“Too slow,” hissed Naomi, looking back over her shoulder. “This way!”
She cut abruptly into an even narrower alley, this one devoid of tables and waiters, and Scorio called to Leonis who turned back in confusion.
A shadow passed overhead.
“They’re on the roofs!” shouted Juniper.
“Go go go!” Jova shoved Scorio after Naomi. “No time!”
Like every inch of Bastion, even this alley was alive with purpose; each shop was sunken three steps below street level, with dark windows and open doorways revealing antiques, scrolls, and people perusing goods. But the foot traffic was less, and vendors saw them coming in time to shrink out of the way.
“We need to go to ground!” Leonis shouted from the rear of their group. “Get off the streets!”
Naomi was a dark-haired ghost up ahead, lithe and nimble. She led them out into a triangular courtyard, a dead, multi-leveled fountain in its center, tables scattered before the broad, faded blue awning of a solitary quiet restaurant. Ancient bricks crumbled underfoot, and the buildings rose three stories on each side, sporting balconies and clotheslines from which hung brilliantly dyed sheets.
Naomi paused by the fountain, peering down each of the three alleys that led deeper into the warren of the city. Scorio slowed, the others pressing up behind him, and then a great shimmering orb the size of a cart flew down from above, distorting the air like a self-contained heatwave, and hit the fountain square on.
The orb didn’t dissipate, but rather glommed onto the fountain’s irregular architecture and immediately exerted a terrible gravitational pull. Naomi cried out in rage as she was sucked off the ground and yanked into the globe’s center, her arms flailing uselessly, and Scorio felt himself pulled forward, lifting off his feet.
He Ignited his Heart, wrenched about, and Jova’s hand was there, outflung. He caught her by the wrist and she hauled him back even as Zala beside him cried out and flew forward, her slight frame betraying her so that she sank into the bubbled fountain beside Naomi.
Movement from above, an intimation of danger. Scorio recoiled and raised his talons as a young man dropped past clotheslines and swelled in shape as he fell. He grew massive so rapidly that when he hit the ground with a crunch of bricks being pulverized, he was a giant nearly twice as tall as Scorio, utterly inhuman and made of rough, craggy sandstone. Twice as broad as Leonis, he rose from his crouch, the damage done to his frame by the fall instantly healing over as cracks sealed up. He stared at them without emotion, his eyes startlingly blue and human in the rough rock of his broad, brutal visage.
“It’s Javok.” Leonis stretched out his arm and Nezzar appeared in his grip, brutal and hexagonal, glowing runes running down three of its faces. “There’s no stopping him. He reforms no matter how hard he gets hit.”
“Javok!” The thin cry came from above. The sandstone giant looked up, then reached out to catch a slender woman who fell neatly into his arms. Scorio had seen her in the Academy hallways, tiny and delicate looking, her eyes liquid black, her lips naturally upturned into a constant smile, her skin as pale as soap. Ymissa? Clarissa? He couldn’t recall.
“Don’t let her touch you!” shouted Jova, moving out wide.
Naomi had assumed her Nightmare Lady form but remained stuck within the shimmering sphere. Beside her Zala extended her hand so that glowing butterflies began to stream toward Javok, who set the pixie-like woman down and then strode toward them, cracking his fists together.
“I’ve got the giant,” growled Leonis. “Find Agon and disrupt that bubble!”
Agon. Scorio had studied every Great Soul that had progressed in the tournament, but they were dealing with the lower half of their class, the ones who’d barely made Emberling, who’d washed out in one way or another.
Students desperate to earn a second year at the Academy.
Agon didn’t ring any bells.
“He’ll be up top,” shouted Lianshi, moving to flank the sandstone giant.
No wonder he’d taken out Naomi. Of all of them, she was the best at climbing.
Scorio reached out belatedly for more mana but the courtyard was already depleted, the Copper having been drained by all the hungry Igneous Hearts. He’d have to rely on what little he’d already saturated his Heart.
Jova strode to confront Ymissa, who ran at her, hand outstretched, only to stagger and scream and cover her face in terror. Leonis charged Javok, who swung a fist as massive as a barrel at the big man, but it exploded into shards of rock when Leonis smashed Nezzar right into it.
Scorio embraced his scaled form. What sweet release, what glorious power. White-hot talons burst out of his fingertips as glossy black scales erupted over his arms, down his back, across his chest and thighs. Horns burst from his brow, and he felt himself grow taller, leaner, and so much stronger and faster in every way.
Feeling like a predator amongst sheep he ran to the closest balcony. Restaurant patrons were scrambling up from their tables to flee into the depths of the restaurant. A dark-skinned stranger broke free of this sparse crowd to sprint right at him, arms extended wide.
Scorio twisted mid-stride. One slash would have killed the youth, but at the last moment he refrained, balking from outright murdering his assailant.
The tackle was expert. Thin arms wrapped around his chest and both arms, and then, impossibly, the stranger’s body turned to stone, dense and heavy, knocking Scorio to the ground.
With a cry, Scorio crashed to the cobblestones. The stranger’s entire body had turned into obsidian, gleaming and faceted, lifeless and as ponderous as an anchor.
But the stranger himself, an emaciated youth with large, haunted eyes and jug ears, staggered back, as if he’d shucked the stone form or ejected himself from it at the last moment.
“Damn it!” roared Scorio, and drank deep of his reserves. He strained, muscles bulging, scales rippling but the stone statue that clasped him tight refused to break and his hands were locked by his sides.
Leonis was demolishing Javok but to little effect, roaring with each great swing of his club, but with every second more and more luminous butterflies were affixing themselves to the sandstone giant. The gravity bubble yet held the Nightmare Lady and Zala in place. Jova loomed over Ymissa, who was cradling her head, while Juniper was trying to climb to the rooftop with little skill.
The young black man raced at Jova.
“Watch out!” shouted Scorio.
Jova turned. Her black-rimmed eyes widened and she thrust out her hand at the last moment. Her attacker leaped into his tackle, arms wide, but bounced off a shimmering shield that appeared a yard before her to crash to the ground, twinned, a stone copy rocking in place beside his actual self.
Jova took a long stride and kicked the young man clean across the jaw. Scorio heard the man’s teeth click, and then the obsidian statue that held him dissolved into Coal mana.
Scorio bounced to his feet and drew forth a small artifact from his robes. He propped it against the floor just right and swirled mana into its core. The bridge exploded upward, reaching past balconies to land heavily against the side of the building. Lithe and quick, Scorio clambered up the steep incline, reached the top, surged, grabbed the roof’s edge, and vaulted onto the great clay tiles.
There. A handsome youth, black hair tousled, eyes wide in alarm. He backed away and stumbled up toward the roof’s spine, only to trip and fall onto his rear. Scorio raced toward him, tiles cracking under his scaled feet.
Agon hurled a sphere of roiling air at Scorio’s feet, who leaped high into the air with his sinuous athleticism, surging right over it, arms outflung to fall upon the man—
—only to feel himself yanked back by the bubble’s pull, sucked into its center where he hung, flailing uselessly, and with no way to get purchase on the tiles.
Agon’s shoulders sagged in relief. “Damn. That was close. Give it up, Scorio. No offense, but you’re my ticket to a second year.”