Koa’s eyes snapped open.

  “Something’s wrong.”

  Tanguy jolted in his stool. The boy looked over to Koa, relief sagging his shoulders. “Gods, for a moment there, I thought you weren’t going to wake up. Are . . . are you okay?”

  Koa sat up in what looked to be a hospital bed, snugged tightly into the corner of a medical tent. As to where he was, nothing in the room betrayed any obvious clues. “No, I don’t think I am. Why do you ask?”

  “The look on your face when you woke up. It was like there was a bad taste in your mouth. Though, considering the circumstances, I think we can say the same for all of us.”

  Koa rubbed his eyes, a banging headache attacking his senses. His limbs felt heavy as he tried to move out of the bed sheets. Tanguy quickly came over to assist him. “Easy now. Don’t move so suddenly – not until we know what state you’re in. For the gods’ sakes, you’ve been out for nearly three days.”

  “Three days?” Koa blurted. The details of that harrowing night returned in a flash. Not heeding Tanguy’s warning, he suddenly swept out of bed. “What happened? Is the rebellion-”

  The blood rushed to Koa’s head, and he almost slipped on his feet.

  “Easy tiger.” Tanguy helped him back to his bedside, handing him a waterskin filled to the brim.

  Koa took a few long draws from the satchel, trying to quell the growing bud of panic that was firmly implanted in his mind. With each new detail of the Paladins’ assault he recalled, a growing portrait of devastation was being painted. The seed of panic was now a garden; vines ensnaring every other unrelated thought, until Koa could think of nought but the misfortune that had befell them.

  “Where are the others, are they alive? Where are Ash and Edmar? Did we lose?”

  With each additional question, Tanguy’s frown only became deeper. “One thing at a time.” He started with a sigh. “Let’s get the worst news out of the way. We lost. We lost terribly.”

  A pause. “I had thought as much.”

  “In the havoc of that dark night, our forces were scattered. Most fled to safety, and it’ll be a long while before we track them all down. Then again, after this, I’m not sure how many will want to return to our ranks.”

  “Octavia, is she okay?”

  “She left with Veida, I believe. They were escorting some refugees out of their settlement. I haven’t seen her, but your wife is a strong woman. I’m sure she made it out.”

  Koa dreaded to think otherwise.

  “Is . . . “ He wasn’t sure how to word this, or if it was an appropriate thing to even ask. Koa was self-aware. He knew how others thought of him, how their friendliness became surface level whenever he insisted that Ash could still be saved. To them, it was pitiful that he dared suggest anything of the sort; that even for a minute, he entertained the notion that there were ways to end the boy’s torment, other than death.

  “Was Ash killed?”

  “No. But by the gods, I wish-”

  At one look at Koa’s leer, Tanguy cut himself off. “Sorry. That was callous of me. He departed after a terrible blow had been dealt to Gold’s Bane. He was apparently covered in blood and screaming, running for the hills. Not even flying away. Just sprinting and shrieking at the top of his lungs.”

  “Screaming? As in a battle cry?”

  “As in the way a child shouts, when they think they’ve seen a monster under their bed. Primal fear. Horror.”

  An unspoken question loomed over both of their heads.

  What in all of Descent could frighten someone like Ash?

  In his new form, Ash was the kind of person you ran away screaming from.

  A clamorous bang overhead, like the beating of two clambels, drew Koa’s attention upwards. “What was that?”

  Tanguy lifted up the flap of their tent. “Come outside. I think it’ll be easier for you to understand if you see it with your own eyes.”

  Raising an eyebrow, Koa followed at Tanguy’s heels, the overt brightness of day like a knife through the cornea.

  Koa could only gape foolishly at the awesome spectacle.

  Two titans clashed for dominance in the sky. Rivulets of Inklings, and Tyrants – the strange, crystal currency of Eclipse and the Ravaged Lands – formed shimmering rivers that coursed beneath the clouds. They all led back to the same central figure, perched on the chest of one mighty, golden construct. Koa had to squint to see him, but Edmar’s statuesque body was like a gem sighted on the horizon.

