The world became a dizzying blur of sky, stone, and screaming wind. Kaelen's stomach lurched into his throat as the ground rushed up to meet him with terrifying speed. The five voices in his head, momentarily silenced by the shock of the leap, erupted into a fresh chorus of panic.
You idiot! What did you do?! Lyra's thought was a white-hot brand of terror and anger. We're going to splatter!
The calculations were flawed! The thrust-to-weight ratio was completely— Corvin's analytical panic was cut short by a wave of sheer vertigo.
Brace for impact! Bren's command was a low rumble, an attempt to impose order on the chaos. Tense the muscles in the legs and back!
This vessel will be irreparably damaged, Silas observed, his cold analysis somehow more frightening than the panic. A fall from this height will result in multiple compound fractures, internal hemorrhaging—
Stop it! All of you, stop! Kaelen's own voice, a raw, mental scream, cut through them. He was just a cup, but the wine was about to spill, and the cup did not want to break. Help me!
A new presence surged forward. It was not a voice of fire or stone, but of fluid adaptability. Elara.
The Aeromancer! her thought flowed, urgent but clear. Stop trying to calculate the fall and arrest it! You know how! The Hydromancer is right—tense the core! Pyromancer, your energy is useless here, cease your flailing! Necromancer, unless you can make us intangible, be silent!
Her commands, born of a discipline that understood redirecting force, were a lifeline. Corvin, jolted into focus by her direct address, seized control of the instinct he'd unleashed.
Kaelen felt his arms fling out wide, not of his own volition. His fingers splayed, and a desperate, raw power screamed from him. The air around his plummeting form shuddered, compressed, and then pushed back.
It wasn't graceful. It wasn't the controlled descent of a master Aeromancer. It was a violent, chaotic series of air bursts that buffeted him, slowing his fall in jarring, neck-snapping increments. He was a stone skipped across an invisible pond, each impact with a cushion of air a brutal shock to his system.
He hit the sloping, tiled roof of a lower building feet-first with a crack that echoed through his bones. His legs buckled. Momentum carried him forward, and he tumbled, a puppet with its strings cut, rolling and crashing down the slope before sliding over the edge.
Another gut-wrenching drop. Shorter this time.
He landed in a deep, foul-smelling puddle in a narrow alleyway with a splash that soaked him to the skin. The impact drove the air from his lungs. For a long moment, he just lay there on his back, staring up at the narrow strip of twilight sky between the towering buildings. The cold water seeped through his robes, a mundane shock against the supernatural agony that still throbbed in every fiber of his being.
The five voices were quiet, stunned into submission by the brutal landing.
Slowly, Kaelen pushed himself up onto his elbows, coughing up a mouthful of muddy water. Every muscle screamed in protest. He was a symphony of pain, each movement a discordant note played by a different part of his body.
Well, Corvin's thought came, weak and shaky. That was… suboptimal.
Suboptimal? Lyra shrieked internally. We nearly died! Again! Because you decided to throw us out a window!
The alternative was being captured by a dozen very angry battle-mages! Corvin shot back, his fear morphing into defensiveness. My actions were a logical response to an immediate threat!
A response that almost ended us, Silas intoned. The structural integrity of the vessel's right ankle is compromised. A minor fracture. My senses can feel the misalignment of the bone.
A fresh wave of pain shot up Kaelen's leg, now that it had been pointed out. He groaned, pulling the leg closer. "It hurts," he whispered, his voice a hoarse croak.
Pain is data, Silas replied, unmoved. It informs us of damage. We must find a place of concealment. The guards will be searching.
The Geomancer is correct, Bren's steady voice agreed. We are exposed here. We must find stable ground. Somewhere we can fortify.
Fortify? With what? Lyra snapped. We're one man with a broken ankle and five opinions on everything!
We have five sets of knowledge, Elara interjected, her tone striving for peace. We have a Pyromancer who can create fire, a Geomancer who can sense the stability of structures, an Aeromancer who can listen for pursuers, a Necromancer who can… sense life signs? And we have Kaelen, who knows this city.
All five minds turned their attention inward, toward the core presence that was the vessel himself. It was a disorienting feeling, like being stared at by a crowd.
…Do you? Corvin asked, the bravado gone from his mental voice, replaced by a genuine need. Do you know where we are?
Kaelen looked around, blinking water from his eyes. The alley was dark, reeking of garbage and stagnant water. But he recognized the moss growing on the north-facing wall, the distinctive crooked chimney of the chandler's workshop looming over them.
"This… this is the Warrens," he said aloud, the words feeling strange. "The old artisan's quarter. Near the western drainage run-off."
A slum. Good, Silas thought. High population density, low enforcement presence. Ideal for hiding.
Also ideal for getting robbed and murdered in our sleep, Lyra grumbled.
Then it is fortunate we are no longer five easily-targeted apprentices, Silas retorted. Now, vessel. Kaelen. Can you walk?
Gritting his teeth, Kaelen tried to put weight on his injured ankle. A bolt of white-hot pain made him gasp and stumble against the damp alley wall.
Clearly not, Lyra said.
The Necromancer said it was a fracture, Bren's voice rumbled, thoughtful. The earth does not heal quickly. But it remembers its shape. It can be reminded.
What are you suggesting, rock-for-brains? Lyra asked.
I am suggesting, Bren said, his will focusing, that I can encourage the bone to remember its wholeness. It will not be a true healing. It will be… a reinforcement. A temporary fix. It will be painful.
More pain? Wonderful, Corvin sighed.
Do it, Kaelen whispered, his forehead pressed against the cold stone. He couldn't be caught here. He couldn't go back to being called an abomination.
He felt a shift within. It was like a part of his mind he never knew existed suddenly flexed. A deep, resonant energy, slow and inexorable, gathered in his core and then sank down into his leg. It was not a soothing feeling. It was the sensation of gravel grinding, of immense pressure, of being stone itself.
A choked cry escaped his lips as the pain in his ankle flared, hotter than any fire, a deep, bone-deep ache that made his vision swim. Then, as suddenly as it came, it receded, leaving behind a dull, persistent throb. The sharp, stabbing pain was gone.
Hesitantly, he put weight on it again. It held. It was stiff and sore, but it held.
It will suffice for several hours, Bren said, his mental voice sounding slightly strained. No more aeromatic acrobatics.
Aero-what?* Corvin began, offended.
Quiet! Elara's thought cut through. I hear them.
Everyone fell silent. Kaelen held his breath, listening. Faintly, from the direction of the main thoroughfare, came the sound of booted feet marching in unison, the clank of armor, and raised voices.
—check the side alleys! The Archmage wants the abomination found!
The abomination. The word hung in the shared space of their mind, ugly and final.
Move, Silas commanded, his voice like ice. Now. Deeper into the Warrens. Use the vessel's knowledge.
Pushing off from the wall, Kaelen limped hurriedly down the alley, away from the sounds of pursuit. He was no longer just Kaelen, the neutral vessel. He was a fugitive, a container of five warring souls, running for his life through the dripping, darkened streets of his own city, with the voices of his passengers as his only guide.