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Book 4

Brixaby, who’d been half paying attention to the humans’ conversation, came over. With a flourish, he pulled out two cards from his Personal Space.

“You should be grateful that I did not eat this,” he commented offhandedly. “They were rather magically heavy to carry around.”

“They can’t be heavier than all those combat cards you carried from Free Mesa Hive that one time,” Joy said.

“Yes, but that was briefly and during battle. These have sat in my Personal Space for some time, tempting me . . .”

Ignoring the byplay, Cressida and Horatio sat forward eagerly.

Cressida halfway reached for the card. “Is that . . .” She glanced at Arthur. “Are you sure?”

“Well, it’s not like I can put them in my card anchor.” He meant it as a joke, but there was a note of bitterness he hadn’t planned for.

Cressida shot him a sympathetic look. Horatio, meanwhile, had no trouble plucking the card from Brixaby.

“Rainbow Knight?” he said doubtfully, but then his skepticism cleared up as he read on. “Wow, Sams, what do you think of this?” He turned the card to his dragon so he could read it.

Though Arthur knew what the card said from before, his Reading skill let him scan over it again at a glance.

Rainbow Knight

Rare

Combat Support

The wielder of this card will be able to collect all spectrums of light from 10 to 750 nanometers from artificial and natural sources. This light will be stored in a light well with a meter accessible from the wielder’s card deck dashboard. Light collected from natural sources such as fire or sunshine will naturally be more potent. Once collected, the wielder may be able to emit that light again at will. Note: This card can only collect visible spectrum light and does not include any heat generated by light.

“I have seen something like this before,” Sams rumbled. “For farmers who wish to grow plants and such indoors. They go out and collect sunlight, come back in, and release it in an otherwise dark room. It is usually paired with a card anchor.”

“Hang the farmers,” Horatio said. “We can use it. Too bad about the heat, but you can add that, can’t you?”

Sams snorted his agreement. “Yes, add it to your heart deck.”

“Go on, Cressida,” Joy said from the side. She was bouncing from foot to foot, and now that she’d grown larger, she made the pebbles around her dance with her excitement. “What’s our new card? I want to see! Is it powerful?”

Cressida read the card to her, though Arthur already knew what it said. He knew it by heart.

Right Back At Ya

Rare

Combat Defense

Using mana, the wielder of this card will be able to form a shield around themselves and their allies. The exact size of the shield will depend on the quality and amount of mana, as well as the skill of the wielder. When defending against physical attacks, this shield will reflect a portion of the energy directly back at the attacker. The amount reflected is proportional to the user’s skill, the amount and quality of mana, and the strength of the attack. This is a skill-based card.

“A skill-based card?” Cressida breathed.

“Yes!” Arthur couldn’t stop his grin. “So the more you use and exercise it, the greater control you will have. In higher levels, it may use less mana. Of course,” he added eagerly, “that means at first it might be mana hungry, but I think if you practice some and level—”

“Arthur!” She laughed, placing her hand on his forearm. “I know what a skill-based card is. I am just amazed. My current mana shield isn’t skill based.”

“Oh. Of course.” He snapped his jaw shut and ignored Horatio’s smirk. But he still couldn’t keep down his enthusiasm. “That’s another thing—I was hoping, based on your mana shield, that the two might share some synergy. I don’t think they’re part of the same set . . .” He waited for her to shake her head to continue. “But they still might combine to two of a kind if there’s a lot of synergy.”

“There’s only one way to find out,” she said, and added it to her heart deck, to Joy’s cheers.

Cressida closed her eyes for a moment, but the smile that bloomed over her face told Arthur that there was indeed some synergy.

“I can’t wait to try this,” she said.

“You’ll get your chance soon,” Arthur promised. “I want to show you something special about the nests.”

* * *

“Ugh,” Joy complained as they flew. “We’re going back the way we came. I know we’re collecting the shards we missed, but seeing the same land again is sooo boring.”

