I had been hit before, more times than I could truly remember in that moment, but I had never grown comfortable with it.

Pushing the weight in Seram's class had been nearly impossible for me at first, but with time, it had gotten easier. Going in and out of The Well had never been easy, but I was much better at it than I ever had been because of how often I had done it.

When my feet met the snow beneath me and Mother Ali withdrew her bandage wrapped fist, it felt like the first pain I had ever felt in all of my short life.

I stumbled back and doubled over with arms wrapped around my middle. My stomach turned like I would be sick, but all that came from me was a rattling inhale as I tried to replace the breath that had been forced out of me.

"The boundary, Autumn." I heard Alexei say from wherever he was outside the trap I had found myself in.

I stuck my arm out blindly and felt it press against something hard that had not been there before.

Like my hand had fallen asleep, pins and needles prickled through my fingers as I used the unseen wall to hold myself up.

"Remove your hand or you will lose it." I heard Alexei say from somewhere much closer than before.

My white haired guard had walked over to where my slow fall had stopped, and all that stood between us was a small amount of lavender light that showed the impression of my hand above Ali's boundary

He took a small amount of snow off the ground and threw it gently against the wall. In a shower of momentary light, the snow disappeared. It did not melt. It did not turn to steam. It simply was and then was no longer.

I snatched my hand away and let out a pained groan as I forced myself to stand.

"You are in her lace now," Alexei said and pointed at my feet. "There is very little you can do to escape."

In all the places the snow had been disturbed and kicked away, there were countless little windows into the working beneath our feet. A pattern of lavender lace shone up through the snow in delicate loops and lines that ended at the boundary of Ali's circle.

Thinking was not my strong suit on my best days, but it was even harder in the cold and with my stomach feeling like it was laying down to die inside me. I latched on to the only thing that Alex had said that held any glimmer of hope.

"Very little isn't nothing. Help me please, Master Alexei. What can I do?" I asked him.

I was playing no game. At that moment, no part of me cared about getting my guard to like me. I needed help, and he was the only one around that could give it to me.

He met my eyes, and I understood that he understood that my plea had been genuine.

I liked Alexei without his mask.

Which did nothing for me then, but I could not help but feel it.

"Begone Alexei," Mother Ali shouted from the other end of her circle and a rain of thrown snow pelted against my back and the unseen barrier. "You are outside for a reason."

Alexei stepped to the side so he could see the drunken Mother. "Mother Ali, is it not dishonorable to fight such an inexperienced opponent? She is little more than a girl, and you are one of the most accomplished fighters in all of chaos. Where is the honor in that?"

Mother Ali put her hands on her hips and grimaced as if she had tasted something bitter. "There is none.".

"Would it not be better to allow her to grow stronger? She has great potential, I have seen it myself. Come back when beating her would not shame you so." Alexei continued.

I did not know if he meant what he had said about my potential, but I thought I understood what he was doing.

"My lace has been placed. There is none later." Ali growled as she gestured down to the intricate pattern beneath us.

I turned back to Alexei and whispered. "What does that mean?"

"You heard her name. She has not shown her true self, but she is Doomlacer. Once someone is ensnared in her pit, there are only two ways out. To die or to kill her." Alexei whispered back.

He raised his voice and continued speaking with Ali. "If there is no later, then it would only be fair if you allowed me to offer her guidance. I am her guard, and if I cannot protect her in this, then you dishonor me as well."

Mother Ali shut her eyes. She took a slow and measured breath before relaxing her shoulders and nodding once. "That is fair. So be it."

Without another word, she began to close the short distance between us.

"Alexei? I can't kill her! I can barely keep myself alive!" I whispered, panic rising up in my throat with every snow crunching step The Mother in Purple took towards me.

"I know. That is why I have sent Lady Anna to fetch the headmistress. Ali became upset with me and she has taken this too far. Do not provoke her further, avoid getting hit, play into her sense of honor." He answered, and his words confirmed my understanding.

