The entity was only a few days old and it knew only one thing: hunger. It was starving. Not because it needed sustenance. No, it was not that kind of hunger. It craved its target because it was created to crave. It was a being born of terrible knowledge, whose true nature was unable to be understood by the mortal mind…and it needed to feed. The starvation was shaped and coaxed by a thousand screaming voices, pilots that directed its cravings.

  The creature, created of lore, was mostly blind. But at regular intervals, a brief burst of sight every so often to interrupt its blindness. In that moment, it could see where its target was no matter the distance, no matter what obstacle lay between it and its prey. But between these momentary glimpses, it lived in a sightless void.

  It spent the majority of its life in these intervals of darkness. It was a flaw in the lore that its creators have yet to overcome and so, its ability to track its prey was limited to these glimpses. This current interval was about to come to an end.

  The universe winked into existence for a few brief moments before disappearing. That window of sight was more than enough. The entity saw where its target was, what it was doing, and where it was going. It changed direction and headed right toward its prey.

  ***

  Sperloc and Tuls were sitting in front of the tent when Vincent returned. The former was busy writing things in a journal while the latter maintained his crossbow. Vincent walked right over to a water barrel, grabbed the ladle hanging from it, scooped up some water and drank, gasping between gulps.

  “What happened to you?” Tuls asked.

  “Menik invited me to join Oris and those guys for a morning sprint.”

  “And you survived?”

  “Barely...” Vincent sat down and tried in vain to cool himself off by fanning his snout with his hand. Tuls watched, laughed in disbelief. He put down his crossbow, got up, stood in front of Vincent and used one of his wings to sweep large gusts of air at him. It felt amazing.

  “Thanks,” Vincent said, “I keep forgetting I have wings.”

  “A strange notion...” Tuls said.

  “Yeah...well...” Vincent trailed off for a moment before finishing with, “this whole place is strange.”

  He had nothing to do. So, he went inside, put back on his shirt, and grabbed the shryken. It resembled a dagger with a mercury-colored blade. Only instead of stabbing people, it encased them in a metallic substance that hardened around the body, imprisoning them. Slade used this one to capture him after he had inadvertently caused the death of a telen in Meldohv Syredel. Her efforts backfired. One of his latent abilities allowed him to hijack artificial conduits like this.

  When he picked it up, a hierarchy of commands and conditions overlayed itself upon his mind. He couldn’t see it, not with his eyes, but he could visualize it. He could modify its lore to do his bidding, make it do things it wasn’t designed to do.

  An amorphous reservoir of metal that could solidify into any shape had a plethora of possibilities. And so, he needed to practice. He wanted to become intimately familiar with its inner workings. However, when Sperloc saw the shryken in his hand, a scowl twisted his already-severe countenance.

  “Do not,” he grumbled.

  “Huh?” Vincent asked.

  “You put that away!”

  Tuls and Vincent exchanged confused looks.

  “Why?” Vincent demanded, taken aback by Sperloc’s reaction.

  Sperloc lowered his voice so that his words did not leave their campfire.

  “If you really were brought here by a Herald...then your powers will only bring ruin,” he hissed, “so you put that away right now!”

  Vincent almost obeyed, but he stopped himself. Back in Crefield, he froze. He could have helped the soldiers fight the Puppeteer’s creations, but he could not do a damn thing. He had the shryken in his hands, but he couldn’t tap into its lore. He had been inept and cowardly.

  “Well? Are your ears working? I said put it away!” Sperloc demanded.

  Anger flared in Vincent’s chest. “What the hell is the matter with you?!”

  “What is that matter with me?” Sperloc put his scroll down and got to his feet. “I am not Herald-work!”

  Vincent, sensing trouble, got to his feet as well.

  “Whoa, whoa...” Tuls got between them, “Sper, calm down!”

  “Don’t you tell me to calm down!” Sperloc slapped Tuls’ hand off his shoulder.

  “You’re making a scene.” It was true. A few soldiers in another camp site turned their snouts to see what was going on. Sperloc realized he was drawing too much attention. So, after wiping some spittle from the corner of his mouth, he took his seat.

  “Fucking hell!” Vincent hissed, “ever since Crefield you’ve been acting like somebody shoved a broom handle up your ass! I hear you grumbling under your breath every time I walk by, talking shit.”

  “That solves nothing, Brother,” Tuls said.

  Vincent bit his lip. It took every ounce of willpower not to explode. His temper was trigger-happy and virulent. It had been for years. But he managed to simmer down. Tuls was right, losing his shit would solve nothing.

