The rain had not stopped for two days now. It dragged down his spine, thin and cold; frozen needles puncturing his flesh in bites and tears. The only release came as it puddled at the bottom of his back, herding together before another of its kind forced its way past his hat and underneath his jacket. Lapat had left that grove with a growing dismay only slowed by a hope of a cure at Lightfall. But now it ate at him. His infected arm itched, his throat burned, the cold ached his bones, and no amount of water cleared the consistent cough in his lungs.

  “Cold, hungry, and dying,” A harsh voice whispered. “And now lost in these woods.”

  Lapat shook the fear aside. It was irrational, emotional, and illogical. Even with the weather, even with the pain, they were making progress. That progress is all that mattered. Albeit painfully slowly and uncomfortable.

  They had settled into a consistent silence, he and the two kids. Lapat preferred it that way. While the priestess was one of stimulating conversation, her blind devotion to her god was a persistent irritant. A slight disappointment in Lapat’s mind, especially for someone so kind and bright. But she was still a better companion than the boy.

  The criminal.

  Lapat fought back the urge to cuff his horned head every chance he got. Lapat was no man of violence. But the impertinence, the insolence, the outright gall the young hellkin carried himself with, was a violation of all the etiquette Lapat held dear. Though he strained to stomach the boy’s involvement, the circumstances Lapat had found himself in made such courtesy difficult.

  “But once a gentleman, always a gentleman,” Lapat coughed, the strain of even a whisper dragged knives down his throat. He cupped his hands and sipped from what raindrops he could gather, but the chill did little to ease the fire in his gullet.

  “It’s the air,” Lapat assured himself. “This weather is wrought with proclivity to sickness. If it be the damp, the chill, or this horrid wind, I was due for some illness.”

  “The air,” that dark voice laughed in his mind. “Is that what ails you so? What, pray tell, is the source of that horrid itch growing across your forearms? A bit of a rash from tree bark? Or perhaps chaffing from your cloak?”

  Lapat tilted his chin up with a haughty sniff. “The symptoms are well under control. I have not taken leave of my facilities yet.”

  “Whatcha say?” Deskin’s voice snapped out before him.

  Lapat looked up at the boy criminal, the rain dripping from his soppy black hair. He needed a barber. It was far too long for any decent gentleman.

  “Nothing,” Lapat responded. “I said nothing.”

  The thief glared at Lapat for a second longer, then returned to his forward trot behind Verna.

  “I didn’t say anything,” Lapat murmured, then quickly silenced himself. Was it too much to be left alone to one’s own thoughts? At least mine are worth revealing.

  He peered up again through the mist of precipitation. He had been all too privy to the unbearable conversations between Verna and Deskin. Worse yet, when they weren’t babbling awkwardly, both dancing around a youthful and abhorrent attraction, yet neither willing to capitulate to the shared emotion, they stared at each other.

  Long glances. Short glances. Hidden peaks that bordered on obtusely obvious to anyone with a pair of working eyes and any sense of social norm. The two clearly found some manner of attraction to the other. But both were too stubborn to communicate that to the other as grown adults.

  “The naive nature of youth.” Lapat let his mind wander. “Had Rosie and I ever been so impetuous? No, surely not. She and I were too mature for such things. We’d met later in life. When flirtation was less difficult. More direct. Though, courting her had been...embarrassing to be sure.”

  Lapat felt the old memory of his nerves electrified when he first approached her. Even worse, he could recall in crisp detail his failed attempts to woo her affections. The flowers he had gotten her that had only attracted bees, the letter he’d written that had been left in the sun and had melted away the ink to a stained blob on parchment.

  “Oh, my darling, if I could do it again, I would never have made such mistakes.”

  But she had accepted it. Accepted him. She laughed at the swarm of bees and thanked him for their pollen. She kept the ruined letter and demanded ten more written in different colors so she could always know what he’d said.

  She smiled, she loved, she accepted him. There was no bad day in her eyes. The thought of her warmed his cold flesh, and every step was that much more bearable with her name on his lips.

