Chapter 9

  Searching for Tracks

  Ashen remains scarred the landscape where nature and society had long been unified. Burned to black, the space left behind was devoid of plants, insects, and all life. The once smoldering remnants of structures had been damp for days. A lingering scent of metal and rot, the smell of death, permeated the land.

  Mien's fist clenched as he looked over the dead remains of Liniva. "What. Happened."

  Surrounded by a host of highway patrol and other soldiers that had accompanied him on his search, no one could muster the will to speak. The devastation of the place was absolute, almost devoid of even sound. Mien began to walk through the skeleton of the town, to see what there was to see.

  An entire town had been destroyed without word getting out. Carnage on a scale that must not be ignored. Mien scoured the ruins for data, any information that wasn’t immolated. Anything to keep his mind working, to soothe the rage he felt on behalf of the lives lost.

  At the edge of the town, what remained of it, were solemn figments of blue and green light. Spirits of the forest, lingering in grief. Mien saw them watching, but had no experience working with spirits. He ignored them, and searched for whatever he could find.

  Beneath the layer of ash permeating the ruins, Mien noticed tracks that others might have missed. Heavy imprints in the ground, as well as sweeping lines along the road. Subtle, but they could be an indication of what happened. Mien found others of a similar vein, and started to follow the direction they indicated.

  “Sir, shouldn’t we be focused on the search for Prince Mistan?” One of the soldiers that had accompanied Mien from the capitol, a man with the same Feral lineage as Mien himself. He had dirty grey hair compared to Mien’s royal silver, and stood more at attention when Mien turned his way.

  After a silent moment, Mien scowled. “Look for him then. Go, begone. Leave my sight.”

  “But sir-”

  “Silence!” Mien turned back to what he was doing and ignored whatever else the soldier was about to prattle on about. There were tracks, which all led the same direction, and heavy enough footprints to suggest someone wearing full plate armor had been here. Mien continued to follow them, and the two groups of onlookers lingered behind several paces.

  The path Mien followed led them to what remained of one of the plazas, where everything had been swept clean. Whatever happened in this area, someone was trying to keep it covered up. “Augh, what happened here?” Mien ground his teeth as he examined the area.

  Every inch of what remained of Liniva had been explored by his soldiers already, and it all looked to be the same. The town had been immolated until nothing was left, with no signs of survivors. There weren’t even any Zori camping out in the town, it was beyond unusual.

  The soldiers assigned to help Mien seek out his missing brother were getting restless. While Mien tried to focus he heard them muttering amongst themselves, many wondering why they had gone so far from the capitol in the first place. They didn’t understand just how much time had passed already, and with the amount of people scouring the Oaken Forest it wasn’t like Mien would be of any help there. If someone had taken Mistan, they could already be halfway to Cryston by now.

  “Enough of this.” Mien turned to the groups of soldiers, addressing the ones who had come with him in particular. “Do any of you understand the magnitude of what we have found here?” Several of the soldiers looked around at the ruins and one another, but none spoke up. “Do you have any idea what could have caused this?”

  “Zori, sir?” One soldier guessed.

  Another grew more alert, “Do you think it was an Annoph?”

  Mien pressed his palm to his forehead in frustration. “Have you ever heard of a Zori horde leaving this little trace, then vanishing? And no, obviously it wasn’t an Annoph either, or there would be nothing remaining of the countryside.” He looked back to the scene of the burned remains of the plaza. “Someone covered their tracks here, and burned everything. There weren’t survivors, or perhaps just the survivors hid the tracks.”

  Humming as he looked around more, Mien noticed traces of magical interference. Spells were used here, there was a faint murkiness in the crevices of some flagstones. Too much activated mana would become a haze that could seep into things, hidden even from the broad cleaning efforts of the caster. “Everyone spread out and look for tracks, starting from the edge of this plaza.” Mien’s order brought the soldiers to attention, and the captains were quick to make sure they were carried out.

