Just a Bystander

It wasn't often that Jerric felt he was out of his depth, but this was one of those rare occasions. He had been caught off-guard by how much mastery Kevan was displaying over the arcanic space, and had also completely misjudged Kevan's ability to adapt quickly. It was hubris on his own part that had blinded him to the danger of being inside someone else's auric-ambient-flare. Kevan was right — if the target knew what was going on, then they would be able to exercise much more control over the threads within that arcanic space than any outsider.

"So what's the long-term plan, here?" Jerric asked, trying to keep Kevan talking. He wasn't sure if Kevan would stoop to it, but a part of Jerric was actually afraid that Kevan would take advantage of the peculiarities of this arcanic space to inflict mental torture on his two prisoners just because it was within his power to do so. "You remove Caden from the picture, and then expect the rest of us to fall into line? You think Ambrose himself will be alright with this?"

Kevan walked right up to the barriers that Devon had laid down, but stopped there at the boundary and shrugged. "The Prophecy will work itself out somehow. Ly and I just have to make this one choice and be done with it."

"Never figured you for the kind to just happily surrender control," Jerric said, shaking his head a little.

Kevan ran a finger across the outermost layer of Devon's barrier. Little ripples of energy dragged in his finger's wake. Then, very deliberately, he applied a little pressure, and his finger sank into the barrier like it was nothing more than jelly. He gouged out a little of it, then popped it into his mouth. Devon and Jerric stared at this aberrant manipulation of arcana, marvelling at how it wasn't behaving the way it should.

"You're right, I'm not," Kevan replied, laughing a little. "The amount of control we have in here is amazing. I could get used to this."

Jerric didn't like the way this was going, so he tried to get Kevan to focus on something else. "But all this is assuming Lynus can beat the augera. That's just insane! Remember the lake?"

Kevan snorted. "I remember. And yes, beating an augera... that's just not something we can do yet. Not until we know more about how all this really works." He gestured vaguely at the space around them. "But Ly doesn't have to beat it. He just has to stop it from fixing Caden."

"And how do you expect him to do that?"

"Oh, he'll find a way. If there's one advantage that he and I both share, it's that the Prophecy is on our side. Do you think the augera can actually lift a finger to stop us?"

Jerric's blood ran cold as he recalled what the augera had told him and Devon — that it was doubly bound to leave the twins unhindered. That was why it had set him and Devon the task of thwarting the twins.

They were the last line of defence, and the augera itself was pinning its hopes on their ability to stop the twins.

A glance at Devon told Jerric that his roommate was on the verge of despair. But the sight of Devon's stricken face woke something in him: a wave of fierce anger at the injustice of how someone who was as good and true as Devon was now at the mercy of someone as cruel and unyielding as Kevan. That led him to a realisation that sparked some hope, and his anger coalesced around that core of sudden certainty that had formed — if the augera had asked them to do it, then it had to be possible to win.

He had run out of questions, and Kevan seemed to be content to slowly pick apart their barrier instead of smashing through it in one fell swoop. Jerric sat, cross-legged, on the floor and forced himself to remain calm. The surge of emotions in his heart froze over, solidifying into icy resolve, and he simply watched as Kevan continued to methodically dismantle Devon's protections.

"Jerric?" Devon was faint with fear. He sank to the floor beside his friend.

"Let me think," Jerric said, his voice flat.

"That won't help you." Kevan paused with a handful of arcana that he had just gouged out of the barrier, then broke off a tiny chunk and chewed on it. "You walked right into enemy territory here."

Jerric ignored Kevan, reminding himself that Kevan wasn't actually standing there. This was just another sphere of conjured perceptions. This body was not really his body. It was simply a projection of his own mind since it was forced to occupy this slice of arcanic space.

And what was that arcanic space, really? They were just focused on a portion of Kevan's auric-ambient-flare. They had tried to break that focus, to draw themselves out, but he had stopped them somehow. It probably had something to do with tightening the threads of his own auric-ambient-flare so that they couldn't extricate themselves.

That meant he was, quite literally, holding on to them, even if it wasn't with his physical hands. There was contact between his auric-ambient-flare and their minds.

Being in contact meant having a connection. A channel.

What would happen if he channelled a little of his own auric-ambient-flare into this space within Kevan's auric-ambient-flare?

The instant the idea occurred to him, Jerric knew that he was on to something. The very act of even contemplating that possibility seemed to open up entirely new vistas of knowledge in his mind. It wasn't even something completely alien to him, because ensorcelment was just a simplification of what he was currently contemplating. This was a deeper frameshift of ensorcelment, working on a more granular and immersive level. And all he had to do was send across a very simple impulse in order to inflict damage on Kevan here, in this non-physical space: feel pain.

If he was still thinking, then his consciousness was still connected to his own auric-ambient-flare. And if that connection was still intact, he could tap on his own arcana, then channel it directly here into Kevan's auric-ambient-flare, this time through the medium of his own snared consciousness instead of using ambient arcana like with normal ensorcelment.

