As much as Riven appreciated the opportunity to get out of the car and stretch to his heart’s content, his legs were twitching with the need to get back into the car and start off again. They had rested enough in his mind and needed to get going, and fast. Aross had promised they only had one day to infiltrate Rennervation city, and Riven was hoping it wouldn’t turn into some debacle. A quick infiltration, a quick sabotage, and opening a quicker pathway into the heart of the city was what they had to do.

All before the sun came up tomorrow.

“Don’t be so agitated,” Viriya said.

Riven paced in the little room of the tavern they’d taken shelter in. “Easier said than done.”

Aross had spared a soldier to act as a guide and the woman had said this little village in the middle of nowhere would be safe from any of Orbray’s agents. They had believed her of course, but her reassurances didn’t help Riven’s disquiet. It seemed like every eye was noting their every little movement, cataloguing what they did to send back a report to their master, Orbray. Viriya had agreed to getting a little room to themselves, even if they meant to stay here for not even half an hour.

Good thing they did. It gave Riven all the privacy he needed to freak out properly when they learned that Aross had been attacked.

“Are you sure that’s true?” Viriya asked the soldier who had accompanied them.

“It is,” she replied. The woman looked even more agitated than Riven felt, her hands clenched on the butt of her gun. “The message said that the attack had been repelled for now, but the culprits were neither dead, nor caught. They retreated, and no one is sure if the assault will renew, or there was some other reason for it.”

“Is the Invigilator all right?”

“She’s fine. So is her son, and they said none of Orbray’s agents came to look for him. Anyway, I don’t think it’s something we need to worry over. We’ve got our own jobs to do.”

Naturally, Riven ignored her sensible words and focused on her demeanour instead. Some other reason for the assault, she had said. The only other real reason had to be that they were testing something, or trying to ascertain something, and it brought to mind the fact that neither Riven nor Viriya were with Aross.

Maybe that’s what the attack was all about—trying to gauge just who the Invigilator had with her, and where the ones who were supposed to be with her had gone.

Maybe they were walking straight into a trap.

“So Orbray doesn’t necessarily want Lintellant back,” Riven said.

“Maybe,” the soldier said. “Maybe not, who knows.”

“Any news on where they might have gone, or what the Invigilator intends to do about them?”

“I’m telling you all that the message had, and anything beyond would only be guesswork and conjecture.” She didn’t add that guesswork and conjecture wouldn’t help, but the dangling pause left the implication there for all to understand. “The Invigilator has been slightly delayed in her plans to set out, but intends to reach Rennervation city tomorrow. There was a slight commotion in Lintellant, and she’s making sure it’s properly fortified first, but the other attacks have gone according to plan. They started to take out the agents Orbray was sending to reinforce Rennervation city.”

A mix. Riven tried not to grimace, reminding himself that it wasn’t all bad. The Rennervation loyalists were taking out Orbray’s reinforcements, using surprise to great effect in the same way Orbray’s attack on Lintellant had.

“Shouldn’t we make sure that we’re not walking into a trap?” Riven asked.

“Riven.” Viriya looked at him as though she knew exactly what he was thinking, though she didn’t seem troubled by it much. Then again, she never showed much on that inflectionless face of hers. “You’re right. We need to get going. This attack was meant to frighten us.” She turned to the soldier. “How much longer do you think it’s going to take us to get there?”

“Another hour, and we should get there.”

“An hour…”

And Riven could tell what Viriya was thinking now. Another hour meant they had wasted nearly five of their allotted twenty-four hours on their journey. One day, and Aross would start on her return to Rennervation city. They needed to have everything there ready for her triumphant return.

Just the two of them. What fun.

“Then what are we waiting for?” Riven asked, getting up and grabbing his bag and sword. At least Aross had resupplied them with the necessary amounts of Sept. “Let’s go.”

They followed him downstairs, where Viriya paid the tavernkeeper as the soldier started the car and Riven got. Soon as Viriya joined them, they set off. Rennervation city was waiting.

#

“I’ll be leaving you, then,” the soldier said.

