text: I heard the chittering one more time as we entered, and right after the door behind us rumbled shut. Then I heard silence.
  
  Which meant the thing had made itself heard. On purpose.
  
  The previous Rite had just been a journey through the tunnels. It felt like a typical campaign where people in front of us had to deal with dim lighting, listen for ambushes, and constantly check for traps in the stonework. Now, though, we were dealing with trees.
  
  Giant trees.
  
  Sequoia-sized monsters that I couldn't even wrap my arms around. Reaching up higher than any redwood I'd ever seen. I held my head at the impossibility of it all.
  
  "We," I sighed. "Are under. The freaking. Ground."
  
  "Yup," Eadric grunted blandly. "Looks like someone forgot to tell the giant Icons-damned trees though."
  
  I turned to look at the dwarf.
  
  "Is this actually a thing? Does this happen on other worlds, and is that why you're so unimpressed?"
  
  "Nope." He shook his head. "Never seen anything like the sight. Just like all the other sights I've seen this month with you."
  
  "You're an ass," I growled. "I've told you that, right? That you're an ass?"
  
  "Haven't bothered to notice if you did," the bearded jerk said with another shrug. "But if you ever get tired of making us go to places like this, let the rest of us know."
  
  <Burrrnnn,> FNG commented backstage.
  
  <Not in the mood,> I snapped. <Now shut the hell up and help me watch for the stalking chitter-death beasts.>
  
  "I can't believe it," Weylin said, stepping to my side, looking all around. "I thought these had gone extinct."
  
  "We're still talking about giant trees, right?" I asked.
  
  "Yeah, we are," Breena said sadly. She cautiously fluttered forward, looking all around for danger, and then put her hand on a blackened piece of bark. "They didn't use to look like this, though."
  
  They were all gray-black, as if they had been covered in rock. Even the leaves themselves were giant black-gray slates high over my head. I had heard that the bark on giant trees could petrify, but this was on a whole other level.
  
  So were the strange symbols dotting parts of the trunk. Instead of being carved, they looked to have been formed naturally into the bark, the wood warping and whirling to create glyph-like shapes. They glowed slightly, but it was a black, sputtering light, the radiance of a thing slowly choking to death after hundreds of thousands of years.
  
  I winced at the sight. It was pompous of me, but somehow I could still identify with dying like that.
  
  "These are Woadfathers," Breena continued sadly. "They gave their world its name."
  
  "Really?" Val said, walking up to one and craning her neck upward. "How? And I thought woad didn't come from trees? It's a type of paint, right?"
  
  She shouldn't have even known that much about woad. But we were a family of nerds, and she probably had learned even stranger facts from us.
  
  "On your world, it doesn't come from trees." Breena nodded. "Woadfathers leak an almost identical version of your woad paint in sap form. So in English the sap and the names of the plants and trees translate into the same name. But Woadfathers actually birth a great host of plants." Breena circled the tree cautiously. "Somehow, every piece of them, the roots, the branches, even the bark, can birth another plant. We don't understand how it happens, but when those pieces flake or fall off the tree, a new plant grows in the location. We think parts of the tree somehow serve as seeds for other plants. Stell and I checked, back when they were more common all those many years ago. Every other plant in the Woadlands has traits that suggest it descended somehow from a piece of Woadfather bark, root, or leaf. Nothing like it exists on any of the other worlds."
  
  "Except here," I finished for her. "We somehow have these giant trees here."
  
  Breena nodded.
  
  "I wish I had known," she said softly. "These trees are all but extinct in the Woadlands. Many of them were destroyed in one of the Tumults. The remaining few are being guarded by Mother Glade and a handful of other Icons. We're hoping they'll repopulate one day, but the truth is they reproduce slowly. They make their own seeds rarely, no more than once a century, if that."
  
  "That sounds amazing," I said, watching the dull pulse of the woad-light in the plants. "But do the Woadlands still need them? That place is carpeted with plant life."
  
  "Woadfathers help every plant grow," Breena continued. "In some ways, their roots actually give more nutrients than they take. Every plant I've seen on that planet, and probably some on other worlds, benefit from growing near a Woadfather. Even the glow of their sap seems to help nearby life. Stell used to experiment with making potions out of it." She looked up, trying to see the leaves overhead. But even with my small light source all I could see above our heads was blackness, with branch-like shapes that creaked and swayed ever so slightly above us. "They're a kind of miracle plant, and many parts of the Woadlands have suffered in their absence."
  
  "That's an incredible story," I said gently. "But everyone keep looking around while we figure this out."
  
  Most of the group just nodded their heads at me and made more of an effort to roam their eyes around. Val ducked her head in embarrassment, and then snapped her head around furiously, trying to make up for her lost concentration.
  
  Truthfully, I wasn't much better. The only sight I had really taken in were the trees themselves and the only trouble I had been watching for was anything hiding in the few branches I could have seen. But if I were planning an ambush I probably would have attacked from a different direction while my enemies were looking around at trees, so I did my best to change my focus.
  
