Scorio bowed low, still awed and humbled to be addressed by such a powerful figure. “Thank you, Charnel Duchess. I hope to ever earn your regard.”
“Good luck to you all.” And she arose gently into the air, wings extended to each side, till she was a good ten yards above them all at which point she soared away.
Scorio straightened. Everyone present of every rank was staring at him with incredulity and awe.
“Well,” said Praximar, rising from his bow. “What a change of events. We have had a terrible start of things, Scorio. I hope you take my apology to heart and allow both the Academy and myself a chance to change your opinion of us.”
Again Scorio studied the man. His smile was sheepish, his expression chagrined and rueful both. Was he genuine? He had only to squint, and he saw the older man as he was in the holding cell, cruel and cold and filled with disdain. “I only want to study and learn in the Academy,” he said, wrestling with his old, terrible anger. So many were watching, listening intently. A crowd of at least fifty. Was this the time to lay bare his grievances? To make his accusations?
“Good!” Praximar clapped his hands. “Then perhaps, if you are not too wearied, you can help us with establishing order in the city. Every Great Soul is needed.”
“Of course,” said Scorio, frowning. “How can I help?”
Praximar stepped back up on his block of stone and gestured to a couple of youths that stood just behind Scorio. “Exero here is a Flame Spark. I’m putting him in charge of you and Famissa. Exero, head south to Ward 4 and find a salient point with which to promote our authority. Deal with whatever problems you see as best you can, but make it clear: Bastion remains under the authority of the Academy and its four Houses. Anarchy will not be tolerated.”
Exero proved to be a pale, lanky youth with a rough mane of white hair. He bowed his head curtly, and looked to Scorio and the woman beside him, who had to be Famissa. “It’s a bit of a run. Let’s get started.”
Scorio nodded and fell in behind the Flame Spark as they raced out of the square. Behind him, he heard Praximar calling out further orders.
And just like that, he was a member of the Academy once more. He looked sidelong at Famissa, a woman with long black hair and tanned skin. She ran purposefully by his side, gaze focused ahead, but sensing his gaze, she looked sidelong at him and gave him a tight smile.
He was part of her group. He was part of the Academy. He was accepted amongst them. His help was needed.
And in that moment, it finally hit home that his entire world had really and profoundly changed. He’d not be going back to his solitary room in the ruins. Wouldn’t skulk into the city to line up at the gruel fountains. Wouldn’t go on long runs by himself, wouldn’t be training under Naomi’s impatient eye.
He was part of the Academy. He’d have access to its resources. He’d be trained by the best and could now devote all of his resources to fulfilling his potential.
Even as they ran deeper into the wounded city of Bastion, as he saw chaos and despair around him, he grinned.
He’d done it.
1
His elation was short-lived. The city had been warped, the changes all the more shocking for erupting at random and then disappearing for long stretches. People wandered in shock, staring, glassy-eyed, at the cancerous outgrowths, the impossible, improbable, transmutations.
Here a tower skewered a building neatly, both inhabiting the same space without a single block or lintel showing the violence of the interposition. There a wall had been flayed from the front of a four-story building, the interior rooms then thrust out, walls and ceilings and floors stretching as if impossible thumbs had pushed at the building’s back, all of it now rendered uninhabitable.
But their goal was Ward 4; on they ran, leaving the chaos behind, the wailing, the cries for attention, the shouts of anger. Members of the four Houses were scattered throughout, all in their uniforms and seeking to impose order, to corral the madness, here helping the wounded, there beating the riotous into submission. Great Souls were even rarer, and the few Scorio saw as he jogged past looked stunned, overwhelmed by the scale of the task before them, the enormity of what had just transpired in the skies above.
“Here,” called Scorio, “a quicker way to our ward.” And without waiting for Exero’s agreement, he peeled off to the left, down a side street whose floor rose ever upwards along Bastion’s radial curvature.
All too soon they spilled out into a large square, deep in the heart of their target ward, an area that neither the Houses nor the Great Souls had yet reached. Pale orange and blue awnings stretched over storefronts, and the buildings shone pale ivory in the light of Second Bronze, their edges trimmed in crimson.
But the square itself was convulsing with emotion, with outrage, with the screams of the dying and the wailing of the bereaved.
Scorio’s eyes widened as he tried to take it all in. Everywhere he looked, he saw the price Ward 4 had paid. Buildings along the square’s left edge were practically unrecognizable, turreted and balconied into oblivion, with one having sunken and rotated so that its roof now pointed across the square at the opposite buildings as if the whole edifice had chosen to take a bow.
Worse was the long line of the dead whom the locals were covering with sheets. Over forty bodies lay in a row, the great dashes of blood spattered across the paving stones a testament to how violently they’d died.
Exero opened his mouth, closed it. Famissa paled beneath her tan. Neither seemed to know what to do, how to proceed.
“Here,” said Scorio, heart pounding, and made his way to the great water fountain in the square’s center, where he climbed up to stand on the clamshell basin and cup his hands to his mouth.
“People of Ward 4!” His cry was swallowed up by the general clamor; a few glanced his way, saw his impoverished and dirty garb, then looked away.
But it was enough to snap Exero out of his silence. The Flame Vault climbed up beside him, raised a hand, and then unleashed a mass of whips from his palm, each outlined in pale green flame. They shot out over everyone’s heads, then snapped closed with a great crack and sucked back into his hand to disappear.
The crowd froze, turned, and stared at them, eyes wide in alarm.
“People of Ward 4!” shouted Exero, raising his palms. “We’re Great Souls from the Academy! I’m Flame Vault Exero—”
“Where were you?” An older woman staggered forward, her hands gleaming crimson. “Where were you?”
“We—” Exero blinked, taken aback.
“Who was that?” shouted another man hoarsely. “One of your Imperators? One of those that failed to deliver on the prophecy?”
Exero frowned, brow lowering, but more were pushing forward, their expressions curdled with fury.
“Half the city ruined, and what did you do?”
“Took you long enough! What you come here for, demand more taxes from us?”
“Can you heal? Please, help my son—”
“Down with the Great Souls!” This last rang out with terrible intensity, and a young woman with a shock of crimson hair whose eyes revealed her brutalized soul staggered forward. “Down with the Great Souls! Down with the oppressors!”
The crowd hushed, many turning in alarm and horror to stare at her, but the woman was so far gone that she didn’t care or see.
Where did Scorio know her from? Her stark features, her blazing eyes - he knew her, but she looked different—
An old man, all bones and white stubble, limped forward and jabbed his walking stick into the air. “The Deniers are right! Down with ‘em! Down with them all!”
More joined in, voices ringing with outrage: “Down with the Great Souls!”
Exero’s expression darkened, and he touched a white marble pendant about his neck. Scorio felt a rush of mana as the Flame Vault swept power into the treasure, and immediately his form was limned in raging golden flame that scorched the ground beneath his feet black.