked. "Out of a city or town, one person will retain some level of consciousness. However, you have been awake for hours without discomfort. That is considerably rare. You are, without a doubt, unique. An Irregular"

There was that word again.

Irregular.

"The Arbiter called me the same thing," I said. "What does it mean?"

"It means you resisted the spell keeping everyone asleep," Acker explained. "Something impossible without a non-insignificant compatibility with Magic. Lacking knowledge, lineage, or tools, you have stumbled into our world through nothing but raw potential. Thus, you are an Irregular."

I blinked. Thrice.

"I... have Magic?"

"Everyone does," Acker replied. "You have potential."

"Mister Walker," Acker said, leaning closer to me. I shrank back on instinct.

"Would you like to be a Wizard?"

# Chapter 6

I am not stupid.

I have never claimed to be smart, but I was certainly not dumb. I was average, smarter and dumber than half.

Would you like to be a Wizard?

I knew a fishy offer when I heard one.

"No." Those were the first words that came out of my mouth.

"No?" echoed Jonathan. His expression did not change but there was an odd glint in his eyes.

No. Thanks, but no thanks. Take your offer and go far, far away.

I did not know Jonathan Acker.

At all.

He had told me many things but I only had his word to go on. It was possible everything he had told me was true. It was also possible he had been lying his ass off. I wanted to believe the former, but the latter was just as likely.

It was not rocket science. I did not know this person, so I could not trust him.

Mom and Dana might have accused me of having trust issues but it sure as hell came in handy every now and then.

"One would normally leap at the chance," Acker said, his tone casual.

I could see why. I really could.

I had seen extraordinary things during the past few hours. I would be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued. I'd be really, really lying if I said the idea of being able to do some of that stuff wasn't insanely cool.

That was the problem. It sounded too good.

Let's say I become a wizard and get all the cool powers.

Then what?

Go into the lion's den? That's how people get eaten.

At the same time... was it really safe to say no to Jonathan Acker?

Did I want Jonathan Acker angry at me? If he was just being helpful in order to get my help, then what would happen when he decided I wasn't useful anymore?

Standard procedure apparently ended up with my memories rewritten.

"Let's say I accept," I said, holding up a hand while considering my words. "I become a Wizard. What happens next?"

Did I wave a magic wand and make everything better?

If it was that simple, he would have done so already.

"If you accept, I will have you search the town for clues regarding the oddities of this duel. I fear there is another goal at play here, yet I cannot afford to be away from my lord for long. With your ability awakened, you would be able to move through the town in my stead without fear."

An easy enough to understand explanation, but I was not convinced.

"Is this really that serious?" I asked, tilting my head to the side.

So some people cheated. Big deal. People cheat all the time. I cheat all the time. Eric didn't approve but not everyone could be an honor student.

"Who's to say this Duval guy didn't bribe the guys on your team to backstab you?" I offered.

"Impossible." Jonathan's reply was swift and certain.

"The Duval family has much to lose by doing something like that," Jonathan Acker said, pushing up his glasses. "Any punishment meted out by The Council far outweighs the possible gains."

The Council. There was that word again. They had been mentioned in the document containing the rules, and the Arbiter was supposedly their representative in this whole thing.

Some kind of governmental body for wizards, I guessed.

Jonathan frowned. "Furthermore, the Council carefully selected the teams from among a group of volunteers. For there to be traitors among them is troubling," he admitted.

"How troubling are we talking about?"

Jonathan gave the question some thought before replying. "I cannot be certain. It may end up being nothing. However, quite a bit of power has gathered in Redfield. The heirs of two great families. The Arbiter. The large scale ritual surrounding this place. If the situation were to be mishandled, the consequences could be catastrophic."

I flinched.

There it was.

The possibility of danger. The possibility of something bad happening to Redfield, to everyone in Redfield. To my friends.

To my mother.

I closed my eyes. "And if I say no. What would you do?"

"I believe I have already told you the standard procedure."

It was not a threat, just a statement of fact.

I smiled bitterly. "This is really not much of a choice, is it?"

Acker frowned. "There is always a choice, Mister Walker. Even if it is not necessarily the one we wish to have. You can choose to forget all you have seen or you can act to protect your home and all you hold dear. Both choices are open to you. The decision belongs to no one else."

Part of me would like nothing more than to pretend this was all a bad dream.

But could I really take the risk? If Acker was telling the truth, then something weird was going on. Something weird besides two rich wizards deciding to settle their grudge here. Redfield may very well be in real danger.

I couldn't take the risk of something bad happening. If there was something I could do to help, then I had to do it.

It was as simple as that.

I knew it and I had a feeling Acker had known it from the moment he had saved me.

It was simply the right thing to do.

"Okay," I said. "Okay. Make me into a Wizard."