  The rest of the ground didn't have anything growing in it. Just black, bare soil, with the occasional cobblestone sticking out, suggesting that the trees themselves had once dug their way through the cobblestones to get at the ground below. Why there was any kind of soil at all down here I had no idea. But I could see no other plant or animal life in this half-dead forest.
  
  "Something's draining them, isn't it?" I asked. Breena, who was still hovering over the closest tree, nodded.
  
  "Yes. They've also been poisoned. That's why they can't heal, and why their outer bark is petrified." The little fairy shook her head. "They're powerful trees. They've even been known to survive intense forest fires. But this poison is weakening them enough to allow something else to feed off of their direct essence."
  
  "Can you cure the poison?" I asked.
  
  "Maybe," the pink-haired fairy said dubiously. "It would take me a very long time and would clean out my mana completely, just for one tree. But even if my cure worked, the poison would come right back. Look here." The little sprite pointed to a non-petrified patch where the bark had been viciously gouged away. In the center of the patch were two deep puncture marks, side by side. They both were as wide as a number 2 pencil. "My guess is that some kind of creature is poisoning them directly, then draining the sap from the woad-glyphs."
  
  "Why bother poisoning it?" I asked. "It's a tree. It's not like it needs to be paralyzed or anything."
  
  "Some Woadfathers actually can defend themselves," Breena answered. "In fact, some of them can even move and talk. It depends on their age, and whether or not they're in hibernation. These must have either been young ones or caught hibernating. Or…" She hesitated. "They were overpowered."
  
  "That last one sounds difficult," I said cautiously, eyes roaming along the ground now. I still saw nothing. Whatever had chittered at us earlier didn't choose to stick around.
  
  "A single Woadfather could probably slaughter hundreds of Hordebeasts easily and without tiring. The group of Spawn we battled before wouldn't be a match for one. And even if the whole grove was in hibernation, there still would have been one or two that would have been on guard. They can even awaken other plant life to assist in the defense."
  
  That definitely reminded me of an old book and movie series. But I didn't say anything.
  
  "So, we're talking Dark Icon-level?"
  
  "Not necessarily." Breena shook her head. "There are plenty of powerful creatures out there that can actually go toe to toe with some Icons. A few can probably snap up a fledgling Icon like Raw-maw in one bite. In fact—" Breena shuddered—"you've… already met a creature that can beat Icons."
  
  Right. Cavus. The Umbra.
  
  Speaking of Umbras, our best guess was that another one was still sealed deep inside Avalon. I hoped we still had a long way to go. Because I knew I still wasn't a match for a creature like Cavus.
  
  "Alright," I said, shifting my thoughts. "We're not going to assume we're dealing with an all-powerful monster yet, because if we really were, it wouldn't be bothering with stealth so much. Not when we can't escape anyway. The tunnel's widened, but I want to see if we can circle the forest around the edge before we go in. It'll be easier to watch anything climbing around on a wall than it will be to watch dozens and dozens of trees all around us. Watch your step for any kind of trap on the floor. On second thought," I added as I changed my mind, "Eadric, watch for traps on the floor. Weylin, Breena, you two watch over our heads. Val and Karim, watch for anything moving on our level. Virtus, guard our rear, and I'll keep my eyes forward. Any questions?"
  
  "There's a bit more light in here, thanks to the glowing sap," Eadric grunted. "Do you still want us to have our own light?"
  
  "They know we're here anyway, but… wait," I said suddenly. I dismissed my shield, transferred my spear to my other hand, and summoned Carnwennan, the white-hilted dagger. Breena had already cast magic to soften the sounds we made. And I knew my dagger had concealment properties. After Rising again, I felt a stronger connection to it. A word whispered its way into my mind, and I repeated it out loud.
  
  "Shroud," I said softly.
  
  As before, the shadows cloaked me. But then those same shadows expanded, cloaking the rest of our group. For a moment I saw everyone disappear, then reappear, but with a haze covering us, as if we were in a zone of invisibility.
  
  Best of all, that same invisibility covered our light sources without removing the light they provided. We were just a dimly lit patch now, in a whole forest full of dimly lit patches.
  
  I grinned, then whispered to everyone through the mindlink.
  
  <Walk left. And no one talk out loud.>
  
  Val jumped for a minute, then she smiled.
  
  <Can I do it too?> she asked. <Holy crap, I can! This is so cool!>
  
  I grinned back. <Just stick to the plan. Keep watching your assigned areas and use this link to shout any warnings.>
  
  <What will we do if we spot any kind of trail?> Weylin asked.
  
  <We're going to assume it's a trap, mark it in the link and in our mindscreens, and then come back if necessary. By the way, Avalon, can you hear us down here?>
  
  No answer. It figured.
  
  <Move out.>
  
  We circled to the left cautiously. I was surprised at how little noise we were making. But then I remembered that not only were we using stealth magic, we weren't walking in a real forest. There was no underbrush to stumble through. There weren't even any leaves or twigs on the ground, because the trees had petrified so much. After a ten-minute walk, we reached the edge of the tunnel and found the wall, about thirty feet away from the closest petrified Woadfather. With that, we traced our way forward, keeping the wall on our left flank and the black-stone forest on our right.
  
