“You should absorb it all.” She handed it over. “You probably unnerved all those poor Emberlings by walking around half-dead.”
“Let’s split it equally.” Scorio examined the sealed cork. “Unless you’re confident your Heart’s returned to normal?”
Her pause was answer enough.
So Scorio cracked the seal, drew the cork, and reached out with his Heart’s senses to watch as luxurious, languid Gold poured forth like molten smoke into the air.
“Been awhile,” he whispered, and neatly cut half the mana away from the bulk to swirl it around and into his Heart.
Absorbing it was pure glory. Even the Bronze he’d tasted in the labyrinth below was as ashes in comparison. The Gold lit him up, thrilled him, made him feel powerful and leonine. With but a twist of his will he substituted the Iron he was burning for Gold, and then exhaled and lay back, closing his eyes.
Gold flames danced over his Heart, and it felt so familiar, so welcome, like returning to an old friend. Two years. Two years he’d spent burning this mana, burning it as quickly as he could in order to survive. The Iron and Bronze, the Copper and Coal, all of it paled in comparison to this richness.
His Heart thrummed and power flooded into his body.
Was it like this for everyone else? Or was his a unique experience due to being Gold-tempered?
The world faded away as he focused on rationing his Gold carefully. The urge to conflagrate and burn it all off at once in an ecstasy of power was almost impossible to resist.
Instead, he sipped the Gold, allowed just enough to fuel his ignition that the flames simmered and seared the spherical surface of his Heart.
Power.
Raw power.
With this he could have torn the Ferric Drake apart limb from limb.
With this kind of mana he could have flown forever.
Slowly, his body reknit itself. He felt his forearms and shoulders itch as the flesh regrew. His Heart, battered and worn from extended periods of ignition, roared with power even as it continued to feel more insubstantial.
But all good things had to come to an end. The Gold mana, infinitely precious, finally burned itself off, and the return of Iron was like having a mule kick him in the back of the head.
Scorio grimaced and allowed his Heart to gutter. His eyelids flickered and then he sat up.
He was healed. He made a fist and studied his arm, the tendons standing clear down his forearm, the bunching of muscles. The pain was gone. The wounds. He was himself again, healed and whole.
“Rank insanity,” said Naomi from where she lay across from him along the edge of the sunken rotunda, cheek propped on her palm. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, her stare direct. “How you burn on and on. If this is you at Flame Vault, I pity our foes when you reach Pyre Lord.”
“Don’t pity them.” Scorio rose and stretched. His robes drifted down about him like burned petals. “Whomever has angered us will have earned it a thousand times over.”
“Hmm.” She smirked. “Keep going.”
Scorio laughed. “How about we clean up and get fresh robes? I’d rather not meet the Iron Tyrant looking like a pauper.”
“We are who we are,” she said, sitting up abruptly. “Fancy clothes and clean skin doesn’t change us.”
“True. But it feels nice.” He walked around the rotunda and down their corridor to the main tunnel. An ashen statue stood beside their entrance, four feet tall and roughly built. Unlike the Titans, its head sat atop a neck, but its face was devoid of features, just a map of shallow cracks and faint hollows.
Scorio studied the blazeborn drudge. “Do you understand me?”
It twisted about abruptly as if brought to life by his words, stepping around to face him, stumpy arms hanging by its side. Warmth baked off it in waves.
Naomi joined him. “Does it speak?”
“Not yet, at any rate. Do you have a name?”
The drudge born made no response, but something about its posture made Scorio feel as if it were focused on them.
“Can you lead us to the baths?”
It bowed its head and began walking deeper into the complex. Its manner of walking was fascinating; it took steps, but even as each leg swung forward, its substance seemed to melt forward only to harden at the far swing of its step.
They followed it down the hall and past a few other Great Souls who nodded politely. Past a few other clutch entrances, more and more of them occupied as the air grew warmer.
A new tunnel appeared to their right, sloping steeply down, broad, shallow steps breaking up the incline. The whole of it was chiseled and shaped, cut crudely into the organic whole of the complex.
The drudge descended.
The ramp was busy with other drudges and Great Souls. People strode with purpose, but none were too busy to study Scorio and Naomi as they passed by, their curiosity unabashed.
Scorio stared straight ahead.
The ramp cut through a series of low-ceilinged chambers and tunnels with rigid directness, only to open at last in a thickly humid gallery whose walls gleamed with moisture. Stalactites and stalagmites were everywhere, frequently connecting to form tenuous pillars, some so massive as to block their line of sight deeper into the chamber, or series of chambers, or whatever this place was.
The drudge stopped at the bottom of the ramp and pointed deeper into the confusing space.
“Guess a lava-based fiend wouldn’t want to go in there,” said Scorio. “Don’t blame you. Thanks for the escort.”
The drudge bowed its head, then turned with great dignity and positioned itself by the base of the ramp.
“You’ll wait for us there?”
The drudge bowed its head.
“Looks like we should explore.” Scorio wiped the sweat from his brow and stepped into the extended rooms. Warm, fat droplets fell from the ceiling, and the floor was dappled with silty puddles. Muffled voices echoed from ahead, and the golden light from cunningly hidden globes made the air look foggy and filled with long-beamed coronas.
“Not what I was expecting,” murmured Naomi, gathering her thick curtain of black hair into a twisted rope and tossing it behind her shoulder.
“The wonders of hell.” They rounded a particularly broad set of stalagmites that formed a partially melted wall and saw a set of steamy pools in which a dozen people were relaxing. There was no artifice; the edges of the pools were rounded, and a large pile of towels and robes were laid upon a wooden board balanced atop a waist-high shelf of rock.
“Come on in,” someone called. “Just find a pool that’s the right temperature for you.”
Scorio raised a hand in thanks and slowly doffed the torn remnants of his robe. He dropped it into a large canvas hamper with other soiled garments and inhaled deeply of the thickly fogged air.
Laughter came from the near distance. More pools?
“Just keep your underclothes on if you’re shy.” A woman’s voice. “Where are you both from? Did you just arrive on The Celestial Coffer?”
Naomi scowled and peeled off her filthy robes, dropping them in the hamper so that she stood in her shift and quickly crossed her arms. Her shift came to mid-thigh, the sleeves so short they barely covered her shoulders. “We should find a private pool.”
The people were watching them, expectant. Scorio dipped a foot into the closest pooclass="underline" lukewarm. “We’re pretty tired,” he said apologetically. “We’re just going to find a quiet corner.”
“Not a problem,” said the first voice, an older man. “There are dozens of pools deeper in. The deeper the pool, the hotter the water. Be careful. Some will scald the skin right off your bones.”
Scorio raised a hand in gratitude as he skirted the second pool. “Much appreciated.”
“Wait,” said a familiar voice, and a woman half-rose from the pool. “Scorio?”
Scorio almost slipped on the slick rock. “Lianshi?”
“What are you doing here?” Lianshi sounded half-shocked, half-amazed. Was she pleased? He couldn’t tell. “Wait, can I…?”