Chapter 26

Pyre moved past the Hollow without slowing.

It pressed toward him, not with sound or motion, but with the weight of implication, of what it meant to fail in Aevum. He did not look into its mist and didn’t acknowledge it, his focus instead on his destination sitting on the hill overlooking Aevum.

The Shepherd’s manor rose ahead of him, darker than he remembered, its silhouette broken by climbing vines and warped stone. The gate stood ajar, metal twisted slightly out of alignment.

Pyre slipped through and stopped in the courtyard beyond.

He stood there longer than he meant to, staring at the broad steps leading up to the entrance, the big door he had once passed through with the Shepherd.

He took a step forward, and the door opened on its own.

Pyre exhaled slowly.

I guess I’m doing this, he thought, crossing the threshold.

Inside, the foyer swallowed sound. The stairwell curved upward, disappearing into shadow to an untold number of rooms upstairs. For a moment, he wondered if he should wait, if moving further without instruction would mark him as presumptuous.

“Hello?” he said quietly, the word feeling oddly small in the space. Pyre cleared his throat. He half-expected Tallow to appear in cat form and hiss at him from the bannister.

Instead, a soft voice answered from the study. “In here.”

He followed the voice to find Sura sitting cross-legged on a divan, posture relaxed, auburn hair clipped neatly to one side, her graceful appearance at odds with the Shepherd’s cluttered study. She looked as though she had been there for some time, neither surprised nor rushed by his arrival.

“How did you know?” Pyre asked.

Her elven ears twitched slightly. “I heard you.”

“You can hear that well?”

She gave him a funny look. “I recognized your voice.”

“Got it.” Pyre took a quick look around at the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, packed tight with volumes of every size and age. Several books lay open on a side table, their pages marked with cramped notes and unfamiliar diagrams that resembled large landmasses being charted in an unknown sea. Along the opposite wall, old scrolls had been unrolled and pinned in careful rows, their script traced in thick black ink.

“Besides,” Sura said, gesturing in the direction of the entrance to the manor, “the door only opens for people approved by the Shepherd. And their guests, of course. You didn’t happen to bring any guests, did you?”

“No.” Pyre’s gaze settled on the stool by the window, the one the Shepherd favored, positioned to look out over Aevum and the distant glow of the Font. “Where is he, anyway?”

“Out dealing with lanterns. But that is to be expected. Besides, I’m here.”

“No one else?”

“Was there someone you were looking for?” Sura asked him.

Pyre frowned slightly. “Wait, you’re not Tallow, are you?”

“No, he’s with the Shepherd. And you will notice the signs when Tallow has taken possession soon enough. As for the others, they’re all gone at the moment. It’s just me.” Sura smiled faintly and slipped a hand into the pocket of her vest, brushing the chain of her pocket watch. “Perfect timing, really.”

She stood and took a step closer.

“What do you mean perfect timing?” Pyre asked, wary now.

“I didn’t know how long it would take you to come back, but he said it would be tonight, and as usual, he is right.”

“The Shepherd knew I’d come?”

“He has a way with things,” she said.

“And you were waiting for me?”

“You could say that, yes.”

“Has he ever been wrong?”

“Occasionally, but his track record is decent. Anyway, you’re here.” Sura motioned toward the side door. “And so am I. Shall we?”

“Shall we what?”

“Relax, Pyre. I want to see what your Sigil can do. Come, then.”

Sura led him through the side passage and out into the side yard, a place of instruction rather than spectacle. Stone benches lined the edges, their surfaces darkened and smoothed by long use. Portions of the surrounding wall had been repaired more than once, the masonry mismatched but solid. Underfoot, the ground bore faint grooves and scuffs where repeated exercises had left their mark through repetition and control.

“You don’t want to know why I came?” Pyre asked.

“I’m fairly certain I already know that part. Care to let me try?”

“By all means,” he said.

“You worked on your Domain Attunement today at the Font. You thought about who you were and how a unique Domain such as Defiance came to be. When you finished, you headed here.” She stopped across from him. “Well? How did I do?”

