text: Putting Breena's moment on hold, and trusting Eadric to make sure the surviving, unconscious enemy was secured, I turned to check on the people we had just rescued. Guineve's shell of protective covering had finally faded from them, revealing them to be completely unharmed from our fight. Hailing from the Woadlands, they were a beautiful people, with black, brown or red hair, and skin ranging from pale to slightly tan. None of them were as tall as I was but a few of them were just at six feet, and their ears slanted to slight points. Blue whirls of Woad paint, the namesake of their world, adorned various places of their bodies, usually a cheek, wrist, or shoulder.
  
  They were also all bruised, dirty, and disheveled. I wasn't completely fluent on reading the ages of their race but I could tell that no elderly were with them, and they were mostly women and children.
  
  They were also, very, very afraid.
  
  "What happened?" a woman in a torn dress stammered.
  
  One of the few men, a shirtless fellow with braided brown hair, stood in front of the group.
  
  "Who are you?" he demanded, though his tone was a careful balance between caution and deference. "What do you want?"
  
  "To free you and save your lives," I replied simply. "I'm Challenger Wes Malcolm and you're on Avalon now. If you come with us, you'll be taken care of. The other ex-prisoners can vouch for me if you need. But you all need to be fed and have your wounds looked at."
  
  "The Challenger is dead," the man replied carefully. "He died fifty years ago. Everyone claiming to be him has been an imposter sent by the Earthmen to deceive us."
  
  The last group had told me something similar. It had been an aggravating bit of news. Especially since Rhodes' people had started off their conquests by saying I had already died for good.
  
  "I just heard about that," I replied. "It's already been added to my list of things to be angry about. Since we're on Avalon, though, I can show you my Deeds and Renown, and the Satellites of the Starsown can help serve as proof."
  
  "Every imposter so far has come with a captured sprite professing to be the Holy Fairy," the man countered.
  
  "Good to know," I replied. "I'll have to figure out how that's happening. But I need to point out that you all were already captured, and already stranded on a foreign planet, so it's pretty unnecessary for me to trick you. If you want, we can look at your wounds now, and hopefully I can get you back to the Shelter and get you some food and clothing. It's that, or you guys can stay out here."
  
  It was harsh, but I needed to drive home their predicament. There wasn't anyone else who could look after them out here and if Rhodes, or the Horde, or God forbid, Cavus, found a way to invade Avalon again I really was their only hope. Being afraid of me wouldn't change that.
  
  The bare-chested man finally nodded, and the group shuffled forward. Breena flew over to look at them, and they marveled at her as she cast healing spell after healing spell. I guess they were able to recognize the real thing after all. Virtus hung back and threw on another cloak, but the other former prisoners stepped forward to help any way they could, usually by providing spare cloaks of their own.
  
  I turned forward to engage our last prisoner, drawing the dagger I had put away at the end of the battle. Shadow had begun to travel over my body, blurring my form slightly. It reminded me of Stell when her body was in between changes. I didn't know why the dagger could do that or the limits of its power, but it had been an excellent complement to Guineve's veiling magic, so I had been putting it to use all day.
  
  Right now I was going to use it to hide myself while I used a newly discovered spell from the Ideal of Blood to charm and interrogate the surviving Malus man. Eadric had explained that he would wake up after a minute of two of being knocked out. Then, because of the way he had hit him, he would go into a full-blown coma and probably die, unless his vital guard held off the damage somehow.
  
  Except I couldn't, because he was already dead.
  
  He had been bound by coils of mist that had looped around his limbs, courtesy of Guineve's magic. But his neck was also bound, and twisted at an angle about ninety degrees different from what it should normally be.
  
  "Guineve?" I asked carefully.
  
  "Yes, dear Wes?"
  
