Flinging his arms up, Skippii sent a shockwave through the earth. Once it hit the stairs, he clenched his fists and pulled them to his chest. The rock detonated as two Rockfangs tore from the ground. The pillars smashed through both golems, toppling them in a knot of heavy limbs, trapping them on the stairs. The foremost golem glared at him, its fiery beard raging over its baleful face.

Picking a stone from the floor, Skippii clutched it, honing his Lava Essence. Within moments, it smelted into a Blister Arrow, and he hurled the projectile at the golem's face. Though his aim was a little off, the arrow's strike was potent, shattering the top of its skull and severing an arm at its shoulder joint. The construct's head lulled, but its fire did not go out. For now though, the two were subdued.

Three more golems strode between the temple's black marble columns, and two more entered from a passageway at the courtyard's opposite end. Sighting him, they charged mindlessly, picking up speed as their weight dragged them forward. The ground shook like a cavalry charge through his bare feet, but Skippii grinned. He had come to relish such a feeling.

Throwing his arms out wide, he expanded the Magmatic Core magia beneath him, then brought it together with a clap. The earth shuddered, then exploded as two Rockfangs tore into the foremost golem. Stone screeched and cracked upon impact, sounding like a catapult smashing a wall. The construct exploded as boulders disconnected, rolling cold across the ground. Its fires went out.

Two more were close now. Thrusting out his palm, Skippii intended to absorb the magia of one by using Siphon Flame. The fires of its beard drew out towards him as the light between its stones dimmed. He drank it up like a quenching thirst, the power of its fire mingling with his, bolstering his core. But the evocation was too slow. The other golem was upon him. Dashing aside, he avoided it dexterously with Boiling Blood athletics. The golem swung a heavy fist that smashed through one of the Rockfangs which he had summoned during practice. It bore down on him as a bull chasing a cat, but his reflexes were too fast.

Meanwhile, its ally's energy was being slowly drained, and Skippii was growing more powerful. The weakening golem staggered after him, turning as he spun around its flank, mindful of the two others approaching from the opposite side. Catching a glance, he saw that they had been split up by the terrain, and were coming at him from different directions. With a flash of panic, he realised that he was surrounded. But the shock was brief.

Smashing the ground, he poured his magia–and that which he had siphoned from the guardian–into the ground. A Seismic Quake like no other he had ever summoned ruptured outwards, with him at its centre. Jagged slabs of stone wrenched upwards as others collapsed into fissures. The golems crashed about him, a landslide which scraped against his inner-ear.

One staggered close. He need not see the fire nearby to sense it. Dashing over to the golem, he bolstered his arm with Eruption Aura and struck the golem with a Blazing Strike.

The grotesque snarl of its face cracked on impact, and he dug his thumb into his jaw, clenching its face in a vice grip. With a breath, he drew its magia with Siphon Flame. The flames fled its visage as a winter gale passes over a candle, rendering it a lifeless husk.

A wicked grin sharpened his lips as the power flowed through him. Though they had been brutish, powerful foes during the Trial of Rupture, the constructs' reliance on fire magia was also their critical weakness. He could toy with them, killing them how and when he desired.

Two which had fallen to the Seismic Quake were rising on heavy limbs, climbing over the now jagged terrain to get at him. Raising his arm, he felt the Magmatic Core swell in tandem, vibrating in sympathy, like a dog whining to be let loose by its master. Clenching his fist, he tore a spire from the earth, piercing the golem through its torso.

Impaled, it bent over, but was not dead. Another behind it approached. Skippii was coated in sweat. A shimmering heat rose from his body, but still, the magia of the earth came freely. He had never felt it so potent. Even when he did not intend it, the power flowed into him, rising through his feet, swirling in his chest. The dam had been broken, and now all the flood was surging.

With a wild gesture, he brought two Rockfangs up beneath the toppled golem and slew it, then turned to face the last. It tumbled towards him, half falling over the uneven terrain. Dashing backwards, he avoided its clumsy blows, but desired to test his brawn. Pumping magia into his forearms to form a Blazing Armour, he held firm when the next fist swung. A flash of light blinded him, but its glare did not linger as he sailed through the air.

A few fast heartbeats, then Skippii hit the ground with a spark of flames and rolled to a stop. He panted, exhilarated, eyes wide in bewilderment. Though the golem had struck him cleanly, its attack had not winded him, nor even broken the skin on his arms. Even his most rudimentary abilities seemed to have been strengthened since his communion with Cor.

Laughing, he rose as the golem turned on him. He wondered if it thought and felt as he did–if it considered its attack a success–a hope for victory–or whether it knew he was playing with it like prey. He doubted that was true. They were slaves to another's intent. All of this, he contemplated while the golem charged towards him, then when it neared, he crouched and drew the Magmatic Core beneath his feet.

Thrusting upwards with both palms, he impacted the golem's charge direct Seismic Quake. With a shriek, the construct exploded in a shower of sand and stones, utterly destroyed–ruptured from within–a smoking ruin.

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For a moment, he stood in the centre of the courtyard, breathing heavily, listening and sensing the earth's tremors for movement. But all that remained were the two constructs trapped in the jaws of his Rockfangs at the stairs entrance. He made his way slowly over to them as Tenoris chased down the courtyard's rocky walls to join him.

"Incredible!" he yelled. "Summitor himself would marvel at such a feat as this, and Siesmorix would quake with adulation. What a marvelous display."

"Yeah, not bad, aye?"

"Not bad? That was nothing short of excellent."