“It’s not that simple.”

“No, of course not. And it never is. But I am right, though, am I not?”

“You are,” he admitted.

“I assumed as much. Do you remember what you experienced?”

“I do.”

“Would you care to share?”

The experience Pyre had just relived at the Font came to him, and he swallowed it down. “I would not.”

She smiled, unbothered. “Well, whatever it is, it brought you here. I would consider that a good thing.”

“What’s your Domain?”

“Which one?” she asked. “Kidding, but only partially. I am an Ascendant, you know.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I have two Domains. You are an Initiate, meaning you have one Domain. Three or more would mean you are a Divine Being, and that’s quite rare. But since I know your first Domain, Defiance, I’ll tell you my first Domain, the one I came to the Nether with.”

“Yes?”

“Patience,” she said, her fingers resting on the pocket watch. Sura tilted her head slightly as she looked at Pyre. “My Domain is Patience.”

“And the pocket watch, that’s your Sigil?”

“No, my Sigil is much larger than this. It is a reminder of my Sigil, however. A keepsake in a way, something given to me by someone close.”

“So your entire life before you died, you were patient.”

“Apparently, I was,” she said calmly. “But that is a common trait of my people. And it has carried over. The only thing I’ve become impatient about is the Shepherd and my affection for him.”

“You really like him, don’t you? I thought you were needling me.”

“No, it’s true. I like him, and I have for ages. I’m certain he likes me, but he never fully shows it.”

“So,” Pyre says, not able to hide the sheepish grin on his face, “there’s love in the afterlife?”

Sura shrugged playfully. “If you’re patient enough, yes. What about you? Do you fancy any of the Unclaimed?”

“What? No. Absolutely not. I haven’t thought about anything like that at all.”

“Well, I’m here to talk if you need me…”

“I will keep that in mind,” Pyre said as he naturally took a position across from her.

“That spot should do.” A luminous force flowed from Sura’s forearm, shaping itself into a broad, circular shield marked like a watch face. The hands rotated once, then snapped into alignment at twelve and six. “Are you ready?” she asked.

“I thought you just wanted to see my Sigil.”

“What better way to show it to me than a demonstration? You have recovered, have you not? If you’ve been at the Font, you should have enough Anima.”

“Your Sigil is seriously a watch shield?” Pyre asked, not certain of what to make of it.

“Correct. Time and patience have a way of guarding one’s true intentions is how I like to think of it. Care to test it?”

Pyre felt the familiar warmth coil in his palm. It gathered faster than it had earlier in the day, as the broken black blade formed, condensing from heat and intention alike. Flames wrapped the weapon in tight, spiraling bands, brighter than before, sharper at the edges. They didn’t flicker so much as cling, reacting to him rather than the air. The sword felt heavier, more awake, and holding it gave Pyre a newfound sense of power.

“Not bad,” Sura said.

For a moment, Pyre just stood there. He had expected her to move the second his Sigil appeared. Instead, she remained exactly where she was, watch-shield angled loosely at her side, posture relaxed to the point of indifference.

“Well?” she asked. “We can learn a lot about each other this way.”

“I didn’t come here for this exactly. I came here…” Pyre didn’t finish the sentence. The truth stalled somewhere between impulse and articulation. He didn’t know exactly why he’d come. He only knew that it was the next logical step.

Rather than speak, Pyre moved.

He advanced on Sura cautiously at first, expecting resistance, expecting her to raise the shield.

She never did, and the distance between them closed without interruption.

Pyre lifted his arm to strike her, and she remained still.

“Aren’t you going to block?” he asked, losing his forward momentum to some degree.

“Uh-huh,” she told him.

The flames guttered slightly around the blade as he lowered his arm. “This is not how I’m used to sparring with someone.”

“Fight me as you would anyone else, Pyre. Pretend I’m one of the Unclaimed.”

He stepped back, jaw tight, then surged forward again, this time without restraint. He swung with intent, fire flaring around him, and froze in his place.