  Stell's oldest Satellite walked out of the mist to answer me. Like every aspect of Stell so far, she was a beautiful woman. Tall, graceful, dignified, imperious, and somehow playful all at once. Raven-dark hair crowned her head and draped down her shoulders, framing a pale face with deeply red lips. She wore a dress made of mist that sometimes resembled a gown, sometimes resembled a toga, but always displayed more of her admittedly impressive figure than my broken, prudish psyche was comfortable processing.
  
  Right now, though, that last bit wasn't as much of a problem, because she had just fucking murdered a guy behind my back.
  
  <Language,> the new, draconic part of my psyche admonished from out of nowhere.
  
  <I'll work on it,> I snapped back. <Now shut the hell up. And don't you curse more than me anyway?>
  
  <Oh, I know,> the New Guy answered, <I just wanted to be that guy for a couple seconds.>
  
  I shoved the rest of his words aside. I needed to get back to the whole Geneva Convention violation that just happened.
  
  "Guineve," I repeated as I regathered my thoughts. "Did you just murder a guy? That I was about to question?"
  
  "I might have, dear," the stately woman replied simply. "Let me check and make sure… yes. Yes, I did."
  
  Well, that was a new side of the woman that liked to bake us all cookies and sugar bars.
  
  "Um, can I ask why? Because I'm pretty sure we talked about interrogating these guys before killing them."
  
  And yes, I was going to kill them anyway. Because not doing so was too stupid on too many levels, the biggest of which being the fact that every one of these guys I didn't kill was just going to torture or kill someone else, and get power out of it.
  
  But it felt wrong to have a piece of Stell make that call. Even though I knew it was a hypocritical, probably chauvinistic feeling. But after seeing what was happening to Breena, it was a decision I had doubled down on.
  
  "I already interrogated him, my dear Wes," Guineve answered calmly. "His mind was very unguarded, so it was easier to use my magic instead of yours this time."
  
  "And then you killed him?" I clarified.
  
  "Yes, dear." The beautiful raven-haired woman nodded. "I'll tell you why when we get back to the Shelter."
  
  She showed none of the emotional turmoil Breena was still working through. No guilt, no regret, no lingering hatred or fear of what I'd think about her. She seemed like she had just done what she thought was the best course of action for all parties involved.
  
  I still wanted to be angry with her. I wanted to argue that she had usurped my authority and went behind my back, and that I didn't appreciate her making this kind of call without me. Then I realized I was dealing with the same kind of feeling that power-hungry teachers, managers, and politicians everywhere struggled with, and that if I couldn't trust my most senior teammates to act independently every now and then, I probably wouldn't have a team left at all one day.
  
  "Alright, fine," I said, trying to put my grown-up hat back on. "I'm going to trust you on this and wait until then. Let's make sure we're done here and head back."
  
  "Of course, dear." The woman nodded as she looked at me, and for a moment I thought she was going to say something else. But then she walked over to the rescued prisoners and picked up the smallest crying child, whispering comfortingly to her.
  
  The trip back home was peaceful enough. The entire planet had already been cleared of resistance so there wasn't anyone left to give us any trouble. And even if there were, the planet itself would have informed me.
  
  I was still processing how much of an advantage that was. Knowing where the enemy was, and what they were doing, played possibly the largest role in my victories over the Horde and the Raw-Mawed Wolf. It was an advantage I both needed to fully understand, in order to maximize, and also an advantage I had to force myself to not depend on, because the other worlds wouldn't talk to me like Avalon did.
  
  But that depended on me thinking clearly, and that was still really hard. Even without the New Guy.
  
  <Teeth,> FNG (short for the Freaking New Guy, my other name for the jerk) spoke up during my reflection. <My name is Teeth. We agreed on that.>
  
  <Sure we did,> I responded. <Now go play with your dads.>
  
  He swore at me, but I was able to tune him out again, which made today a really good day.
  
  "Um, Wes?" Breena asked me. "Everything okay?"
  
  "Huh?" I turned to her. "Yeah. As far as I know, anyway. Why do you ask?"
  
  "Just thought I'd check," she said as she fluttered by me. She bit her lip. "Sorry for being paranoid."
  