Jonathan Acker smiled.

~~~

Thirty minutes later I was starting to rethink my decision.

We had not moved from the house, but the room had undergone several changes. All furniture had been moved out, and a variety of arcane symbols now covered the walls. All of them had been hand-drawn by Jonathan Acker with an inked brush.

"Magic is an art," Jonathan had explained as he began drawing the complicated symbols. "One that takes years to learn, let alone master."

I didn't have years. Thankfully, I didn't need them.

The way Acker had explained it, when people were asleep their grasp of the possible and impossible shifted, allowing Wizards to perform previously taxing feats with ease.

For example, creating a ritual to help a guy skip the long process of learning how to use Magic.

The symbols on the walls were supposed to help with that. I could not make out heads or tails of them, but Acker seemed to know what he was doing judging by the intense look on his face and the strong sense of purpose in each movement of his brush.

Then there were the symbols on my skin.

On Acker's instructions, I was standing on the center of the room with my shirt off. Any soccer mom would have been scandalized by the sheer amount of ink on my body.

I was about to ask a question, but Acker was ready.

"Do not," He said, looking right into my eyes, "talk."

The words died in my throat.

"This is a complicated process," Jonathan Acker said, mostly for my benefit I guessed.

Jonathan took a step back to admire his work. He nodded, satisfied, before moving on and writing a new set of symbols.

"To synchronize with Magic is to tap into a fundamental force of the universe," he said, drawing a weird upside down U. "It is not something one can take lightly under any circumstances. However, we have three advantages."

"The first is, of course, the state of the town," he said, moving to re-ink his brush. "The second is your innate compatibility with Magic, which is above average to say the least. Last but not least is the spell covering the town which is designed to take away someone's Magical Affinity and give it to someone else."

"Thus," He said, moving out of my line of sight, "It becomes possible for us to cheat a little. I can use the properties of the spell to stimulate your innate Magical Affinity."

After a few more minutes of painting, he moved in front of me again. "I will not lie, Mister Walker," Jonathan Acker said. "This will hurt."

Before I could do anything, Jonathan Acker had already sliced his palm with a knife I was positive he did not have a second ago.

A drop of blood touched the floor.

Black ink lit up with soft, red light. Jonathan Acker began chanting as the arcane symbols glowed with power.

I could not understand his words. I could not hear anymore.

I could just feel.

My body was on fire. Every nerve screamed in pain. Red light seeped into every inch of me. It was power. Pure power. Blinding in its intensity.

I shouted. I screamed until I could do it no more.

Darkness welcomed me.

# Between Lines – Jonathan Acker's Turn

Battle required thought.

Battle required strategy.

Battle required leadership.

It was a tragedy the ones in charge were lacking in all three.

Lord Arundel and Lord Duval were gifted in several ways, none of which were even tangentially related to their personalities. They had been born in the right families. They had inherited centuries of magical research and possessed the necessary compatibility with Magic to make good use of them.

While Jonathan would forever be grateful for the kindness the Arundel family had shown him, he could not say this gratitude extended to the chosen heir. This duel was just one more incident that deemed the man lacking in his eyes.

Jonathan Acker had not mentioned the trigger of this little war to young Mister Walker for several reasons.

Shame being one of them.

Lord Arundel and Lord Duval had been, for the better part of the year, competing for the affections of Lady Cecil. While Lady Cecil was not the only eligible bachelorette around, she was the one nearest to Lord Arundel and Duval in age and status.

Pleasing to the eye as well, if Jonathan was allowed to say it. However, her looks mattered little in the end. For Noble families, marriages were just another way of forging alliances and gaining power.

A marriage between two Noble families was more than a fusion of monetary assets. It meant sharing generations' worth of magical research. A marriage with Lady Cecil would provide a welcome boost to the social standing of the lucky suitor.

The two heirs had never been on the best terms, and the competition for Lady Cecil's hand had done little to help matters. After only two months of courtship, the two lords had already been trying their hardest to exalt themselves while humiliating the other.

Which is not to say they had lied, cheated, and stolen.

Of course not.

They had people to do that for them.

Like Jonathan.

Lady Cecil had not helped matters. The woman was far from innocent and always inciting them towards greater displays. Throughout the past year, she had reaped a number of generous rewards. Out of all the people involved, she had been the only one to truly enjoy herself.

For Jonathan Acker, it had been a trying year. He may live to serve the Arundel family, but he could not say he enjoyed being part of this childish feud.

The worse had come when Lady Cecil made her choice. She had not chosen Lord Arundel but Lord Duval, a harsh blow to his master's pride. A part of Jonathan had hoped the young master would lose gracefully and allow the experience to help him grow.

The day after the couple announced their engagement, Lord Arundel had made his challenge.

It could have been a simple duel challenge. Duels between Nobles were not at all rare.

However, his Lord's pride would not be satisfied with that.

_Spolia Opima_.

The Rich Spoils.

The highest price one could wager in a duel.

It was the last resort of the desperate. A gambit to raise one's Magical Affinity by stealing that of their opponent. The reward was high, but so was the risk.

Noble families like the Arundel and Duval would never stoop so low. For the chosen heir to lose his ability to use Magic was unthinkable.

Yet the challenge had been made.

Yet the challenge had been accepted.

The gauntlet had been thrown in front of too many people. It was not possible to pretend it had never happened. The rest of the family could do little to interrupt or stop it.

But they could run damage control.

The duel should have been a simple one-on-one match, but a one-on-one battle where the winner took all was too dangerous for both sides.

Adjustments had been made. Rules had been negotiated.

Wizards ranging from mediocre to barely decent had been recruited for each side. They had been all too easy to lure with promises of power. The official reason was to allow both heirs to show their leadership skills.

It could not be further from the truth. The new rules just created the conditions both families wanted.

The heirs did not need to be defeated for the duel to end.

As long as both sides lost ten people each, the duel would end in a draw. Neither heir would lose his Magic that way, making it a far more attractive outcome to both families.

It was Jonathan's job to ensure that vision was realized.

Not that Lord Arundel knew of it, of course. The man's pride would never allow such a thing. Certain jobs could only be done in secret. Besides, it would not do for the heir of such an important family to be accused of foul play.

Plausible deniability was a wonderful thing.

It was cold comfort, but Jonathan told himself that even if his Lord had won Lady Cecil's affections, the situation would be the same. Only the roles of challenged and challenger would have changed.

Jonathan Acker sighed.

Oh, the things he had to do.

But, he thought, not everything was unfortunate. In fact, several good things had come out of this situation.

Like Mister Walker.

He had been an unexpected but welcome boon.

Truth was, he had not been fully honest with Mister Walker. Their encounter had not been a coincidence. When the Arbiter had called him to tell him about an Irregular, he had scarcely been able to believe it and sought him out. It was the best choice he could have made.

He was also not that worried about Lord Arundel. The man was well taken care of. No one would be reaching him before the duel ended. However, he had deemed it necessary to give that impression to Michael Walker.

It made it easier to lure him into becoming a Wizard.

Talent like Mister Walker's was rare, and there was little Wizards liked better than a promising talent.

The world of Magic was a harsh one. The old families held a considerable amount of power, and possibilities for upward mobility were low.

After all, there was no such thing as a Magic school in their world.

While the basics were easy enough to obtain, a wizard was, for the most part, left to depend on what he could figure out during his lifetime and what his family had achieved before him. A first generation wizard could not be compared to one belonging to a family dating back ten generations.

First, second, and third generation wizards had a tough time making a name for themselves. However, it was not impossible. Old families were always looking for talent. Without the Arundel family's backing, Jonathan Acker would not have achieved his station in life.

Without his help, Mister Walker would have remained a normal person for the rest of his life.

A waste.

Jonathan Acker very much looked forward to the young man's development.

Those were his most sincere thoughts as he walked into Redfield's main plaza. With slow and relaxed steps, Johnathan Acker made his way to a small café.

About half an hour late.

"You're late," his contact said the moment she laid eyes on him. She had long black hair and sharp features. She waited for him at one of the outdoor tables, her arms crossed and her face set in a frown.

He could not blame her. At the same time, he was not sorry. Helping Mister Walker had been too important to delay.

"My apologies," he said while taking the seat opposite to hers.

She was young, possibly sixteen. While physical appearance was not a reliable way to judge the age of a Magic User, in this particular case he knew what he saw was not far from the truth.

Her reputation preceded her.

She was Erika Dahl. In spite of being a mere Third Generation Wizard, her ability to defeat wizards of higher generations in duels had attracted quite a bit of notice.

"Miss Dahl," he said, "it is an honor to finally meet you."

Old families were always looking for young talents to sponsor. Miss Dahl had been an investment of the Duval family, one that had paid off in spades.

"Likewise, I have heard much about you," she replied, though there was a hint of annoyance in her voice. "It is unfortunate we have to meet under these circumstances."

It was a shame really.

They were just too good at their jobs.

Why else would they be entrusted with the safety of the family heirs, guarding them in a competition where a single misstep could cost them their Magic?

It was cruel.

"Indeed." He inclined his head slightly to acknowledge her point. "Regardless, we must do our best for the sake of our masters. I am sure you understand this as well."

Erika made a face, for a moment looking very much like the teenager she was.

It lasted for half a second.

"Let's get to business then," she said. "At the beginning of the duel, there were a total of twenty-six Wizards in this town, not counting the Arbiter. As of one hour ago a total of fourteen have disappeared. In nearly all cases no disqualification has been registered. They are just gone. I trust the Arbiter made you aware of this?"

Disappeared not disqualified.

There was meaning in those words.

All participants in the duel had special trackers placed on them. A spell allowed the Arbiter to know the location of the participants as well as their current status. Additionally, each team had its own way of keeping track of its members as well as contacting them at any given moment.

For them to be missing meant all those spells had been bypassed somehow.

The majority of the participants were first and second generation wizards. It should be impossible for a few rejects to bypass the spells, yet there were fourteen people missing, over half the total number of participants.

"It is as you say," Johnathan replied. "I received the Arbiter's message and have verified his words just as I am sure you have."

It was a shame. Truly. It would have made for a good story.

The promising heirs would engage in a duel of power and wits, neither managing to gain the edge in the end but both coming out stronger for it.

That was the ending the families wanted, an end which would be impossible unless they found the missing people.

For the game to end in a tie, ten people from each side needed to be disqualified. Without those people, it was impossible.

Erika frowned. "Forgive me for saying so, but you seem awfully calm about this."

"Recklessness will do little to aid the situation. If the people are missing, we must simply focus our efforts on finding them." His words were delivered with utmost calm. He might as well have been talking about the weather.

Erika gave him a look.

"Mister Acker," she said, measuring the space between her words. "I like to think I have treated you with respect and I would like if you extended the same courtesy to me."

Johnathan Acker tried hard not to smile.

"I beg your pardon?"

"The situation goes beyond some missing Wizards," she said. "There were only twenty-seven wizards in this town when the duel began. In addition, there is a barrier around the town preventing outside interference. Not counting our masters and us, the best wizards in this town are third generation at best, yet all the detection spells have been evaded. Even if the number of people asleep makes some types of Magic easier, the theoretical knowledge should still escape them."

"Regardless, we cannot argue with the facts," Jonathan said.

"Indeed," Erika said, now glaring at him. "Which means the knowledge must have come from somewhere."

"What," Jonathan asked, giving her a measured look, "are you suggesting?"

"Does the Arundel family have other designs towards the results of the duel?" She asked.

Erika and Jonathan stared at each other.

"The Arundel have no desire to seek quarrel with the Duval," Jonathan said, bringing his hands together. "It would earn us nothing and cost us much. The agreed upon outcome is the only reliable one."

Erika examined Jonathan's face, looking for any trace of deceit.

"Very well," she said after a while. Though her expression did not change, the tension around the table lessened.

"I must say, you are being unusually upfront about this," Jonathan said, raising an eyebrow.

Direct confrontation like this was a rarity among Wizards.

"I cannot say I am fond of double-talk or running in circles around a point in the vain hope of trying to gain a paper-thin advantage during negotiations. I am not quite sure how much I can trust you, but the Duval family will have my hide if I fail here. I imagine the same goes for you. We gain nothing by hiding information from each other."

Like that, Erika Dahl put all her cards in the table.

She was not understating things. Old families were not fond of failure, especially from their servants, which, talent aside, he and Miss Dahl most certainly were.

Jonathan smiled his first honest smile in the conversation.

It truly was a pity they had to meet under these circumstances. He was now certain she would have made an excellent friend, but in the end, they were little more than tools for the families they served.

"Regardless," Erika went on, "the situation does not make sense. It should be impossible for something like this to happen without an external influence."

Jonathan nodded. He could imagine the different scenarios running through Miss Dahl's mind.

Someone could have infiltrated the duel grounds to kidnap the participants. However, such a task would be exceedingly difficult. The duel grounds were protected by strong spells put in place, not just by the Council, but also by the representatives of the two families.

In other words, both of them had put spells in place to ensure no one would get in or out of Redfield. To sneak in without breaking one was hard enough. To sneak in without dispelling a single one of them was nearly impossible. The intruder would require inside information from both sides to perform the feat.

They would not be having this conversation if that was the case.

Which left one other possibility.

"You believe the culprit is among the participants?" He asked.

"Culprits," Erika corrected. "We are looking for two people at least. People from both sides started disappearing around the same time. A single person could not have done it."

It was a frightening prospect.

The participants had been chosen from a large pool of volunteers. Controlling the selection process of the Council would have been troublesome to say the least. Furthermore, the suddenness of the event did not allow for much time to plan interference.

Infiltrating a participant on each side should have been impossible.

"I see. Then, for the moment, let's assume there exists a skilled leader guiding this effort," he said.

Erika raised an eyebrow

"And what, pray tell, could this skilled leader want? If he is after Magic, then he should have captured a few more participants and ended the duel. They might be scrap but Magic is Magic."

"I imagine the rewards being sought are more... substantial," Jonathan said.

Erika nearly flinched. "Don't even joke about that."

The combined Magical Affinity of twenty people divided into six was a noticeable boost.

The combined Magical Affinity of the two heirs, even divided into twenty, dwarfed it by a few orders of magnitude.

It was a dangerous plan, but not impossible. Just nearly so.

However, the consequences of such an act would be dire. The Arundel and the Duval were powerful families. The loss of their heirs would be a great blow to their reputation and threaten the continuity of their lines. The one responsible for such a thing would be hunted forever.

"We should cancel the duel right now," Erika said.

Jonathan Acker nodded. "It would be the most prudent course of action, but would the families agree to that?"

Erika frowned. Of course not. He knew it, and she knew it. Canceling the duel after so many preparations would make them look weak in front of the other families.

"The only way to end the duel now is to disqualify ten participants from each side," Jonathan said. For Wizards of their caliber dealing with First, Second, and Third generation Wizards was a simple task. If they worked together it would not even take half an hour.

It would have been a simple task if they knew where the participants were located.

"I guess now we know why more than half of the participants have disappeared," Erika said. "We don't know where they are, and we can't end the duel by taking out the ones we have at hand."

A frown appeared in Miss Dahl's face. Jonathan understood her distress.

He might not survive whatever punishment the Arundel family decided to levy on him if Lord Arundel lost his Magic. Since Miss Dahl's situation was similar to his, it was only natural for her to be scared of the possibility.

A failure of that magnitude would not be forgiven.

"If it worries you so much, it would be my pleasure to handle the situation," Jonathan offered.

Too many emotions flashed through Erika's eyes in an instant.

"Can you?" She asked, tone guarded.

Jonathan smiled and placed a hand on his heart. "Rest assured, I have the right tool for the job."

# Chapter 7

I opened my eyes to a whole new world.

It was humid.

Swampy even.

Those were my first thoughts upon waking up.

I blinked as I moved to a sitting position. Someone, most likely Jonathan, had placed me on the couch. The living room was back to normal. There were no signs of the arcane ritual which had taken place.

However, the air had changed.

It seeped into my skin. I could even feel it in my lungs. Every action I took only confirmed its existence.

It was like swimming in honey.

"I see you are awake."

I turned just in time to see Jonathan Acker coming through the door. Was it just a coincidence or had he sensed my awakening somehow?

"Yeah, I just-" I stopped. I couldn't talk. I couldn't breathe. As soon as Acker started moving closer to me, I was overwhelmed.

I was drowning.

"Oh dear."

Like that, it was over. Sweet, blessed air reached my lungs once more. I put a hand on the couch to steady myself, gasping for air.

What the hell just happened?

"My apologies." I looked up. For once, Acker's face plainly expressed an emotion, guilt. "I neglected to take into account the added stress my presence would cause."

Well, that was a grand load of nothing.

"What?" I asked once I got a hold of myself. "Seriously, what?"

"You are a Wizard now, Mister Walker. Congratulations by the way," Acker said as if that explained everything. Maybe it did. "You have become aware of Magic. How is it for you? For some it is noise. Others smell ozone in the air. I have met one person who felt it as heat."

"Humidity."

He rubbed his chin. "Interesting." I wasn't listening to him, though. My brain was still trying to process his words.

Magic was in the air.

I had almost drowned in power. Literally.

Ha.

I was beyond not amused.

"You're telling me all Wizards walk around experiencing intense discomfort because, and I'm speaking literally here, Magic?"

He shook his head. "Far from it. This is an extremely unusual situation. Usually, you would barely notice it, but I am afraid your hometown is far from normal right now."

You people are at fault for that!

"Due to the ritual and general state of the people here, the..." Acker stopped, trying to search for the proper word, "density of Magic has become quite high. My presence did not help matters. When I came in, I neglected to moderate my output. The... amount of Magic was too much for you to take in at once. Rest assured, it shall not happen again."

I got the feeling Acker was really dumbing things down for me.

"Although I realize I am the one explaining this, please refrain from thinking of Magic in terms of Density and Quantity in the future," he added. There was a slight trepidation in his tone. As if he was ashamed someone would link him with this talk.

Yep, he was definitely dumbing it down for me.

Whatever.

"Okay," I said, getting up. "You got your wizard. I have the amazing power of drowning in Magic. What do I do?"

"I told you I would provide you with the proper tools," Jonathan Acker said, before producing a familiar stick from somewhere. "Catch."

I fumbled a bit when he threw it at me but managed to grab it. It was beige, around twelve inches long, and made of plastic. There were three weird symbols carved along its length.

It was a backscratcher.

"What's this supposed to be?"

Jonathan Acker smiled. "Do you not recall? Mister Grant used it to great effect against you."

I blinked. Grant. The guy who nearly choked me. Come to think of it, he had been using some sort of... stick.

I stared at the backscratcher, then at Acker, and back again.

You've got to be kidding me.

"You've got to be kidding me."

"Mister Walker, I rarely joke."

"It's a backscratcher," I said, waving the tool around. "How does that even work? How does a guy get magical powers using a backscratcher?"

This was the lamest magic wand ever.

"What you call magical powers are but simple manipulations of Magic," Acker said, apparently taking pity on me. "In the end, a Wizard is nothing more than a skilled liar who brazenly misinterprets commonly accepted facts to create the results he desires."

I blinked.

Twice.

A thin smile appeared on Acker's face. "For example, it is known a backscratcher is used for reaching places a person otherwise can't."

It clicked.

I held out a hand. "Wait, wait, wait. Wait! Are you saying that because it is commonly accepted that backscratchers let you reach places your hands can't, a Wizard can manipulate that to... get telekinesis?"

I stared at the backscratcher again.

No way.

"It is one of the means available to us. Function Theory is quite popular, but I digress. Explaining the exact mechanics to you would take several hours. Just know you have acquired a reliable tool," Jonathan said. I could see a glimmer of amusement shinning behind his eyes.

I glared but bit back the smart comment. A shame since it was a really good one, but self-preservation won out. Jonathan Acker had been tolerant but I did not want to push it too much.

Besides, he did explain. I even understood it. To a point.

Wizards were dirty cheats who used bizarre logic to get the results they wanted.

Well, wasn't that just a flattering description?

Whatever. Focus on the immediate stuff.

"Okay," I said, twirling the backscratcher in my hand. "I have a weapon. How do I use it?"

"It should come naturally to you," Acker said. "You have a Magic Tool. You can feel Magic. Close your eyes. Focus. Feel the Magic at work."

I frowned but did as he said. Talking with Acker had helped me take my mind off it for a while but the place was still unbearably humid and closing my eyes only increased the sensation.

...huh?

Something was off. I could feel something different in the backscratcher. It was dry. No, that was not the right word for it. It was... waiting? Like a dam about to be opened. I just needed to will it. I just needed to think about it and it would.

"That should do it I think." Jonathan snapped his fingers, drawing me out of the trance. My eyes snapped open, and I felt my connection to the Magic Tool fading.

"It would not do if you accidentally damaged this house," Jonathan Acker explained. "The people living here could be hurt. Just remember that feeling should you need to use the tool. However, in the best case scenario, there will be no need for it."

I stared at the backscratcher.

I was so going to use this thing once I got out of this house.

"Right," I said, sitting down. "You just want me to check how things are going out there and look for clues."

Though with the way my day was going, the best case scenario should be renamed the extremely unlikely scenario.

"Precisely," he said. He grabbed one of the chairs and moved it so he sat in front of me. "I want you to take a look at this."

Jonathan Acker placed a map on the coffee table. I had no idea where he had kept that thing, but I was starting to get used to him pulling things out of nowhere.

I leaned in to get a better look. It was a map of Redfield, the type which you can look up online and print. However, several modifications had been made to it.

For starters, it had moving dots.

I could see a little under half a dozen dots moving around, most were bundled together but one was by its lonesome, and I was positive the lone dot's location coincided with the house we were in.

"The map should show all members of Lord Arundel's team," Jonathan said, pointing to the red dots on the map.

He then pointed to the one lone dot. "This one represents me for example."

I stared.

Awesome.

"That's so cool," I blurted out. Heat rose in my cheeks.

I know I shouldn't be surprised by now, but I had the feeling the wonder wasn't going to fade anytime soon.

Mercifully, Acker did not react beyond a small smile.

"As of a few hours ago, some of our men vanished. I have reported this to the Arbiter and have been informed the same happened to our opposition," Acker said. "It stands to reason some of them have been taken by an unknown third party. Your job will be to find them."

I blinked. Several times.

"I will what?"

"Perhaps find them is a too strong word," Acker said, noticing my hesitation. "As I said before, I just need you to walk around the town and look for clues."

"And if I find them? You said the Magic Tool is only a precaution, but last time I ran into a wizard I ended up with some serious neck pain," I said, rubbing my neck.

As I spoke, I realized I really should have asked about all this stuff before agreeing to it.

That's what I get for being a good person.

"You will not be unprotected," Jonathan Acker said. "I took the liberty of procuring a blood sample from you."

"You did what?" I fought the urge to stand up and check my body for injuries.

"Oh, it is perfectly safe. I assure you," Acker said, waving a hand.

"With your blood, I can create a much stronger tracking spell. Whatever measures are being taken to block the Map will not work this time. I will be able to monitor your emotional and physical state. Should you be in danger, I will go to you and deal with the problem myself."

I narrowed my eyes. "You are making this sound awfully safe."

If it was as safe as he was making it sound, there would have been no need to turn me into a wizard.

"It will be," he said with all the confidence in the world. "As I said before, the Magic Tool is merely a precaution."

There was some talking after that and a lot of glaring, but really everything that needed to be said had been said. In the end, I was going to go along with his plan, and that was all there was to it.

If something weird, well, weirder was going on in Redfield, I wanted to help. I wanted to be there for mom and the others.

Jonathan Acker had given me the power to stand on this stage.

It was time to step up.

# Between Lines – Erika Dahl's Preparations

The town was split in two.

Each heir had been given reign over one-half of the town for the purposes of the duel. Everything east of the main plaza belonged to Lord Duval, and the heir had chosen the mayor's house as his base of operations.

From there, he was to guide his followers against the enemy, at least in theory.

In practice, Erika would have done most of the job. Lord Duval had been content to take the master bedroom for himself while Erika had installed herself in the mayor's study.

Before, she had been annoyed that Lord Duval would likely stay in his room until all was over. Now, she hoped he did.

Things had changed. Something dangerous lurked in Redfield, and not counting Lord Duval, she had a grand total of two people left at her disposal. Venturing out under these circumstances would be dangerous to say the least.

Thus, it was good she didn't have to.

Jonathan Acker saw to that. Her counterpart seemed certain he knew the best way to handle things. By letting him tackle the problem, Erika did not need to risk anyone important. All she needed to do was wait until the situation was resolved.

It sounded good, but Erika knew one thing with certainty.

You could not trust a Magic User.

They were double-dealing, lying, deceitful pieces of scum.

Perhaps it was hypocritical of her to think so. No, it most certainly was. She was, after all, a Witch. She had been one all her life.

Her father and his father before him had been Wizards. Minor ones, but Wizards still. From the day she was born, she was expected to inherit their research and take it to greater heights, a task in which she had succeeded with flying colors. She had even attracted the attention of the powerful Duval family.

Erika Dahl was what other Third Generation Wizards aspired to be.

Thus, when she said Magic Users could not be trusted, she knew what she was talking about.

Wizards, after all, were nothing more than brazen liars. Every spell and curse there was had its roots in lies. The bigger the lie, the better the spell. Using Magic was lying to the universe in the most blatant way possible and getting away with it.

It was not a mindset that created trustworthy people. In fact, most Wizards cared about only one thing.

Their Research.

Magic was passed down through generations. With each generation, the study of Magic advanced, and the family gained greater power. With greater power came status and privilege.

Research. Discover. Achieve.

Those three words summed up their society.

Wizards lived in a state of constant competition. Everyone was a rival, and wizards would lie, cheat, and steal to gain even the slightest edge.

Erika hated it.

She had no time to play with cloaks and daggers. She had no patience for double-talk. She took little joy in betrayal. However, as much as she looked down on Wizard culture, her loyalty to the Duval family was rooted in the benefits she reaped from the relationship. Under their wing, her power and knowledge had grown by leaps and bounds. Thanks to their resources, she had advanced her research far more than her father and grandfather ever could.

Working for the Duval family was simply the sensible thing to do in order to get ahead in the world.

A bitter smile made its way to her face.

Even someone like her was not above playing the game. It was why she knew Jonathan Acker could not be trusted.

He was, after all, a Wizard.

The man would sell her out and betray her the moment it became convenient for him. Under the circumstances, there was only one thing she could trust Jonathan Acker to do.

She could trust him to look after his own interests.

Just like she would.

The man was to the Arundel what she was to the Duval, someone who owed everything he was to that family. If anything happened to Lord Arundel, he would not survive it.

He would act in the best interests of Lord Arundel. No, he would act in the best interests of the Arundel family, and the Arundel wanted a tie.

Unless, she thought while looking at a map of Redfield, that was not what they wanted at all. He might have said otherwise, but she could not rule out the Arundel family being behind these events just yet.

Winning the game would bring little glory to either family. Furthermore, it risked creating a feud between them.

However, taking Lord Duval's Magic might just be worth it. The Arundel family would gain a substantial power increase. The loss of its heir would cripple the Duval and tarnish their reputation forever.

If that was the case, then Jonathan Acker's actions were little more than a way of ensuring her inaction while he prepared whatever he needed to.

Erika pursed her lips.

She could not let that happen.

If the Duval went down, she would go down with them.

Her course of action was clear.

She needed to protect her Lord.

It was, she supposed, possible Jonathan Acker was as good as his word. He might have been honest in his desire to help. Right now, he might be doing his best to find the culprits and deal with them in an efficient and safe manner, ensuring the game progressed as planned.

Erika Dahl did not believe the world was such a kind place.

Not for Wizards.

For all she knew, the man could be trying to locate their base to launch an attack at this moment.

"Plotting. Mistress is plotting."

The words, spoken with a sibilant hiss, caused her to look up. Erika was a private person and rarely if ever let anyone inside her study.

Not humans at least.

A small, emerald snake slithered across the floor towards her. It rubbed its head against her shoe, an oddly affectionate gesture.

Erika frowned.

"Gandr," Erika said. "How many times have I told you not to interrupt?"

The snake raised its head to look at her eyes.

"Mistress is plotting," the snake said as if that explained everything.

Its mouth did not move yet without a doubt the sound came from the snake. There were no hidden speakers around. It was no trick or prank. The snake could talk, sometimes entirely too much for Erika's liking.

Erika pinched the bridge of her nose. "I am not plotting," she said. "Not really."

She was preparing herself. The difference was quite clear, and all who thought otherwise clearly did not know what they were talking about.

"Plotting," Gandr insisted, raising his head. "Gandr can't be fooled. Mistress is making that sort of face."

What face? Erika suppressed the urge to check herself in a mirror. She would not give her Familiar the satisfaction.

"We can't trust the Arundel," she said, only partially for Gandr's benefit. Voicing her thoughts often helped her think better.

"It is possible they are the ones behind the oddities of the duel," she said, turning her gaze back to the map.

"Besides," she said, running a finger over the map, "even if they are innocent, we can only trust them to look after their best interests, not ours. As we speak, Jonathan Acker is focusing his efforts on scouting the town. Who knows what advantage he will gain from it?"

She blinked.

In that case, she thought, the answer was obvious, was it not?

"If Jonathan Acker is going to focus his efforts on the entire town, we just need to focus ours on one spot," she said.

Gandr let out a high sounding hiss which she had long ago learned was the snake equivalent of laughter. She ignored him, her mind already on the task at hand. The barriers protecting Lord Duval were... adequate. They had been made with only the duel in mind. If the Arundel family wanted to be serious, she would have to make adequate adjustments.

If the Arundel desired to strike, she just needed to raise a fortress.

All too easy, she thought, a smile tugging at her lips. She just needed to plan this right.

In that moment, the door to her room slammed open. Her smile died upon seeing the intruder.

"Lord Duval," she said, standing up and offering a small bow.

The heir of the noble house of Duval was a man in his mid-twenties with red hair, high cheekbones, and clear blue eyes. He was tall, good-looking, and well-dressed.

Erika disliked him. He had all his late father's ego and none of the experience to back it up.

Duval marched in, not bothering with greetings. "Why have the men moved?" He asked.

"I did not give any order," he said, waving an arm around. "Why have the men moved if I have not given any order?"

Erika fought the urge to wince.

Not good. Not good at all.

Lord Duval was not aware of the situation. To be precise, she had not deemed prudent it to make him aware of the situation. Should Lord Duval learn the truth, he would no doubt charge outside looking for the source of trouble.

She couldn't have that.

She could not allow Lord Duval to place himself in such a potentially dangerous situation.

"There was... a slight situation, my Lord," she said with deliberate slowness to give herself time to think.

"A slight situation?" Lord Duval repeated, eyebrow raised. "A slight situation is the reason why most of my men are not here? Does that sound like a slight situation to you?"

"My lord, you must understand the limitations of the men you command," she said. When in doubt, appeal the arrogance. "They are rejects. Most of them are only First Generation Magic Users."

First Generation Magic Users. In plain terms, people who were completely new to the world of Magic. They had no research to support them and usually little in the way of resources. The lowest of the low.

The only people desperate enough to gamble everything on the chance to gain a little power.

The complete opposite of Lord Duval.

"I am well aware of the limitations of Wizards from lower class families," Lord Duval said, in one breath agreeing and insulting her. It was the only art he could claim to have mastered. "What I ask is who gave them permission to act without consulting me? Does a 'slight situation' somehow take precedence over my authority?"

The words were delivered with the natural arrogance that can only be gained from high birth.

Lord Duval had knowledge, resources, and power to spare. Far more power than any ten First Generation Magic Users combined.

An idea took shape in Erika's mind.

"So, I ask again, why are the men gone? Who gave the order?" He asked, his eyes peering into hers.

She lowered her gaze. "I did, my lord," she said.

"You. Gave. The order," Lord Duval repeated, each word enunciated with patronizing slowness. "Remind me of our positions, Erika. Who do you serve?"

"The Duval family, my lord," she replied without missing a beat.

"And who am I?" He asked, putting a hand on his chest.

Erika kept her face blank. "You are the heir of the Duval."

"Exactly. Heir of the Duval family. Future Lord of the Duval family," Lord Duval said, patting his chest. "I give the orders. You were put here to follow. Not lead."

It was not true. Duval's mother had placed her so she could manage everything and make sure her son did not mess things up. However, it was not something she could say out loud.

No matter how much she wanted to.

"Of course. You are right, my lord. My apologies," Erika said, fists clenched at her sides.

"Good," Lord Duval said with a satisfied smile. "I shall overlook your offense this time."

A paused filled the air. Lord Duval looked at her, expecting.

"You have my gratitude, Lord Duval," Erika forced the words out of her mouth.

Duval nodded. "Now, recall my men and make sure this does not repeat itself."

Erika bowed. "It shall be done, my lord."

"See, that it is," Lord Duval said, dismissively.

"There is just one more thing," Erika said, stopping Lord Duval as he was about to leave.

"What?" The word came out fast, strong, and with more than mild irritation.

"I must apologize for this," Erika said, not sounding sorry at all.

Lord Duval never had a chance. He had been too busy grandstanding and looking down on his subject to pay attention to the rest of the room.

He never noticed the small snake slithering behind him.

He yelped as the green snake struck, sinking his fangs on his ankle. Duval's face twisted in anger.

It was already too late.

Duval stopped. His whole body went as still as a statue, except for his eyes which could only look around in confusion.

"Gandr has a really strong poison," Erika explained with a small smile on her face, as she bent down to pick the snake. "You will be paralyzed for a day. Perhaps two. It varies from person to person."

It was not a natural poison. It was product of the many modifications she had made to her Familiar in order to make him suitable for her needs.

Erika watched as a myriad of emotions passed through Duval's eyes. Confusion. Rage. Fear.

Meanwhile, hers only contained one: Vindication.

"Do not misunderstand," she said, moving to lock the door. "I am not betraying you."

"Baad," Gandr said in a sing-song tune, wrapping himself around her hand. "Mistress is baaad!"

Erika glared at the snake, shushing him before continuing. "I am merely doing what your mother commanded. I am acting in the way that best ensures your safety. Your cooperation is preferred but not required."

The rage in Duval's eyes showed what he thought of her words. Erika could not find it in herself to care. She held no love for Duval. Only his wealth and power were worthwhile.

She planned to make good use of the latter right now.

"You see, my lord," she said, spitting out the word like a curse. "You will be making yourself useful. Perhaps for the first time in your life. You will provide the power I need."

She could do it alone, but the risk was too great. If she powered up the protective spells, she would be ill-prepared for what may come. Meanwhile, Lord Duval had power to spare and they lost little by not having him around.

He was more useful as a battery.

"Mistress is going to be in trouble!" Garnr said, bobbing his head from side to side.

Erika pursed her lips. He was not wrong. Lord Duval could make things troublesome for her after this.

Very troublesome.

Like it or not, he would one day inherit all the Duval family had. Her included.

Good thing she had a plan for this.

"Only if he remembers, which he won't," Erika said as she began to move the furniture of the room to create more space. She was going to need it for what she had planned. "I will modify his memories after this is all over."

"It is completely safe I assure you," she added, seeing some panic appear on Duval's face. "There should be no lasting effects, and even if you do feel some pain, you will forget all about it."

She smiled.

"Take pride, my lord. You will finally make yourself useful."

Lord Duval could only look as she started preparing the spell.

# Chapter 8

One hour.

I had been wandering around Redfield for one hour.

No clues. No mysterious people. No sudden attacks. Just empty streets, sore legs, and unbearable humidity.

I felt betrayed. Movies and TV shows make it seem like you can't walk one block without running into something interesting. In reality, looking for clues was more like working in the ugly, little shop in the mall no one goes to, where the hardest thing one must do is try not to fall asleep behind the counter.

Oh, I hated that summer job. Even with Rob and Eric occasionally dropping by to be as annoying as possible, it was boring. Probably because Dana never visited... which had been one of the first signs the relationship wasn't going to work.

I sighed. Oh well, at least there was one thing... three things going my way. Kind of.

One, I had gotten a chance to use the backscratcher.

It was awesome.

I had also managed to procure another bike. Doing this by foot would really suck.

As for the last thing, well, it was more of a hunch.

I am sorry to say my bad guy catching experience does not go beyond big and small screens. I haven't even read detective novels except for that one time we had to read Sherlock Holmes for class.

Really, who on Earth wants to read what's essentially a 100-page guessing game?

That's just wrong.

But I digress. I might not have incredible powers of deduction, but I did know one thing.

I was hungry.

Redfield wasn't large but riding a bicycle all day took its toll on a guy. I might be a wizard now, but I still needed to eat just like everyone else. Magic was not a substitute for the simple things in life.

If you were going to wage a multi-day battle, well, you would need food, right? Each team probably had supplies.

But what about the other guys?

They might have brought something with them, but would that be enough? Running around. Hiding. Doing Wizard stuff.

That had to tire a guy.

Example: Me. I could marry a cheeseburger right about now. If these guys were anything like me, they were going to need a place with food.

In a small town like Redfield, their food options were limited. The main plaza had the highest concentration of restaurants but it was too visible. I could try looking for other fast food restaurants around town, but I had a better target in mind.

Super Markets.

If you were going to hide somewhere, might as well do it in a place with food. Super Markets had food, space, air-conditioning, nice parking lots, and more.

As far as hiding places went, they could do much worse.

Best of all, there were a grand total of two in town.

I was on my way to one, Gnome's, home to all your favorite products at low prices and destroyer of small businesses everywhere. The second part of the slogan was not official, but I bet they take pride in it too. At least, that's what mom always said.

Gnome's had a large parking lot. Rare was the day it was full, but today the cars shined by their total absence.

There were no signs of forceful entry. Then again, with Magic it was possible to break in without leaving visible signs. Jonathan Acker had shown me that much.

I made my way around the building to check the back door. The streets were quiet and the sun stronger than it had any right to be at this hour. I tried to stick to what little shadow the walls provided with little success.

When I finally got to the back door, I was almost disappointed by how neat it looked. No broken doors. No noises. No nothing.

I sighed.

Oh well. I guess it was too much to hope for.

"Don't. Move."

I froze. I hadn't felt anyone. I hadn't seen anyone. I hadn't heard anyone, yet someone was there. Someone had sneaked behind me.

Something was pointed at the back of my head. I could feel it pressing against my scalp.

Blood drained from my face.

Please, let it not be a gun.

It hadn't really entered my mind. I had been too dazzled by the supernatural happenings, but the feel of cold steel made me realize something with stark clarity.

I could die.

Those three words echoed in my mind for a small eternity. I wanted to run. I wanted to shout.

I didn't.

I was too scared.

"Drop the tool and raise your hands," the man said.

I did. My hands went up, and the Magic Tool hit the ground. Thoughts of using it didn't even cross my mind. Between pushing the trigger and focusing my will, I knew which one took less time.

"Take five steps forward and turn around. Slowly," the man commanded again.

I did as he asked and by doing so got my first look at him.

He had brown eyes and black hair. He was tall, thin, and kind of scruffy. I couldn't help but be reminded of a scarecrow.

Mostly, I focused on the gun.

I had never seen one before, not outside movies at any rate. It was all steel and shiny with the empty blackness of the barrel entirely too close for comfort.

"Where did you get this?" The man asked, holding up the backscratcher with his free hand. He had picked it up when I had my back to him.

"I found it," I lied on instinct.

Not a good idea.

The thin man's eyes narrowed, and I felt the air around me grow thicker. Literally grow thicker.

Magic. I understood it at once. He was gathering it. Focusing it.

"Kid, I'm not going to ask again," the scarecrow said. "You did not find this thing lying around. I know the owner. There are very few circumstances that would make him let go of it."

Not good. Not good at all.

"Look, I swear I don't know what's going on," I said, putting my hands in front of me and talking as fast as I could. I didn't even have to fake panic. The gun took care of that. "I woke up and everyone else didn't. I was just walking around. Next thing I know, some guy grabs me. I got a lucky shot. Knocked him out and ran. I grabbed that thing by accident. That's all. I swear!"

I was gasping for air when I finished. I wish I could say I didn't sell out Acker out of some sense of nobility, but really? I just didn't think of it.

I could only hope at this point, hope Mister Scarecrow didn't shoot.

"So that's what happened," the man said, frowning. "I figured something happened to him once he stopped communicating with us."

Oh yeah, I had just confessed to knocking out the guy's ally.

Guns did wonders for a guy's thinking ability.

"And that would make you... an Irregular," he said, drawing out the last word, almost as if tasting it. The sudden intensity in his eyes cut my thoughts short.

"I have heard about you. Guys who lucked out. You got some nice affinity with magic right from the get-go. Must make you feel pretty good, right? Make you feel you're better than us chumps who are just scraping by."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I said, taking a slight step back. "I'm sure this is all just a misunderstanding. If we just calmed down and talked-"

"And now you just knocked out my pal from the competition," Scarecrow said, voice growing more heated. "No more magic for him. Not ever. He had real talent, you know? He had all these ideas. Just needed an extra push to be great, and then you just take him out with a lucky shot?"

Alarms blared inside my head as the air grew even thicker. I screwed up. I really screwed up.

"To top it off, you steal his Magic Tool!" He said, holding up the backscratcher. "He worked hard to understand this thing. Day and night. I saw him doing it. Now it's all useless to him. You took his magic away!"

I was going to die.

I was really going to die.

I snapped my eyes shut. My whole body tensed, waiting for what was to come.

And waited.

And waited.

Tentatively, I opened an eye. To my profound sadness, Acker hadn't come to rescue me. Scarecrow was still there as was his gun. His gaze was unfocused. His free hand was near his ear... almost as if he was on the phone.

I bit my lower lip, thinking on my choices.

I could run for it, but I had no confidence in my ability to get away.

Gun were scary, you know?

One shot. Bang. Dead.

"You've got to be kidding me!" Scarecrow shouted, drawing a surprised look from of me. He looked as if he wanted to say more, but stopped himself. Respect, caution, fear? I didn't know.

Was he talking to someone?

Or he was crazy. That could be it too.... Please let him not be crazy. If someone was pointing a gun at me, at least let him be sane.

Scarecrow sighed. As he did the tension disappeared from the air. Magic normalized, and I had to fight the urge to fall to my knees.

"Fine," Scarecrow said, sounding like a petulant child talking to his parents.

Not that I had any intention of saying that aloud.

"You got lucky," he said, finally deeming it fit to address me. I wasn't quite sure what the proper reaction was.

Proper was left behind a couple of miles ago and set on fire.

"Thanks?" I tried.

"Oh, don't thank me," Scarecrow said. "If I had my way, we wouldn't be having this conversation, but the boss wants to talk to you. Turn around. We are going inside."

I shivered but did what he said.

He led me to the back door. The doors opened on their own once we got close enough. There were no lights on which made it hard to see what was inside. Nevertheless, one thing was clear.

I had gotten it right. This really was their hideout.

As we walked into the shadows, the thought failed to be comforting in any shape or form.

Being right was not what was cracked up to be.

Who knew?

# Chapter 9

It was so dark I could barely see beyond my nose.

Electricity should work just fine. I wouldn't have been able to spend all morning in front of the TV otherwise. Either they liked the dark, shadowy look or they could actually see just fine here.

"Take three steps forward then turn left and keep doing."

Going by the complete lack of trouble Scarecrow had giving orders, I was guessing it was the latter.

After passing through an entirely too long hallway, Scarecrow pushed me into a larger room. I wish I could have admired the details, but it was as dark as the rest of the place.

I only knew one thing for certain.

This place was a bit too weird.

I worked in a store last summer. I knew my way around one.

This wasn't it.

The back door should have led into some sort of bigger storage. Instead, there were a bunch of smaller rooms, several doors, and all-too-narrow hallways. The rooms and sizes were all wrong. However, I did not have time to think about what it meant. Other concerns took priority.

My continued existence, for one.

"I brought him like you asked, boss," Scarecrow said once we came to a stop, confirming my suspicions. He had been talking to his leader.

Joy, they had telepathy.

"So you're the Irregular," the boss spoke from the shadows.

"I guess so?" I said. I was starting to get tired of that word. You'd think it was an insult the way they threw it around. Given just how little I knew, it just might be.

"You guess so," he repeated. His voice was rough, kind of hoarse actually. "Let's do away with the titles then. Give me your name."

"Michael," I said, not seeing anything I could gain by lying about this bit.

"Michael," he tasted my name. "Okay. Tell me, Michael, do you understand what type of situation you are in?"

"I understand Scarecrow over there has a gun pointed to my head."

Behind me, I heard Scarecrow grunt. My whole body tensed up.

Okay, maybe I didn't understand my situation. Those words were so not worth it. Please, let him not have a twitchy trigger finger.

I got no further reaction from him. The boss, on the other hand, laughed. Not for long. It was quick and loud, almost bark-like.

I hoped that was a good sign.

"Good, you have a grasp of the obvious. That will make things easier," the boss said. "Right now, my associates and I are competing for certain resources against another group. To that end, you will notice your hometown has undergone certain... changes."

That was a nice way of speaking while saying very little at all.

Was it a Wizard thing?

Please let it not be a wizard thing.

"Like the entire town falling asleep?" I asked. I don't know if he heard my conversation with Scarecrow, but it seemed like a safe bet. In any case, I needed to keep up the act.

I was just some kid who had woken up and knew nothing about Magic.

It was easy enough since it was the truth. Mostly.

I really hoped this guy couldn't read minds.

"That's part of it, yes," he said. "Tell me something. Do you believe in Magic?"

There was something about the way these people said that word. This guy and Acker. You could hear the capitalization. The reverence.

"I'm not going to lie," I said, struggling to keep my voice even. "Right now, I'd believe whatever you'd tell me."

"An open mind. Good. Makes things easier. Then take the following as the absolute truth. Magic is real, and we are Wizards. That should be easy enough to get, right? Though... perhaps a demonstration is in order?"

My body tensed as I felt the Magic on the room thicken.

Then I saw the shadows move.

Literally move.

Like the Red Sea parting before Moses, the shadows moved away from me, forming a perfect circle with me at the center. There was no light. It was just... not dark.

The show wasn't over. Shadows ran through the ground like a small stream and gathered in a small pool in front of me.

The pool went up.

Inky darkness rose up into the air and gathered in a single sphere of darkness just a feet away from my face.

I had been teleported. I had been a victim of that one guy's backscratcher of doom. I had felt my body drown in Magic.

However, this was just... whoa...

"I trust that clears all your doubts." The words startled me into attention.

"Now, maybe you can help with a question of mine, Michael," he said. There was a note in his voice that had me on edge. I felt sweat drip down my back.

"Why were you carrying that backscratcher?"

Crap.

"It's a bit of an odd choice for a weapon. Not exactly durable material. The reach is not stellar. Even if you don't have a gun, a kitchen knife or a baseball bat would make for better weapons. Even a broom would do. Yet here you are, carrying a backscratcher."

My whole body went cold.

I needed to think. I needed to think fast. "Look, I-I... I just panicked and-"

"Do not. Lie. To me."

His words cut through mine. I could feel the Magic in the room grow dense, ready to strike. I couldn't hide my flinch.

"Oh, and there is that too," the boss said, his tone lighter now. "You can feel when we are about to use Magic, can't you?"

It was an assertion, not a question. I had been too obvious when they had used Magic. I couldn't help it! I could feel it! Magic was literally everywhere right now. It was uncomfortable all the time, but when someone actually used it I could barely get any air in!

I hadn't even thought of an excuse for why I was walking around carrying a Magic Tool. It obviously outed me as someone who could use it because why else would I carry the damn thing?

Ah, enough! I just needed to think of an answer. There had to be a way to spin this right.

I was caught, but not exactly doomed.

"I can feel it," I said, my thoughts running faster than my mouth. "The way the air in the room gets thicker, like it's all covered in molasses. I have been able to feel it since I woke up. When that guy attacked me, I managed to grab the backscratcher and... use it. I guess that's what I did?"

Silence met my words. I still had my head where it was supposed to be. I considered it a good sign.

"Interesting," the man said. "You became aware of Magic the moment you woke up. No, that's not it. You woke up because you became aware of Magic. Irregulars are really something. I'm jealous. How about you?"

It was obvious the question was not directed at me. Scarecrow's reply was just an unhappy grunt.

Someone really didn't like me. Joy.

On the plus side, the boss hadn't caught on to my lie.

"Now, what to do with you?" the boss said. "What do you think we should do with our friend here, Daniels?"

Huh, Scarecrow had a name, a last name at any rate.

"We knock him around a little and add him to the pot," Scarecr- Daniels said.

If they noticed the way I sucked in air after he said that, they did a good job of ignoring it.

"That's an option. An Irregular should have quite a hefty amount of Magic to share between us three, but I think I have a better idea."

I heard a snap of fingers. The orb of darkness in front of me faded away.

"You said you could use Grant's Magic Tool," the boss said. "How about a demonstration? Daniels if you would, please."

I head Daniels' signature grunt before he threw the backscratcher at me. Not being able to see much, I fumbled before dropping it to the floor. Blushing, I bend down and picked it up.

"I recommend trying your best," the boss said. "I won't have a reason to keep you around if you can't use it well."

Either use it or get added to the pot as Daniels had so eloquently put. Message received.

Alright. I took a deep breath. I could do this.

"Oh, and by the way? Trying to attack us will not work out for you," the shadow manipulator said.

I could almost feel the anticipation radiating from Daniels, a grim reminder of my position. I was surrounded by darkness in a room with at least two other people. One of them had a gun aimed at me and wouldn't mind a chance to use it.

I had no intention of giving him cause.

I closed my eyes and focused. Having my Magic awakened by Acker had hurt like hell. Actually using it? Considerably easier.

It didn't hurt that the Backscratcher did the bulk of the work. It was ready and waiting for a little jolt of power. I just needed to close my eyes, reach out, and feel the Magic all around us.

I lifted my arm and pointed the backscratcher to my side.

Gently, I... moved wasn't quite the right word here. Rather, I asked the Magic to move. From around me and into me. From my body to my arm and from my arm to the tip of my fingers and into the backscratcher.

The effect was instantaneous.

For an instant, I was aware of everything in the room. Even though most was out of my reach, every single part of the room was suddenly within my Grasp. Robert Browning would have been proud.

We were inside a storage room. At least, that's how it felt like with all the boxes lying around.

However, there was only one other person in the room.

Daniels was there, yet I couldn't feel his boss at all. I could feel his presence, his Magic. It was impossible for him not to be in the room, yet he wasn't in the spot where he should be.

As if he was a shadow.

That was not the end of the oddities. The room had no exits at all. I couldn't feel a single door or window. There were just walls all around us. It was ridiculous. I was certain we came in through a door, but it was nowhere to be found now.

That more than anything convinced me against trying to escape. I could probably throw Daniels pretty hard, but with nowhere to run, I'd have to actually fight these two. Not a pleasing thought. Plus, I had no idea what Shadow could really do just yet.

Instead, I locked on a set of heavy boxes and closed my Grasp around them. With a flick of the wrist, I swished the backscratcher and pulled.

The boxes came tumbling down.

I exhaled. The enhanced senses that came with using the Magic Tool vanished. The entire thing had taken three, maybe five seconds, but it had felt much longer.

"Impressive," Shadow said. "It seems we do have a use for you. Congratulations. Now please, take two steps forward."

I wanted to ask why. I also wanted to ask what the hell was taking Acker so long. His fancy tracking spell should be warning him I needed rescuing.

Right?

I did not let any of my concerns show. I took two steps and flinched as the shadows pooled around my feet and rose up like snakes, slithering around my body.

My neck to be precise.

A bead of sweat rolled down the side of my face.

"Try not to move."

He tried to keep his tone neutral, but I could hear the amusement lurking underneath. I tried not to give him the satisfaction of seeing me squirm.

I failed.

The shadows tightened around my neck in one painful instant. I gasped, bringing my hands around my neck.

Then it was over.

The pain vanished, yet an unnatural coldness remained around my neck.

"W-what did you just do?" I asked, not quite able to keep the anger out of my voice. Screw calm. That hurt!

"Just a little something to ensure your loyalty," he said. Even as he said that, I could feel the coldness around my neck gain intensity. "See, we have an important job to do, and since we are missing a member thanks to you, it is only fitting you replace him. Arundel and Duval will both fall today, and you, my friend, will help us."

"Of course," he added. "Should you fail to follow my orders, you might find your head a stranger to your neck."

A nervous laugh escaped my lips.

I really should have listened to the Arbiter.

# Chapter 10

Two Wizards and a charming yet miserable young man ride in an old, white Volkswagen Beetle to face off against powerful, rich Wizards.

If it sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, it's because it is one.

My situation had gone past bad, rushed beyond horrible, and knocked down catastrophic on its way to the finish line.

Then it had set itself on fire. Because why not?

Thanks to Shadow, my neck now sported a one-inch black line around it, like the type of tattoo only someone who was trying really hard would get.

It'd be nice if that was all it was.

I am not exactly clear on the mechanics but it hurts like hell when Shadow wants it to hurt. According to him, it could kill me too, and I was not willing to test it. Johnathan Acker, the one person who could probably get me out of this mess, shined by his absence.

So much for that improved tracking spell. If I wanted to survive, I was going to have to do as told. Which was why I was going to help these guys take out the heir of the Duval family.

Joy.

"Are we there yet?" I asked.

Beside me, Daniels fingered his gun without lifting his gaze up.

"How attached are you to that mouth of yours?"

Daniels had a couple of issues.

I raised my arms in surrender and went back to staring at the road. The gun still unnerved me, but their boss had told them not to hurt me. If I had learned one thing, it is that when that guy spoke people listened.

Or they didn't, and he put a Shadow Ring on their necks.

Persuasive guy, that Shadow.

So persuasive he didn't even need to be in the same car as us. He had given the orders and sent us on our way. I didn't even get to look at him. While we were headed for Duval's territory, he would deal with Arundel.

Being honest, I was not certain he would fail.

Call it instinct. Call it gut feeling. He felt strong.

I sighed and let my head rest against the window of the car. Another piece of the puzzle I had no clue what to do with. Having little else to do I turned my gaze towards my "teammates."

Gun-nut Daniels was sitting next to me. He was tense. His eyes darted around, taking every inch of our surroundings. A small bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. His gun was held tight in his hand. Occasionally he would send a glower my way. He really didn't like me. If it were not for Shadow, he would have used that gun on me by now.

It was a sobering thought.

On the driver's seat was the third and final member of our team. He was tall and tanned, possibly in his early twenties. Were it not for his scruffy, dark clothes, he would probably be considered handsome. He wore a beanie and, of all things, driving gloves.

He had introduced himself as Flores and told me he was our driver. That about summed up what I knew of the guy.

Sadly, I was lacking in the keen powers of deduction that would allow me to know everything about a person just from the dirt on their shoes.

I didn't even know much (or anything really) about Daniels. It was hard to believe I was supposed to attack some wizard with these guys.

I didn't even know what the plan was.

I didn't even know if there was a plan!

I was going to need to be less than subtle.

"Say, do you think we should introduce ourselves?" I said, raising my hand like a kid in class. "You know, names, likes, dislikes? What can we do to avoid meeting unavoidable doom? That sort of thing."

A lot less than subtle.

"Shut up," Daniels growled next to me.

Flores, however, laughed.

"Nah, it's okay, Daniels. Kid's got a point, you know? Can't go into the job all blind. That's bad business," he said. His tone was jovial. Almost excessively so given the situation. Well, my situation. His was probably a lot better what with being here willingly and all.

Lucky Bastard.

"Here's how it works kid," Flores said as though he wasn't only a few years older than me. "Duval has got some major power. We beat him up. We get his Magic. Meanwhile, the boss is going to kidnap Arundel and time it so we take him out at the same time as Duval plus all the other guys we captured in order to trigger a tie. That way, we get both their Magic. Everyone is happy, and everyone wins. Well, except the Nobles, but who cares about them?"

That lined up with what Acker had told me about the rules. Sorta.

"You're making it sound way too easy," I said, resting my head against the window.

"Oh, it is," Flores said. "We got the boss. You've met him. You felt it. The guy has some serious power and he's not afraid of sharing, unlike those other assholes."

I raised an eyebrow. "Share?"

"None of your damn business," Daniels snapped at me. Flores' easy laughter followed.

"Dude, chill," He said. "He's already with us. In for a penny, in for a pound. Be honest, you're with us, right?"

"I'd lose my head otherwise," I said, not bothering to lie about it.

"See?" Flores said, not taking his eyes off the road. "He's one of us now."

God, I could hear the smile on his face. Someone who just heard that should not be so cheerful. Regardless, it worked. Daniels grunted and went back to staring at the street.

"Anyway," he went on. "You're new to all this, so let me lay it out for you. Old families? Not the sharing types when it comes to Magic. They hoard. They sell and trade, but they aren't big on giving."

"No magical castle in Scotland then?" I asked, not being able to help myself. Flores did not seem to mind. If anything, his smile grew.

"Not a single one," he said. "Getting the basics is easy enough, but you're on your own after that. The guys at the top are not keen on helping us common folk figure things out. Not the boss, though. He went ahead and shared with us."

"Wait," I said, raising a hand. "You mean you knew him before all of this?"

"Well, duh," he said. "It's not like this was a spur of the moment thing. We planned it for a long while."

So much for randomly chosen participants. Not that I was supposed to know anything about that, which meant there were not many ways in which I could ask about it.

Lucky for me, Flores liked to talk.

"The boss is a class act," Flores said, either not minding or not getting the so-called "class act" had a thing for making death threats. "He bothered to teach people like us. Gave us the Magic Tools and everything. Well, not to me. I was already pretty awesome."

"Really?" I asked, not quite bothering to keep the sarcasm out.

"Oh, don't give me that look," he said, glancing at me using the rearview mirror. "I'm actually a Second Generation."

Daniels grunted, somehow managing to give the impression he now cared even less about what went on inside the car than two seconds ago.

"Second Generation?"

"Ah, right, you're noob." Flores made a face. "It means I'm the second generation of my family practicing Magic. Guys like you and Daniels here are First-Generation. The more generations your family has spent studying Magic, the higher you are in the world."

"And Duval?" I couldn't help but ask. "What about his family."

"He's like, what, tenth generation or something?" Flores cocked his head to the right and tapped his temple. "The Duval are an old family. It gets hard to keep track of them sometimes."

"So, one generation plus one generation plus two generations versus ten." I pointed at each of us. "Oh yeah, I'm feeling really confident right now."

"Pfft, everyone knows nobles are wimps." Surprisingly, it was Daniels who spoke up. "Haven't thrown a punch their whole life. Give them a good one and they fall just as easy as anyone else."

"That's the spirit," Flores said. "Cheer up, kid. The bossman has it all covered. He gave us the weapons. The way the town is now gives us something of a power boost. All we need is to reach Duval while the boss takes care of Arundel. "

When he said it like that, it almost sounded possible.

"Do you even know how to find Duval?" I asked after a while.

"Daniels and I were part of his team when this whole thing began so yeah, we know. We even took care of most of his guys already. Just like how the boss and Grant took care of most of Arundel's people." He looked ahead. "Besides, the guy is not exactly trying to stay hidden."

I leaned forward to see what he was looking at. Beside me, I felt Daniels doing the same.

My jaw dropped. I did not have to look to know Daniels' expression mirrored mine.

Giant stone walls waited one mile ahead of us.

They were ten meters tall at minimum and stretched for at least three city blocks. As someone who had lived in Redfield all his life, I could say with certainty that those had not been there the day before.

We had definitely found Duval.

"Ready for it boys?" Flores asked.

"No."

He chuckled and stepped on the accelerator.