Pyre’s body locked mid-motion as if reality itself had decided to pause him, the flames doing the same. His muscles screamed in protest without obeying, his breath catching half-formed in his lungs. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Sura lift her shield, the smaller hand on its face ticking forward toward seven.

“What did you do to me?” Pyre said through clenched teeth as she circled him.

“You had decent enough training in your realm,” she said, studying his stance as if he were a diagram rather than a person.

Then time snapped.

The strike finished, but not in the direction of where she had just been.

Pyre stumbled forward into empty space and hit the ground hard. He rolled, came up on one knee, and found Sura standing several paces away, shield lowered, expression unreadable.

Understanding crept in slowly, unwelcome and sharp.

He moved again—this time with calculation.

Pyre advanced, then pulled back deliberately, feeling the invisible boundary where resistance began. The pressure wasn’t uniform. It wasn’t everywhere.

It’s a radius, he thought as he adjusted his stance.

Gripping his sword with both hands, Pyre thrust forward, channeling fire into a horizontal pillar. The flames erupted outward in a focused plume, a controlled release meant to overwhelm rather than strike.

“Not bad,” she said, Sura suddenly beside him.

Pyre spun to meet her, heart lurching. His fire completed its arc behind him, scorching stone.

“How?” His voice cracked as his eyes caught the watch again. The hour hand had jumped to one. “Fight me fairly,” he said, backing away.

“There is no fairness when you fight with Sigils,” she said, words firm yet eyes filled with kindness. “There is only strategy. It helps to understand your opponent’s Domain, but not all Domains have a breaking point, something you can exploit. Yours can be exploited, Pyre. This is why some of the factions are wary about you.”

His grip tightened, knuckles white. “Exploited?”

“Think about it, and try again.”

He did.

Again and again.

Pyre attacked from every angle he could conceive—wide arcs, short bursts, feints layered on feints. He tried speed. He tried hesitation. He tried abandoning his sword entirely, charging in barehanded in the hope that unpredictability would close the gap.

Each attempt ended the same way. Freeze. Displacement. Absence.

Sometimes, Sura stopped him mid-motion, time clamping down with surgical precision. Other times, she simply wasn’t there when he struck, reappearing just beyond reach, watch-face ticking inexorably onward. Soon, his Sigil’s flames burned hotter, less controlled, bleeding Anima into the air.

He fell.

Once. Twice. Three times. By the fourth, he barely caught himself before hitting the stone. He moved quickly, back to his feet, never one to stay down.

“Do you understand yet?” she asked.

“You’re cheating,” he said, chest heaving as he pointed his Sigil at her.

“Not exactly. I’m showing you the flaws in your Domain. At the same time, I’m teaching you about Sigil combat, true Sigil combat. You know my Domain, Patience, yet you do not know how to exploit it. I know yours, Defiance, and as I would have predicted, it’s an easy one to toy with. Let me put it this way: given enough time, you would attempt to strike at me until your Sigil broke.”

“I would,” Pyre said, the admission tasting like blood.

“No matter how long it took.”

Pyre grunted a response.

“This is one of the things factions worry about with Defiance. But we, the Unmoored, don’t see it that way; the Shepherd certainly doesn’t see it that way. Defiance is a powerful tool when used correctly. It mixes a number of traits, from bravery to sheer willpower. I think we’re done for the night.”

“Done?” Pyre asked, disoriented by her instruction.

“You have more training tomorrow, and now you have a way to frame that training. The other Unclaimed—you know their Domains, do you not?”

“I do,” he admitted, the realization dawning on him.

Sura smiled, and her watch shield faded. “Then see what you can do with that knowledge. And return, if you’d like. I hope you found the experience productive.”

“I missed you every single time. To me, it was infuriating. To you, it must have been like sparring against a baby.”

She grinned. “You were close a few times. I won’t tell you which times, but you were close, Pyre. And a challenge is always nice.” Sura gestured toward the manor. “Come, I’ll lead you out. And I’ll assume you know how to find your way back from there.”