Before them, the final two golems wrestled with their restraints. The one which Skippii had struck with a Blister Arrow pinned the other, and neither seemed to have the intellect to work together to escape their binds. Rather than kill them, Skippii reached into the earth as he had done to awaken them, and located their embers. He imagined holding each in his hand, and felt their primitive attentions focus on him. Their faces raised, they glared at him with fearsome expressions, but there was no hatred in their stoney eyes, only duty.

"Stand down," he commanded, and the constructs went limp. Their fires died down.

"You can command them?" Tenoris said exasperatedly.

"Only stop and go," he said. "But, maybe there's more I could do, I just don't know how."

"If you hadn't destroyed them all, we may have used them in the siege," Claie said, coming up from behind, helping the old woman navigate the terrain. But their smile suddenly faded as Skippii met their eyes. "I don't- I mean, obviously it was necessary, but-"

"Shut up." Skippii laughed and patted the scribe lightly with his knuckle. "You're right. Maybe they would have been useful. But I needed to feel my power in action. You know? So I can measure myself against an opponent."

"Are you satisfied?" the ex-slave laughed asked.

"Very," he smiled lightly.

Cliae handed him the tunic and belt which he had discarded. "It's good to see you didn't burn through your loincloth this time."

"More control," Skippii explained as he re-dressed. "But, I'd really rather have some attire that wasn't flammable. Chainmail, maybe."

"Expensive," Tenoris hummed.

"That won't be a problem," Eirene said. "Come, it is time for your parting, and there is something which I have held in secret. Gifts. The makings of caretakers over the generations, many of whom possessed skills in the crafts and divination."

"What more gifts have you to bestow?" Tenoris said. "Your home, your food, and now offerings too? I feel burdensome, and a farmhand never feels content until he has reaped and gathered more than he needs for himself at least three times."

"Silence," Eirene snapped, hobbling with her cane over the crooked courtyard, towards the temple. "I've had enough of your ramblings. Sixty years without hearing another person speak has left me quite fond of the silence. Speak fewer words. Come."

Tenoris pulled a face behind her back, and the three of them chuckled like boys as they followed the old hermit inside.

***

"It has to be me," the hermit insisted as she climbed a ladder into the loft. "It is my purpose."

The three of them waited inside her living space while the old woman's footsteps pattered lightly atop the wooden floorboards above. Skippii had offered to help her up the ladder, but she had insisted on doing it alone. Claie leaned over her desk, reading the journals stacked there, too shy to impose on taking a seat. Tenoris paced about the room impatiently, then finally plopped himself by the fire, staring intently at the ceiling.

"This is where I found her," Skippii explained. "When I first arrived, she was dying. I warmed her up, and… I think when she saw me, she regained her will to live."

"Such dedication," Tenoris said irreverently. "It is good that you came when you did."

"What are the chances?" he whispered.

"The chances are good when Oyaltun is casting the dice."

"Come here Cliae," Eirene said from above. "You may help me carry these down."

Cliae ferried an assortment of objects wrapped in cloth, and they all waited patiently for Eirene, except that Tenoris lifted the edge of one's canvas to peek beneath.

"Stop that," Cliae chided quietly.

The big man withdrew his hands and sat on them until the old woman arrived.

"Firstly, for the heres." She untied a string, unfolding a small square canvas to reveal a silver cloth inside. Raising it delicately in both hands, she displayed a long tunic of fine Philoxenian make. Golden triangles were woven to spiral around the hem, interlocking like chains of a link, never breaking their pattern; the fabric shone silver in the firelight, fitted with a delicate white-leather belt.

"This is no ordinary garment," she said. "It was created by an apostle of the lesser God Maysones, Master of Craftsmen, as a gift for Her Luminescence, Hespera. It is many centuries old, but has lost none of its quality, for it is imbued with Hespera's essence. It will never burn, never mar or tear, unless rent by one more powerful than the Goddess herself."

Skippii took the tunic from her, marvelling at its quality.

"The belt too, is woven with her preserving light."

"How did this come into your possession?" Tenoris asked irreverently.

"It was stolen by the craftsman's slave, who was then driven to this temple by Oyaltun–sister of Hespera. Whether or not such was a tactical choice by her Sentiescence, or a deed born from jealousy, I do not know." Eirene smiled wryly. "Now it is yours. Go about and use your magia freely, without fear of exposing your nudity."

Cliae laughed. "Oh, I'm sorry. I was just imagining you seeking counsel with the Imperator in nothing but a charred loincloth."

"It won't burn?" he enquired. "Unless by something more powerful than Hespera. What about Cor? Are the Primordials not as powerful as the Gods?"

"Yes," Eirene said. "But you do not possess the full strength of Cor yet, only a fraction. Your fires won't mar it."

Rising, he dressed, and found it hung loose over his form, but as he twisted to fit the belt, he found the fabric brush with a strange metallic tingling. Wriggling to avoid the sensation, he thought of Hespera's essence seeping into his skin, and contemplated her mind becoming aware of his.

"Be at peace," Eirene said. "You will get used to it."

"What is it?" he said, pinching the fabric to keep it off his chest. "Can she… I mean, if I wear this, will Hespera know?"

"I shouldn't think so," said Eirene. "The tunic never reached her palace, and she never learned of its making. However, were she to behold you, she would recognise her essence within it."

Skippii licked his lips nervously. "I don't want to draw the Gods' attention."

"It's too late for that," Eirene snapped. "And besides, you are Oyaltun's acclaimed. You may wear whatever gifts she wishes."

Cautiously, he let go of the fabric and tied it around his waist. The belt included notches for scabbards, but his had burned during his trials, along with his lifelong kuri. Though he had little use for a large curved knife anymore, he still felt a little exposed without the tool.

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