  In the far distance, I heard chittering again. It was at a different pitch than the two times I had heard it before.
  
  Val's head snapped toward something far in the distance.
  
  <Wes?> she messaged me. <I think I can find them.>
  
  <How?> I messaged back.
  
  <Shadow magic,> she replied through the mindlink. <One of my signature spells. Shadowcowl.>
  
  <How does that work?> I asked.
  
  <It helps me see and hear what's going on in any shadowy places I can already notice. I don't even have to be in the shadows for it to work. But something just moved down from the trees to the spot we were at before.>
  
  <Really?> Weylin asked, surprised. <Even I couldn't hear anything.>
  
  <It was faint, but I know what I saw,> Val insisted. <It was just one shape.>
  
  <A guard then,> I realized. That was good to know. <Can you see anything else near us?>
  
  <No. I have to concentrate for it to work though. So it's not perfect. But I think they don't know where we are anymore.>
  
  That was more good news. The guard hadn't dared to attack when we were there, and it hadn't been able to detect us after I activated the shroud.
  
  <Keep moving,> I decided, and we returned to our careful journey around the massive forest.
  
  As we walked, I filed away as much of our trail as I could with my improved memory. Between the shared awareness that the mindlink gave us all, we were able to keep a decent map going in our subconscious. We crept carefully and quietly for another fifteen minutes without seeing anything more than half-dead trees. The tree branches continued to creak faintly over our heads, as if the forest was an old house at night, expanding and contracting in a way that always used to scare me when I was five. Every now and then we heard brief quiet chittering in the distance, but it never came close and it was always gone when Val swung her head in that direction.
  
  After a few more moments walking, chittering sounded directly ahead of us, and I had to bite back a curse.
  
  <Company,> I said needlessly. <Stay sharp.>
  
  Whatever had made the noise was gone by the time we had reached its origin. But there was another sight on the walls.
  
  Two man-sized mounds stuck out, spaced about six feet apart. As I got closer I realized that they were long and narrow, like a recently dug grave. They all had a stony texture, and they seemed stuck to the gray brick wall by a kind of sticky substance on their backs.
  
  A few moments later I realized that they were not only man-sized, but man-shaped. Shaped like screaming men around my height.
  
  <Stop moving forward,> Eadric said next to me.
  
  I looked down, and saw the same sticky substance gluing the screaming statues to the wall on the floor. Up close, I could tell that it was in strands, or rather, webs. Which cleared up pretty well what kind of creature we were facing down here.
  
  <Val, can you tell where the chittering creature went?>
  
  <Wes,> Val messaged urgently. But she didn't elaborate, other than projecting a strong sense of fear that overrode all of the other info I was getting from her.
  
  <What?> I asked, looking around. I couldn't see what was scaring her.
  
  <Wes!> she repeated.
  
  I finally whipped my head to look at her. She was shivering and pointing at the mound I had just started examining. I had just enough time to mentally process that this mound looked different from the other but not enough to realize that folded across its chest were two more pairs of arms and on its face were two more pairs of eyes that just opened.
  
  I had a split-second to freeze up and stare stupidly into one pair of bulging, blood-shot eyes, one pair of pupil-less, black shiny orbs, and one final pair of fly-like, compound eyes. That gave the creature's six pairs of arms—one pair containing a five-fingered claw hand, one pair an awkward, three-clawed talon, and the final pair over its shoulders just consisting of a blade-like pincer limb—an opportunity to all stretch out and stab at me. It cleared the five feet of distance too quickly for me to easily use my spear, and I barely had time to leap back and get my arms in the way before the man-spider from hell barreled into me.
  
  The creature was strong enough to knock me to the ground as it pounced. A shout of surprise escaped my lips as claws, talons, and pincers sliced into the shield spell covering me, stabbed into the leather tabard covering my arm and chest, and, this time, stopped there, thwarted by Icon hide. My forearm caught on the creature's long throat in time to keep its teeth and snapping mandibles from biting my face off, and I began to slam Carnwennan into the side of its head, shouting repeatedly:
  
  "Oh-my-god-it's-a-giant-were-spider-from-hell-get-it-off-get-it-off-and-holy-shit-my-armor-finally-turned-a-blow-for-once!"
  
  More sharp, angry limbs slashed thin cuts at my face, but by then everyone else had remembered they were my friend, and the black arach-man began jerking from the impact of arrows, axes, and swords. Then I heard Val shriek in rage, and the pincer limb slashing at my face went twisting and bleeding through the air. The creature howled in pain, lifting its head and baring its throat inadvertently. I jammed my white-hilted dagger through chitin and wrinkly flesh, pushing and wiggling the blade as much as I could until the last of the monster's vital guard gave out and it slumped gurgling onto the floor.
  
  I shoved the rest of the corpse off of me, and leaped back to my feet, cursing my carelessness earlier.
  
  <Everybody okay?> I sent through the mindlink.
  
  "Yes," Karim answered, moving to stand over the corpse. "And I am answering you out loud now because it's too late to be quiet."
  
  My eyes had been darting around while we spoke, but I didn't see anything else rise up to attack us, and through the mindlink I could tell everyone else was the same.
  
