“The ritual has found its target. Praise be to Fortune,” Kite breathed, shoulders slumping in relief where he sat opposite Mtanga, the two men illuminated from below by the fading light of the ritual circle.

  “They do say that the third time’s the charm,” Mtanga noted. “I can’t imagine it being easy to find a time to slip something out without a gold-ranker noticing.”

  “Then let us make haste and hope that it is indeed the case,” Kite said, leaning forward and grabbing the newly imprinted tracking stone, its lone glowing dot pointing towards his adventure society badge somewhere to the northeast.

  “We still have to wait for the others to return,” Mtanga replied, rising to his feet alongside Kite. “Performing the ritual here in your room was a good practice in working with a non-ideal environment. It’s easy to get complacent with the ritual chambers or artifact support. Still, it does make me even more impressed with the few combat ritualists out there. Real geniuses, those. At least those who survive long enough.”

  It took another half an hour for the others to return, with Christine slipping in just after Ryker and Linger returned.

  “Do you have it?” the team leader asked without preamble, and Kite only had to hold up the tracking stone for Ryker to give a grunt of satisfaction. “Good. Because from what we got on our end, we’ll have to move quickly.”

  “Oh, pray tell,” Mtanga urged, sitting down in one of the chairs as he packed away the last of his ritual chalk and other materials.

  “It seems like Van Sztramm and Lady Ljublia left the city a few hours ago in one of his personal skimmers. Just the two of them,” Ryker said as he began to summarize the information they had gathered. “Weren’t subtle about it either. The information brokers we went to weren’t even near the high-end of things, and they still all agreed.”

  “Not too surprising, as the man is a gold-ranker after all,” Linger added. “Also, Van Sztramm’s research team is still all accounted for within the city, but there is a distinct mobilization of house guards and other staff in their family compound, so I assume that won’t be the case for long. But from the look of things, we should have at least until the afternoon tomorrow, if not more.”

  “Oh, how do you know?” Kite asked, curious.

  “Well, they did have all those fancy skimmers being loaded with supplies. You know, the fancy kind that feels like it should break if someone sneezed at them the wrong way. Or, to take another completely random example, bent down and ripped off a few important-looking pieces from beneath them when no one was looking. At least no one who actually knew how to properly keep watch,” the gray-eyed celestine replied with a mischievous grin.

  “So as things stand, we have about a day with Van Sztramm presumably away from the city at an undisclosed location with minimal guard and company,” Ryker summarized. “Which actually makes what we’re thinking of doing anywhere near plausible. Where’s the tracking stone pointing us?”

  “Northeast, I believe.”

  “Hmm, no official holdings that way registered to his family, but that means little with these kinds of people. But even more remote is just better for us. It sounds like he truly didn’t consider us coming after him to be an option,” Ryker finished, the slight grin tugging at the corner of his mouth assuming a distinct predatory feel.

  “My uncle did sound a bit concerned, or at least exasperated when I spoke with him,” Christine supplied, having gone to speak with Sir Ilmaril. “But he did seem to take me seriously when I gave him the code phrases that it was important and a rescue mission in which initial discretion was paramount. Uncle Ilmaril won’t stop us, and will cover for us…”

  “But…” Ryker prompted.

  “But he will come after us if we aren’t back or have reported in by sundown tomorrow,” Christine finished. “Couldn’t get him to back down on that part, and I’m not sure I really want to when a gold-ranker is involved, core-user or not.”

  “If Sir Ilmaril gets involved in an official capacity, we’ll have a spectacular mess on our hands,” Ryker sighed. “We’ll probably be stuck here for months while the posturing begins anew, with all kinds of investigations and queries. But you’re right. It’s better to have the potential backup, at least. We’ll make sure to drop one of our badges outside any building or the like to make sure that they can find us.”

  “That’s it then?” Kite asked, rising from where he had been seated floating cross-legged in the air. “And… you will actually accompany me?”