  He left the campsite, bringing the shryken with him. Sperloc made like he was going to follow, but Tuls stopped him. There was an exchange of heated words and raised voices, but they died into the distance as Vincent left them behind. He wanted to be away from everybody else, so he headed into the woods, half-expecting somebody to stop him. Nobody did. A shadow soared up above and Vincent saw Madeen. He knew the zerok would relay his location to the expedition, so he wasn’t in any danger of getting lost.

  When he found a nice quiet spot, he continued delving into the shryken’s lore, guided by alien intuitions and logic. He could see how modifying one node in the command tree would affect the rest. But there was something natural about his progression, something that seemed... 'familiar’.

  The shryken could see nearby life forms. Insects, birds, tree-dwelling critters. And if Vincent changed the right command, it could target them. It could shoot out strands of argent and encapsulate them. Doing this required concentration, however. It was why he failed in Crefield. It was hard to concentrate when there were screams in the air. He wanted to get to a point where he could switch targets on a whim and activate the shryken’s lore with just a thought.

  He had many ideas he wanted to try out. One of them involved wearing the shryken like a suit of armor that could harden or soften at a moment’s notice. The rigidity was variable, after all. Another idea involved using it like a landmine, having a bunch of spikes of metal shoot outwards if somebody or something approached. Of course, that would be fairly dangerous. Another involved using it as a grappling hook.

  But for now, he wanted to keep it simple. He delved into its script. An “ethereal” version of himself, only visible to his senses, appeared. It was surrounded by the shryken’s language, floating among the commands and conditions that comprised its lore. There were birds chirping in some branches nearby. There was also a long orange worm crawling up its trunk. He was going to try targeting a bird, encapsulating it, then switching to the worm.

  Strands shot forth from the handle and encased the birds, whose songs were abruptly cut off. But switching targets was difficult. Though he could visualize the hierarchy, parts of it still remained abstract to him. The shryken could see the worm, but it was one of hundreds of life signatures. So it took him at least twenty seconds to switch. The birds were freed and they flew off squawking while the strands reached over like tentacles to ensnare the worms. It was progress though, and progress was welcome. He commanded the shryken to retract its metal.

  He tried to find new targets for the dagger to encapsulate, smaller targets, but they were evasive, “slippery” almost. Each life form was visualized as a mote of light with its own signature. Using his ethereal form, he tried to turn them into labels that he could recognize: bird, butterfly, beetle. But every species had a subspecies and so, their signature varied a bit, which made the process overwhelming. Sighing, he took a break. That was when he noticed another distortion in his peripheral. He put the shryken down.

  “You know that’s a little creepy, don’t you?” he said. No answer. “Slade, I can see you.”

  The illusion dropped, revealing her figure leaning with her back against a tree trunk, arms crossed. Shadows dance across her form and her sly green irises seemed to catch the sunlight.

  “The shandan, I can understand,” she said, “They have been trained to spot signs of shade-wearers. You, I do not. It does not matter how well I weave the threads, you still see me.”

  “It must be the eyes,” Vincent said, “Don’t you see how they glow and shift colors? Clearly, they’re magical. Why are you stalking me?”

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  He waited for an answer, but she remained silent. A breeze tickled the treetops. Branches groaned. A cloud passed in front of the sun, bathing the area in shadow. Something landed next to him. He looked down and saw a sword handle. He picked it up to inspect it, but immediately dropped it when he realized what it was.

  “Isn’t that your sword...what did you call it, Calimere’s something?” he asked.

  “I want to know how you did it,” Slade said. Her voice was deep and rich in undertones.

  “Did what?”

  “Are you jesting?” Slade demanded. Vincent knew exactly what she was referring to. During his confrontation with the Puppeteer, he had drawn fire from her blade.

  “I’m supposed to keep my mouth shut...about what happened in Crefield,” he said.

  “Firelight came out of my blade and ‘walked’ toward the stormspawn. Everybody knows it was you, even if The La’ark refuses to confirm it.”

  Vincent picked up the handle again. He could detect its hierarchy immediately, though it looked different from the shryken’s. There was a trigger that summoned the blade and activated another series of commands. But beyond that, he couldn’t see anything. Knowing the heat this weapon was capable of unleashing, he didn’t dare try to mess with it.

  “The entity that created the storms killed me,” he said.

  “Killed you?” Slade repeated.

  “I mean...yeah. At least, I should have died. It broke my neck. Then I became like a ghost.”

  “A ghost?” Slade sounded skeptical.

  “Yeah. I could see everybody and I could hear everything, but they couldn’t see me. My body...this body was on the ground. But I could still walk around like I was some sort of spirit. I saw you fighting that thing and without knowing what I was doing I grabbed the...what’d you call it, ‘fire light’? I grabbed some bands of it, walked toward the stormspawn, squeezed the bands and then I lit up. I don’t know how I did any of it, but that’s what happened, and I’m just as confused as you.”

