Dane was still staring at the sky.
Not at where the spear had gone—it was long gone, disappeared into the atmosphere somewhere beyond the clouds. He was staring at the general concept of sky. The idea of it. The fact that it existed above him and that something had just punched through it hard enough to make the air scream.
His nose had stopped bleeding, but he could still taste copper.
"What..." He blinked. Swallowed. Tried again. "What happens if that thing comes back down on us?"
Sael, who had been watching the horses settle, turned to look at him.
"It won't."
Dane blinked again. "It won't?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because it left the world."
Silence.
Dane's brain was trying to process the statement and failing spectacularly. His jaw worked for a moment, but nothing came out.
***
Sael just stood there, hands in his pockets, expression neutral.
The other soldiers were staring now too. Not at the sky anymore. At Sael.
Lieutenant Voss had gone very still in his saddle. His face had lost some of its color.
One of the younger soldiers—the one who'd nearly been thrown from his horse earlier—was just staring with his mouth slightly open.
Ilsa's expression had frozen into what looked like shock as her hand had dropped from her sword hilt at some point, though she didn't seem to have noticed.
Shaye's face was pale. Her bound hands were trembling.
And that boy, Orion—
Orion was smiling...
"Hmm."
Then again, perhaps this demonstration could have used a little more finesse. He hadn't meant to put more mana than was necessary. It seemed he'd lost his touch. Just a bit.
The protective spells he'd cast—the ones meant to shield the people nearby from the worst of the backlash—those should have been sufficient. Should have kept them comfortable, even. But clearly they hadn't been, given the state everyone was in.
And the horses. The poor horses.
They were even more sensitive to mana than humans. More attuned to shifts in magical pressure. He should have accounted for that and have layered the protections differently. Now, they'd been startled beyond what was necessary.
For that, Sael was sorry.
He looked back at the young people. They... were still staring at him.
Several seconds passed.
The wind picked up slightly, rustling through the trees.
Sael shifted his weight. The attention was uncomfortable. Too many eyes. Too much focus. He resisted the urge to pull his hood back up.
"Did that prove I killed the dragon?" he asked.
His voice came out more abrupt than he'd intended, but the question needed asking. He'd demonstrated the spell. Showed them what he could do. That should be sufficient.
Voss seemed to struggle for words. His hand tightened on his reins.
"Y-yes." The word came out rough. He cleared his throat. "Yes. Sir."
The 'sir' hadn't been there before.
Sael nodded. Good. That was settled.
"There's a chicken stand," he said. "At the festival in Gatsby. I'd like to get some before it sells out."
More staring.
He gestured vaguely toward Ilsa and Orion. "You two should join me there."
Ilsa straightened slightly. "I—yes. Of course."
"Good." Sael looked at Shaye. She flinched. "As for you, I hope you'll be arrested."
Voss nodded once. "We'll take her into custody for further investigation and reach out to house Eryndor and the Astra academy about this matter." Shaye's face went even paler.
Hermits who wandered the world—quiet, eccentric, and far too powerful for anyone's comfort—were rare, but not unheard of.
Every nation had a story or two: a traveler who leveled a mountain because someone overcharged them for tea, or a recluse who appeared once every century to fix a dam, cure a plague, or vaporize a monster.
Nobody ever verified the stories, but they all carried the same moral. You never knew which wandering stranger might turn out to be one of those. As a result, sensible people made a habit of leaving such types alone.
Lieutenant Voss, to his credit, seemed sensible. He didn't ask Sael to stay for questioning, though the way his fingers twitched on the reins suggested he might. Give him another minute, and duty might win out over common sense.
"The binding on your mana core will last as long as I don't cancel the spell," Sael continued, addressing Shaye. "So you won't be able to cause problems while they process you. I imagine professor Eryndor will want to answer questions as well, given his involvement."
He paused.
The stares hadn't stopped. Eight soldiers. Ilsa. Orion. Even Shaye. All of them looking at him. Maybe they expected more explanation, some elaboration on what he'd just done or why or how it worked.
He didn't feel like giving one.
There were too many eyes on him at once, too much attention focused in his direction. His chest felt tight in a way that had nothing to do with mana expenditure, more like the uncomfortable awareness that everyone was watching and he was supposed to do or say something and he'd rather be anywhere else.
Yes. He just wanted to leave, so he would.
"That is all." Sael said as he raised his hand and cast.
"[Invisibility]."
The spell settled over him like a familiar coat. Light bent. His outline blurred and vanished. Relief came with it, immediate and physical. They couldn't see him anymore. The soldiers jerked in their saddles, heads swiveling, searching for where he'd gone.
"Wait—" Voss started.
[Float].
Sael rose.
Smooth and effortless. The ground released him and he drifted upward, past the tree line, past the canopy, into open air.
