The sun rose and I with it.

  It was a familiar scene. Myself, getting up early; Attar, still asleep where he lay on the floor. He’d even snored as loudly as Attart. But only one of them, now that I thought about it.

  I shot upright, the lights on the glowstones winked out, so I let my shine forth.

  Only one Attar remained.

  I checked the perimeter of the wall. It looked unchanged, though my memory had never been exact.

  I shone brighter, waking Attar.

  He was that strange type who was disoriented in the first few moments of waking.

  “What? What is it? Where?”

  I gave him an impatient moment to sort out whatever needed sorting out in such instances. Perhaps they were busy dispelling misapprehensions of safety.

  Finally he woke properly, though he still looked bleary. What was gained from acting half asleep?

  “What is it, Oswic?”

  “Where is Attar? The other I rescued from the book?”

  “I am he.”

  I frowned, “Then where is the Attar whom I rescued from time, and whom I restored back he clothes, bell, manacles, and skull?”

  “I am he.”

  His eyes widened.

  “My memories and soul holds two accounts of the yesterday. One where I escorted you, and one where I burned down the manor after being drawn into the book.”

  So he hadn’t lost all of Attart’s powers. His appearance didn’t change when I looked at him, but he still absorbed souls.

  Everything left a mark, some more obvious than others.

  “My name is Neferihti the Shadowmaster.” Close enough, I couldn’t remember his name exactly.

  Attar frowned, “No you’re not. Why does that feel strange?”

  “Now you tell me you are Neferihiti.”

  “I am Attar, necromancer of the Bronze Coast...”

  I nodded, “You cannot lie, and therefore none may lie to you. It is the duel nature of the elves at play.”

  “I am not an elf.”

  “But you were once, though you no longer remember.”

  “Didn’t you restore my soul?”

  “I suspect Tom left a mark on your soul, even if he is no longer part of you. You may with effort and time be able to overcome the restriction, but think carefully about if you wish to. If you begin to lie again you will lose your ability to detect lies as well.”

  “So it is a gift.”

  “That is how I would think about it.”

  Attar dusted himself off and jumped to his feet, “So you didn’t lie about saving me, unless this feeling is also false. But that is too many layers for me.”

  “Be careful all the same, the warlocks work in layers.”

  “But you have rescued me twice over in my reckoning, and thrice at least if your words are true. I am yours.”

  He stuck out his hand.

  “Thank you.”

  I clasped it, “Come with me back to the wobble room. I have spells to write, but I had a bad experience here that I’ll not risk again.”

  ***

  True Teleport II

  True Teleport III: The caster and his gear moves 150 ft over the course of eight seconds, but does not exist in the intervening space.

  I needed another Conscience, but I’d completely run out of teleports the day before, and I’d never felt so vulnerable. Plus, if I was to teleport the both of us, I’d need more instances of the spell.

  The dark magic here was stronger, I’d felt the pull as I’d written my spell, but I’d wrested back control and written the rune aright.

  I alerted Attar that I was done and began leading the way back toward the room of hourglasses.

  “We’ll risk the room of time again if you are willing. The other paths I know contain giant spiders and worse. If we carefully shuffle our feet we should be okay.”

  Attar bit his lip, “I don’t fear spiders, my spirits can handle those well enough, but being frozen in time as you described—I’ve already lost eight of my kin’s years.”

  I patted him on the shoulder, “The spiders matched me spell for spell, the hourglasses require only that we watch our step. Should one of us misstep, the other may don the goddess’s trouser and scarf,” I pointed to both slung about me, “and free his companion.”

  Attar’s silence was telling, but he followed me all the same.

  We navigated the room of sand and time without difficulty, much to Attar’s relief. The tension visibly drained from him as we crossed the threshold out the other side.

  He relaxed too soon, however, for the Neferhis were waiting for us.

  It was not upon them Attar’s gaze first fell. The room was large with gold veined walls after all, and contained a chest overflowing with gems. It was only natural his gaze fell there first.

  Natural, but incautious. He’d learn quickly.

  “Oswic, you return to us and you’ve undone another of the warlocks’ magics. Our trust was not misplaced, though your companionship shall suffer for it.”

  “And it shall grow anew, and I shall continue to grow your own trust.”

  All four Neferhis gestured to the door at once, “Break them, Darkswallower.”

  I needed to find a better name.

  But I gave the slightest bow and lead Attar past the strange apparitions, head held high. No sense in making enemies when I already had so many.

  ***

  Lightstep

  Rapture

  “Ready?”

  Attar was grinning, “I can’t wait.”