  At the exasperated glances of his companions, he felt forced to elaborate. “I… thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Thrusting this upon you is most selfish of me, especially for someone I don’t even know that well. But it still feels important to give Laevyeth this chance at an actual life of her own, rather than some curiosity. And, honestly, to make sure that the vile karma Van Sztramm and his ilk have accrued is well and properly severed. Retrieving Laevyeth is my utmost priority, but if humiliating our soon-to-be host is at all possible, I surely wouldn’t mind it.”

  He turned to each of his companions, giving all of them the deepest bow of respect and gratitude he could.

  “So, I thank you all. Be it through debt, memory or karmic link, know that I will always remember your assistance in this matter, and will ever strive to repay in kind.”

  Silence fell after his proclamation, and through his spiritual sense Kite could feel that his words and feelings had definitely reached them. Perhaps a bit too much, as Christine seemed almost flustered and Ryker had to fight to keep his stern exterior. It was Linger who first broke the silence.

  “Gods, Kite, you sure know how to deliver an epic thank you. Now I feel well and truly appreciated,” the celestine man said with a grin. “Now, are we going or what? Getting ourselves a skimmer at this hour might be tough, but not impossible.”

  “In that matter, my dear Glint has offered her assistance,” Kite replied, patting the bottle at his hip. “It will cost me a fine treasure to add to her hoard, but it is money well spent.”

  “Then gather your things,” Ryker said, the tone of command back in his voice. “Take separate routes out through the city and meet up a few kilometers out along the northern road. We’ll be traceable, but there isn’t enough time for us to do it more subtly if we want to keep our momentum and potential surprise. And by the time anyone can muster a response, it should be too late anyway.”

  Ryker’s face took on a more grim cast as he continued, the gravitas of the matter clear. “We might be facing a potentially hostile gold-ranker though, so we’ll need to plan it out as much as we can. Van Sztramm should be just above the threshold though, as anything else would just be to waste cores. And you’ve all trained for this, even if it is a situation we usually strive to avoid. If we can keep up the pressure and capitalize on any gaps or weaknesses we can identify… Well, then we might just get another proverbial feather in our caps,” he finished, the slight grin returning.

  That in and of itself was most reassuring to Kite. If Ryker thought it doable, then it was. Sure, they would be dancing on the edge if it came to violence. But that, at least, was something which the members of task group Gauntlet were used to.

  “Any more questions?” Ryker asked. None came, so he nodded and turned for the door. “Then, Gauntlet, we move out. And perhaps show an overconfident ass what power earned through actual work and danger looks like.”

  “My Lord, the hour draws late. I don’t want to overstep, but perhaps some longer intervals of rest might yield better results-” Lady Ljublia ventured carefully, but fell silent at a wave of the gold-ranker’s hand.

  “No, Astana. I’m close, I can feel it. The enchantments must be mighty indeed to have kept me away from complete suppression for so long,” Van Sztramm said, but the slight jerking in his motions as he twirled one edge of his blonde mustache belied his mounting frustration. “Even at this nightly hour, we must be persistent.”

  Lady Ljublia did not protest, even if she would very much have liked to have gone to bed by now. While Silvers like her could stay up for days, doing so when proper beauty sleep was an option was just plain wasteful.

  “So, another try then?” she instead asked, flipping to a new page in her notebook.

  “I… yes, I should but…” Van Sztramm began, and Lady Ljublia hoped that his pause meant that he might have started giving her words some consideration. But the look in his eyes as he turned to her quickly quashed that hope, as it was the look of a man who viewed getting what he wanted to be a foundational truth of the world, and yet he was being denied. That kind of man was not prone to patience, not with the end goal so close.

  “Astana, you have been crucial in providing me - us - with this opportunity so far. But before I continue I will have to make absolutely sure that you are indeed committed. That you have what it takes to go the distance and see this through. To be a pioneer, brave and daring. Because surely you do, don’t you? I am an excellent judge of character, after all.”

  As he spoke, Van Sztramm had slowly closed the distance between them, the man eventually coming to loom above Ljublia as he finished his little speech. Looking up at her superior, Ljublia suddenly felt very small, a tiny part of her mind wondering if she had - perhaps - let her ambitions guide her too much as of late, allowing her to get mixed up in something that could get dangerous.