  As he continued to scour the plaza Mien stopped to look closer at those around him. They leapt into their work, but were quick to fall back on their true feelings. A sense of disappointment could be felt from his retinue. Mien knew what a soldier who thought they were above an order looked like, even when trying to hide it. So many of the soldiers from the capitol had the same sense of superiority he saw amongst the nobility, that feeling that they were above tasks they thought menial.

  On the flipside, the group of highway patrol that joined Mien’s company to escort them looked hollow. He had meant to make Liniva a base to operate out of in the search for his brother, but the arrival of the group to ruins had broken their spirit. Many of these patrolmen were natives of the area, residents of Liniva or neighbors. To have returned to such devastation left so many of them shocked, they were just going through the motions. Mien was beginning to believe he would have to find out the cause of all this on his own.

  “Sir! I found something I’d like your opinion on!” A soldier from his own crew with tousled black hair, glasses, and a large manos device pack was saluting as he called for attention.

  “At ease.” Mien approached to see what the man had found. Beneath the ash and rubble coating the plaza, one section was covered in a kind of shimmering glaze. An unusual substance that most people would never encounter, a rare sort of film. “This plasm, It shouldn’t be here.”

  “Do you know what it is, your majesty?”

  “Don’t call me that.” Mien gave the soldier a sharp look, then brushed away the ash further. The film did not move, but a sense of unease in the distance sounded as the Spirits on the edge of the plaza gave an audible shudder. Mien, and everyone else, looked over as the sound died down. “These are dead spirits, the willing dead, protecting whatever is beneath this.”

  “The willing dead?” The soldier looked between the plasm and the edge of the plaza with an inscrutable expression. “But why, sir?”

  “To know the whims of the Spirits is beyond me.” Mien drew two swords and slashed down, despite the protest of the magical beings who did not approach. The plasm was malleable, meant to withstand intrusion, but it could not fare against the piercing blade of a Myrrhmidon. Mien cut through the veil, then closed his eyes in regret.

  Several others had been drawn over to see what was happening, but the acrid stench repelled them. “Sir, is that-”

  “The people of Liniva.” Mien expelled energy to tamp down the hole and disperse the scent into the air. “Protected from the desecration of Zori.” Mien coursed energy along his blades as he walked away, burning whatever remained as he sighed. It wasn’t new information, just a piece of the puzzle.

  Soldiers throughout the plaza were halfway between stunned revelation and middling attempts to continue searching, save for one. Unlike the rest of the highway patrol, their captain was active with an almost furious focus. A woman carrying her armor and spear with practical purpose worked without reservation for the grime accrued. Where her colleagues looked hollow at the realization of the fate of their home, she seemed determined to root out the cause.

  Mien watched as the woman honed in on something without calling out her find, and stepped closer to have a look for himself.

  Tracks leading out of the plaza, out of the town. Hasty sets of footprints making their way away. “After all that work to clear up the tracks, why these?”

  “Do you think they are involved?” The patrolwoman asked, “Or just people that found this place and left as fast as they could?”

  “I’d like to think anyone who discovered this scene would report it at once, but there is no way to be sure.” Mien trailed the path and looked east towards the charcoal remains of the walls. “East is Nita.”

  “Prince Mien, Sir!” Snapping his attention towards the offending officer, Mien noticed that many of the soldiers had grouped up near the commander of his retinue. “The soldiers and I are wondering when we will be continuing our search for the Crown Prince.”

  “I am not your Prince, commander-”

  “No Sir!” The commander cut Mien off as he approached, “But you are in charge of this special investigation group, Sir. This group assembled to find the Crown Prince.” The man stood at full attention, but his eyes betrayed a disdain for the area around him. His armor was spotless, despite where they stood. “If you’ve finished fooling around-”

  Blades of force too fast to be seen cut through the air as Mien swung his swords. The ornate pauldrons the commander wore clattered to the ground seconds before the rest of his plate the moment the fasteners realized they had been cut. As the commander felt the air on his bare shoulders, untouched by the strike close enough to cut through his fatigues, he became stiller than a statue.