Brixaby turned toward her, but Sams spoke up first, in a low-measured tone. “As I understand it, we are to destroy the place that spawned those scourglings to begin with.” He paused to curve his big yellow head around to check with Horatio, who nodded at him. Satisfied, Sams turned back. “Dragons should never let scourglings live and should always destroy them at the source.”

“I guess,” Joy said. “It’s just boring, and I’m tired.”

Arthur suspected that the last complaint was the real reason Joy was in an unusually grumpy mood.

It had taken longer than he liked for her and Sams to say that they were ready and able to fly again. They had truly been close to their last legs during that fight and were more exhausted than they had let on to their riders.

If it were up to Arthur, he would have let them rest the entire day—deadlands or not—or had Brixaby carry them in his Personal Space. Joy, at least, would fit.

But Cressida and Horatio knew their dragons and insisted that they were ready to go. Arthur had to trust their judgment.

Part of it was that they’d been properly horrified by the existence of the nests, and even more so that the city-states not only knew about them but used them as a bellwether for their Dark Hearts.

“No wonder you said the deadlands are expanding around here,” Horatio said, spitting to the side. “What else do they expect to happen?”

Cressida had wrinkled her nose at the spit but agreed. “I never imagined there could be so much dead land. I mean, I’ve seen it on maps outside the kingdom, but here . . . there is no kingdom. Just little oases of life. I can’t believe they’d be foolish enough to threaten that.”

“The people here call the Dark Heart opening a Reshuffling,” Arthur said. “There’s a lot of power and cards to be gained—enough to completely upend the workings of an entire city.”

“Like a boy from a border town getting a Legendary card?” Cressida asked.

“Something like that.”

* * *

They knew they were getting within range of the nest when the flying Common scourglings came after them again.

The real danger these presented was if a flock overwhelmed a single target.

But the vast majority had been decimated by the last fight. The scourglings came at them in dribs and drabs and were easily killed by Sams or Brixaby, who was more than happy to level his Stunning Shout ability on more pinpoint targets. Joy took care of the very few that got close.

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Even better, they followed the ragged line of scourglings straight back to the nest.

Commons weren’t the most intelligent.

The nest was a thick crack in the ground, and from up high looked like a scar on diseased flesh.

As the dragons drew close, a final burst of about two dozen scourglings emerged. Most of these were knocked out of the sky by a flash of light from Sams.

Arthur made a mental note to ask Horatio what his dragon’s cards were, exactly. Now that they were an official retinue and were going to go into the Dark Heart together, he needed to know his team’s strengths.

A few of the scourglings escaped the blazing light and circled around at different angles. Brixaby swelled, preparing his shout. Joy flexed her claws.

“Wait!” Horatio yelled. “Let me!”

Then he activated his Rainbow Knight card.

It was pretty obvious that was the card because the air around Horatio seemed to twist all out of proportion, and colors briefly became inverted and then . . . Odd. It was like looking into the depths of a glass prism built by a merchant of fancy gifts.

His head was red, shading to yellow at the neck, then green, blue, and finally purple at his feet.

“Aw,” Joy said. “It’s very pretty!”

Suddenly, all the colors bled into purple and then seemed to vanish.

Arthur remembered that Horatio for some reason, often described their invisible light card as purple.

No sooner had he thought that than a fully visible purple beam shot out farther than any of their attacks had before—farther, even, than Brixaby’s Stunning Shout.

It split into several mini beams, striking every single scourgling.

The air, which had been full of whistling shrieks, suddenly went silent except for the occasional thunk-thunk-thunk of falling bodies hitting the ground.

No more scourglings came out of the nest.

“Wow.” Horatio turned to Arthur, grinning. “That worked even better than I had hoped. Great card, Art!”

Arthur waved an acknowledgment back and tried not to feel a little bitter that his friends could add cards to their decks while he was stuck without a card anchor.

“I could have done the same, had I shouted,” Brixaby grumbled.

Arthur patted him on the neck.

The three dragons circled the nest opening a few times just to make sure the fight was done. When nothing more emerged, they landed.

The crack itself was large and deep enough that no one could see to the bottom. But it was too small for any of the dragons, even Brixaby, to get in.