  “No, you fool. Only a coward will shy away from opportunity,” she inwardly chastised herself, quashing the doubts. Van Sztramm could no doubt sense the emotions in her aura, so completely hiding them was out of the question. But he would know that it was her actual words and actions that mattered. So the words which left her mouth were at least decently confident, at least to Ljublia.

  “Of course, Lord Van Sztramm. We shouldn’t let anything stand in the way of progress.”

  Van Sztramm regarded her for a few more seconds in silence before he smiled.

  “Good, it is as I thought then. Come with me. I might have something which can expedite our progress.”

  The pair had been seated in one of several parlors of the secluded villa to which Van Sztramm’s servant had taken them, the living floors as filled with rustic charm as the basement laboratories were equipped; overflowing to the brink of becoming too much. The gold-ranker now led Ljublia back downstairs, cosy wooden paneling giving way to stone and clean tiles. But instead of back to the laboratory where they had left the spear, Van Sztramm took a few more turns before stopping at a seemingly blank space of wall.

  “I hope you can appreciate the level of trust I place in you, Astana,” Van Sztramm said as he pressed his family signet ring against the wall. “Most in my family do not know of this storage, only my research team. And as you are part of it now, you need to know everything at our disposal, no matter what the rest of the world might think.”

  The touch of the ring caused the wall to ripple and flow away, the stone behaving like liquid for a moment to form a square opening. Inside was a simple stone shelf holding three objects; a dodechahedron of polished steel, its facets seeming to reflect different spectrums of color, a handle of carved bone covered in sigils of silver and a bottle which seemed to contain an ever-moving tangle of meshed threads.

  None of them were things Ljublia recognized, but from the secrecy and the gold-ranker’s words, she suspected that their legality was questionable at best.

  Van Sztramm regarded the items for a time before reaching in and picking up the bone handle before another touch of the ring caused the hidden compartment to close. As soon as the object left its storage, Ljublia’s magical perception could start making it out, and she almost recoiled at the sense of the thing.

  “W-what is that? My Lord?” she asked, hastily adding the honorific which she almost forgot.

  “This, Astana, is something which I bought at an auction during my travels. A very discreet event, as you’d probably surmised. It is apparently called an Anima Awl,” the gold-ranker explained, holding up the object as if carefully brandishing a knife with an invisible blade. “It is an instrument with which to prod the soul. I’ve only read a bit about the most interesting theories of the soul’s reaction to such a process, the results as varied as they come. But so far, I have yet to have undertaken a project where it might come in handy. Until now. This should allow us to hasten the process of breaking down the defenses of that spear while also providing other important information, such as the nature of its sentience. It having an aura does imply it having a soul after all, but who knows? Perhaps the more advanced motive spirits can be close enough to fool even my deductions.”

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  Ljublia was only half-listening as the implications continued to sink in. Van Sztramm apparently had something very, very illegal in his possession, the kind of things that might see him executed or skeletally suppressed should it come to light. And now Ljublia knew, even becoming partially complicit by that knowledge alone. She would not be able to leave this project now, even should she wish. Not with a secret like this.

  The gold-ranker gave her a glance as she didn’t respond, but otherwise let Ljublia process as he continued.

  “It will take me some time to familiarize myself with this instrument, and it is apparently a most mana-hungry thing too. As such, we have little time to waste. Come, let us return. You can have a go at your own ideas of investigations while I prepare.”

  “It would seem as if our target at least knows how to pick scenic yet secluded places,” Kite murmured to the rest of the team present around him.

  From their vantage at the outskirts of a forest of evergreens, they had just the right angle to see the sprawling villa below. The building was nestled among a cluster of rocky hills in the wilderness outside Svyatograd, close enough to the city to make travel relatively easy yet far away enough to not warrant any unwanted visitors. Finding the place by chance among the other rolling hills of the region before the true tundra began was most unlikely, and Kite supposed that the villa being built with only a single floor above the ground was probably as much for concealment’s sake as any sense of style. While it now sported several lit lanterns or similar sources of illumination casting their glow over the small circle of wild garden around the house, the lights hadn’t been visible from outside the arrays either.