  “The desolation of an entire town, hundreds or more killed without any trace of the culprit, left unknown for days, and you think we’re just fooling around?” Mien approached and placed the flat of one sword onto the commander’s shoulder, the edge close enough to his neck to split hairs. “If you want to search for my brother you had best go dredge up the rivers in the Oaken Forest like the rest, if you can stomach your boots getting wet.” Mien looked around at the soldiers standing at attention, more alert and focused than any instant than they’d been since joining him. “Return to the Mystic Grove. You’re dismissed.” Mien lifted his blade and turned away, “And you’d best ensure your report doesn’t contradict mine.”

  Mien walked away from the soldiers, the plaza, from the ruins of Liniva. He’d dreaded returning to Myrrh after all this time, but there were enough bodies on the hunt for his brother to handle that case. Something else was going on, something dangerous. The culprits behind this disaster were of far too great a concern to be ignored, and Mien was not about to make a decision he regretted.

  Two sets of motion sounded behind him as people rushed to catch up, then fell into a march behind him. Mien glanced back to see the man with the large pack and the patrol captain following him, when no one else would. “Your names?”

  “My name is Kristine, sir, but I go by Kris.” The highway patrol captain said, offering a salute.

  “I’m Pierre.” The man eschewed rank and honorific, he was insightful. “Where are we headed?”

  “We found tracks leading out of the city towards the east,” Kris explained, “Three sets heading in the direction of the road to Nita.”

  “Four sets.” Mien amended, “One of them is rather light footed.” He picked up the pace and allowed himself a smile as he heard the others match his pace. “We operate as a team from here on out, under my command. Let’s get to the bottom of this.”

  Four heavy packs whumped onto the table as Hyato entered the inn room. Sebastian closed the door behind them, while Michael and Yan looked up from their lunches. “What’s this?” Michael asked, wiping some soup off the table where it had spilled.

  “Supplies for every eventuality.” Sebastian took a seat across from the others. “Just in case we need to make a hasty exit. How did your morning go?”

  Yan prodded some mountaineering gear on the nearest pack with a frown. “Nothing great. We checked for trackers and hunters everywhere, but they’re all out of town. And the military posts were no help either, since most of them are away facing the Zori Horde.”

  Sebastian shrugged, “Then I guess we should try to track down the Revenant ourselves like we planned. Assuming it stayed in town.”

  “I think it did. I checked in at the lumber yard we did some work at yesterday, and an entire crate of Nodules had been stolen. The foreman didn’t seem that concerned, but it’s a clue.”

  “Well it’s not like they are rare or expensive, but we know the Revenant is feeding on them. That still leaves the problem of tracking them.” Sebastian rubbed his chin as he thought over the issue. “Disposing of drained Nodules means either throwing them out or burning them. Burn enough and the smoke should be discolored, they're barely useful as kindling as is.”

  “I guess that leaves checking the trash. There are dumpsters in most of the alleys, nice wooden ones.”

  Sebastian grimaced and shook his head, “There’s no way I am going dumpster diving to look for shriveled bits of bark.” He glanced at both Hyato and Michael, who seemed about as carefree as Yan about the idea. “Ridiculous. I’ll stick to staring at chimney smoke.”

  “Suit yourself. But if it takes us longer to find the Revenant because of you, don’t come crying to me.” Yan focused on her lunch, while Sebastian shook his head some more. Before much longer their break from the morning’s busy work ended in favor of more.

  The streets of Nita were woven from long interconnected lines of living wood, but many places without buildings were reserved for parks. The grasses, trees, and ponds breaking up the view of buildings and streets made for a pleasant experience. They contained many seating areas for people to meditate, which were most often occupied as the party passed by. Michael enjoyed the different views from behind his shaded lenses as he followed Yan and Hyato through the city.

