The hag shrieked its deathcry, and I withdrew my dagger.

  I spun on the spot, opening a portal ahead of the one that was fleeing, the portal’s partner blooming into life at Corminar’s side. I shifted my attention away as the elf loosed arrow after arrow through the portal into the enemy, trusting him to finish the job.

  One of the six remaining hags charged at a man standing in front of his two young children. He knew they could not outrun the monsters, and so he put himself between them and danger, buying them a few more seconds.

  ‘Val!’ I shouted, pointing to the endangered residents.

  She didn’t even look where I was pointing, and just started running. I opened a portal in front of her, dropping her onto the roof above the man and children, and she released her life-drain magicks onto the enemies. Over the past few minutes, I’d noticed this new spell was very effective against the hags—something to do with them being monsters of Witchcraft, I suspected.

  I left Val to it, closing both pairs of portals before falling backwards through a new one. This one opened me in the air above where Lore and Arzak faced down three more of the enemies. I tumbled backwards, feet over head, before landing at the rear of one of the hags. I stabbed as I fell, burying my dagger deeply, before activating Val’s life-drain spell that was etched into the side of my blade. Green magicks shot forth, enveloping the creature, and it, too, shrieked as it died.

  ‘Mm. Nice,’ Arzak said as she swiped her swords at the nearest hag, only for it to blip out of existence the moment before the blades touched it. But Arzak moved with the momentum of her attack, spinning around on the spot to slice at the air behind her—just where the hag rematerialised.

  ‘Also nice,’ Lore commented. He tried the same, but was out of luck; the creature instead reformed at my side.

  I knew that any attempt to stab the hag—at least, one that it saw coming—would cause it to phase out of reality again. But I had my blade held out already, so it was a simple case of activating Closed Reach, warping reality to bring the hag onto my blade, rather than the other way around. I activated my Etched Blades ability once more, draining the monster of its lifeforce. The glow on my blade grew fainter; I would need Val to recharge it once the fight was done.

  Not that it took much longer. Now that the hags were outnumbered, we could easily dispatch them. And the last two that tried to flee? I opened portals for Corminar and Val to finish those hags off.

  4x Enticed Hags defeated!

  Worldbending — +7,300xp

  Worldbending increased to level 79!

  Base Points gained — +2 INT, +2 Free Points (INT/WIS/CHA)

  Knifework — +5,200xp

  Knifework increased to level 61!

  Base Points Gained — +1 DEX, +1 STR, +2 Free Points (VIT/DEX/STR)

  Level up!

  You increased to level 25!

  ‘We good?’ I called out after registering my notifications, not just to my team but to the residents of the small town too.

  Some way away, someone called out in pain. I opened a portal next to Val, rushing her to the injured woman’s side.

  ‘Anyone else?’

  * * *

  Arzak had an informant in town. Well, she had two informants in town, technically, but only one of them is relevant to the story. While the orc and Lore spoke to the stablemaster who wore the symbol of a circle sliced in half upon their chest, the rest of us reconvened.

  ‘We’ve seen it before,’ Val said.

  ‘Seen what before?’

  Val gestured to the town, and to the two bodies being shifted onto a cart. ‘Monsters. Pushed out of their normal habitats. A dozen hags… that’s beyond strange. That’s unnatural.’

  ‘The witchfinder village,’ I said.

  ‘That too, but not the one I was thinking of,’ Val replied. ‘The Iron Sea. Back before we sailed to face down Niamh.’

  Corminar shifted from foot to foot as that particular Player was mentioned; she was a reminder that his home was still occupied by the forces of the Goldmarch.

  ‘We saw cephalopor pushed from the sea. Merfolk too. And it was power pushing them out, wasn’t it?’

  ‘What are you saying, Val?’

  ‘I’m saying there is immense power at play once again. And I think we all know who’s going to be behind it.’

  The Council. I didn’t need to say this bit aloud. ‘Maybe there isn’t time for rest, after all.’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying.’

  I nodded, then left Val and Corminar to appear at Lore and Arzak’s side. ‘What’s the latest?’ I asked.

  ‘Trouble in Tradum, a couple of days to the east,’ Lore said. ‘A Player there, it sounds like. But…’

  ‘But if we go after them, we might have to contend with my mother again.’

  Lore nodded, and both Arzak and the informant looked warily my way.

  ‘Well, I think I’ve got a plan for that,’ I said. ‘We’ll make use of her own weakness.’

  Arzak grunted her understanding, but it took Lore a little while to catch up.

  ‘There’s just one more thing,’ I said, this time to the stablemaster. ‘We’re going to need a pretty big favour.’

  * * *

  I held on for dear life.

  The sound of beating hooves echoed around my skull. The constant impact of hoof against road had me gritting my teeth to stop me from biting from tongue. It was fair to say that I wasn’t a natural horseman.

  Val, on the other hand, was a different story. She said she’d only ridden twice before, but I couldn’t help but think she was lying. The horse seemed to respond to even her lightest touch, and she navigated us around obstacles with ease.

  An overhanging branch threatened to knock us from the horse’s back, and I ducked just in time, hanging on to Val’s waist ever tighter. Val could very easily have ridden us around this particular obstacle, but then she wouldn’t have been able to screw with me.

  ‘Having fun back there?’ Val shouted, and I could hear the glee in her tone of voice.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Oh well!’ she retorted, and then a moment later she had our horse galloping even harder.

  I grit my teeth even tighter, then barked through them, ‘Do we have to go this fast?’

  ‘Do you want to catch up with Elinor or not?’ The question was a good one. Initially, my answer would have been a quick “yes”. Now that I was living in the reality of riding a borrowed horse, I wasn’t so sure. This wasn’t for me. This really wasn’t for me.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  The plan was a simple one. Elfric had told us my mother’s weakness—even she couldn’t be in two places at once. So if we, as a team, wanted to hunt down a Player, then we’d need to ensure that my mother was elsewhere.