  Oh. She had seen me grinning suddenly. And I had probably made some weird facial expressions while I was talking to Teeth, which she couldn't figure out because her bond usually didn't let her sense him.
  
  "No, you're good," I replied. "I was just having an internal conversation."
  
  "Oh, okay," my fairy companion said, accepting that fact without judgment. I was always relieved when she did that. The more I got to know Breena, the more I realized she was slow to label someone as 'crazy.' It had taken me some time to get used to that and open up to her, but the fact of the matter was that she was a tiny, spiky-haired woman with wings and sparkles, and so she spent far more of her time convincing Challengers that they weren't crazy for seeing her. "How is your new friend?"
  
  "Annoying," I admitted. "He's always saying stupid crap whenever I'm trying to concentrate on something important."
  
  "Like during a fight?" Breena asked.
  
  "No," I admitted. "He's gotten smart about that, thank God. But every now and then I'll try and have a quiet moment to myself and process things, and he starts squawking like a needy two-year old. It's aggravating, especially when there's still so much to plan."
  
  "Um," Breena said again. "You do realize he's you, right? Another half of your psyche? Formed to help you process all the trauma and changes you've undergone?"
  
  "Maybe?" I offered. It was a compromise. The truth was I didn't like to think about that idea, and if Teeth was really part of me then I didn't like what that said about me.
  
  <The feeling's mutual, super-virgin,> he suddenly quipped, getting through despite my best efforts.
  
  <Didn't I tell you to—>
  
  <Screw off? Yes! BUT YOU WON'T LET US! THAT'S THE PROBLEM!>
  
  He did have a point. And it's not like he had anywhere else to go.
  
  "It'll be fine, Wes," Breena promised me, hopefully missing every part of my internal shouting match. "All this part of you really wants is to figure out a way to deal with some urges you're probably repressing. In fact, it's good that he's bringing them to your attention."
  
  I wanted to vehemently disagree with her, but somehow she was oblivious to that fact, fairy empathy and magic Challenger bond notwithstanding.
  
  "But this always happens on some level with people who form Soul-bonds and Flesh-bonds with powerful creatures, even without everything else that's happened to you. He'll go away in time, but before then he might even help you process things."
  
  <Fat chance,> I wanted to say.
  
  <Jerk,> Teeth argued. <You should listen to her more. And be grateful a woman like that is even willing to put up with us.>
  
  <I told you,> I growled in my head. <She is too young and way too small.>
  
  <She can get bigger,> FNG retorted. <And she's older than both of us by an extremely safe margin.>
  
  "He's talking again, isn't he?" Breena asked sympathetically. "Poor guy probably just wants to feel heard. If you want I can talk to him—"
  
  "No," I said quickly. "That's okay. More importantly though—" I took a breath—"how are you doing? You kinda scared me back there."
  
  "Yeah, I'm sorry." She deflated a little, even shrank to a smaller size. "This bunch was really loud. In their heads."
  
  "Isn't everybody?" I asked.
  
  "No," she answered. "Most people guard their thoughts. All the time. I'm not even sure they realize they do it. It's really hard to read what's in your head, for example, even though I have the strongest bond with you."
  
  "Yeah, people on my planet are really paranoid about someone knowing what goes on in their heads. My country especially. We really value our privacy."
  
  "But your people can't do magic," the fairy wondered. "Most of you don't even believe in it. Why would you guard what's going on inside so carefully?"
  
  "I… don't know," I answered, pondering the issue myself for the first time. "It's just something we do."
  
  <I know,> Teeth answered. <It's because Father Aegrim taught us all to hide what was inside. So he could influence it better. He taught all the broken humans. Not just us and our ancestors.>
  
  "Well, that guy didn't," Breena said. "He didn't show it on his face, but he was almost delirious. Drunk on hurting people. Hungry for the power he'd gain from making sure they failed the challenge of staying alive. He was going to drown them, Wes." Breena shuddered. "He was going to find a way to drown one or two of them. Because he remembered the rush he got back when he drowned you, and had been obsessing over it."
  
