Bernt braced himself, manifesting an extremely simplified spellform from his foot and activating it as he pushed off. It launched him twenty feet up into the air and forward. He landed heavily on both feet and wheeled his arms, tipping forward to catch himself against a rock. A year earlier, he’d watched a cultivator bounce up sheer cliffs as though he were a winged mountain goat. He’d already been impressed, then. Looking back now, though, he knew he hadn’t been giving Song nearly enough credit.

  It had taken a lot of practice just to get the angle and the timing right, so that he landed higher up on the slope instead of falling right back down to where he’d started. And that was just going up. Despite Bernt’s talent for aeromancy, he wasn’t willing to experiment with flinging himself down from high places just yet. He only had so many healing potions. Hiking downhill for hours every day was brutal on the knees, but it was better than falling.

  He should have come up here last year, when his elemental benefactor had originally told him to come looking. But he hadn’t had the time. The duke, the guild and the military had agreed that he couldn’t risk coming out here this close to the Madzhuri border. There had been a war brewing and the whole place had been swarming with red dragons after that mess in the Depths. Besides, the elemental might not even be here.

  The war was still brewing, sort of, and while dragon sightings had decreased, they hadn’t stopped. What had changed were Bernt’s options. It had been a year, and his sorcery research had hit a dead end.

  He was failing.

  They’d made great strides early on, based largely on Katrin’s novels. The duke’s daughter was an avid fan of foreign literature, and her collection contained a surprising amount of information about the savage sorcerers among Miria’s native peoples. It was mostly buried in cultural norms and oblique references, but very occasionally there were direct descriptions of their magic.

  Using her books, Bernt, Uriah and the noblewoman had developed working theories for how sorcerers grew in power. For nearly a year, they’d read everything they could get their hands on and tested what they could, mostly on Bernt himself. They’d even shown that normal people—ones born without the talent to become a mage—could manipulate mana, even if they did it entirely blindly. It was a stunning discovery, if one that didn’t have much practical application.

  Bernt himself had grown in knowledge and power, too, and yet they couldn’t do what they’d been asked. When it came to creating new sorcerers, they’d gotten nowhere.

  While Katrin attempted to ‘awaken’ her spirit naturally, as one of her books claimed was possible, Bernt and Uriah had gone out to find help. The only confirmed way they had to become a “true” sorcerer—one who could absorb new magical potential to become more powerful—was to be made into one by someone much more powerful and far more skilled than Bernt himself. A foreign bit of someone else’s sorcerous spirit had to be shaped and grafted into a recipient. That was why he was here. The elemental who had created the seed of his own true sorcery was out here somewhere. It had to be. And if it was willing to create a spiritual sea for Bernt, maybe it would do the same for others.

  Three months ago, when the winter snows had just barely melted down in the valley, Bernt, Uriah, two of the military’s finest summoners and a volunteer aeromancer had set out to the nearest elemental confluence that they could legally access—a small air confluence near the border to the Dwarven Confederation.

  They’d started relatively small with a gale elemental. Bernt had done his best, trying to communicate with it directly through spiritual contact, but the thing wasn’t smart enough. From there, they’d upgraded, first to a tempest and finally a stormcaller. That last one had been sapient, Bernt was sure, but it still didn’t understand what he wanted.

  It had been a bitter realization. Elementals—even ones that might be smart enough to create a human sorcerer—didn’t necessarily understand how to do it. It meant the elemental who Bernt had worked with was possibly unique, or at least in a class beyond even the most powerful elementals that summoners could readily access.

  It meant he had nothing. Not unless he could find the elemental.

  He’d set out almost immediately when they’d returned from the air confluence, but so far, he hadn’t found his benefactor. And soon, he’d run out of supplies and out of time.

  Pushing down his worries, he launched himself up another sheer section and caught himself on a ledge just beneath the top of the ridge. He hauled himself up, and found himself with a clear view out over the mountains ahead. This was the Phoenix Reaches, technically, and he could see burning rain falling far in the distance to the south and east. Strange, alien vegetation grew on the lower slopes that could survive the intense heat, or in some cases, even feed on it.

  He scanned the slopes below, peering down into the valley and examining the peaks for any telltale flickers of fire, but he saw nothing. The elemental, as expected, was nowhere to be seen.

  He let out a breath in a low sigh, but he was too tired even to feel disappointed.

  ***

  By the time Bernt returned to Norhold, the greenery on the eastern side of the river had turned a baked golden brown by the glaring southern sun. Spring was transitioning to summer. He should have been sweating in his heavy robes but he felt, if anything, pleasantly cool. Fire was a part of him, now, and an overly sunny day couldn’t touch him. On reaching the gate, one of the guards held out a hand to stop him.

  “Halt!” he barked. “State your name and business!”

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Mage Bernard,” Bernt identified himself simply. “I’m returning from a research trip for Duke Renhild and the Mages’ Guild into the Sunset Range.”

  The guard squinted at him, taking in his expensive gray robes. Then he dropped his hand, “Ah… you’re the Underkeeper, then? The dragonslayer?”

  The robes, while not the same shade of gray as official underkeeper’s robes, gave him away if his name didn’t. Not everyone knew him by sight, but he wasn’t just an anonymous mage or underkeeper anymore, either. He was the Underkeeper, and his legend had only grown over the past year. According to rumor, he’d brought down an ancient empire, killed a dragon, ended one war and probably prevented a second, at least for a while.