  I also felt a strong sense of shame coming from Val.
  
  "Sorry," she said. "I panicked. I'll try and be better."
  
  "It's okay," I answered. "That thing was freaking horrifying, sis. I panicked a bit too. And I've faced all kinds of scary things so far."
  
  "You could have died," she said, biting her lip. "And this time you wouldn't have come back."
  
  "That kind of danger's never gonna go away, Val," I said gently. "Remember what I said earlier? We just keep learning."
  
  "This is hard," she whispered, not looking at me.
  
  I felt it then, through the mindlink. Frustration at not being strong enough yet, fear that she'd never be strong enough, fear that people would hurt her again, for real this time, and it would be her fault this time because she could have stopped it somehow. Fear that someone else would get hurt because of her.
  
  It clicked through my brain that in some ways, this was scarier for Val than being a captive was, because of her new ability to fail.
  
  "Hey Breena," I said as I knelt over my sister. "You know those hugs you give me when I start freaking out? Val needs one."
  
  <Already on it,> the little fairy sent as she flew a pink trail all around the dark-haired girl. The dust in her wake made Val sneeze, and then Breena grew large enough to hug her chest. Breena glowed brighter, and this time the glow took on a yellow tint, and she began whispering inaudibly to my sister. She held her for a few moments longer, until Val shuddered, relaxed and hugged Breena back.
  
  "Thanks," the girl whispered shyly. "I think I'm good now."
  
  "No problem," Breena replied. "Wanna be my sister too?"
  
  "Sure." Val grinned. "I'd like that. That'd be great."
  
  <Ahem,> Karim projected to me. The mental cough somehow felt respectful and asinine at the same time.
  
  <Good job on helping her,> he added, <but we need to talk about the corpse.>
  
  <Yeah, sure,> I projected, then switched to talking because it was easier for the whole group right now. "Alright. Everybody, thanks for the help. I shouldn't have let that thing sneak up on me. Any idea what this thing is, and how it caught us by surprise? Since we were supposed to be invisible?"
  
  Virtus, Eadric, and Weylin had formed a small perimeter and were scanning the darkness for any signs of movement. But Virtus spoke up anyway.
  
  "It's one of the Arachmen," his deep voice rasped out from his helmet and skull. "But they are more commonly called Keepers. Largely because they take forever to consume their prey."
  
  I heard chittering far off in the distance. We probably needed to move again.
  
  <Didn't your own people take forever to consume their own captives?> I tried to ask delicately. That was one of the acts that caused the undead warrior to leave his cohort.
  
  <Our captives were already consumed,> he answered, sending to the whole group. <What we did was abominable, but we weren't known for it because it was just draining mana from ghosts. But the Keepers slowly drain all substance from the physical bodies of their prey, leaving them in a state between death and life. They ignored ancient laws condemning that act, and so were banished from many worlds.> There was an awkward pause, and then the skeleton resumed talking. <My company used to accept contracts to battle them. I wasn't expecting to see a group of them here. Invading Avalon alongside us.>
  
  His disappointment rolled out through the mindlink in large waves, before he managed to clamp down on it.
  
  <Okay,> I said, calmly and firmly. <How do they fight? How do we fight them?>
  
  Something chittered again, then stopped abruptly, as if it had been hushed.
  
  <Surprise and swarm tactics,> Virtus answered. <They can breed and command other arachnid monsters. This one was alone because he was feeding. He must have seen the dim light around us, then hid among his prey. He only attacked you because we had discovered him.>
  
  So, basically my fault. Our dim light wasn't that noticeable near the glowing stone trees, but next to the wall it stood out. I told myself the same thing I just told Val and moved on.
  
  <Wait,> I sent. <You said this statue was his prey?>
  
  <Look at the neck,> Virtus answered without turning around. His head swiveled as he kept scanning the dark underground woods.
  
  It only took a moment to realize that the necks on the statue had stone-free patches similar to the trees. Diseased-gray skin surrounded two deep puncture marks, and I winced at the sight. Those wounds looked like they went all the way to the bone. A little deeper and the monster's venom wouldn't have been needed because the victims would all have broken necks.
  
  <Is he already dead?> I asked. <And why is the monster feeding off of them instead of the trees themselves?>
  
  <Plant life is a staple to them,> Virtus answered. <Flesh is a delicacy. This was probably the monster's private stash. Victims in this state are still alive, however. Keepers prefer their victims to have strong vital guards, so that they can repair themselves over time, so that they can feed on them longer. The venom also takes care of the prey's basic biological needs somehow, so that the victim doesn't die of starvation or thirst. This one must have been a powerful individual to still be in this state.>
  
  I winced at that news. This kind of fate sounded even worse than what I went through. Possibly even worse than what the victims of the Horde Pits went through. Then I realized how many Pit victims we had recovered, and had the reckless hope that this person could be saved as well. But I didn't dare, I told myself, because—
  
  <*Seek what is lost.*>
  
  A small, quiet voice interrupted my own mind.
  
  I growled at it. But in the end it was telling me to go for what I wanted.
  