Viriya nodded, clasping hands with the woman. “Thank you for the ride.”

They nodded at each other before the solder re-entered the car and drove off. She and Viriya had struck up a silent friendship in the car. Riven didn’t pay it much mind. He was too busy staring out at Rennervation city.

Aross was right, the city was walled like it refused to come out of the distant past when cities needed walls to hold off attackers. But those walls weren’t archaic in the least, no matter how much Aross claimed otherwise. They were smooth and immensely tall, rising higher than any building Riven had ever seen, standing several hundred yards tall like impassable cliffs. The walls were silvery-grey, and smooth as tiles. If there had been crenellations at the top in the past, they had been removed to make a proper corridor that was walled over like any other building, little windows allowing patrols to check the surroundings.

“We’re supposed to get past that?” Riven asked.

“Clearly,” Viriya replied. “What, you don’t think we can make it?”

“You think we can?”

“You don’t think I had a plan?”

“You never told me you had one.”

Viriya didn’t say what her plan was. Riven didn’t push. He should have known she wasn’t going to come here with no idea of what they needed to or had to do. After all, Aross had given her a report on what was in the city and what sort of defences they were supposed to expect. Riven had been reminded that he had once been Viriya’s aide, helping her decode field reports, but that time was long past it felt like, and he had point-blank asked what the pertinent details were.

What she had said really hammered it home that this was little better than a suicide mission.

“So,” Riven prompted. “How do we get up there? I assume we’re getting up there and going over, since going through the gate would set off too many alarms.”

“We’re going to use the trick you showed me last night.”

“What trick?”

“Remember fighting that Arnish girl?”

Riven paused for a moment. Then he blinked, turning to stare at Viriya. “You can’t be serious. That was your plan all along? But…” He turned back to the wall. “It’s so damn high. There’s no way we can make it that far. It’s insane.”

“The gap between insanity and ingenuity is tiny, Riven, and we both know I’m ingenious.”

“That you are,” he admitted. “But also foolhardy, reckless, not afraid to die no matter what. Dying isn’t going to help us with this mission though.”

Viriya sniffed. That was as close to laughter Riven was going to get from her. “It’s work. But enough talk. It’s time we tried it out and made sure if it works or not.”

There was no arguing with Viriya once she had settled on a course of action. Riven took a deep breath and waited, focusing as his pressure burgeoned within and pushed against his hold. Viriya took several steps forward and raised her gun to point at the distant top of the wall. Riven tried to believe in her, really did try to have faith, but the doubt wouldn’t leave. Healthy scepticism, right? The distance was too great. There was no way her shot would reach several hundred yards, if not well over a thousand. Between them and the top of Rennervation city’s wall.

Nevertheless, she fired her gun and the golden-green bullet shot towards the top. Riven stepped forward. At least, if they died, they’d be dying together. The pressure blasted out of him and formed a golden shield around the both of them, an auric orb that ensconced both him and Viriya.

She raised her glowing fist and tapped the shield, the green glittering out over it like a spreading spill. A second later, they shot forward.

Riven had to have left his heart somewhere back on the ground. They were shooting forward too fast, his back attacked to the curved far end of the golden shield. Viriya was flattened beside him, her face turned away. She wasn’t afraid of the impact, but the inertial force was drawing Riven’s head back too, as though seeking to decapitate both of them for their audacity.

He managed to keep his eyes open to bare slits. The wall was shooting at them as though they had been launched from a cannon, and it seemed they were arcing in the air, going high in a parabola and passing their zenith before dipping down in their trajectory. Not good. Riven needed to get the shield higher somehow. They’d crash into the wall at this rate.

And strong as Riven’s shield was, they’d still shatter against the wall and splatter into bloody and gory bits at this kind of force.

“Riven!” Viriya somehow shouted. “Let go of your shield and hold onto me!”

Too terrified to argue, he barely processed what she had said and obeyed immediately. There was no way he could convince his Essence they’d be safer somehow if he dropped the shield, but faith, Mother always said. He needed to have faith in Viriya, and his Essence needed to understand he knew what he was doing. Or Viriya was at least.