  It was all heavily exaggerated, of course. He’d had help, for one, and he’d been lucky. But thanks to the persistent propagandistic efforts of a few very powerful and influential people, he’d gained a lot of notoriety. After a while, he’d stopped trying to set the record straight. It was too exhausting, and worse, people would often decide he was just being modest. So, he simply nodded.

  “That’s right.”

  “You’ve been gone for a while, then? “ the guard asked, stepping back to let him through. “You haven’t heard the news?”

  Bernt threw a glance into the city, half expecting to see whatever the man was talking about, but of course there was nothing but the usual bustle of traffic. “What’s going on?”

  The man leaned forward, lowering his voice a bit as if worried that he was going to be overheard. “The duke is dead. Killed in broad daylight three weeks ago. His nephew’s just arrived from Teres, set to inherit the title.”

  “I…” Bernt faltered, unsure what to say as his heart dropped into his stomach. “Uh. Who… what’s his name?”

  “Brinwald. Was the margrave of Wrightport, or something. One of those soft coastal cities. Rumor has it the king himself disinherited Lady Katrin on account of her… interests. A shame, if you ask me.”

  Bernt nodded his thanks and entered the city, making straight for the Mages’ Guild. He walked with purpose, but internally he was reeling. It felt like he wasn’t quite in control of his body. Renhild was dead. What did that mean? His contract was, first and foremost, with the duke. He had paid his salary and strong-armed Archmage Carlan into creating his very position at the guild. More recently, he’d been shielding him from the displeasure of the king himself.

  He only knew about that latter bit because Katrin, the duke’s daughter, had told him as much. To defuse tensions that had nearly led to a war against their western neighbor, the king had made some compromises—ones that Bernt’s growing notoriety put him at odds with. Bernt’s involvement with unfamiliar magics and his well-known association with a demon had drawn attention, most notably from the newly empowered Temple of Noruk and the entire country of Madzhur.

  He was still stewing in dark thoughts when he entered his laboratory on the third floor of the Mages’ Guild, where Katrin sat meditating while Uriah re-read one of her novels and took notes. The other mage dropped the book as soon as Bernt entered and stood up, obviously glad for the interruption—they hadn’t managed to glean any new information from Katrin’s novels in months.

  “Did you find it?” he asked hopefully.

  Bernt sighed and shook his head, sinking into a chair. Uriah wilted.

  “So. That’s it, then?”

  Katrin opened her eyes, glaring at the two of them. “I’m still working on something. I told you this was the best way. If I can spontaneously open my spiritual sea, all of this travelling and summoning will become unnecessary.”

  “Maybe,” Bernt conceded without conviction. “But if it was something people could just do like that, don’t you think cultivators would be doing it more often? Only the one book suggested that you could create your own spiritual sea, and it’s a novel. You know it’s a long shot.”

  “That’s what you said about me doing magic, too!” she retorted challengingly.

  Bernt grunted and let the matter drop, unwilling to start an argument over it. She had learned to cast spells, of a sort. Spellforms—or rather crude singular glyphs—that she’d learned to form blindly with a sort of meditative dance. She could form the same force glyph Bernt had been using to climb mountains, though hers was much weaker and went off unreliably. Still, she’d managed it, and to conjure a small gust of wind and a flash of light.

  It wasn’t very useful, but according to conventional wisdom, it should also have been entirely impossible for someone who wasn’t born with the ability to sense mana. Natural sorcerers—kobolds, lizardmen, fae, and all the sorcerous beasts and monsters that roamed the wildlands—didn’t have that ability either, though. They didn’t shape spellforms with their will like mages did. Instead, they manipulated the mess of spiritual channels that formed their spirit by instinct, guiding mana flows to cast and modify the spells that were contained in its shape.

  Katrin had neither a mage’s senses nor a sorcerer’s channels, but she had a perfectly good spirit to work with. She had assumed that was enough and against all common sense, she’d been right. Unfortunately, she’d let it go to her head. Since the breakthrough, which had occurred last summer, she’d latched onto the idea of becoming a true sorceress on her own.

  She’d tasted magic, and she wanted more. Only, she didn’t like the idea of having her spirit modified by an outside presence, least of all an unknown spirit. Not that that was an option available to them, now. Instead, she’d spent the winter and spring attempting to “open” her spiritual sea, as described in one of her favorite books.

  Unfortunately, she had not defied expectations a second time. So far, she’d had no more success than he and Uriah had had with the elementals. After a moment, he sighed and met her eyes.

  “I’m sorry about your father.” She tensed and looked away. “I heard on the way in. How are you doing?”

  “I’m…” The noblewoman got up slowly and exchanged a meaningful look with Uriah. “I’m taking it a day at a time.”

  “We think he was assassinated,” Uriah added bluntly. His jaw clenched, then, more quietly, he added, “By the king’s order, probably.”

  “What?” Bernt choked, eyes widening. “How do you –

  “Ah, there you are!” A woman’s voice called from behind him. He turned to see Head Librarian Zaira poking her head through the doorway. “I heard you were back. You’ve been summoned to see the magistrate immediately upon your return. You should go and announce yourself to his office before anyone gets the idea that you’re failing to comply.”

  “Ah,” Bernt said slowly. “What’s it about? ”

  Zaira grimaced. “The word came down from Archmage Carlan. So, nothing good, I’d guess.” She looked around at the others searchingly. “You didn’t happen to come home with a breakthrough?”

  Bernt sighed and shook his head as he rose, grabbing his banged up underkeeper’s staff.

  “No.”