  While Arzak, Lore and Corminar rode east to Tradum—Corminar had to share a horse with Lore, and he had not been happy about the whole affair—Val and I were making noise. We stopped in every town we came across, asking as loudly as possible if anyone had seen someone matching Elinor’s description. The reason for this was twofold. First of all, we really did want to know where she was. Secondly, though Arzak’s network of informants was great, we knew the Council’s network was greater. If anyone heard us asking after the location of a Player, it would get back to them sooner or later. And who would they send to deal with us? My mother, of course.

  But that was only the first stage of the plan.

  ‘Branch!’ Val shouted, and I ducked immediately, not realising that there was no branch. The witch cackled, which did nothing for her class’s stereotype.

  ‘Very good.’

  ‘I thought so.’

  I caught sight of the sun, hanging overhead to the left of us. It seemed to have moved fast; no wonder Val was pushing the horse so hard. If we were going to have any chance of catching up with Elinor, we needed to be much further north before the sun set. ‘Reckon you can get the horse through a portal?’ I asked.

  ‘Err…’

  ‘They’re pretty big?’

  ‘For a person, sure. But—’

  ‘Arzak and Lore fit through just fine!’

  Val grumbled something that I didn’t quite hear.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘I said… we can give it a go.’

  Something told me that this wasn’t what she’d grumbled, but I opened a portal way ahead of us anyway. This one wouldn’t take us too much further along the road, but I wanted Val to have plenty of warning for our first attempt.

  I expected the horse to resist the instruction to leap through the portal. Going through one for the first time was a… strange experience. It felt unnatural, or dangerous somehow. And yet, the horse happily tucked in its front legs, pushing off the ground with its rear legs, and soared through the portal. Val and I had to duck to avoid us hitting the top of the portal—and being knocked from the saddle—but it worked. We made it.

  We travelled this way for another hour or two more, the portals combined with the horse’s speed allowing us to cover ground at a rate surely unheard of anywhere on Alterra. It pleased me to think that we were maybe the fastest travellers alive outside of direct teleportation spells—and those were only used by the super rich.

  The sun was not quite setting, but was certainly low in the sky, when my mother shimmered into sight on the road ahead.

  Val wrenched on our borrowed horse’s reins, bringing it—and us—to an abrupt stop. I had to hold on tight to Val’s waist as the animal reared.

  The Council had heard our noise. They knew we rode north to take down Elinor. And my mother had once more been sent to stop us. This time, the woman made no effort to speak, only staring at me with those horrifying eyes that so closely mirrored my own. She drew her blade. Would she make no offer this time? Would she attack us for real, rather than simply miming her strikes? I could not honestly say I knew, and I wasn’t about to find out the answer.

  ‘I want to accept your offer,’ I said.

  My mother paused, mid-way through the slow drawing of her dagger. She didn’t open her mouth, yet the question was plain. Why? Why would I change my mind so soon? What could possibly be a convincing answer to that question.

  Of course, Val and I had practised it. ‘On one condition.’

  A pause. The woman who was my mother in blood only kept her eyes on us. The evening light filtering through the leaves on the branches that hung over the traveller’s road, bespeckling the ground. One of the last fallen leaves of winter crunched as the horse shifted on the spot, apparently as uncomfortable with this situation as I was.

  ‘Tell me,’ Cleo finally said.

  ‘Val’s coming with me,’ I replied. ‘Both of us.’

  ‘And your other friends?’

  I shook my head. ‘I thought that would be pushing my luck. There’s a reason we didn’t bring them.’

  My mother stared back at me for a moment, considering her reply. This was a woman who did not speak without giving it due thought. I must have got the opposite trait from my father. ‘I think that can be arranged. In return, you will stop hunting members of the Council.’

  I nodded. ‘Agreed.’

  Cleo stared at me longer still. Could she really see inside my soul? Did she really have that ability? It certainly felt like it. If she could, she would know that this was a ruse—a ruse intended only to buy us some time, not one that would fool the Council forever. As she continued to stare, I held that dark gaze.

  Finally, my mother put a hand in a pocket, then threw me a gem. I opened a portal to snatch it from the air and take it in my own hand. ‘Bleed on it,’ the woman said.

  ‘Sorry?’ Val repeated.

  But if I wanted to be believed, I was going to have to be seen to follow instructions. I took my dagger and sliced the back of my left arm, the resulting red trickle flowing down the dirty skin and light hair, and landing on the gem I’d just been given. It glowed blue as the blood touched it.

  ‘When the ritual begins, this gem will summon you,’ my mother said. ‘Be sure you answer its call.’

  I nodded, and watched as my mother turned away before disappearing from sight. ‘Come on,’ I told Val. ‘Let’s go.’

  Without sharing a word—neither of us convinced my mother had gone just yet—Val turned the horse around, and we galloped away from our meeting point for at least half an hour, using portals to increase our pace all the while. Only then, when we were as sure as we could be that my often-invisible mother wasn’t listening in, did I tell Val to stop at the side of the road.

  I drew the gem from my pocket.

  ‘You think she believed you?’ Val asked.

  In answer, I threw the glowing gem into the trickling water of a nearby stream. From the banks, I could see that this was a fully fledged river in the summer months, when the hot sun melted the snow in the mountains so far from here. If nobody found the gem before then, it would sink to the bottom of the Sea of Terrors, never to be seen again.

  ‘Only the gods know what that gem is really for,’ I explained to Val, who nodding knowingly. ‘Come on. Let’s head to Tradum. See what the others have learned.’