  “What would you say now, my love? Would you sigh at the rain, grateful for the bloom it brings? Would you shiver at the cold and be thankful for a jacket when others have none? Or would you simply laugh at it all? Would you be curled up in our home, lost in the pages of a book, or setting the stove to a simmer?”

  He could rarely anticipate her mind. Little bees, he called them, every thought running rampant in a beautifully chaotic manner.

  “Does your mind take you to me, I wonder. Do you miss the feeling of my arms around you? Does your table grow quiet? Is our bed cold?” Lapat shivered, shaking loose a torrent of chilling rain down his back. “Rosie, my love, I will fix this. I will be home soon. I promise.”

  He closed his eyes, willing his words to carry on to her. If even for a moment, for the faintest hint of his love to warm her cheek.

  “Will she forgive you?” A dark voice whispered in the back of his mind. “You did abandon her.”

  “I did not!” Lapat hissed suddenly, causing Verna and Deskin to look back at him in confusion. He smiled and waved them away, tucking his face from the cold.

  “But you did, didn’t you? All the pain you feel of her alone, it is regret. Is it not?”

  “I am doing what I must,” Lapat whispered, scratching his wrists. “She knows that. I told her. I explained it all. This gives us more time together. With a cure, we can live a happy life.”

  “Only if you succeed,” the dark voice cackled. “Only if you survive.”

  “I will,” Lapat urged. “I will.”

  But as another day passed and they awoke with the cold nipping at their skin and foraged berries doing little to appease empty stomachs, Lapat’s thoughts turned sour. They all felt it. The luckless nature of the weather only fed a draining weariness that made it difficult to speak, let alone think of even a moment of sunshine. Beyond the physical toll of the trek, the creak of his bones, the itch of his infected flesh, and the ever-present scratch of his throat, he faced a mental battle. One waged by the raiding words of Deskin’s insistent comments.

  “Still walking in the woods! How grand!”

  “Great, more forest!”

  “I think it might be raining! What do you guys think? Do you feel a slight sprinkle?”

  Every remark ground Lapat’s jaw just a little more. But he had to hold on. At least a little longer.

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  “Perhaps we will clear the forest and find a farmhouse or a roadside inn soon?” Lapat suggested. “A place to stop for the night and step out of this wretched rain. I... I am unsure how much further I can go on today.”

  “No,” Deskin said firmly in a sudden mood of seriousness. “Can’t be caught out in the open. Don’t know who is looking for the ring or survivors of Meerside. We will stay in the woods.”

  “I am not accustomed to rummaging in the forest like a wanted brigand,” Lapat grumbled.

  Mud squelched against every step, and even the trees around them seemed weighed heavily by the constant downpour. Lapat’s sleeves ran wet, wiping back snot and water as the cold crept into his body with malicious intent. His boots were cracking and tearing, the moisture eating away the strength of the leather as the chills devoured his flesh.

  Finally, Deskin threw up his hands in anger. “This is pointless! We are lost!”

  Lapat rolled his eyes with a sigh. “Verna knows where she leads us.”

  “I’m not lost.” Verna turned, biting her lip uncertainly. “We just have a little further to go. I think.”

  Frustration and pain splashed across Lapat like a dam near bursting, all this time held back by a naive belief of progress. “What do you mean, ‘you think’?”

  “The Gold Road should be only a little further north of us. Well, north of the river,” Verna insisted. “Then Lightfall is further north of that.”

  “I’m not so sure the old man is going to make it a little further,” Deskin mocked.

  Old man? Lapat willed back a flame of irritation. “Yes, if my memory serves correctly, it is further north. However, this trek has weighed heavily on us all. We have wounds.”

  “Hear that? Old man has some scrapes. Verna, can’t you fix him up?” Deskin wiggled his outstretched fingers. “Do a little Malina magic and poof? Or you, old man? Thought you were a wizard.”

  “That is not how magic functions,” Lapat growled, interrupting the priestess.

