“Hey! It’s time,” Cynthia whispered.

  Wretch opened his dark orbs to look around the room, the color of the sky above replaced by shades of gray. He had gotten thinner, and no longer noticed the smell in the room, though he was certain it reeked.

  Holding out his hand, he willed the Blinking Blade into his palm and Victoria revealed the rope. They passed up the blade to Ezra, the kid had grown mute once more, but he still did what Wretch had asked of him, reflecting the light to a point the others couldn’t see.

  Wretch observed his Ember and dove his consciousness into the flame, visualizing a clawed arm that grew and a lower jaw that mended itself. He let the flame loose, whispering to it instead of dragging it by force. The heat darted through his body, his arm and partially healed jaw twitching and regenerating. It should have hurt, but he barely noticed.

  His control was improving by leaps and bounds. When he before had needed a full charge to regrow his arm, it now took three-fourths.

  He glanced at Boris, slumped and snoring in his chair. Daybreak would come, and the ritual of pain would repeat. The clock clicked its way to seven, and he thought of the Richter’s house.

  I miss it.

  Many times, he had asked the professor if they were alive, and the professor would answer without a hint of doubt.

  “No.”

  The happy twins, the focused and experienced captain that cared, despite his love for money. The all-knowing and misplaced Astrid and the crude and destructive Elenya. Maybe they didn’t make it. Maybe the masked man that stayed to fight really killed them all.

  He watched the glimmer of the blade above, and for the first time he let the realization hit.

  I am the only one left.

  He waited for crushing grief. Nothing came. He was hollow, and that hurt more than any jagged blade.

  Footsteps echoed from beyond the door, far too early.

  “Quick, hide the rope!” he hissed.

  “Shit!” Victoria said, scrambling the rope back into her wild tuft of hair.

  He held out his hand and conjured the dagger, it burned away from Ezra’s hands and into his own. He filled it with new flame and dropped it into the bucket with a wet plop.

  The door groaned open.

  The professor and his masked underlings stomped inside. Boris grunted and opened his eyes, shooting to his unsteady feet.

  “Sorry! Boris forgot the time,” he mumbled through yellowed teeth.

  “Oh no need to apologize,” the professor said as he patted the shoulder of the hunched man. “I am rather early today, inspiration struck. I tried to wait, but alas, my ingenuity would not grant me rest.”

  Wretch’s heart hammered in his chest. “What do you need?”

  The professor stepped up to him with a curious look as his cold eyes bored holes into him. He didn’t answer, studying Wretch crammed in his cage.

  Then, a twitch in his brow and for the first time in weeks, he looked up at the other prisoners.

  “I had a plan,” he said at last. “But, scholars and Blessed need to be able to adapt, and I am both.”

  Wretch craned his neck to follow the man as he walked around the room, trying to discern what he meant.

  “Are you killing me?” Wretch said.

  The man scoffed. “Stop that nonsense. I wouldn’t hurt a guest of the house, and you know that much.” The professor said, a hint of irritation in his voice.

  “If you are not here to cut me open, why are you here? I doubt it was to teach,” Wretch answered, trying to steer the conversation in its usual pattern and away from the others.

  “Teach?”

  The professor rubbed his chin, “why yes, in a way I am here to teach.”

  Wretch feigned a sigh of dejection, his heart still trying to rip through his chest.

  “Lets get it over with,” he said as he extended an arm through the bars.

  The professor waved him off.

  “I learned a lot from my time at the von Agér college,” the professor said as he stopped in front of the cage and his face was stern.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “And…”

  He came closer, just out of reach.

  “When a student is hiding something... I could always tell.”

  Wretch held a clawed hand behind his back as the man articulated the words, not breaking eye-contact.

  “Boris, lower the cages. We’ll begin with an unannounced search.”

  Wretch lunged. Throwing his weight against the bars, razor sharp claw flashing towards the man.

  He was too far away, the man always kept his distance, but something burned into his hand. The fiery, half formed Blinking Blade slashed through the air, whistling towards the man’s throat.

  He’d kill him right here.

  A blur intercepted, the laughing mask moving like lightning.

