A/N: The beautiful banner above made by the lovely seventhstar! His outfit would be out of place in the medieval ages, but otherwise it's close to how I imagine Gilbert (maybe with a darker skin tone?)

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I start to howl hysterically. I can't help it—the idea of me being a necromancer is just as ridiculous as Diomedes returning from the dead.

Maybe not so ridiculous after all.

Or is it? I can't decide.

Seeing Gilbert's disapproving expression, I sober myself, coughing away the last bits of madness in me. "Sorry," I say weakly, suddenly ashamed of myself.

"So...You're not a necromancer?" he asks. The glare I give makes him wither into his blankets. "But, he – she told me so."

"Who?" I tilt my head to the side. He did collapse rather suspiciously after he bellowed for me to dodge the arrow on the archery field. What if he had experienced a vision during that lapse of unconsciousness? Perhaps it's an effect brought on by the Marks? The thoughts run through my mind randomly. Yet they don't seem so random at all...

"This will sound mad," he says hesitantly, shooting me a quick glance to read my immobile expression. I nod encouragingly, gesturing for him to continue. "After I yelled at you to get down during the assessment to dodge the arrow, I – I collapsed and had a vision."

I lean forward eagerly. "Of what variety?" Gilbert's face turns blank. I try to rephrase my words. "What exactly did you see?"

"It was...black." The answer comes as soon as my question registers properly in his head. "All around. And there was a – a figure, made of red smoke, who spoke to me."

Red smoke. Interesting. "This figure, could you recognise the voice?"

Gilbert shakes his head mournfully. "Its voice was a mixture of many overlapping voices. It echoed of both male and female undertones."

I dig the heel of my right palm into my thigh, trying to force the disappointment rising in me to subside. The pressure point I place on my bone does little to stop a lump forming in my throat. Ridiculous. Why am I so cut up over such a pathetic matter? I shouldn't have expected Gilbert's 'guide' to be an exact copy of mine.

But if his 'guide' was Abner, then at least we could possibly put our heads together to try and figure out who – or what he is. And what the visions mean for us.

"So, it told you that I'm—of all things—a necromancer?" I ask, trying to divert my mind from my indirect dissatisfaction at Gilbert's 'guide'. He gives a curt nod in response. "You actually believed it?" He flinches reflexively.

"I..." Gilbert coughs a few times. He attempts to straighten himself on the bed, as if he can further delay his already slowed reaction to my statement. "I – I was...It somehow compelled me to believe every word it said, no matter how I tried not to. I don't know, it's difficult to explain."

I suddenly recall how Abner forced my anger to subside the first time I entered a vision. Perhaps our different 'talking visions', so to speak, aren't that different at all. "I understand," I finally say, which induces surprise on Gilbert's face. Putting it as plainly as possible, I narrate my experience of my own brand of visions to him, careful to omit the detail where Abner knows my true gender.

When I finally reach the part where Abner told me that Diomedes has resurrected himself, Gilbert's face blanches. "He told you that?" he squeaks.

"Aye." I raise a brow. "Your guide told you that too?"

He bobs his head. My insides churn with a feeling of dread. "Do you think it's true? That Diomedes has risen again?" My voice is a harsh whisper.

"I – I don't know. But the ghost in the field...You did defeat it, didn't you?" I give a grunt of confirmation. "That's why my guide told me you were a necromancer—only one with the power of the shadows can return the dead to their place, apparently."

"That's absurd," I snort. "Do I look like a necromancer to you?"

He narrows his eyes at me. "I've never seen a necromancer in real life, so I can't really say." I scowl at him. "In all honesty though, what are we going to do about the news? I can't too be sure, but I don't think our guides were jesting about the news."

"We'll have to tell the king." My shoulders sink of their own accord when I realise that I have a heavy task to deliver. "It may or may not be true. However, it's best if we prepare for the worst."

"I wonder, how powerful is Diomedes, if he was able to resurrect himself?" Gilbert muses.

I grimace. "I'd rather not find out the answer to that question."

"Me neither. I'm just curious though."

"I hope that curiosity of yours won't be the death of you."

Despite his injuries, he manages a weak laughter. "I'm a Champion. I dare say I can manage myself pretty well."

I don't have a response to that. I close my eyes, myriad thoughts processing through my mind; I make futile attempts to see the rhyme and reason behind them. That's when I realise that I have something else I need to clear up with Gilbert. "Your voice on the archery fields..." I start haltingly. Gilbert's eyes snap up to meet mine with a fierce intensity. "It was you, wasn't it? You saved me from the arrow, although you were nowhere near enough to push me away from its arc."

He drops the stare, opting to study the fine strands of thread sticking out of his woollen blanket instead. "Tell me, I have to know," I say softly.

After he chews on his bottom lip thoughtfully, and with a twisted expression on his face, he relents, "Yes."

"How did you do it?"

His eyes flick towards my direction, not quite at me but rather at the wall behind me. "My 'guide' told me that it was a power of a Champion of Pst. Ailith—to be able to temporarily wrest control of a being's body with the power of their voice. The voice somehow acts as a medium for the Champion's will, exerting it towards the target of choice. She also explained...other things that I can't quite remember."

Excitement leaps throughout me—could this be the power of the Champions of War that the Manuscript had been so vaguely described? The power to control everything and anything on the surface of the earth? "Gilbert, this is excellent news!" I exclaim. "Why didn't you mention it to me earlier?"