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  It was still amazing to see so many people going about their business, but there were many patrols of guards on the road that day. Sweeping for Zori and ne'er do wells in equal measure, there were many buildings and streets closed off by guards to deal with such issues. Whether it was monsters or crimes that had increased of late, the guards were being rather proactive about them.

  Yan led the boys to a series of alleyways, narrow paths of wood but also stone that rested on the backsides of buildings. “Alright, split up and get looking.” She opened a dumpster and reeled from the smell, then got right to scanning through it. There was nothing glamorous about what they were doing, but Michael gritted his teeth and started dumpster diving at the other end of the alley.

  Moving through the back streets, out of sight of passersby as they dug through trash, Michael had the sense of being in the wrong. His friends came up with the idea, and seemed to be going at it without issue, but he didn’t feel good about it. Perhaps there was something there, some memory of a forgotten past telling him what not to do. Or maybe it was because of the stench.

  After more than an hour of hopping from alley to alley, steering clear of guards as they skulked about, someone stepped out just as Yan flipped open a lid. An older lady eeped with a start and flinched as Yan stepped back. “Oh my, darling. You gave me a start.”

  “Sorry ma’am.”

  “What are you doing back here?” The woman gave a furtive look around, noticing Michael and Hyato further down the alley, “Are you kids in trouble? Need some money for food?”

  “No, thank you. We’re just, looking for something.” Yan couldn’t help but feel dishonest, but the woman straightened up and pursed her lips before sighing.

  The older lady tossed a bag of trash into the dumpster and clapped her hands clean, “Well you be careful now, dearie. The guards have been rather boisterous today. Even shut down one of the pubs right during the lunch hour.”

  “Really? Why did they do that?” Yan checked around to be sure, but there weren’t any guards or other people around.

  “It’s that young upstart captain Roland.” The lady waved a hand in front of herself, “Gets command with all the others off fighting and it goes right to his head. Throwing his weight around for clout, I tell you.” She shook her head, “Just mind your backs.”

  “Will do. Thank you.” The woman gave Yan a bright smile and nod, then slipped back inside the building from whence she came.

  Hyato and Michael closed in to find out what happened, so Yan filled them in. “Come on, Let’s hit the next alley. I feel like we can get a few more of these before we have to head back.” The boys nodded, but the news had done little to assuage Michael of his ill feeling.

  With the warning about the guards, Yan was more cautious when selecting alleyways. As she scanned the streets Michael sidled up next to her. “Are you sure we should be doing this?”

  “Unless you have a better idea on how to find the Revenant, we should be fine.” Yan settled on one distant alley tucked away in a block with tall streets. Michael followed, but seemed concerned. “Don’t worry, I doubt we will get caught, and even if we are seen we can escape across the rooftops. You’re agile enough.”

  It was confirmation that they were doing something wrong, which made Michael hesitate near the edge of the alley. He didn’t feel good about their plan, but Yan and Hyato were quick to get right to it. In those fleeting moments Michael wondered whether it was worth it to do something that felt off, until Hyato glanced over towards him. The man was stoic and emotionless, or perhaps somehow forlorn. It wasn’t much, but the idea that someone was waiting for Michael to join was enough to urge him on.

  Michael took over searching the bins where Hyato had been, while the swordsman went a bit further to check out a side alley hidden away deeper. A few minutes passed in silence like many others, rustling through trash and poking at every bit of discarded wood in search of drained Nodules. It was after a few minutes carried on that Yan looked up from her work and glanced around with a furrowed brow.

  “Where’s Hyato?”

  “He went down that side street to check more dumpsters.” Michael flapped the lid close on one and moved to the next. Yan continued to look around, eyes shimmering with energy for a moment.

  Betwixt tall buildings and the distant titans of the forests and mountains, it got rather dark in the alleyways even during the height of the day. Noon had passed, and the later it got the deeper the shadows became. Yan did a slow turn as she took a few steps closer to Michael, looking for something along the narrow space between buildings. Was there too much water on the pipes? A fog was rolling in from the street, but it was still the middle of summer.