~~~

We did a few laps around the structure. With its large stones walls all cut and carved, it made me think of an ancient fortress, something that would not look out of place in Ancient Greece.

I knew for a fact, it was only a few hours old.

We rode around it in silence. There were no guards or locks. Just one large, open gate which lead into a long hallway. We parked the car in front, staring at the fortress for a full minute.

Unsurprisingly, Flores was the one who broke the silence.

"So, do we go in or what?"

"I vote no," I said, raising my hand.

I got a grunt in reply. Guess from who.

"Yeah, I don't think that's really an option," Flores said.

"Then don't ask the question in the first place," I snapped back.

"Yeesh, no need to get testy," Flores said. "But fine, let's move. Everyone be on your guard. Keep the windows up, the doors locked, and your seatbelts fastened at all times."

I thought it was just figure speech until the car started moving.

"Wait, we're driving in?" I asked. Sure, the car would fit, but just barely, and there was no telling if the halls grew narrower as we went deeper.

"Relax," Flores said as his foot pressed against the accelerator, forcing me back. "This is the Flores family specialty."

"Driving recklessly?"

"Well, that too," He said as the Beetle accelerated through the narrow passage. Distantly, I could glimpse the road ending in a wall.

"Wall! There is a wall ahead," I said, but Flores did not even touch the break. The car swerved to the right, making a noisy 90-degree turn.

"Damn it, would it kill you to break!" I reached for my seatbelt and put it on. As I did, I could not help but notice the road was getting narrower.

Way narrower.

Yet the car kept going like nothing had changed.

What the hell?

"Don't look so scared!" Flores laughed at the look on my face. "The car is a Magic Tool. It goes everywhere, runs everywhere, and has amazing mileage."

Well, that... didn't exactly make me feel safer.

Okay, maybe a little.

"Ass," I said, prompting Flores to laugh harder. I might have heard Daniels snorting but I dismissed it as a figment of my overactive imagination.

To my surprise, Flores slowed down soon after. A little. Enough that our surroundings weren't a blur anymore at least.

Enough to see the road branched into two roads in front of us. One kept going ahead, the other made a sharp turn to the left.

"Well, isn't this something?" Flores said. Even Daniels leaned forward over the driver's seat to get a better look.

"An intersection?"

"The fourth intersection since we came in to be exact," Flores replied. Daniels and I stared at him. How had he even noticed while driving at that speed?

"And I get the feeling this is not the last we are going to see," he added.

Realization dawned.

This wasn't a fortress.

It was a labyrinth.

"Alright," Flores said, slowing the car down to a halt. "I'm open to suggestions."

"We don't have some sort of magical compass?" I asked, half-hopeful.

"Don't be stupid," Daniels scoffed. It was the most he had said in my presence since the time he tried to kill me. Progress. The gunman lowered his window and poked his head out.

"It all looks the same," he said, examining the walls. The passage was so narrow he could reach out to touch them.

He was, sadly, right. There were no distinguishing marks or clues. It was all the same carved stone. After looking around some more, he went back inside and plopped down on his seat.

"Right-hand rule," he said.

"Huh?" That did not come just from me. Flores turned to look at Daniels too.

"Right-hand rule," Daniels repeated. "When you are in a maze you always take the right in any intersection. If it's all connected you will eventually end up where you're supposed to go."

My jaw did not drop. It was a close thing, though.

"What?" Daniels shuffled under the weight of our stares. "I like mazes. Used to read about them."

Well, wasn't that just precious?

"Oh, nothing wrong with that," Flores said, putting his eyes back on the road and his hands on the wheel. "In fact, it's _all right_."

Oh God, he actually just said that.

"You actually just said that." I slapped my forehead as Flores laughed at his own pun.

"Never do that again," Daniels said as Flores started up the car.

I was in full agreement but I didn't say it out loud.

I'll be damned if I ever agree with that guy.

# Chapter 11

One hour and dozens of right turns later, something started to sink in.

This place was big.

Bigger than it looked from the outside. Much bigger. Some of the passageways were longer than the labyrinth's supposed diameter. Then there were the dead ends. I had lost count of how many dead ends we had run into. The car had covered several miles already, and we didn't seem to be any closer to the end than when we began.

Plan All-Right might work, but it was not going to work anytime soon.

"Okay, I am not going to lie, dudes. This is kind of really boring," Flores said as he took yet another right turn.

"Preaching to the choir," I said, leaning back into my seat. At the beginning, we had been on full alert, ready for any sudden attacks. Staring at nearly identical passageways for the past hour had a way of killing the tension.

Daniels didn't even grunt after I opened my mouth. He was trying to hide it behind his silent guy act, but I knew he was just as bored as Flores and I were.

"How is it so big?" I couldn't help but ask.

"Magic," Flore said. I glared at him which only caused him to laugh. "I'm serious. This is high-level stuff. Old family stuff. Duval's work probably."

"And you want to beat this guy up?"

Flores shrugged.

"We just need to get within reach of him. No one said that was going to be easy. Especially with the labyrinth and all."

He had totally said it was going to be easy.

"Can we take down the walls?" I asked.

"Those things are thirty feet tall, made of stone and who knows how thick," Flores said, counting with his fingers. "I could take down a few, but the car wouldn't survive and there's no telling how close we'd get to the center. Then we'd be stuck going on foot."

"How about you?" I asked, turning to Daniels.

"I have a gun, not a cannon," he said, lifting up the Tool in question. I sighed. At this rate, it was going to take ages to get there. There had to be an easier way to do this.

The main problem was the number of dead-ends. If only we could avoid them, we'd save a lot of time.

"How about you?" Flores asked. "Don't suppose you can use Farech to knock down the walls?"

"Farech?" I asked, puzzled.

"The backscratcher," Flores said. "That's how the other guy called it."

The mood in the car was suddenly uncomfortable. I could feel anger radiating from Daniel.

Right. These guys thought I had taken out their friend. While Flores didn't look like he minded, Daniels had apparently liked the guy.

"I'm not really sure," I said, trying to keep any discomfort out of my voice. I did not like the way Daniels was glaring at me.

"Eh, just try it," Flores said, apparently not feeling the tension. Wanting to get this line of conversation over and done with, I hurried to comply.

I closed my eyes and grabbed the backscrat... Farech. Yep, definitely Farech. It just sounded better.

I concentrated and focused Magic into it. I could feel my senses expand thanks to the abilities of the Magic Tool.

And just like that I found the answer to our problem.

"We can do it," I said, opening my eyes.

"You can bring the walls down?" Flores asked me. He was so surprised he actually turned to look at me. Even Daniels' gaze held some curiosity.

"Eyes on the road," I said. "Also, no."

I hadn't tried. While knowing what I could really do in terms of raw power would be nice, I also didn't want them to know what I could do, and I sure as hell didn't want to overexert myself over this. I had no idea what the effects of using too much Magic were, and I wasn't keen on finding out.

"Then you lost me," Flores said while taking yet another right turn.

I frowned, trying to think of the best way to explain it. It wasn't like I actually understood what I was doing here. Farech did most of the job. I was just the battery.

"Look, this thing doesn't just let me grab something that's far away," I said, holding up Farech. "It lets me feel everything around me as well."

"You get a feel of the maze," Daniels deduced, his eyes widening ever so slightly as he looked at me.

"Got it in one," I said, nodding. "When I use it, I can feel the maze for an instant. Not the full thing obviously, but some."

"What's the maximum range?" Daniels asked, his tone all business.

I frowned, looked at Farech, and sent a burst of Magic through it again. Once again, my senses expanded. I could feel everything that was out of my reach. The first time I had done this I had just locked on to a nearby object.

This time I focused on range. I tried to feel as far out as I could.

"Around 90 yards," I said opening my eyes. "Not enough for the whole thing, but-"

"But enough to discard more than a few dead-ends," Daniels concluded. "We can use that."

"Sounds good to me," Flores said. "Where to then?"

"Ignore the next turn and keep going straight ahead," I said.

"Hey, random question," Flores said while following my instructions.

"What is it?"

"Well, you get a feel of everything around you," Flore began.

I raised an eyebrow. "Yes, and?"

"So... does that mean you're feeling us up?"

A heavy silence settled over the car. Even Daniels was looking at me weird now.

I didn't. I could only feel things out of my reach. The car was small enough for Flores and Daniels to be within reach. Which meant Farech was effectively useless on them right now. I was not about to let them know that particular weakness... which left me with one awkward question to answer.