  <Breena,> I projected. <Do you think we can save this person?>
  
  <No, Wes,> the little fairy said sadly. <But—> her voice grew firm <—I didn't think you could save ghosts or people from the Horde pits either. Go for it.>
  
  More chittering in the distance. Val looked all around, but I could tell she couldn't find the source.
  
  <We're going to risk it,> I decided. <It might not work. Or he might stay weak and be a liability. But maybe he could help us, or at least tell us what happened in this place. Let's be quick. Val, Virtus, keep watch. Everybody else with any kind of healing magic, let's use this link to brainstorm and see what we can come up with.>
  
  <They can be healed,> Virtus interrupted quietly. I turned to look at him. <The reason contracts against them were so popular was because their victims could be recovered. I never learned the process, but I've taken contracts to rescue victims in states as bad as this one.>
  
  That was all the reinforcement I needed. I sent all the knowledge of the healing magic I knew from the Ideals of Water and Air, as well as the only spell from the Ideal of Blood that I knew. Breena sent out her knowledge of healing spells from the Ideals of Water, Air, and Wood. The three Testifiers pulled healing spells from their Saga magics: a script to cleanse harmful effects from the body, a song to speed a body's recovery, and a carving ritual to fortify a body that Eadric could perform on the stone coating on the Keeper victim. We worked out an order for our magics to activate, and as we did so we realized we needed a primary spell to serve as the foundation magic. We considered using one from the Ideal of Water or Wood, supposedly the best Ideals for healing, but they still didn't seem optimal. Wood did encourage growth and recovery, and water was a basic element of all life, but we needed to quickly replace lost blood and tissue, because the same venom that was slowly poisoning them was also keeping them alive. If we weren't careful, this person would die as soon as we purified him.
  
  <You need a different spell,> the draconic part of my conscience whispered to me. <Can I help?>
  
  <What do you have?> I asked suspiciously. Because we weren't exactly friends yet.
  
  <You need to open up more to your genetic memory,> Teeth insisted. <You know far more magic than you think you do.>
  
  <How?> I asked carefully. I hated listening to him but it wasn't like I had much of a choice.
  
  <Look at the Ideal of Blood again,> Teeth insisted. <And let me into that part of our brain.>
  
  <You mean my brain,> I argued. Because I still wasn't happy with this new roommate of mine. But I realized I was about to start a fight I didn't have time for so I toned my attitude down. <Fine. But if you try and take control of everything again I swear I will inflict the mother of all chronic migraines on you.>
  
  <Look, I did that one time—nevermind. Deal. Just give me a minute.>
  
  I felt something strangely familiar wiggle around in my head. It was like moving a limb that had felt numb for so long you had forgotten it was there. I felt it briefly touch the part of me that housed my Blood magic, and then awareness of a new spell rolled into me.
  
  <Vein to Vein: The caster can directly transfer blood and tissue from his own body to another's, or choose to take an incapacitated target's blood instead. The amount transferable depends on the caster's blood magic rank and total vital guard pool of both participants.>
  
  <The Challenger can choose this as a signature spell, causing it to evolve as the Challenger reaches certain ranks of Blood Magic.>
  
  <That's actually perfect for what we need,> I admitted grudgingly, then added, <thank you.>
  
  <You're… welcome,> the new guy replied. <This is weird. Can we go back to hating each other?>
  
  <God yes,> I answered, relieved, and then passed on knowledge of my new spell to the rest of the group. Breena was especially excited that I had managed to learn magic on my own.
  
  <You can be your own teacher now!> she chattered excitedly. But then her face paled. <Oh my lost Icons, Wes can make his own magic now. I'm never going to sleep again.>
  
  Val giggled through the mindlink.
  
  <Breena,> I sighed.
  
  <Right, right, we don't have a lot of time. It looks like Wes will have to use this spell to transfer lost nutrients directly to the victim while we cleanse the poison and keep him alive. We're gonna need to augment him in addition to the victim.>
  
  That was all that needed to be said. I activated Mighty Pump, my other Blood Magic spell that sped up my own recovery rate. Then, after casting every spell possible to enhance my mana pool and vital guard, Eadric made the fortification carvings into the stone covering the victims, Weylin began singing, and Karim began writing the script for purifying toxin. We had decided to do one patient at a time, with Val and Virtus ready to alert us if we were attacked again.
  
  Then I performed the gestures and incantation necessary to enact Vein to Vein, pouring my own life liquid directly into the first victim's wound.
  
  I heaved in surprise, suddenly feeling weak, and oddly thirsty, all over. Breena's Water magic washed over me, granting a blissful but all too brief relief, and then the pain, thirst, and fatigue would return. It began to feel like chunks of me inside were being blended up and slurped away by another. But flakes of stone fell from the face in front of me, and I knew I had to continue.
  
  More magic washed over me and over the person coming into view before me. I gritted my teeth and kept channeling my own life to replace what was lost in the life in front of me.
  
  My body cried out in pain, and this time the Dragon of Pain and Affliction, the one who had first cursed me, answered it.
  