  “Mi-” A hand clasped around Yan before she could shout an alarm, and with the arrival of the aggressor there came a blanket of mist. The smoke bomb was water based, a non irritant to keep people unaware.

  “Who would have thought you’d end up here of all places, Yan.” The voice was muffled, but not familiar. Yan clenched her fists, “Ah ah ah, don’t try to go energy form or anything, or your friend is toast.”

  Slight motion in the mist told Yan all she needed to know. Michael was just a few feet away, yet didn’t realize what had happened yet. There were others around too, poised to strike. The difference in how the mist moved where Michael was and the rest of the alley, there was a clear pattern to it. An opening, there had to be one somewhere.

  “Just come along quietly and we can forget this whole mess. Then we don’t have to be deployed to find you anymore.” The man tried to back out of the alley, but Yan didn’t move with him. “Don’t make this difficult. You can’t take all of us.”

  Yan saw the mists shift as the others watched her too, that was good enough. With a slightest motion of one finger, Yan unclasped the dagger on her belt and it clattered to the ground.

  The noise drew Michael’s gaze like every slight sound did, though he would just see mist from where he stood. “Yan?” A heartbeat elapsed before Michael charged forward with his sword drawn, causing hesitation in the man grappling Yan. In the brief moment she elbowed back before surging from where she stood to rush past Michael.

  With sudden activity stirring up the air, some of the mist parted enough for Michael to see the man concealed in a full cloth outfit. As he turned back he saw Yan striking another in the same uniform that was lunging for his back. Yan slipped into a combat stance and pressed her back to Michael’s. “Get ready, they’re coming.”

  “What’s happening? Who were those two?” Michael looked around as the enemies vanished, cursing his dark tinted lenses.

  “Stay sharp, there are four of them, and they could be anywhere.”

  Many brutal battles had tested Michael since the day he awoke in the ashen grove. The agonized struggle against the Revenant, the skirmish with the bandits, and the hysteria of the mob had been intense. The ever present threat of endless monsters as they crossed Zori infested hills had exchanged intensity for dread, with the looming threat of exhaustion. Michael had thought himself aware of what combat was, until he found himself trapped in a narrow foggy alley.

  Broad knifes appeared from the mist at high speeds, coursing straight for his eye. Yan intercepted to deflect the blades with rapid energy strikes, but was also blocking attacks aimed at her. Michael wondered what he could do against four invisible foes, when he was not even capable of seeing their attacks let alone the enemy.

  “Use that black energy technique!” Yan hissed, the sound coming from either side as she zipped back and forth.

  “Right.” Michael thrust his sword into the ground and pulled the energy up through his body and down along the sword, “Dark Blade!” The cracked lines were obscured by mist, but the resulting wave of energy launched a dumpster, several crates, and something else up and around the alleyway in a chaotic mess.

  Yan’s hand on Michael’s arm pulled him into motion as the two rushed down the alley away from the mist. In the intervening moments of confusion the smoke bomb was diffused, but they did not make it far. A figure garbed in dark clothes, tight and simple while covering every part of them, landed in the way of Yan’s retreat. Another mirrored them on the other side, standing with broad blades poised and ready.

  “Watch out for their kunai, Michael. And don’t lose focus, there are two more hiding somewhere.” Yan’s warning made Michael tighten his guard, but the revealed foes had stopped their attacks from before.

  One of the masked assailants spoke out, “Enough of this, Yan. It’s time for you to return.”

  “You don’t get to decide that!”

  “We’ll follow our orders to bring you back, the easy way or the hard way.”

  Michael swung without warning to launch a wave of energy, but the man jumped up and clung to the wall, clicking his tongue in annoyance. “You don’t get to decide anything for Yan, leave her alone!”

  If the attackers were planning on chattering more, they didn’t have time as Michael started to lash out in earnest. He launched violet vibes, crackling surges, and used the simple sword techniques he’d been learning to try and swat them down. Yan had no time to thank him either, as the enemy began countering with kunai that she focused on deflecting.