  I nodded. I had thought the guy looked familiar. Most of the guards that had killed me in the past kind of blended together now in my memory, so I was never one hundred percent sure.
  
  "I had to make him know," Breena insisted. Her tone had become pained and defensive, and she seemed nervous. <She's afraid of what I might think of her,> I realized. "I had to make him know just how much it hurt. So I snapped. I'm sorry," she repeated, her head drooping as she hovered next to me. "I don't think he knew anything important, because all he thought about was how good it felt to kill and who to kill next. But I can't say for sure, and I didn't give you the opportunity to find out. And I probably scared you," she added in a small voice.
  
  I wanted to laugh, because the last comment was so ridiculous. Scare me? Really? Her issues should scare me? But I had just enough maturity to know just how badly Breena would misunderstand, so I leaned toward her as I talked, making a conscious effort to not guard my thoughts, and to project how I felt about her through our bond.
  
  "Hey. Breena," I said. "Use your magic fairy powers and guess how I'm feeling right now."
  
  Her spiky hair lifted as she turned her head to look at me, and her eyes narrowed as she concentrated. Then she smiled.
  
  "Oh," she giggled, and then my happy silly friend was back. "Thanks, Wes. And I love you too."
  
  I smiled back, feeling a little self-conscious, and then realized I had given her a chance to examine Teeth's feelings about her.
  
  <Hey,> he suddenly said.
  
  <What did you show her—>
  
  <Take care of her,> he cut me off. <I mean it. Treat her right.>
  
  I stumbled at that, and Breena giggled again.
  
  "Sorry," she said. "But he talked again, didn't he? It's kind of cute watching you two figure each other out."
  
  I sighed. Thankfully, though, Teeth was done talking.
  
  We arrived back at the Shelter, and I had to reflect how it had changed.
  
  Before the Dark Icon Raw-Maw's attack, the shelter had simply been one massive dome, reaching up to the heavens and across the horizon. A handful of tiny basement doors had been the only entry. But when Raw-Maw had shattered his way inside, the magic broke somehow. It wasn't much, at first. Just some stones becoming loose and falling from the walls every now and then. Then I saw some dust fall from the ceiling in the basement, and rejected the proposal that people should live down below, or even go inside. Which was inconvenient, because the underground tunnels had an inexplicably efficient transportation matrix down below.
  
  Then, when Guineve handed me the magic scabbard for my special sword handle, which may or may not have been the hilt to Excalibur, the whole thing collapsed. The entire, infinitely tall and wide sheet of solid rock, each stone weighing probably a ton, just melted into the ground.
  
  It should have caused a colossal earthquake. Should have probably created its own fault line and reconfigured the landscape. At the very least, it should have made more than a quiet series of thuds.
  
  But that's what happened. The stones just struck the grass below and crumbled into dust upon impact. Avalon informed me—after I had finished screaming—that it had absorbed the first layer of defense per ancient protocol, now that the Lord of Avalon had regained sufficient Right to Rule. This would eventually free up a considerable amount of power for other rituals, even though it would take Avalon time to redistribute all the energy.
  
  I still protested. The giant wall had proven to be a phenomenal defense against both the Raw-Mawed Wolf and his army of Hordebeasts. Even if those were the last invaders, that still didn't check the fact that there were a number of ancient evils, the chief of which possibly being an Umbra of Cavus' caliber, still below us held back by nothing but a seal that, for all I knew, was dangerously close to its expiration date. I really, really wanted my giant magic rock wall back, so that I could use the traps on it to blow something else up if we needed to.
  
  But Avalon insisted that it was unable to comply. Now that a Lord of Avalon was back, it said, it was my job to defend against Tumult-class monsters. If I wanted that massive rock wall back, I would just have to recreate the magic ritual that summoned it. One that Avalon inexplicably no longer had in its logs, despite its recent repairs.
  
