Archcrafter: Chapters 39-40 (The Weirkey Chronicles) (Patreon)

There's another worldbuilding post up! Otherwise, I'll leave most of the notes for after the chapters.

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Chapter 39

Zero months. Zero days.

Theo sat in the waiting chamber outside the arena where the duel would take place, attempting to put everything else out of his mind. There had been final gambits, final preparations, and final soulcrafting, all of it in the past now. He emptied his soul of everything except his objectives.

Only the fight remained.

~ ~ ~

Nauda had expected the duel to take place in the Yorthin Coliseum, though in retrospect she realized that it was a bit large for a single fight between two individuals. Instead their group had gone to a small arena owned by the House of Coin, officially serving as a neutral location. Though House Blacksilver had sent representatives, Nauda didn't feel that they truly counted as allies, since they were only there for the sake of the political balance.

They had been kept in their own waiting room at first, while Theo departed to prepare. He carried most of their sublime materials, wore Fiyu's bracers, and they had plans for her staff as well. Eventually they were allowed into the central arena chamber, so Nauda examined the room carefully. The Armeau family had already proved willing to hire mercenaries and attack outside the terms of the duel, so she wanted to be ready.

As soon as she arrived, however, she realized that she didn't need to be worried about that. An Authority from the House of Coin sat in a walled podium to serve as a judge, and there were many other soulcrafters present. Both sides had apparently agreed not to bring anyone above Ruler, but she saw another Authority in the crowd: Tythes sprawled across four seats, balancing an entire tray of pastries on one foot and occasionally shoving one into his mouth.

Looking away from him, Nauda analyzed the arena instead. It appeared to be a simple block of golden marble, though she noted several spheres along the edges that felt like sublime materials and could no doubt form a barrier to keep the fight contained. The platform itself was reasonably large and the ceiling was moderately high, which she thought was fair to both contestants. Of course, given that Theo's life was on the line, she would have preferred a bigger arena.

"I am worried," Fiyu said quietly, for perhaps the fourth time that day. She needn't have said it, given the anxiousness written across every line of her face. Nauda remained unsure how to comfort the other woman, so she just smiled back.

"We've done everything we can. We'll have to trust him."

Fiyu didn't respond, just shifted her head around as if trying to observe the whole building at once. There wasn't much to observe, since the building wasn't packed and the majority present were well-behaved House officials. With one obvious exception... who she just then realized was ambling in her direction.

"Here to make a profit in the aftermath?" Tythes handed the tray of pastries to a random soulcrafter moving in the other direction and they had no choice but to take it. He leaned against the seats beside them and smirked. "Surely you're not stupid enough to believe your little friend has a chance of winning?"

"Are you here to make a profit?" Nauda asked. "Or do you just need someone to bully?"

"I am an Authority! You will treat me with respect!"

"Of course, Lord Tythes. Forgive me for troubling your glorious mind with such questions."

He glared down at her, eyes twitching as if he wasn't quite sure about her tone... except there seemed to be something darker lurking underneath. Tythes abruptly brought his presence down on her, and Nauda winced, but she refused to look away from his gaze.

"I should crush the life from you right now." Tythes leaned closer, his face becoming sinister. "In fact, since we're already here to watch an execution, perhaps I'll-"

When he started to raise his hand in her direction, Nauda reacted first, thrusting her staff out so the forks caught his arm. She knew she had absolutely no chance against his strength, but with so many soulcrafters around them, she didn't think he would truly strike her. He certainly looked shocked, staring down at his arm bound in place.

"Oh, how quaint." Tythes began to move his arm, exerting only a fraction of his strength to continue moving it toward her. Nauda braced herself against the floor and fought back as well as she could, not giving up a single inch. "Why bother fighting? You know you'll never change anything. The powers that be can never be toppled from their perches, so you might as well begin groveling beneath them."

It required all her strength just to remain standing, much less speak, so Nauda just gritted her teeth and refused to give way. Tythes still forced her backward, driving her to the ground with deliberate slowness, watching for her to collapse. Fiyu hovered nearby, standing ready but aware that she couldn't truly help. Nauda's effort was equally futile, but she couldn't tolerate that smirk...

