text: The vision of Chris was gone. The frightened old men were gone.
  
  "You okay, Wes?" Breena asked me as she hovered near my shoulder.
  
  "Yeah," I answered as I shook away the last bit of disorientation from linking with the weird device in my head. "Just doing a bit of counter-espionage."
  
  "Oh," she said carefully. "Umm, okay. Did it work?"
  
  "I have no idea," I admitted. "I hope so. At least I know what Chris is doing and have a handful of things lined up in case my family gets targeted."
  
  "Good," the pink-haired little fairy said dubiously, as she wasn't really sure how to take my news. "So um, is now still a good time? For that thing you wanted to do?"
  
  "Yeah, sorry," I replied. "I'm ready."
  
  My connection to the Malus organization's old network was still very sporadic, so I had to take advantage of it whenever it came up, unless I was already in the middle of something just as important. Thankfully it had come up now, and not five minutes later, so my plans were only delayed.
  
  "Avalon," I said aloud. "Repeat all remaining requests directed to the Lord of Avalon."
  
  "The Nascent Lord of Avalon has dealt with all requests save one," the mists below my feet intoned in its deep, robotic voice. We were outdoors, in front of a dark, old cave, still stranded on what used to be a misty ruined world that was now slowly coming alive.
  
  The cave before me was the same cave I had led a prison break out of all those weeks ago. But what was weeks for me had been less than a full day on Avalon's connected worlds.
  
  "The remaining request is from a group of planar travelers wishing to return to Avalon's surface. They are directing their response to the former rulers of Avalon, naming them as Warren Rhodes, Robert Barnes, and Joseph Shepherd. They claim to be returning from a successful raid on a village in the Woadlands and are now bringing back tribute. The tribute includes a number of physical goods as well as some thirty people to be shared between the Horde and a service designated as 'Earth Revenue.' As control of the planet Avalon has changed, their request has been redirected to the new Lord of Avalon, the Earthborn Challenger, Wes Malcolm. They are awaiting the Lord's reply. Per the Lord's standing order, the travelers have not been notified of the change of authority on Avalon."
  
  Which meant Rhodes' people had no idea that I was now in charge of the portal system on Avalon, no idea that several weeks had passed on Avalon while they had been waiting for about a day on their current world, and no idea that their local base had been destroyed. They also had no idea that I had spent all day 'processing' their portal requests, now that I had finally secured the planet and gotten everyone situated.
  
  Time management became a beautiful thing when supernatural resources were involved.
  
  "Avalon, accept the remaining request, and give them the same parameters other travelers have been given all day. Planar travelers are to enter in one large group carrying the non-living spoils, followed by a large group containing living tribute with no more than two guards total accompanying them, followed finally by all Horde escorts. Make sure the living tribute is moved to a safe distance away from the arriving Horde and is untouched by them. State previously damaged goods as the reason for new protocol, and that any deviance from said protocol will be dealt with harshly."
  
  Thanks to some well-articulated threats involving the dungeon's surviving gibber-beasts, we had learned both how Rhodes' people arrived and how to have Avalon duplicate the process. We hadn't had any problems all day, but I waited to see if this last group would be the one to wise up and realize that their former base had been compromised.
  
  Because if they did, then this would probably be a bad end to an otherwise very good day.
  
  The portal opened. It was a purple swirling disk, like all of the other Malus portals had been. Three large and powerful men stepped out of it.
  
  "About damned time," the one in front grumbled. "Stupid new protocol."
  
  I wanted to sigh loudly in relief. But I was smart enough not to.
  
  "Where are the other guards," the man on the right said, noting the complete lack of a reception out front. "Shouldn't Jon and Max be out front?"
  
  Like the other two men, he was clad in a mix of chain mail with padding over and under it. They were wielding clubs, axes, and round shields, along with some whips that dangled from their waists. And this particular man had black distinct veins crawling up his right cheek all the way from his neck—a result of him Descending multiple times. The Descents had likely given him a great amount of power, all while taking something else from him, and probably without him even realizing it.
  
  His question was shrugged off by the man in the middle.
  