"Just shut up and drive."

~~~

Thanks to my directions, we managed to avoid a large number of dead-ends, which is not to say we avoided all of them. My range was just 90 yards after all. There were several passageways which were longer than that, and more than a few of them led absolutely nowhere.

Regardless, we were getting closer. We could all feel it. Literally. The walls of the labyrinth might look the same, but the air was different. Magic was different. Thicker. Denser.

We were getting closer to the source of the spell.

Closer to Duval.

Even the mellow Flores had quieted down, only occasionally opening his mouth to ask for directions. I was just about to give him the next set when I suddenly fell to the side, crashing against the window.

No, I didn't fall.

The car did.

I blinked, dazed, my body still in motion, the car still in motion.

Something had hit the car from the below.

"Hold on!" Flores shouted as he tried to regain control but it was no use. The car gave one last violent turn before landing on its back, wheels facing the sky. The seatbelts protected us, but I could barely tell my left from my right. I felt like someone had taken my brain out and played football with it. Judging by their groans, Flores and Daniels were not doing much better.

"Is everyone okay?" Flores asked.

"Y-yeah... just don't shout," I said, holding my head. Why couldn't everything stop trembling?

Thump

Wait....

Thump

"Do you feel that?" I asked.

Daniels swore. He was looking at something through the window. Flores and I followed his line of sight.

Thump

It was a hoof.

A big hoof, which led to an impossibly thick leg and, presumably, to a proportionally adequate torso.

Thump

It was heading for us.

"We need to get out of here!" I said as I struggled to unfasten my seatbelt and open the door. Daniels scrambled to find his gun. He had dropped it during the crash.

"Wait!" Flores said. "You can't run faster than my Beetle."

"Your car can't run at all," I snapped.

"Magic, remember?" Flores shouted. "You have it. Use it!"

Thump

My face heated up. I scowled but didn't argue. The thing was just a few yards away. I focused and activated Farech. The exterior of the car was now within my grasp. Nothing seemed broken so at least there was that. I grabbed the underside of the car and _pulled_.

Four wheels hit the ground and Flores hit the accelerator with all he had. The engine roared as we sped away.

As we escaped, Daniels and I looked back to see what we were up against.

I gasped in surprise and I am positive Daniels did too. Watching the hoof had led me to believe it was some sort of animal. I had only been half-right.

Like the rest of the labyrinth, it was made entirely of stone. It was five meters tall with large muscles and broad shoulders. It had a long snout and sharp teeth. Two long horns grew from the sides of its head, and its hands ended in claws bigger than any knife.

It was a Minotaur.

It was running towards us and gaining speed with each step.

"Floor it!" Both of us shouted at Flores who hurried to comply.

"A minotaur!" I couldn't believe it. "It's a damned stone minotaur!"

"I see it," Flores said, one eye locked on the rearview mirror. "This is some serious next level stuff!"

"Explain," Daniels said, now with gun in hand. His gaze shifted between the Minotaur and his weapon. Against that massive beast, a gun left a lot to be desired.

"Don't waste bullets," Flores said. "That's a golem. It's not alive. Your gun only works on living targets."

I filed that comment for later. Any edge over Daniels was a good edge.

"Look," Flores said. "This is not some random Magic Tool acting out. This is really complex stuff. I mean, a labyrinth with a Minotaur in it? Doesn't that ring any bells?"

"Theseus and the Minotaur, yes," Daniels replied, drawing a stare from me again.

He really did know his labyrinths.

"What does that have to do with anything?" He asked. I was inclined to agree. So Duval liked his myths and had a flair for the dramatic. Who cared about that when there was a monster chasing after us?

"It has everything to do with this!" Flores said while swerving to the right, the Minotaur hot on our trail. "Keep your ears open. This is a free Magic Lesson! Using objects for Magic? That's beginner's stuff. That's your gun, my car, and his backscratcher. It's the basics."

"All this?" He said, gesturing at the surroundings. "This is not him doing a themed attraction. This is the Minotaur's Labyrinth! He's tapping into that story and recreating it with us as the sacrifice. That thing is not going to take hostages. It's going to eat us because that's what the Minotaur in the myth did to anyone who entered the labyrinth."

Oh.

I gulped.

"Oh hell," Flores said. His wide-eyed stare was aimed straight ahead. Daniels and I took our eyes off the Minotaur for a moment to see... oh hell.

We were on a dead end. In all the chaos, I had forgotten all about using Farech to check the road ahead and give Flores instructions. If we kept going, we were going to run into the wall. If we stopped, the Minotaur was going to get us.

"Seatbelts!" Flores shouted. "All of you! Seatbelts on! Now!"

"Flores?" I asked, noticing he wasn't slowing down. "What are you doing?"

He didn't stop.

"Flores?" I tried again.

"Trust me." He tightened his grip on the wheel. "This is no normal car."

I was going to die, I thought as the wall grew closer to us. I was going to die in a ball of fiery death.

I braced myself for the impending crash.

It never came.

"UP!" Flores shouted, pulling at the wheel with all his strength. The car's front jumped off the ground, and the front wheels made contact with the walls. I was thrown back into my seat as the car started to run up the wall as though it was flat land. One meter. Five meters. Ten meters. The car kept going with no signs of being pulled down by gravity.

As we reached the top, the car switched from vertical to horizontal position and kept running over the wall.

"Woohoo! How about that? My beetle is awesome, ain't it?" Flores laughed as Daniels and I struggled to catch our breaths.

"First of all, yes. Second, you could have done that the entire time?" I wanted to punch him. "Why didn't you do it sooner? We could have driven over this whole thing!"

"A couple reasons. One, we are easy targets like this," he said. Sweat shone on his forehead. "Two, this is nowhere near as easy as I'm making it look. The walls are barely thick enough to support the car and wall running is pretty tiring. Plus... you've got to be kidding me!"

I heard it before I saw it through the rearview mirror. A loud crash rang through the air as rock crumbled just a few yards behind us.

It had broken down the walls. The stone Minotaur roared as it lifted a chunk of stone the size of a car over its head.

"Dodge!" Daniels shouted. Flores was already on it, turning the driving wheel for all he was worth. The Beetle slid down from the top of the wall, down the side, and back on the ground again. Less than a second later, the giant rock hit the spot we had just been in like a cannonball, scattering chunks of the wall all over the place.

"Okay, yeah. Easy targets. I get your point," I said as Flores did his best to dodge the falling rocks.

"You are the expert. Any ideas on how to stop this thing?" Daniels asked, and I really hoped Flores had an answer. My heart fell when I saw him shake his head.

"Just because I know the spell base doesn't mean I know a thing about how to undo this kind of spell," Flores said. "Short of trying to run my Beetle into him, I'm out of ideas. And between us, I'm pretty sure that will hurt us more than it will hurt it."

I bit my lower lip. This was Bad. Scratch that. This was BAD. All capitals. Forget about making it to Duval. At this rate, that thing was going to eat us. Even if we lucked out and found the exit, the Minotaur would still be after us.

I rubbed my neck. No other way around it, we needed to take this thing out if we wanted to make it out alive.

I took a deep breath and unfastened my seatbelt. "I'm going to try something," I said. Both Daniels and Flores threw weird looks at me.

"You think Farech is going to work?" Daniels asked.

I shrugged.

"No clue, but I got to try," I said while lowering the window and moving my upper body through it.

The giant stone beast slowly gained on us. Each of its steps caused tremors and left deep imprints on the ground. I raised Farech and guided Magic into it. Once again, my senses expanded. I could feel the Labyrinth. I could feel the Minotaur. I just need to push and-!

Something exploded in my brain.

I reeled back. My body slammed against the door, and I would have fallen out of the car had I not managed to grab hold of it just in time. It was only by sheer luck I did not drop Farech.

"Gah!" I clutched my head after retreating back into the car. Blood pounded in my head. My muscles screamed in pain. In stark contrast, the Minotaur kept going as if nothing had happened.

I glared at the beast while fighting the urge to throw up. The bumpy ride was doing me no favors right now. Ugh, I wanted to bury my head in pillows.

"Dude, what the hell just happened?" Flores asked, looking through the rearview mirror.

"Not so loud!" I winced. My own voice caused me pain. "And nothing happened."

"Doesn't look like nothing, kid." Daniels made no effort to keep his voice low. Jerk. I would have glared had I not been busy burying my head in the Beetle's seat.

"Ass," I said. "Nothing happened. To it. It's too strong to move."

The thing was.... what? Ten tons of stone moving at a hundred miles per hour at least? The moment I tried to grab it had taught me all I needed to know. I couldn't handle that much force. The Minotaur's reckless charge had broken my Grasp like tissue paper.

The ensuing feedback had been... not nice. Excruciating even. Someone might as well have replaced my head with a watermelon and smashed it with a hammer.

Daniels scoffed. "Useless."

I glared out of the corner of my eyes. "I'd like to see you do better," I shot back. "Oh wait! That's right! Your weapon might as well be a BB gun to that thing!"

"It's not a BB gun to you," Daniels warned me, keeping a tight grip on his gun.

"Neither is this," I said, holding up Farech. My horrible headache was overwhelming my self-preservation instincts.

"While I hate to interrupt this fascinating conversation, there is still the matter of _the Minotaur chasing us_!"

I looked behind us. "...oh that."

Good sense. Always were you least expect it.

I thought back on the glimpse of the labyrinth I got during my disastrous attack on the Minotaur. "Take the next right then keep going straight ahead."

"Got it!" Flores made the turn and we managed to lose the Minotaur from sight, if only for a brief instant. Three seconds later, the beast rushed back into our line of sight. Its powerful leg cracked the ground as the beast put all its weight on it to make the ninety-degree turn.

I frowned before using Farech to check out the layout of the labyrinth again. Good, the next turns were just close enough to give this a try. "Make a left next."

"What happened to right-hand theory?" Flores asked even as he followed my instructions.

"We are a bit beyond that now!" I shouted as we lost the Minotaur from sight in the next turn. "Right. Then left. Then another left and a right."

I held onto the front seat to avoid being thrown around as Flores proceeded to follow my instructions without slowing down in the slightest.

"Now stop!"

The Beetle came to a dead stop. The only reason I wasn't thrown forward was because I was already holding on to the front seat. Daniels was not so lucky.

Heh.

"Think we lost it?" Flores whispered.

I shushed him. All those consecutive turns had managed to remove us from the Minotaur's line of sight. That thing would now have to decide which route to take to find us. If everything went right, the labyrinth would work in our favor this time, giving us time to think of a more permanent solution.

A giant stone fist pierced through the wall of the labyrinth, dashing my hopes. The noise directed our gaze up just in time to see chunks of rock falling towards us. Flores had his foot on the accelerator before the second fist joined as the Minotaur tore the large wall like tissue paper.

Okay, that's just not fair.

"Okay, that's just not fair," I said.

"Yeah, who knew a Minotaur would be skilled in the complex art of following tire tracks?"

I glared at Daniels. I had known it was a possibility, but I had hoped the whole Sentient Stone thing worked in our favor.

It didn't even have real eyes!

"Actually, it didn't," Flores said, drawing our stares. "Follow the tracks, I mean. It didn't follow our trail. It broke through the wall to get us."

I blinked. Good point. If it had followed our tracks, it should be following the same path as us. Instead, it had broken the walls... as if it knew we were there in the first place.

"It knows." My eyes widened. "It knows where we are in the labyrinth."

"That'd be my guess," Flores said.

"How?"

"Magic," Flores said. "Some kind of tracking spell that connects the Minotaur and the labyrinth, like some sort of built-in GPS. Fancy stuff, but not unheard of."

"I thought we were protected from tracking," Daniels said. I did too. The way Acker had told it, all the fancy tracking spells put in place during the beginning of the duel didn't work on these guys.

Jonathan Acker sure as hell wasn't coming to rescue me.

"Not quite. The boss' Magic hid us from all the tracking spells already in place, but if someone puts a new one on us, we are fair game. We must have been caught in the spell the moment we entered the labyrinth," Flores said.

"So, both the Minotaur and the guy controlling it know exactly where we are?" I asked.

"Pretty much."

Well, so much for the element of surprise.

"Can you interfere with the spell in some way?" Daniels asked. It was a good question, one whose answer I hoped was yes.

"Are you joking?" Flores asked while making a left turn. The thought of waiting for directions had long since been left behind. "That stuff takes time and concentration. Both of which are going to be hard to find with a GIANT MONSTER chasing after us!"

"But you could do it if you had time," I cut in before Daniels could make a retort. My eyes locked on the Minotaur as it turned to follow us, the ground cracking underneath its hoof.

"What? Maybe? I guess? I have some materials in my trunk, but, again, giant Minotaur."

"It's okay. I got an idea," I said.

"Is it going to be as good as your last idea or as good as the first one? 'cause let me tell you, you have a bit of a mixed record with us." Flores didn't even look at me. His gaze kept switching between the road ahead and the Minotaur in the rearview mirror and with good reason. What used to be 80 yards between us had become 50 and were decreasing fast.

"Just shut up and keep driving, I'll get us the time." I raised Farech. If everything went perfect, I might even kill the beast.

"You already tried using that," Daniels said. "It did not work back then."

I ignored him and closed my eyes, this time not even bothering to get up from my seat. I did not need to aim and doing it the first time had been stupid. Farech let me grab anything outside my reach. Everything else was immaterial. I did not need to see it. I just needed it to be outside my reach.

Now, as much as I hated to say it, Daniels had a point. I had tried moving the Minotaur, and it hadn't worked. The stone beast had been too much for me back then, and it was still too much for me now. I couldn't handle the strength of its charge.

I didn't need to.

Flores took a left. The car's tires screeched against the ground. Behind us, the Minotaur followed suit.

My senses spread out as I activated Farech. I could feel the huge body of the Minotaur. Its leg cracked the ground as it put all its weight into it to turn without slowing down.

Now!

I pushed.

The Minotaur's body crashed against the labyrinth's wall, breaking it down. The ground shook and a cloud of dust rose up, blocking our view of the fallen monster

I released the breath I hadn't known I was holding.

My back was soaked with sweat and my muscles felt a bit sore, but at least I did not have a splitting headache this time.

Flores' grin threatened to split his face in half. "First of all, Awesome! Second, how come it worked this time?"

"Explanations later. Keep driving. It's not over," I said.

"What do you mean it's not over- Oh, Apsu!"

I had no idea what that meant, but I was positive it perfectly captured our situation as the Minotaur walked out of the dust cloud. Had it been capable of sound, I am positive it would be roaring with anger. A few cracks were running along its body, especially in its knee. That was as far as the damage went. The beast took one step, then another and another, building up speed with each one.

"What now?" Flores asked.

"We keep doing it," I replied.

"What?"

"Keep on making left turns," I repeated.

"Do what he says," Daniels said, apparently having understood my plan. "It's not like you can do anything else."

Flores gave us a dubious look but took the next left turn regardless. I closed my eyes, paying attention to the sound of the Minotaur's footsteps as it moved closer to the turn.

Now!

Again, I guided Magic into Farech as the Minotaur came into view. Again, I felt it put its whole body weight into its leg.

I pushed.

The crash was deafening. Another wall came down as the Minotaur's body crashed into it.

I breathed.

"Just remember," I said turning to face what I hoped was a thoroughly convinced Flores. "Keep on Making Turns. Preferably left turns, but I get that's not always possible."

"You got it, boss," Flores said, prompting Daniels to snort at the title.

Whatever, I thought, turning just in time to see the Minotaur getting up.

I had this.

I couldn't handle the Minotaur's weight with Farech. Especially not when it gained momentum. That much was true.

Flores took another left. I repeated the process once more. The Minotaur went down again.

Cr-creak

That didn't mean I couldn't handle the Minotaur at all. If I had a limit on the maximum amount of force I could apply, I only needed to be smart about how, when, and where to apply said force.

Flores took another left. A new crash reached our ears.

Creak

The Minotaur's charge was a frightening thing. If it hit us, we were dead. However, that much force was also a weakness. It was hard to turn when running at top speed. In Olympic running events, the running track has curves not right angles. There is a reason for that. When the Minotaur forced itself to turn without even slowing down, it put all the weight of its charge on its leg. For one moment, all that force was concentrated on a single place.

It was a good way of messing up your leg, especially if someone was willing to help out.

Another turn.

Another fall.

Creak!

I didn't need to fight against the Minotaur's force. If I gave it just the right push when it turned...

Flores took a turn.

I applied as much force as I could on the Minotaur's knee.

CRACK!

The beast's limb broke. The ground shook one last time as it fell. In vain the Minotaur struggled to get up. Its leg lay some feet away, broken from the rest of its body. Not showing the slightest pain, the Minotaur tried to use its claws to drag itself through the ground with single-minded devotion.

It was for naught. It would never reach us now.

The sight would have been pitiful if the beast wasn't still so dangerous.

"Now THAT was awesome," Flores said, offering me a high five. For a moment, I contemplated leaving him hanging.

I didn't. I was feeling pretty good about myself right now.

"Let's get some distance first," I said. "It's not going to catch up to us anytime soon. We'll do the spell after."

No one disagreed with me. The beetle sped off, leaving the Minotaur uselessly crawling on the ground.

# Chapter 12

We drove for a few miles just to be on the safe side. After one final turn, the Beetle came to a stop in the middle of a rather small passage.

"Question," Flores said, as we stepped out of the car. "Do we even need to do this now that the Minotaur is down and all?"

"Does the spell allow Duval to sense us still?" Daniels asked, opening the trunk and taking out a tool box.

Flores considered the question for a moment, moving his head from side to side. "Yeah. It's not a sure thing, but certainly possible."

Daniels shoved the tool box into Flores' arms. "Then get working."

"Yeah, yeah." Flore opened the tool box. Curious, I glanced over his shoulder. There was not a single screwdriver or hammer there. Instead, the toolbox was filled with small, rectangular flasks full of ink. There were also a small number of brushes bundled to the side.

They were similar to the materials Acker had used to "Awaken" me. Did all Wizards use those then?

I hoped not. My drawing skills left much to be desired.

"I'm going to need the car cover in the trunk. Put it over the car," Flores said just as Daniels was about to close the trunk. The man grumbled before taking out the car cover and doing as he said.

I rose an eyebrow as Flores let himself drop to the ground and started taking out flasks from the toolbox.

"Why the car cover?" I had to ask. I really did.

Flores opened one of the flasks and began inking his brush. "I need the car covered with something. A car cover works well for this since it's already made to, you know, cover the car. To cover. To protect. To conceal. It's a bit of a stretch but I can work with that. Come to think of it, polarized windows could work too. Might have to get those in the future."

Both my eyebrows rose as I pieced what he was saying. "You're making a Magic Tool?"

"Nothing so complex... well, kinda," He said, as he began drawing patterns on the ground. "A Magic Tool is more... permanent. This is a bit more jury rigged. An ad hoc Magic Tool if you will. It's meant to work only on this occasion and only to hide us from this spell. Well, since it's meant to work for one specific thing, it's better at it compared to something I would make for a similar but more general purpose."

I nodded, managing to understand the gist of it. Flores really knew his stuff. Even Daniels was paying attention going by the way his gaze was focused on the symbols Flores was drawing on the ground.

Still, I needed to know more. "So, what if-"

"Ah, ah, ah!" Flores interrupted, wagging his finger at me without even looking away from his work. "Lesson time is over. No talking now. I need to focus. Unless you want me to mess up and explode us or something."

Not willing to test that theory, I shut my mouth and sat on the floor. Daniels, probably wanting to put as much distance between us, chose the opposite wall to lean against. Like me, he kept silent while Flores worked.

Flores drew two concentric circles around the car and several smaller ones on the car cover. After that, he began filling the circles with all sorts of weird symbols. Some of them were similar to what Acker had used on me. Others, not so much. As he moved, he made sure not to step on the ink.

Flores did not strike me as the type that cared much for details, yet he drew each symbol with a precise, steady hand and delicacy I'd have thought beyond him minutes ago. His forehead shone with sweat as he went about his task. One. Ten. Fifty. I lost count once he drew over a hundred symbols. Part of me wanted to ask what each meant, but I refrained. His warning was fresh in my mind.

I lazily twirled Farech. Did all Magic start out like this? People drawing a lot of weird symbols on the ground to get an effect? If so, I understood why Magic Tools were a thing.

Drawing the Runes took way too much time.

I bit back more than one yawn as the minutes passed. No wonder he said he needed time to do this. It'd have been impossible to do it with the monster chasing after us.

I glanced at the sky. The sun was still up.

I rubbed my neck. How much time had passed? An hour maybe? We hadn't even reached the end of the labyrinth yet.

This was going to be a long day.

"Done!" Flores jumped to his feet, taking a moment to admire his large and intricate drawing. Weird symbols were drawn all over the various circles he had made. There was barely any empty space between them.

"Not bad if I say so myself. Which I do. Alright people, watch and learn!" Flores kneeled at the edge of the circle and placed his hands on the ground, just barely touching the ink.

He closed his eyes and focused. I could feel the Magic around us respond to Flores' Will. It flowed like a river through his hands and into the ink, giving it power. One by one, the symbols lit up as Magic flowed through them. The light grew in intensity, forcing me and Daniels to cover our eyes before it faded into a soft red glow.

Little by little the symbols began to move. At first, I blinked several times trying to clear my vision, thinking it a mere trick of the light. However, it was no trick. The symbols Flores had drawn were now alive. They moved in circles, shrinking with each repetition. In the end, only five concentric circles no larger than my fist with odd symbols on them remained painted on the car cover.

I took another look at Farech's three Runes. Suddenly, I had a lot more appreciation for how they got there. If what Flores had just done was supposedly the quick and dirty method, I didn't want to imagine what was considered normal or, God forbid, long.

"That should do it," Flore said, standing up and dusting his hands. "Okay people, everyone in the car. We've lost enough time already."

Daniels and I stood still for a moment.

"Flores," I said.

"Please, anyone who saves me from a Minotaur gets to call me Miguel. Great work back there by the way," He said while extending his hand to me. I looked at it for a moment before shaking it.

"Yeah so, Miguel," I tried again as Flores vigorously shook my hand.

"Yes, what is it?" He said, still shaking my hand.

I thought back on what little I had learned about Magic Tools today. "The car cover needs to stay in the car to hide us, right?"

"Got it in one. So long as it's on, we'll be hidden." Flores puffed his chest in pride of his accomplishment.

"...How do we get in the car without removing the car cover?"

Daniels decided to add his unwanted yet ultimately necessary two cents.

"How are you going to see where you are going while driving for the matter?"

Flores' hand froze mid-shake. Almost mechanically, his head turned to look at the Beetle. The car was fully covered by a tightly secured car cover.

"Well, this is going to need some creative adjustment."

It did. It really did.

~~~

Some creative knife work later, the three of us were back in the car and driving through the labyrinth.

"As long as the Runes are not damaged, the car cover will work as intended," Flore had explained while cutting a large hole into the cloth so he could see through the windshield.

We had then cut two extra holes for the car doors. One for the driver seat and another one for the back seats.

I am not sure how right Flores was, but no Minotaur or Wizard had come chasing after us. For time being, we seemed to be safe and had gone back to our old Right-Turn strategy with some help provided by Farech's sensing power.

It was really boring.

That seemed to be the theme of the day. Long, boring moments followed by bursts of excitement that made me wish for the boredom to come back. I was growing fond of boring. Truly. People underestimated the value of boring. It was not great, but it was safe. Wonderful quality.

I scratched my neck.

Boring ensured your potential life would be measured in years as opposed to hours.

"You know, this is kind of boring."

Flores did not share my enlightened thoughts.

"Would you rather be attacked again?" I asked, propping my chin on my palm.

"Nah, but we could do something fun, you know?" Flore said. He took his eyes off the road for a moment to look at us. "You two are way too silent."

"We are on a job," Daniels said in a measured tone, the kind of tone that was too measured to be natural and just gave away he was way bored too. "This is not the time for fun."

Flores snorted. "Please, it's always time for fun. Oh! We could play a game!"

I raised an eyebrow. "A game?"

"Yeah, something like I Spy or 20 Questions!" He suggested, almost bouncing on his seat.

"The only things we are going to spy here are labyrinth walls and your car," I said.

"I didn't hear a no on 20-Questions," Flores said in a sing-song tone, moving his head from side to side.

I sighed. I was not exactly in the mood for games. I hated agreeing with Daniels, but he had a point. This was neither the time nor the place. Flores may have made us invisible to the labyrinth's tracking, but there were still ways to find us.

We were still quite visible for one.

It was the one reason we didn't just drive up to the top of the labyrinth and skipped all the way to the end. Beyond how much energy such a task would take out of Flores, they'd see us coming for miles.

"How about we just talk?" I suggested. I doubted I could change Flores' mind. He didn't seem like the type of guy who gave up easily, but maybe I could nudge this in a direction that suited me.

"Talk?" Flores tilted his head to the side. "About what?"

"Well, I am still new to the whole Magic thing." And by new, I meant hours new. Literally hours. "There are still tons of things I don't know. How do people even become wizards for one? "

I was probing for information and not being subtle about it. It didn't matter. Flores wasn't the most reserved person out there.

"Oh, there's tons of ways," Flores said. "It can be as easy as getting your hands on the wrong type of book and finding the stuff works. For example, before becoming a wizard, my dad was a mechanic. Loved cars. Taught me everything I know about them. One time, a client brought a fancy car to him. The guy had gotten it as part of some inheritance or something. I am not quite clear on the details, but it was a beauty. A genuine Countach!"

Flores turned, perhaps hoping to see recognition flash in our eyes.

He didn't.

"Come on! A Countach! The Lamborghini? Ranked 3rd out of the Top Ten Cars of the 70s? Ring any bells?"

Daniels and I just stared blankly.

"Philistines." Flores huffed and put his eyes back on the road. "Anyway, the guy could never make the car work the way he wanted it to. Didn't brake well. Didn't run well. All sorts of things. No wonder, really. The thing was Haunted."

"Haunted?" Daniels echoed and there was no mistaking the mock in his tone. "You're telling ghost stories now?"

Flores rolled his eyes. "Right. I keep forgetting you guys are noobs. Haunted Objects are a thing. Which you would know if you actually bothered to learn about Magic beyond using that gun. If you let me continue without interrupting, you might actually learn something"

Daniels glared but did not say more. The tall man crossed his arms and stared at the windows.

"Haunted Objects are not exactly rare," Flores went on. "They also have nothing to do with Ghosts. That's a confusing subject I'm not going into right now."

Wait, so ghosts were a thing too? I wanted to ask but given Daniels' recent interruption I was not sure another one would be well-received.

Stupid Daniels.

Flores scratched his head. "Eh, the full theory is a pain to explain, and you might not get it anyway so I'm going to simplify things a bit, okay? We use Magic Tools. My Beetle. Daniels' Gun. Farech. We deliberately use Magic to alter an Object's Function in order for them to serve a desired Purpose. That's a Magic Tool in a nutshell."