  <Suffer and fail, traitor-prince,> Aegrim whispered through my weeping nerves. <You are unclean, and this act is forbidden. Now wallow in the pain you have always deserved.>
  
  Teeth screamed as his father's voice tore through us. But then the second dragon who marked me rang out in my mind.
  
  <Heed him not>, Vinclum, the Dragon of Honor and Bonds commanded. <For this is a glorious act. You will both be whole despite your harms.>
  
  My own inner dragon wrestled Aegrim's voice out of his mind, gritted his mental fangs, and focused along with me.
  
  My magic suddenly surged, and suddenly all of my pain was swept away by a blinding sensation of raw power. When the white faded from my eyes, I realized my arm was the only thing holding up a heaving, shivering man about my height. I reached out to brace him with my other hand, and he coughed twice, finally looking around with wild eyes.
  
  "Easy," I said gently. "Easy. Can you understand me?"
  
  He answered me in a language that sounded like complete gibberish. If I had to guess, it was something similar to Gaelic or another Celtic language. <Translating,> my mindscreen told me. <Stand by…>
  
  The man's eyes widened further, and he began thrashing in my grip, trying to shake free. From my mindlink I knew that he had eye-socket contact with Virtus. But his body was still very weak, and it was no trouble holding him down at my Strength level. Before he could shout I clamped a hand over his mouth.
  
  "Hush," I said slowly. "Danger. Stay quiet."
  
  He struggled a little longer in my grip, and as his eyes darted to the left and right, where the other statue-people were, he began to relax.
  
  <Translation complete,> my mindscreen informed me. I sighed in relief.
  
  <I'm about to try and talk to him,> I sent out. <But first, how long did that spell take?>
  
  <You healed him in less than fifteen seconds,> Virtus replied, turning his back to us again. <I didn't think that would be possible.>
  
  <It's usually not,> Breena confirmed. <Not for damage this extensive. He still needs a moment to recover though.>
  
  <Nothing's near us,> Val confirmed, still watching the dark. <I keep checking the nearby shadows, but either they didn't hear us earlier or they don't know what to do about us.>
  
  Right. This place hadn't opened up in aeons. The creatures had probably forgotten there even was an outside world.
  
  "Nod if you can understand me," I said to the man. He did so, still looking shocked. "I'm going to remove my hand now, but if you shout you risk all of our lives. Understand?" Another nod. At this point, I let him go. He took a deep, shoulder-heaving breath, but other than that he remained standing. Now that I wasn't up in his face it was easier to get a proper look at him.
  
  A bit over six feet, as I already noticed. Light-brown hair bound up in braids, with light-brown eyes as well. He was muscular, even after being poisoned and malnourished for so long. He wore thick leather pants and was bare-chested, with intricate blue swirls of tattoos covering his entire chest. As I watched, the tattoos started to glow, and his breathing steadied. He looked back up at me.
  
  "Earthborn," he said quietly. "One of you survived after all. Two, actually. But you're both too young… and you're with him." The man's eyes slid over to Virtus, who still had his back turned to us.
  
  "Change of employment," I answered quietly. "He works for me now. And we're here to take back the rest of Avalon. But we need to move."
  
  Breena was still staring at the glowing tattoos.
  
  "Um, Wes?" the fairy said. "He's supposed to be extinct too. He's one of the Gaelguard."
  
  "The what?" I asked, committing yet another word to memory.
  
  "We were the Woadfathers' shields," the man replied, "We were to protect them as they slept." His accent faintly reminded me of Merada's, Stell's Satellite on the Woadlands.
  
  "They went the way of the Woadfathers," Breena replied. "Most of them died out in the same Tumult that took the trees they guarded. There are maybe five total left on the Woadlands, and three of them are near the end of their lifespans."
  
  "Tumult." The man blinked. "What Tumult? What of our fathers back home?"
  
  More chittering. We were probably out of time.
  
  "Virtus, help him walk," I commanded. "Everyone else, we're moving out. Dim the light this time, and watch for more webbing on the floor." I turned to look back at the man. "We're going to have to finish this conversation later. For now though, my name's Wes Malcolm, of Earth and Avalon."
  
  "Alum," the man panted. "My name's Alum. And I can walk on my own."
  
  More chittering. I sent the Arachman's corpse into Breaker's storage space to avoid leaving a trail, and then we moved. I wasn't willing to give Alum a weapon or bring him into the mindlink just yet. And I wasn't even sure I could link with him at the moment. I got the same sense of disconnect I got from trying to link with Guineve. But I was able to expand Carnwennan's shroud to cover him as well.
  
  I had us march for about fifteen minutes, narrowly avoiding several strands of black webbing on the ground. But I imagined they hadn't really had to catch anything for the past hundred thousand years or so. That thought made me wonder if I was dealing with OG Arachmen or just their descendants.
  
  <Movement behind us,> Val informed me. <A lot of movement. But it's just surrounding where we were before.>
  
  "So they're still trying to close us off, and they don't know we've escaped," I said out loud, for Alum's benefit. Then I deactivated the shroud, because it had begun to put a strain on my mana.
  