Below, he could see them. Small figures in a clearing. Voss was on his horse now, looking around wildly. The other soldiers were doing the same. Ilsa had taken a few steps forward, head tilted back, scanning the sky.
Orion was still smiling.
Strange. The boy had been smiling through most of this, actually. Sael wasn't entirely sure why. Perhaps he enjoyed watching magic demonstrations. Some people did, he supposed.
[Flight]
Sael turned and accelerated toward Gatsby.
The wind pulled at his coat. His hair. The forest blurred beneath him into patches of green and brown.
He hoped the chicken wasn't sold out.
It had smelled very good.
***
Sael descended toward Gatsby in a wide arc, still invisible. The festival sprawled below him, larger and livelier than when he'd left.
Harrin's guards were everywhere now. Blue and silver uniforms dotted the streets in clusters, more than he'd seen in years. They'd set up checkpoints at major intersections, and he could see patrols moving through the crowds in organized formations. The response had been swift, at least.
The festival itself hadn't died down. If anything, it had gotten more energetic, as if the near-disaster had reminded people to celebrate while they could. Music drifted up from multiple stages scattered throughout the city. He could hear drums, something stringed, voices raised in song. People were dancing in the streets, spinning and laughing, packed shoulder to shoulder.
Lanterns had been strung between buildings, even more than before. Colorful banners snapped in the wind. The smell of roasting meat and fried dough and something sweet rose on the breeze.
He spotted the chicken stand from the air and adjusted his trajectory. There was an alley nearby, narrow and empty, shadowed by the buildings on either side. Perfect.
Sael landed softly, boots touching cobblestone without a sound. He walked forward a few steps, turned the corner into an even narrower gap between two shops, and only then canceled the spell.
"[Dispel]."
The invisibility faded. Light stopped bending. His outline solidified.
He waited a moment, listening. No shouts of surprise. No one had seen him appear out of thin air. Good.
He straightened his coat, ran a hand through his hair to smooth it down, and stepped back out into the alley. From there it was a short walk to the main street.
The crowd hit him like a wall.
Not literally, but the noise and movement and sheer density of bodies made him slow his pace. He kept his hands in his pockets and his head down, navigating through gaps in the press of people. Someone bumped his shoulder. A child darted past, nearly tripping him while a woman laughed loudly just to his left.
"Get your Sael pendants! Hero of the Four Hundred-Year Peace!"
Sael heard the voice somewhere to his left. A woman's voice, high-pitched and enthusiastic, cutting through the general noise of the festival crowd.
He didn't look. The pendant hawker always made the nose wrong.
The chicken stand was up ahead. He could see it now, the line stretching back a dozen people or so. Not as bad as it could have been. The vendor was working quickly, handing out skewers wrapped in thin paper, accepting coins, shouting orders to someone in the back.
Sael joined the line and exhaled slowly.
The Corruption. He kept coming back to it. Four hundred years ago, they'd been certain—absolutely certain—that they'd eradicated every trace of it after killing the Corrupted One. They'd spent three additional months in the Field of the Fallen, searching. Combing through every inch of scorched earth and shattered stone for any remnant, any potential problem.
They'd found nothing.
He remembered those months vividly. The others had wanted to leave after two weeks. Understandable. The place was a graveyard, and standing in it felt like disrespecting the dead. But Sael had insisted. He'd cast detection spells until his mana ran dry, then recovered and cast them again. He'd examined the ambient mana for weeks, looking for any taint, any shadow of what they'd fought.
Nothing.
So how was it back? Had they missed something? Had it been dormant, waiting? Or was this something new, something that only resembled the Corruption he remembered?
He didn't know. And not knowing bothered him more than he wanted to admit.
"Next!"
The line had moved. He stepped forward, but his thoughts were still elsewhere.
If it was real Corruption—true Corruption, not some imitation—then it meant their work hadn't been finished. It meant something had survived. And if something had survived, then—
"Next!"
Sael blinked.
He'd been mid-thought when the vendor's voice cut through. He looked up and realized the line had moved again. Several times, actually. He was standing directly in front of the stall now.
Right.
The vendor was watching him expectantly. A stocky man, middle-aged, with a thick mustache that drooped impressively past his chin. His hair was dark and wild, tied back with what looked like a strip of leather, and he had the kind of barrel chest and thick arms that suggested he'd done more than cook chicken in his lifetime. Maybe a retired soldier. Or a blacksmith. Something that required strength.
His expression was friendly enough, though there was a glint of amusement in his eyes, like he'd caught Sael spacing out and found it funny.
"What can I get you, friend?" the man asked.
Sael cleared his throat. "Chicken. Please."
"Just the one?"
He almost said yes. Then he remembered.