Before I had lost it, when I would use my red, passion would burn through me like Rhiannon's pyre during Embpyre. The highs of my blue had felled arrogant trees and broken walls.

The lace beneath me was Ali's working. Holding it must have been giving her a high just as my aura did for me.

Still panicked, still terrified, and still cold, I stepped towards her and lowered myself into the stance I would assume if I was playing points with Arthur behind the manor.

I had to buy myself time.

All the long hours spent playing outside of Arthur's long reach were not for nothing it seemed.

"There is the Autumn Aubrey I was told of," Mother Ali smirked, still approaching me slowly. "I was told that you would grow fierce if you were put in a corner. It is good that my sisters are not liars."

Her words grated against me so harshly that I thought I was buried in Azza's sand once again.

Something dark broke through my panic and spilled from my lips before I could stop it.

"They are. You all are. You said you wouldn't try to avoid my strike, and then you hit me. You lied to me. What's honorable about that?" I asked, real anger making my fists clench until my knuckles went right.

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"What are you doing? I said not to provoke her!" Alexei yelled from his place outside the barrier.

There were far too many reasons for me to be mad, and far too little reasons for me to care if I got hurt. The pain I felt in my heart was far worse than my aching stomach.

"I am supposed to be at play right now!" I said through my clenched teeth, and found that I was unable to stay still any longer.

I lunged forward and tried to drive my pointed fingers through the center of her chest.

"Why did you have to come today!" I shouted as my strike fell short and I pressed forward further.

With little to no effort, she evaded my attacks with a smile on her face.

I swung again. "It's not fair!"

She stepped back.

I almost caught her shoulder as she turned sideways to avoid me. "She gets to go to Hymneth and I have to be stuck here with you!"

The snow that hit her boundary disappeared like before and I chased after her around the curve of the pit.

"She gets to be the warden, and I have to get punished!" I knew that I had lost control as I continued, I knew that Ali or anyone else didn't care how much Tana had hurt me, but being mad for one reason had let all the other reasons come to my surface.

No matter how hard I tried, I could not touch her, but I did not stop.

Habit my left hand behind my back, but as I missed again with my right, I brought it forward and very nearly jabbed her in her side. "She gets a father and all I get is Mothers!"

I caught sight of a wide eyed Alexei watching my tantrum and my anger shifted from my own problems to hers. "And you're short! Maybe that's why he doesn't like you. If you wore a dress instead of underwear and a coat, he might think you're pretty!"

I felt bad saying it, and I felt even worse seeing Ali's reaction to my words. What made me feel worst of all, was being powerless to stop her counterattack.

She dropped down and clutched my ankle faster than I could react. Like I was a wadded sheet that needed to be snapped open, she turned and pulled me from the ground in one seamless movement.

Then, I was in the air.

Shortly after, I hit the ground and the trampled snow did nothing to cushion my fall.

White flashes filled my eyes and I could not move despite knowing how vulnerable I was.

"Speaking of things that you know nothing about is both foolish and rude, child," Mother Ali said from where she loomed over me. "Collect yourself and we will begin again."

Everything about her had changed, the way she stood, the look in her eyes, even her messy curls had been pushed back from her face. There was no sign of the drunken silliness that had been pouring out of her earlier.

She left me then, but I did not climb back up to my feet. I stared at the little wooden shack that had been Anna and I's for much too little time.

I had been excited for everything in front of me when we had been staying there. Spring Tana was a name that I had never heard. The trap that Azza had laid for me had not been discovered. I knew that I would have to be Ire, but I did not know what it was going to be like being her yet.

If I could have taken us back to those short days, and held us there like Sam could hold me in his place if I lost myself, I would have.

I heard Alexei walk over to where I had been thrown and stop on the other side of the boundary.

"I hope that what you have lost of your clothing is enough for you to understand that you should listen to me." He said simply as he knelt down.