  Steel met steel with a clang. The rapier halted Wretch’s conjured blade a hair’s breadth from the professor’s skin.

  The laughing mask moved again, almost too fast for his eyes to catch.

  His hand fell to the floor, severed with a clean cut.

  He roared, but not from pain. Wracking in his cage, slamming against the bars like a true beast. Through it all, the professor didn’t flinch.

  Calmly he picked up the blade, studying it and gazing around the tower.

  “Oh my lovely little Wretch. You are a crafty one…”

  Wretch still reached for him, the bars pressing against his neck and torso.

  “If you don’t tell me what you were planning,” the professor said softly. “I'll kill the others and leave you here alone.”

  Cynthia made the choice for him.

  “We reflected the morning light,” she whispered, tears streaming down her cheeks. “We hoped someone outside might see…”

  The professor looked at his masked assistant, holding a bloodied rapier and staring at Wretch in his cage.

  ”We knew he had a blessed weapon, correct? This is a grave mishap.”

  The figure, with a laughing mask didn’t look away from Wretch in his cage.

  ”We didn’t see it clearly in the storm, we figured he had lost it in the chase. It was our mistake.”

  The professor nodded, then his smile grew grim.

  “Give this to Marish, He can curse it for the time being.”

  Wretch bit down until blood filled his mouth.

  “I’ll kill you. I’ll tear you to shreds with these claws. Burst your eyes, wring your necks. You’ll beg, I promise."

  The professor didn’t seem impressed.

  “You are clever, Wretch, but cleverness does not exempt us from the weight of our actions. What can a professor do to dissuade such behavior?”

  The professor stood in thought for a moment. Then burst into laughter, struggling to draw in air as he doubled over.

  “They say you should return villainy with kindness. And I am nothing if not kind.” The professor said while wiping a tear from his eye.

  Wretch blinked away tears of his own. Cynthia sobbed in her cage. Victoria curled into a ball, rocking silently. Ezra sat motionless while Jonah leaned back against the wall of his cage. Still dangling his only leg as he looked up towards the gears above.

  No one is coming, Wretch thought

  “I just decided,” The professor said while straightening. “One of you will get the pleasure of leaving your cage today. Fetch the keys!”

  He waved and an assistant left the room.

  “Any volunteers? I might just let you walk out the front door! If you still can.”

  “Take me,” Wretch began. “It was...”

  The professor raised a hand, silencing him.

  “Not you, my little troublemaker, no. They will bear the burden of your actions. You know why?”

  The professor stepped close again, just beyond reach.

  “Because I know you, Wretch.”

  “And I know it will break you.”

  Wretch’s pupils constricted, a cold spreading through his core.

  “You’re a monster,” he whispered. “You take pleasure in this.”

  The professor lit up with a wide smile, and for the first time since they met, the smile reached his eyes. His word came back as a whisper, slow enough for only him to hear.

  “At first that was true, but look at you now, your beauty, your resilience, I am molding you into something great, something worthy of our gifts.”

  Only the groans of chains answered him.

  “Take me,” Jonah said with his only leg, looking down from above. His eyes were clear.

  “Very well. Raise the other cages, this man here just earned freedom!”

  Jonah breathed deep, the type you did before diving off a cliff.

  “If you get out,” he said. “Go to Salvinjad road. Ask for the Ivanov family, tell my brothers… tell them I love them.” Jonah said, and for once, there was no joy in his voice.

  “You will have to become a Fireling for the both of us,” Jonah continued.

  Wretch’s throat ached, and he struggled to speak.

  “I am so, so sorry.”

  One of the masked assistants returned and Jonah’s broken body was gently lifted from the cage, carried like a child through the door.

  Over the shoulder of the laughing mask, Jonah and Wretch locked eyes. His mouth moved, cracked lips shaping words.

  Goodbye, friend.

  Sidekick Fights Back

  by TheLazyDreamer

  What to Expect:

  ? Cunning Protagonist

  ? Rich World-Building

  ? Unique Destiny Manipulation (LitRPG-Adjacent)

  ? Romance and Family Building

  ? Epic Conflicts and Intriguing Mysteries