  “He’s still here?”

  Opposing the golden man was First Rite’s figurative golden boy. Remus floated in the centre of his plasma giant, his body a slither of heat barely distinct within the sun-hot light. Tiny orbs of obsidian ejected out of his flaming behemoth, detonating upon contact with Edmar’s swarming coinage, and exploding holes into the streaks of wealth.

  The two monoliths of power sent gales sweeping across an empty plain that ensnared them. Now that Koa bothered to look around, he recognised how familiar their surroundings were, and how utterly alien at the same time. His mind automatically filled in the blanks to where his subconscious expected to see buildings standing, clansmen sparring, and other festivities transpiring. It all washed away, as easily as a layer of paint yet to dry.

  Gold’s Bane had been razed to the ground. In fact, everywhere for miles all around had been reduced to a wilting wasteland.

  “If I heard you correctly Tanguy,” Koa said slowly. “Then I’ve been asleep for three days.”

  “Two nights and two days exactly. Our third night will be upon us soon.”

  “So you mean to tell me that Remus has been in a stalemate against Edmar all that time? Does the boy not ever sleep?”

  Tanguy looked as hard-pressed as he was to accept the reality. “He’s been tunnel-visioned on keeping Edmar preoccupied, long enough for the Rebellion to escape. It’s probably not what Remus would have wanted, but I decided to stay. Both to look after you, and make sure he’s okay. I don’t think he can go on much longer than this.”

  “That giant of his? He’s kept that technique sustained all this time?”

  “Not entirely. Eventually they’ll both wear each other out, and resort to simpler modes of combat. It doesn't get any dirtier than a simple bare-knuckled fight. But soon, they’ll start right up again, when they can muster the energy. That cycle has repeated half a dozen times already, and while I’ve been tempted to intervene, that would leave you exposed. I suspect there’s a few colonies of Paladins hiding out here, waiting for their general to finish combat. They’d just love the opportunity to please Ash by killing his unconscious brother.”

  That answer unsettled Koa, but Tanguy wasn’t finished.

  “Though I guess the real reason I haven’t jumped in, apart from being a coward, is that this fight is way out of my league. Guys like them,” Tanguy shook his head. “I used to always think of myself as this big macho guy, but we’re not cut from the same thread. People like Remus and Edmar, they just don’t quit.”

  Despite how much his pride didn’t want to admit it, that same sentiment was echoed in Koa. Simply observing the atrocity of Remus fighting at his full power was a practice in humility.

  “Do we know the locations of anyone?” He asked.

  “Violet is recovering after splitting herself into a thousand parts.” Tanguy muttered those words another time under his breath, hunching down and not moving his eyes off the fight. “Now that I think about it, Projections really are weird. As for Aziel and Veida, they’re reporting to our other outposts. Somebody has to inform them of the devastation that occurred here. I just hope it doesn’t crush their spirits too much.”

  Koa wanted to ask more, but there wasn’t much else to find out. At the core of it all, the Talents had suffered a tremendous defeat. That’s all there was to it. A hard pill to swallow, but more enquiries wouldn’t make it any easier.

  “Alright, I’m all better. Now we have no more excuses to stand by and watch as Remus puts his neck out for us.”

  I can’t imagine what he’s feeling right now. Koa tangentially reached out for the faintest glimmers of power his Mark emitted. After he was fairly sure he could fight without erupting in pain, he activated his Mark completely. I know he feels responsible. That’s why he keeps fighting. He thinks that – in some small way – this’ll make up for it.

  “Perhaps I have been delaying the inevitable.” Koa sensed the echo of his own activation in Tanguy, flames searing across his companion’s arms. “Let’s do this, nice and-”

  Koa felt as if the light of a thousand suns was being projected into his many eyes, all at once. He winced, stumbled back, and by the time he could see again, couldn’t believe the sight that graced him.