  “Given that privacy array, I would say that the secluded part had a bit of help,” Mtanga muttered wryly from Kite’s side, the archer currently busy with exchanging some of the rings and other trinkets he wore for those he deemed more suitable for the task at hand.

  “And you’re sure that we didn’t trip any alarms?” Ryker asked, already fully prepared with enchanted cloth twined and braided along his torso and limbs for additional strength and protection.

  “No, no, we’re fine,” Mtanga said, waving off the team leader’s concern. “They were simple things for simple conditions such as random wanderers or stray monsters. From the defenses I have seen, this place is no fortress. But it doesn’t have to be if you can’t actually find it.”

  “Assuming that there aren’t more arrays hidden closer to the building itself,” Kite said, concerned. He was already restless from the waiting, eager to get on with saving the outworlder who he had tasked himself with protecting. Although Kite was pretty sure that he would have wanted to save anyone from the likes of Van Sztramm.

  Mtanga was about to answer, but was interrupted by Linger’s voice which suddenly spoke softly nearby.

  “No, the closer perimeter seems clear. Or at least it’s only sporting the same level of protections as the outer arrays, also known as child’s play.” the celestine said as his lurker form dropped its camouflage. Linger stayed transfigured, however, and pointed with one long arm towards the eastern side of the villa. “I did notice more than a few cellar windows, so we’d best keep an eye out for a basement level.”

  “Auras? Or other activity?” Ryker asked.

  “No, at least not what I could detect from outside the arrays. If you’ll take us through, we’ll all gain a better sense. But the tracks outside seem to confirm our information as I’ve only found traces of three people.”

  “Good. Then final confirmation of information,” their team leader said, turning to look at each adventurer present in turn. “Objective?”

  “To retrieve Laevyeth and extract, preferably with Van Sztramm or anyone else unable to pursue in the short run,” Kite replied, receiving a nod in return.

  “Known essences and powers?”

  “Van Sztramm possesses light, magic, resolute, avatar. Mostly a spellcaster according to the information brokers, racial gift for special attacks probably having been transfigured by the magic essence,” Christine said, ticking off the different essences on stone-encased fingers. “Light beams and, Fortune be praise, only a small number of other offensive spells. But plenty of mana regenerating crystals and other such means, some utility. A weapon conjuration is rumored but wasn’t confirmed.”

  “We sure could have picked a worse gold-ranker to tangle with,” Linger noted. “I’d much rather face someone with a lot of utility powers rather than someone like Sir Ilmaril.”

  “But he’s still a gold. Even with little training, you know what they can do,” Ryker retorted. “The strategy is clear though and you each know your part. What about Ljublia?”

  “Essences are swift, balance, fire, mystic, although most of her power set is unknown at the level of information we had time to gather,” Kite supplied. “But if she has extensive combat training Ljublia has either hidden it well or managed to silence any rumor thereof. Like Van Sztramm, she is a member of the adventure society in name only if their contract records are to be believed.”

  “Good. Linger, be ready to take care of Ljublia. Glint, find the servant woman and contain her before joining us for some added pressure. And Mtanga, start preparations as soon as we enter.”

  “Of course, Ryker. Thanks to Kite opening his purse, I’ll even have the chance to try some new additions!” the archer said happily, patting a purse at his side while Kite did his best to hide his wince as he imagined the money spent.

  “Then we form up,” Ryker confirmed with a nod, enchanted cloth strips tightening around his limbs as he started moving towards the building at a quick pace.

  The rest followed, easily swerving around patches of bushes and keeping to the stonier areas as they closed in on the concealed villa while keeping as much out of sight as possible. The wilderness around Svyatograd with its prickly bushes, patches of stone and tall wild grasses made for a harsh yet beautiful backdrop to their approach, the light of the moons creating sharp contrasts.

