The three remaining scorpion-mantis chimeras didn’t wait for a formal invitation. They skittered forward in a terrifying, synchronized rhythm, their multifaceted eyes reflecting the dim, bioluminescent moss of the grove like shattered mirrors. But even as they closed the distance, they didn’t seem to notice that the power dynamic of the forest had fundamentally shifted.

  I was no longer the human who had been hunted like prey since he arrived. I was a towering nightmare of bone-white skin and corded muscle, standing nearly eight feet tall. Though slender, each limb felt weighted with terrible purpose, thrumming with power that seemed to resonate from marrow to flesh. The largest chimera, the same armored behemoth that had nearly torn me apart minutes ago, now had to crane its segmented neck upward, all those glittering eyes reflecting my transformed silhouette.

  "Well isn’t that a kick to the nuts," I said, my voice so deep it barely sounded like me anymore. I couldn't help the dark, giddy thrill at the change of circumstances. "Doesn’t feel so good to no longer be the biggest kid on the block does it?"

  The lead beast seemed unfazed by my taunting and lunged. Its remaining scythe-arm snapped toward my neck with the speed of a falling guillotine. In my old body, I would have been decapitated before I could blink. Now? The chimera’s attack looked like it was moving through water. I could sense the angle, the point of impact, even the wind resistance. Everything was moving so slow. It was like playing a video game where I’d suddenly turned on every cheat code at once.

  The serrated limb slashed toward me, but I caught it casually like someone might catch a thrown baseball. My obsidian claws punctured the creature's armor, sinking in with surprising ease. The violet energy that had transformed me no longer felt foreign. I could feel that the snarling wolf-spirit of Nyxora's magic had completely merged into me, the use of its power becoming as natural as breathing. The struggle for control was over. It was simply me now.

  With a laughing snarl, I jerked my arm outward. Snap. The sound of the chitin cracking was like shattering the world’s largest egg. I ripped the limb clean from its torso and tossed it aside. Black fluid sprayed in an arc as I tossed the severed appendage aside. Twenty four hours ago, the sight would have turned my stomach. Instead, watching that ichor fountain from the wound sent a thrill through me I'd never felt before, like I'd finally woken up after a lifetime of sleepwalking.

  This is what I've been missing, I realized, as the armless creature scrambled in circles, leaking black fluid with every desperate movement. Not the violence but the control. For once I wasn't just reacting, wasn't just surviving. The power humming through my veins meant I was finally writing my own story instead of being a footnote in someone else's.

  A spray of ichor hit my face, smelling like rotting meat and causing me to gag a bit. “Ok. Yeah. That was gross.”

  Wiping the gore from my face, I caught a glimpse of Lyren out of the corner of my eye. She was pale, her knuckles white on her staff, but the look on her face wasn't just fear. Across our bond I felt a burning, sharp frustration. As a Hunter of the Sealdair, she was used to being the one doing the protecting, not the one being rescued. I could feel her anger at her own weakness, the injuries and the exhaustion from defending my body while I was out had left her barely able to stand, and she clearly hated it. But beneath the frustration, there was a growing worry. She wasn't just worried I’d get hurt; she was worried I was enjoying this too much.

  "Myles! Look out!" Lyren shouted. I had been distracted by delving in her emotions but that had allowed me to feel her fear flare before her words ever hit my ears.

  I quickly spun. The second chimera, the smallest and fastest of the three, charged from my left, its stinger whipping over its head like a lash. The barb buried itself deep in my upper chest. I went down to one knee as I felt my collarbone shatter and the burn of venom pumping into my veins.

  Lyren's scream caught in her throat, as she surely thought I had over estimated myself, the small chimera finishing what its brethren had started. She was right of course. I had, once again, underestimated my opponents and overestimated my abilities. Fortunately, things were going to be very different this time.

  Before the stinger even left my body, the violet energy inside me roared to life, flooding the wound with savage purpose. My flesh crawled with unnatural movement as the magic launched its counteroffensive, forcing the yellow venom back through the entry point in a hissing spray.

  "Well. That’s new," I said, watching with detached fascination as my shattered collarbone reformed and skin sealed itself without leaving so much as a drop of blood behind.

  While I was still crouched down, the chimera’s stinger lashed out again, but this time I was ready. My claws flashed through the air, shearing off the barbed tip along with several segments of tail. Time seemed to slow as the severed barb tumbled end over end before landing on the ground in front of me. I plucked it from the ground, stood, and charged the armless chimera before it could scramble further away.

