Bernt stared at the cracked stone, frozen in indecision. Could he fix it? If he kept everything aligned just right…

  First, though, he had to get his defenses up. Gritting his teeth, he focused back on the task at hand, raising the rest of his wall of cold fire. He needed to protect himself from unwelcome surprises, then he could try to repair the summoning circle. If it wasn’t going to work, he could still make a run for it. The cultists, at least, couldn’t move any faster than him.

  But… the demons probably could. They didn’t need as much sleep as he did, and the hellhounds at least could run much faster than he could. He could kill demons, but how many could he take at once? He had no idea how many there might be.

  It would come to a fight at some point, now that they'd found him. If he stayed and fought here, he might be overwhelmed, but he had the confluence and his circle of perpetual cold fire to offer some of protection. If he ran, the demons would catch him eventually, and he’d be exhausted. But, in the second case, there might not be as many of them.

  Both options could get him killed.

  What was he supposed to do? He’d thought that the demons were long gone, hunting for him on the other side of the mountains, or rather chasing after the rest of the expedition by now. He hadn’t expected this.

  As he considered it, Bernt realized that he didn't want to run. He was tired of looking over his shoulder, ever since that first ambush, nearly a month ago now. Tired of running and hiding. Tired even, of tiptoeing through the Phoenix Reaches, trying to avoid any sign of dangerous elementals and predators. He was just tired.

  Sure, maybe there was a way out. A third option. But there wasn’t time to sit around and hope that a better solution would just come to him. He had to act, and he had to do it now.

  First, he had to see what state his summoning circle was in. It was a long shot, but it could offer him an enormous advantage. If he could complete his augmentation, it might change everything. Those cultists had just been regular people, as far as Bernt could tell. Crazy ones, sure, but not mages or even properly trained fighters. As a magister, he could cast larger and more potent spells. Maybe it would be enough to stand up to the demons.

  Maybe.

  Whatever. If the summoned elemental couldn't help him with his augmentation, he could still release it on the cultists. His temperature barrier should protect him.

  Finishing the protective firewall, Bernt recast his heat barrier near the confluence and made his way back to the stone, retrieving the termite clay shard that he’d dropped on the nearby ground as he went and depositing it into his bag.

  Heat radiated from the ground uncomfortably inside the protective barrier, and he worked on cooling the space down again as he examined the damage. The slab had cracked about a third of the way through, cutting through a portion of the second, outer circle and splitting through a whole section of runes in the curve of the inner one. The smaller half had sunk into the sand a bit, misaligning the whole thing in the process.

  Carefully, Bernt dug his heat resistant right hand underneath it and lifted it back into place. Then, focusing on what he wanted, he cast his stone shaping spell to fuse the two halves back together. Finally, he shoveled a few handfuls of sand underneath to make sure the whole thing was properly supported when he let go. The hot sand stung as he pushed it around, but he didn’t burn himself too badly. Blowing some errant grains off the markings, Bernt examined the result.

  It had mostly worked. The circle was aligned properly, at least. Unfortunately, all of the markings that the crack had gone through directly were smudged slightly by the stone shaping spell. He’d have to redo them.

  Bernt ground his teeth in frustration. Sweat soaking through his robes, he cast a spell to cool the space inside his protective barrier again and looked around to check for any approaching enemies. Unfortunately, he couldn’t see very far from because of the shallow depression that contained the confluence. That was a problem, but not one he could address now. Banishing his concerns to the back of his mind, he refocused on the matter at hand.

  The innermost circle was the one that opened the way to the elemental plane of fire and lured the correct kind of elemental to it. The second was for protection, keeping the elemental contained once it emerged. The outermost and final circle was actually a banishment, designed to instantly send back any elementals that the summoner didn’t want bursting through their open door.

  Bernt stared down at his work, considering.

  He didn’t strictly need the third circle. It was important if you were trying to keep powerful elementals out – but he was trying to get the most powerful and intelligent one he could possibly find. Besides, the second circle would keep it contained, right? That was what it was for.

  Carefully, Bernt smoothed over the damaged markings with another spell and reached into his bag for his shard of burnt termite clay. He realized only after he pulled it out that he hadn't grabbed the bit of clay. No, the pebble in his hand wasn’t a magical material of any kind – it was just a rock. But on that rock was a familiar circle of runes.