  I lifted him with my spells and sent him floating across the chasm. He whooped in exhilaration, eyes wide, staring down.

  “I should have never gone into necromancy! Is it too late to become your apprentice?”

  I’d actually considered the idea. My soul still surrounded his, as evidenced by both spells working. Our connection might be enough to speed his learning or at least understanding of the runes, perhaps even enough he could cast from my runes.

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  “There is a chance, though typically the study takes many years. I am but a beginner Magus myself.”

  He laughed, “Come off it. No beginner could set themselves against the entire Bleak Fort and remain standing months later.”

  “And yet, I have. Fortune smiles upon me. Nature’s path has use for me yet.”

  His eyes grew as wide as when he’d flown, for they could grow no wider, “Truly? You are a beginner, not in jest?”

  “It was how they captured me. A full Magus would have never been subdued. When Magi and warlocks clash the battles always otherwise end in the death of one or both, never capture.”

  True Teleport III

  I appeared next to him a second later.

  Attar tried to jump, but he was still hovering just above the ground on the far side of the pit and so instead lurched in the air. Then he burst out laughing, “You did mention you could fold the earth. I didn’t suspect it appeared so abrupt.”

  I supposed it would.

  “It is by far the most useful of my tricks. Even my healing is only necessary as a failure of the teleportation and it shall be my method up said well.”

  I floated him along behind me like one of my will-’o-wisps to stand before the mound and pointed up our passage.

  Attar screwed up his face, “Disgusting.”

  “I’d remove it if I could, but it would take days of spell crafting. Perhaps after we find Tom’s mother.”

  “The sooner the better. Send me up.”

  I started levitating him. He still had a cutlass in hand and I’d already explained the knocking so that I might ascend as well. The rope Attart and I had left behind was useful both as a guide so that he could avoid touching the sides of the wall and to pull himself up faster than my levitation allowed.

  When he reached the top he called back down a faint echoing “Clear!”

  I drifted him over the edge and out of sight. A moment later a sharp knocking rang back down to me.

  ?Clothes’ Hanger?

  Safe TeleportII

  Attar barked out a laugh when I arrived.

  “You tricked you me! You said it would take you near eight seconds after I first sent the signal!”

  I flipped to Safe TeleportII in my spellbook. Sure enough, the rune had changed. I hadn’t noticed the change as I’d been busy not existing.

  Safe TeleportII: Move 150 ft over the course of four seconds.

  This had happened before. Something about the lower levels of the Bleak Fort made my spells impatient.

  “My spell was altered by the dungeon. It is not supposed to be so fast.”

  Attar bent down to grab the lip of the well and pulled himself to the ground, “Aye, I’ve felt the same. It hasn’t happened yet, but something tickles along the edges of my necromancy whenever I call to the dead. This is a place of dark magic which allows for nothing else to go by unchanged.”

  “Forcing a change is the un-nature of dark magic. True magic follows the path intended.”

  “Is flight intended?” Attar asked in a teasing tone.

  “Nature does not abhor a shortcut. It is one of the first lessons of the Magi.”

  “Then perhaps the dark magic was not so dark, to allow you to take the path twice as fast.”

  “I’ve thought the same. I’ve also thought small concessions are how temptation start.”

  Attar shrugged without commitment, “This is the ogre lair you spoke of? Did you search again for your wondrous ring?”

  I’d decided to mention the ring, on the condition I couldn’t share it for risk of Attar casting my spells inadvertently.

  I hadn’t had time to check before. It would do me little immediate good to find, but a second ring would at least allow me to experiment with enlarging the first.

  A quick search, and then a more thorough aided by Attar turned up nothing. Some of what I’d brought back in time with me seemed to no longer exist in this time, though with rain to explain its sprouting.

  “I think it best we explore the fourth floor as far as we can for today, and then return to Tom’s house for the night. If you don’t wish to risk yourself along side me, I can return you there first.”

  Attar shook his head, “I am yours. I’ve already said so.”

  I was secretly relieved. A necromancer would be invaluable, but even more so as a connection to the companion I once had.

  But it need not be a secret.

  “Thank you. I’ve grown fond of your company, even you don’t remember it. And your talents will be useful against foes I myself cannot face.”

  “What is there that you cannot best?”

  “Our first foe even. Finding Tom’s mother’s place. Do your spirits know where a hobgoblin’s mother might dwell?”

  Attar cast an eye about the room, “My own do not, but their is death enough in this room to question many. With my bell and skull, it shouldn’t take too long.”