  "Probably in the back being lazy, since this planet sucks to be on anyway. Let's just be grateful they didn't make us wait even longer and get everyone moving. I don't feel like being bitched at today by management."
  
  They walked forward, turning to shout at the beings arriving behind them. A large mass of huddled, shivering figures stepped through next, flinching away from the whip-cracks of two other Malus members. The two men accompanying them shouted and corralled them to a large patch directly to the left of the cave entrance, muttering about the new stupid protocol. Finally, an unruly mass of three-to-four-feet-tall bipeds wearing nothing but filthy loincloths—and sometimes not even that—streamed out of the portal, hooting and leering at the frightened mass of prisoners. Ilklings and Wretches, the smallest, weakest species of Horde. Another guard cracked a whip at them, and the disgusting, oil-skinned monsters leaped away, still cackling and leering at the potential 'prey.'
  
  "You know the god-damned rules!" the front-most man shouted back at them. "You don't get anyone until they've been processed!"
  
  <Avalon,> I said in my mind, choosing to communicate mentally this time. <Send the signal.>
  
  <Affirmative,> the planet replied.
  
  A moment later, all of the prisoners were covered with a three-inch coating of surprisingly durable mist, courtesy of the Guardian of Avalon. Guineve had finally recovered all or most of her power.
  
  The two Malus Men next to the suddenly shrouded prisoners shouted in alarm, but before they could act further they were blasted by arrows, blue arcane darts, and finally arm-thick bolts of lightning. They went down, perforated and fried to a crisp before they could even blink. The three men in front turned to react, and I stepped out of a shadowy patch of the cave to stab one in the neck.
  
  He gurgled at me in surprise, understandably because the dagger my magic hilt had become masked me in an invisible shroud before I attacked. As his vital guard engaged to try and cancel out the wound to his jugular, I brought the mace in my other hand down on his head, swinging again and again until I had smashed my way through his bowl helmet and into his cranium.
  
  As he went down, I turned to see the others. Eadric had stepped out of his own misty concealment, courtesy of Guineve's magic. The dwarf slammed his shield into his opponent's side, knocking the man off-balance, then followed up the push with a hammer-strike to the man's kneecap. As the man's vital guard struggled to save the function of his leg, Eadric batted away his opponent's axe with his shield, stepped around him and slammed the pointed end of his warhammer into the back of the man's other knee. He screamed and went down. Then Eadric swung what looked like a careful, glancing blow to the man's temple, and then the Malus member stopped screaming and went limp.
  
  The last of the three Malus Men was jerking back from an assault of a variety of missiles, both magical and mundane. A small pink light was fluttering all around him, blasting him with tiny fiery darts whenever he moved his shield to block the fire from Weylin and Karim. He was already smoking and bleeding from a half-dozen spots on his body. I gave his vital guard another ten seconds max before he went down, and felt confident about Breena handling him on her own.
  
  That left the Hordebeasts. They had brought three dozen of them here. Two-thirds were the oily, shriveled Ilklings and one-third were the slightly larger, horned, and armed Wretches. None of them would be anywhere near as strong as the men we just took down by surprise, but as a group they'd be more than enough for me to worry about gaining a casualty or two. Especially considering the next part of the plan.
  
  I gave the quiet mental command to the last member of our group, and it was Virtus' turn, along with the twelve ex-refugees with him, to exit Guineve's concealment.
  
  The tall, skeletal warrior and the dozen rescued locals with him charged forward, lined up in a phalanx resembling what the ancient Greeks used, a wall of shields with spears pointing over them. The deathless hoplite had been training them for two weeks, and so far today they hadn't disappointed. Moving as two rows, with Virtus anchoring the middle, they slammed into the unorganized mob of tiny monsters, stabbing and crushing almost half of them right off the bat. As the surviving Wretches and Ilklings tried to maneuver around the incoming shieldwall of death, the second row peeled off to either side, stabbing down into oily flesh and piercing through already-weak vital guards. They stabbed and pushed, and a few of the monsters got close enough to scratch back or swing their clubs, but the shields and padded armor kept everyone from getting any more than a few scratches and bruises. As the combat quickly wound down I breathed a sigh of relief and turned to Breena's sole remaining opponent, even though my mental connection with her told me she was unhurt and had the battle well in hand.
  