  In the end I gave up screaming about it and just focused on the fact that I'd soon have more power for my other ideas.
  
  Weirdly enough, though, the underground tunnels somehow survived with no damage whatsoever. They even became more stable. They also led to a new area, one above ground. It was a massive clearing in the middle of a group of sheer cliffs I had never seen before. The ground gently sloped upward into large fields of grass, dotted here and there with small crude huts made of thatch, mud, and straw. There was enough for all of the refugees and newly resurrected Avalonians to move into, and they had done so immediately. I was worried about the condition the huts were in, but the people all assured me that these buildings were still preferable to the ruins outside, as they had roofs. They also pointed out that this spot had the best weather so far, and after a couple of days I had to agree. There was just a very light level of mist and almost no cloud cover, which meant I could actually see Avalon's white sun here. If I didn't know better, I would have assumed I had just walked into a painting depicting an idealistic vision of an old peasant village.
  
  Beyond that, there was a large building that was actually made of wood and stone. It had high walls, with windows only on the second floor and above, and looked just big enough to let me squeeze my entire community into it if I had to. There was a large front opening consisting of two doors that was wide enough to admit a fair number of people at once, but still narrow enough to barricade from the other side if one had to. The feudal defensive nature of the structure baffled me. It still wasn't anything close to the defensive value the old tunnel wall provided, and I couldn't understand why I would bother to have defenses at all this deep into my world. Anything that had gotten this far into Avalon wasn't going to be turned back by a Dark Age manor knockoff. Breena and Guineve were just as baffled by the structure as I was, and the resurrected Avalonians just said it was my lordly seat. They didn't know, or wouldn't say, why I had a lordly seat, but they all confirmed that it was the sort of thing they knew a Lord of Avalon would have.
  
  I had been frustrated and angry about the whole business right up until I realized that the manor had come with the most comfortable bed I had ever slept on, home back on Earth included. One well-rested night later, I decided to write the whole problem off as Avalon giving me its own version of 'bling'—specifically real estate.
  
  The structure seemed to have three main rooms of note: a hall for dining and meeting, a room with a chair I could apparently sit in and hold court, and a place for me to sleep. Right now I was in the hall, getting a report from Breena concerning the overall status of Avalon.
  
  "Okay," Breena sighed, then took a deep breath. "First of all, Guineve can confirm that we're not lagging behind any of the other worlds time-wise anymore. We're gaining a week at least, maybe even a month, for every day that passes on all the other worlds, not just Earth. I know you already figured that, what with the ambush and everything today, but we wanted to confirm that sort of advantage isn't going anywhere. For now, at least."
  
  "Fantastic," I replied genuinely. The one thing I had been lacking the most in trying to stop at least six apocalypses was time. It was nice to know my breathing room wasn't going anywhere, even if I still had to make full use of it.
  
  "Second, all of those people we somehow managed to bring back to life, which is… kind of a new one, even for you?" she asked herself, sighed again, then kept talking. "They're integrating pretty well. Most of the people we rescued from the Horde Pit turned out to be the fathers, husbands, and brothers of the other prisoners, so they're fitting right in, with an extra dose of happy shouts."
  
  I smiled at that. After all of the madness and pain everyone had been through, it was good to recover something thought to be lost for good.
  
  <*All is not lost*>, the quiet voice said suddenly in my mind, before vanishing again.
  
  I blinked away the distraction and turned my attention back to my bonded companion.
  
  "Okay, that's more good news. How are people dealing with the resurrected Avalonians?"
  
  "Best is answer is 'they don't know themselves,'" Breena replied. "They've accepted them for now, but no one really knows what to make of having another member from an extinct race show up on your doorstep every week or so. By the way, we're still gaining about one of them a week and I have no idea how long that will last. But everyone's just taking that fact in stride for now."
  
  "As long as everyone's getting along, I'll take it," I answered. "Are they bringing anything new with them?"
  