  It took him about half an hour after he had separated the spirits who knew things from the rest and finished interrogating those who knew. He looked somewhat confused at the end of it.

  “An otherworldly being’s house is apparently north east of here, quite close by, but the path is circuitous and ‘broken’, whatever that means. Another of the ghosts claims that map or not, we will get lost.”

  “Compasses only work in a few of the rooms in the dungeon. Can you get them to point the direction?”

  Attar repeated my question. He then (presumably) mirrored the spirit and pointed to the corner of the room holding the well.

  ?North Star?

  Sure enough, our path was to the north-east. It wasn’t too hard to follow, as there was only one path to take beyond the ogre’s lair.

  Attar and I set out past the bodies of the ogre and his wife/sister/mother. No side passages save the stairs presented themselves, no other doors or egress. It was two, maybe three hundred feet of corridor before we reached the end: a single door.

  Soldiers’ Swords

  “Take it down.”

  Attar and I hid around the corner while my swords got to work. The crash of splintered wood signalled a job well and quickly done, which was shortly followed by a woman’s scream as two tiny men emerged from the ground beneath our feet and sliced Attar’s right arm off at the elbow.

  A third man struck at my leg, but the sword deflected off my skin.

  Attar stumbled back against the wall. Had I been the man I’d been when I first entered the dungeon I might have still been reeling by the time the gnomes performed their second attack. But I was that man no longer (scream as illustration).

  ?Push X?

  One of the gnomes assailing Attar splintered, crumbled, then spread across the floor in a red and white mess of blood and bone fragments.

  A second sword stroke bounced off my arm. I hardly felt it, too busy focused on the gnome I couldn’t stop stabbing forward at Attar once more.

  Watching his companion be reduced to paste as he tried to strike must have thrown the gnome off his game, for he missed his strike, not even passing within a foot of Attar’s head.

  He had his chance.

  The gnomes were already turning to run when my fingers finally found my second spell.

  Push VI

  The gnome shrieked as he flew across the hallway and cracked into the far wall. He hung there, smashed against like a swatted bug.

  The gnome who had been after me dived into the stone at my feet as if it were water. I fumbled for a third spell but was too slow to catch him.

  Immediately, I turned my attention to Attar instead.

  Regenerate II

  Two years in an hour was 10 days a minute, four hours a second, still too slow for such an injury. I grabbed his forearm and tried to fit the limb in place on the stump. It had worked for me, though admittedly with a far less complicated wound.

  Would that Rian or Conan were here instead. I had some medical skill, but that was for tending wounds, not reattaching limbs.

  Attar’s arm had already healed too much, or the ends had already withered. Whatever had happened with my finger didn’t take here.

  I drew my dagger and clamped down on the part of me that wanted to let out a second scream. It was worth the attempt.

  I was easily able to hold Attar in place as he thrashed against the pain of the blade. The “live” edges of his arm began bleeding with strength once more. I picked up his arm and tried again. This time it took, though weakly. I held as still as I could to give it time to work. His fingers began to twitch. Colour returned shortly after. I kept Attar pinned firmly in place while I waited for the spell to work. Even now the connection felt looser than I’d like. If I’d had my ring I’d cast another spell, but both my hands were occupied.

  I could cast Lesser Heal VI without the ring, but didn’t bother. The spell was too weak to make a significant difference, and it’s property of being sensed from anywhere too valuable to risk on a frivolous cast.

  “How are you feeling Attar? Still in pain?”

  “Hurts,” Attar gasped, “Don’t let go.”

  “I won’t.” I was waiting the full hour. The wound was too deep. At least blood loss wasn’t a problem. It took a minute, maybe less, to fully restore Attar. It was somewhat reminiscent of the ogre. Perhaps he’d had a similar skill to my own.

  The hour passed without dark magic making itself known, nor creatures attracted to the smell of blood and sounds of combat. They knew better in these twisted halls.

  “Hold still,” I cautioned Attar as I slowly lowered his arm. He was sporting a scar nearly half an inch in width the full circumference of his elbow.

  I reached delicately for my spellbook with my other hand and found the spells:

  ?Regenerate?

  Greater Heal IV

  Greater Heal III

  That would hold him. My wandering fingers also found absence where both my push spells had been. Even the protected one had left no sign it had once existed. I let the torn page fall to the ground. It had been a pain to keep track of anyway, but the loss hurt. Those spells had been difficult to create and had saved me numerous times.

  I checked Attar. The strain on his face had eased and he was experimentally moving his fingers. He looked up at me with a silly grin of relief on his face, “I think you saved it. I thought I was dead.”

  It was worth it a thousand times over.