He made a face. "Turns out, all our careful preparations can be mimicked by accident under the right circumstances to create one unstable final product. Magic is tricky like that. When that happens, we call the end result a Haunted Object. It's not common. Chances of a person or group of persons making a Haunted Object are one in a million. But hey! When there are 7 billion people alive one in a million ends up being a sizable number."

I blinked. "That sounds... dangerous."

It also explained, at least, one haunted house documentary.

"It can be," Flores admitted. "It can also be rather harmless. The Countach was somewhere in the middle. It's funny in hindsight, but back then it was creepy as hell. One time it left the garage and parked itself in front of our house. We couldn't even fix the damn thing. Didn't help that the owner kept "forgetting" to pick the car up so we were stuck with it."

Flores somehow managed to grin and shiver at the same time.

"Somewhere in between various fixing attempts and thinking about calling a priest, dad started changing. See, his affinity with Magic wasn't bad at all, and the Haunted Object was giving him the nudge he needed to Awaken. He became aware of Magic. Once you Awaken, it's hard not to notice it. Can be a real pain sometimes. I'd pay good money to not notice Magic in here."

I nodded. The Magic around here felt like a swamp. I had no frame of reference for what was considered "normal" Magic, but I hoped it was nowhere near as bad as this.

Flores run a hand through his hair. "It was pretty weird for me. Dad started going to occult shops and stuff. I didn't know if he was going through a late Goth phase or an early midlife crisis. He had a room for all these weird books. If mom hadn't left a year before, she sure as hell would have the moment she stumbled on his collection."

"Eventually, dad managed to meet a real Magic User," Flore said. "The guy introduced him to our world. Good thing too, because dad finally had proof he was not going crazy."

"Hold on," I said, not being able to help it this time. "Earlier you said wizards didn't do sharing. Isn't that kind of the whole reason for this?"

"Wizards as a whole are not a sharing bunch," Flores said, annoyed, "but leaving a Magic User to his own devices is a recipe for disaster. Toying with Magic is dangerous if you don't know what you are doing... sometimes even if you do. Teaching the basics of the basics to a First Generation User is a duty shared by all Wizards."

I pointed at myself. "I can't help but notice no one has given me the basics."

"Yeah... sorry about that. These are really not the best circumstances, so you're getting something of a crash course." Flores smiled sheepishly. "I'll teach you some stuff when this whole thing is over. You got my word on that."

I smiled and nodded. "I'll look forward to it."

Provided I survived, that is.

Nevertheless, I was grateful for the offer. Part of it was due to Flores being the nicest person I had met all day, granted the competition was not exactly fierce. Flores just happened to be the one guy who had not tried to kill me or put me in dangerous situations. Still, he seemed like a genuinely nice guy.

I frowned. A genuinely nice guy who was part of a secret plan to take down the leader of a supposedly powerful family. I had to keep things in perspective. Can't afford to get too comfortable with these guys.

Flores grinned. "It'll be fun. Learning how to use Magic changes your life. It's Magic, you know? You really can't help yourself once you find it. You need to know what you can do with it. Let me tell you, my dad's mechanic skills got way better once he started adding Magic into the mix."

"You can do that?" Daniels gave up all pretenses of not paying attention. He put a hand on the driver's seat and leaned in till his head was almost side by side with Flores'.

Flores shrugged. "It's not like there is a law against it. Wizards have to make a living somehow. Using Magic to get an edge is just common sense. Tastier food. More comfortable beds. In dad's case, better cars."

Flores smiled. "Those were some good days, especially once Dad started teaching me as well. Man, I remember the first car I fixed up, a Toyota AE85 if you can believe it. I had some fun with it."

I had no idea what that car was but I nodded like I did. Besides me, Daniels did the same. It was possible he actually understood Flores' car-speak but I doubted it.

"So yeah, that's pretty much how I got into Magic," Flore said. "I started out at a young age so I have way more experience than you. I have my dad's old research. I grew up knowing which places Wizards use to hang out and so on. It may not seem like much but it is, and that's just one generation. Know what I mean?"

I nodded. Without Flores knowing how to cloak us, Duval would have already sent something else after us. No, even discounting his usefulness here, the way he talked and mentioned things was enough to make me realize how ignorant I was about Magic.

I'd like to think it was just me, but it didn't look like Daniels knew that much either.

If the gap between Flores and us was this big, I didn't want to imagine the gap between us and someone like Duval.

I sighed. "I'm jealous of you." I wish I could have found about Magic like that instead of all...this.

Flores chuckled and I got the feeling he would have reached out to pat my back had he not been driving. "Trust me, you won't be after we win here. You already have a good affinity. With Duval's added, you're going to skip crawling and go right to flying."

I smiled but refrained from commenting. I was nowhere near as confident as Flores about the whole thing. In fact, the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a horrible idea. We might as well be marching into the dragon's den. Hell, we already fought a Minotaur. For all I knew, there were dragons waiting for us.

Part of me still clung to the hope that Jonathan Acker would show up and rescue me.

"So what about you?" I tried changing the subject by bringing Daniels into the conversation.

Predictably, I got a snort and Daniels was soon looking out the window again.

Peachy.

Flores chuckled. "Don't let him bother you. I can tell you his story."

"Flores!" Daniels' glare had an edge of warning, but Flores just rolled his eyes.

"Oh, please! Like it's some big secret. There are dozens of guys with stories like yours. Just like there are dozens of guys with stories like mine. There are only so many origin stories out there, you know?"

Daniels' glare darkened but he ultimately just crossed his arms and looked out the window. "Fine! Whatever. Do what you want. Just don't expect me to pitch in."

"No problem! I can handle it just fine." Flores cleared his throat with excessive drama. "Once upon a time, our lovable gun nut was a normal guy like any other guy. Perhaps scruffier than most, but normal all the same. He lived his life day in and day out, not knowing he had a gift. A special talent."

From what Acker had told me, anyone could learn Magic when it came down to it. I wondered just how many talents went under the radar because no one taught them anything.

"One day, he met someone," Flore went on. "At first, he thinks the guy is a weirdo with all his talk of power and Magic, but it turns out, he means it. All the weird stuff he is talking about is real."

The cogs in my head turned as I moved my head to face Daniels.

"You just got randomly introduced to Magic by someone?" No. Not randomly. If I had it right then...

Flores chuckled. "Oh, not just someone. He got hand-picked by the boss himself."

Yep, I was right. I furrowed my brow. "I'm getting some mixed signals about Magic supposedly not being something people share. Because I'm hearing a lot of sharing here. "

Flores shrugged. "It happens. There is only so much a lone Wizard can do, especially when he lacks resources. He can't go to other Wizards because asking help means showing too much of his research to someone who will understand it."

I was starting to see where this was headed. I pointed at Daniels. "So they get some random schmuck instead?"

"It was not like that!" Daniels grabbed me by the collar. Hot anger twisted his face. That had been a taunt too far.

"Daniels," Flores warned before I could do anything. I could feel the Magic in the air grow denser as it answered Flores' Will.

Daniels met his gaze for one tense moment, before scoffing and letting me go.

Jerk.

"I had lost my job," he said. "Grant and I had fallen on hard times. The job market was bad. I was living like a beggar. Had to sleep on a park bench... The boss took us in. He taught us and helped us make something of ourselves."

I felt a twinge of guilt. Grant. The guy whose place I had taken. The original owner of Farech. Flores didn't seem to care all that much about it. Hell, I didn't care much... but now I got why Daniels did. They went way back.

"He didn't ask us to do anything," Daniels went on, his voice growing in strength. "He taught us how things worked in this world. How some glorified snobs hogged everything, preventing the really good people like the boss from doing more to help others. After everything he had done for us, you bet your ass we volunteered to help him!"

I wasn't sure how to take that. Daniels... he really believed Shadow meant to do good.

Which made a degree of sense. He wasn't the one with the shadow collar around his neck. He didn't have to worry about his impending death.

He just needed to believe whatever Shadow said. And so far? No one had really painted the old families in a positive light. Not even Acker. The duel in Redfield was just another example of that. People I had never met had dragged my entire town into their feud on a whim. I had to wonder how many times they had done so.

The people Jonathan Acker worked for didn't remotely sound like good guys.

Argh, I felt a headache coming.

"So," I said. "Does that mean you have seen his face?"

Daniels glowered. "None of your business, kid."

Well, there went that information source. He still didn't trust me, and I really couldn't blame him.

After all, I couldn't just trust Shadow to keep his word. If I wanted to survive, my best bet was trying to find a way to contact Jonathan Acker. If I wanted to survive, I needed to stop Shadow from getting what he wanted and disposing of me.

I needed to betray these guys.

# Between Lines – Erika Dahl's Turn

It was not often that Erika Dahl found herself surprised. In spite of being only sixteen-years-old, she was already the right hand of Lady Duval. She had seen the beautiful, the terrible, and the bizarre.

Still, she had not expected them to overcome the Minotaur.

Only the slight thinning of her lips betrayed her emotions as she studied the map of her labyrinth. Previously, the map had shown the intruders moving through the maze as they fled from her golem. Now, it only showed what remained of her Minotaur. The golem still moved, but too slowly to be of any use and repairing it would cost more time and energy than it was worth.

Besides, she had no target to guide it to. The three intruders had long since vanished.

That should not have happened.

The participants should all have been First Generation Magic Users, Second or Third at best. The Council ran a background check on them before allowing them to compete. Every single one of them was a confirmed nobody.

Certainly not people with the skill to take down her golem.

The nature of the ritual made certain spells easier, but it did not give one the knowledge required to use them. By all means, her Minotaur should have killed them.

Then again, this was not the first time today the nobodies surprised her. She had to accept the intruders were more than what they should be.

Regardless, she worried. Not for herself or her lord, of course. Defeat was simply not allowed. To contemplate defeat was the first step towards partaking in it. No matter how strong a foe she faced, she would win. No, she had no cause to worry about the intruders.

What worried her were the ones who had given them the chance to oppose her lord in the first place.

The Council.

"Betrayal. I smell betrayal," Gandr said, moving over the table. The snake's forked tongue licked at the edges of the map.

Erika frowned but did not deny his words.

"Does it make you happy to state the obvious?" She asked instead.

Someone in the Council had betrayed them. There was no other way to explain the situation. There was no other way for dangerous elements to have made it this close to them.

The entire thing had been planned from the start.

"We have been betrayed," she said, moving a strand of long, black hair behind her ear. "The important question is how deep does it go?"

"All of them," Gandr hissed, moving to make himself comfortable in her lap. "Traitors all."

"Don't be ridiculous," She said, running a finger over Gandr's head.

Had the entire Council conspired against the Duval family? Unlikely. They had too many political allies for that to be the case. More likely than not, she was looking at a small but efficient conspiracy, a few members of the Council who had been in the right place at the right time to influence the selection process.

Which brought another question to mind: Where the Arundel involved after all?

So far, she had seen nothing that would help her discard the possibility, an unfortunate situation. Having to fight Johnathan Acker would be... unpleasant.

"Mistress is too trusting," Gandr said, curling himself into her lap.

"Mistress has common sense," she corrected. "There is little point in assuming everyone is against us right now."

"Especially," she added, tapping the map. "When we can focus on the enemy in of us."

"We'll burn them!" Gandr said. "Burn and flay."

Erika sighed. Sometimes she really wondered where her familiar got this nonsense from. Sadly, she was stuck with him. Another Gandr would take years of work.

Besides, if she had to be honest, she was fond of her pet, bloodthirst and all.

"Luckily for everyone involved, I have a better idea," she said, picking a small bell from the table and ringing it.

Gandr drew back his head as if struck.

"The buffoon. Better?" Gandr hissed out, somehow managing to look offended in spite of being limited to a snake's facial range of expressions.

"He is not a buffoon," Erika said.

He was neither incompetent nor amusing enough for the label to apply. Rather plain if she had to say it. A First Generation Wizard who excelled at nothing and could be easily discarded.

"Besides, I don't need him to win," Erika added.

If it was a matter of winning, she could do that on her own. The only threat was Johnathan Acker which was why she could not afford to be reckless. She needed to get a good look at what she was up against right now. They had taken down the Minotaur. That spoke of a measure of talent.

Unfortunately, her map was limited in terms of what it showed, merely moving dots.

She needed a better look before going out.

"Bait. Bait. Bait," Gandr said with happy hisses, wrapping himself around Erika's elbow. It was, as Erika had long ago learned, the snake equivalent of a hug.

"Don't say it loudly," Erika said, lightly bopping her familiar on the head. "Don't say it at all. It is rude."

Not wrong, but rude.

It would be annoying if Gandr said those things within earshot of her pawn.

"Besides, he is not bait," Erika said. "They are already coming for us, I don't need to draw them anywhere else."

It'd be largely pointless.

"I need to see them, see how they fight. What type of Magic do they use? Do they even have Magic Tools? I'd rather know all those things before fighting them," she explained to Gandr.

Not that the snake ever listened.

"The buffoon, as you so kindly put it, is going to get all that information for me," she said, looking pleased with herself. "And if he manages to take one or more down, then all the better."

"Bait," Gandr repeated, prompting a sigh from Erika. She was truly wasted on her familiar.

A knock on the door announced his presence.

"Come in," she said, putting a practiced smile on her face. "I have an important assignment for you."

# Chapter 13

"You've got to be kidding me."

Daniels swore and Flores didn't look particularly happy either. After another half an hour of driving, we had reached the center of the labyrinth. We could even see the place Duval had chosen as his base, the mayor's house as it turned out. I wondered how deliberate that was. Regardless, our goal was in sight.

There were just two small problems.

One, the house was on top of a hill which clearly hadn't been there the day before. Redfield was as flat as a board. The terrain around here was plains and soft rivers for miles. There certainly hadn't been a hill big enough to support an entire house within the city limits yet there it was, standing tall and proud with no reason other than A Wizard Did It.

Two, there was a forest between us and the hill.

The center of the labyrinth was an area larger than a football stadium. The mayor's house was in the middle, and between the three of us and the house was a forest of tall trees, sharps thorns, and a multitude of brambles.

"Flores. Explain," Daniels said, clenching and unclenching his fist. Had there been a stress ball in his hand, he'd have broken it already.

Flores took a break from staring to look at Daniels.

"Explain?" Flores repeated.

"Explain what? That?" He waved a hand at the forest. "I'm flattered you think so highly of me, but I really don't know what to say here. It's a forest. It's big and thorny and we have to cross it. That's about it."

"Can you dispel it?" He tried again.

Flores blinked twice, before laughing while slapping his leg.

"Can I dispel it? You're thinking way too much of me. If I could do something so convenient, I'd have done so with the labyrinth. Like I said before, this is advanced stuff. Seems like Duval is pulling out all the stops. On the plus side, he's bound to be tired from this. A person doesn't just Magic this whole thing up without repercussions."

I sighed. At least there was that bit of good news. He might be tired from doing amazing Magic we can only marvel at.

At this rate, he might just fall down some stairs and do our job for us.

"So, is this Magic based on a story too?" I asked, admiring the tall trees.

"That would be my guess, yes," Flore said. "A forest of trees, thorns and brambles to protect the 'castle.' Care to guess the story?"

"Sleeping Beauty," Daniels replied without missing a beat.

Flores and I stared.

Just stared.

Feeling a bit self-conscious, Daniels shuffled a bit before glaring. "My mom used to read it to my sister. Any problem with that?"

Huh, Daniels had a sister. I added it to the mental list of things I knew about the guy.

It was a short list.

"So does this make Duval the evil fairy?" I joked before a thought hit me. "Is there a Sleeping Beauty?"

Daniels snorted. "Don't be stupid. The good fairy is the one who summons the forest to protect Sleeping Beauty."

Because that was clearly common knowledge.

"And there is no way there is a sleeping beauty... is there?" Daniels turned to Flores midway through his words.

Flores opened his mouth then closed it and opened it again.

"Actually.... There just might be," Flores said. "There is value in symbolism. The more accurate the representation, the better. It'd even be a good way of maintaining the spell. You could turn the Sleeping Beauty into some sort of battery. It'd take the edge of it."

"So he might not be as tired as we think?" I asked.

"Possibly."

"Well, that's just great," Daniels said, running a hand through his hair. "Fine. Whatever. Let's just keep moving."

"So do we drive in or what?" I asked.

Flores scratched the back of his head and looked away from us. "Yeah... about that..."

I stared. "Please, tell me the car can drive through this."

"You said this car could drive through everything," Daniels added.

"It drives on walls! Walls!" I said. "Hell, you said it could drive through walls."

Against our combined onslaught, Flores could do little more than put his hands up and smile sheepishly.

"I did! I did say all that, buuut that's not a good idea."

"Why?" Daniels asked. The frown on his face told Flores he better have a good reason.

"Look, it works like this," Flores began, hands still up. "I could drive on top of the trees. We'd make good time. It'd be the easiest thing ever."

"But?" I prompted, already knowing the answer. It was the same reason why we hadn't driven on top of the labyrinth.

"We'd get caught," Flores said. "My spell doesn't hide us from sight. That house is on top of a hill. They will see us coming. The only reason they haven't seen us yet is because the trees are hiding us right now."

"You said you could bring down one or two walls," I pointed out. "Bringing down some trees can't be harder than that."

"Same problem," Flores said. "They will know. Worse, I'll waste too much power doing it. I'll be useless after crossing."

I frowned. He was making sense. Why was he making sense? I didn't want to walk in the dirty, thorny forest.

Mostly because of the thorny part.

Support came from an unexpected place.

"Can't you just drive in between the trees?" Daniels asked. "Some of the passages inside the labyrinth were not wide enough for this car but you managed somehow. Can't you do the same with the trees?

I looked at Flores, hopeful.

With a sad face, Flores shook his head. "Sorry. The difference in scale is too big. I can make up for a difference of a foot at most, but that forest is way too dense for me to go through using normal means."

"Then what are we supposed to do?" Daniels asked. "You say we can't use the car. Fine. What do we do instead? Because if I got this right, the moment we step out of your car, we're no longer protected by your spell."

"Back to square one," I said, nodding. "A really thorny square one."

Agreeing with Daniels felt weird. Really weird.

"Yeah, I thought about that too," Flore said, reaching for the glove compartment and taking out two pieces of cloth, "but I have an idea."

"An idea?" Daniels echoed.

"Three-quarters of an idea," Flores said, as he handed us each a piece of cloth. "Tie this around your wrists."

I took the cloth and held it up in front of me. It was one of the pieces of the car cover we had cut out. "What's this going to do?"

"It'll hide you."

Daniels and I shot equally doubtful looks at Flores.

"This is regular cloth," I said, waving it around. "No marks. No weird symbols."

"It's not just cloth," Flore said. "It's part of a Magic Tool. Unified Object Theory states that... eh, never mind that. It's going to go over your heads."

Well, excuse me for not being born into this.

"The point is that because it is part of a Magic Tool, there is a link between it and the main tool. It will perform the same function... maybe not as well, but it should hide you. The original was made to hide the entire car, and you are the passengers. It should work. I think."

"It's just cloth," I repeated.

"I never heard of a Magic Tool working without any Runes on it." Daniels added his two cents.

"Argh!" Flores threw his hands up. "You two are impossible. Where is the trust? Fine! I'll prove it to you. Close your eyes."

We both looked at him.

"Just do it."

I sighed but did as he asked. When it came to Magic, Flores had shown his knowledge dwarfed ours considerably.

"You haven't noticed because the sheer concentration of Magic in this place is absurd," Flores said. "However, there is a link. Focus your senses. Feel the energy around you. Feel the cloth in your hands. Focus on it."

Feeling Magic was not a problem. It was impossible not to.

That was the problem.

Trying to feel the Magic in the cloth was like checking if your swimsuit was wet while inside a pool. The thing was soaked in Magic. The ambient Magic had long seeped in an- hold it!

"There is something here," Daniels said. "Some kind of tendril."

I nodded. It was not ambient Magic. It was a long, thin tendril of higher density Magic stretching from the cloth all the way to the car cover surrounding the Beetle.

"Just because something is broken doesn't mean all its links are cut off," Flores said with a smug smile as we opened our eyes.

"Point taken," I said while tying the cloth around my wrist. Daniels did the same. "Okay, so we can go out without activating all the alarms. What next?"

Flores reached under his seat and took out a bag. "Catch," he said, throwing it at me.

I blinked as I caught it. It was a normal plastic bag full of small orange... things. None was larger than my fingernails, yet each one of them had a Rune painted on it.

I let out an impressed whistle. This was some serious preparation. I couldn't begin to imagine how much time it had taken Flores to put this together.

"Those are markers. I made them out of a traffic cone," Flore said. "Remember how I said I couldn't drive the car through the forest? We're going to fix that. You two will go in, get to the hill, and put these markers along the way."

He pointed to Daniels. "When you get to the house, shoot. Go for maximum sound. I will activate the markers which will allow me to cross the forest with the Beetle using way less energy than normal. I will be able to catch up with you in less than a minute. We crash in, beat up Duval, and retreat. Any questions."

I blinked. That sounded halfway plausible.

"It can work," Daniels said after a while.

"How are you going to hear his gun?" I asked.

"His gun can be really loud. Trust me on that one," Flores said. Daniels nodded.

Right, Magic Gun.

"This still leaves us going in alone," I pointed out.

Flores shot me an apologetic look. "Sorry about that, but we're going to need the car at the end, and anything else is too risky."

He tried for a smile. "Don't worry. Daniels might be all broody, but he's good in a fight."

That was kind of the problem.

I really didn't want to be alone with Daniels.

"Trust me, kid. This is no picnic for me either," Daniels said. He opened the door and stepped out of the car.

I sighed.

This was not going to end well.

# Chapter 14

The forest was dense and thorny. Only a small bit of sunlight could get past the canopy of trees which made traveling through the forest difficult, to say the least.

On the plus side, in spite of the forest possibly being based on the tale of Sleeping Beauty, being wounded by something sharp and pointy didn't end with us falling into a deep sleep that necessitated a Prince Charming.

I knew because the first thing Daniels had done after leaving the car was pushing me into the thorns to find out if they were dangerous and only followed after me once he saw there were no ill-effects on my person.

Teamwork.

On the con side, thorns were thorns.

"Ouch."

They hurt.

So far that had been the biggest problem. No traps. No attacks. Just pointy thorns.

I really hoped there wasn't poison in them.

"How about you walk in front for a change?" I said to Daniels who had so far been content letting me lead the way.

That I took the bulk of thorns and branches to the face that way was purely coincidental, I am sure.

"You're the one with Farech," Daniels said while taking a few traffic cone pieces and sprinkling them on the ground. "You are the one who can see better here."

I hated how much sense he made. Farech's sensory abilities were dead useful. Every time I used it, I got a feel of where everything was in the forest. There was no one better to lead the way. It just made sense to organize ourselves this way. I led with Farech, and Daniels followed while making sure to mark our path with orange plastic.

Common sense was slowly turning me into a pincushion.

Curse my useful Magic Tool.

"How convenient," I muttered, flicking Farech to the left to push a few branches out of our way. "I can feel you smiling, you know?"

I couldn't. I had just heard him snort behind my back, but there was no need for him to know that.

"Don't get too used to Farech," Daniels said. I did not need to look back to know he was pointing at me. "Once this is all over, you are giving it back. Grant's Magic Tool is not yours to keep."

I sighed while brushing some fallen leaves out of my hair. "You really don't let that one go, do you?"

"You took out my partner!" Daniels shouted. "Even if we succeed, he won't get anything because of you! You bet your ass I'm not going to let it go."

Okay, that was enough.

I stopped and turned to face him.

"You really want to talk about this?" I asked, throwing my hands up. "First, your partner attacked me! He tried to choke me, so yeah, I'm not exactly sorry about what happened to him. And really? He's not dead just unconscious. Get over yourself. Second, I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask for your crazy plan or your weird Magic. I didn't want a murderous stone monster chasing after me. I didn't want labyrinths, and I sure as hell didn't want thorn-filled forests! Also, you were going to SHOOT ME! So excuse me if I'm not exactly sympathetic to your plight, you psychopath!"

I was red and shouting by the end. My temper had gotten the better of me again. I expected Daniels to shout back or even attack me.

He didn't.

"I wasn't going to kill you, idiot," he said.

I have never raised an eyebrow higher.

"You. Pointed. A Gun. At Me," I said, pointing at the weapon in question. "Obviously the picture of non-lethal force."

"It's a Magic Tool!" He said, waving the gun. "It won't kill if I don't want it to kill. I just needed to scare you into obeying."

That didn't still hope in me at all.

"That doesn't instill hope in me at all," I said, crossing my arms in an X. "I mean, it's not like I'm walking around with a bomb on my neck or something. Oh, wait, I am."

I pointed to the black stripe around my neck. "Remember this? The boss you admire so much put it on me and strong-armed me into doing this or else my head will blow up."