  "Not yet." The tiny sprite shook her head. "Most of their memories are still gone. Guineve and I are working with a couple when we have time to see what we can bring back. Best guess is that they'll gradually make a full or mostly full recovery as long as they get enough time. But no, no one has any lost tech or magical secrets to share with us yet. But the phasing trick they can all do is still really neat."
  
  "Okay." I nodded. "Do we still have enough food to handle the new people?"
  
  "Yeah." Breena nodded back. "And a lot of the people we rescued had experience in farming and cooking. Furthermore, now that the whole planet's secure, we have no problem getting any plants we want. Especially with the new seeds you created. Those are working out great."
  
  "Good," I said, although we wouldn't get the full use of the seeds Avalon created until we started visiting other worlds. Right now the five different types of super-grain were kind of redundant. <I should probably work on beans or protein plants next if I get a chance>, I thought. But for now, that took care of all the immediate concerns.
  
  "So what you're telling me is that everyone's still safe, getting fed and clothed, and that we're not in any immediate danger time-wise?"
  
  "I forgot to talk about clothes, but yep, everyone's all good." My little friend nodded. "We have food, clothing, and time. Which is why Guineve is making me put up with all of the other stuff you wanna do." Her head and shoulders sagged, and she gave me her saddest puppy-dog look yet.
  
  She looked like she was expecting me to figure out exactly why she was sad. I waited all of a half-second before answering, which was apparently too long, because she got frustrated.
  
  "She's withholding cookies!" Breena suddenly shouted. "And non-cookies too! Even the stuff I won in the bets with Stell!"
  
  So that was why her attention span had been so great these days.
  
  "Well, we had better get to it, then, so that you can get your hopes and dreams back," I said while trying to keep the irony out of my voice. Somehow it worked, because the little fairy brightened immediately.
  
  "I knew you'd get it, Wes!" she said while clapping her hands. "You're my favorite for a reason! Again! Anyway," she continued, ignoring my confusion over the 'again' part of her compliment. "Master-plan number one: portals. Actually, I shouldn't make a list because that's the only one we should focus on right now. Here's why," she added hurriedly. "The bad news is we can't use our old portal network because that's tied to Stell's main body, probably because she's still using it to jump around the different planets and coordinate with her other Satellites and provide disaster relief. We should probably leave it alone completely, because it will just endanger her if we tinker with the network at all."
  
  "Alright," I said, taking it in stride. "We still need a way to get to the other worlds though."
  
  "Yeah, totally." The little fairy nodded. "So Guineve and I were thinking we could try the old Pathways."
  
  "Yeah, I've been wondering about those," I said as I leaned forward in my seat. "Those are how the Horde and that Dark Icon came here, right?"
  
  "Right," the fairy said with a slow bob of her pink-haired head. "They fell out of use a long time ago. Back when Stell had the portal system up and running and there was no one who was allowed to visit Avalon anyway. And Guineve helped make sure no monsters came from them to attack us. Most of them have sort of collapsed, though, and it's weird that the Horde knew a way here at all."
  
  "It's also weird that you weren't attacked sooner," I answered. "Raw-Maw's team nearly thrashed us, even with Guineve backing us up."
  
  "I seem to remember it just being Raw-Maw, a nascent Dark Icon, that was the real source of the trouble. And that Guineve was still very injured at the time. And most specifically, I remember you turning red into purple again and killing a monster that was just beginning to grasp immortality itself. Instead of dying horribly on its claws and fangs, like you should have."
  
  "Wasn't that why I was able to kill it, though?" I countered. "Because it wasn't immortal yet?"
  
  Breena sighed.
  
  "You're being dense on purpose, Wes. It isn't cool anymore. You know perfectly well no one was expecting you to battle Dark Icons yet. Let alone beat them in single combat."
  
  "I thought I had help from all of you for that?" I replied. "For starters, Guineve fought him too. And all of you enhanced me in a way that I could tell cost each of you."
  
