Every time Farrir’s hammer struck the scythe blade, excess Arcara flowed through the anvil’s runes, then circled around and poured back into the blade from below. Where before, the blade had been a crude arc that looked like it was made of black water, it now had a solid form, like the night sky given shape.

  From the side, he smoothed the crude cutting edge down to a fine shape, and the Vale Core’s power ran along the curve with magenta lightning.

  Finally, Farrir sank Larra’s artifact into the scythe’s blade at its very center. It dissolved into the weapon’s form, leaving only a circle of nearly-invisible runes in the perfectly smooth side of the blade. The last of the Vale Core’s energies poured into the rune circle, turning it a permanent shade of glowing purple.

  The entire weapon emitted a pressure similar to that of the Vale Core, and it weighed down on Vayra’s shoulders and core just the same, but it wasn’t nearly as harsh. Instead of an anvil hanging off her shoulders, it was a heavy hauberk of chainmail.

  With each strike of the hammer, the weapon’s influence on Vayra’s core faded. She hadn’t understood before what he’d meant when he said he’d change the purpose, but now it was clear.

  Before, the scythe had been a hammer. It’d repelled the channels where it’d cut them, and it took effort from Vayra to pull the filaments back together, but now, though it still wanted the cut to her soul to linger, it wanted it to remain as a cut.

  That was easier to overwhelm.

  She bundled up the channels and pulled them back in place, then sealed them back together. “Keep talking to me, Phas,” she said. “I want to know if I’ve done something wrong and your voice goes away.”

  ‘Will do,’ Phasoné replied. ‘But what do you want to hear about?’

  “Uh…had any pets?”

  ‘I…did.’ Phasoné then rambled off a list of exotic animals that she’d kept while growing up, and it worked well enough. As they worked, booms rattled out through the forge. Someone was pounding on the door with powerful techniques. Each impact made the gates rattle, and the crossbeam bent and splintered. Any moment, it’d shatter, and the gods outside would leak in.

  By the time Phasoné had finished the list of former pets, there were no more loose, severed Arcara channels at the base of Vayra’s neck. No more. Vayra rubbed the back of her head and breathed a sigh, then said, “I’ve done it.”

  ‘Done?’ Phasoné asked. ‘It…feels normal. Can you hear me alright?’

  “Loud and clear, glitter princess.”

  Farrir was almost done forging the weapon, too. He raised his hammer above his head, then brought it down with a heavy swing. A pulse of blue light blasted through it, resonated in the anvil, then surged back up into the scythe. Most stayed in, fading away into the form and leaving it with a black and magenta hue. The rest burned off in a pulse of pure Arcara, lighting the room and sending Vayra staggering back with its shockwave.

  “It is complete,” said Farrir. He held it up with one hand and tossed it to her. “Given the circumstances, it is as close to a masterpiece as you’ll find, though if you don’t advance to Grand Admiral, you will be like a child carrying a cannon.”

  A heavy strike rattled the doors, and a crack formed in the crossbeam. One more hit, and they’d fly open.

  “Be quick. The gods are almost through.” He tossed the scythe through the air, and she snatched it up with one hand. It was heavy, but not unbearably so.

  ‘So, are we dual-wielding?’ Phasoné asked. ‘We haven’t trained for that at all, and they aren’t exactly daggers or sabers…’

  “I had an idea,” Vayra said. “Are you holding your scythe?”

  ‘I am.’

  “Excellent.” Vayra adjusted her grip on the black scythe. No longer did it feel wet, but rather, like she was gripping ancient leather. It fit her hand, though it’d take a little to get used to the feeling of a solid weapon in her grip.

  Then, when her hands were in the right position, she Moulded Phasoné’s scythe overtop, forming a ghostly white outline around a core of darkness. Pinpricks of light shone all across the blade, and though it wasn’t a rift in space like her scarf, it still looked like a starry sky. The pinnacle of her scything ability.

  She whirled it around, letting its weight help her spin it, and letting its counterbalance work with her. When she stopped, the swing ended in the exact perfect position she wanted it to.

  “Thank you, Farrir,” she said.

  “All I ask is that you show the galaxy my craftsmanship.” He hoisted his hammer up onto his shoulder. “And that you defeat the gods before they hunt and kill me.”

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  “You’re not…trapped?”

  “When they break in, I will run. I will go no further with you—I want to live. I am a blacksmith, not a warrior.”

  She turned and faced the doors. “Come on…she whispered. Advance, Vayra, advance!”

  At Grand Admiral, and with the Mediator Form, she’d have to be equivalent to an Emissary. Or close.

  Nothing happened. The doors shook, and the crossbeam bent. Arcara-empowered water leaked through in jets, and with Phasoné intact once more, Vayra created a Ward and blocked them. The pressure and force still sent her skidding back across the floor.

  There were three forms outside. Karmion, Nilsenir, and Kalawen. She was just an Admiral. Against the three of them? They’d destroy her.

  Then the gods stopped. No more techniques blasted into the door.