Whatever reply was at the tip of Daniels' tongue was cut by an arrow whistling past my face and embedding itself on the ground. I blinked several times, not quite understanding what had happened. Something wet dripped down my cheek. I reached out to touch it and looked at my fingers.

Blood.

My blood.

"Get down!" Daniels shouted, tackling me to the ground. An instant later, an arrow flew through the place where my head had been.

"What the hell?" I shouted, looking around wide-eyed. There was nothing but forest around us. "What was that?"

"Move it, kid!" Daniel said, grabbing me by the scruff of my shirt and dragging me behind a tree just as another arrow landed on the ground.

I tried to calm my breathing as I leaned back against the tree. The arrows had stopped, probably because Daniels hid us from sight.

Did Daniels just save my life? Gratitude and disgust warred within me before I shoved them to back of my mind. Deliberate later. Survive now.

"What was that?" I asked again.

"An archer," Daniels said, trying to peek from behind the tree. "Get your head in the game, kid. I can't have you turning into dead weight right now."

"Oh, an archer! I'd have never guessed with all the arrows and all. Masterful deduction there."

Fear made my tongue loose.

Or maybe it was anger. At this point, I was spoiled for choices.

"Focus." Daniels glared at me. "You're the one with Farech. That means you have the best chance of finding the guy."

I glared back and shook out of his grip. Still, he had a point. I took a few deep breaths and activated Farech.

My Reach extended to engulf the area around us. I could feel everything from the worms in the dirt, to the green treetops, and even each individual thorn.

No such luck with archers.

"I got nothing," I said. "He's probably out of my range."

"Great," Daniels spat. "We can't see him, but he can obviously detect us going by that wound on your cheek."

"Yippee," I said without cheer. "Archer. That means his Magic Tool is a bow, right?"

"Not necessarily," Daniels said. "He could just be using something to enhance his vision. The boss told me most First Generation Magic Users supplement their natural talents with Magic. It's easier to enhance a set of binoculars than it is to make arrows that never miss."

I nodded. That made sense. "You know, that's the first time you have said something worthwhile."

Yeah, I couldn't resist. I am a wonderful team player, but don't ask me to work well with someone who had threatened to kill me.

"Shut up and help me figure out how to get out of this. For all we know, the archer could be circling around us."

I frowned. That was a troubling thought. I reached out with Farech again just in case but found nothing.

Something occurred to me. "Haven't you taken out a bunch of Wizards already? Shouldn't you be able to kick this guy's ass?" I asked.

"That involved the element of surprise," Daniels replied. "They have the element of surprise right now."

Of course. They had hit them from behind like Grant had tried to do to me. The poor bastard.

"We could call Flores," I said. "If his car can really mow down its way through the forest, well, let's go for it."

Daniels shook his head. "It's not worth it. We can't risk the car being damaged. It's too important for us."

"Why? You all had your first date there or something?"

I could tell Daniels was trying really hard not to hit me. It would be stupid of him to do it as I was, technically, his ally. Still, I decided to tone it down lest rage win over self-preservation.

"The car is our getaway vehicle. Yes, there are dozens of cars in this town which we could steal," He said, pre-empting my next question. "We could do that, and we'd be stuck with a replacement that cannot run in every terrain there is, a replacement which would need things like fuel. Trust me, you're lying to yourself if you think you know that thing's top speed. Without that car, we will be caught the moment the Council knows the result, and all of this would have been pointless."

I bit my tongue to refrain from saying anything. I had no idea if Daniels was telling the truth or not but he sounded convincing enough. At the very least, he believed it.

"Fine," I said, throwing my hands up. "Fine. We won't do the sensible thing. Now, pray tell, what do we do? Because if we do nothing, we won't need that getaway car in the first place."

Daniels held up a hand. "Shut up. I'm thinking."

A novel experience, I'm sure.

I looked at the green canopy. "Say, how about I knock down a tree or two?" Compared to the Minotaur, a tree ought to be easy.

"Forget it," Daniels said. "Putting aside the attention it would bring. There is no guarantee you would actually hit the archer, and no guarantee you won't hit us by accident."

I sighed. He had a point.

Which meant we were stuck here until either of us could think of something. It was a shame. Were it not for the archer, this would be a perfect opportunity to take out Daniels. Flores wasn't around to see us, and their boss was somewhere in the city, probably fighting Acker right now. I just needed to move a few feet away, and I'd be in the perfect position to knock him out. No one would know.

As I thought about many happy what-ifs, an arrow struck the ground between us. Something small and metallic with a blinking red light was tied to it.

As one, we stared at the arrow then at each other.

Beep

"Run!"

I am not quite sure who said it first. Regardless, we scrambled to our feet and took off in opposite directions at top speed.

There was, to my profound relief, no explosion after the beeping.

There was only a hiss as gas was released into the air.

A thick cloud of gas blanketed the area. Quickly, I brought my shirt to my nose and kept running only to trip on an exposed root.

Damn it!

I heard a distant cry which I recognized as Daniels'. Fear gripped my heart as I struggled to get up. Had he been shot? Was he done just like that? How had the archer gotten to him in the first place? The gas should have made us harder to see. He should not be able to aim right now.

Pain, sharp and hot, pierced my back. A scream came out of my mouth as I dropped to my knees.

What was that? What was that? What was-! I winced as I moved my hand to check.

There was an arrow on the back of my shoulder.

Daniels words came unbidden.

It was easier to enhance sight than to enhance an arrow to never miss a target.

The archer was not enhancing his arrows. He was enhancing his sight with a Magic Tool. That's why he kept missing us, if only barely. The skill was all natural, and like normal people, he wasn't perfect. He couldn't hit bulls-eye all the time.

There was probably nothing magical about this gas either. It was just a regular smoke bomb.

How mundane.

Effective but mundane.

An arrow landing on the ground just a few inches away from my face told me this was not the time to analyze. I dragged myself to my feet, wincing several times as I did so. I hadn't pulled out the arrow. I didn't even know how.

I dashed through the forest. Pain stabbed my back each time I put a foot on the ground. Under normal circumstances, it would have been enough to send me crawling to my bed.

Another arrow flew through the air landing on the spot I had occupied barely two seconds ago.

These were not normal circumstances. Adrenaline rushed through my body, giving me the rush of energy I needed to keep going. My heart hammered against my chest. My breath came out in heavy gasps. I could feel the back of my shirt becoming wet with blood and sweat.

I did not stop.

If I stopped or slowed down even for a second, I was dead.

The smoke was dense. I could see little beyond my nose. Had it not been for Farech, I would have tripped a long time ago. As it was, the archer was not the only one who could see in the smoke. Every time my foot hit the ground, I activated Farech. Again and again, I used it until the surrounding terrain had imprinted itself with vivid clarity into my brain.

Just a little more. Just a little more. I could feel.

No, I could see.

Daniels.

He was lying on the ground, his expression twisted in pain. Many thoughts rushed through my mind in the space of a second before I jumped and swung Farech.

My Reach expanded.

I grasped the earth.

A wall of dirt that was about four feet tall, ten feet long, and two feet wide rose up from the ground just as I landed behind it. An instant later an arrow hit the side of it.

I panted while leaning against my dirt wall. At least, I tried to before being painfully reminded of the arrow in my back.

"You okay?" I asked between pants to the downed Daniels.

Daniels coughed weakly and looked up before saying, "I got shot in both legs. I can't get up and there is a hostile Wizard shooting at us. I can't think of a time when I have been less okay, and this is coming from a guy who had to sleep on park benches covered with bird poo."

I looked at his legs and winced. The arrows had embedded themselves deep. I had no idea how he was still conscious.

"A simple no would have done just fine," I said, trying to peek from behind my wall only to quickly duck once an arrow flew too close for comfort.

I showed my back to him. "Think you can do something about this?"

"I could, but pulling it out would just make it worse," he said.

"Well, aren't you the definition of helpful," I said while noting with no small amount of worry the Archer had stopped shooting. That meant he was going to circle around us to aim at our backs. Again.

"I don't see you doing anything for my arrow wounds," Daniels snapped back. He frowned in thought before snapping his fingers. "Actually, I might be able to do something."

I heard rustling behind me as Daniels managed to prop himself to a sitting position.

The distinct sound of a gun being cocked reached my ears.

"Hold it! What do you think you're doing," I said, turning around and backing away as far as I could without leaving the safety of the wall. Daniels had taken his gun out and was aiming at me. My hand reached for Farech but at this distance, there was no way I would be able to use it before Daniels pulled the trigger.

"I'm not going to shoot you," Daniel said, exasperated. As if I was being completely unreasonable for panicking due to him pointing a gun at me.

Was it Wizard thing? Maybe it was even a Daniels' thing.

"You may not have noticed but there is a disconnect between what you are saying and what you are doing. Just a tiny bit," I said holding up my thumb and forefinger less than an inch apart.

"Look," He said, holding up his hands, "I'm going to shoot you, but I am not, you know, going to shoot you."

Ah, I nodded like that made sense. It was clear Daniels had lost it.

This required tact.

"Did you hit your head? Is the blood loss getting to you? Are you hearing voices telling you to do stuff?"

"Funny." Daniels growled and pointed to his gun. "This is a Magic Tool. It uses the functions associated with a gun in order to shoot bullets with different effects... at least, that's how the boss explained it. Some of them hurt. Others, not so much."

I cocked my head to the side. "And you have a healing bullet? Because if you do, I'm blanking out on why you haven't used it on yourself."

I pointed to the wounds on his legs.

Daniels looked away. "It's not exactly a healing bullet. It's more like... freezing. The boss created it for me to be able to take down competitors without them being disqualified. Complete immobilization without the loss of consciousness."

That would explain how they had captured so many people without the duel ending.

My mind flashed back to the Minotaur. Daniels had wanted to try something with his gun there, but Flores had stopped him since it would only work on living beings.

"How are guns related to freezing in any way?"

"What do people say the moment they point guns at each other in the movies," Daniels asked as if it was obvious.

I raised an eyebrow. "You've got to be kidding me."

He shrugged. "I don't make the rules. I didn't even make the gun. I'm just glad I have it."

"Yeah, and you still haven't told me why you didn't use it on yourself."

Daniels bit his lip but did not answer.

"You are not sure it's going to work, huh?"

"I have never tried to Freeze something on a small scale," Daniel admitted, "but there is no reason why it shouldn't work. Should stop the bleeding and pain at least. Only reason I haven't tried it on myself is because freezing my legs would put me in an even worse position."

And because failing would leave him at the mercy of the Archer.

"And I'm going to be your guinea pig why again?" I asked, trying to pretend my back didn't hurt like hell and that the blood loss wasn't getting to me. "Give me one good reason."

"I will give you three," Daniel said, looking right into my eyes. "One, you are losing blood with every second. Two, you and I know someone is getting into position to shoot us even as we speak. Three, you're my best chance of making it out alive so I'm not going to betray you."

There was a smug grin on his face as he finished. I wanted to punch it. However, I didn't. Instead, I harrumphed and turned my back to him.

"Just do it."

Daniels didn't say anything. No warnings. No reassurances. No apologies.

The gunshot rang through the forest.

"You asshole," I said turning around, face red with anger. "You could have at least given me a warning that freaking hu...rt?"

No, it hadn't.

The noise had scared me but I hadn't felt a thing. I blinked twice. I couldn't feel any pain anymore. On my back, that is. My legs hurt from all the running, but my back was numb. I patted myself on the back to check. While Daniels had called it freezing, I was not cold.

I was just numb.

I could not even feel my own touch.

With one hand, I grabbed the arrow on my back and pulled it out. I needed to put some effort but felt no pain. I patted my back right after. The wound wasn't even bleeding at the moment. It was just... frozen.

I directed my gaze to Daniels and found the insufferable smirk I knew would be there.

"Okay, it worked," I said. "Don't rub it in. Are you going to do yourself?"

He coughed and shook his head. "I told you. Freezing my legs is not an alternative. I wouldn't even be able to crawl after that."

And the alternative was obviously to slowly bleed himself into unconsciousness. That made sense.

"Okay then, don't blame me when the blood loss gets to you," I said. "Now, while you were being useful for once, I came up with a plan to take down the Archer."

"Oh really?"

I told him.

"That's the stupidest thing I have ever heard."

"Well gosh, I guess I'll have to rely on you to get up and do stuff... oh wait!"

You'd think with our lives in peril, I'd tone down the snark, but apparently it just brings out the worst in me.

"You're an ungrateful ass, but... you are right," Daniels said. I had never seen someone swallow a lemon before, but I imagine that person would look very much like Daniels at that moment. "I am useless. You're mobile. Go ahead and get killed for all I care."

I crossed my arms. "Damn right, I will... that did not come out right."

Daniels sighed and shook his head. "Take this," he said, offering me his gun. "Use it on him."

I looked at the gun. Without it, Daniels would be defenseless. "You sure?"

"No, but if by any chance you succeed you are going to need to take the archer down with a freeze bullet. Just focus on freezing what you are aiming and shoot. If you don't succeed, well, I'm dead anyway."

I nodded before taking the gun. It was heavier than I expected. Then again, what did I know? I had never held a gun before.

"Thanks," I said.

"Just make sure not to get us killed."

I bit back the snappy comeback this time. I kneeled down and activated Farech. In spite of everything the day had brought with it, I had gotten lucky with this one thing. Farech's main power was dead useful for a number of things.

Then there was its secondary power.

The moment I activated Farech, my Reach expanded. I could feel everything within 90 yards of my body. Usually, this only lasted for an instant. A single moment that allowed me to accurately Grasp whatever target I desired.

This time, I did something different. Instead of letting the sensation vanish, I held on to it with all my might. I clenched my eyes shut. No object was chosen. I just held it in even as sweat started to drip from my forehead.

Dimly, I understood what was happening.

The radar function was a side-effect of the Magic Tool's main function, a fluke even. A backscratcher is not strongly tied to the function of Sensing. I was forcing an object to do something too removed from its regular function.

It occurred to me this could backfire in dangerous ways.

I held on.

My eyes were not enough. My ears were not enough. I needed to feel. I needed to wait for the right moment.

There!

An object, small and thin, flying almost too fast for me to sense. An arrow.

I held out Farech and pulled.

A new wall of dirt rose before me, intercepting the arrow.

This was it.

I activated Farech again and took off running.

Right to where the arrow had come from.

I had the trajectory. I had the direction. I had felt it the moment the arrow entered my sensing range. The Archer may be outside my range but that didn't matter anymore. I had him.

After all, an arrow could only go in a straight line.

I swung Farech in an arc. A ball of earth and dirt the size of a baby elephant rose from the ground and launched itself to the place where the arrow had entered my range.

I clicked my tongue as more arrows entered my Reach. I knew blindly throwing things at the Archer wasn't going to get him, but I had hoped for a lucky shot.

I sped up.

Using Farech, I grabbed not the dirt, but the air in front of me.

I pulled.

A furious gale exploded above me, sending the arrows off-course.

That was the beauty of Farech. I can grab everything within my Reach. As long as I was smart about how I applied that force, I could do a lot.

If you move your palm fast enough, you can feel the air resistance. If a speeding car passes by, you can feel the wind left in its wake. Farech packed a lot more power than either of those things. Sending an arrow off-course was easy enough, provided I could feel it coming.

I sped up and wasted no time in activating the Magic Tool again. The moment I stopped using Farech to sense my surroundings was the moment I ended full of arrows.

More arrows came at me. I swung Farech again.

Close. I could feel it was close.

There!

80 yards away. Someone was moving in one of the branches. Someone with a bow and arrows. I could feel him pull his bowstring.

I had him.

70 yards.

He fired. The arrow was within sixty yards of me when I batted it to the side with Farech. Next, I Grasped a couple of tree branches, moved them to block me from his line of sight, and kept on going.

50 yards.

My heart pounded against my chest as the Archer reached for his binoculars. I was having none of that. I Grasped and crushed them. I would have caught him already if I was certain I could do it without having him suffer the same fate. I was getting the hang of Farech, but delicacy was a work in progress, especially while running for my life.

30 yards.

I pushed.

The tree broke.

The archer held on as the tree he was on crashed into the forest floor. I flicked Farech again to slow down its fall just enough, but the impact was still felt for several yards.

I was panting now. The Archer ended up caught under one of the branches and was struggling to get out. His bow lay broken at his side.

10 yards.

I took out Daniels' gun from my pocket. Blue eyes met mine.

I aimed.

"Freeze."

The bullet hit home. The Archer stopped.

He just lay on the ground, unmoving. I let myself fall next to him and checked his body. He was breathing. His heart was beating. Just slowly. Really slowly. On his body, there was not even a wound in the place where the bullet hit

I looked at the gun with new respect.

Neat.

Not as good as Farech, but neat.

My job done, I collapsed next to the fallen tree. Farech fell from my hands. My legs hurt, and I felt like I was about to throw up at any moment. I didn't say anything. I didn't do anything. I was too tired for either.

There was still much to be done. Duval was still out there. The shadow bind was still around my neck. I wasn't even out of the forest yet.

My mother. My friends. The entire town. They still slept. This wasn't even close to being over. However, I couldn't muster the strength to get up at the moment.

I just stayed there, resting.

# Chapter 15

Minutes passed while I lay there.

I suppose I should be worried about someone coming to attack me. After all, I had not been shy about making noise. However, I couldn't muster the strength to worry. I was tired. If someone tried to attack me right now, I'd faint and save them the trouble.

Still, all good things must come to an end. I needed to get moving. My body protested every step of the way as I stood up, my back being the only exception. Hopefully, the Freeze effect would last until this was all over.

I picked up my stuff and checked the archer's body again. Sadly, he had nothing worthwhile on him. His binoculars were all smashed up thanks to yours truly. I had done it in the heat of the moment, but now I was starting to regret it.

Those binoculars could have been really useful.

Meh, I thought as I began making my way back.

It was alright. I would figure out something like it.

The thought struck my brain like lightning. I almost tripped as I realized the truth of the statement.

I could figure it out.

I was already a part of this world, wasn't I? I had beaten a Minotaur and a magical archer. I might have started out as an innocent bystander but I was getting the hang of this. Once everything was over, I could continue learning Magic. Figure things out. Make some cool Magic Tools for everyday life. It could even be fun.

If I made it out that is, I thought, frowning.

My hand drifted to my neck for the umpteenth time that day. The shadow collar was still there. I could feel it. Maybe not by touch but certainly by Magic. There had to be a way of contacting Jonathan Acker.

Slowly, I made my way back to where I had left Daniels. He couldn't see me just yet. Neither could I for the matter. The walls I had made to protect us blocked him from view.

I twirled Farech between my fingers and expanded my Reach. Daniels lay against the wall, still breathing and moving a little too much to be unconscious.

Shame.

It'd have made things easier.

I took a deep breath, focused, and flicked Farech down almost gently.

There was nothing gentle about what happened next.

I winced as Daniels' head was slammed against the wall and he fell to the ground, unconscious.

I checked with Farech again to be on the safe side before moving next to his downed form. Daniels would not be opening his eyes anytime soon. Not until the whole thing was over.

I could tell myself I was doing him a favor. This was serious stuff. Even if he succeeded, he was going to end up hunted down. He had said as much. That kind of thing tended to happen to criminals. Yeah, I was doing good by keeping him out of trouble, saving him even.

I could tell myself that but I'd be lying.

Daniels was defenseless. I had his weapon, and there were no witnesses around. If anyone asked, I could blame it on the archer. I wasn't going to get a better chance, so I took it.

I sympathized with their goal to a degree. Steal from the rich and give to themselves might not be the catchiest slogan but it resonated with a lot of people. They thought they were doing good. Maybe they were. What did I know about wizard politics?

I even kind of liked them. Flores seemed like a nice guy, and I'd be lying if I said Daniels wasn't growing on me. Kind of like fungus.

I just couldn't forget.

I couldn't forget my first meeting with Daniels was far from cordial, and I sure as hell couldn't forget their boss had done the magical equivalent of tying a bomb to my head.

If I had to choose between Acker and Shadow, well, one had tried to kill me and the other one had saved me.

Easy choice.

"Sorry," I said to Daniels' unconscious form as I applied freezing bullets to his legs. That should stop his bleeding at least. "I guess I couldn't trust you. Well, not you. Your boss. Not that I trust you that much, but mostly I don't trust your boss."

"How unfortunate it is to hear that, Mister Walker."

Blood drained from my face. It couldn't be. It couldn't. I had just used Farech. There was no one around. I would have felt him otherwise.

Then again, I hadn't felt him the first time. Why would this be any different?

I turned around, hoping against hope.

My heart dropped all the way to my feet.

There he stood with his whole body cloaked in unnatural shadow.

"How?"

"That is a good question," Shadow said bringing a hand to his chin. "However, you need to be more specific? How am I here or how long have I been here?"

I gulped.

"B-both," I managed to say, holding Farech tight in my hands. I would have bolted if my legs weren't frozen in fear.

He had seen me, I thought with cold sweat on my forehead. He had just seen me take down one of his men.

"You are curious. I understand that," Shadow said.

He snapped his fingers.

"Unfortunately, you are not in a position to question me, boy."

Pain assaulted my senses. I fell to the ground clutching my throat.

Cold.

So cold.

I gasped for air but none came. I couldn't breathe.

I was going to die.

"That should do it."

Pain left as suddenly as it came. Something yanked my body by the throat until I was face to face with Shadow.

A face devoid of anything but darkness peered down at me. "You took down another one of my men. I am quite angry with you."

I stayed quiet, still shivering from the cold. There was nothing I could say in my defense.

"At the same time, I am impressed with your progress. In a short time, you have become skilled with that Magic Tool."

My eyebrows rose in surprise. I had not expected a compliment, but I could not lower my guard yet. If anything, those words confirmed he had been watching me.

"I should kill you," Shadow said. "You have done more to harm my plans than anyone else in the city. The more I think about it, the more sensible the idea becomes. What do you think? Enlighten me. Why shouldn't I kill you?"

Though his face was featureless, I could feel the inquisitive look aimed at me. He was asking. He was really asking why he should keep me alive.

In a moment of clarity, I understood a wrong answer would be the end of me.

I took a deep breath, hoping to calm myself. It didn't work. My heart beat so strongly I could even feel it in my ears, drowning all other noises.

"Be-because... because you can already kill me," I said between stutters, keenly aware of the pressure the shadows exerted on my throat. "Whenever you want. Wherever you want."

Shadow brought a hand to his chin. "Good enough answer, I suppose."

I felt the pressure fade. Without it to sustain me, I fell to my knees.

"It is a good thing you understand, Walker," Shadow said, pacing around me. "You understand I can kill you whenever I want. You understand I am always watching. You understand I _own_ you."

I flushed with shame but bit my tongue. There was nothing I could do right now.

"Keep that in mind the next time betrayal crosses your mind. However, I'm not an evil man. I still stand by my words. There are only three of us left. There is no reason to cut down that number."

He still needed me. It was the one thing I was banking on. Flores was good, but I doubted he was good enough to finish the job on his own.

"Should you help us achieve success, your life will be yours once more. Is that understood?"

I stayed silent before realizing Shadow expected an answer.

"Y-yes," I said, not looking up. "Understood."

"Then it is all good," Shadow said. "You will cross this forest. You will lay out the path for our driver, and you will fight together to defeat Lord Duval."

The 'or else' was sufficiently implied.

"You are welcome to explain Daniels' fate however you want. You should have already thought up a few excuses. Use them. Truth tends to be adverse to unity," Shadow went on.

Of course, he would say that.

I didn't know how close Flores and Daniels were, but I couldn't imagine him reacting well to what I did. He might even attack me. Shadow wasn't suggesting I be quiet. He was ordering me to be.

Because Daniels' disqualification was an inconvenience. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Daniels might have sung him praises, but it was clear this man didn't care about him.

"This concludes our little chat," Shadow said, turning around. "While I enjoyed it, I cannot imagine the same can be said of you. For your own sake, please do not give me cause to have another one."

I stayed silent as he vanished into the shadows of the forest.

Shadows which were now more frightening than ever.

# Chapter 16

With heavy thoughts in my mind, I finally reached the clearing in the center of the forest.

What I found was what I expected and at the same time not at all.

The hill on which the mayor's house rested was barely a block away. There were no monsters in the way. No archers. No armies.

It was just her.

Her skin was white and unblemished. Long black hair reached past her shoulders. Her white dress was too elegant and of too high quality to ever be sold in a small town like Redfield. Her features were sharp, but they did not take away from her beauty.

Beauty. That was the key word.

She was beautiful.

I had never used the word before. Not even with Dana. Cute. Hot. Sexy. Those words I had used plenty of times, but I felt anything less than beautiful would not do justice to the one before me.

Out of all the people I had met today, she was the youngest. She did not look older than I was. Compared to Shadow, the Minotaur, and even Daniels, she cut a far less intimidating figure. If I didn't know better, I would have dismissed her as harmless.