  With a primal roar, I plunged the venom-dripping weapon through the creature's clustered eyes. The barb punctured its head with a wet, meaty sound that vibrated up my arm. A shudder ran through the massive insect, its jointed legs folding inward like a collapsing marionette, twitching in death's final spasms before it collapsed into a tangle of broken limbs and oozing fluids.

  Celebration would have to wait. The chimera whose tail I had just borrowed screeched in pain, circling me in a blur of chitin and malice, its scythe-limbs slashing the air between us with desperate precision. But in this new body, its movements seemed almost comically telegraphed.

  Each duck and dodge felt like cheating physics, my transformed frame responding instinctually before my mind fully formed the command. I surrendered to the savage rhythm, my obsidian claws finding gaps in its armor I hadn’t noticed before and peeling back plates that had previously seemed impervious to harm. When its limbs occasionally found purchase against my alabaster skin, the wounds sealed themselves with a tingling heat, leaving only faint silver traces that faded even as I watched.

  I danced with the chimera, each slash of my claws washing away the helplessness of the past days—no, the past years. Black ichor sprayed across my alabaster skin, each drop a victory, each pained twitch of the monster before me a reminder that I was no longer prey. I craved more. These creatures didn't have enough blood to quench this new thirst.

  The battle trance had blinded me so completely that I missed the third chimera's calculated retreat. As I dismembered its brethren, it assessed the situation with cold insect intelligence. Its compound eyes flickered between us, mandibles clicking in what might have been frustration before it abandoned any pretense of fighting me. It skittered past our battle toward the only vulnerable target in the clearing. Lyren.

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  Shit!

  My opponent was a mess of leaking wounds and cracked chitin, but its compound eyes still burned with predatory intent. I couldn't risk turning my back on it, even with Lyren in danger but if I didn’t move now I’d never make it in time to protect her. There was no more time to play as time compressed into heartbeats.

  With all my strength, I lunged forward, obsidian claws extended like living blades. The first strike punctured the chimera’s thorax with a wet crunch. The second tore through the thin connection between its mantis head and body, severing it completely in a spray of black ichor.

  The monster's body crumpled to the ground behind me, but I was already turning. Thirty feet away, the third monster skittered toward Lyren with enough speed that even with my enhanced reflexes, I'd never cross the distance in time. For a heartbeat, terror threatened to paralyze me.

  Then I felt it, another power stirring beneath the violet energy that had transformed my body. I plunged my consciousness inward, finding that pristine white chamber within my mind. There, the owl's sigil pulsed with golden-white light. I reached for it, feeling calming power filling my meridians that lit up like rivers of starlight beneath my skin.

  A word tore from my throat. "Scoram!" alien yet familiar, as if I'd known it all my life but never spoken it aloud. The syllables vibrated through my bones, and a pulse of icy cold power surged through my pathways, converging in my outstretched hand.

  The air near Lyren and the charging chimera suddenly compressed, the air distorting with an audible warble. There, hovering in defiance of reality, a spectral claw took form. My claw, but magnified to monstrous proportions, its translucent fingers spanning six feet from thumb to pinky, the entire apparition pulsing with the same white-gold radiance that now coursed beneath my skin.

  The spectral hand moved as an extension of my own, responding to my slightest gesture with perfect synchronicity. I reached forward with my arm, and the massive construct snatched the chimera mid-air, its scythes just inches from Lyren's face.

  The creature's spindly mantis body appeared distorted within the translucent fingers as they closed around it, the scorpion part of the monster futilely trying to sting the intangible hand. When I squeezed my fist, the ghostly appendage constricted with devastating force. A series of wet cracks echoed through the clearing as the chimera’s thin limbs snapped like twigs. Its exoskeleton buckled inward, dark fluid erupting from the seams, before its bulbous head burst with a sound like stepping on overripe fruit.

  But I wasn’t finished, I was pissed.

  One gesture of my hand and the spectral fingers obeyed, wrenching the mantis portion from the rest of the monster and launching it deep into the forest. I rotated my hand, clenching my fingers into a fist and smashing into the ground before me. The earth trembled beneath my feet as the ghostly appendage mirrored my movement, descending with divine fury upon the scorpion's thorax. The creature's exoskeleton yielded instantly, a violent eruption of viscera and soil spraying outward from the impact.