"Enough." The Authority from the House of Coin raised a finger in their direction, not containing any cantae. Tythes heaved a great sigh and stepped away, while Nauda dropped to one knee, keeping herself up only by leaning on her staff. "No fighting outside the duel."

With that, she turned away in perfect disinterest. Still, the House of Coin had enough political power to keep Tythes in check, and he seemed to have grown bored with their contest. Instead he dropped down into one of the seats nearby and stuck his feet up on the arena, which required quite an awkward stretch.

"You're confident in your friend, huh? Dumb. You are a dumb person."

"Why should I bother talking to you?" Nauda said. "You just want to amuse yourself."

"Oh, to the contrary." He sprang upward with alarming speed, eyes suddenly fixed on hers. "I'd like to see your spirit break. Why don't we make a little bet on this duel? When you lose, you'll have to break that staff of yours in half, lick my boots, and tell me that you'll never defy your betters again."

"Why would I agree to that?"

"Hmm, what meaningless prize would convince you to take such a stupid offer?" Tythes pretended to consider, then reached into the back of his pants, apparently to scratch. Just as Nauda curled her lip in disgust, he pulled his hand back out, revealing a pristine white piece of marble. "What about a Chasm Invitation? Your little friends seemed to be interested in those."

Nauda hesitated, looking for the trap within all the posturing. Was he really just a fool, using his House's wealth to humiliate others? It would be easy to believe, yet she always felt something slightly more sinister from him, just underneath the surface. His offer seemed to be real, and his smug confidence certainly was...

If she couldn't trust her allies when this much was on the line, who could she trust? Nauda straightened and stared directly back at him. "Then it's a bet. I'll collect the Invitation from you after the duel."

"Oh, I'm going to enjoy this!" Tythes gave a giddy little laugh, spun in a circle... and then flattened Nauda and Fiyu to the floor with an overwhelming flood of cantae.

Not prepared or braced, Nauda dropped immediately, and she felt her soulhome shudder. Tythes wandered off the next moment as if he'd forgotten them, taking the hat from a nearby official and placing it on his own head. Beside her, Fiyu released a small sigh and struggled to climb back into her seat.

Before Nauda had fully recovered from the sudden assault, another Authority stepped beside them. It was Tythes's supposed aunt, gazing down at them with sad eyes. When they focused on her, she gave them an unnecessarily low bow, considering that she outranked them by every possible standard.

"I apologize for this," she said softly. "House Crimson is... not what it once was."

"Can you not do something to stop your relative?" Fiyu asked. The older woman shook her head.

"I am the House's past, a foundation on which others should build. I... hope that you will not hate Tythes, despite his behavior. Please accept this as a small apology." The Authority handed them a small box, bowed again, and then departed as quietly as she came.

Though suspicious, Nauda decided that opening the box in this company was safer than opening it anywhere else. It proved completely ordinary, and inside, there was a powder... Nauda's eyes shot open as she realized what she was looking at. The powder was in fact a sublime spice, ground down to a fine form and refined by spiritual processes. Not only did it resonate with powerful cantae, it could easily be added to sublime foods to significantly increase their strength.

"Is it a trap?" Fiyu asked. Nauda handed the box to her, but though Fiyu tilted her head at it, she didn't seem able to sense anything other than its potency. It was a deeply wholesome gift, which just made Nauda more suspicious.

She couldn't understand if House Crimson was really so chaotic, but perhaps that was all a distraction. These antics gave them an excuse to have two Authorities present, more than any other House, with which they could... do what? As little as she trusted them, she couldn't come up with any kind of coherent plan for their presence here, so perhaps it really was just the whims of a powerful child.

Before anything else could go wrong, the sound of a ringing bell filled the chamber. Once everyone was silent, the Authority from the House of Coin rose to her feet. She stepped forward, sweeping her eyes across the audience with an expression of utter apathy, and spoke in a neutral tone.