Good thing I did know better.

Out of all the people I had met today, she was the last line of defense. It wasn't the Minotaur. It wasn't the Archer.

It was her.

She did not attack as I made my way to her. She simply stood there with her arms crossed, watching me.

No ambushes.

No traps.

Just her.

It was either the height of arrogance or I was really not that big a threat.

"Hello there," I said, waving once I was within thirty feet of her. "You... come around here often?"

As far as ways of breaking the ice went, it could use some work. The girl's raised eyebrow told me she was not impressed.

I winced and shoved my hands in my pockets, grasping Farech and Daniels' gun as I did so. "Yeah... that was bad. Sorry."

I cleared my throat. "Let me try that again. My name is Michael Walker. I will be trying to beat up your boss today."

Unfortunately.

To my surprise, she cracked a smile at that. I liked her smile.

"Honesty from a Wizard. How quaint," she said before doing a curtsy and introducing herself. "Well then, in that case, I am Erika Dahl. Servant of Lord Duval. I will be in charge of stopping you today."

Despite myself, I smiled. "I don't suppose there is any chance you could just let me pass?"

"How curious," she said. "I was about to make a similar offer."

I cocked my head to the side "Oh?

"I saw your fight in the forest," Erika said.

It was only due to a small miracle that I managed to keep my face blank after those words.

How? How much had she seen? Had she seen me attack Daniels?

Was she aware of my situation?

"I made slight modifications to the binoculars of the archer you fought. I saw everything he did through them right until the moment you crushed them," she explained, her tone casual. Conversational even. As if there was nothing she should be worried about. "It was an educational experience."

My face fell. "So the guy was just bait to find out what I could do? That's cold." I was disappointed and not due to the Archer's overall fate. At least, that guy would live.

I was disappointed she hadn't seen Shadow. Things would be way easier if she had.

I really shouldn't have destroyed those binoculars.

"It does make me seem somewhat callous," Erika said, not sounding like she cared about it. I fought the urge to snort. There was no 'seem' about it.

"Regardless," she said, bringing her hands together, "Your performance was more than adequate for any First or Second Generation Magic User. You have the talent necessary to succeed where others would fail."

"Is this the part where you ask me to join you?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. I had been in this position enough times today to pick up the cues.

"Quite," she replied without missing a beat. "Surrender now and you shall not be harmed. You will confess everything you know, and I will testify in your favor. Your crimes will be pardoned and, like me, you will be turned into a ward of the Duval family. You will have access to power and wealth the likes of which you can scarcely imagine."

I'm not going to lie. It sounded good. I knew it wasn't as good as she was making it out to be. Meeting Acker had taught me enough about his status to know it wasn't. That didn't change how attractive the offer was, though.

I stared into her blue eyes.

It was a really, really attractive offer.

I sighed and rubbed my neck. "And if I say no?"

"We will fight. You will lose, be captured, and punished for your crimes. Let me say it right now, the punishment for trying to steal the Magic of someone like Lord Duval is not light," Erika said, explaining everything with the same certainty a person would use to say two plus two equals four.

"You sound awfully certain." My pride had been wounded enough times today to know her certainty was not arrogance. Not entirely at least.

Still, it hurt. Just a bit.

"I have seen you fight," Erika said. "Make no mistake you are skilled for someone relatively new to our world."

I fought back a smile. Oh, she had no idea.

"However, I am a ward of the Duval family tasked with ensuring no harm comes to their heir, and I am very good at my job," Erika said, a dangerous edge crept into her words. My body tensed as the Magic around us stilled in accordance to her Will, ready to lash out.

I swallowed, feeling really small all of sudden.

"Do not give me cause to demonstrate," Erika finished and I could feel she meant every word.

"Not going to lie," I said, trying to put on a brave face, "that's a really nice offer."

I even considered it for a second. Duval probably had a way of taking off the Shadow Collar. I would just need to explain my situation and tell them I was working for Jonathan Acker.

All my problems would be solved.

Except, I couldn't. Not really. Not after having learned Shadow was watching my every move somehow. Until I knew how, I couldn't take risks.

Saying yes might as well be signing my death sentence.

"But I'm going to have to decline," I said. For a moment, I contemplated attacking her while she was unguarded, waiting for my answer.

My gut instinct told me doing so would be a colossally bad idea.

Instinct was a good friend.

"No offense intended," I added, shrugging. "It's tempting but no. I have better things in mind."

My continued existence for one.

Why couldn't I have met her sooner?

Erika's expression dimmed. "Pity. I thought you had some sense."

She raised her arm.

My muscles tensed. I unconsciously took a step back.

Something small and green shot out from her sleeve with lightning speed.

It did not stay small for long.

I barely had the time to throw my body out of the way just in time to avoid the charge of a colossal snake.

My eyes widened once I saw the full scope of the creature. It had the length of two school buses and was covered in emerald scales. Its head whipped around and red eyes locked on me. A pink tongue slithered out as the creature bared its fangs at me.

Fangs which were bigger than my head.

"Silly human," the monster hissed out.

I nearly dropped Daniel's gun in shock.

"You should have taken my Mistress' mercy when you had the chance," It said, choosing to taunt me instead of attacking. Good thing it did too. It gave me the opportunity to gather my wits and make a logical decision.

I shot it.

A normal bullet would have done little against a monster of that size, but this was no normal gun. I directed Magic into it and focused on a single word.

Freeze.

I was new to shooting, but the snake was so big I couldn't miss. Its body froze. Its eyes stared me, unblinking and unmoving. For a single moment, I dared to hope.

The snake twitched. Once. Then twice.

Something shattered.

There was no sound at all but I could feel it in my skin when the snake's brute force overpowered my Magic.

"Human!" The snake screamed. Great, I had only made it angry.

I fired another bullet with a different thought in mind before taking off running. A deafening sound rang through the field.

I didn't stop running. A quick check with Farech told me what I already knew.

It didn't even slow it down.

For a moment, I contemplated using Farech on the snake. The thought was quickly discarded. Just like the Minotaur, the beast was bound to be heavy, and unlike the Minotaur, it didn't have legs and knees for me to take advantage of.

If I used Farech on the snake, the backlash would be the death of me.

Instead, I swung Farech, tore a chunk of the ground, and threw it at the snake. With speed no beast that size should be capable of, the snake slithered out of the way, letting the projectile crash harmlessly into the ground and kept going after me. In less than a second, the monster overtook me. Its large body made a circle around me, blocking any escape. My head whipped around searching for a path but it was of no use.

There was no way out.

I lifted Daniels' gun and aimed, but the snake acted before I could shoot. The tip of its tail struck my back, knocking me to the ground.

It was tap. I knew that. For something that big it had simply being a tap, yet even with my back numb the impact struck me like a hammer. Bile rose in my throat. Black spots were already swimming in my vision.

I bit the inside of my mouth. Hard.

Copper filled my mouth. It hurt but it pushed away the blackness. I couldn't faint. I couldn't lose now. Not while that man had his hands on the kill-switch. I weakly tried to push myself up, but the snake wrapped the tip of its tail around my body, holding me prisoner.

"Silly human. Tricky human." It lifted me up with its tail. "You cannot best Gandr."

I blinked. Somehow the name seemed familiar.

"Is that so? From where I stood, he seemed to give you some trouble," Erika said, walking up to us.

"That took too much time. You are slipping." She chided the giant snake as though it was a little kid. To my complete disbelief, the giant seemed to shrink back from her.

"Gandr is sorry," it said, bowing its head. I gaped.

"Just don't play around too much from now on," she said, reaching out to pet its head. The giant monster leaned into her touch.

Her blue eyes found mine. "You are still conscious. Impressive. I don't suppose you want to reconsider my offer?"

I tried to chuckle but it came out as a cough.

"Really?"

"I could use information about your collaborators. I like being prepared," she said.

She did, didn't she?

Honestly, she should have just sent the giant snake after us from the get-go. Combined with the Minotaur, we wouldn't have stood a chance.

There was something to be said about being too cautious.

"I-I just want to say one thing," I said. Had my body not been immobilized, I would have even lifted a finger into the sky for the sake of drama.

Erika crossed her arms. "And what would that be."

"Behind you."

Watching the ensuing emotions play in Erika's face was almost cute. Confusion. Realization. Shock.

Determination.

With a burst of Will, a translucent shield appeared around her as she whipped around.

That was fine. She wasn't the target.

A white Volkswagen Beetle dirty enough to be called gray rammed into Gandr.

The car's engine roared as it struck the snake with enough force to send it flying over a dozen yards away. Mercifully, the impact was also strong enough for the snake to lose its hold on me. I fell on my ass, but that was a better fate than being dragged along with the snake.

I winced from the fall but managed to find my way back to my feet. I spared a glance to Flores' car and let out an impressed whistle.

Flores had said his car could smash through the walls of the Labyrinth should it be needed. He hadn't been overstating its ability. The dirty car now glowed with power, and the roar of its engine had never been louder.

"Do I rock or do I rock?" Flores shouted from the driver's seat. I smiled even as I focused my gaze on Erika. The blue shield that had appeared around her was still up. Her eyes flickered from Flores to me, reassessing the situation, wondering if there were more of us out there and whether Flores' entrance had been simple dumb luck or not.

It wasn't.

Not fully at least.

I had fired a total of two bullets. The first one had been a Freeze Bullet.

With the other one, I had tried something else.

Daniels explained it to me back then. His gun could fire more than one type of bullet, so I took a gamble and tried to use a Bullet which made noise.

Lots and lots of noise.

Enough noise to be heard on the other side of the forest.

Flores had already known the signal. He was the one who had chosen it. That was what he meant when he told Daniels to use the "loud one." I had already set the path with the traffic cone bits Flores had given us. All Flores had needed was to hear that sound.

Still, it hadn't been a sure thing.

I winced as I straightened my back and steadied my grip on Daniels' gun. It really hadn't been a sure thing. A few seconds more and I would have been a goner.

"Since you were kind enough to make the same offer twice," I said, aiming Daniels' gun at her, "I figure it is only fair to give you a choice here. Let us pass."

If Erika was the slightest bit threatened, she didn't show it. "Then, it's only fair, I return your words. Behind you," she said, pointing.

I heard the hiss but I didn't dare to turn back lest I give my back to her.

"Flores?" I asked.

"Yes?"

"Is the snake getting up?"

I will admit it was a stupid question... but I really, really wanted one thing to go my way for once today. Was that too much to ask?

"Humans!"

It was.

Reaching out with Farech, I could feel the snake starting to move again, its head rose menacingly into the air.

"Flores, can you keep doing that glowing thing?" I asked.

"A few more times," he replied.

Not bad, but also not good. We would just have to work with it.

"Okay. You take care of the giant snake. I'll deal with its master," I shouted without looking back.

"Sure, take the easy one." I couldn't see him but I imagined he was rolling his eyes at me. "Fine, we'll make like bumper cars! Come here ugly!"

The Beetle's engine roared at the same time the snake launched itself at us. It was probably a sight most people would give their right arms to see. However, I only had eyes for the woman in front of me.

Erika crossed her arms. "Do you really think you have a chance?" Her stance was unguarded and really? I was starting to think she had the right of it.

"Kind of," I said, moving my hand in a so-so manner. "You're better at Magic than me, but you're still flesh and blood. The same as everyone else. I figure I just need one good hit."

"Oh?" She cocked her head. "Care to test that theory?"

I pulled the trigger.

# Chapter 17

Freeze.

Focusing on that single word, I pulled the trigger.

The bullet bounced off her blue shield without even leaving a scratch. Rain would have left more of a mark.

Frowning, I activated Farech and...

I couldn't reach her.

Her shield and everything in it was just a big blind spot to Farech. I couldn't Grasp her or anything near her.

"Don't look so disappointed. Your logic is sound," Erika said. There was no mockery in her words, and somehow, that made it worse. "I am flesh and blood just like you. However, any proper Wizard has proper defenses. Try as much as you want, you won't hurt me."

She snapped her fingers and flame appeared in her hand. "On the other hand..."

I barely had the time to use Farech. A wall of earth rose before me just in time to block the incoming fire. Flames crashed against it likes waves. Some of them escaped to the sides and kept going. Erika's stream of fire was bigger than my measly wall and didn't look like it was going to stop anytime soon.

I frowned and held Farech in front of me.

More.

I needed more between me and her. Way more.

The earth rose up. Wall after wall. One. Five. Ten walls. More in front of me to increase thickness. More beside the first to increase width.

The fire did not stop. In fact, the flames only grew hotter, sending scorching heat all around. My eyes widened as the walls began to glow red.

They were going to melt.

If I didn't do something, I was going to burn and drown in lava.

My brain raced through the alternatives. My heart beat so loudly against my ears I could barely hear the roar of the flames.

Facing mortal danger at the mercy of luck.

A smile dyed in desperation appeared on my face. A hysterical laugh escaped my mouth,

Business as usual then.

I spread out my Reach. The entire land became known to me. I could feel Flores and the snake fighting several yards away.

More importantly, I knew exactly where Erika was. The flames blocked visibility and she was a blank spot to my senses, but a blank spot was all I needed to know her location.

With Farech, I Grasped the ground behind me and threw it at Erika. Around one ton of earth crashed against her shield.

I wasn't done.

I kept swinging Farech. I kept on ripping the ground and throwing it at her. Each projectile was equally harmless. None of them could so much as scratch her shield.

That was fine. I didn't need to scratch her shield.

I needed to bury it.

With each projectile more and more earth piled up around her. Earth that could not stand the heat she was generating. Earth that had no choice but to melt into lava.

I fell to one knee, panting, but kept on piling rocks. It was working. Little by little. More and more molten rock surrounded her. The flames crashing against my defenses grew weaker. She couldn't aim properly. She couldn't see properly.

One last step.

With a yell, I swung Farech in an arc. This time I did not grab the earth around me.

I grabbed the air.

I pushed as much Magic as I could. I focused until I was barely aware of my own body. My developing burns. My numb back. My tired muscles. My racing heart and panting lungs. None of that mattered. I existed for the sole purpose of using Farech. To create as much force as I could.

A force strong enough to create as much wind as possible.

Strong wind.

Fast wind.

Cold wind.

Wind that put out fires.

Wind that took the heat away.

Wind that could turn lava back into stone.

A raging gale crashed down on top of Erika and her shield.

The fire stopped.

I fell on my ass, panting so hard I feared my lungs would fall through my mouth. My body groaned in protest as I crawled on the floor to peek behind the walls.

There was no fire.

Heat lingered but the brilliant flames were nowhere to be seen. There was just rock and stone now. The lava surrounding Erika shield had been cooled into rock. Her shield had turned into a prison.

She was probably fine, but getting out should take time. I couldn't imagine melting it from the inside to be remotely safe.

I took a deep breath and brought a hand to my neck. Hopefully, that would buy us enough time to finish this. I just needed to help Flores finish the snake. After that, we'd be on our way to Duval-

Crack!

...

I froze.

Please no.

Slowly, I turned around.

The tree branches from the forest had grown with unnatural speed and wrapped around Erika's stone prison. The stone sphere was lifted into the air as the branches squeezed it.

Crack!

It was breaking. Little by little, cracks appeared on the rock. Little by little, the stone peeled away to reveal a translucent blue shield.

No!

I flung a huge boulder at the shield with Farech but that only served to break the stone faster.

" _How?_ " I wanted to scream at the sheer unfairness of it.

"Just who do you think created this forest? It is mine to do as I wish."

Erika barely raised her voice, but I heard her just fine. "I underestimated you. For that, I apologize. It shall not happen again."

Even as she spoke, the braches were already speeding towards me. My muscles ached. I couldn't muster the strength to dodge.

Fine!

One of the branches was torn off as I grabbed it with Farech and used it to bat the others aside.

Two could play with the forest.

I flicked Farech and Grasped one of the nearest trees.

It was heavy.

I gritted my teeth and ripped the entire thing out of the ground. The effort brought me to one knee but I held on to it.

I swung the tree.

I swung it again and again, knocking back as many incoming branches as I could. I broke them. I smashed them. I crushed them.

More came.

A hysterical laugh escaped my mouth.

I was going to lose.

A scream burst from my throat as I kept attacking the branches. I could barely move my arms. The strain from moving something so heavy with Farech was too much.

I was really going to lose.

With one last swing, the tree fell to the ground just as Farech fell from my hand.

"Get the hell away!" I drew Daniels' gun and shot Freeze bullets at the incoming branches. It was useless. I already knew. They wouldn't work on the trees just as they wouldn't work on the Minotaur. The branches kept on advancing.

I tried backing away but my limbs gave out on me. I fell.

Easy prey.

The branches wrapped around my limbs. Daniels' gun was taken away from me at the same time as another branch wrapped around my neck.

A bitter smile appeared on my face.

It was over.

I had lost.

The branches dragged my body until I was but a few feet away from Erika.

She was unharmed.

Had I been capable, I would have snorted at the sheer absurdity of it all. My clothes were torn in various places and stained with blood and dirt. I had a collection of developing bruises, burns, cuts, and an arrow wound.

Erika did not have a single hair out of place. No blemish on her perfect skin. Not a wrinkle on her clothes.

It was unfair.

For the first time I understood, really understood, the emotion driving those I had been forced to work with.

"I told you it would end this way," Erika said from behind her translucent shield. Even though I was like this, she still did not lower it. Cautious even when she didn't have to be. That seemed to be a pattern with her.

In the distance, I could hear Flores and Gandr fighting. It didn't matter now. Even if Flores won, he wasn't going to beat the woman before me.

One good hit the bastard had said.

He had made it sound so easy. I knew he had been making it sound easy. I just never realized how harsh reality was. Neither did he, come to think of it.

He had no idea.

"Yeah, you did, didn't you?" I managed to get out, my voice was faint. Weak.

"Consider yourself lucky to be alive," she said, turning around. "I'll deal with the other one now. You will remain bound until everything is over."

Yippee.

I was really going to die. In a few hours, I was going to die. Erika may be stronger than anyone else, but unless she captured Shadow, my fate would remain unchanged. Even if she or Acker captured him, he might just kill me out of spite and I couldn't say anything because that would just get me killed faster.

I could only stare at Erika's back as she walked away.

Shadows surged.

They weren't the black spots a person about to fall unconscious might see. This was pure shadow surging in front of me like a black geyser.

It was coming... from my neck.

My eyes widened as the wave of blackness rushed to meet Erika's back. I tried to open my mouth. To warn her maybe, but I couldn't. My body would not move. I was paralyzed. I could only watch. Everything around me slowed down as the blackness met Erika's blue shield.

That thing had withstood molten stone and one-ton projectiles. It protected her from Farech's grasp and bullets. Everything had bounced off, less meaningful than dust in the wind.

The shadows passed through.

There was no loud impact. There was no fierce clash. The shield did not break.

The shadows just passed through as if the shield was not there in the first place.

Erika never saw it coming.

The shadows struck her back and spread like a disease. Black marks which seemed to suck out the light around them appeared all over her body. Her shield shattered. She fell to the ground, immobile.

"What?" The word came out angry and full of confusion, maybe even a twinge of fear.

"What's the meaning of this?" Erika shouted. The Magic in the air shifted. The smallest embers appeared in her hands but it was for naught. The shadows grew with the light and smothered them.

"Meaning? My lady, it is all quite simple. This is my win."

I heard the voice before I saw him. A pool of shadows appeared just a feet away from Erika's prone body. From there, he rose. First the head. Then the shoulders, torso, and legs.

"Shadow," I whispered. Fear seized my heart. Even though he had saved me, I felt no joy in seeing him.

"Mistress!"

A loud crash I recognized as the Beetle being thrown aside reached my ears.

Gandr's giant body (Was I seeing things or had it grown smaller?) entered my field of view an instant later. The green snake bared its fangs while charging at Shadow.

The snake never even got close.

Shadow raised an open hand in Gandr's direction. A wall of shadows appeared in the snake's path, stopping it cold. It didn't end there. Just like with Erika, the shadows wrapped around the monster, binding it in place.

"Mistress!" The beast cried again, fighting against its bonds but it was of no use.

"You are already beaten, beast. That you managed to retain your size with your mistress under my power is impressive, but it is over," Shadow said.

Sure enough, Gandr was growing smaller each second. After a while, I could no longer see any sign of its giant body, only the shadows binding it.

"Kill my familiar and I will see you dead!" It was the first time I heard anger in Erika's voice. Though the threat was not directed at me I felt it all the same. Even tied and bound, the rage in her blue eyes was frightening.

"Your familiar will survive," Shadow said, not sounding the least bit intimidated. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have things to do."

There was something weird about him. It had been there in the forest too, but it was more prominent now. Something in his tone and manner.

Something familiar.

"Do you think defeating Lord Duval will be easy?" Erika asked before Shadow could leave. "Run now while you have the chance."

"Easy? Hardly. However, I don't really have to fight him, do I?" Shadow said, bringing his hands together. "You took care of that for me."

Erika paled.

"This forest. The labyrinth. They are tricky, large-scale spells," Shadow went on. "Even for someone like you, setting this up should not be an easy task. Unless, of course, you had someone to take the burden for you."

He paused for a moment, savoring the growing distress in Erika's beautiful face.

I wanted to punch him.

"Tell me," Shadow said, pointing to the house. "If I climb up that hill and go into that house, will I find a man ready to fight or one incapable of so much as lifting a finger?"

"You have no idea what you are doing!" Erika said, struggling against her bonds. The hot anger in her voice all but confirmed his words. "Everyone in the world will hunt you down for this. The moment you enter that house, your life will be forfeit."

"Oh, but I am already in the house," Shadow said.

From the look of confusion in Erika's face, she did not understand his words more than I did.

"I am already in the house. I have walked up the stairs and found a sleeping Lord Duval. I have taken care of the one you left guarding him and disabled your security measures. Impressive defensive array by the way," Shadow said as he paced around her, like a tiger about to strike.

"One. Two. Three," Shadow said, lifting up his fingers and counting. "Lord Duval is now disqualified. As is Lord Arundel, and everyone else we have captured. All simultaneously. What a pity. It seems they will all lose their Magic now in accordance to the rules of the duel."

"You're lying!" Erika shouted, desperate panic had taken hold of her voice and face.

"I assure you, I am not," Shadow said. As if responding to his words, everything around us began trembling as if hit by an earthquake.

Wide-eyed, I could only stare as trees withered and the stone walls of the labyrinth cracked and crumbled into dust.

"It is a trick. It has to be," Erika said, looking like she desperately needed to believe that.

The trembling did not stop. Our surroundings kept changing as if wanting to prove her wrong. The leaves went brown and fell. The trees shrank in seconds and what remained withered away. The imposing walls cracked and shattered until they were little more than dust in the wind. The hill the mayor's house stood on sank back into the ground.

Even the space itself seemed to distort. Shrink.

Within a few seconds, the forest and labyrinth were gone without a trace. The branches holding me in place withered away, leaving me to fall on the ground. All that remained was a street, a normal town street you could find anywhere.

"No," Erika whispered so low I barely heard it. Her struggles stopped. She just lay on the ground staring in disbelief.

Less than a second later, a multitude of lights rose up like fireworks and gathered to form a second sun shining in the sky.

It was warm.

My eyes closed in relief as the light bathed me. It was hotter than anything I had ever felt yet it did not burn me. The light seeped into my skin, giving strength to my muscles and breathing life into me.

I stayed there for as long as the light lasted. For a moment, I forgot about everything else. I just wanted to bask in it. In the entire day, this was the one moment where I was truly content.

All too soon, it ended.

The warmth faded, and I opened my eyes to the cold reality.

"Do you have any idea what you have done?" Erika asked. If the experience affected her in any way, she didn't show it.

She was still bound. Unlike mine, her bindings did not depend on the forest or the labyrinth which had been powered by Lord Duval but rather Shadow's, well, shadows.

"Oh, I do," Shadow said. There was something in his voice. Contentment. Satisfaction.

It was voice of a man who had won.

"If you truly knew what you were doing, you would have never dared to invoke the wrath of the Council," Erika snapped back. Even now embers flickered around her only to be consumed by shadows as quickly as they appeared. Where she free, she would have burned him already.

"I do believe you underestimate me, Lady Dahl."

Erika and I blinked at the same time. That had not been Shadow's voice though it most certainly came from him.

It had not been his voice but it was a familiar voice all the same. I got up to a sitting position just in time to see the door to the Mayor's house open.

Out of it came Shadow. One identical to the one in front of us.

"Shadows are wonderful things," the Shadow in front of us said while the new one walked towards him. "We have put so much meaning in them as a concept, one can do many things with them, even give them a life of their own."

The other Shadow melted into a pool of blackness and took his place at his feet.

As his shadow.

After that, it wasn't Shadow standing in front of us anymore.

It was Jonathan Acker.

# Chapter 18

Jonathan Acker was a plain looking man.

His suit would not look out of place in any office. His face was unremarkable and his glasses better suited a librarian.