  The elemental grenade wasn’t meant to be used like this, but… it should work, right? The construction was simpler than the innermost circle he’d inscribed, but it served essentially the same function. Anywhere else, the portal it formed would collapse almost immediately, resulting in a quick flash of intense heat. Here, the proximity to the confluence should keep it stable.

  If he could make it work with the less damaged outer circle, he could skip most of the repair work.

  Bernt put the rock down experimentally and turned it, trying to align the runes to those in his second circle. It would work, though it would lack the luring effect of the circle he’d originally drawn. He was cutting a lot of corners… but time was a factor, and this would be the fastest way by far. Besides, he still had both the outer circle and his heat barrier for protection.

  Being careful to keep the area of effect small, Bernt softened the center of the slab, allowing it to crumble back into sand. Then he pushed the pebble down into it, bringing the runes on the stone and those remaining on the slab onto the same plane.

  The resulting portal would be tiny – only as big as the little rune circle on the rock – but it should still work. Maybe a magma elemental would take some time to squeeze through, but it wasn’t as though it had bones to worry about.

  Repairing the second circle only took a few minutes – only two runes were damaged there, after all. He double and then triple checked it to make absolutely sure it would hold. In the event that something hostile came through, he would be relying on it to contain the elemental, after all. At least until he could loose it on his enemies.

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  Finally, he was ready. Bernt looked around nervously again. Was it really worth it? It would have been better to do it properly… but he really wanted to avoid getting interrupted mid-summoning if he could help it.

  Just to be extra safe, Bernt raised another temperature barrier, this time in a smaller dome just around himself and not including the summoning circle. Then he reached out and activated the circle.

  The runes shone with a soft light for a moment, but they were almost immediately overpowered by the glare coming from the tiny white-hot hole that now filled that the little circle on the pebble at the center.

  Bernt squinted against the brightness and raised a hand to protect his eyes. He adjusted them a bit and looked through the narrow gaps between his fingers. It was still uncomfortable, but he needed to see what was happening. He didn’t expect anything to dive through immediately, but he wasn’t about to turn his back on it, either.

  A minute passed, then two. Keeping an eye on the sand around the circle, which had started to take on a reddish tint, Bernt recast his temperature barrier again. It was much too soon, but who knew how hot it was out there now? He wasn’t eager to test it. When still nothing happened, he looked up and around the edge of the depression, checking it for enemies.

  Still nothing.

  A soft gurgling sound drew his attention back to the summoning circle. Something was flowing up and out of it, like water from a spring, spilling past the tiny inner circle and out onto the sandstone. A few seconds later, it rose into a small, familiar shape – a sort of oblong fireball that floated inside the circle for a minute before trying to escape. The flame sprite bounced off the inside of the second circle, reoriented as if confused, and then tried again.

  Bernt watched it doggedly repeat the same maneuver over and over several more times. It didn’t seem to understand what was happening and it never tried anything new – it just ran headlong into the warding circle and failed to pass. Once more, Bernt wondered if an elemental this simple was actually alive. Maybe he could use it for an investiture. If nothing else came through soon, at least he might get the chance to examine it.

  ***

  An ancient firestorm roiled around a small point of cold and darkness in a never-ending sea of light and energy. Convective currents buffeted it, rising from the solar core far, far below, but it expertly rode the searing winds, whirling in a neverending dance around this specific point in space, as it had done for an age.

  The thin place had torn open, leaving a tiny hole into the fabric of the universe.

  For eons, the storm had watched over this strange anomaly, meditating on what it meant, and dreaming of what might lie beyond. It couldn’t remember when it had found the thin place exactly – it was too long ago. But it still remembered pouring heat into it, and wondering… where did it go? It was not transformed into motion or light – it simply vanished. It could not be, and yet it was. How did it work? And why couldn’t it follow?

  While these questions remained as elusive as ever, the existence of the thin place itself was confirmation of a much greater truth, shrouded in myth and legend. There were higher realms. Worlds beyond this one. If only it could grasp the true meaning of this place – its purpose, it would be able to ascend.

  Now, the way lay open, but still the storm hesitated. What had changed?

  Then, a tiny spark of life flitted out from a passing jet of plasma and threw itself into the hole, trailing light and fire behind it. The tiny entity was barely awake, drawn by instinct more than intellect. Still, the foolish thing had the right idea. The way had opened, somehow. There was little point in discerning precisely how it had been done. Condensing its form down as far as it would go, it threw itself into the tiny rift and toward the great beyond.