Ilsa and Orion. They'd be joining him. He'd told them to meet him here. They'd probably be hungry after riding from the forest clearing to Gatsby. It would be... considerate to get them food.
"Actually," Sael said, "make it three."
The vendor grinned, showing a gap between his front teeth. "Three it is. You want the festival special? Got a honey glaze on 'em today. Little bit of spice, too, if you like that."
"That's fine."
"Coming right up."
The man turned and started working. His hands moved quickly. He grabbed skewers from a rack, selected three chickens from the spit—golden-brown and glistening—and began wrapping them in thin parchment paper. The smell was even better up close. Roasted meat, honey, something herbal that Sael couldn't quite place.
The vendor worked while humming under his breath. Some festival tune, probably. He seemed like the type who enjoyed his job.
"Three chicken, festival special," the man said, setting the wrapped skewers on the counter in front of Sael. "That'll be eight Sols."
Sael reached for his coin pouch.
He untied it from his belt, opened it, and began counting. The coins clinked softly as he moved them around with his fingers. Five. Six. Seven.
He counted again.
Seven Sols.
Sael froze.
The vendor was still standing there, waiting. The wrapped chickens sat on the counter between them. Other people were in line behind Sael now, he could hear them shifting, talking quietly among themselves.
He stared down at the coins in his hand. He was one short.
Oh no.
The vendor's expression hadn't changed yet. He was still smiling, but there was a flicker of something in his eyes now. Confusion, maybe. Or the dawning realization that Sael might not have enough money.
Sael looked up at him.
His mouth opened slightly, not quite sure what to say.
"There he is!"
Sael turned.
The familiar voice had come from somewhere in the crowd. Close. He scanned the faces and spotted movement: two figures pushing through the press of people, heading in his direction.
Ilsa appeared first, her face flushed and slightly breathless. Orion was right behind her, looking significantly less winded but still hurrying to keep up. They both looked like they'd been running.
"Sorry—" Ilsa said, stopping just short of bumping into someone. She took a breath. "Sorry for taking so long. We had to come on horses."
Orion nodded, still smiling that strange smile of his. "The guards let us through the checkpoints pretty quickly once Ilsa showed her identification. But the crowds made it slow going."
Sael blinked. "It's fine. No worries."
That was true. He didn't mind that they'd taken time. What he minded was the seven Sols currently sitting in his hand and the eight Sols he was supposed to give the vendor and the one-Sol-coin gap between those two numbers.
He wasn't sure if his face was showing any of this.
Probably not. People used to tell him his expressions were hard to read.
But Orion's eyes had flicked down to Sael's open coin pouch, then to the wrapped chickens on the counter, then back up to Sael's face.
The boy's smile shifted. Just slightly. It looked... knowing.
"How much are the chickens?" Orion asked, turning to the vendor.
The man glanced between them, mustache twitching. "Eight Sols for three."
Orion nodded and reached for his own pouch without hesitation. "Please, allow me to pay."
He said it easily. Casually. Like it wasn't a thing at all.
Sael looked at him.
Orion was already counting out coins. He placed them on the counter—eight Sols, exact—and slid them toward the vendor with a slight nod.
The vendor scooped them up, glanced at Sael one more time with an expression that might have been sympathetic, and then nodded back at Orion. "Pleasure doing business. Happy Sael's day, enjoy the festival."
Sael cleared his throat. "Thank you."
The words came out stiffer than he'd intended, but he meant them.
Orion just smiled and picked up all three wrapped chickens, holding them carefully. "My pleasure, sir."
Sael took one chicken and stepped aside, letting the next person in line move forward. His coin pouch was still in his hand. He tied it back to his belt slowly, trying not to think too hard about the fact that he now owed young Orion a debt.
Which he did.
That was how debts worked.
And he was low on coins, seven Sols wouldn't last long. Sael didn't need money—not in the practical sense—but walking around without it made him feel… exposed.
Like being unarmed, but socially.
I'll have to take an odd job later, he told himself. Help repair a roof. Move furniture. Sell a few monster cores.
Something simple that paid in Draco and Sol.
"Two of these are for you, actually," he said, pointing at the two chickens in Orion's hands.
The two of them exchanged a glance before turning back to Sael and accepting the offered food.
Then they bowed.
Deeply.
"Thank you, sir!" they said in unison.
Among the nobility and those who moved in their circles—which included most mages—this was how you acknowledged someone who stood far above you in power or status.
"Do not do that. Rise."
The vendor, as well as the people in line were staring now.
A highborn soldier and an academy mage, both bowing like that to some stranger who'd just been one Sol short for festival chicken. It did not take particularly sharp reasoning to guess what they were thinking
Sael's face warmed.
He turned and started walking, perhaps a touch faster than necessary. "Follow me."