He dropped the shield. Air wailed around them as though mad they had dared to come up so high. Riven grabbed onto Viriya, no different from a drowning man grabbing onto floating debris. She didn’t seem to care. He caught a flash of her flyaway brown hair, before it slapped him in the face, a hundred adders hissing and scratching at him for getting too close.

Despite the wailing wind storming all around him, Riven had no trouble hearing Viriya’s next shot.

“Now Riven!” she shouted again, so close her words thrust into Riven’s ears as though seeking to shoot right into his brain. “Use your shield!”

Riven did so. Scions, he needed his shield now more than ever. He blinked. The pressure shot out him like lightning, recreating his golden shield around them, which didn’t stay golden for long. Viriya’s green Essence conquered it as fast as he had thrown up.

They shot up again. It didn’t last very long. The rise was as fast as the last one, throwing them back against the shield and pressing them behind as it climbed faster and higher.

“Break it!” The way Viriya’s shout came, she had to be living right in his head or something.

Riven did so, shattering the shield with hard focus. They tumbled through the air again, this time sinking faster than before as they thumped don onto the roof of the wall. His arse hurt on impact, and Riven had to resist the urge to pat it. If only Viriya hadn’t been around. With a jerk, he leapt off her.

She glared at him through her grill of long brown locks masking her face. “You almost crushed me.”

It was good that it was still noon, and Riven’s shield had to have been less visible in the bright light than it wouldn’t have been after dusk. But he was sure they’d been seen anyway. It would be only moments before someone came to check on them.

“But I didn’t, did I?” Riven had a hard time looking at her, a hot flush possessing his neck and face. “Anyway, we need to get out of here before they start asking why there was a golden comet shooting at their wall.”

“It’s not their wall.”

No, it wasn’t. The wall stretched out of leagues in either direction, curving away to both the left and the right as it encircled the entirety of Rennervation city. The roof was flat with no railing at all, which sent a small shiver lancing up Riven’s spine. A strong gust would be enough to send them plummeting to their deaths.

Well, it would have but they both had their Essen to call upon.

“What’s—”

Riven shut up when he saw Viriya looking away over the distance with a look of consternation on her face. Her hands were gripping her gun tight enough to make her knuckles appear as though the bones were popping out. He followed her gaze, then frowned along with her.

Orbray’s agents were coming in through the gate. High as they were, it was still easy to recognize the navy uniforms among the flood of black-and-red military gear. Ascension Essentiers. Granted, there weren’t a lot of them—Riven counted at least half a dozen as the column moved into the gates—which suggested that the attacks planned by Aross were either underway or had succeeded. But if these had made it here, would there be more coming? Or were they the last of those coming in to shore Orbray’s defence of Rennervation city?

“Not good,” Viriya commented.

“So many Essentiers…” Riven had already killed three. How much more blood was he supposed to get his hands dirty with before they finally won? “We’re screwed if there’s more.”

“Then let’s hope there isn’t.”

She turned around and went to the other side of the roof, leaning dangerously forward. Riven couldn’t stop thinking of gusts again, and he stayed just a bit back. Just in case.

But he was still close enough to see what was happening inside the city.

Orbray’s reinforcements were marching in an orderly fashion, and the soldiers and Essentiers within the city had come to greet them. Riven wasn’t sure he could get a proper count this time. There were far more navy dots on the inside, and they were all milling about as though they didn’t need to hold themselves to the same order as the military.

“Shit,” he muttered.

Viriya didn’t say anything for a while. She looked as though she was desperately resisting the urge to jump and dive into the mess far below. Riven wouldn’t have put it past her but it was a good thing he was here to pull her back if needed.

“I know it doesn’t look good,” Viriya said. “But it should be fine. We haven’t been seen yet. All we need to do is infiltrate the rest of the city and get into the Invigilator’s Office.”

She didn’t expand on what came next, but it was obvious. They needed chaos right in the heart of everything just to show Orbray’s grip on Rennervation city was nowhere near as strong as he’d let them believe. It wouldn’t be easy though. Not with this kind of defence.

