His breath caught in his throat. Within each swirled a metallic blue smoke, shot through with glittering flecks of mica. They were indescribably beautiful, endlessly curling through a variety of hues, revealing dark, sapphire depths and lightening to brilliant azure at the raised ridges.
But more than the sight of them was the pull they had on his spirit. Scorio couldn’t fathom why he felt such a desire for the blue smoke. Drawing the vials forth, he held them up and stared into their depths. What were they? The smoke seemed too solid, almost an endlessly swirling fluid, or…
But he wanted it. Like a starving man might crave a grilled slice of meat, fat and juices dripping from the seared exterior, he yearned to devour their contents in some manner.
Scorio stared, transfixed. The corks were sealed with thick crimson wax, with a symbol pressed onto their heads as if by a signet ring. A chimera, a cruder version of the one carefully stenciled on the badge he’d discarded.
It would be child’s play to break the seal and pop a cork. But then what? Drink it? Try to swirl it around his Heart… but to what end?
With great reluctance, he slid them back into their velvet loops and folded the pouch closed, buckling it tight. No. Given his ignorance, he’d just waste this treasure. And the only thing worse than not consuming it would be watching it disperse into the air while he flailed like an angry child after it.
Frowning, he stared at the alley mouth where pedestrians strode by, flashing into his line of view before disappearing after two steps.
Return to Dola? Hand over the pouch? This mission had been riskier than even she’d warned. Sure, there had been people on the inside setting things up for them, but their disguise had been flimsy, the security too tight. Was that Dola’s fault? No; she’d made the risks very clear. But she’d been all too willing to gamble their lives away at the slim prospect of acquiring these vials.
Would the next job be better? Dola would never stop trying to profit off his abilities. She’d ride his successes till he died.
Mood turning dour, prickled to mercurial anger by the pull of the vials, he remained crouched in the gloom, the burnished light of Second Bronze bathing Bastion in its unceasing glow.
He felt uneasy, felt trapped. Biting the inside of his cheek, he considered the black pouch, then sighed and rolled his neck till it popped. Had he overlooked other options? Feiyan and Helena had made it seem otherwise. Was Dola his only recourse? He thought of the guards chasing after him. They’d just been doing their jobs, and now would pay for their failure to guard this treasure. The thought made him feel queasy.
Turning, he sat against the wall, shoulders slumped. He simply didn’t know enough about this world to make educated decisions. Everything was so complex, the city, its people, the politics, the tension that filled the streets. He’d emerged from the ruins searching blindly for direction, guided by anger and resentment. What were his goals? What was he trying to achieve? To just live as an operative for Dola, earning a handful of octs after each successful heist?
No.
He’d convinced himself it was fitting to rob from the Houses, but now that he’d actually done it, he realized it wasn’t for him. He didn’t want to be sent blindly into another suicide mission. To die or be apprehended like Skarx, a rustspark addict desperately trying to just make it through another day.
He ran his thumb slowly over the velvet pouch. For better or worse, he was a Great Soul. He had within him illimitable potential if he could just harness it. Helena, Feiyan, even Dola had been aware of that primal difference between him and them. Questions of fairness or merit aside, he had a chance to make something of himself.
But again, to what end? Praximar had closed all the doors. Even if he overcame those obstacles, forged a fake identity for himself, what would he achieve? Did he wish to simply embed himself in one of the four Houses, to walk around in a uniform, giving orders and living off the labor of others? That had no appeal.
What if he became powerful enough to strike out into hell itself, to leave Bastion and its problems behind to explore the lands under those blue skies? That felt better, but still felt… hollow.
There was too much he didn’t understand. He had to grow, to learn, to figure out his place in this strange world. Which meant, more than anything else, he had to continue wrestling with his Igneous Heart, with his latent powers. Leonis and Lianshi were no doubt blossoming under the guidance of the Academy instructors, but he had to figure it out by himself.
And these vials might be a means to achieve a breakthrough.
He’d not be giving them back to Dola.
Scorio grimaced and rose to his feet. Which meant, in turn, that he was making a very powerful enemy.
He thought of Dola. Powerful, white-haired, grim-faced, looming over the Narrows like a shadowy titan, her reach sufficiently pervasive to penetrate even House Chimera’s skycrane yard.
Not an enemy to make lightly.
Then again, she could only ever be the worst kind of friend.
Carefully placing the velvet pouch inside his robes, he took a moment to adjust his numerous treasures, tightened his belt, then stepped up to the alley’s mouth. He looked up and down the broad street at the sparse crowd rushing back and forth. Each person carried behind their inscrutable faces a world of purpose, desires, hopes, and frustrations. All of them belonged to Bastion, understood it in their own nuanced way, navigated its corridors of power, strove to do just a little better, to parlay their luck and talent and dreams into an improvement of some kind.
Was he any different?
Not really. But fate had gifted him the means to realize a wholly different level of power. To attain goals beyond even his own imagining.
Stepping out, hands linked behind his back, he walked axially south, tracing the long road beneath the sun-wire toward the distant ruins.
He’d been a Blood Baron once. He, Scorio. Reborn within the Academy, on a jeweled bier. Had that past-life version of him also been cast through the Final Door? If so, it meant he’d overcome these challenges. He’d asked the same questions, faced the same foes, and won through.
Scorio took a deep breath and raised his eyes to the city that arched overhead. The disparate neighborhoods, all of them bathed in the sun-wire’s ruddy glow. He’d walked these streets centuries before. He’d ignited his Heart, had passed his Four Trials, had broken through the bottleneck of being a Dread Blaze, had become a Pyre Lord, and then a Blood Baron.
He studied the strange city as he walked, lips pursed. If he’d done it once, he could do it again. Perhaps in this life, he’d rise higher. Reach Charnel Duke like Jova Spike had done.
But to what end?
The question gnawed at him. He felt, as deeply as he did the pull of the vials, a hidden imperative. A reason to fight. A cause. A primal drive to overcome and grow.
To spurn the Academy, and show the chancellor that he’d excelled without their help? That felt a hollow and petty motivation. Power for its own sake? To satisfy his curiosity about what it was he could do?
Intriguing, but insufficient.
The sun-wire began to dim, the light turning a sultry brown, a soft benediction, shadows creeping forth to meld, colors fading, a dusky burn that promised true darkness. Great streams of mist began to rise from the city, arching their way up toward the sun-wire and there set to coiling around its livid filament.
He’d have to find a place to bed down. Where? Helena and Feiyan would have vacated their basement by now. It had obviously proven safe enough for them to use for a spell. There was no reason it wouldn’t work just as well for him.
On he walked, the neighborhoods changing, the differences in their character subtle, but all tending toward greater impoverishment the closer he got to the ruins. It was still Second Rust when he finally reached the edge of civilization, pausing to stare out over the maze of scorched rock, gutted buildings, and rubble-strewn streets.