However, he wore the smile of a victor.

"YOU?" The embers around Erika burned brighter than ever, and for a moment, it looked like they would prevail.

The moment ended with a single wave of Acker's hand.

"Please, refrain from doing that," Jonathan Acker said. "It generates unneeded effort on my part."

"You would betray your lord?" Erika asked as though he hadn't just talked. "You would betray our lords? For what? You're not a third-rate talent. House Arundel provides you with everything you need."

"Not everything," Jonathan said. "I do not think my decision is hard to understand. If Lord Duval is as unpleasant as the rumors say, you should have no problems sympathizing with my position."

Erika snorted. "He's an ass but I'm not going to risk my life over it. Why would you?"

"Several reasons," Jonathan replied. "I suppose there is no harm in letting you know some of the truth. I imagine you thirst for answers as well, Mister Walker?"

I shifted as I felt his gaze on me.

"You could say that."

Mostly I wanted to know if I got to live.

"You should both know the situation in our world, some more than others of course," Jonathan said, giving me a look.

Whose fault did he think that was?

"Our world is wrong," Jonathan said, and for the first time, I heard some anger in his voice. His normally placid face gained the tenseness only restrained anger could provide. "We have discovered the greatest power in the world and used it to create a society of glorified yes-men. Everyone must bow to the old families no matter how utterly graceless they might be. I dislike it. I reject it, and so, I shall not have it."

"And this is your answer?" Erika shouted. "This is a crime! The Council will not rest until they have your head. All the old families will hunt you."

"They will try." Jonathan shrugged as if it was not his problem. "They will find me a greater challenge than expected. I shall put the Magic gained from Lord Arundel and Lord Duval to good use."

Resignation fell on Erika's face. "How long?" She asked. "How long have you planned this?"

"Taking Lord Arundel's Magic? Quite a bit. However, you overestimate me if you think I planned all of this," Jonathan said. "The opportunity merely presented itself. You can only imagine my surprise when Arundel challenged Duval with their Magical Affinity on the line."

"Well, aren't you just the luckiest guy in the world?" I said, snorting.

I did not buy it for a second.

"The fates smiled on me," Jonathan said, shrugging. "Once the duel had been declared, I only needed to make sure my collaborators were chosen."

Collaborators meaning the poor fools he had recruited.

"Which would only be possible if you had someone inside the Council on your side," Erika said. "I gathered as much."

"Oh?" Jonathan Acker cocked his head to the side, looking at Erika. "Would you care to enlighten us?"

"The duel has been irregular since the beginning," Erika began. "However, what's weirder is no one from the Council has come to check on things so far. The Council should have received a report by now, yet here we are with two heirs bereft of their Magic and no outsiders in sight. The only way that could happen is if no one told them."

Angry blue met placid brown. "You and the Arbiter are in this together."

I blinked. The Orange guy?"

"The Arbiter is in charge of the selection process, and the Arbiter is the one tasked with keeping the barrier around the town and notifying the Council of the results. Only through his help could any of this be realized. He helped you sneak your men into the teams and has not made a single move to inform the Council of what is going on here."

Jonathan Acker clapped like a teacher proud of his student for being able to solve a difficult problem in class. "Correct. The Council will not hear of this for some time. I imagine it will take them a day or two to find out what happened here. He and I will be long gone by then."

I couldn't help but notice he made no mention of Flores and the others.

"Mister Walker, perhaps you have something to share with us as well?" He asked looking at me.

Oh, there were plenty of things I wanted to say.

Because really, I should have seen it coming.

After all, I had never told Shadow my last name was Walker.

Instead, I glared, wishing I could punch him. Sadly, my body was barely strong enough to remain seated. Standing up was not in the cards. Even at full health, I wouldn't be able to do a thing to him.

I raised my head and made a point of not looking in his general direction. "What do you want me to say? That you grabbed a bunch of rejects and used them like pawns?"

He may have hired Flores, but the other two were brought up just for this, right down to their Magic Tools. Daniels' gun and Farech could both immobilize targets without knocking them out.

"Did they even see the real you at any point?" I winced as I asked the question. Even speaking was painful.

The expression on Acker's face said more than words could.

My laugh was full of bitterness.

"Of course." I sighed. "Well, that's it then."

I could say more. Way more. I had more or less pieced everything together by now. I could talk about how Acker and his group had caught a bunch of other players by surprise and captured them. Acker hid them with his Shadow Magic and had Daniels' put them in stasis with his bullets. Like that, they were able to control the number of remaining players and could end the duel whenever they wanted.

Then there was Arundel.

Jonathan Acker had captured Arundel and put him in stasis from the very beginning. No other explanation worked. He had told us he was going to deal with him while we took care of Duval, but that had been a lie.

Acker had been with us the entire time, with me really. He had been hiding in the shadow collar. That's how he had known I attacked Daniels. He was there all the time, waiting for the opportunity to strike.

He had used me as a trap.

I could explain all that and a bit more, but I was not going to.

Because, really? "I am not going to take part in a deduction show that only serves to explain how everything went your way," I said, unable to hide my bitterness.

God, I so wanted to punch him.

"Not everything," Jonathan said. "You were not originally part of my plans. Imagine my surprise when I found a genuine Irregular, one strong enough to walk inside the duel grounds at that. The moment the Arbiter told me about you I knew I had to meet you. I even took out one of my men to gain your trust."

I could literally feel Erika's gaze on me, no doubt re-evaluating me thanks to Acker's revelation. Truth be told, I didn't really care what she thought of me right now.

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" I asked, my voice increasing in volume. "I mildly inconvenienced you. Joy. Then you went ahead and forced me into doing your dirty job after putting your damned shadows around my neck!"

A strong coughing fit cut off my words. Each cough shook my whole body, sending waves of hurt through it.

I had lost count of how many times I had tasted copper throughout the day.

I would have fallen had Jonathan Acker not kneeled down next to me and seized me by the shoulders.

"You have received significant damage," He said, examining me. Why he felt the need to point out the obvious was beyond me.

"Allow me to do something about it," He said.

I wanted to say no, but he wasn't asking for permission. Acker placed a hand on my forehead and a wave of cold spread through my body. For an instant, I thought I was frozen. However, the cold began fading before panic had a chance to take hold of me. All the cold in my body traveled north right to where Jonathan Acker's hand touched my skin. The older man pulled his hand back and with it all the cold in my body.

I blinked.

I felt... fine. Good even.

I stared at my hands as Jonathan Acker stood up. They were still dirty but the scratches and wounds were all gone. I could feel my back again, but there was no pain. Even the arrow wound was gone.

Tentatively, I stood up and found no trouble in doing so. It was like I had just woken up after a good night's sleep.

I looked at the man who healed me and the only thought running through my head was that now I was healthy enough to try punching his face.

I didn't.

Angry or not, I knew exactly what my chances against him were.

"I won't say thanks," I said in the end.

"I do not expect you to. As you said, I have not treated you well," Jonathan said, sounding entirely too reasonable for my liking. "If it is any comfort, rest assured that the shadow around your neck is now gone as per our agreement. Furthermore, you need not worry about the residents of this town. The spells in place will keep them safe and asleep until the Council arrives to wake everyone up. No one will be hurt."

"You're all heart," I said, rolling my eyes. I was almost proud of how much sarcasm I shoved into so few words.

Still, I had to admit that did make me a little happy. Sure, Acker got everything he wanted but at least, it was over now.

I even got to keep my head.

"You must admit you have gained something from this experience," Jonathan pointed out. "You have faced challenges and come out stronger. You have potential. I would hate to see it wasted."

I stared at him, face blank.

"Is this a recruitment speech?" I asked, crossing my arms. "Because, this is really sounding like a recruitment speech, and you cannot possibly think I am ever working for you again. Ever."

Jonathan just shrugged. "It is a far better alternative than the other options before you.

I blinked. I did not like how that sounded. I did not like where this was going. At all. "What are you talking about?"

"He means," Erika spoke up, her words dripping with bitterness. "The ones who lost their Magic during the duel are the lucky ones. They will only have their memories modified. However, we are all guilty of stealing Magic, and we will receive appropriate punishment. Imprisonment. Forceful removal of Magical Ability. Possibly death."

"But that's his fault! He planned this!" I said, feeling much like a little kid. I even pointed.

I mean, yeah, I had helped him, but there were circumstances. People had to understand that.

Right?

"He may have forced you into this. I tried to stop this. It does not matter. Two heirs are now without their Magic, and that Magic is within us. That is the only truth that matters. The Council will hunt us. You have the traitor to thank for that."

Slowly, I turned to face Jonathan Acker. He just stood there, not even bothering to deny it or apologize.

It wasn't over.

The thought sunk into my head like an anvil.

It wasn't over.

I was a criminal now.

Because. Of. Him.

I saw red.

All self-control left me. I jumped at him like an animal, hands reaching for his throat hoping to squeeze all the life out of it.

Rings of shadows appeared around each of my limbs, leaving me floating in the air. I screamed and struggled against my bonds with no more success than Erika.

"I understand your reaction, Mister Walker," Jonathan Acker said. He had not even lifted a finger. "However, anger will solve nothing."

"No, but hurting you will make me feel a lot better," I said, fighting with all my might to get my hands even one inch closer to his neck.

Jonathan Acker sighed, looking very much the part of a disappointed teacher.

"It would be ill-advised to hurt the only one who can help you," Jonathan said. "The same goes for you, Miss Dahl. I can feel you building up a spell. I advise you save yourself the inconvenience. It will not work."

Erika frowned. "And you expect us to trust you?" She asked. "After everything?"

"Who else will extend a hand to you right now? As of this moment, you lack reliable allies. Sooner or later, the Council will capture you, and you will face their justice," Jonathan Acker said, extending his hand. "I offer you a place at my side."

Erika and I traded disbelieving looks.

He couldn't possibly be serious.

"You can't possibly be serious," Erika said.

"Why not?" He asked, unflappable as always. "Your talents are notable, and with the boon gained from this experience, you shall reach greater heights. For this, the world will hunt you, but I can protect you. I am your natural ally."

Erika laughed. Long and hard.

"Forget it," she spat out, and I could swear her eyes changed into slits for a moment.

"A pity," Jonathan said, not sounding too disappointed. He had expected that reply. He'd have to be an idiot not to.

"I suppose your answer is the same?" he asked me.

I glared. "Damn right, it is the same!"

Jonathan Acker sighed and rubbed his right temple with the tip of his fingers. "Very well. Know that my door is always open. Seek me out should you change your mind. Oh, and do help Mister Flores out of that car of his. It will be hard for him to escape otherwise."

Acker turned on his heels and walked away. I opened my mouth to say something, but he vanished in shadows before I had decided on the words.

The shadows holding me vanished.

My body hit the ground.

Hard.

"Ass," I said, bringing both hands to my chin. There was some blood there. I had gotten hurt when I hit the pavement.

Great.

Just great.

Sighing, I picked myself up and pulled the neck of my shirt. It was getting a bit too hot for my liking... oh.

Erika Dahl was free.

She was already up, teeth clenched and hands balled into fists. The air around her twisted and turned like a furnace. The asphalt beneath her melted with frightening speed.

I gulped.

Apparently, the sound was enough to get her attention. Her head whipped around. I froze as her blue eyes met mine.

"You," she hissed out.

She took a step forward.

I took a step back.

"Hold it," I said, putting my hands in front of me "You're mad at me. I get that. I kind of helped with this... a lot, but I'm also a victim here!"

For a moment, I thought she was going to burn me on the spot.

Instead, she took a deep breath, trying to rein herself in. The heat lessened and the asphalt stopped melting.

"He... was holding you hostage," she said, more for her benefit than mine, as if trying really hard to remind herself why burning me was a bad idea.

I appreciated the effort.

"You would have died if you hadn't done as he asked. Is that true?"

I nodded at once. "Yes. It's all true. I wanted nothing to do with this but he put that thing on my neck and forced me."

Erika was silent for a moment.

"I still do not trust you," she said, causing me to freeze up. "But I see no reason to attack you now."

"Thanks for that, kind of," I said, exhaling. "So, we're wanted people now."

Erika bent down to pick up the snake I hadn't noticed was crawling towards her before replying. "It is as Jonathan Acker said. The Council will hunt us, and make no mistake, they will find you."

"How?" I asked, pushing my hands into my pockets. "No one knew I was going to take part in all this."

"No one knew. Past tense," She said. "Unless you mean to tell me not one of the disqualified players saw you."

I winced. The Archer. Daniels. Farech's original owner, Grant.

"They will talk unless, of course, you feel like silencing them permanently right now," she said to me. My horrified expression was answer enough for her. "Good. Neither do I. Besides, even if they don't talk, your Magical Affinity is too noticeable."

I blinked.

"How noticeable are we talking about here?" I could hide in this town couldn't I?

"Very. People who have awakened to Magic, even those with average talent, are lights shining in a sea of gray. You and I shine too brightly to be mistaken as anything other than Wizards," she said with something akin to pity in her voice.

I didn't want it.

I wanted to be told I could stay here. That I could continue living as if nothing bad had happened.

That was not going to happen.

"I advise you leave this town soon," Erika said, as she began to walk away. "Jonathan Acker's plan has bought us a day or two before the Council learns of this. Do not waste that time. Flee from this place and you might live."

With that she and her pet vanished in a burst of flame, leaving me with a dozen troubling thoughts, each one worse than the last.

Sighing, I picked up Daniels' gun and Farech. I took a look at Flores' car a block away. Gandr had done a number on it. The back was crushed and it had dents in several places. One of the wheels had come off and all but one window were broken.

Getting stepped on by an elephant would have been kinder to it. Flores was going to cry when saw it.

Wait.

I blinked. Thrice.

What had Acker said about Flores again?

Gears turned in my head, and I took off running for the car

"Flores!" I knelt beside the driver's seat. "Flores are you in there?"

I got my answer in the form of a fist with a raised thumb. Well, it was more of a thumbs down since his whole body was upside down.

Appropriate given his circumstances.

I tried opening the door to get him out but found it stuck. I thought about pulling him out through the window, but the broken glass made me reconsider.

"Try to lean away from the door," I said, backing away. "I'm going to try something."

I flicked Farech and _pulled_.

I knew something was wrong the moment my Grasp closed around the door. I had gotten the hang of willing Magic into action throughout the day. Modesty aside, I had gotten pretty good at it. At the beginning, it had taken some focus. Now, I had but to think and Magic would flow like a gentle stream.

This time, it was a raging river.

I intended to pull the door slowly so as to not hurt Flores by accident. Instead, the door was wrenched off its hinges and made an arc through the sky. I turned just in time to see it land a block away with a loud clang.

I stared at the door, the car, and Farech with growing disbelief.

"Careful," came the weak voice of Flores.

"Sorry," I said, kneeling next to him. "I used too much force by accident. Don't know how it happened."

Except that wasn't true, was it?

Everyone had been talking about it.

It was the prize that started this crazy adventure.

Magic.

Lots and lots of Magic.

20 people didn't have theirs.

I got their share. Part of it at least.

I was stronger now. I had more power and considerably less control as evidenced by my attempt to use Farech. All the control I had gained over the course of the day was gone. The ability which helped me survive many life-threatening situations was no more. I was back to square one.

I snorted. Some prize this was.

"It's not that funny," Flores said, misinterpreting my reaction.

"You only say that because your mirror is broken. One more black eye and you'd look like a raccoon," I replied. He made for sorry sight. He had a cut lip, a black eye, and a green bruise was forming in his cheek. "Now, shut up and help me get you out."

I unhooked his seat belt and began to pull out his body, a task that ended up being more complicated than expected due to various factors.

The time taken had nothing to do with me being too weak to pull his body.

Nothing at all.

"Can you stand?" I asked.

"I'd rather find out later if you don't mind," Flores said, leaning against his wreck of a car.

I shrugged. Couldn't argue with that logic.

"So, my car is done for," Flore said after a few seconds of silence.

"That it is," I said, nodding. Really, what else could I say?

"I don't see Daniels around," he said.

"He's out cold. There was a Wizard in the forest," I replied, pointing back with my thumb before realizing the forest was no more. "He got an arrow on the leg, tripped, and knocked his head against a rock."

The prepared lie rolled out from my tongue. Even so, I felt a twinge of guilt for lying to Flores. Out of everyone I had met, he was the one I liked the most.

You might even call us friendly acquaintances.

"Ah," He said, nodding. "Shame about that. Probably for the best."

I raised an eyebrow "Oh?"

"I may have been wounded but I was still conscious. I caught the important bits of your talk with the boss... well, ex-boss now. Daniels would have been crushed if he had heard it," Flores said with a sad look on his face. "He loved the guy."

I thought about his words for a moment. Daniels had lost his Magic, and by doing so, he had been saved from Acker's betrayal. He would never know how little he mattered to the man he worshiped.

More importantly, I thought, turning my gaze towards the driver, Flores was in the same situation as me.

He was conscious when it all happened. Meaning, he had gotten the same boost.

Like Acker, Erika and I, he too would be hunted in the future.

"What are you planning on doing now?" I asked. "You heard the guy. We're wanted people now."

"Not sure. The original plan had us going to a hideout in the north," Flores said. "Of course, the boss didn't take me with him so that's kind of telling. Plus, my car is not going to run anytime soon. Eh, I'll probably steal a car and get as far away from here as possible."

"Is the Council that scary?" I asked, genuinely curious. Acker had mentioned it. So had Erika. The problem was they took the knowledge for granted.

Flores was better when it came to explanations.

"Extremely scary," He said with dead seriousness. "It's an organization that monitors wizards all over the world. It mostly makes sure no one is being too overt with their powers. There are plenty of branches but at the center of it all is the Grand Council. All the big families have seats there, Duval and Arundel among them."

The gears turned in my head. I had done the magical equivalent of kidnapping the sons of two world leaders and turning them invalid

"Well, shit."

Flores nodded. "Shit indeed."

"What should we do with Daniels? Are you going to take him?" I asked. He may not have stolen Magic, but he did try to steal it, something that would be easily uncovered once they interrogated the captured wizards, well, ex-wizards now.

To my surprise, Flores just shook his head. "Leave him here. I'll dress up his wounds just in case, but it's safer for him to stay here. The Council will interrogate him but not much beyond that. They tend to leave normals alone. At worst, he might get his memory altered."

"Altered?"

"He'll forget about all of this. Magic. The boss. The Duel." Flores shrugged. "Might be for the best really."

"If you say so," I said, having no reason to press the issue. Flores was the expert here.

It really might be for the best. Daniels believed he was doing the right thing. The person he was before meeting Jonathan Acker may do some good yet.

Plus, he would forget I betrayed him. A win all around.

"Since we are talking about it, what are you planning to do?" Flores put a hand on the ground and pushed himself up. I moved to help him but there was no need. He grabbed hold of his car and used it to gain stability and pull himself up.

"I... really hadn't thought much about it," I said while trying to conceal how nervous I was.

I just had no idea what to do.

Where do Wizards go when they don't want to be found?

"Come with me then," Flore offered, pointing at himself.

Huh?

"Huh?"

"It will be fun," He assured me, then frowned. "Well not fun, but it'll be safe. I hope. We'll steal a car and get far away from here. I'm thinking that one."

He pointed to a car at the end of the street. "We have some time until the Council knows but once it does we want to be as far away from here as possible. How about it? I did tell you I was going to teach you some stuff."

It was a tempting offer.

There was something to be said about safety in numbers, and Flores was less likely to betray me than most given we were on the same boat.

By all accounts, I should go with him.

"How soon do you need to leave?" I asked after staring at the red car he was pointing at for a while.

"Within the next hour or two preferably," He said, dead serious. "I'm checking Daniels' wounds just to be on the safe side, but after that, I'm gone."

I cocked my head in his direction. "You have a one day head start. They are that bad?"

"Worse."

The Wizard's Council. The more I heard about them, the less I liked them.

I should really just take his offer. Just jump in the car and get as far away as possible.

But I was never good at goodbyes.

I wasn't like Flores or the others. This wasn't their home. It was mine.

My gaze shifted from Flores to the car he planned on stealing.

I gave him my answer.

# Chapter 19

In the end, I hadn't gone with him.

I couldn't.

I could say it was just about wanting to say goodbye to my hometown. I couldn't leave right away. I needed more than two hours. Truth be told, it wouldn't be a lie, not a full one at least.

There was just something else.

I had betrayed Daniels. If Flores ever found out about it... I was not sure how he would react. Would he be angry? Would he betray me? Or maybe he wouldn't mind? Could he forgive me?

I didn't know. I couldn't be sure, so I had told him I needed to do a couple of things in Redfield before leaving.

Like everyone else I had met since waking up, I couldn't fully trust him.

Flores had looked disappointed but ended up leaving after he took care of Daniels. His fear of the Council outweighed his concern for my safety.

In the end, I bade him goodbye as he drove west at full speed.

Well, at least, he left me something good, I thought as I walked through the streets with a notebook tucked under my arm.

"Take it," Flores had said after diving into his wreck of a car to pull it out of the glove compartment. "These are my father's research notes. You are going to need them if you want to survive."

I had tried to object. I really had. It was too precious. It was his father's book. If I had anything left from my father, I would never let it go.

Flores didn't take no for an answer. The knowledge, he claimed, was already in his head. The way he told it, he had long surpassed the contents of the book. To me, however, it was an invaluable treasure.

He had given me a way to learn about Magic.

It made me feel even guiltier about not going with him.

Still, I hadn't been completely lying. There were things I needed to do. I made my way back home first, took my second bath of the day, and changed clothes. After that, I found some paper and wrote.

And wrote.

And wrote.

I was not good at goodbyes but I would feel bad if I left without one.

I left the notes on my desk. For my mother. For Rob and Eric. For Dana. For all of them and more. I didn't go into too many details. I couldn't.

It was just... goodbye.

I packed some things, kissed my mother goodbye, and closed the door behind me.

Like Flores, I stole a car. I had no idea how to hotwire a car, but I didn't need to. Breaking into a house and taking the car keys was a simple task. I even made sure to pick one belonging to someone who lived far away from me. It wouldn't do to have the car theft linked to me... not right away at least.

That would just make trouble for mom.

As I drove away, I looked at Redfield through the rearview mirror. The sun was already setting in the horizon.

I thought of my house, of the ice cream place where I had my first date with Dana, of the schoolyard where I had my first fight, of the park where I used to run around with Eric and Rob when we were kids, of the classrooms where I fell asleep while Mr. Wagley droned on and on.

It had been a nice life. Not the best but nice.

It had been my life.

Not anymore.

Goodbye.

# After the Lines – The End of Youth

Mom,

I am sorry.

I am not quite sure how to say what I want to say, but I figure I should start with that. I am sorry.

You may find this hard to believe but a lot has happened.

Wonderful things. Dangerous things. Terrible things. Things that are just so much bigger than me. Like they were made just to remind me of how small I am.

I... am not making much sense, am I?

Again, sorry.

By the time you read this, I will be long gone. It has nothing to do with you or anyone else in town. I love you all, and I will miss you. We might argue about things sometimes but you're my mother and I love you. I am grateful for everything you have done for me.

You're the best mom in the world.

However, I have to run now. I will be running for a while I think

I would say don't worry about me, but you're probably going to worry anyway. I am sorry about that too.

You may hear some things about me in the future. Don't believe any of them.

Don't look for me. You won't find me. Just please... wait for me. I am not sure what the road I am taking is like, but I do know in time it will lead me home again.

I promise.

With love,

You son

### The End

# Afterword

Welcome one and all,

I am F.A.R., the writer of this book. For reaching the end, you have my thanks.

It is known all children must eventually grow up and step into the world. However, the world is not always content to wait until they are ready. You can say that is one of the themes of this book. Michael Walker is forced to leave his childhood home behind and enter into a wider world, one full of unknowns and danger.

Does it feel like he got the short end of the stick in all of this? If you feel sorry for him, I have done something right.

Worry not, Michael Walker's story will continue. This book is but his first step into the World of Magic. Please look forward to his continuing adventures.

Ah, how about a nice hunt under the full moon for the next time?

# Support the Author

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Reviews are the lifeblood of indie books like this one. If you have enjoyed this book, support the author by leaving a review. It is free and doesn't have to take more than a minute of your time. Remember, your words will always be the greatest support a writer can receive!

# Other Titles by F.A.R.

Michael Walker's Journey Continues in...

Full Moon Hunt

Tired and on the run from powerful enemies, Michael arrives at Wolfwood City. He wants nothing more than to rest for a few days, but life is rarely so kind. A hunter from the Council is hot on his trail, an intrepid reporter keeps on asking the right questions, and of course, there is the possibility that the biggest werewolf convention in the country might have attracted a real monster!

When the moon rises, Michael Walker will need to use all his skills to survive!

Get it Now!

# Connect with F.A.R.

Twitter: <https://twitter.com/FarBooks>

Smashwords: <https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/FarRites>

Official Website: <http://farwriters.com/>