He gives a weak shrug of his shoulders. "I didn't think it was relevant to our point of conversation.

"We just survived an attack from a ghost. And at this rate, we should be expecting more to come. I think it's very relevant to our point of conversation." Gilbert squirms in his blankets, as if he's trying to seek cover underneath them. Half-consciously, my eyes narrow themselves at him. "You weren't going to mention it to me at all if I hadn't pressed on the matter, weren't you?" His silence is enough confirmation; anger quickly overtakes the exhilaration in my voice. "Why? So that you would be able to defeat me in duels more easily? To make a mockery of me as I struggle to understand your power? Is this a matter of inflating your ego?"

"No!" he shouts, startling me. I don't show it, moulding my expression into stony neutrality instead. Gilbert's eyes finally meet mine once more, anguish rolling in them like crashing waves in a storm. "You don't understand, do you? It's...it's terrifying. Being able to grab someone's will just like that, without even realising you're doing it..." He takes in a deep, shuddering breath. "Pietists Above, I might even be compelling you to be more talkative right now without either of us realising it!"

His words are spoken with an edge of terror sharply lacing them; they make me consider my next words very carefully. "I think – I think I understand. In a way, it is terrifying to have that much power granted to one person," I admit, even as some small part of me screams in delight at the prospect of what I can potentially do. Now here comes the tricky part—weaving logic into my speech without triggering too big of a negative reaction in Gilbert. "But we're Champions; we are supposed to have this power. It's a blessing of the Pietists, Gilbert. And we need this power. If, if Diomedes is truly coming for us." For me, I correct myself.

"I know, but still..." Gilbert slumps heavily in his bed, a hand pressed against his forehead. Then suddenly, he jerks up, eyes bulging out like a goldfish. "Wait a minute, you don't have the ability, don't you?"

"Well, I certainly didn't have it when I was fighting the ghost." Jealousy suddenly prickles beneath the surface of my skin, threatening to claw its way out and manifest itself as a monster.

"How in the Seventh Hell did you defeat the ghost?"

"Strategy, plain and simple." I tell him how I managed to land hits on the ghost by perfectly timing the strikes.

"You didn't have my ability, yet you managed to defeat the ghost." His voice is full of awe. I find myself slightly flattered by the praise, though the way he says 'my ability' still irritates me. As if the ability to momentarily control something is his and his ability alone. "Why don't you have the ability to compel then?"

Running my tongue over my teeth in attempt to cool an uncomfortable heat surging in me, I say, "I suspect that my abilities will manifest later than yours. When we'd first duelled as Marked Champions, it was only after your triggered berserk state that my own abilities kicked in to save me from being skewered by your blade."

"You wouldn't be skewered; I could have controlled it," he retorts defiantly.

"Undoubtedly," I say sarcastically. "That's why you stabbed me in the shoulder during that duel."

Gilbert chuckles easily, good humour restored. Then, growing serious and with an insistent begging tone to his voice, he says, "Please don't tell this to anyone, will you? Not even King Terrell nor Sir Kendrick."

"You're forgetting Captain Eldric."

"Oh bother him! It's the other two I'm worried about." I wouldn't be so sure of that. The Captain seems to me the most perceptive and shrewd of the trio—a dangerous man for sure. Gilbert's amber eyes are wide and pleading, and I briefly wonder if he's using a compulsion against me willingly or unwittingly, if he is doing it at all. "Please," he squeaks.

"Fine," I agree grudgingly. I then heave a sigh, before getting up and brushing off specks of dust off my breeches. My movements are slowed, like an old man suffering from aching joints. I stretch my legs, getting rid of the cramping numbness in them; I don't realise how physical demanding the assessment was till now. "I'd better be going. Get some rest. We'll have a long day tomorrow."

Gilbert's look stops me short from exiting the room. "I know that you won't fully accept what I said the other night," he says quietly, obviously referring to the night in Hangman's Tower. I assume a flicker of a wince flashes across my otherwise neutral expression. "But whether you like this or not, circumstances have brought us to work together—there's no way out of it alone, Constantine."

"What do you expect me to do then?" I shoot back, some of the usual iciness returning to my voice. "Extend my hand as a peace offering for all these years, or grovel on my knees to beg for your friendship?" Bitterness threatens to pour out in a rush; only my logic keeps it in check.

"What I'm trying to say is that, for now, we can be allies."

To my dismay and elation, he extends his right hand out towards me, inducing me to shake it. I take a step back, toppling the stool over. I do not attempt to place it upright.

Nor do I immediately flee the room, as I should.

Instead, I lay still, unmoving, a thousand conflicting thoughts bombarding my mind. On one hand, allowing myself to make social contact with someone will put me at risk of slowly opening myself to the world, and in turn, my willingness to share my secret against all common sense. On the other hand, being allies with Gilbert could possibly bring us mutual benefit, and two heads are better than one...

Pst. Bronicus, do not make me regret this.

"Allies," I agree, finally taking Gilbert's hand.

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A/N: Dedicated to belladonnafox. Go check out her work Guardians: Magic Rising, one of the best urban fantasies I've seen to date, featuring a crazy heroine who has an unfulfilled childhood dream of fighting like an Amazon, a stoic, socially awkward witch who has way to many secrets, and a Guardian who is very pestilent (literally).

Garderobe - A medieval toilet (nope, not joking; go look it up!)