KEMAL

His breath left in thick, heavy globs of blood as he sat in the small divot. One after the other. It haunted his dreams. Wild. Out of control. He fought for breath in the darkness of the smallest lamp within the atrium. I think I'd prefer death at this rate. Another cough bled his lungs, and he swallowed thick bubbles once it subsided. Kemal raised his attention to the dead or dying shapes within the other divots. Where did they take Julis...? He looked over at Loto, who sat quiet, fiddling with his fingers, unable to move. Death swilled his nostrils, and he coughed again. Tyber sat in his divot, gone in mental death but not physical. Kayal all over again.

"How are you doing, Captain?" another soft voice asked.

Kemal looked over his shoulder to Warden Telon — one of the more recent disappearing acts who looked worse than he felt. "Alive," he mumbled. "Yourself?"

Telon drew their eyes back into the darkness. "... I can't hear the others breathing."

"Lucky bastards..." Kemal grumbled and tried to get comfortable in the stinking, bloody divot.

"You had another nightmare," Loto muttered.

"When am I not?" Kemal groaned and rubbed his head with his manacled hands.

"You were muttering about ashes and then gasped out 'Fenrer'," Loto said. "And then you had another expulsion flash."

"They're just nightmares," Kemal mumbled, trying to keep his eyes open, though the cultists took great pains to keep them mostly alive, including Tyber — though he doubted the Warden remained on their plane, sharing Kayal's fate. "Whenever you want to throw something at my head to finish me off, I'd appreciate it."

Telon gave a weak laugh. "If I had the strength, Captain."

Kemal tasted the blood on his lips then shook his head. "Don't bother with formality at this point," he said and took in a deep sigh. As deep as the blood in his lungs would allow. He tried to keep his mind calm and clear for what lay ahead until the end of the road. Death itself avoided them, with only writhing shadows in the room for company. He curled his lips inward, trying to taste Navei poundcakes instead of clot, rot, and decay. Shoulders against the edge, he relaxed and tapped his manacles against his chest. Heatwaves pressed on his brow, a promise, a much wanted assurance. I could close my eyes and...

Footsteps caught his attention, but he lacked strength to do much else but raise an eyebrow when the lock glowed and clicked open.

Four shapes wrestled with a nimble one. Each cloaked in darkness as they stepped around Tyber and forced them down in the center of their divots, latching manacles around their feet and wrists. Magick erupted out of them, a spark of green light, though the runes filled instead and grew heavier, forcing them to their feet with a gasp.

Kemal squinted between the shapes as the others left without nary a word. Or food. Or water. Just another prisoner.

Their breath came in short pants, but as his eyes adjusted to the sudden light, his life refused to leave him when they lifted their head out of the darkness. Green swirls. Bathed in shadow, made of light, they swung their attention around the room in a panic.

"...You've got to be kidding me—" Kemal choked, causing them to try and rush for him, though the chains dragged them back.

"Kemal...?"

One last failure for the road. "Here I was hoping it was just a nightmare," he said, allowing the light to fill his body and return facial features to those around him. "Fenrer... out of all places you could end up... why this one? Should've just let it happen."

Fenrer dragged himself out of the darkness, ashen, stuck with blood, but he looked leagues better than any of them. Tiny flecks of hope bloomed along the swirls. "I found you," he said, his breath catching. "You're alive."

Kemal overturned his hands, and found himself unable to tell the whole truth. "More or less."

The other two fell dead quiet, keeping their heads low. Fenrer, with all the youthful, hopeful energy he fought to preserve, tried to get up again. "They're okay," Fenrer insisted. "It'll be alright now. Where..." He looked around again. "Where are we? Do you know?"

Kemal shuddered when a heatwave fell across his body. Another threat of a flash. "We're in an extinct volcano," he told him. "I know there are mines deep within this place. Julis sensed them before we ended up here. Described it like veins to a heart." Kemal bumped the back of his head against the ledge. Too many times half-tempted to bash his own brains in, but something always gave way to his own pause.

Fenrer sat down again, then misery started to take hold. "I left Adara, but... I didn't want to think about what they might've done to her with her magick."

"She's got time to run," Kemal mumbled.

Fenrer looked over at him. "It was you, wasn't it?"