  Hundreds of thousands, likely millions of Inklings, Tyrants, and some other strange currencies Koa wasn’t completely familiar with, all vanished in a literal flash. Edmar, alongside his three-headed giant of gold, gone with it.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  An emptiness now characterised Gold’s Bane. Empty sky, empty land.

  And a man falling to the earth.

  The pair of them raced over in a burst of power. The second Remus came within arm’s reach, they gasped him.

  For a second, none of them could do anything but breathe.

  Remus could have been a hundred years Koa’s senior, and Koa would have easily believed it. Thin skin was pulled taunt across his face. His eyes were rheumy with a kind of desperately sad affliction. Like an old man looking back on his glory days, hoping to salvage some comfort as the years went on. Yet there was no sanctum to be found in the past or present, and nothing was reflected in Remus’ eyes but the path of destruction he had led.

  “Toying.” He whispered.

  Koa and Tanguy shared a glance.

  “Remus, let’s get you to bed, okay? It’s my turn to look after you now.” Koa did his best to put on one of those motherly expressions Octavia would adorn, whenever at the aid of the sick or needy. “We can have you and Violet recovering in the same infirmary. The Vitality Sect will do everything in their power to put you back in tip-top fighting shape.”

  Remus didn’t protest as they dragged him into a sitting position, but he didn’t exactly comply either. He merely laid there, like a ragdoll. “He was toying with me. That whole time . . .”

  The man didn’t seem to blink. Even as Tanguy and Koa silently made a makeshift gurney to carry him on, he merely looked up to the cloudless sky. His eyes were glossy, and no matter how hard Koa tried, he couldn’t imagine what the man was thinking.

  “Tanguy.” Koa whispered, as they began the long road towards the next outcrop of civilization. A nearby hamlet between First Rite and their current locale had been transformed into a medical camp. “I think . . . I think Remus is pretty messed up.”

  It was the understatement of the century.

  Tanguy merely nodded. The Fire clansman didn’t dare look away from Remus, as if checking to make sure the fragile flickers of life remaining in his body didn’t puff out.

  “Stop.” Remus said abruptly.

  When they didn’t oblige, he said it louder. “Stop!”

  Koa shared another weary glance with Tanguy. Maybe it was because Koa had so many, but he was finding it surprisingly easy to communicate with his eyes alone.

  Before they could put him down, Remus rolled off the gurney. He crashed to the ground unceremoniously, limping to a shaky stand.

  He pointed a wobbly finger at Tanguy. “You.” He slurred, as if drunk. “Fire-man.”

  Tanguy pointed at himself and nodded. Koa might have laughed at the pantomime, if he wasn’t so concerned that one of his best friends was intellectually impaired. Koa had slept for three days after exerting himself non-stop for one. Remus, being the overachiever he was by nature, had been fighting with Edmar that entire time, and the gods’ knew that Remus gave everything he had in a fight. Once the man finally did catch some shut-eye, he might not wake up until the next Rebirth. Hyperbolically speaking or not, they mustn’t allow Remus to brush aside the recovery time he needed.

  “Can’t rest yet. Not until we . . . make graves.”

  Koa paused. In tandem, he and Tanguy roved their eyes over the barren wasteland of dust and sand. How many bodies would they find here?

  “Remus.” Tanguy said slowly. “It’s a nice thought, but remember what’s at stake here. We don’t know when the Paladins could return, to swoop in and finish off the leader of the Talents. You. If that happened, the Rebellion really would be over.”

  Remus shook his head. “Don’t try to salvage what’s already broken.” He was suddenly absorbed in a hacking cough. “These men and women fought because they believed I knew what I was doing. They-” he bent at the waist, wrapping his arms around himself. After shivering for a second, Remus raised his head. “At least deserve a proper farewell.”