  "It's how they hunt," the Gaelguard answered with a nod. "They surround, then they spread webs, then they attack. But they are unused to foes that vanish into thin air."
  
  "Yeah, that ruins everyone's day," I agreed. "But I can't keep us invisible forever and combat breaks the effect anyway. And anything that gets close enough will be able to see or hear me normally. But…"
  
  I tried to think quickly. There was a group of enemies at my back still trying to trap me in a location that they thought I left. They apparently had trouble sensing us. Maybe it was because of all the stimuli we used coming in—light, noise, movement. Now that all of that was gone, they were having trouble figuring out how to detect us.
  
  That meant we needed to alternate between being loud, flashy, and violent for short bursts and then go back to being quiet and still.
  
  <Val, do you think they're finished setting up the ambush?> I asked.
  
  <Yeah…> she sent back cautiously. <Yeah, I think so. They just stopped moving, but I can still see a few twitch. Some look like actual giant spiders.>
  
  I turned to our rescued prisoner. "How are you feeling? Do you think you can fight?"
  
  His eyes widened in offense to my question. That would have to be good enough. I pulled out my silvery short-bladed sword and my shield, handing both to him. He took them both and gave me a quiet, confident nod. I saw his tattoos glow briefly for a half-second.
  
  We turned and headed back to the spot as I shrouded everyone again, making as little noise as possible.
  
  <Okay,> Val said as we were a couple dozen meters away. <I think I've got a firm count on their numbers now. Over a dozen giant spiders above us in the trees, and two more of the scary man-spider things down below. They just finished webbing the area and they're looking around, trying to figure out where we went.>
  
  <She's right,> Weylin sent. <I can see them now too.>
  
  <Great,> I answered. <And good job. Now sit tight and gain your mana back for a bit if you need to. Virtus, did these things know about your people being down here?>
  
  <If the Polemarchus or other command knew, he didn't tell me.>
  
  "Alum," I whispered quickly. "You recognized Virtus."
  
  "A few of them fought with the Arachmen in the beginning," he whispered back. "Those that survived went further below with the Hungry Thing."
  
  "Then the Arachmen should be familiar with the skeletal warriors. Virtus, go talk to them and distract them. Everyone else will attack from a different angle. I can help you figure out what to say over in the mindlink but try to get them to group up near you."
  
  <Understood,> he said.
  
  "Alum, when I give the signal to attack you need to cover your eyes and ears, or you'll go deaf and blind." He nodded. With that, we began.
  
  Virtus left the protective stealth-sphere of my magic dagger and began shouting for an audience, something about damages for a broken contract. One of the Arachmen tuned his horrible head toward him and hissed, then began chittering at him.
  
  <Translating,> my mindscreen said to me. I ignored it. I'd already had enough conversations with nightmare monsters.
  
  The second Arachman walked over and began chittering as well. I tried not to pay attention to all the fangs and mandibles clacking around in his mouth and chose to watch the trees instead. More bulbous, multi-legged shapes crept forward, and when the count reached over fourteen I gave Alum the signal to shield his eyes and ears. Then I cast an old, rarely used Lightning spell that Breena had helped me modify.
  
  <Light Screen.>
  
  A storm of electric light ripped into being directly in front of the Keepers and their spider pets, and this time an angry *boom* accompanied it. My team had prepared for it and Carnwennan's shroud actually helped mitigate the effect, but for creatures that hadn't had such stimulation in thousands upon thousands of years, the effect was nearly enough to end the battle right there.
  
  Carnwennan's shroud collapsed completely under my aggressive action, and as our enemies chittered and screeched in agony, the rest of my allies began their attack.
  
  The mindlink made our coordination close to perfect. Karim and Breena unleashed the Lightning magic they had somehow gained from me along with a storm of their own magic. I saw three multi-legged blobs fall tumbling to the ground in curled-up clumps. Weylin's enchanted arrows accounted for another two. I unleashed my own storm of small lightning bolts courtesy of my old Shocking Digits spell and then left the rest of the trees to our three ranged combatants.
  
  Virtus immediately whipped out one of the javelins on his back and hurled it at one of the Arachmen leaning against a tree, pinning one of the monster's hands to the petrified wood. Eadric was already charging over to that monster, launching a javelin of his own.
  
  I turned to Alum, who was still blinking from the effects of my magic, despite all he had done to be ready for it.
  
  "Follow me, and we'll handle the last one," I said as I summoned the Horde cleaver out of Breaker. It was an awkward weapon, just a long, oddly shaped blade at the end of a handle, but it was enchanted with green-glowing glyphs, and I was now much stronger than its original owner. The Gaelguard nodded and fell in behind me.
  
  I cleared over a dozen feet with a single bound, thanks to my Air Magic and now-inhuman speed. Another leap brought me in range and I swung the cleaver down in an overhead swing that forced the stunned Arachman to defend with his right three limbs. He barely got his arms in the way and screamed when my massive chopper cut clean through his scythe arm. My blow continued downward, slamming into his middle limb with a loud crack. By that point my weapon had also begun to cleave into his torso. Carapace crumpled and wrinkled leathery hide split to reveal a mess of black blood and innards. The Arachman let out a high-pitched scream, still mostly blind from my earlier spell. The next moment Alum was by my side and he slammed his short blade into the monster's mouth, twisting it until the Keeper went completely silent.
  
