The next morning, after Jessie got on the bus for school, Ellen and I met at the Peoria GC.

It was shocking how dead it was. The library was completely empty; it seemed like every delver in Phoenix was on duty, and honestly, I couldn't blame them. With the surge running, there were more than enough portals opening to go around—it was an opportunity to gain power, and Ellen and I looked like we were letting it slip by. But Jeff needed a day to get the last two members of a full team together. Once we had that, we could really push.

And that meant the best move Ellen and I could make was to finalize our builds and lock them in.

"I'm looking at Dash for one of my remaining skills, and maybe the familiar Mana battery one for the other," Ellen said from behind her book. Her sticky notes were arrayed on the desk like an army preparing for battle. "I'm definitely feeling the improvement to Shadow Box and my spells from all the regen I have—plus Arcane Resonator—but having a reserve to pull on in emergencies would be massive."

"Why Dash?" I asked.

"Because even though I have Shadestutter, it costs Mana to use. Dash isn't as quick or safe, but I'm already not using my Stamina, so it's a better option almost all the time. I basically don't use Shadestutter right now, because the opportunity cost of not being able to Shadow Box or cast an offensive spell is too high, but if we're pushing into C-Rank portals soon, I'll need to stretch my limits more, and using Stamina would help with that."

She raised a good point. My own build had some glaring weak points, although the increased Mana from my last few merged skills had gone a long way toward addressing them. The biggest one was that if I wanted to use anything more powerful than Ariette's Zephyr as my main spell, I'd need additional Mana sources—or much higher regeneration. "Tell me about Energy Font."

"Easy skill to get. It's just passive meditation while low on Mana. It increases your Mana regeneration while you're focusing on it. Pretty effective when you're completely drained, but I've got 500 Mana, and it loses effectiveness after I pass a quarter full. That's enough for, like, one Shadow Box with a little extra."

"Perfect. That's my first skill, then.' I scribbled it down in my notebook. "As for my second, I'm leaning toward Brendan's Hymnal. It'll give me access to some powerful lightning-based spells. They won't work with Cyclone Forms—that is, I won't get Wind Charges—but I'm hoping they offer a more high-damage alternative to the E-Rank stuff in Ariette's Grimoire."

"Yeah, that book's full of fast-cast magic, but if you're going to be a striker, you'll need something more violent," Ellen said.

"I've got Windsplinter, but I need to clear it off my core. It's good situationally, but it takes up too much space. If I'm only going to fit three spells on there, I need a quick, multipurpose filler spell, a heavy-hitter, and a utility spell. Right now, Ariette's Zephyr is my filler, but Windsplinter doesn't work as a heavy-hitter or finisher, and I have no utility."

"Right."

I stood up. "I'm going to wander for a bit, find the books I'll need for Brendan's Hymnal and Energy Font."

Ellen popped up and followed me to the door. "I'll join you. I need to track down some books as well, for the mana battery skill."

Ellen knew that she wouldn't have made it through the last forty-eight hours without Kade. Not without, at the very least, having to kill her hatchling—and more likely, having her father thinking she owed him even more than he already believed she did.

And Kade had handled it gracefully. He hadn't even brought up how much danger she'd put his sister in. Instead, he'd just treated the whole fiasco as…what? Just another step on the path he was on. Ellen wasn't fooled, though. Kade had been tense from the moment she'd texted him up until she'd completed her own Familiar Bond and had the second egg under control. There'd been something inside of him ready to go—ready to fight and kill.

She owed him. She hated that she owed him, but she did.

So, as they perused the shelves, looking for two specific books. Ellen brought up the topic the only way she could think of. "Thanks for letting me sleep in your bed."

Kade nodded. "It was the safest option, aside from you taking the egg and going home. I didn't want you getting into a fight in your car, and you needed a few barriers between you and Jessie. And I'm used to the couch."

"Yeah…about Jessie." Ellen paused. Kade had stiffened slightly; his hand was frozen on the spine of a book on Mana control techniques. "That's the right one. Go ahead and grab it. I said I owed you, right?"

"And I said it wasn't a big deal, and that we were partners."

"Yes, you did. But that's not how it works, Kade, and you know it. If it was just you and me at risk, it would have been fine, but I knew I was putting Jessie in danger before I texted you. I just didn't have anywhere else to go. I couldn't trust anyone else, and—"

Kade fished the book off the shelf and tucked it under his arm. He forced a smile—Ellen could tell it was strained. "Ellen, I don't…I promised my stepdad that I'd take care of Jessie and keep her safe. If I hadn't thought we could handle it, I wouldn't have let you in. You said you messed up a few times—"

"Four." Ellen winced as she said it, but she had to come clean—for her own sake, not for his. "Coming to your place, leaving you with the egg instead of asking Jessie to get the information, falling behind on my skill merge in the first place, and then falling asleep when your egg hatched."

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Kade was quiet for a while. Ellen followed, worry churning her stomach. Then he grabbed another book and handed it to her. "That one's for familiar skills. It should have what you want in it."

"So…" She took the book, holding it in one hand. The other hung awkwardly at her side. "Yeah, I definitely owe you, and what happened wasn't fine. I'll make it up to you. Just tell me how."

"Fine." Kade went quiet again. Then he cleared his throat. "You can decide what you think is fair, though. And whatever it is, let's wait until after things calm down. The portal surge needs to be our priority—that, and finishing our builds so we can start getting stronger."

Ellen smiled. "Of course." But inside, she wasn't sure if she liked his answer, or if she'd been hoping for something else. If he was just being polite, or if he really wasn't worried about her debt to him. Either way, Ellen was confused, and she didn't like that feeling.

