Vel stumbled until Sigurd had her “safely” hidden behind rubble. “We do not want to fight that thing,” he said.

  “Have you fought one before?” Amalia asked.

  “No, not a mother,” Sigurd said. “And mostly, I didn’t fight so much as outrun.”

  “So . . . what now?” Aden whispered.

  “Um . . .” Sigurd peeked his head up, but as soon as he did, he dropped back down. “I think it saw me.”

  “She,” Vel insisted.

  “Is that really important right now!” Sigurd asked, words nearly slurring into each other. “Look, we know there should be some stairs on the north and south side, so, which set?”

  “I think I saw some on the south side,” Amalia said, already creeping to the right, only to pause when she came to a spot where they’d have to climb up and obviously be seen.

  “This is a great plan,” Aden said sarcastically.

  “Shut up, Kid,” Sigurd huffed.

  Vel frowned, and as she moved to peek up at it, Sigurd pulled her back down with a tight grip on her shoulder. “Sigurd,” she said, “I think it’s good. If it saw us, it would already be attacking if it thought we were evil.”

  “She has a point,” Aden said.

  Sigurd pulled his lips into a thin line. “It could be, until it throws a rock at you. All the baby ones do, why would this one be any different?”

  “I don’t know, I just feel like━”

  “Feelings?” Sigurd rolled his eyes. “Velmira, think. They throw rocks at you. Please.”

  Velmira frowned. Yes, they were adorable, and they were babies, so maybe they didn’t know better. This mother elemental wasn’t moving against them after waking and seeing them, and as she listened, she heard the grinding of stone as it moved, along with the slight sloshing of water. This thing was dangerous. She knew it, and could feel it in her gut. With a push of [rock throw] and [spry jump], Vel propelled herself over the rubble, landing with no time to use [feather fall].

  [Spry Jump level 5]

  The mother elemental was moving in slow circles, and rounded all the way until it saw her, stopping and staring with unblinking eyes. Why would they blink? They were made of sapphires. She made her way down the rubble with jumps, using [feather fall] to get closer to the elemental, hearing Sigurd utter curses as he tried to keep up.

  [Feather Fall level 48]

  [Feather Fall level 49]

  Landing closer to it, an entirely new notification popped up in purple letters before Vel.

  [Dark’s Blessing: The gift of a mother elemental]

  I knew it! It is good, Vel grinned, looking up at the elemental. She bent over in an unnatural way, growing closer to Vel with her head. It almost looked as if she was going to crush Velmira, something that had Sigurd frantic.

  “Vel! Velmira, please!” he called, still scrambling to get to her.

  “It’s okay, Sigurd, she’s a blessing,” she said, which didn’t ease the hunter in the slightest bit.

  That was until the softest gust of wind blew over Vel’s form, delivered from a small tornado that floated around her head.

  [Skill gained: Wind Blast]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  Vel closed her eyes, giggling. When she opened them, she met two large sapphires, and dropping from around them were cute little baby elementals. Earth, fire, little tornadoes, and water. They landed on the ground, bouncing towards Vel’s feet. While all of them respected her, the little rock elementals still threw pebbles at her legs.

  [Iridescent Hide level 8]

  [Iridescent Hide level 9]

  [Iridescent Hide level 10]

  [Iridescent Hide level 11]

  [Tough Hide level 63]

  Finally, she heard Sigurd stop, his breath floating past the frizz on the top of her head. “What is it . . . ?” he trailed.

  “She’s giving me skills,” Velmira said. “A blessing from Dark, called ‘the gift of a mother elemental’.”

  Amalia moved up beside Vel, panting. “So,” she wheezed out, “Sigurd just has a bad relationship with these things? What did you do?”

  “I saw sapphires. What do you imagine a man like me tried?” he asked.

  Vel snapped around, glaring at Sigurd, “You tried to steal an elemental’s eyes?”

  “Eyes? Vel, we don’t know if those are its eyes?”

  “Of course we do! They’re on her head, and she has two of them. Sapphire eyes, sort of like mine,” Velmira said, turning back to the mother elemental that still hovered over her.

  Slowly, several small ice spikes formed in the air, as if water droplets were being pulled together and crystalized. The spikes flew in a small grouping like Vel imagined fairies might have done. She twisted about, turning as they danced around her form once, then harmlessly shattered, flying over her face like snow.

  [Skill gained: Ice Spike]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  I can’t wait to tell Edard about this, she thought, closing her eyes until the refreshing coolness of the snow died down. Opening them again, she looked up at those large sapphire eyes, glinting in the light that was cast over the elemental’s form from a second story window.