I glanced over and saw that a large swathe of my skirt had fallen against the unseen wall and no longer existed. From just below my hip, all the way down to the broken hem, my grey stocking and cold skin was exposed.

"I can hear Mother Nami approaching. Stand up, do not press her, keep your thoughts to yourself, and stall. You have been placed in an unfair situation, do not let your temper make it be your last." My white haired guard said with something that almost looked like care on his face.

Before I could respond, I heard a familiar voice call out from somewhere close.

"Cowardice." A deep voice rumbled in my ears.

Alexei glanced away from me and I sat up to see Sam prowling over to where I lay.

"You would have her sit and wait for aid to come?" My familiar growled at my guard, his deep blue eyes locked in a contemptuous glare

Alexei's expression hardened. "As opposed to what? She is a girl. Ali is a force of nature. What can she do? The headmistress will be here shortly. I thought familiars were meant to protect their Ladies?"

"No," Sam said simply as he stuck a claw against the unseen wall. "That is for their guards to do, if they had those that were capable of it."

Sam's claw passed through the lavender light that surrounded it, but as soon as his blue fur reached the boundary, it fell away and revealed the clean white bone underneath it.

"You do not know her, swordsman. The false assumption that she is helpless is evidence enough of that," Sam growled up at Alexei as he removed his fleshless claw. "She is not a girl. She is a sorceress, and she should do battle as one."

I hated how his words made me feel.

What was the point of getting up if I would just be struck down again?

"The mortal has dressed you and prepared many delights for you this evening, My lady. Do you mean to disgrace her or do you mean to honor her? The choice is yours." Sam said simply.

Alexei scowled down at him. "She will be killed."

Sam responded without looking at my guard. "If it is her time to die, then it is mine as well. If I am dead, then I will no longer care."

Knowing I was being manipulated and still agreeing with what was being said was an odd feeling. It was almost as odd as watching Sam be so close to Alexei. My familiar hatred for the white eyed man had been no secret. As odd as it was, the big blue cat's words rang true to me.

Ali had ruined my skirt, she had ruined my date, and it was my turn to ruin her.

I began to focus my aura in my palm long before I began to climb to my feet.

"Lady Autumn, I beg you to see reason. She will kill you, I have seen how lethal she is with my own eyes." Alexei whispered harshly.

"Eye. You only have one eye." Sam said with a swish of his tail.

Alexei covered his face in his hands. "I wasn't born this way, cat."

The Mother in Purple waited patiently for me in the middle of the pit, her hands held behind her back and her spine straight.

I took a step towards her.

"If you do not try to strike her again before the headmistress arrives, I will play points with you. Is that not something you want?" Alexei asked in his uncharacteristically concerned tone.

"Yes." I admitted, the pressure behind the seal of my palm close to reaching the point that I could no longer hold it.

"Then I swear it. Do not press her like before and we will play points when this is over." He insisted.

I nodded in agreement and took another step forward. "Agreed."

Mother Ali shifted into a ready stance as I approached and I had to fight to keep my eyes focused on her.

I had spent many nights bending branch under the watchful eyes of my coach, and I had never been so thankful for it as I was then.

I had never held so much of my power before, the cold current of my will had never been quite so strong.

"Lady Autumn?" Alexei called out from behind me, but it was all I could do to take another step without falling to my knees.

I threw my right arm towards Mother Ali like I had done before.

She made one of her slight movements to avoid it.

I caught the front of her tight fighting garment and pulled it towards me. The material was stretchy, and though I failed to move her closer, it would have to rip before I let it go.

Not very long before then, in a cave where fruit grew with no sunlight, I had learned just how much ruin I could cause without meaning to.

"Ali!" Mother Nami shouted as she burst from the evergreens and strode towards the pit.

The Mother in Purple drew back her fist.

I let my power pass through my palm knowing full well what my will would bring.

Ali swung.

The azure firework hit the ground beneath us before she could hit me.

I blew us both away.

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