  I was about to pull back and smash the creature a second time when the white-gold energy connecting me to the manifestation of my claws wavered, then broke. The massive hand shimmered briefly before dissolving into motes of light, leaving behind nothing but a shallow depression filled with the pulverized remains of my enemy.

  My body suddenly felt like lead. I groaned as my bones shrank with a chorus of agonizing pops, and my muscles receded until I was back to the form I’d been since my transformation in the grotto. The only lingering effect of the battle was a large scar on my shoulder, a silvery, raised reminder of where the flesh had been molded back together.

  A weak pulse from my nexus left me with the impression that I could likely fix the unsightly scar with some practice but that would have to be tomorrow Myles’s problem. I was way too tired to try and call upon any of my new abilities for at least a little while. Not to mention the fact that we weren’t even free of the Glimmerwood yet.

  For now, silence reclaimed the small clearing. I unsteadily walked over to my elven companion, the trauma of my body shifting between forms slowly fading but leaving the copper taste of blood in my mouth.

  Lyren leaned against her staff, eyes wide, staring at the crater where my spell had left a gory mess.

  “I’m sorry, “ I said, stopping next to her. I was worried she was angry with me but when she turned to look up at me, an excited look of wonder spread across her tired face.

  "Myles. You’re a Cyphra," she said, reaching out to grab my arm. “How is this possible?”

  She was shaking but I couldn’t tell if it was from fatigue, her injuries, or whatever this Cyphra thing was. From the boneless way Lyren stood, like the only thing holding her up was the death grip she held on her staff, I worried she was going into shock or something. Despite her excitement Lyren’s eyes were sunken with dark circles highlighting how exhausted she was.

  “Are you ok?” I asked, ignoring her question for now but she only nodded numbly.

  Not sure what was wrong, I began checking her out to see if she had any injuries but surprisingly she seemed in better shape than I remembered her being before I had my little roommate drama within my soul.

  As I examined Lyren, she didn't resist. Her skin retained the warmth I recalled, and the familiar spark passed between us when we touched. A small gasp escaped her, but she didn't withdraw. I struggled to concentrate on my task, trying not to be distracted by the desire emanating from her as she pushed into my touch.

  My amateur assessment revealed that her arm was still broken, though no new damage was apparent. Curiously, the wounds on her shoulder and neck looked as if they had been healing for days.

  Lyren didn’t mention any healing abilities but then again she still hasn’t told me what her other affinity is. I guess it's possible that all mages have some sort of heightened healing factor but I get the feeling that isn’t it.

  When I stopped fussing over her when I realized she was looking up at me with those piercing green eyes. Despite the newness of it, I could feel that she was probing the bond for something but I wasn’t sure what. All I knew was that this amazing woman had saved my life twice now and suffered much because of that.

  You are such a self centered ass Garber. This woman has been hurt and exhausted since the moment you met her. Her friends died only yesterday and on top of that she was almost turned into a monster in what had to be an intensely traumatic experience. Grow the fuck up. She needs you now. You need to be a man and make protecting her your number one priority at least until you can get her to a doctor.

  "Myles…,” She said, never taking her eyes from mine. “Only the Cyphra possess the Axion affinity. Are you…I don’t understand."

  I wiped a smear of black ichor from her cheek, my hands starting to steady. "That doesn’t matter right now. All that matters is that we need to get you away from here and out of this miserable forest."

  Lyren smiled weakly.

  “I’m going to carry you for a while if that’s ok?” The petite redhead looked like she was going to protest but I scooped her up before she had the chance. She was surprisingly light even with her staff clutched against her chest.

  “Just tell me where to go. I think I can run fast enough to get us good and away from here before any other forest natives decide to check out what all the noise was about” I said. She seemed to realize I might be on to something. That or she was simply too tired to argue with me.

  “The trail continues over there,” she nodded to my right. She glanced up at the sky peaking between the branches of the dense canopy above. “If we follow it, the trail should lead us out of the Glimmerwood in just a few hours. That should be plenty of time before dusk.”

  She was starting to nod off in my arms even as she spoke, which was probably best. From what she said the only sleep she had in the last two days was the brief period of time she was unconscious in the grotto and that couldn’t have been more than an hour or two at the most.

  “Get some rest,” I said. And with that I took off along the trail running as fast as I could manage without tripping or jostling my passenger too much.