  The ground rumbled beneath Vel’s feet, and in a perfect circle around her, she could see the stones cracking and breaking apart. Amalia and Sigurd stumbled back, giving space for the stones to fly up, breaked and then condensing back together around Vel in a domed shield until she was shut into the darkness. This would have been terrifying had it not been for the trust she had for the being. Hardly a moment later, the stones crumbled, allowing light to speckle back in bit by bit until Vel stood in the center of rubble.

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  [Skill gained: Stone Shield]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  How many will she give? she thought, looking up towards the massive stony beast. Though she might have been faceless, Vel could tell in the way she moved that she was gentle. Enough that her babies could safely climb over her rocky form.

  Fortunately, the rock babies had grown bored with Vel, though they still occasionally threw stones at her, gradually leveling [iridescent hide] up to 16 and [tough hide] up to 65. If she could, she’d let the little guys throw their stones at her all day long, if only for the cuteness factor and for the free levels.

  Fire formed before the mother, an ember burning and dropping towards Vel’s head. She stared at it, the ember growing until it broke apart and spiraled around in a hundred little embers over Vel’s form. The heat radiating from them was soft, but enough in the jungle temple that she could feel the sweat on her brow, up until the fires all went out in a drizzle at her feet.

  [Skill gained: Fire Prance]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  After the skill was granted, the mother straightened out, something Vel took as a cue that her gifts were complete.

  “Thank you,” she said, and the elemental lifted a stone slab from the ground. She moved it around and set it in front of Velmira. There was . . . and expectation, it seemed, as the mother elemental’s face rotated up to look at Vel, then down to look at the slab. Turning around, Vel looked at Amalia, Sigurd, and Aden━who sat at the top of the rubble near the room’s entrance━and said, “I think she wants us to get on the slab.”

  “No,” Sigurd said, narrowing his eyes.

  Vel rolled hers, then reached out, grasping at Sigurd’s wrist. “Come on, she’s nice,” she said.

  Sigurd cringed, and for a moment, Vel sword she saw some measure of fear in his eyes. The only times she’d really seen such fear was when he was worried about her; worried about keeping them alive. But this, this was something else, like a more generalized fear and less a worry.

  “I’m not getting on that,” Sigurd said.

  “Then I’ll go on without you,” Velmira said.

  Sigurd huffed. “Fine. Kid, get down here,” he said.

  Aden reluctantly stood, and for the first time, Vel could see the exhaustion in the way he moved. He was sluggish, every step looking heavier than the last. He’s done so much healing already, she thought, knowing how he’d worked on the [spear masters], and then twice over on her. Some of those injuries weren’t small, but he was holding true to his word to be the best damn healer.

  Velmira turned around, placing her hands on the slab to leverage herself as she kicked off with her feet. It wasn’t as hard or as high as she thought, but perhaps her skills helped with that.

  [Spry Jump level 6]

  Once she was standing on the slab, she offered Amalia a hand. The singer grabbed it with both hands, and in turn, so did Vel. She leaned back as she helped Amalia up, Sigurd making the climb effortless but practically lifting the smaller woman from the ground.

  When Aden reached them, Sigurd plucked him from the ground, then set Aden on the slab’s ledge. The teenager punched Sigurd in the shoulder. “I could’ve gotten it myself,” he whined.

  “I’m sure you could have,” Sigurd said, and jumped up.

  Once he and Aden were on their feet, the slab rumbled softly beneath them as it lifted off the ground. It floated up into the air further, the movement so smooth that balancing was easy, enough for Vel to turn in the direction the mother was taking them to. There was a ledge with no wall, held up by a pillar that was still attached beneath it. The ledge was on the far side from where they had started, and upon it were a set of stairs that led up to the third floor. And a window.

  When the slab stopped at the ledge, Velmira stepped off along with Amalia and Aden, then turned to find Sigurd on all fours, looking somewhat sick.

  “Are you okay?” Vel asked.

  “Yes,” Sigurd nodded unconvincingly, and pushed himself up. He stepped off the slab and on the ledge, and the moment he did, the slab lowered back to the ground. Sigurd visibly shivered. “Freaky little . . .” he muttered.

  Vel held back a giggle, and watched as the mother elemental slowly lowered herself back to the ground, sapphire eyes facing her pile of rocks as water and earth dropped. The tiniest breeze running through the room ended, something Vel only realized had been present the entire time. Fire winked out, and the baby elementals all returned to the mother, seemingly going to sleep or winking out.