  She walked over to retrieve her blade from Vincent, then she went back over to lean on the tree trunk, resuming the same pose she had before. For a while, she didn’t say anything. She was deep in thought. It made Vincent a little bit uncomfortable.

  “Do you want to grow stronger?” she finally asked.

  Vincent figured the answer was fairly obvious. Why else would he be out here training his “Saedharu” powers?

  “You didn’t answer my question,” he said, “Why were you stalking me?”

  “Because you are strange.” Slade did not elaborate further on her answer, perhaps figuring calling him “strange” was answer enough. Vincent opened his mouth to pursue it further but decided against it.

  “Yeah...I want to get stronger,” he said, turning the shryken in his palm.

  “Then I will help you.”

  Surprised, he stared at her. She wasn’t looking at him, however. Instead, she was gazing into the distance, her eyes filled with contemplation. Her tail flicked across the grass.

  “You want to help me...” Vincent repeated.

  “That is indeed what I said,” Slade said.

  There was something strange in her tone. She did not inflect much, but there seemed to be a slight hesitance. Vincent blinked, unsure of how he should proceed. If anything, he expected Slade to stop him. He thought perhaps she had been secretly hired by The La’ark to spy on him. He had not been prohibited from exploring his abilities, but these people had many reasons to be suspicious of him. So, this...this was truly unexpected.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “I have always wanted a protégé,” she said, “a student to call my own.”

  He continued to stare at her, trying to read the expression on her snout. There was a slight tug at the corner of her maw.

  “I can’t tell if you’re being serious or if you’re full of shit,” Vincent said, “I find it really hard to read your snouts sometimes. Is that really the reason?”

  “Does it matter if it is, Vincent Cordell?”

  “To be honest...it might,” Vincent said, “You are by far the most unpredictable being I’ve met since coming here.” Slade produced her throwing knife and began to balance it on a claw. “First you capture me, chain me up like some animal. Then you become my escort. You keep showing up to save my ass, which I appreciate...but I just don’t get you. What’s your motive?”

  After flipping the knife on her claw a few times, she clutched it handle. “Vincent Cordell, I am going to walk toward you and cut you with this knife,” she said, “The only way to stop me is to trap me with the shryken before I reach you.”

  “Wait...what?” He stared at her, looking for some sign that she was joking.

  “I said I am going to cut you. Defend yourself and stop me."

  Vincent felt a jolt in his chest as she began to approach him, holding the knife in her hand, which glinted in the sunlight. She was being serious! He grabbed the shryken, stumbled to his feet and held it out before him, panicking. He wanted it to lock onto her and ensnare her. But he couldn’t focus on the hierarchy. It was happening too fast. When she got close enough, he tried to stab her with it. But she caught his wrist with her free hand and twisted it, forcing him to drop the blade.

  He didn’t know what happened next, only that he tried to throw fists. Instead, he found himself thrown onto his back and pinned to the ground. She held the knife to his face, lowered it...and sliced a sliver off his mane. She held the strands in front of his eyes to see. Then she let him up.

  “What the fuck is the matter with you?!” he shouted.

  “You need a guide, Vincent Cordell,” Slade said, letting the strands she cut drift off into the wind. “My reasons do not matter. They are mine. You are free to refuse my help. But as you saw, your talent is useless to you. I can help you grow. I cannot do what you can do, but I am sharp, I am observant, and I have more experience fending for my life than most of the shandan have had over their entire careers.”

  Vincent clutched the back of his head with his hands. He had to calm down and take a few breaths. He had frozen before Slade just as he had frozen in Crefield.

  “You are a maniac,” he said, shaking his head, “but...yeah. You made your point. So, you want to team up.”

  He didn’t know what to think. Slade had not spoken to him since they left Crefield. Instead, she stayed distant, watching him from afar. He wasn’t sure he trusted her. He could not forget the time she chained him up, arresting him for a crime he had no knowledge of committing. She was only doing her job, so he shouldn’t hold it against her, but the ignominy remained.

  Come on man, swallow your fucking pride, he thought.

  “I’m open to it,” he said, “but how would that work? You said it yourself, you can’t do what I do. You don’t see what I’m seeing when I’m taking over the shryken.”

  “And what do you see?” Slade asked, “I recall you saw a hierarchy. You saw the Biddings and Forbiddings.”

  “Yes...and no,” he said, holding up the shryken, “I don’t actually see them, but I can visualize them. There’s me, and then there’s another ‘me’, an ethereal, immaterial form. It’s the ethereal form that can interact with them. That’s the best way I can describe it.”