Riven looked beyond the gathered soldiers and Essentiers and into the rest of the city. The tapestry of buildings and streets spread out before them like a map that had come to life. Rennervation city was built on multiple levels, with the quarters and old homes near the walls at the lowest level. From then on, different sectors had different elevations—the factories and industries were low and hidden away, only spotted for the smoke rising from their stacks, the residences of the rich raised above most everything else like the sector was the jewel of the whole city. Highest of all was the Invigilator’s Office, towering over the rest of the city like an archaic keep lording over the rest of the castle, big and wide as a palace.

That was what they had to infiltrate. All those winding streets and cramped buildings, several of which were built in the same weird architectural style as that guardhouse Riven had visited near the Frontier, all curved walls made of white sandstone.

Viriya turned to leave, and as Riven followed, they both froze.

A soldier was climbing onto the roof of the wall. There was a hatch that Riven and Viriya had both missed, and it was open, the top half of a uniformed soldier glaring at them both.

“Intruders!” he shouted. He looked down. “We’ve got Essentiers here. Enemies! Pro—”

He didn’t get to say more. Viriya had pulled out her gun and with practiced ease, shot the man right in the chest. The soldier slumped, but he didn’t fall down into wherever he’d come from. Instead, he rose as though he was being pulled bodily to the Beyond. Once the corpse was past halfway up, he was thrown to one side, flecks of blood from his gaping chest wound dotting the roof.

An Essentier followed him up.

Viriya shot at the woman, but there was a flicker of orange light. The bullet sunk into her chest, but the ferocious smile on the woman’s face didn’t waver. A ragged hole had opened up on her chest at the same spot where the soldier had been shot earlier. But she didn’t die or even fall back.

Despite the wound, the woman pulled herself onto the roof. “My, my. Aren’t you good with that gun, little girl? But it looks like it didn’t work. Why don’t you try a little harder?”

Viriya obliged. Her next shots took the woman right in the forehead, the bullet opening another hole in her skull. A bloodless hole that gave no sign that the woman had actually been injured. Her smile was still fixed in place, her blue eyes promising that those bullets had no effect whatsoever.

“What in the world are you?” Riven asked.

“Lacelle. An Essentier.” She peered at him, eyes widening a little in recognition. “If I’m not wrong, you’re little Morell! Well, looks like I’ve been blessed with good luck today. Do you know how much of a celebrity you two have become over the past few days?”

“Yes, I assume we’re pretty popular after handing you your collective arses over the past few days.”

Lacelle broke out into laughter, so hard she slapped a hand over her stomach as though she’d burst from the mirth. Viriya used the chance to shoot at her again. It did nothing. Her orange Essence still glowed like a luminescent phantasm and the ragged hole on the other side of her chest showed no blood.

“Yes, shoot away!” Lacelle said. “It’ll make my job easier when you’re out of your damn bullets. I hope you two have got a good laugh over your temporary success. Killing not one or two but five Essentiers! Three Firstmarked, a Secondmarked, and that Thirdmarked in Tollisett.” She clapped, nodding gravely. Her smile ruined the effect. “Congratulations. I think you’ve had a decent enough run but it’s time you were laid to rest. Your comet burned bright and fierce, but by now, your fuel had run out and—"

Viriya fired her gun again, cutting off the Essentier’s rambling monologue. Her golden-green bullet sailed over Lacelle’s shoulder with her brick-red hair, and all of a sudden, she was thrown back. She shrieked as she went sailing over the hatch.

“And that’s that,” Viriya said. “Let’s—”

Lacelle charged in and punched Viriya right in the face.

Riven staggered back, yelling in surprise as Viriya thumped down onto the ground, pressing a hand to her face. Damn, she’d been hit right where Kowlen Aross had drawn blood last night.

But more importantly, how had Lacelle popped into being right in their midst? Riven looked over to where Viriya’s Essence had Locked her away. There was nothing there. Just the faint trace of orange Essence burning away in the air.

Had she teleported? Or was her power making some sort of decoy?