“We’ll be fine. They’re just Commons.” Arthur pulled his ladder out of his Personal Space. “Why don’t you three dragons harvest the scourglings we just killed, and we’ll clear out the nest?”

He dropped the ladder and moved to descend, but Cressida stepped up. “I’ll go down first.”

“What? Why?”

She gave him a fierce look. “You’re the one who gave me the new shield card, remember? Horatio got to test his, and now it’s my turn.”

He winced, but he agreed.

Cressida leaned over to look down the crack. Then she summoned Wicker and one of her water cranes. They both slipped down the crack, and Cressida followed.

She didn’t use her shield on the ladder, but it was possible using it would give her trouble while interacting with outside objects.

It only took a few seconds, but it felt like forever until Cressida called back up. “There were a few scourglings down here, but the area’s clear now. Hurry, while it’s safe to come down.”

“Me next,” Horatio said, pushing past Arthur and giving him a jaunty smile. “You do want to see down there, right?”

“There’s glowing mold,” Arthur complained, but Horatio was already halfway down the ladder.

Arthur followed. On his way down, he heard an odd pulsing thud, like a heartbeat.

At the bottom, Horatio activated one of his light abilities, as light seemed to diffuse a few inches off his skin. And even though there was glowing mold, it did give Arthur more visibility.

Like the others, this nest was arranged into corridors.

And Cressida was under attack.

. . . sort of.

The rhythmic pulsing sound was coming from newly hatched scourglings—still wet from their ovoids—throwing themselves against her shield.

She must have had her new kinetic shield up, because it had a different hue, redder than the blue of her mana shield. More importantly, the scourglings bounced back every time they threw themselves at Cressida. Awkward and ungainly on the floor, with only the use of their hind feet and wing arms . . . they were a little pathetic.

Meanwhile, Cressida stood strong in the middle of the corridor, protected by the shield.

Horatio glanced pointedly at Wicker and the water crane, which stood to either side behind Cressida, watching but not engaging with the attacking scourglings. “Are you going to let them fight?”

“In a few minutes,” Cressida replied. “I’m trying to get some easy levels for my shield.”

Arthur smiled. That’s my girl.

But the smell down in this nest was just as awful as the others. Arthur quickly fished around in his Personal Space for more rags to soak in vinegar and tie around his mouth and nose. He gave one to Horatio as well.

With a frown of concentration, Cressida lowered the back half of her shield to allow Arthur to pass one of the rags to her.

Meanwhile, Horatio bent and squinted at the wall. He held out his hand, and abruptly it was perfectly illuminated, showing more proto-ovoids growing in clusters that Arthur hadn’t seen.

“So this is how baby scourglings are made, huh?” Horatio asked.

“Yeah, but here’s a fun trick.” Arthur grabbed one of his butcher knives and stabbed the tip into the largest ovoid of the bunch. From the partially developed scourgling inside, he harvested a Common shard and flipped it to his friend.

Horatio caught it, eyebrows lifting in surprise. “Wait . . . do you know what this means?”

“Yeah, we can farm scourglings . . . or we could if it wasn’t like playing with fire.”

“Acid fire,” Horatio grunted, then turned to Cressida. “Are you going to let those poor things bash themselves to death?”

“Poor things?” she repeated.

Horatio shrugged, but Cressida seemed to think he had a point. Lowering her shield, she sent Wicker forward.

The three scourglings that had been attacking her were by then too exhausted to move out of the way of the flame bear. They fell to one swipe of his paw.

“Send Wicker and your crane down the corridor,” Arthur said. “Have them kill the scourglings but leave the egg sacs. We can harvest them ourselves.”

Cressida suddenly grinned at him, feral and beautiful at the same time. “Watch this.”

She clapped her hands, and with a crackling roar from Wicker and a gurgling cry from the water crane, the two elemental beings rushed down the corridor. Just as they got into a good clip, they merged into a gout of steam that continued with rolling momentum past where Arthur could see down the way.

Pained scourgling cries echoed back to them. From the gust of heat that blew back at them a few moments later—uncomfortably hot but nowhere near what the rest of the corridor got—Arthur realized Cressida had created superheated steam.