  “Why not?” Deskin shot back. “Seems pretty useless if you can’t even do anything with it when you need it.”

  “It is not useless,” Lapat insisted. “It is an incredibly intricate and complex power that demands years of study to understand, let alone wield and control. I’ve spent my life studying it. Even with my decades of training and mastery, the power I wield is ultimately blunt and slow. Healing someone requires finesse. The body is too intricate. As Verna is aware, only the gods are powerful enough to turn unstable power into a scalpel of precision capable of operating with finesse inside the human form.”

  Verna nodded uncomfortably. “We bear Her blessings, yes.”

  “Precisely, you bear it. You are a conduit for her power. Whereas, as a master of the Arcane Arts, I access it directly. You see, magic is an endlessly roaring river of power that is diverted through a door into the material world. A door that is near impossible to control, let alone hold back.”

  Lapat sighed, tired of this ache, this pain, this exhaustion, and more importantly, tired of Deskin. “Regardless, you of all people wouldn’t understand with all the time in the world to explain.

  “I wouldn’t understand?” Deskin sneered. “And tell me, why wouldn't I understand?”

  “It’s simple, you are a brutish criminal,” Lapat said plainly. “You lack patience, determination, and an adequate intellect for even the most rudimentary studies. You are like a hammer; you serve a purpose, one of violence. But that is all you can do. Casting is simply above you.”

  Deskin bared his teeth, his demonic look all the more barbaric. “You don’t know a damn thing about me, witch freak. Don’t act like you are better than me. Your magic is no less bloody than my daggers. At least I’m honest about who I am and what I do. When have you ever looked back at what your magic did to help anyone? How many people suffered that you wiped your hands clean of because it wasn’t up close and dirty?”

  Lapat whirled, stomping up to Deskin, anger pounding his head. “Mind your tongue, boy! I’m no killer! I never wanted to hurt anyone!” He twisted his fists, hands shaking with rage. “I didn’t ask to be part of this! I seek knowledge. You are a slave to greed. I didn’t ask you to join us!”

  “Guys,” Verna pleaded. “I know we are all cold and tired, but please let’s not argue.”

  “No,” Deskin hissed. “Let the old man speak. About time he grew some teeth. Tell me what you really think.”

  “Cocky, dangerous, insubordinate, childish. I think you are nothing. A low life. A leech on society. You don’t build. You don’t create. You take. You tear down. You are too lazy or stupid to make something of yourself, so you gave up and steal from everyone who worked hard enough to be something.”

  Lapat knew he should have stopped. A rational part of his mind told him it was too much, not productive, each word falling from his lips like a poison. But it felt good. All the anger and rage burned hot in his chest.

  “Why should you suffer it alone?” The voice cooed. “Your skin itches and peels from within. Your body rages against your soul, fighting a contagion that can never be halted. You carry the weight of a life of mistakes, and you bear it in silence. But this…boy. He doesn’t understand sacrifice. He doesn’t understand selflessness.”

  “Worse of all, you drag others into it!” Lapat pointed to Verna, refusing to take his eyes off Deskin. “How many people have you hurt because you messed up during your crimes? How many people were forced to watch as you stole everything from them? How many have you killed because they saw too much? You are selfish, childish, and nothing more than a stain in the history book. A body left behind in a bloody crime of your own making.”

  “Guys,” Verna pleaded. “You need to stop, this isn’t-”

  “No, let him talk!” Deskin barked, never looking away from Lapat. “Let’s see who the old man really is. Because he’s had you convinced, he’s innocent, hasn’t he?” Deskin shoved a finger into Lapat’s chest. “That is your game. You prance around claiming to know so much, but when it comes down to it, you are nothing but a stuck-up prick. Privileged and raised on a silver spoon. Told what a good boy you are.”

  “Stop! There is something wrong-” Verna shouted, but it was a dull hum in the background. The very air between Deskin and Lapat was near electric. Lapat’s blood was hot. His power groaning to be released.

