In the Province of Can Vahs, quite distinctly south and ever so slightly west of the Can Vahs Arcane Colleges, lay a collection of rusted, dusted, and ransacked structures, arranged betwixt two main highway roads as if filling the four quarters of a rhomboid. It is this geometry that gave this lost town the name Annul Rhombus.

Annul Rhombus used to be a major trading and cultural hub among the local Provinces. North Road led to the Seminary as a matter of course, then to Thi Atrix above. East Road led to Kerdin Khal, a Magick-heavy province in its own right. South Road led to Dak Aerfal, the southern oceanfront. Finally, West Road led to Phew Talis, popular with the well-moneyed and chief importer of avocados.

It was quite a busy city in its heyday, but as with many good things, it had been by terror besieged.

Betrayed by the utter lack of response from the Sleepless Seminary, the stakeholders from the other Provinces packed up and left, never to return. By the time the Can Vahs Arcane Colleges reformed and reopened, they had secured other, more reliable trade routes.

So were the buildings of Annul Rhombus left to collect dust and... not much decay. The buildings were enchanted, after all, but they still collected outlaws, and in Can Vahs, even the outlaws had Magick.

That was, until yesterday. On Thursday, Twenty-Eighth of Ninth, a rift opened at the top of North Road, capturing the attention of two gaggles squared off to fight over territory. The enemy gangs joined forces, their Elements primed to erase the first entitled bum to barge in like they owned the place.

Unfortunately, said first entitled bum was a dark-skinned blaze-robed Provost who had not even fully left the rift when ear-bleeding firebombs blocked the streams.

Her second action drowned them in a wall of flame before they could regroup.

Her third action: call a Spell Circle around herself and fill it with the golden flame of Forging Magick.

At this point, a tan-skinned womanly Student of Fire stepped into view and gagged.

A torrent of bladed, pointed, and blunted armaments catapulted out of the Circle, showering the crime city at large, still glowing from the Magick that made them.

The student backpedaled into a male Student of Air behind her. "W-Why would you do this?!"

The Air Student dropped his jaw to the melody of every criminal resident screaming curses and orders to run. The rift tore shut.

Lienne's lips wrinkled upward. "Clearing the town. Everyone runs when your hello is a volley of Forged armaments raining everywhere at once." She kicked the paved dirt underfoot and the Spell Circle disintegrated into thin Æther.

The womanly student threw her hands toward the charred skeletons around Lienne's feet. "What the fuck are those?!"

"They ambushed us and we needed bodies. Efficiency, Layla."

Layla's auburn hair accented a fierce scowl. "You're cruel!"

"I contest that."

The male student of the two shook his head, too fatigued to deal with whatever this was.

Lienne held her hands out, tethering raw Magick onto the bodies. "Layla, you're up." With a claw-like squeeze, Ser Lienne compacted the charred bodies into a clump.

"Wha-" Layla's voice stammered. "What do you want me to do?"

"We're going to Call a Demon." Lienne smiled as if she didn't just utter something insane. "That being what I told you we were doing."

Layla's head jittered. "N-No. I'm not doing this."

Lienne's brow furrowed. "You said you weren't squeamish."

The Student of Air rushed to interpose himself between the two women, staring Lienne down. "Ser! This is so much more than that! You just charred a bunch of people alive in front of her, and you want her to use the fresh remains to summon a Demon?!"

"I recruited Layla specifically for her Element and Aspect, Daniel. I made no secrets about what we would be doing-"

Viscous water coated Layla's eyes. "You didn't tell me we'd sacrifice people!"

Lienne sighed. "It's not a sacrifice: they tried to kill us and I turned the tables. That they left dead matter behind is convenience."

"No! I'm done! Danny, get us home!"

Lienne planted a palm on her face. "Fine. You're too distraught anyway. I'll come back with someone else."

And that was what happened. Daniel Carter took Layla Bauer into his arms and opened a portal back to the Arcane Colleges.

It would not be until the next morning that Lienne would return, this time with Daniel, who stepped far from the carnage, and a much older man wearing a black-trimmed red robe, who did not.

The new man surveyed the charred bodies. "This the tribute?"

Lienne nodded. "Indeed, Walter. If you can handle the Calling, I'll get us the one we need."

Ser Walter Raded splayed his hands wide, gathering Magic about his clawed digits. Azure brightened to orange and darkened to blood. Sweat soaked his skin as he drew his hands close. With a laboured breath, he focused the sanguine fires in front of his heart, and as a black tendril licked away from the rest of the pyre, he thrust it forward, streaming it onto the bodies.

The Magick seeped into the corpses, amalgamating them into crimson tar. At Ser Raded's flourish, an oblong disc of flame ignited atop the tar and a death-sick wind bellowed in all directions.

Daniel, not even facing it, dropped to the ground, dry-heaving.

Ser Raded sighed. "Should have braced him, Lienne."

From within a wreath of golden fire, Lienne watched the semisolid Magick mold and bubble. "Get your arse out here, Vanessa!" she barked, ignoring her colleague.

Walter The Ignored tripped and lost his footing. "Y-You named a Demon?!"

Lienne's grin expanded. "Well yeah! I liked her!"

Ser Raded climbed back to standing. "What manner of monster are you, anyway..."

The tar boiled into a humanoid shape, solidifying into crisp black flayed flesh, clothed by frayed brown leathers and red furs. A skeletal visor shielded its visage, and in one of its talon-like hands rested a long slender blade whose obsidian glaze shone beautifully under the sunlight.

