And she turned and walked away calmly.
Scorio realized he was clenching his jaw with terrible force. Slowly, through a constant exertion of his will, he relaxed his body. Focused on nothing but breathing. By the gods, had he thought he’d moved beyond rage? It took a long while to reduce to a simmer.
All the while cutting responses played in his mind. Things he could have said, should have said, if he hadn’t been so shocked by her words.
But no. His mistakes were his own. He’d stopped blaming others in those precious seconds before he made Tomb Spark. If Jova didn’t understand what he’d gone through, or why he’d done what he’d done, then that was on her. He had friends that wanted to stand by his side and that valued his company.
Jova, he finally accepted, was no longer part of that group.
Scorio knelt and squared his shoulders. Thought on rocks and sleds. The ornery bastard of a boulder he’d spent the past two weeks besieging, the cracks that had finally started to show, the sense he’d developed of its fault lines.
He shook his head, clearing it.
That wasn’t his life anymore.
He snorted in amusement. How long would it take to cease thinking of that pile?
Peace. He was here at last.
It was time to get to work.
He opened his Heart senses and reached out for the ambient mana.
Traces of Copper flowed through the air, thin filaments needling their way horizontally through the air, curving around the great suspended Iron ingots that slowly flowed along the same vector.
And there.
Oh, glory.
Bronze mana.
Resplendent like the sun-wire in the late evening reflecting off the canal waters. Not mercurial like Copper, not massive and ponderous like Iron, but rich and noble, great undulating rivers of the stuff slowly pouring through the air.
Scorio reached forth with his mental paddle and then paused. For how long would this image serve him? Ydrielle’s finesse was a stark reminder as to how far he still had to go.
But damn it, it would work for now.
Scorio scooped a mass of Bronze out of an overhead flow and swirled it around his Heart. It was a joy to work with, responsive and blending the best of both Copper and Iron. With a grin, he pulled it into his Heart, more and more till he felt utterly saturated, and then Ignited.
Ah, glory!
Scorio felt his Heart burn brightly. Bronze mana seeped out through the many cracks, but the euphoria was incredible. To Ignite after five months of deprivation! Strength, vitality, and sheer power flooded him.
He felt his body tremble, like a parched man finally raising a cup of water to his cracked and bleeding lips.
All too soon the Bronze was gone. He’d been so dazzled that he’d failed to extinguish it before it guttered of its own accord. No matter. There was plenty down here.
It took time for his Heart to recover; guttering always put a strain on his system, making it harder to manipulate mana again. But he Ignited again and again.
Each time was a joy.
How had he deprived himself of this for so long?
But slowly his joy diminished; it was impossible not to see how much Bronze he was venting. His near-six months of self-denial may have healed his body of his Coal saturation, but it had done little to heal his Heart.
A sound caught his attention. A trio of giant hounds had emerged from one of the three tunnels. Jova was gone.
Scorio rose to his feet.
The hounds were massive and hairless, their bodies covered in startling patterns of orange slashes against a toxic yellow background. Thick ropes or perhaps tentacles grew living manes around their angular heads, and their eyes burned a livid crimson as they stared at him.
Scorio immediately set to drawing more mana.
The hounds spread apart as they padded forward. They ran with their jaws parted, revealing huge canines. They moved at an easy trot, unhurried, unconcerned, with one curving out wide to ensure he was herded toward the ledge’s rim.
Scorio inhaled deeply and fought for calm. He tried to read them with his Heart senses. They glowed richly with a deep Bronze burn.
Snarling silently Scorio moved back, gaze darting about for some advantage. He’d Ignite at the last second, assume his scaled form. They’d dog pile him, come from different sides all at once, seek to bite some part of him, and tear him apart.
The hounds sped up, their manes rising into spiky, rippling collars about their necks, the tip of each tentacle discharging a mysterious red light.
“C’mon then,” rasped Scorio. A mad delight filled him as he Ignited and assumed his scaled form. His lean, compact muscles swelled and he grew taller, more graceful, infinitely more lethal. Always in the past, this form had made him a fearsome fighting force, but now, after five months of endless, brutal labor, he felt as if he’d broken into a different level altogether.
Felt like maybe, just maybe, he could take on all three of these huge hounds at once and survive.
The hounds bayed and leaped at him.
Scorio crouched, prepared to fling himself to one side and try to roll under one of them when three man-sized boulders dropped from the gloom with utter finality to smash each hound into the ledge, crushing them completely.
Scorio staggered, recovering from his nearly initiated leap, and stared wide-eyed at the dead fiends. Each had burst beneath their rock like an overripe fruit hurled at a wall.
Jova stood at the entrance of the closest tunnel. She looked amused. “Sorry. I hope that wasn’t alarming.”
“Not a problem,” said Scorio hoarsely, releasing his scaled form and sinking down. “I appreciate the assist.”
“The assist.” She smiled coldly. “Sure. Whatever.” And walked back into the darkness.
“Damn,” whispered Scorio. He couldn’t take his eyes off the dead fiend before him. It had never had a chance. The rock had dropped with terrible speed. That put Jova’s range at well over twenty yards.
He couldn’t wrap his mind around that kind of power.
Evelyn would survive in a fight against Jova only by making her the focus of her immunity power. Simeon could appear next to her, but was her horror aura strong enough to drive him back? Could she shatter Dameon’s forcefield? Davelos would be able to approach her in mist form for as long as he held his breath, but the second he exhaled he’d be pulverized.
Scorio hung his head and grimaced.
Right now it was painfully obvious that he wasn’t on the same level as her. Not even close.
But as soon as he made Flame Vault he’d manifest his own new ability.
Maybe that would put him on par. Maybe he’d get something as formidable as her mastery of all things stone.
Scorio sighed and dropped to his knees.
The only way to find out was to first heal his Heart. And given how long and torturous that route was going to be, there was no time to waste.
Chapter 40
Three weeks passed.
A new impatience surged within Scorio, making it hard for him to focus, to buckle down and just meditate and let his Heart heal. Ironically, he’d been able to go endless months doing nothing but backbreaking labor without complaint; he’d managed to simply stop thinking, stop hoping, and lose himself in the endless pain of the moment.
But now that he was descending into the Chasm? Now that he felt himself part of his old crew once more, keeping the same hours, dining with them, a Tomb Spark in truth where most of them were just Emberlings?
Now the passage of time grated upon him.
His Heart became his enemy.
Each day he studied it, the fractures and cracks he’d so carelessly inflicted upon its gleaming black body, and willed them to close faster.
It was almost worse that he saw some minor progress. The five months of not Igniting at all had allowed some minor healing to take place, but the channeling of Bronze every day did wonders. The deepest cracks narrowed. Some of the holes and pitted marks grew more shallow.