Riven got no time to ponder. Lacelle had pulled out her gun and was pointing it straight at him. “Don’t even think about trying to fight back.”

Lacelle turned to point the gun at Viriya, but she was already up, pointing her gun right back. Then she fired. The bullet blasted into the woman again, or rather, into the orange Essence burning all over. Another hole that had no effect.

The orange Essence kept burning, rising higher and higher to enwreathe Lacelle completely.

Riven gasped. The Essence. The gun. Shit.

He focused, drawing out his own Essence. Golden lines shot out and rushed to Viriya faster than thought, forming an auric sphere all around. Just in time. The burning orange Essence collapsed revealing that there was no one underneath, and a shot rang out, thundering through the area. It cracked into the shield Riven had erected, leaving a wide delta of white fractures spiderwebbing out everywhere.

“Viriya, she uses her Essence as a decoy,” Riven said. “The real one isn’t even where you shoot.”

“Wrong,” Lacelle said. Riven and Viriya both turned to see her standing to the side a few yards away. She was twirling her gun, staring at Riven’s shield with particular interest, like a researcher about to eviscerate a rat. “My Essence is Distortion. It distorts the space around whatever it covers to give the impression that any impact has occurred, and twists the light to make it look like a hit has landed.”

“And it lets you disappear too, doesn’t it?”

“In a sense.” Lacelle placed two fingers on the shining diamond badge on her shoulder. It had to have been hidden by her Essence so far. “Suffice it to say, you have no way of harming me.”

A damn Firstmarked. Just his luck.

Riven swallowed. Maybe she wasn’t wrong. He had no idea how to combat Essence that could bend light and twist space into creating such strong illusions. How would they ever hit her properly? He didn’t turn his head, but there were so many Essentiers down in the city. If they were having so much trouble getting past just one of them, how in the Chasm were they supposed to fight off so many?

“Leave her to me,” Viriya said. Her face was set, hand brushing off the blood on her lips.

“Are you insane?” Riven asked. “How are you supposed to fight against someone you can’t even see?”

Viriya ignored him, stepping forward towards Lacelle. “Your Essence doesn’t let you strike until it’s gone, does it? You’re a slave to its whims. I’ve noticed. You only strike out after your Essence completely disappears.”

“She can still move though,” Riven noted.

Viriya’s observations were correct, but so was the fact that she had move while she’d been invisible. It was curious she hadn’t killed or subdued them already. But that only meant her Essence was more limited than Riven had initially assumed. No, he was being stupid. Something that insanely ridiculous couldn’t even exist.

They had to wait a little while longer and observe everything properly. He ought not to make such hasty judgements.

“Enough.” Lacelle focused. She had on a little cavalry helm, and her subsequent focus to draw in her Essence made it fly off her head. The orange Essence flared all over her, blazing into wings off her shoulders and rising into the sky, her jacket flapping and dark hair whirling everywhere. “You’ve had your little play session for long enough.”

She charged at Viriya, ignoring Riven completely. Viriya was ready. Riven pulled off his shield at a gesture from her, and then she fired behind her, tapping herself with her glittering green fist to send herself flying backwards. Fast. Too fast. Lacelle was left catching up as Viriya shot backwards and landed far back on the wall’s roof, stopping at the curving edge just before she fell.

Scions, she sure knew how to cut it close. Riven’s heart was beating in his mouth.

That didn’t stop Lacelle apparently. She kept rushing towards Viriya, her Essence a burning conflagration that followed along like a meteor’s burning tail.

Riven needed to move. Whatever Viriya had in mind, he was still afraid it might not be enough. They didn’t know anywhere near enough about that orange Essence and what it might be capable of to make a real plan about it. But Viriya looked assured. In fact, she wasn’t even looking at her adversary. Her eyes and her smile were on Riven.

She fired her gun at him, and he instinctively raised his shield as the pressure possessed him like a livewire. His golden Essence burst out, and the bullet lodged in it for a moment before dropping to the ground, still glowing golden-green.

Then Viriya came flying at him.