  “It sounds similar to imaging,” she said.

  “Imaging? I think I heard of it before. What is that?”

  Slade reached into her pocket and withdrew a white orb the size of a ping pong ball. It had a frosted appearance. A blinding white light suddenly emanated from the orb and it flew up into the air where it hovered. It was called a spark and the Falians liked to use them as floating light sources at night.

  “I am here,” Slade said, “I am standing before you. But I also float before you. I am Slade Reashos, the bounty hunter. But I am also Slade Reashos, the spark. I am connected to the conduit via imaging. I now have two bodies. Not one.”

  Vincent wasn’t sure he understood. “What do you mean?”

  “It is as I said: I am in two places. I have two bodies. One is real. One is artificial. I see what my eyes see, but I also see what the spark sees. A path connects the two of us.”

  “So that’s how that works? Your consciousness is split?”

  “An apt analogy,” Slade said, “There are dangers, but if the spark were destroyed, I would remain physically unharmed.”

  “Do you mind if I give that a go? I might understand it better.” The request drew a smirk on her snout. At least Vincent thought it was a smirk. It truly was hard to tell sometimes.

  “You may try. But you will fail.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Vincent said as the spark floated downward until it came to rest on the ground. The light went out. He bent down to pick it up.

  “I would sit,” Slade said.

  “All right...” Vincent took a seat and held the spark in his hands.

  “Do not change it.”

  “I won’t. I don’t even know if I can. It seems different.” He could sense lore, but it seemed less accessible to him for some reason. There was a mental trigger, but that was it. “So, how does it work?”

  “Close your eyes. Imagine a path connecting your mind to the spark. Some find it is easier to imagine the path as a ‘ribbon’ or a ‘rope’.”

  It didn’t seem like anything was happening at first. But as soon as Vincent pictured an invisible ribbon connecting him to the orb, he could feel it. It was intangible, it could not be seen, yet it was there, nonetheless. At the end of the ribbon there was a doorway. Or was it a latch? No...it was a lock. His mind was trying to grasp at images that would provide understanding.

  “Open the door...and pull yourself into the spark,” Slade said.

  Vincent opened the door, reached inside and then...

  He had no arms. He had no legs. He could not hear. He could not smell. He could not taste or touch. His body was gone. He had no lungs to breathe. His body was gone. He had no feet to carry him. His body was gone. But he could feel it. He couldn’t feel it. He was numb, he was sweating. He tried to gasp for air, but he had no mouth. He could not breathe, yet he was panting.

  The only thing he could do was see. And he saw himself flailing. The world was spinning. He was spiraling. A hand snatched him out of the air. He needed to breathe, he was suffocating. But he had breath...and yet he didn’t. His eyes were lying. His senses were lying. He had no senses except for sight. He had to...he had to...

  And then he was expelled from the spark. The path closed and he could breathe again.

  “Fuck!” he gasped, “Oh God, what the hell...”

  Nausea filled his gut.

  “Now do you understand?” Slade asked.

  “Give me a moment...”

  He massaged his temples. Back on Earth, he had tried a virtual reality headset and it made him extremely motion sick. What he saw in the game did not match what his body was feeling, and it messed him up. He had to bail out within minutes. This was like that, only five times worse because it wasn’t just sight...it was all senses that clashed.

  He felt his consciousness inhabit an inanimate object. It felt like his body had been ripped from him and yet he still had it. He was limbless and yet he still felt his limbs. He had two sights; two feeds overlaying each other.

  “How in the hell do you do that? That was awful...”

  “It is one of the most difficult arts,” she said, tucking the spark back into her pocket, “It takes years of training and practice to become an imager. Even then, most can only hold one or two paths in their mind. Most exceptionally skilled imagers can hold up to four or five.”

  That sounded incomprehensible. “And how many ‘paths’ can you control?”

  “I can hold thirteen.”

  What in the hell, Vincent thought. Splitting one’s consciousness into thirteen entities, he couldn’t imagine it. How did her mind remain intact? Just the thought of it made him feel like throwing up.

  “How...how does that even work?” he asked, “How does it connect to the brain? I want to know what kind of impact that has...I have so many questions...”

  “Are they important right now? The point is your talent sounds similar to imaging.”

  “Yeah...maybe,” Vincent said, “but it seems way easier.”

  “Which is why I can help,” Slade said, “You sit on the ground and concentrate because you can only control one body at a time. This is useless if you want to use the shryken as a weapon. You must control two bodies. I am a prodigy, and I am offering you my aid.”

  “Ok...I’ll take it,” Vincent said, “So...when do we start?”

  “When do we start?” Slade repeated, “We start now. Describe to me everything you see.”