  Koa spoke vehemently. “And they’ll get one. We can regather our forces, and once the dust has settled, send a grave unit to collect the bodies. It’s safer that way. You need to be more selfish! This all falls apart if you die here.”

  “Selfish?” Remus suddenly jolted to alertness. “All I’ve been my entire life is . . . is selfish. Funeral. Today. That’s an-” his eyes regained that dreamy quality. “Order.”

  Remus passed out, his head banging across the edge of the gurney.

  Tanguy slapped himself in the face. With a sigh, he regarded the unconscious man, with a wistful glimmer in his eye. “What do you think?”

  “It’s stupidly dangerous to hang around here any longer. But if that’s what the boss wants.” Koa shrugged. “Who am I to argue?”

  Night was finally settling. The pallid light of a full moon leaked from the sky, and it was with a methodical silence that Koa and Tanguy set about their dark business. Their goal was to finish searching before the breaking of dawn. Of course, neither light nor dark would provide any surefire safety, and Unbounded tended to be much more active in the night-time hours. Now that Koa thought about it, this place should have been crawling with fiends.

  “Their fight.” He blurted.

  Tanguy shot him a glance. “What?”

  “Their fight – Remus against Edmar. It scared off the Unbounded around for miles. Now that it’s over, they’ll be returning soon. Like maggots. When they find hundreds of abandoned corpses . . .”

  Tanguy shivered. “No wonder he was so adamant. There can’t be a more undignified way to treat the dead, than to let them be eaten.”

  Koa looked down at the gurney. They always moved it within eyesight as they travelled from section to section of the battlefield. Already, they had a few piles of dead bodies. There was no time for individual graves. The best they’d be able to provide was one giant funeral pyre. The stink of rotten flesh would haunt the place for decades after they were done, but then again, this stretch of wasteland wouldn’t recover for at least a century anyway.

  Growing up in the Wilderness Clan, Koa had always been surrounded by nature in all its forms. But these badlands they had scorched into the earth – it was like one ugly scar that Chantal herself would retch at. Koa wondered if his goddess would ever forgive him for playing his part in the catastrophe. His sect was supposed to protect nature, not tarnish it.

  The first few carcasses were enough to make Koa gag. After that, he must have adjusted to the sight and smell, for neither he nor Tanguy dared to complain as they piled up the dead.

  He was reminded of Elmore, and Donovan. What he wouldn’t give to speak to them one last time.

  I don’t know what to do, Elmore. Nothing’s going right. Ash – how do I help Ash?

  Part of Koa listened out to the howling of the wind between the distant canyons, hoping to recognise his cousin’s deep monotone amongst the breeze. He heard nothing but sand slipping past.

  “There’s a settlement not far from here: the one I mentioned earlier, with all the refugees.” Tanguy scattered away Koa’s reverie. “Would you mind heading over there?”

  “Of course. Keep an eye on him for me.”

  With that, Koa jogged over the short distance. Even when he was a long past the outskirts of Gold’s Bane, he couldn’t stop smelling the rot of meat. No matter how many times he blinked, those mountains of limp bodies remained in focus. He called away his many eyes, hoping that would help, but the image was locked firmly in his mind.

  You would think that after seeing a corpse so many times, you would become jaded to it. Maybe in the moment, but then the memories would arrive. The images would stay inside your head, long into the night. Like an impression carved into the bone of your skull.

  It didn’t get any easier.

  Koa halted as the charred infrastructure of what had once been a row of buildings emerged into view. Even those planks of supportive wood were on the verge of collapse, the walls hallowed out as piles of detritus stuffed the streets. Koa felt his heartbeat increasing as he edged closer and closer to the settlement.

  Situated here had been the weakest people in proximity to Gold's Bane. People who were truly helpless in the world of brutal violence that was Descent, destined to be cut down like lambs to the slaughter if nobody intervened. Koa could stomach seeing the bodies of warriors, but wasn’t sure how he’d hold up coming across innocent fathers, mothers, and children. It was easy to forget about those roles when somebody looked the part of a fighter. Suited in armour, Mark glaring in potent power. Without any of that, all that was left of a person was who they were to other people. It was the loss of that which hurt the most.