Kemal sucked in his lips and wetness stung at his cheeks. "Not anymore," he whispered. "How nice of them to take a piece of the crystal they lodged inside me for that." Temptation reigned again, and he tried not to bite into his tongue and eat it in turn. "How're you doing, Fenrer? How've you been? Been a while. Apart from this situation, I can at least say it's good to see you." He raised a bandaged hand, where the cult took two of his fingers for his insolence and previous defiance against his inevitable fate. Fenrer's brow furrowed at the nubs.

"Worried," Fenrer whispered. "Neven's worried himself sick."

"Sorry." Kemal tilted his head at him. "Better him be sick and safe surrounded by loved ones who will watch out for him than... this. We've given them enough fodder for what they're planning." He studied the younger Hanekan. "Have they done anything to you?"

"No..." Fenrer wiggled his chains. "Just this."

"They say anything to you?"

Fenrer opened his mouth, then closed it. "They didn't say anything to me but I heard them talking about crystals," he told him. Kemal shook his head at the continued uncertainty. "They mentioned another Aurus Warden as well."

Kemal lifted his head. "What?"

Fenrer chewed on his lip. "They mentioned something about how they managed to extract the essence and they set him loose."

That's not good. Here I was hoping Julis got a quick death, but... Even that was too naive and idealistic. Kemal rubbed his grimy brow. He paused when Fenrer made a whimpering noise, allowing his hand to fall back against his thigh when Fenrer adjusted himself in the chains and glanced at him.

"Kemal?" Fenrer whispered. "You know what they're planning, don't you?"

When I'm all that stands against the abyss... Kemal checked on his grimy, blood-soaked armor. "I do, I just don't know how even with what they're doing is will manage it, but if there's the slightest chance you can escape—"

"We'll all find a way to escape." Fenrer gave a sharp, faithful nod.

Kemal released a weak, pitiful chuckle. "You've always... tried to see the best in every situation, didn't you?" he questioned the younger Hanekan, who raised his head slightly to reveal the grime on his own features with only the green, swirling, supposedly crystalline eyes of an Aurus. "When you're the one here who can see the truth of everything around you." Why would they talk about Aurus' eyes? Kemal pondered for a moment, and then leaned against the wall of his divot. "I'm going to state this as clearly as possible. They wish to open a new Source Gate, but they seem to be trying to find the old one to do so."

Fenrer's shoulders slumped in relief, but Kemal felt anything but when it lodged in his throat. "Good. You can share it with Warden-Commander Faehariel while you recover."

Fenrer. Kemal coughed, and paused when Fenrer went on with so much youthful, unbroken hope and faith.

"Maria found a way to save Yuven from the corruption. She can do the same for you."

Kemal looked over at the other three Wardens — all at varying stages of death, or undeath. He lost the will to keep track of it all. "See the truth for what it is, Fenrer," he whispered, refusing to tell another lie at the end of his rope. Though Fenrer flinched, he pressed on. "What's important is that someone escapes with knowledge. I asked the questions... Now I'm giving you the answers." Kemal tried to lift himself out of the divot, but his spine refused to work apart from a twitch, a convulsion through his lungs but he refused to kneel to anything but his solemn oath. "It's not just that they're trying to open a new Source Gate to the Echo Obscura. They're also trying to call something out from the other side with how much blood glyphs they're placing. Think of all the places you know that have had supreme amounts of bloodshed. They don't even need to have the cult involved, though I wouldn't be surprised if they created the circumstances. This world has seen a whole lot of bloodshed since the disappearance of the original Source Gate. But I've compiled the most recent ones." He raised his hands to reveal the truth. "One, they were hunting for king's blood. Or, more specifically, magick not seen in the regular rank and file. Spatial and time dilation and distortion. Lightning. Creation... redirection."

Fenrer went ashen and still.

