Better yet, his collection of Black Star plants grew. Night by night he scoured the streets of the ruins. Defied the odds, pushed his luck, and collected as many as he could find. Some nights he came up empty, or only find one or two; other nights he’d nail his luck and stumble across a dozen growing in a particularly rich area.
“You keep up this madness,” said Naomi one morning, eyeing his latest score of six plants, “and one night you’ll go permanently missing.”
“It’s not happened yet,” said Scorio, washing his face and trying to convince himself he was awake.
“You’re killing yourself for a single Black Star pill,” said Naomi, her incomprehension evident. “Your peers in the Academy get one every morning as part of their breakfast—if they don’t get better.”
“I’m not in the Academy,” he said simply. “So I’ll take what I can.”
“Let me see that cut.” She took his wrist without asking, turned his arm to look at the deep scratch that ran from his elbow to shoulder. “You clean it out?”
Scorio pulled his wrist free. “Yes. Though I’m out of gray ivy paste. I’ll have to collect more tonight.”
Naomi frowned at him.
“What?” He tugged his sleeve back down. “I’m lucky the—well, I don’t know what it’s called—didn’t take my arm clear off.”
“No. It’s just that…” And for a moment Naomi looked nonplussed, strangely uncertain. “I just don’t understand. Your effort far outweighs the rewards.”
“So I simply shouldn’t try?”
“It’s like I said. You’re risking death every night for nothing.”
“Not nothing.” Scorio sat cross-legged, placed his hands on his knees. “Two more nights and I’ll have fifty plants. That should be enough for my first pill. Which will put me one pill ahead of the game.”
Naomi sighed and lowered herself to sit before him. “I can’t imagine how powerful you’d have become if you’d stayed in the Academy. But no matter. If you’re that close, we might as well go visit my friend. See how this can best be done.”
Scorio sat upright. “You’ll introduce me?”
She scowled. “You’ve proved yourself by collecting so many. I’ll be true to my word. You can come as long as you stay silent.”
“Great! When can we go?”
“Later. But for now, enough of this talk. Focus on the ambient Coal mana. Let me see you stir it.”
Scorio steadied his breathing, bottled up his excitement, and closed his eyes. He summoned his Igneous Heart. It appeared quickly and hovered in his mind’s eye, gleaming and cold.
Once he’d have thought the Coal mana in the room to be dense, but after his nightly adventures deeper into the ruins, he knew this was a weak cloud at best. Still, it resisted his manipulations like mud. He summoned his will, envisioned his paddle, and after two swirls, began working on his technique, reducing the paddle’s size and moving it more quickly through the clouds, no longer trying to shove the whole sooty mass around, but rather cutting through it and allowing the friction of its passage to drag the cloud into action.
“Better,” said Naomi as the clouds began to swirl, his will cutting through them neatly. “Now, direct it into your Igneous Heart.”
This part still gave him trouble, but the act of cutting through the mana seemed to make it more pliant; he infused his Heart with his presence, and then inhaled, drawing a deep spiritual breath even as he directed the clouds into its glittering core.
The dark mana’s swirls tightened into a spiral with the Heart at the center, and though the process wasn’t as neat as he might have wished, the mana spun its way into the Heart in one great slurp and was gone.
“There!” He opened his eyes but sat absolutely still. The sensation of so much mana in his Heart made him feel as if he were balancing a crystal glass filled to the brim with water upon his palm. The slightest movement and it would topple over, spilling everywhere.
“Not bad,” said Naomi, a touch of a smile appearing at the corner of her lips. “Not at all bad.”
“How close am I?” Scorio fought to keep the excitement from his voice but failed. “From total saturation?”
“Closer. You could probably ignite now if you wanted the weakest Heart out there. But you’ll know when you’ve hit your absolute limit when your body breaks out in soul fire.”
“Soul fire?” He felt some of the mana begin to seep out of his Heart and locked it in tight. “What’s that?”
“Total saturation, the point at which your Heart has been stretched to its maximum potential limit, is when the mana suffuses your heart so totally that it manifests as mana-colored flames that envelop your body.”
Scorio glanced down at his arm. “No black flames.”
“No black flames. If I had to guess, you’ve only filled your Heart a fraction of what it’s capable of. Which speaks to a naturally deep Heart.”
“That’s good?”
“Normally. But not if you’re out here with nothing but Coal to draw on.”
“But if I had those blue vials…? And used this technique?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Almost all of it would be wasted. But yes. That would push you to your saturation point if you could control it.”
With a sigh, Scorio released the mana back into the room. “Have you used the vials?”
“Not yet.”
“Can I convince you to give them back?”
She raised her chin, her expression growing cold. “Don’t mistake our relationship, Scorio. I’ve taken pity on you, yes. You’re a moment’s diversion. But I don’t harbor any illusions about where this is going.”
“Which is where?”
“You don’t have enough self-control. You will either die during one of your night runs or go into the city and get yourself caught. Either way, your hunger for power will be the end of you. So why throw away such a priceless resource on so foolish a Char?”
“Then why haven’t you used it yet?”
“That’s my business.”
“No,” said Scorio, his voice growing as hard as hers. “You stole it from me. I can’t take it back, but you owe me the courtesy of telling me what you’re going to do with it.”
They locked eyes, and the tension in the room grew till Scorio was certain she was about to shift into her nightmare form.
Instead, she looked away and rose to her feet, looking irritable and restless. “Fine. I can still indulge in basic courtesy. If I’m to make the most use of the vials, I need to affirm my own commitment to my growth so that I don’t waste it either.”
“Your ambition,” said Scorio.
“My goals, yes.” She moved to the window and stared out at the ruddy landscape. “I’ve the talent, but not, as my father would say, the drive. Acquiring these vials has caused me to reconsider my options. But I need to be sure that I know what I want and why before I even dream of breaking it open. It might not help me become a Tomb Spark, but it could make all the difference when I press for Flame Vault.”
Scorio frowned at her. “You wouldn’t use it to become a Tomb Spark?”
“That’s nothing you need to worry about.”
Scorio considered. “Fair enough. But I have a proposition for you.”
She glanced back at him over her shoulder. “You’d have to give me something of greater value than a sapphire vial if you want me to give you one.”
“Not quite.” He smiled. “My bridge and steel rod. You took those from me, too. Let’s say they’re still yours, but allow me to use them at night. They’ll make my exploration of the ruins a much easier feat.”
Her eyes narrowed, but he thought he saw a flicker of guilt in their depths and knew that he had her.
“Very well.” She drew both items out and set them on the windowsill. “Basic courtesy. You can borrow them. But they are mine by rights.”
“And what rights are those?”
She smiled, gathered up his bundle of plants, and then hopped up onto the windowsill. “The single greatest legal claim in Bastion and all of helclass="underline" the right of the strong. Be ready at First Rust. We’ve an appointment in town.”