"We have assembled here today to witness the duel between Esaire ai Armeau, hosted by the House of Burning Leaves, and Peanen of House Blacksilver. The duel will be until defeat, which I will judge as a neutral arbiter. If the House of Burning Leaves is victorious, they will be permitted to take their criminal from the city. If House Blacksilver is victorious, the Armeau family must answer for their vendetta and then be ejected from the city."

That seemed to be new, so Nauda perked up, wondering if Blacksilver negotiators had been at work, or if Theo himself had managed to push the terms. She wasn't sure, as there had been no sign of them since they arrived.

At that moment, the Authority rang her bell again, and the combatants entered from opposite sides. Esaire wore the same elegant clothes he always had, as well as his armament gloves and his new sword. Theo no longer looked shabby next to him, gleaming in his white cloak that didn't match the dark expression on his face. They stepped up into the arena, but remained silent.

"When the duel begins, this space will be sealed until its conclusion. Are both duelists fully prepared?"

Esaire snorted and looked away, but Theo shook his head. "Not yet. Nauda?"

She rose to her feet, letting everyone look at her, and then hurled her staff upward so that it spun end over end before landing in Theo's outstretched hand. It would have made more sense to just toss it over, but they'd practiced that move, and efficacy wasn't the point. Theo couldn't really use her staff... but Esaire spared a glance in her direction, a slightly troubled expression on his face.

"Now I'm ready." Theo gave a smirk that she would have thought was real if she didn't know him better, then spun her staff around rapidly before lowering it to his side.

Some in the audience sat forward with new interest, but the presiding Authority had barely even looked at anything that occurred. "If that is all, then we are prepared. The match begins now."

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Chapter 40

At first they stood in complete silence, Theo still holding his staff ready. Esaire had yet to draw his sword or do anything with his glove armaments, simply staring at him. Eventually he raised his hands and placed them together in a gesture that would have been respectful if not for the rage in his eyes.

"This is no time for insults," Esaire said. "There is blood in our past and blood in our present. It ends now."

Theo had planned lines of his own, especially if Esaire had tried to push any kind of moral superiority. He'd also considered trying to bring up the attack at the quarry, to work against Esaire's position even if no one was ever prosecuted for it. But though the Armeau family might be planning other things, the man himself was focused on nothing but the fight.

Esaire drew his sword carefully, gracefully... and then he was already across the arena, his thrust a blinding silver flash.

The fight could very easily have ended in that moment, with Theo impaled through the chest. As it was, his speed was barely enough to leap aside. He didn't attempt to deflect the strike, knowing his opponent could tear right through him, and just put distance between them. Esaire whirled for a different strike, but Theo cast a bolt of gravitational torsion directly at his chest.

Before it could connect, a blue sphere of cantae lit up around Esaire. In a flash he was nearly on Theo again, a sweeping slash that threatened a shocking portion of the arena. Theo evaded it by reversing his gravity, then while he was in the air dropped several gravitational fields on top of his opponent.

Grunting, Esaire partially doubled over before he managed to straighten again, his cantae able to deal with even such multiplied gravity. But Theo came back down making a thrust with Nauda's staff and he barely blocked, moving sluggishly in the heavy gravity.

Nauda hadn't taught him how to use her binding ability, and it wouldn't have suited him in any case. But Theo was accustomed to fighting at high speeds from his first life, and he'd received staff training in his second, so he could easily merge the two and make himself appear like a real threat. Esaire had to play cautiously, anticipating a binding strike at any moment.

Under so much gravity, against a larger weapon, Esaire staggered backward until he switched to his cloak-like aura that nullified gravity. He did it faster than at the quarry, yet something about the switch... Theo leapt away and fired a few intentionally weakened torsion bolts, but Esaire blurred away from them. That speed... Theo had soulcrafted for more than he'd expected, but Esaire had surpassed even that.

Again keeping his distance, Theo repeatedly leapt away from his opponent, holding his staff back and instead firing more torsion bolts. As if he'd built his entire strategy around switching between those two different tactics.