Kemal sighed. We've been playing into their hands for Turns... but best that someone knows. I know I'm... not making it out of here alive. One finger raised, he started the countdown, "Irimount — where they attempted to speed up the metamorphosis of a Corruptor and take the crystal before the expiration of the host to place it in another Derelict to create a more subservient predator." Another finger, he went on, "But before then, the conflict of royals within Naveera and the bloodshed of the king's blood all over." He twitched, then raised one of the missing fingers. It tingled down to his wrist, but he continued on, "Let's move on in chronological order." And you're not going to like this one. "For the first instance... Sungrove and Haneka — we're proud people, Fenrer," he pushed when Fenrer opened his mouth. "We have always lived by way of strength, to fight for what we believe in." He sucked in his lips. "Now... I don't know the specifics, but I have been listening to them talk. Why should they have any fear of any of this getting out? They don't plan on letting us leave alive, at least." He drew the same missing finger down. "So, forget about time's order. Let's go to the second instance of Sungrove."

Fenrer slumped into his knees. "Where Reyn and I were almost killed."

"The two pillars of Haneka — the reason it became the kingdom it is now from the ruins the Derelicts created of it, where they forced us to fight for our lives until it was all we knew how to do," Kemal whispered when Fenrer bumped his brow against the ground. "Yes, they managed to get both of your blood at the same time, in a place that saw such concentrated bloodshed and desecration. So, they have the blood of one whose spatial distortion is unmatched — unique. They have the blood of lightning, and blood which redirects all that comes its way. They also shed the blood who can create from nothing except life." Kemal coughed up a wad of blood, which splattered on the side of his divot and Fenrer raised his head with a frown.

"They also have the blood of time dilation," Fenrer revealed.

Kemal froze. He hacked up pain, his limbs twitching, but though he waited for the expulsion flash, it never came. "That's troublesome, but that's only one part of their plans. Gathering the blood components for their sacrificial glyph. They'd also have to gather enough power into a singular focal point to crack open a Source Gate."

"Is that what they're doing here?" Fenrer asked weakly.

Kemal breathed through rust, then shook his head. "Here? I don't think so. I think this is simply another 'point' of their glyph."

"But-" Fenrer trembled and slid closer to him, while the two mentally living Wardens lowered their heads further. "What do you mean? We thought you discovered they were just creating a glyph of this area, but what you say—"

When I'm all that stands. Kemal found a smile crawling on his face. "Oh no. You saw my notes back at Asairai, didn't you? Didn't Neven show you? Or was he a parent to the end? Trying to protect you from the harsh truth of what we've stumbled into?" It stung his cheeks when he turned it to Fenrer, to keep hope and faith alive even if he had to die. "It's only one piece, Fenrer. Think. Ask questions. Why spend all that effort over there if their main goal is here? It's because it isn't. They're not doing something small. This little area isn't their glyph. Aztryxer is. This is just a taste."

Fenrer stared at him in disbelief. "But that's impossible. We don't even know how the original Source Gate was created, since we know it wasn't the Anima!" Fenrer lunged against his manacles. "The Anima and the Ancient's were the same thing. Not gods! But people who tried to save this world and the most they could do was make a new one of the ashes of theirs, giving up their world for one they knew they wouldn't get to see! They're the ones that closed the original Gate — but how did that Gate come about? Why are the Derelicts here?"

Ask questions of this world. It is the only way to survive in it. To learn. His own hope returned to him at the incessant questions. And because of that... Kemal spat out some more blood, then chuckled. "Fenrer Pyren," he spoke with the power of a name. "We got this far because instead of throwing ourselves at the enemy, we tried to learn of them and from them." He clenched his fist against old blood. "As long as the truth gets out, we will have done our duty." But you will live if I have anything to say about it. "I am not dead yet. I will protect the light even as my last breath leaves me."

"You won't die."

Kemal chuckled and closed his eyes, weary.

"I talked to your brother."

"How was he?"

"Good. Decisive."

Kemal smiled, remembering his youngest brother. Never so curious as he, but constant and certain of his own answers. Maybe it runs in the family. "Good," he said. "I'm glad to hear he hasn't become too big for his britches. Next time you see him, can you do me a favour?"

"Of course!"

Kemal tasted the last of his tears. "Tell him that if he ever loses his way, I will come out of the tomb of the Tyronai's to knock him back to his senses."

Fenrer paused, then warbled, "You can tell him yourself."

He lost the strength to live, but not to fight. "I'll certainly try." Eyes closed, he sat in his own ashes, but he had yet to fall. Yet to die. And I'll make them regret torturing Wardens, torturing Neven, and most of all, keeping me alive. He dragged his fingers against his divot, having no more questions to ask.

Only a single answer.