  Each time one enemy retreated another appeared to attack. They focused on ranged throws hard enough that Yan had to block, but angled so she couldn’t get hold of the weapons. “They’re toying with us.” She muttered, to tell Michael why the fight was in a stalemate.

  Another flurry of knives forced Yan to intervene, and Michael saw what she meant. In order to avoid injury, the enemies were focused on attacking in a way that would negate her. She was fast, but his own attacks were too easy to dodge. Michael sent a halfhearted strike just to see what would happen, but the enemy avoided it as if they were going to move away anyways.

  The way Yan moved was different from their previous journeys, she moved like these enemies. They were the same then, and they were trying to take her back. How much more was she hiding? “It doesn’t matter.” Michael said to himself, flexing energy around his legs. He launched a sword strike to make one of the enemies vanish, then burst out with a sudden leap.

  From the swirling mists came one of the masked enemies like before, but Michael arrived first. He blocked the kunai with his body, eliciting a gasp of shock from the enemy. Michael grabbed with both arms, despite having three knives buried into his arms and chest. “It’s just not a battle if you don’t get hurt!”

  The charging tackle worked as Michael grabbed the enemy and slammed into a wall with them, creating enough of a shockwave to disperse more of the mist. The force of the impact rattled Michael’s arms and the wall of the building at the same time.

  There was a moment of pause as Michael let go and his foe fell to the ground, while the others broke formation in surprise. Then, they rushed towards him with roars of fury.

  A shadow appeared behind the approaching enemy, along with the glint of green eyes, an instant before she attacked. Yan struck with lethal speed, but the man in dark clothes dodged at the last breath. “Don’t forget the mission.” He said, as if repeating a mantra. The fury the enemy had shown after one of their own was incapacitated vanished. All at once, the menacing air of danger from the enemies returned.

  Michael rejoined Yan, who was still fighting unarmed. “One down, heh.” He felt the sweat pooling down his brow as the mists around them thickened. The obscuring mist thickened. Michael looked around, then spotted one of them rushing him. He tried to counter, but took a cut as they zipped past. One of them had thrown a blade at Yan at the same moment, distracting her.

  They couldn’t hit Yan, but they could hit him. Michael took two more sudden attacks, each one different enough that he couldn’t react. Michael tried to slash or grab, but the enemy was too fast. Yan swept in to block an attack for him, but another knife hit Michael in the back.

  “Are you okay?” Yan pivoted to block another attack as Michael moved towards a wall so they couldn’t get behind him.

  “I’ll be fine.” Michael swung his sword around towards empty spaces in the hopes to drive them away, and managed to avoid one or two attacks. It worked once, but this was a losing effort.

  Just as Michael was feeling backed into a corner, the attacks ceased. All four of the enemies slipped out of sight, and the mists grew thicker. Yan remained on edge, but sidled over to Michael while watching for signs of movement. “You good? That armor helping?”

  “Helps enough.” Michael exhaled, not even trying to track the enemy. Whatever they were up to, he just needed to be ready.

  The moment of reprieve was over almost as soon as it began. A few kunai, followed by a gust of wind, sailed between Michael and Yan, causing the latter to dodge back. The moment she was away from Michael, all four shadows descended upon him.

  They realized the strategy too late, Michael had become the primary target. He tried to unleash a dash, but ended up bouncing into one that tackled him, then slamming against a wall. He avoided taking any hits to the face, buying enough time for Yan to recover and join the fray.

  Michael understood what would happen next, and he wouldn’t allow it. The enemy tried to backtrack so he shouted and swung his sword hard, striking the tip into the ground. “Focus... narrow!” Cracks of power coursed ahead, then blasted up into the air. He hadn’t wanted to throw everything around the alley again, but when he used Dark Blade this time he was able to direct the attack. Two of the enemies were launched into the air.