  ***

  Just as Bernt leaned closer to get a good look at the little flame sprite, the tiny summoning portal began to bubble up again. Unlike the last time, though, it didn’t stop after a moment. The pressure increased, and seconds later a geyser of white-hot fire shot up into the sky, swirling into a nearly solid mass high up above his head like a second sun. He couldn’t feel the heat, thanks to his multiple heat barriers, but it seemed that his precautions had been well warranted.

  The fire kept coming, though it darkened after what felt like a minute, going from white hot to yellow, and finally to a sullen, orange plasma that wrapped itself around the outside of the elemental like a skin to contain the burning fury beneath.

  In front of him stood a pillar of fire as tall as a house, flickering only ever so slightly on its surface, and perfectly contained within the circle. As he watched, a tongue of flame licked out, resolving into a three-fingered hand that quested gently out toward the wards. Bernt watched as it traced the mana flows down toward the ground and then, ever so delicately, touched the inside of the outer rune circle.

  The stone shattered with a sharp crack and the wards went out.

  Bernt flinched at the sound and his heart dropped into his stomach. Shit.

  Immediately, the elemental’s shape ballooned outward, taking on a more humanoid appearance. It shrank down to half its height and doubled in width, forming the vague outline of a head and torso as it did. A moment later, incandescent white eyes blinked open in its head, looking directly at him. The little flame sprite obliviously wandered over to the center of the confluence and began to circle it like a moth around a flame.

  Bernt stayed frozen inside his protective spell. That was not supposed to happen. Of course, he should have considered that any warding circle he drew would only be as strong as the material that it was scratched or drawn onto, but the book hadn’t warned of anything like this.

  He swallowed thickly, watching he creature. At least it hadn’t tried to attack him – not yet. Slowly, he raised his hand in greeting, trying not to make any sudden movements.

  “Hi,” he tried. “Can you talk?”

  The massive creature leaned down and ran a huge, three fingered hand over his outer heat barrier. To the elemental, it was like a physical thing and he could see its substance flatten against it like a hand on glass. It tilted its head to the side curiously, as if contemplating what that might mean and then placed another hand on the barrier as if to confirm that it was there.

  Bernt really didn’t want to know what would happen if it seriously tried to get through.

  But... this was what he'd wanted, right? He had an obviously intelligent fire elemental standing right in front of him. Now that it was here, though, he had no idea how to talk to it. Would it even be able to help him? It seemed confused more than anything.

  How did shamans do this?

  “Uh… please wave your hand if you understand me.” Bernt said carefully.

  The elemental gave no indication that it heard him. Instead, it made a slow circle around Bernt, eyeing him. Then it turned to take in its new surroundings. Bernt's heart leapt into his throat. He couldn’t let it wander off – he’d never get this close to it again. And if he could get it to help him against the demons... well, some of them were immune to hellfire, but he wasn't so sure that would work extend to this.

  Before he could think better of it, Bernt reached through the barrier with his right hand and touched its lower arm.

  The effect was instantaneous. He just barely felt his hand pass through the ethereal substance of the elemental’s skin, but he also felt it from the elemental’s end. More vividly, though, he could feel the creature’s confusion, its curiosity, and its fear. It had never been in a place like this, and it was all wrong. It was a dead place, cold and with no motion, no convection, no transformation.

  The foreign idea blossomed in Bernt's mind as if it were his own, but at the same time, Bernt knew it wasn't true. If anything, it was too hot here and there was nothing static about this world. Besides, real life incorporated all the elements, and required a balance to thrive.

  Bernt didn’t think or project these thoughts out – they were just the context of his emotional reaction to the elemental’s own state of mind. It wasn’t an exchange of ideas so much as a simple trade of impressions – then his hand was through. But it worked, nonetheless.

  The elemental stopped and turned back, eyes boring into Bernt, who shook his head, reorienting himself. If that hadn’t been so eerily similar to the sensation of sharing his consciousness with Jori when he used his overcharged familiar bond through the portal spell, he might have stumbled out of the barrier in his confusion. He’d only meant to get its attention, but this… this was better.

  Bernt grinned up at the creature as it extended its hand once more and carefully laid it down on the heat barrier.