  Vayra blinked, and then, in a flash, the gods took off. They raced to the side, through a hallway, then blasted out the side of the tower into the open air.

  When their presence faded, when Vayra wasn’t at risk of an immediate trap outside, she ran forward and slipped out the door, turning sideways to fit through. She sprinted down the hallway, then to the hole in the wall. Glade and Varion had walked out from opposite sides of the arena, and stood at the center, not yet fighting each other. Their mid-fight break had only just ended.

  The hole in the wall faced directly out over the arena, though from such a height, she could see the entire ring before her. She was at eye-level with the sunlight projection. A chunk of the Moon’s surface shifted in front of the sun, and the projection was bright and obvious as could be.

  It showed nothing of Glade or Varion.

  Instead, a shaky scene of golden light erupted over the arena, faintly outlining the Cardinal Arrant’s great cabin, replaying Vayra’s conversation with Karmion to the whole arena—right down to her admission that she was only an Admiral, and damning Karmion for lowering himself to her level.

  “Stop this!” Karmion bellowed, his voice ringing out across the entire arena. “This is false!”

  As well as Vayra knew how difficult to falsify a projection like that would be, so did the audience.

  “Altrous, halt the projection!” Karmion shouted halfway through.

  Kalawen attempted to conjure an illusion around it, and Nilsenir raised a veil of gunpowder around it.

  But there was enough lag on the projection, on Altrous’ Reach technique, that even an immediate halt allowed Myrrir’s recorded projection to play all the way through.

  Vayra leaned out the hole in the wall, gripping the jagged edges to stop herself from falling out, and stared at Altrous’ tower. But his mechanism for projecting the light didn’t form a direct line from the tower. Instead, sunlight poured out from the arena’s upper ring, where Myrrir stood.

  He’d hijacked Altrous’ Reach technique. A wire of sunlight blazed down from the viewing platform of the sun-god’s tower, then erupted as a full scene from Myrrir’s device.

  It was almost over, and the crowd watched, transfixed as Karmion of the vision laid out his disdain for them.

  Vayra glanced back down the hallway, but Farrir had fled, and he would be long gone. With the gods busy, she had a little more time to prepare. She jumped down and buoyed herself with starlight, filling her channels and letting herself glide, then landed in a crouch beside Myrrir.

  “The weapon is done?” he asked.

  “As best as it can be!” she replied. “They’ll come for you.”

  She glanced up at the sky, where the three gods still floated. Already, they were tracing the route of the technique to Myrrir and her.

  “Leave it!” she shouted. “We need to run!”

  “Where?”

  “To the port! When Tallerion arrives, we’ll need a way offworld, and I’m sure our ships need help!”

  “Indeed,” said Myrrir. “Are you going to fight the gods?”

  “Unless you think they’ll let us go without a fight!”

  “Just like on Naebel, then.” Myrrir grimaced. “Odd to be on the other side of it.”

  ‘Enough empathetic waxing!’ Phasoné complained. ‘More running away! Flee! By the Stream, you’ve just severely pissed off three gods!’

  Vayra nodded, then turned and leapt over the edge of the arena. As she fell, she activated the Astra Shroud and kicked off the wall. Myrrir kept up for a few seconds with his own Bracing technique, and yelled, “What about Glade?”

  “We can’t help him now!” she called. Her lead expanded, and she pulled out in front of Myrrir. “If he wins, he’ll find us and help us. If he loses, he’ll probably not…survive.” No matter how little she wanted to think about it, she couldn’t put it in any other way.

  And though she didn’t want to leave Myrrir behind, her Shroud was faster than him. She skirted around the arena and raced off toward the port. No sense in waiting behind—the ships needed her.

  As she drew closer to Shatterport, sharp booms of cannonfire poured through the forest and slipped along the road. People fled from the arena, still despite the assurances of the gods, and debris rained down from above. An enormous Ko-Ganall vertebrae, charred from its descent through the atmosphere, blocked the center of the road, forcing Vayra into the woods to turn into the woods and navigate around it.

  Myrrir caught up when he blasted a hole straight through the center of it, allowing a path for civilians to reach the port.

  But even if they wanted to evacuate, the port was entirely locked down. When Vayra reached Shatterport, she leapt up onto the rooftops for a view of the harbour. Cargo ships waited in their berths, unwilling to challenge the Elderworld blockade, and hordes of bluecoats marched along the wharf, keeping civilians back.

  Crowds plugged the streets as people tried to push toward the ships. If any grew too rowdy, the bluecoats unleashed volleys of grapeshot on them, scattering and killing the closest.

  Vayra scowled. But Tallerion could clean up the wharf when the time came. The bigger problem was out to sea.

  The remaining fleet of Velaydian ships, now only about five of them, clumped a few miles offshore, surrounded on all sides by much more numerous Elderworld ships. A few techniques clashed—water-Path God-heirs against the remaining Order of Balance Adepts and Disciples.

  Vayra leapt off the roof of a warehouse and down to the water, then sprinted toward the Velaydian fleet.