"Enough running!" Esaire leapt into another blindingly fast thrust.

When Theo dodged, he realized that it had never been intended to strike him, just herd him into a corner. He desperately fired several more torsion bolts, but Esaire switched to his spherical shield and began advancing, the bolts deflecting harmlessly. Theo took a step back, bringing Nauda's staff forward and again applying gravitational fields to his opponent.

He saw a glint in Esaire's eyes before cantae flooded from him.

In that moment, Esaire sprung his trap. He'd been feigning the need to switch between two different types of shields from the beginning and now leapt forward surrounded in a brilliant sapphire aura. Even with his new speed, Theo barely had time to feel the shield negate his gravity, then Esaire was bashing the staff out of his hands to prepare for the finishing blow.

Theo didn't even try to hold the staff: he let it drop and then cast two torsion bolts in swift succession, one from each hand.

This time, he didn't hold back, and the energy pierced through Esaire's defenses. Fiyu's bracers were better suited to his skills than the staff, if not a perfect match, so they helped him penetrate. His opponent grimaced and staggered, blood blossoming under his shirt... but then he lunged forward, his free hand reaching out. Cantae flowed from his glove, nearly striking Theo.

Only a fall directly upward saved him, taking him just barely over the strike. Theo hit the ceiling painfully hard, though the barrier prevented him from smashing through. Beneath, he saw Esaire grasp his injured shoulder, which was still bleeding profusely. Unfortunately, he was a Ruler-tier soulcrafter with a reinforced body, so even the gravitational torsion within his body wasn't enough to completely disable him.

Esaire shook off the injury and raised his sword toward Theo, waiting for him to drop. So he didn't. With his gravity still reversed, Theo stood up on the ceiling, staring down at his opponent and smiling. He was faking the expression, but he needed to goad Esaire into making a mistake.

From the ceiling, Theo began firing torsion bolts down at Esaire. Of course, Esaire easily shifted back and forth to evade them, so Theo began to weaken his bolts, using barely any of his cantae. It worked for a few steps, Esaire still dodging wildly, but his eyes shifted to track one bolt, then he stopped moving. Theo fired off a series of bolts, both weakened and serious, and Esaire dodged some and let others splatter uselessly off his aura.

"Useless. I'll come to you, then." Esaire leapt upwards, as fast as before, his sword drawing a line of sparks against the barrier.

While he dodged, Theo tried to apply as powerful a gravitational field as he could to Esaire, to no effect. He'd hoped that Esaire's ability would only be able to negate a certain amount of the effect, but either he'd been cautious, or as a Ruler his limits were far beyond the cantae Theo could manage.

Still, his ceiling position was superior and his opponent was still losing some blood, so Theo concentrated on dodging. To his surprise, Esaire managed to pull out even more speed, his body starting to sweat as he leapt and slashed with even greater ferocity. If Theo hadn't soulcrafted additional speed rooms, many of those strikes would easily have taken off a limb, but he could just manage to stay ahead of his opponent.

As Esaire dropped to the ground after another missed slash, something shifted in his posture... Theo wasn't even sure what he saw, his instincts just forced him to move before his conscious mind could decide.

An instant later, Esaire hurled his sword in a brilliant beam of cantae. The silver streak tore through the edge of Theo's coat and actually cracked the barrier, embedding the sword deep into the ceiling. Theo's eyes widened as he realized the intensity of that surprise attack... but Esaire had weakened his aura by throwing so much cantae into that strike, so Theo immediately struck with another bolt, this one to the head.

Esaire managed to duck aside, but the torsion effect grazed his arm, tearing his clothes and some of the skin beneath. He was injured in both arms now, so-

Something tore through the back of Theo's leg and cut across his shoulder.

He hit the ceiling and rolled across it, pushing himself away from whatever had struck him even before he understood. When he looked back, he saw that the sword hovered in the air, now covered in his blood. Below, Esaire smirked and swirled one hand, sending the sword in a similar circle. His other glove glowed with cantae, and Theo realized that he'd had another trap.