  Turning around, Vel looked at the window, and out it, she could see the front of the temple. There were Ymrillian horses and knights there, who were now guarding up two tied priests and three dead church knights. Or at least, Vel assumed they were dead. She couldn’t see directly below the window, placing her hand on it and trying. Now that their battle was won outside the temple, she wondered if they were trying to get to her.

  “Velmira,” Sigurd said, his footsteps echoing as he moved a few steps up the stairs. “We need to keep moving.”

  Nodding, Vel turned away from the window, taking heart in the fact that they were winning. Now, Edard. He was waiting for her, needing her at the zenith of this temple. I’ve wasted so much time, she thought praying he’d forgive her as she took those first steps up.

  The long staircase darkened the further up they went until at the top of the stairs, it opened up into what looked to have been a hall, but there were gaps in the inner walls, leading into rooms on the inside of the building. The only light was granted by tall slivers of windows, which also allowed fresh air into the space.

  “Historian said the stairs would be on the north side,” Sigurd reminded.

  “Are you just bad with names or somethin’?” Aden asked.

  “Or something,” Sigurd answered.

  Vel shook her head at the two, and about faced to move down the hall towards the north side, pausing. The walls had collapsed in here, creating a dead end.

  “What are the chances the hall wraps all the way around?” she asked.

  “Likely, I would say, if it’s not littered in ruin as well,” Amalia said.

  Velmira turned around, passing doors that barely hung on their hinges, a black room beyond. She started over rubble, climbing over a wall that opened up to a hole into the same black room, the darkness eerie. She paused looking at it. It was so . . . unnaturally dark.

  [Climb level 45]

  Amalia climbed up beside her. She stopped halfway, and sighed. “Holy . . . The hall is blocked there too.”

  Vel turned, looking at the rubble piled up at the other end of the hall. “This is starting to feel deliberate,” she said.

  “I think it is. They chose this location,” Sigurd said.

  “But how did they know we’d come up this staircase?” Vel asked.

  “Likely, they didn’t. Both sides are probably blocked off like this,” Amalia pushed stray yellow strands behind her ear.

  She too now looked in the darkness into that black room. “I don’t like this,” Aden said, leaning over and peering at the blackness. “That darkness is unnatural, somethin’ made it. And guys, if I can’t see, I can’t heal.”

  “Maybe I can fix that,” Vel said, and held out her hand. When she’d been given [fire prance] it looked more like the fire itself was prancing, not so much that she needed to prance. She hoped that was true.

  Much like fireball, though slower, Vel grew cold, like the heat merely shifted through her body and formed a ball of fire that hovered over her hand.

  [Fire Prance level 2]

  The light was enough to push back part of the unnatural darkness, and Vel knew that with time, she would grow too cold to support this. So, instead of going through the hole in the wall, she made her way back to the doors, closer in the direction they needed to go.

  “Hold hands,” Sigurd said, taking Amalia’s hand in one of his, then Vel’s. Aden was at the end, attached to Amalia as Vel pushed the door open with her foot.

  She jumped as the door groaned and fell from its hinges, then took in a sharp breath as she proceeded into the darkness. Only being able to see a few feet in front of her was terrifying, enough that her grip on Sigurd’s sweaty hand tightened. With each step, slow and methodical, she looked back towards the doorway, the only other source of light, which grew dimmer the further they got. What if there was a hole? What if we just fell through the ceiling? she thought.

  Closing her eyes and taking a large breath, she opened them back up, casting darkness off of mossy stone floors and pebbles. No rubble or walls yet. Not even furniture. This was supposed to be the floor to house high priests and high priestesses, wasn’t it? Maybe even her? So why was it so open and empty, and . . . how long was it going to take them to find the stairs at this rate.

  Vel shivered as the cold bit at her spine. She couldn’t keep this up for much longer, as evidenced by the ember in her hand fading. She looked back at the door, and . . .

  Blackness.

  Where had the door gone? How could they be so far in that there’s no light left from the door? Or was it night already?

  [Skill gained: Nightmare Leer]

  [0.5 Magic added]

  The ember went out, plunging Velmira in darkness. For a long moment, there was nothing, and Vel moved closer to Sigurd, holding his hand tight, then his arm. She heard the sound of her own breath, but didn’t hear his.

  “Sigurd?” she asked, but there was no response.

  Is this the nightmare? she asked, furrowing her brow as she felt her heart pound in her chest. A light not far off came into view, like dark, viscous flames over a . . . chicken? Its head turned, the eyes as black as the room around her. Blacker even, until a red glint flashed in them.

  [Quest of Retribution received: DIE.]