  “You don’t know real work. You lie on a pedestal and look down on the rest of us, but at least I actually give a damn about something!” Deskin leaned in like he was sharing a secret, his breath hot. “And let’s be honest. No one believes your bullshit story about your wife. If she exists at all, she’s back home thanking the gods you finally left her alone.”

  Rage consumed Lapat. A quaking, animalistic hate finally let loose that drove his blood to fire, his fingers cracking with flame. “Don’t you dare talk about my wife!”

  He grabbed Deskin’s chest, yanking him off the ground. “Say her name! Say it one time and it will be your last!” Lapat’s chest heaved, the anger flooding his veins. The power soared through him like a torrential storm.

  Deskin snarled, spite burning in his eyes. “Your wife-”

  “STOP!” Verna screamed. “Look!”

  They turned, her terror breaking the spell between them. A wisp of ever-changing colors floated above them like smoke. Colors like the Night of Lights; magenta seen only in the sunrise, the gray of a burnt anvil. Swirling and pooling, Lapat followed its tail down. Ripples of color emitted from him, cast off his body as if alight. He released Deskin and stumbled back.

  “Are you...alright?” Deskin asked, baffled.

  Lapat touched the greatest source of the wisp gingerly, half expecting to feel the heat of his power. His infected arm, the disease hidden from the others, buzzed with energy. “It’s...I... magic.”

  He was alight with ecstatic currents, a wave flooding his entirety. His mind, body, and soul were awash in strength. The power was natural, easy, untethered. It coursed from him, bending and twisting, seemingly feeding and fueling off his arm. “I don’t understand,” Lapat said in awe. He looked up, awestruck and amazed. “How is this possible?”

  “You two were fighting and then the ring…” Verna opened her palm where the snaking cloud gathered. The ring emitted a dim emerald glow, awash in the colored smoke that seemed to leach into the band.

  “What did you do?” Lapat said, astonished, his mind racing.

  “Nothing! I can’t- I just felt it. And you were so angry. And when I touched it, you only got worse and wouldn’t listen.”

  The ring continued to glow, shining brighter as more of the wisp coalesced and disappeared into it.

  “It must have magical properties,” Lapat gasped. “Outside of opening the gate. Surely the ring can close it, but this is...” Lapat laughed giddily. “This is incredible! Impossible! This defies everything we understand. I had thought the ring was activated by some other force, but this… This will change everything.”

  “Put it away.” Deskin’s voice was cold and sharp.

  Lapat shook his head. “Put it away?”

  “Stop your magic. Stop whatever this floating stuff is and put the ring away.” His face was stern, deadly serious.

  “This is the most miraculous event of the century! The millennium!” Lapat insisted, unable to tear his sight from the ring. “I need to study it! Understand it!”

  Deskin rushed forward, closing his hand atop Verna’s open palm. “We aren’t the only ones looking for it. Put. It. Away.”

  Verna stared at him, nodded, and hid the ring away in her robes. Lapat watched as it fell into the cloth, the green light going dark. The colorful wisps around him faded until it was as though they were never there. The energetic buzz in Lapat’s arm slowed and dissipated. He was left tired, sore, and empty.

  “Let’s keep going,” Deskin ordered. “Rain might only get worse.” Verna followed him, leaving Lapat behind.

  “But you don’t understand-” He coughed, cringing in anticipation of the burning in his throat, but none came. He touched his neck gently as if afraid to break it. But he was fine.

  Hesitantly, he cleared his throat, expecting sharp needles of pain, but there was nothing. It was as though he’d never felt sick at all. Possibilities raced through his mind, a thousand questions, all trumped by a single curiosity.

  Once Verna and Deskin were out of sight, Lapat pulled back his sleeve, his hands trembling. The black sores had retreated.

  What once covered his forearm now speckled just past his wrist. He prodded his flesh gingerly, sure that it was some trick of the light. But it wasn’t.

  The skin was warm, natural, his.

  The Black Rot had healed.

  “How is this possible?”