  "It did." Breena nodded again. She flew down to sit on the table, growing to the size of a small child. That was different too, and no one was explaining why she was able to get so big. "The power released from killing the monster more than made up for it, but even with Guineve helping, a believable win should still be about ten Rises away. And that's just because the Raw-Mawed Wolf hadn't finished becoming a Dark Icon yet. A full-fledged Dark Icon should still be at least twenty Rises away for you, even with a retinue of like-minded heroes and myself. A strong Dark Icon, that can draw power from a Pantheon, should be about forty Rises away. At least."
  
  I shrugged.
  
  "Don't know what to tell you. My odds feel pretty unfair, all things considered. I'm pretty happy I've been able to stand up to them so far."
  
  "So are we," Breena said quickly. "It's just causing us to constantly re-examine everything we thought we knew. Like how you were able to kill an incomplete Dark Icon."
  
  <Cough, cough, I helped, cough,> Teeth said in my mind.
  
  I ignored him.
  
  "Yeah, I think the Flesh and Soul Bonds played a large role in it. In fact, a lot of things have come easier to me since then. And I can tell that I'm gaining even more power than I used to when I Rise now."
  
  <Really?> the new guy asked. <You're really not going to give me any credit here? That whole fight was in my form!>
  
  <Sorry,> I replied. <I can't hear you over the sound of your own self-importance.>
  
  "You do know we can tell when you're having an internal conversation, right, Wes?" Breena asked. "Guineve and I figured it out. You make this weird face, like you're mad at someone, but your eyes won't roll back far enough for you to glare at them."
  
  "Sorry about that," I replied. "The new guy's kind of needy."
  
  <Asshole.>
  
  <You're welcome.>
  
  "Aaanyway," Breena interjected awkwardly. "The fact remains that you have possibly more hidden tricks and powers than all of the previous Challengers combined. We'd like to have more control of the process of awakening those, and I'd actually like to talk about that, after we wrap up our discussion on the Pathways."
  
  "Yeah, those," I said, getting back on track. "Can we use any of them?"
  
  "Well, no," Breena admitted.
  
  I glared at her.
  
  "That's not a good way to close a subject, Breena. Why can't we use any of the Pathways?"
  
  "In the first place," Breena began, "because most of them have been destroyed. That actually happened even before Stell arrived here. There were only a handful open, and they didn't seem to get a lot of traffic to begin with. After a couple millennia of nothing but monsters arriving from them for Guineve to kill, Stell went ahead and used her power as Steward to shut them down permanently. It took Guineve being out of commission for one of them to open back up, and we suspect that's the result of a whole Pantheon of Dark Icons. One that seems really motivated to come here and hunt you, specifically."
  
  "Yeah," I sighed. "That."
  
  <Kill the traitor-prince.>
  
  That's been the chant of almost every Hordebeast I encountered. That concept, that hate, had been the source of power for the Raw-Mawed Wolf to become a Dark Icon candidate.
  
  "That Pathway is still technically usable, although Guineve has locked it down to prevent further invasions. But I don't think we can use it for two main reasons: one, it's got to be firmly under enemy control if they can bring a Dark Icon through it, and two, I don't think it leads to any of the current worlds."
  
  "What do you mean any of the current—oh," I stopped myself, realizing at the last second.
  
  "The Lost Deeps," Breena said with another sad nod.
  
  The one world Stell had lost before I came.
  
  And she had lost it to the Horde's first appearance.
  
  Which meant the home base of the Horde that hated me, as well as that spectral figure that threatened me in the end, was most likely the same location.
  
  I recalled the spectral dragon's commitment to keep throwing demigods at me, and decided I wasn't ready to take on that turf yet anyway.
  
  "Fine," I admitted. "We can leave that Pathway sealed for now. But if Stell and Guineve had been closing the other Pathways, then it stands to reason we can open them again."
  
  "Yeah, reason lied," Breena admitted. "Turns out those suckers are much easier to shut down than get back up."
  
  I sighed and ran my hand through my hair.
  