"Who dare-" an inhuman voice rasped. It had once belonged to a woman, but the fires of whatever hell it came from severely disfigured it.

Lienne inclined her head. "Hey."

The blade snapped the wind, resting delicately on the Provost's throat. "You. So hot and bothered you came back to me? Or maybe you want my other services..."

Ser Raded glanced at the scene incredulously. "Ser Lienne?!"

The apparent swordswoman, supposedly named Vanessa, chortled. "You don't know him well, do you, sweet Caller?"

"Don't make me burn metal in you, 'Nessa." Lienne's voice dropped to a menacing growl. "No, I want you to test some resolves."

Vanessa's blade lifted away from its mark on Lienne's throat. A drip of red trickled down onto her robe. "You found someone you're interested in, didn't you, old coot?"

Lienne handed a rectangular package of leather and string to the new entity. "Four students will be coming later today. Three men, one woman. I gave them a Mission to retrieve that package from you. I want you to make them work for it."

Vanessa clutched the package in her free hand, leaving the middle finger outstretched. "I assume I am free to kill any who fail to satisfy?"

"No," Ser Raded decreed.

"We don't have sway for that, Walter." Lienne waved a breeze of flame near her neck to seal the admittedly-tiny wound. "And I'd rather you didn't, Vanessa. You may torture them instead."

"That's even worse!"

The leathers on Vanessa's emaciated body flapped to a wind of Æther billowing from beneath. "Mmm~ Yes I think we have a deal."

Lienne bowed before the hellspawn. "Thank you for your time."

"My pleasure, wannabe lion. And next time, don't feed me day-old lowlife garbage! I'd rather you offered naught!"

"Technical difficulties. We'll be going now. Watch for a carriage." With Lienne's parting words, the three Magi regrouped and translocated away.

When they departed, the Demon turned its attention to the package. It sniffed at the contents and purred. This was going to be fun.

Vanessa's feet crunched down on the gravel underneath, her eyes peering through slits in the visor toward the deserted buildings to and fro. Bottles of what had been wine lay strewn about between an unnatural number of weapons. The city stunk of burnt coal, but everything smelled burnt to Vanessa.

The Demon woman paced through the long North-South diagonal of Annul Rhombus. Then, she patrolled the borders, then weaved through the buildings. She had looked for a more appetizing meal in the empty fields and even up a few trees, but the town was truly ghosted.

Vanessa found a lovely pile of wood and stone debris, selecting it as a good hiding spot. Staking her blade into the dirt, she tore open the leather packaging to reveal a gold-leafed tome bound in hard crimson letter and lettered in onyx symbols. She carefully lifted away sticks and stones to reveal a patch of soil. She clawed a shallow recess into the soil and set the crimson grimoire within. She buried the book in dirt and buried the dirt in debris.

Vanessa counted fifty-some-odd paces out and loitered near what had been a tavern before it was trashed by outlaws who had since fled.

With nothing else to kill the time, the Demon stood vigil in wait for the promised challenge.

After many long hours, Vanessa was indeed rewarded, for faint traces of Magick breezed in from the east. Air, Fire, Water, and straight Æther? No, that was wrong. The raw voice rang loudest. Vanessa leaned in to listen to the ebb and flow. The Watery voice held an edge of Darkness. She would be formidable. The Airy and Firey men were rather behind in comparison, but Light radiated from the fourth, a-

Vanessa snarled. It was one thing for the old man to call himself a woman when he bore a woman's scent, but to impose that fate on another?! "One day I will thee burn, cur," she cursed. But right now she had other priorities.

Vanessa took back her blade and marched forth, sniffing at the Magick ahead. What manner of cursed soul was she, and which Element held sway over her? Water Magick swelled around her mouth just so she could salivate. She was getting closer. Even more exciting, the four Magi knew it. Their energies grew more intense, and then the fourth Soul sang to the Heavens.

Vanessa's sword arm trembled. She saw, at that moment, what the man in woman's garb had seen in her. This was a woman who'd realized both Element and Aspect.

Vanessa soaked in the story of the new girl's Shroud and her heart fluttered. Would she finally experience the privilege of a clash between Astral and Umbral Magicks?

The Students' cloaks billowed slowly into her view, but Vanessa's eyes marked only the strong Aura before her.

LunaSoltaer

Okay, so Grammarly really liked this Interlude as opposed to the prior chapters, giving it about a full ten more points than what I had written and edited previously. I'm curious about it, since I did have a lot of fun with the wording, but this might also mean I'm a better third-person writer than first-person, which will be troublesome seeing as Solstice is first-person. That said, I did worry a bit about putting another Interlude in so soon thinking people would hate me, but I basically told myself to shut up and write. And I'm glad I did.

See, I originally intended Ch37 to go straight into Ch38, but then I realized I really wanted Ch38 to focus entirely on Em and Friends encountering Vanessa (I've been wanting to write this for a YEAR now, and it's a major milestone that's been incubating since the very beginning of Solstice, which means I'm probably going to be spending quite a bit of time making sure I like what I publish), so I needed to put the setup of Annul Rhombus SOMEWHERE, and of the three or so options I'd considered, my muse liked this one the best. I hope I made the right decision, but more than that, I hope you all enjoyed reading this.

It is heartwarming to know that people enjoy this book I write. Thank you.