  But while Kite’s senses were completely on edge during their approaches, expecting something - a cry of alarm, magical defenses, or anything, really - to make themselves known, there was no sign of discovery. Except for the lights dotting the exterior of the villa, there were almost no signs of habitation at all. Only the skimmer and some newly disturbed plants during its landing hinted at people being present, as well as the glowing dot on the tracking stone in Kite’s hand.

  Just before entering the circle of more semi-kept gardens - probably arranged in that state to add some greenery while keeping the rustic, outdoors-fell - Mtanga went ahead of them and made a scan of the perimeter with a handheld device. A short time later, the archer shook his head and waved the others forwards even while his aura signaled that the approach should be clear. Then he got to work, having his own preparations to make.

  Wordlessly, the formation of the others changed as Kite took the lead. During more than one previous contract, it had been his role to charge first through the door; splinters flying and barriers raised. But tonight was not the time for such an approach. Instead, Kite slid up to the door as silently as his armored feet would allow, and while the others fanned out slightly to catch glimpses of the building’s interior through nearby windows, he reached into a pouch inside and retrieved a small phial.

  Making sure to shield it from the wind, Kite uncorked it and tipped out a small pile of glittering powder into one palm before throwing it across the door in a swift, decisive motion. The impact caused a small, pale cloud to billow outwards and be carried away by the breeze but also the lines of an array to become visible.

  “A most basic array, praise be to Fortune,” he thought, sending the small prayer as he lashed out with his hand again in a pointed thrust of gauntleted fingers which struck a most obvious node in the array before Disrupting strike caused it to fuzz and break apart. “Braid would be embarrassed. But I suppose that having his work as a standard which to practice on for the last few years might be a bit unfair to most array-makers.”

  Before the array could reconstitute itself properly, Kite opened the door as silently as possible and slid inside, the others quickly following suit. As their auras were pulled tight around them to lower the risk of discovery, the group had to rely on more corporeal senses as they crept into the faintly lit entry hall. But for experienced silver-rankers, especially the ilk of Ryker, Christine and Linger who had been with Gauntlet for a lot longer than Kite, those senses were impressive.

  Only a few steps inside, Kite’s expanded vision let him see Ryker pause briefly before tapping Glint’s bottle while gesturing off towards the left. Another moment of focus let Kite register the faint clank of cutlery being put back into a drawer from a few rooms over in that direction. Still in her carp form, the familiar shot off through the darkened rooms like a silent shark about to tear into a tasty little seal.

  The others did not stop, however, as they had already seen the stairs leading down wards further down the hallway. From the start, the group had decided that any basement floors would be their first priority given what Linger had reported of the layout of the building.

  They had just reached the stairs when the clinking of cutlery was replaced by a sloshing sound and a female shouting voice thoroughly muffled by being encased in water, Glint apparently having handled the bronze-ranked servant that had allegedly accompanied her master to this remote place. Even so, the group froze for a moment as they all tensed in anticipation. Because if they could hear it, a gold-ranker within the house definitely could as well, assuming that there wasn't anything blocking the sound.

  But as no sign of intervention came, Kite even dared to murmur under his breath;

  “Isolated laboratory?”

  “Most likely,” Ryker agreed. “We go down and start our sweep from the left, then-”

  The team leader had barely begun giving out orders before a shrill and metallic whining sound suddenly came echoing up from below. It had a distinctly muted quality, hinting at it passing through at least one set of doors or similar barriers before reaching the corridor and stairs. And within the high-pitched noise, Kite also picked out the sense of something else, even alien as it might have sounded; a scream.

  “So much for isolated,” Christine noted even as the group started moving as one, speeding up to a controlled rush which would still negate most of the noise they were giving off.

  Rustic wooden paneling instantly changed to cold stone and clean tiles as corridors stretched out in either direction. But the shrill noise continued, acting as a beacon, and a short stretch of hallway followed by a single left turn later, the team found themselves in front of a heavy metal door, obviously enchanted.

  “I pulsed my aura. Nothing, so probably shielded. Prepare to breach. Directed force,” Ryker said, voice clipped. And Gauntlet went to work.