  "Breena, we have to figure out a way to the other worlds. Or we'll lose them."
  
  "I know!" the fairy said as she smacked the table she was sitting on. "And ow. That's not normal wood. But we think we have a solution." She shook her tiny hand, then continued talking. "A lot of Avalon's old functions are reawakening. We think either you might be able to do it now, or you should be able to do so soon."
  
  Avalon, after inexplicably deciding I was the only candidate for lordship of its planet, assigned me a level of authority dependent on the amount of 'Right to Rule' I gained over time. As far as we had been able to determine, I gained Right to Rule whenever I got stronger, completed certain tasks, gained or improved certain items like the weird hilt and sheath, and whenever I did basic leader stuff with the refugees.
  
  "Okay," I said. "This is just a guess, but something tells me Avalon is going to decide that I don't have enough authority to unlock the Pathways yet."
  
  "Really?" Breena asked as she tilted her head. "Why?"
  
  "Call it constructive pessimism," I answered. "I'll check anyway, but I'm pretty sure Avalon would have told me by now if I could open the Pathways on my own now."
  
  "Affirmative," the familiar voice suddenly spoke through the floor. "Confirming that Challenger-Lord Wes Malcolm lacks sufficient Right to Rule to project authority to Avalon's daughter-worlds."
  
  "See?" I answered. "It's probably going to make me get stronger, then undergo another Trial deep inside the passages. Like I did when I cleared out that first group of tunnels down below."
  
  "Confirming the Challenger's predictions. More power and Trials are necessary to gain further Right to Rule."
  
  "Yay," I said sarcastically. "But at least we have a game plan now."
  
  "Yeah," Breena said in a toneless voice, suddenly gaining a thousand-yard stare. "I get to train you some more. And now you've discovered three new types of magic you wanna learn about now, too."
  
  It said something that with everything else going on, Breena's training time with me still counted as traumatizing for her.
  
  "About that," I began. "I was thinking that maybe you should delegate some of those lessons?"
  
  The little fairy blinked at that.
  
  "Wait, what?" she asked. There was almost a hopeful note to her voice. Almost.
  
  "I mean, I know I kept pushing my limits during training…"
  
  "Our limits," Breena corrected. "You kept pushing my limits too, Wes."
  
  "Yeah, and I'm sorry about that," I admitted. "It probably saved my life though, given how I've won a number of battles by the skin of my teeth. But now that we have other experts here, maybe we should spread out the portions of training to different people. Like Virtus, for instance," I said, bringing up the skeletal warrior that had been training the new citizens of Avalon. "I've actually sparred with him a couple more times, and judging by the bruises he's given me there's still a lot he can teach me. Let's just leave the weapon and conditioning portion of training to him from now on."
  
  More blinking.
  
  "Really?" Breena asked, and this time there was definitely a hopeful tone to her voice. "You'd be okay with that? 'Cause that used to be the biggest chunk of training. Are you sure about that?"
  
  "I don't know if it should stay the biggest chunk," I said, rubbing the back of my neck. "Since I'm not trying to fix a disability anymore. But it will still be important and I think it would be easier trying to learn sword and axe-work from someone closer to my size anyway."
  
  "That's a perfect idea!" Breena screamed, flying off the dining table. "I love it!"
  
  "Great," I said, unable to stop smiling. "And while I don't think there's a better expert on magic than you, I'm thinking Weylin, Eadric, and Karim can at least get me started in learning their respective magics. And if they turn out to be unnecessary, we can drop that part of my training anyway."
  
  "I love it!" Breena shouted, flying around my shoulders. "That's like the most reasonable idea you've had ever. Yaaay!"
  
  She hugged my neck, and her larger size actually made me stagger.
  
  <Good job,> FNG said in my mind. <You made her happy. Keep treating her right.>
  
  <Yeah, I know,> I thought back firmly, getting my balance back as my bonded familiar kept hanging off my neck. <That's important to me too. Speaking of which, it's time to check on our other woman.>