All that had saved him was the fact that his discipline had made him maintain his gravitational fields. If he'd fallen to the floor instead of the ceiling, Esaire would have instantly closed on him. Even now, he could feel blood pouring from his back leg and shoulder. Without his coat it might have cut through his spine, and his leg shot agony when he tried to stand.

Before he could move, Esaire sent the sword sailing at him again. Theo dodged aside, but a moment later Esaire's other hand reached out. Cantae grasped him and slammed him down to the floor, knocking the wind from him. Theo saw the sword slide into position above him, then it plummeted as Esaire dropped him back up, directly into the point.

Theo desperately threw all his gravitational fields at the sword, and though Esaire's cantae tried to control it, at ten times its normal weight, he stumbled in surprise. In the process, Theo ended his reversed gravity, dropping back to the ground instead of into the sword.

The movement disoriented both of them, but Esaire wasn't as familiar with suddenly changing gravity. Before he could recover, Theo cast another torsion bolt that grazed his hip, making him stagger back.

One of Esaire's hands swept down, and Theo rolled to the side before the sword stabbed down in the same movement. Esaire tried to swipe at him, but now that Theo understood how he controlled it, he could dodge easily enough.

Yet when he tried to stand from his roll, his injured leg refused to cooperate. Recognizing how little time he had, Theo instead reduced his gravity to a tiny fraction of normal and pushed himself into the air. It was only a strange approximation of flying, but it allowed him to float over the arena without putting any weight on his leg.

"Come on, show me what you can do!" Esaire began striking from a distance, sending the sword to slash with one hand and trying to catch him with the other.

If not for the injuries to both arms, Esaire could well have finished him then. Theo could just manage to stay ahead of his speed, but now both of them were bleeding and Esaire would soon figure out that he couldn't easily move from side to side.

Theo began casting torsion bolts, but Esaire batted them aside effortlessly with one glove while trying to move his sword for a killing strike. This was exactly what he'd been afraid of: each bolt cost him cantae, but his opponent's superior force could simply overpower each one.

Putting a hand to his back, Theo pretended to be holding the injury... while beginning to generate a singularity with that hand. If he could keep his opponent confident for long enough, he could build enough of the proper cantae to finish his technique.

Esaire leapt at him without hesitation and Theo instinctively hurled the half-formed singularity. That startled Esaire, who barely managed to twist aside in midair. Theo was nearly as surprised, so all he could do while maintaining his gravitational fields and the half-formed singularity was kick off the ground with one foot at nearly zero weight to put distance between them.

As soon as he could, Theo began to generate another singularity, this time with both hands. Esaire turned and smirked at it. "You think I'm going to give you time for that?"

The sword flashed from the side and Theo released the partial singularity toward it. Esaire cautiously swept his blade back, then returned it to his side as he began to advance. He swept the sword back and forth across the arena, drawing sparks against the floor.

"You can hold me back by throwing those, but you'll never build up enough strength to stop me."

Grimacing as if desperate, Theo released his next attempt at a singularity before Esaire could attack again, this one aimed at his opponent's legs. Esaire easily stepped aside, but the singularity energy hovered against the arena floor, nearly invisible.

Falling back, Theo tried to form a singularity over and over, each time forced to release the energy to defend himself. Esaire laughed as he pressed forward, and Theo really was near his limits. His soulhome was almost empty, and his concentration was stretched to the limit maintaining all the partial singularities glimmering around the room.

Abruptly Theo switched tactics, instead casting a series of torsion bolts at his opponent's legs. Esaire dodged them one after another, but Theo tried to draw on Fiyu's intense storms and hammer him backwards. Slowly his opponent took one step back, then another, his foot nearly falling into the partial singularity...

And then Esaire stepped around it and laughed. "You thought you could leave these as traps for me?" He gestured around the arena, his eyes flickering to the glimmering specks of darkness. "I would have thought you'd learned by now, I can see through such petty tricks. I know where each and every one of your traps are, and they're no threat to me."

"Let's find out." Theo turned his hands toward one another and then pulled every partial singularity in the room back toward himself.