  Ljublia didn’t yawn, having long since cleared herself of such habits of a mundane body.

  “This does feel like a moment in which a yawn would have been more appropriate though. Pushing on with experiments through the night is better left to those troglodytes back at the campus who barely leave their offices anyway,” she thought to herself, glancing out one of the thin windows to the basement laboratory.

  The stone chamber, furnished with several workbenches containing equipment for different kinds of magical examinations, was currently only lit by the moons outside, a single glow stone lamp on a table next to Ljublia and - more ominously - the now glowing sigils on the Anima Awl which Lord Van Sztramm had been intensely focusing on for the last half an hour where he stood before the work bench holding the spear across the room from her.

  It was odd, barely feeling that normally so domineering gold-rankers aura as each ounce of his spiritual strength was focused on the instrument in his hand. But while Van Sztramm had explained quite little in regards to its use, Ljublia wasn’t surprised that the man’s aura was somehow involved.

  “Both ‘Gadermann’s Treatise on The Nature of The Soul’ and ‘Ictuanwi’s Selective Studies on Spiritual Torments - a survivors’ accounts’ does agree that one of the most common ways to attack the soul is through the spirit,” she thought, turning back to watch the process while torn between fascination and revulsion.

  Much like the instinct to retract one’s hand when someone described an injury to a similar appendage, the thought of something trying to pierce Ljublia’s soul made her recoil on some deep level even though it was a sensation she had not - and definitely never hoped to - experience.

  “Even so, progress requires sacrifice,” she told herself, repeating Van Sztramm’s earlier words for reassurance. “If the spear is truly sentient, which all current signs are pointing towards, there is a world of new discoveries awaiting us. Even if I still feel that employing such means feels a bit rushed compared to waiting for the others of the research team.”

  There was no outward sign that Van Sztramm was done except the man straightening a few minutes later, the Anima Awl held carefully as if one faulty motion might cause it to lose whatever potential it had so far gathered.

  “Ready yourself, Ljublia,” the gold-ranker said. “This should be enough to wear down whatever spiritual defenses this curiosity has remaining. Take notes. Because this might be the beginning of a new chapter in our careers.”

  Then, as if pushing through some kind of intangible resistance, Van Sztramm lowered the carved bone handle down towards the spear. When it was about a handspan away from the beautifully carved haft of the weapon, a shining spike suddenly materialised between the handle and point of impact; its impossibly thin tip pushing against the spear.

  The Anima Awl had no more than touched it when Ljublia rocked back from the sudden sound which followed; a high-pitched metallic shriek which would have no doubt burst the eardrums of normal- and iron-rankers alike had they been present. But deeply uncomfortable as it was, Ljublia also recognized the note for the scream that it was, emanating from the form of the spear as the weapon’s aura was finally made properly manifest, its spirit flailing widely in blind panic.

  “The spear reacts instantly to the touch of the Anima Awl giving off previously undocumented noise at impressive volumes. Its aura is now clearly discernible, alien yet familiar. I can sense its silver rank, but it is otherwise markedly different from that of any other living being I have met-”

  Ljublia’s pen started to dance across the page of her open notebook, her swift essence lending her motions additional speed and precision. Her records of this event could become a significant addition to whatever would come of the discovery of this oddity, so Ljublia made sure to add as many personal touches as she could so that no one would be able to obfuscate the part she played in it.

  She started to move closer as she wrote, her steps measured as she circled Van Sztramm to get a better angle.

  “-the shrieking is most loud, a clear indication of it possessing a soul. How an artifact came to somehow incorporate a true spirit is a mystery, one that we will make sure to uncover. For the sake of-”

  Ljublia was mid-step and mid-sentence, pen poised to make a nice and idealistic flourish when her notebook just… disappeared. Or rather disintegrated, along with her pen and three of the fingers of Ljublia’s left hand which had been holding the thing, as the metal door to the room was sent flying inwards with such force that it crossed the room as if launched by a siege engine. Straight into the deeply focused Van Sztramm.