  I still should have paid more attention.
  
  She had been fighting the man with the veiny cheek, and said cheek was pulsing, as if it were trying to activate some kind of power, but it wasn't working. Probably because the man was lying on the ground, smoking and bleeding from all four of his limbs. He was also gurgling, because Breena was using a spell from the Ideal of Water to direct a stream of fluid straight into his nostrils. He was gurgling and trying to twist away from the lethal liquid, but it wasn't working, because he was too injured and Breena would just reposition to keep up the attack.
  
  She had done this once before, when my life was on the line and she was the only thing between me and my last opponent. But this time was different. The man was already down. All of our people were still up. And Breena's face was set in a tiny rictus of hate.
  
  <Breena!> I yelled at her through our mental link. <He's down! The fight's over!>
  
  <Did you drown him like this too?> she thought back, baffling me. <Did you cut him too? Answer me!>
  
  The next moment, her intent and emotions came washing over me through our link, and I realized she wasn't talking to me.
  
  The Malus soldier gurgled on the ground. It would have sounded pitiful, but for Breena's intense rage.
  
  "Stop trying to tell me it hurts!" the little fairy screamed. "You already knew it hurt, or you wouldn't have done it to Wes! You wouldn't have done it to the people you took!"
  
  "Breena!" I shouted. "The fight's over!"
  
  She didn't listen. She was too wrapped up in the emotions cycling through her. I sighed, stepped over, and jammed a palm full of lightning into the prone man's chest. He jerked one final time, then died.
  
  My little fairy companion blinked, and then looked around.
  
  "What?" she asked suddenly. "Oh. He's gone… but why?" She looked up at me. "I had him, Wes."
  
  "I know," I replied. "But I had to step in."
  
  "Why?" she demanded, flying in front of my face, her small woman's body shaking with adrenaline. "Why couldn't I handle him?"
  
  "Because you were starting to become like me," I said back quietly.
  
  Her eyes widened, and I felt her reach in through our link to read my intent, my emotions. It was a new thing, or at least a thing that was new to me. Fairies, or sprite-folk, as they called themselves, had an easy time reading the surface thoughts and moods of other races. They could tell what people were feeling, or afraid of, even if they couldn't always understand, or care, why. It was why Stell had made a sprite-folk Satellite of herself to attach to Challengers, so that they could better read the condition of the extraplanar hero that had come to battle whatever world-ending Tumult had arisen. But somehow the bond had developed even further, to where Breena could read some of the surface thoughts of her Challengers, even when she lost most of her power and reset by linking with a new Challenger. I had found this last part out only recently. Breena had been getting concerned about how I had been acting after all of my torture and deaths. One time I tried to brush away her concerns and she blew up on me, and explained how she could tell what I was thinking sometimes and so she knew that I still wasn't okay even if I pretended I was.
  
  Today, as we had been ambushing all of the Malus Members trying to return to Avalon through their portals, she had found that she could read the surface thoughts and feelings of other Earthborn as well, not just me, her bonded Challenger companion. I had taken it to be an invaluable interrogation tool and it was part of the reason all of the ambushes today had gone so smoothly.
  
  But I hadn't taken into account just how many atrocities and war crimes she had become aware of. And now she was drowning prisoners alive.
  
  I sighed, and then did my best to project all of the empathy and compassion I felt through our bond. This situation wasn't her fault. I knew firsthand just how easy it was to do what she had just done. We had to help hold each other together, or we'd spend all of our spare moments making sure these bastards got what they deserved, and there just wasn't enough time for that right now, even on Avalon.
  
  "We'll talk afterwards," I said kindly, but firmly. "For now, we've got to interrogate the man Eadric knocked out, and check on the new group of prisoners we've rescued."
  
  "Okay, Wes," Breena said in a small voice, hanging her head. "And I'm sorry."
  
  "I know," I said back, and I reached forward to carefully give the one-foot tall fairy a careful hug. "I'm sorry too. But we'll talk after everyone's safe."