Esaire's eyes widened as he realized the truth, but it was already too late: all of the singularity energy around the arena gathered together between Theo's hands. The sword flashed out, surrounded by silver cantae, intending to tear apart his technique before it could be released.

When it touched the darkness, cantae and sword were both consumed.

As the black hole swelled between his hands, Theo needed a moment to catch his breath, his mind still reeling from the effort required. It had come very close, but he'd formed the true singularity just before the sword reached him. Though Esaire still had his gloves on the other side of the arena, for the first time there was a flicker of fear in his eyes.

"Okay, that was a good trick, but-"

Theo didn't reply, just brought his hands together and tunneled the black hole directly into his opponent.

Even then, Esaire managed to dodge back, his superior speed pulling him out of the way in between the moment the cantae started to manifest and when the singularity began to consume everything about it. But he was much too close, the black hole tearing fragments from his aura and growing rapidly.

Esaire let out a scream and channeled all his cantae to his gloves, creating a force that pushed him back, away from the all-consuming sphere. That effort kept him at a distance, but the darkness absorbed the cantae he used to do it, growing more and more powerful as Esaire began to weaken.

As his defenses fell, Theo got a clear view of his soulhome, all three silver tiers of it. There was an elegant defensive wall, but as the black hole grew in power, the wall cracked, then pieces of the rubble began to float away. His singularity had manifested on a spiritual level now, a dark sphere in the sky of Esaire's soulhome that continued to grow.

Leaves tore from his silvery trees, loose bricks lifted into the sky, and part of his foundation gave a loud crack. In the real world, Esaire stared at him in horror, recognizing what he faced.

Theo released the technique and the arena was still. The judge had risen to her feet and several other Authorities in the audience had begun to act as well. Their overwhelming power ensured that he never would have been able to ruin Esaire's soulhome or kill him. But Theo just stared into the other man's eyes and made sure that he knew that Theo could have gone further, and he'd chosen to stop.

Around them, he saw shock on the faces of all the spectators... except for Nauda and Fiyu, who were watching with a mixture of joy and relief. After so long being utterly focused on the fight, Theo let himself smile at them. He also started feeling his leg and back injuries, which were going to need treatment, but that could come later.

"The match has clearly ended," the arbiter said, "and House Blacksilver is victorious. The Deuxan party must now answer for their actions."

"I have a few questions." Theo looked past Esaire, who had collapsed, and instead focused on Arceon ai Armeau. The head of the Armeau family was a fully developed Ruler, stronger than his grandson... but there was a hint of fear in his eyes. "While on Deuxan, I attempted to do ordinary research on Deuxan history. In return, you declared me evil and tried to have me killed. Why?"

"This..." Arceon drew himself up with all the dignity he could muster. "This is not a matter to be discussed in such a public place!"

Though the expression on the arbiter's face didn't change, she let her full strength as an Authority settle over the room before she spoke. "The city of Norro Yorthin does not care for your local customs. You agreed to the terms of this duel and you must now obey those terms, or be considered in contempt of the House of Coin."

"You... you spoke of a forbidden matter." The old man's eyes flickered between Theo and the Authorities in the room. "Must I speak the name here?"

"I don't care, I just want you to explain why."

"Nearly a century ago, the small Deuxan family you researched was destroyed, root and stem. The exact circumstances are lost to history, but we know this: the destruction spread. Others in the same court wanted to acquire their lost assets and attempted to research what had happened, only for those families to be destroyed as well."

"By who?"

"We don't know. It is believed to be a foreign power that had passed beyond the known limits of soulcrafters, because the destruction was so swift and many demons crawled through in their wake." Arceon took a deep breath and shook his head. "Since that day, uttering that name has been forbidden. The riches of that family must still lie somewhere, and fools occasionally still die trying to learn more. So every significant court has agreed that the very knowledge of that name must die out."

For the sake of the audience, Theo snorted. "I don't know anything. This superstition is utter madness... I tried to do a little historical research and you persecuted me all the way to Fithe."