  A quick glance told me the rest of the battle was over. Virtus and Eadric were standing over the corpses of the other Arachmen and Val nodded at me to let me know that all of the giant spiders hiding in the trees were dead.
  
  "Alright," I said. "Let's move a few feet away and go quiet again. Alum, pick a good spot for us to rest."
  
  The woad-marked man nodded, and led us a good distance away as I reactivated the shroud.
  
  There was a problem with my strategy. My dagger's shroud required mana to maintain, and looking at my current mana pool I realized I couldn't keep it up indefinitely. If I wanted to whittle away the spider-army's patrols, I'd need to come up with another plan.
  
  I shouldn't have been complaining. It was still an awesome power. But I really didn't like being trapped underground with an army of spider monsters that could hear, see, or smell me. <Focus,> I told myself as I deactivated the shroud. As far as Val and Alum could tell there weren't any freaky spider monsters within at least a hundred meters. <Get more info, then figure out a plan.> I turned to our newly rescued Gaelguard.
  
  "I need any information you have on what's down here. How big is this underground forest? How many monsters did you originally battle? How many do you think are left?"
  
  "That last one's going to be tricky," Virtus spoke up. "They would have bred since then."
  
  "Only to replace their losses." Alum shook his head. "We battled their kind on the Woadlands long ago, even drove a nest of theirs out. The young they are unable to feed would have been consumed themselves."
  
  Gross. But it was in line with all of the other crap I'd had to kill so far.
  
  "But there should be no more than a few hundred Arachmen, several times that many spider-slaves, a handful of Arachknights, and their honor guards."
  
  "Fantastic," Virtus muttered. "This will be difficult."
  
  "We've dealt with high numbers before," I pointed out, worried about morale.
  
  "And you did well. But Keepers set traps themselves. They won't swarm out and die to your own traps like the Horde and our cohort's fodder warriors did."
  
  "We'll have to figure it out," I insisted, then something clicked. "Wait, do they primarily use webbing in their traps?" Both ancient warriors nodded. "How long does the webbing last? And do they bother replacing it when they know there's no more remaining prey?"
  
  "If there's prey, or if they're expecting an attack, they rebuild it daily," Alum answered.
  
  "But if they don't, in a place like this, it would probably last several thousand years," Virtus confirmed. "I was part of two contracts that dealt with reclaiming a Keeper-infested world. If there was no nearby prey, then they only webbed their dens and larders."
  
  "Then they would be constructing traps behind us or where they predict we'd go," I whispered. "Which means we either need to hit their dens or their larders. Come to think of it, with spiders, those two things are usually in the same place."
  
  I couldn't count on taking out random patrols, because they were just as good at stealth as we were and I had no idea what their routes would be. But Alum should have an inkling or two regarding their permanent locations. I hoped.
  
  "That reminds me," I continued, turning to look at him. "How are you recovering so fast? Our healing wasn't enough to make you immediately bounce back."
  
  "I still haven't." The celtic-styled warrior shook his head. "I'm so weak I'd barely be a match for yon hollow-man." He pointed at Virtus, who somehow snorted in contempt. "But the Woadblood pulses in tune with my heart, letting me be a little more alive every moment. It may well be a decade before I'm my old self again."
  
  "It's the tattoos, Wes," Breena whispered. "Unlike normal Woadfolk tattoos, they're a form of magic. They give the Gaelguard some of the Woadfathers' strength and vitality."
  
  Alum nodded, and his tattoos glowed as if in answer. Then he closed his eyes, as if he was concentrating, and the glow dimmed completely. "I was one of the last claimed, so I have an idea of where the others were taken. If we can save them too," he said desperately, then took a breath and calmed himself.
  
  "I'd like to try," I replied, grimacing. "But even if we can cure more people, I'm not sure we can protect them in a fight. The main reason we risked rescuing you was because we needed more information."
  
  "You won't have to protect us in a fight," the woad-man snorted. "My people will be a match for these things even fresh out of the cocoons."
  
  "How did you lose, then?" Virtus asked bluntly.
  
  "Same way the Earthborn lost to your people," Alum retorted. "The Thing Below. Its magic turned the tide of every battle. So did the great beasts that hid in its shadow."
  
  "Great beasts?" I asked, looking at Virtus. "Thing Below? You got any info on that, Virtus?"
  
  "He may be referring to our employer," the skeleton hedged. "I never encountered him, so I can't swear that's what he's referencing, but my understanding is that he was the reason we were able to outnumber the Earthborn warriors so badly."
  
  "We were worse off," Alum said bitterly. "We had to hide in the thing's wake, and its tamed beasts were a match for entire teams of Gaelguard and awakened Woadfathers. That gave the Keepers too much advantage. We killed many, but they picked us off one by one, before we could reform our warbands."
  
  "Alright," I said. "We'll decide what exactly to do based on the opportunities we see. Take us to a location you think we can hurt them at."