  He searched well for a few minutes, but much to his relief, most of the refugees appeared to have escaped.

  Octavia and Veida led these people to safety. We’re forever in their debt.

  Koa continued onwards. It was about time he headed back to Tanguy. They would need to start lighting up the bodies soon. He wasn’t exactly excited at such a grim prospect, but their fighters deserved a noble departure from this world. Maybe their spirits would meet a better fate. He prayed that they rested easy.

  In a not so distant alternate reality, Koa would have walked away. If not for the myriad of eyeballs that floated behind him – if the Pet-Keeper had never robbed him of not just his closest friends, but his half his sight – then it would have been so easy to miss. Part of him wished he hadn’t seen it.

  An arm. Sticking out from a boulder.

  Every cell in his body seemed to go still. Every action slowing to a snail’s pace, he craned his neck to the side.

  A furred arm laid limp in a pool of Ichor. His mind stopped thinking, but step by step, his legs carried him closer to the site of the incident. Now that he knew what to look out for, that gloomy scent of power was everywhere. Ash had been here.

  Koa must have stood there for a minute. Two minutes. Five minutes.

  The body was still there.

  He moved closer to the pile of rubble. It was nothing special, simply another razed building. The entire settlement appeared to have been struck by a landslide. But natural disasters didn’t hold a vendetta against Koa: his brother did.

  Stone by stone, he began removing the rock. He didn’t allow himself to think, for thinking would make everything all the more real. Ignorance was bliss, but with how puffy his eyes were starting to go, Koa wasn’t sure he could stay ignorant for long.

  A black body was exposed beneath the waste, crooked tendrils either sliced off or crushed. The blood was cold to the touch. She had been laying here for a while. All alone. Something told Koa that nobody had been there to comfort her through the final moments.

  There was no point denying it. From the moment Koa had first seen that arm protruding out, he’d know the truth. That it was his wife whose Ichor muddied the earth.

  “Octavia.” He spoke the word like it was the most precious sound in all the human vocal range. Barely above a whisper.

  Koa wrapped his arms around what was left of her body, not caring that he was soaking his shirt through. On one of her more humanoid arms, the ones with fingers – distinct from her stubby, spindly tendrils – Koa’s eyes ran towards a wedding band.

  The ring was cracked. The jewel that Koa had placed inside was nowhere to be seen.

  In the culture of the Arachnid Clan, the husband didn’t wear a wedding ring – only the wife. The memories came flowing back, and Koa recalled how he had stressed for days, deciding how he was going to make it. His Delicate Touch Mould was especially adept at crafting fine details, but something that demanded such precedence made him sweat bullets. He had eventually settled on a simple design, cursing his overthinking.

  It was crafted out of the wood of an elmore tree, the material crystalised inside of that same tree’s sap. If his cousin was still here, he would have asked him to be the best man at the wedding. This was a crude alternative, but anything that made him feel closer to Elmore was comforting.

  The crystal had been a purple jewel. He wasn’t quite sure what exact kind it was, only that he’d bargained for it on the markets of Hybrid, picking the prettiest one he could find.

  Slowly, he slipped the ring off Octavia’s finger, placing it on his own. It was almost cruel how well it fit.

  Koa opened his mouth to speak, closed it again, and repeated the cycle a dozen more times. The boulder lodged into his throat wouldn’t budge.

  Without a word, not bothering to wash the tears off his cheeks, Koa picked up his wife’s body. Carrying her, he trudged back towards the remains of Gold’s Bane.

  Tanguy had taken it upon himself to start the fires early. Koa locked his eyes on them, as the bodies of a thousand brave warriors returned to Infinity.

  There was one more to join them.