Judging from the reaction, no one else took it particularly seriously. A representative from the House of Burning Leaves rose to say that the Deuxans had comported themselves dishonorably and would no longer be considered guests of the House. Someone from Blacksilver argued that they should answer for their disruption, but the arbiter insisted they be simply exiled to their home world.

Theo ignored all of it. Despite his mocking reaction, the revelation troubled him deeply. Brigana ai Teraeves had been from a small but powerful family, perhaps a bit strange based on his brief meetings, but not deserving of such a reputation. He feared that it could somehow be his fault, that Vistgil and his demons had eradicated the entire family because Brigana had traveled with him.

Based on what Arceon said, however, there had been roughly a decade between Brigana's death and the destruction of her family. Theo didn't think he'd been lying, but the records might be inaccurate. It was possible that their destruction had nothing to do with him, but it felt too much like another one of Vistgil's traps.

If the Teraeves family had interacted more than usual with outsiders to the Nine Worlds, then it made sense. They'd been destroyed with their wealth intact, and anyone who had known them might try to retrieve it. When they did, they'd trigger the trap that had been woven into Deuxan culture itself.

The question was... had he triggered that trap? Theo didn't think that there was anything directly sinister behind the Deuxan courts, and the Armeau family didn't seem inclined to spread the knowledge. Here on Fithe, he had no doubt that the details of the fight would be forgotten, since everyone would focus on the fact that an Archcrafter had beaten a Ruler.

So he might not have brought his enemies down on his head, but he needed to be even more careful than before.

City guards pulled the Armeau family from the arena, gently but with the full threat of force. Theo saw hatred in the eyes of the grandfather, but as Esaire was carried out, he stared back with a strange expression. There was no time to address him further, so Theo would need to keep that in mind.

"Curse you!" An explosion of anger finally overcame the stillness and Theo turned to the side to look.

Tythes stalked away from the others representing House Crimson and hurled something white down at Nauda's feet. She picked it up with a smile, and turned it so Theo could realize that it was a Chasm Invitation. He could only presume that she'd bet on the fight and mentally thanked her for it, though he should also thank Tythes for being so careless.

"You may have won that, but you cheated!" Tythes jabbed a finger at her. "Duel me next!"

"I'm humbled by your assessment of my strength," Nauda said with a meek bow. The Crimson Authority hissed and took a step closer.

"I don't care that you're just an Archcrafter, I can wait to tear you apart! Let's set a duel, just like this! You'd need, what, ten years? A hundred years? Duel me or I-"

He cut off as the older woman from House Crimson grabbed his shoulder. "It's time to go home, Lord Tythes."

Though he hissed and glowered, more like a toddler than an Authority-tier soulcrafter, Tythes let himself be dragged away from the arena. With him gone, the atmosphere relaxed further. Theo saw Blacksilver representatives smiling at him, no doubt very glad for the fame he'd brought their House, but he ignored them to limp next to Fiyu.

"You require healing," Fiyu told him, her smile growing somber. "The sword cut deep."

"I do, but I want to know about that Invitation." He glanced at Nauda, who slid an arm under his shoulders to help him keep the weight off his injured leg.

"Not much to it, just a smart bet. We have three now." She grinned over at him. "That was remarkable, but I imagine you're hungry. Should we bring you something to eat while you recover?"

"Nothing too expensive. I have some serious debts to pay off." But considering that his debts were to his allies, Theo didn't consider that a bad thing.

-

This isn't quite the end, of course: there's an epilogue that I hope everyone will enjoy. But these two chapters conclude the duel, as well as showing Theo's soulcrafting arc over the first three books. As mentioned, this series will be more than a trilogy.

After the epilogue, I have a number of fun things lined up! Please look forward to both another conversation between the characters explaining soulcrafting details and updated versions of some key soulhomes. Also some new covers potentially soon!

The fourth book in TWC is underway. Not ready to post, but I can promise that there won't be a major delay. At some point I'll finish with the new covers and actually publish all these books, but more information on the overall trajectory later.