The Rifts of Psyche by Kyle West (i love reading .txt) 📕

fray, too. A Burner named Ramore. He almost killed me with Thermal Magic.”

“And you’re just telling us now?” Cleon asked.

“A Thermalist,” Fergus said. “Cleon, you must make sure we’re warded before we go in there.”

“Sure thing, Cap.”

A few minutes later, they rounded a bend to see the entrance of the cave, on a ledge about a hundred meters above them across a narrow gulley.

“That’s it,” Lucian said.

“As forlorn as forlorn can be,” Cleon said. “This land has the feel of wyverns. See all those caves up there? What was Serah doing here?”

“Escaping notice,” Fergus said. “Some of the Deeprift villages make a practice of hunting frays. It’s safer for frays to live in the Upper Reaches or even in the Darkrift.”

“That’s a sad life.”

“Indeed.”

Without another word, Fergus started forward. Now that he knew where the group was going, he wanted to take the lead again.

Within minutes, they were fifty paces from the cave mouth. Fergus held up a hand.

“I sense no mage in there,” he said. “But she may just be a good warder. Be cautious and spears ready. And keep an eye out for the Burner.”

“Maybe I can go first,” Lucian said. “She knows me.”

“She knows me, too, though it has been a few years,” Fergus said. “We go together. It might take all three of us to bring the Burner down if it comes to it.”

“If you kill Ramore, she will kill you.”

Fergus laughed bitterly. “She has reason to already. It was I who led her out of the valley when Kiro exiled her. That wasn’t easy on anyone, but least of all Elder Ytrib.”

By now, they were close to the cave entrance. Close enough for Lucian to notice that something was amiss. It was a sight that made his heart drop.

He pointed at the entrance, where a body lay sprawled on the ground, almost completely lost to the darkness.

“Rot it,” Fergus said. “How did I miss that?”

“Too busy running your mouth, Captain,” Cleon said. “Should we investigate?”

Lucian had a bad feeling about this, but what else was there to do?

“Looks dead to me.” Fergus said.

The only question was whether the body belonged to Serah, Ramore, or someone else entirely. There was only one way to find out.

Since the other two weren’t moving, Lucian took the lead. He reached for his Focus. If this were some sort of trap, it would be better to be prepared for it. Remembering Serah bragging about her Gravitonic Magic, he streamed a Gravitonic ward around himself, using Psionic Magic as his shell. To his surprise, the ward set fine. It seemed Elder Erymmo’s lesson had stuck.

“You streaming?” Fergus asked. “I thought I told you—”

“—Serah is an accomplished Gravitist. We need to be defended against that.”

“Yes, do that,” Fergus said, somewhat testily. He seemed annoyed he hadn’t thought of the idea first. “Can you extend your ward radius?”

“How do I do that?”

“Reach your Focus farther and commit more ether.” His eyes watched him, appraising. “That is, if you can handle it.”

Lucian nodded, and expanded his ward about five meters, which should be enough to cover everyone. His ether pool constricted, making him feel momentarily lightheaded. It was hard to say, but he probably only had half of his pool left to stream. That made him uneasy, but they weren’t here to fight. They were here to talk.

Lucian watched as Cleon set a Thermal ward, while Fergus’s concealment ward was still active. With each of their wards, protecting them from Gravitonic, Thermal, and Radiant magic, they were as well-protected as they could be. Lucian’s heart pounded at the thought that Ramore could be lurking within, ready to strike.

“I’ll take point,” Fergus said. “If the Burner is in there, Lucian, Bind him and let me take care of it. I don’t want to leave anything to chance.”

“And Serah?”

Fergus paused for a moment to think. “Cleon will deal with her.”

That settled, the three men strode toward the dark entrance of the cave.

What hit Lucian first was the smell. Burned flesh had to be the most disgusting stench in all the Worlds. It took holding his Focus for Lucian not to heave the contents of his lunch.

The sight of it was almost as bad. The body was a charred husk, to the point where it was impossible to tell who it was. Size alone wasn’t enough of an indicator, since so much had burned away. Bone showed through the blackened skin of the arms.

Whether this death had been self-inflicted, or the result of a fight, Lucian couldn’t say.

“Search the cave,” Fergus said. “She might still be around.”

Lucian’s stomach churned at the thought that Serah might have met the same grisly end. He refused to believe it. As a frayed Thermalist, Ramore could have done this to himself out of his own madness. It seemed the most likely explanation.

Little could be found in the cave. Either Serah had packed up and left, or the cave had been looted by somebody. Or somebodies.

The three stood near the cave entrance again. The sky was darkening. It would be night in just a couple of hours.

“Cleon, thoughts?” Fergus asked.

Cleon was poring over the cave entrance. “Plenty of footprints here. Fresh. No more than two days old. Most point to and from the Upper Reaches.” He pointed in the direction Lucian had wandered from three days ago.

“Can you pinpoint a set of footprints that might be smaller than the others?” Fergus asked. “Belonging to a woman, perhaps?”

“Hard to say,” Cleon said. “Plenty of larger footprints, though, made by boots from the look of it. The tracks tell a story. Could be that Serah and her unlucky friend here were ambushed in the dead of night, and all their stuff looted. The one here was burned to a crisp while the other was taken prisoner. We already know the Queen is interested in the Snake Pass. And only mages would have the ability to take another mage hostage. That tells me there’s a level of organization here that few but the