“The steam dissipates too fast out in the open,” Cressida explained as if reading his thoughts. “But they’re really good in enclosed spaces.”

With that, she started walking down the hall, resummoning her elemental creatures and sending them along for another steam bath.

Horatio leaned close to Arthur. “Don’t tell her I said this, but your girlfriend can be a little scary.”

Arthur grinned.

* * *

They cleaned out the nest rather quickly, it having spent its best fighters in the aerial battle.

Cressida and Horatio seemed glad of the shard harvest . . . but not so much when Arthur pulled out a shovel at the end of the tunnel.

Thankfully, the dragon corpse wasn’t buried too deep down. It was a purple—an unusually large one.

Seeing buried dark-purple scales made a lump grow in Arthur’s throat. He quickly used Brixaby’s Call of the Void to harvest its remaining card.

It was so rotten that he could only read the rank—Common, and that it had something to do with flight. It was also actively disintegrating.

With a wince, he stored it in his Personal Space, where it sat like an uncomfortable lump against his soul. He would to transfer it to Brixaby as soon as possible.

Horatio stared. “That shouldn’t be possible. It’s been dead for how long? That card should be gone.”

“That’s the thing,” Arthur said. “It’s buried in the deadlands. Nothing about this dragon’s corpse is rotting. Well, not much.”

Cressida had seemed too shocked for words but finally gathered herself again. “Arthur, that card is disintegrating! And you . . . you just put it inside yourself.”

“Time doesn’t move in my Personal Space—”

She spoke over him. “The last time someone played with disintegrating cards, it spawned the Mind Singer! I haven’t forgotten that. Have you?”

Arthur let out a long breath. No, he certainly hadn’t forgotten what had happened under the scholar’s guild—or completely forgiven himself over it. Especially not after seeing what had happened to the free hive . . . and those poor hatchling dragons.

Even Horatio looked uneasy.

“It’s safe,” Arthur said.

She crossed her arms. “For now.”

“Yes, for now. But there’s something else. Brix and I have gone through other nests, and one dragon buried below had a trio of cards. One of those repairs other cards.”

Horatio made an appreciative sound. However, Cressida narrowed her eyes as if she knew there was a “but” coming.

And of course, there was.

“The repair card is in need of repair too, but if I can fix it . . .” He waved his hand around. “Think about it. How many times were you and Horatio attacked on the way here? All those different scourglings came from nests, and all of those were powered by disintegrating cards.”

Cressida and Horatio exchanged a look.

“We were attacked more the closer we got to here,” Horatio said. “But sometimes there wasn’t a day that went by when we didn’t see a scourgling.”

“Think about how many cards that represents.” As Arthur talked, his voice grew faster as he became more excited. “These are ancient cards. They haven’t been active in the world for generations. Who knows how much power they represent—how much opportunity! And right now, they’re just rotting away into scourglings. Everything around here is!” He smacked the side of his hand against the tunnel wall in emphasis. “We shouldn’t just let them just die!”

“Arthur,” Cressida said quietly. “If you wanted more cards, you could always just go to a shop. Why is this so important to you?”

“Because . . . because . . .” He sputtered for a moment. He couldn’t put his mixed but suddenly desperate feelings into words.

Until in the next moment, he could.

It was as if something unfurled in his mind. He knew himself and could see the motivations behind his own muddled feelings better.

“You know what Brixaby’s power is. For him to gain more power, he has to eat cards.”

And I’ve done the same, he thought with another surge of guilt, thinking of the Grindstone card.

If he had a chance to go back in time, he probably would have still absorbed the Grindstone card. But still, removing something from the world didn’t sit right with him.

With a final burst of clarity, Arthur blurted, “What if Brixaby is a card destroyer . . . but I could somehow bring cards back into the world?”

Skill level gained: Meditation

Level 20

He had gained several levels in Meditation . . . without meditating. Or had he?

The next alert was more surprising.

New skill gained:

Self-Insight (Self Class)

Due to your card’s bonus traits, you automatically start this skill at level 5.