Ellen and I learned Dash and Energy Font at the same time, and in the same place—the sparring rooms. They were so empty that even though it was B and A-Rank hours, we had our pick of the place. I stepped inside first, taking up a position in the center of the room, then filled my hand with Ariette's Zephyr.

"What, exactly, are we doing?" Ellen asked.

"You're running. I'm casting. Dash can be learned on the track with sprints, but I think it'll be more efficient if—" Instead of finishing my sentence, I flung a Zephyr at Ellen. It hit her in the stomach, and she doubled over, coughing. "—there's a little danger involved."

"Seriously, Kade," she asked, pouting, coughing, and trying to hide a smile at the same time.

I flung another Zephyr her way. This time, she started sprinting, and I missed. "Yep. Serious. Let's get to work."

The Zephyrs flew like hail, and before I knew it, I was out of Mana and Ellen was slowing down. I focused on the empty feeling in my core and worked to reduce it. The mana came a little faster, maybe, and I flung another Zephyr just as she dropped to a jog. "No slacking, Ellen!"

She stuck her tongue out at me. I didn't have the Mana to respond.

I went back to concentrating on regenerating Mana quickly. It worked best if I didn't move, so I stayed perfectly still except when I was attacking.

It took almost an hour. Ellen was red-faced and puffing when she finally learned Dash. "Try to…try to hit me now," she said, smiling through an obvious stitch in her side.

I slammed a Zephyr into her forehead, and her head snapped back. "God dammit, Kade!"

Skill Learned: Energy Font

A mage without Mana is a dead mage. Almost every caster knows that, and almost every one of those develops a strategy to mitigate that condition. Some grow their Mana pools with skills, while others seek external Mana sources to supplement their own. Energy Font allows quicker regeneration of Mana the less of it you have in your pool. Those using efficient, cheap spells get the most benefit from Energy Font, but all mages can find its speedy returns helpful in a pinch.

Upgrade Effects: 1. Each rank increases the maximum Mana levels Energy Font can restore. 2. Each rank increases the mana restoration rate.

Brendan's Hymnal was shockingly easy to learn.

The hardest part was erasing the inscribed Windsplinter to make room for Shock Wave. It was the perfect spell to replace Windsplinter with: a powerful, close-range finisher that was slightly cheaper in both cost and space than the directional, limited wind spell.

Shock Wave acted a little like the lightning trap Bindings I still carried into portals, but with significantly more force—and considerably more damage. In fact, the spell reminded me a little of Stormbreak. It was a short-range area damage and control spell that limited its damage to 'everyone who wasn't the caster' and divided its damage among all possible targets at close to ninety percent efficiency.

I didn't intend to use it as an area attack, though; between Ellen's Shadow Box and my Howling Gale, we had that covered. What I wanted was something that punched harder than Rain-Slicked Blade, especially if I could echo it with Lightning Strikes Twice—something to pour eighty or so Mana into and end a fight with.

Something to use as a striker.

Removing Windsplinter took a long time. Once inscribed, spells didn't want to be destroyed, so I had to go in and carefully, slowly, and painstakingly erase tiny sections of the spell—without destabilizing it, since at this point, it'd only result in the symbol re-forming while I was unconscious. That ended up taking three tries, and Ellen finished her mana battery skill while I was unconscious for the second time.

Then I could finally start inscribing the jagged, angry-looking lines of Brendan's spell, Shock Wave. I was more precise than I'd ever been with anything, and almost before I realized it, the last line of the circle of lightning bolts had been etched, surrounding my core like a tribal tattoo around a planet. I stared at it for a moment, then nodded.

"Got it."

Skill Learned: Brendan's Hymnal

Though only an A-Ranked mage, Brendan's deep voice and razor-sharp wit served him well as a lightning and thunder caster. This hymnal is the culmination of his life's work, assembled posthumously by friends, colleagues, and a handful of researchers who reverse-engineered his spellwork. All agree that the mage would have been among the S-Rankers with the most raw power if it weren't for his death containing the Svalbard portal break. You may inscribe the tome's spells onto your Mana core and cast them spontaneously at the cost of Mana.

Ezekiel Elwood didn't want to fight.

But the mess outside of the Tyrants' campus had gotten so bad that he was operating—and operating at B-Rank capacity.

He never operated at full capacity. Not in B-Rank portals, ever, and rarely outside of them. That wasn't his purpose or his calling. It didn't feel like acting anymore, and with the sheer number of portals, he couldn't support Terrel. Portals that could actually kill him without Terrrel protecting him gave Ezekiel anxiety. He felt vulnerable, and the Power of Friendship and his hidden-rank skills only did so much to fix that.

The B-Rank Tyrants he was running with were competent enough. They'd mowed through a pair of C-Rank portals to warm up, spending less than an hour in each. But now they were up against a B-Rank. And his build was starting to drag them down.

He just wasn't built to operate at full capacity. C-Rank? Sure. But B-Rank? Not so much. He was a talent scout, for Christ's sake.

An all-hands call was an all-hands call, though. He gritted his teeth and shifted his Power of Friendship to damage, ignoring the wounds on his teammates' arms and backs. The flailing swamp monster they were fighting didn't hit hard, but on a long enough time scale, it would overwhelm them through sheer number of blows.

Ezekiel's best bet for getting through this and back to headhunting Kade Noelstra—the prize of the year, most likely—was to help kill this monster as fast as possible.

So he poured himself into his role and hoped he'd be able to perform well enough to get the win.

Then to get the next portal cleared. And the next one.

He hated portal surges so much.

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