His head snapped up and his eyes fixed on Kevan, a savage gleam in them. "We walked into enemy territory... but you left the door wide open."

"Wha—"

A torrent of arcana erupted from Jerric's splayed fingers, a more savage and concentrated version of the beam that they had played with so much in their Double Thau practices. But this time, there were no arena-grade shields in this illusory space, and Jerric had seized control of it so that he could freely manipulate what was happening inside. He wrapped his ensorcelment in the illusion of the beam, and it worked. The beam crashed into Kevan and smashed him into the steps on the far side of the arena, and his screams of agony filled the space.

"OUT!" Jerric shouted at Devon, gesturing at the section of the wall behind him. It crumbled apart, revealing the raw arcanic space beyond. Devon's cry of relief echoed out into it, and he threw himself into the breach. His body dissipated and resolved into its mote-form, which then flashed away.

Before Jerric could follow, he felt himself being viciously yanked deeper into the arena. The breach sealed itself shut in a cacophonous rumble. Something lifted him off the ground, then smashed him into the floor so hard that the stone beneath him broke apart. He experienced all the pain of being crushed to death, and none of the release.

"Of course you'd find a way," Kevan spat, his voice ragged. Jerric managed to tilt his head so he could see his enemy. Kevan was extricating himself from the scorched steps, his body almost entirely blackened. Here and there, his skin was falling away to reveal the raw flesh beneath.

Jerric gritted his teeth and pushed himself upright. His torso felt horribly misshapen and it seemed like most of his ribs were shattered if the agony was anything to go by. When he tried to stand, he realised that he was completely bisected at the waist.

"Oh shit," he managed in a deadpan, before collapsing face-first into the floor.

A moment later, he heard Kevan's body hitting the ground too, with a sickening squelch.

Not real, not real, not real, Jerric kept telling himself. It took an inordinate amount of time, but eventually, he managed to extricate himself from the fog of almost unendurable agony. He stood, whole and unblemished, and surveyed the damaged arena.

He was standing in an impact crater that contained a copy of his shattered body. He shuddered and turned away from the gore, only to take in the sight of Kevan's charred corpse by the half-melted steps.

"That hurt."

Jerric spun around, deadly arcs of arcanic lightning sparking forth from his hands, but they were held at bay by a crackling orb that Kevan was holding in his hands. This new body was unblemished, too, but he wore a harrowed expression that Jerric was sure was also on his own face. Jerric focused as much as he could to maintain the barrage, but eventually, it petered out.

Silence. Jerric listened to the frantic beating of his own heart, then slowly sank deeper into his glacial composure until it stopped entirely. He didn't need a heart, here. He didn't need his body. None of it was real.

All he needed was his mind.

Kevan was the one who acted first, and in this state of complete dispassion, Jerric noted that Kevan had defaulted to gesticulating wildly, having become so flustered that he had forgotten not to telegraph his moves.

The heavy arcana bolts that spawned out of the air were easily dealt with. Jerric snapped them aside without batting an eyelid and zeroed in on Kevan's palms as they came together to channel that deadly beam sequence. He saw his chance and took it.

If your body wasn't real, then time and space didn't matter. Jerric willed it, and his body was next to Kevan's. He seized Kevan's wrists and snapped them off. Then, while Kevan's mouth was opening in a scream of pain, he shoved his fist in and punched right through his skull.

Before Kevan could extricate his consciousness from the illusory construct of his body, Jerric stabbed at it with his own mind. The whole illusion of the arena fell apart, and they were now both in mote-form again, drifting amidst the nebulous threads of Kevan's auric-ambient-flare. Here, Kevan's scream of pain sounded afresh, echoing into the empty spaces between the threads.

Now that they could see all these threads again, Jerric could trace the links of Kevan's consciousness. He had no intention of giving Kevan any time to recover. With ruthless speed, he followed the links all the way back to their anchors in Kevan's auric-ambient-flare, and now he could see Kevan's thoughts racing in real-time as the poor fellow desperately tried to manage the mental anguish he was still feeling after that illusory duel.

'Tangled-resolve-power,' Jerric intoned, 'I see your mind. I see your thoughts.'

He reached out with his own auric-ambient-flare, the cold-strong-watcher no longer contented to simply sit by and observe. All that time spent watching had given him enough information to act with decisiveness and to move with pinpoint precision. His tendrils of intent twisted around Kevan's mind, reading how Kevan himself had tangled them, and he began to emulate that knot-like pattern. It would be so easy to stop those thoughts permanently. Why, Kevan's mind itself was providing him the blueprints for this operation!

'JERRIC, NO!'

The warm-skilful-bridge barrelled straight into him, and all at once, the deadly pattern of Jerric's tendrils fell apart like a spider's web being blown away by a tropical storm.

'Jerric... you've beaten him. Stop. Please, stop.'

Slowly, the glacial calm that had descended over Jerric's mind thawed. And now, as they floated before Kevan's mind, the wordless silence was filled with child-like sobs of the tangled-broken-power.