“At what range can you begin draining?” asked Scorio.
Leonis frowned. “About ten yards? We’ll have to get in very close. Best if you distract it before we move in.”
Ten yards. Scorio could barely sense his iron bar at three. But he bit back his bitterness and nodded decisively. “Sounds like a plan to me. You both ready?”
Leonis held out his hand for the bridge, then examined it, turning it about. “This is a potent treasure. You really lucked out in finding that corpse in the caverns.”
“I know it,” said Scorio softly. “I still mean to honor Radert at some point. Without his treasures, I’d have died down there.”
“Lucky for us all you didn’t,” said Lianshi. “Let’s get moving. Good luck!”
“Good luck!” said Scorio back, and her smile was bright and hopeful as she gave a small wave and scooted off down the length of the retaining wall toward a western drop-off point.
“Play it safe,” said Leonis, giving him a light punch in the shoulder, and then he, too, hurried off, bent over nearly double behind the wall.
He watched as they scaled down the building, made their way carefully a good two blocks west, losing sight of them intermittently, then saw Leonis creep out onto the jutting outcropping and activate the bridge.
Scorio had to stifle a laugh when both Leonis and Lianshi jerked in surprise as the bridge exploded forth, extending out over the fiery gorge at a steep angle and then dropping down to lie solidly across the chasm.
The two Great Souls wasted no time, however, and raced across, collecting the bridge when it retracted, going to ground amongst the distant ruins.
His turn.
Scorio slid and hopped, jumped from rock to ledge, until he reached the fragmented avenue that culminated in the broad bridge.
Nothing moved. First Bronze was still bright all around them, the shadows attenuated, the light bright and syrupy.
Taking a deep breath, Scorio began to stride toward the bridge, chalk in hand. The toad struck with terrible speed—he’d have to be ready to scrawl his line the moment it appeared, because by the time he saw it the tongue would already be hurtling toward him.
Scorio stepped onto the bridge and paused. His skin goosebumped with nerves. Were his friends in place? Was he timing it right?
No way to know but to proceed.
Moving carefully, not wanting to look too brazen, he made his way across. The bridge was easily five or six yards wide, a massive stretch of rock without guard rails or any distinguishing features. Just a broad expanse of gray, cracked stone that extended over the roiling furnace-like depths below.
He kept his gaze fixed on the demolished house at the far end of the bridge. Was that movement? No. Or—no. Not yet.
He was about halfway when the toad appeared. One moment the landscape was desolate, and then it was there, having hopped up onto a rough-edged boulder, facing him with all the stillness of an eerie statue, massive and malevolent.
Its back and legs were black as the densest shadows, Coal mana oozing off it like thick oil onto the boulder. Its stomach and the soft underside of its jaw however were a lighter gray, the skin dusty and textured like that of an old man.
But its face. Its brows above each blank hollow where an eye should have been extended up into sharp ridges that were almost horns, and there was a depth of intelligence to the cast of its impossibly broad mouth that made Scorio think it was smiling, smirking, perhaps, pleased with itself and contemptuous of the world.
All this he registered in a fraction of a second, and then he was down on one knee, ripping the chalk across the rock as a sense of motion hurtled at him, a dark cloud, a burst of violence.
A second later a large, oily black cushion spludged against the invisible wall thrown up by the chalk-line, compressing and wiggling just a foot from Scorio’s face, spattering gray mucus to the sides as he felt an explosion of Coal mana.
Reflex kicked in, and Scorio fell back on his ass as he jerked away, just as the tongue retracted, shooting back into the toad’s gaping maw with impossible speed.
It shifted in annoyance upon its boulder, as if seeking a better stance to compensate for its failure.
Scorio waited, expecting his friends to begin their assault, and then remembered he was meant to draw out as many tongue strikes as he could. Summoning his courage, he rose, stepped around the invisible wall, and began striding toward the toad once more, chalk held at the ready.
It ceased its fractional adjustments, and then once more launched its tongue, the strike almost too quick for Scorio even though he was prepared. Even so, he barely got a foot of chalk drawn out before the tongue impacted, spattering him with gluey mucus and another wash of Coal.
The goo was gray and impossibly sticky; his robes immediately congealed and held together wherever dollops sprayed him, and he resisted the urge to wipe a wet mass off his chin for fear that his sleeve would stick to his face.
Taking another deep breath, he hurried around the barrier, chalk hand trembling with anticipation. The toad moved its bulk back a little, wiggling from side to side as if unsure, and then instead of attacking again it hopped down and off the rock.
Immediately Scorio sensed the Coal mana in the air begin to swirl, and saw thick, black vapor begin to stream from the toad’s form toward where his friends were no doubt hidden behind a screen of fallen rocks.
Scorio broke into a run, pounding across the rest of the bridge as the toad oriented itself on Leonis and Lianshi. Its form was lightening, the loss of the black smoke causing the dense darkness of its back and limbs to pale.
But then, before Scorio could draw mana into his Heart, it opened its mouth and inhaled.
All the Coal mana in the air rushed toward it in a roar, draining the air in seconds, a vast and powerful inhalation that caused its cheeks to balloon out grotesquely even as its hide turned jet once more.
Scorio staggered, almost lost his balance, the paddle of his will suddenly finding nothing to work on. The immediate area had been completely scoured of mana.
Leonis and Lianshi’s burst out of hiding, each running in an opposite direction as they abandoned their cover, and the toad edged first one way then the other, picking a target.
“Hey,” shouted Scorio, racing forward, trying to close the distance, waving his arms as he went. “Look at me! Hey, toad head, look at me!”
His friends weren’t moving with the alacrity of ignited Hearts; they’d lost whatever mana they’d built up.
As such, Leonis was unable to duck when the toad finally gulped down all the drained mana, opened its mouth, and hit him with its elongated tongue, slamming the oily, mucus-covered tip into his side, engulfing his arm and hip.
“No!” Lianshi cut back from the angle she’d been running to intercept, but she’d gone out too wide.
Leonis went stiff, eyes bulging, and the tongue retracted, hauling him through the air as if he were little more than an insect.
Scorio dug the steel rod out from his robes, took three lunging steps, and leaped at the expanse of tongue right before him.
And as he flew forward, he reached out with his will, yearned to find some wisp of Coal, the faintest hint of power.
There—already the mana was regenerating, the locale so rich in power that it had attracted the toad in the first place. A few wisps, just enough for him to desperately swirl them about his Heart as he came crashing down upon the tongue, and stabbed the rod into its glistening gray expanse, pinning it to the ground.
In that very moment, he swept mana into the treasure and felt it lock into place.
The toad let out a panicked Uarghp! sound as it strained back, yanking at its tongue, and then Lianshi was by Leonis’s side, grabbing his free arm and trying to haul him free.
“Stop!” shouted Scorio, pulling forth his knife and placing its edge across the taut skin of the tongue. “Release my friend or I’ll cut straight through!”