Riven had to admit it was strange seeing her flying around like that. She had tapped herself on the chest again, and the way she was coming at him made it seem like she was in desperate need of an embrace. Though her face made it pretty clear he’d die if any such thing were to happen.

With a moment’s focus Riven drew in his golden shield again. Viriya’s eyes widened, and she looked to stop herself in mid-air, but that was impossible. Instead. She did a great job of crashing into his shield and staggering back as she dropped to the ground.

“What was that for, you arsehole?” Viriya muttered as Riven made his shield disappear.

“Nothing,” he replied, unable to stifle his grin.

She looked like she wanted to curse him but she was all in business again, smoothing away her scowl in moments. “Listen, you need to let me handle her on my own. We can’t both waste all our time on her but we can’t exactly leave her alone either.”

“You’re telling me to run for it?”

“Essentially. You’ll need to start the sabotaging and all that without me. I’ll join you as soon as I’m done here.”

“Viriya, I don’t know what you’ve thought up, but we don’t know what her insane Essence is really capable of. Distortion… what in the Chasm does that actually do other than twist, well, everything.”

“Never mind that. I think I can tell. Her Essence creates a separate space, like a dimension parallel to this one, where only she can exist. It’s not really bending the space, or light, or time of this world, it’s creating a small but entirely new one.” She paused as though double-checking her reasoning. “And a reflection of that in the real world. But what you need to be doing is getting the Chasm down from here and thinking about what your next move is going to be. You need to trust me with this, as I’m trusting you to take care of things without me.”

She was right. She was always right. They couldn’t waste what little time Aross had given them on just fending off one Essentier. But damn, his soul shrivelled up at the idea of abandoning Viriya.

“Enough running,” Lacelle shouted. She had stopped in frustration after Viriya had gone flying again, but she was facing them again, her orange Essence riding off her shoulders like a burning cape. “Face me and die!”

Lacelle charged at them.

“She’s coming,” Riven said, quite obviously.

Viriya glanced at him before fixing her eyes on the approaching Lacelle. “Don’t use your Essence until I tell you to, understand?”

Riven nodded. They waited, both their hands on their guns. Riven’s fingers itched to pull it out and shoot even though he knew it would have no effect, not so while that orange Essence was still burning. Maybe Viriya was waiting for the exact moment that the orange Essence disappeared and Lacelle attacked. Good plan. As soon as the other Essentier attacked, Riven could use his Essence to protect them both while Viriya took care of her.

As Lacelle approached, Viriya raised her gun. She pointed her firearm at the orange Essence, but she didn’t fire. Riven raised his too. He held it light in his hands, though. Lacelle was unlikely to be exactly where her Essence suggested. No, she’d move.

As soon as Lacelle and her Essence reached them, she paused a few yards away. They stared at each other for several tense seconds. It took an enormous effort for Riven to keep his hands down and not shoot, his eyes drifting over the whole area to locate the spot Lacelle would pop out of. How in the world was Viriya able to stare down the other Essentier like that without shooting her face off?

With a shriek, Lacelle shot her orange Essence at them. The whole of it came at them, charging in like a madman set on fire. Viriya stepped forward and punched burning Lacelle with her glowing green fist. The burning Essence disappeared, leaving faint traces of blurry light.

Revealing Lacelle standing several yards away to their left.

She had her gun out and aimed right at them. Then she fired, the bright blast coming out of the muzzle seeming to envelop Riven’s entire sight.

“Now Riven!” Viriya shouted.

Scions, he’d been waiting for just that. The pressure was already boiling just beneath his skin, and it took hardly a thought for his golden Essence to pop out and form his shield. But it was all wrong.

Viriya dived away for some reason, firing her gun and shooting at he same spot where Lacelle’s shot lodged in. The double heaping of stress from both the front and the back made Riven’s shield shatter, the whole thing happening to fast for him to focus on renewing it and fixing the cracks with more Essence. Being surprised was such a bitch.

Worse, he tripped on Viriya’s legs. Or maybe she had landed wrong after her dive and her leg had lashed out, but whatever the reason, Riven found himself stumbling backwards. The edge of the wall was barely a yard away.

Then he fell from the roof.