  It wasn’t enough. They caught the brick walls and managed to right themselves. “Damn scouts!” Yan swore, throwing something at one of them. It spooked them enough to drop back, but didn’t land.

  “You’re losing touch, Yan. Too much time away from home has dulled you.”

  “Oh yeah, want to come over here and test that?”

  A lack of response made Yan chuckle, but Michael worried about the next attack. He glanced back towards the distant exit to the alley, then saw a flash of red within the mist.

  The wave of energy sheared through the mists and dispersed them in a single stroke. The enemy disguised their surprise by pivoting to face the new threat, but one of them collapsed as a man in red and white appeared past them.

  Sword outstretched to one side with the conclusion of Flash Blade, Hyato turned around to enter a combat stance. “You guys are fighting Ninjas? Should have sent an invite.”

  “It got lost in the post.” Yan took up a new combat stance, holding one of the kunai in a pose matching the enemy ninja. Michael recovered his poise as well.

  The enemy attacked, two ninja going high and a third striking from range. They were fierce, but the tables had turned. Hyato swept his sword in a wide arc to form a solid surge along the trail of his blade. Surge shields last for as long as a blade is in motion, but can match in durability what the user has in vim. He blocked all three attacks, which opened up the way for Michael and Yan to counter.

  With one ninja down and the others dodging back, it was just a matter of time before Michael and the others won. That is, until the full scope of the situation became clear.

  “Everybody halt!” A deep voice boomed from a man in uniform leather armor, who had sword and shield drawn to match the half dozen identical armored guards behind him. “This unruly behavior is intolerable. Destruction of property, brawling, and noise pollution. You seven are under arrest!”

  “We can talk this out, there’s a good reason-” Yan’s protest died the moment the ninja ambush squad reacted. They clambered up the walls to flee at full speed, causing angry guards to rush the alleyway from both ends. “Run!”

  Yan took off down the side alley, while Hyato and Michael hastened to follow. It was narrower, darker, and stacked with too many dumpsters, crates, and miscellaneous refuse to navigate. Yan hopped up to run along the rim of a dumpster with the lightness of a feather, while Michael and Hyato clambered to try and keep up. The shouting from behind grew more fervent, “Stop criminals! You’ll face justice, I swear it!” Whatever chances they had to reason with the law were too far gone.

  Michael wondered if turning himself in was the right thing to do, but his anxiety about that issue was overshadowed by the anger in the guards’ tones. He felt a familiar tinge of loathing resonating from their words, which fueled him to flee with more gumption. Using a surge to leap over a dumpster, then another to burst himself upwards, Michael slammed into the edge of a rooftop belly first. He caught himself with hands crunching into a roof tile and boots digging into the brickwork. It was painful and unpleasant, but Michael pulled himself onto the roof.

  Yan landed beside him a moment later, then both looked down at Hyato. The guards were closing in, but the swordsman looked as calm and collected as ever. With an almost smug certainty of motion he slipped between two crates as he gathered energy around his legs. Then he planted on foot on an elevated crate and burst the surge to unleash a powerful jump.

  The trailing ends of Hyato’s red coat snagged on the corner splinter of a crate, arresting his momentum as he crashed back down to the ground. He looked distraught as Michael and Yan gasped, and the guards were closing in behind him.

  For a brief second Hyato looked at Michael with trembling eyes, then calm overtook him and he rolled one arm in a swift motion. Hyato unclasped and threw his sheathed sword up onto the roof, then stopped moving as the shouting guards arrived to hold him down and chain his arms.

  “Get some people onto the roofs and catch the rest!” The guard in charge looked up and glared, before turning to haul Hyato away with a small army in tow.

  Michael and Yan watched for just a moment, before collecting the sword thrown in the last moments. It was not how he’d expected the battle to end, but they had been warned.

  “We should get out of here.” Yan urged, “And figure out what to do next.”

  “Let’s go meet up with Sebastian,” Michael looked out across the rooftops before turning to Yan with a serious expression. “Then, we need to talk.”