Ruby walked home alone.

  The forest was quiet.

  The path back to the cabin was one she had traveled hundreds of times over the st two years, yet tonight it felt unfamiliar beneath her feet. The moon hung high above the treetops, its pale light filtering through the branches and painting the ground in soft silver patterns.

  Ruby wiped the st of the tears from her face as she walked.

  Her breathing had finally steadied.

  The hollow ache in her chest was still there, but the violent waves of grief had passed.

  She forced herself to keep moving.

  The silence of the woods wrapped around her as she stepped through the clearing.

  Then she noticed the trees.

  Ruby slowed.

  The leaves were wrong.

  She stepped closer to one of the branches and lifted her small fme again, letting the light illuminate the foliage.

  The leaves were brown.

  Not just brown.

  Dead.

  She turned slowly.

  The grass beneath her boots was gray and brittle.

  The ground itself looked lifeless, the rich green forest floor repced by a dull, colorless patch of earth.

  Ruby frowned and looked around the clearing.

  Everywhere she had cried…

  The pnts had died.

  Her stomach twisted slightly.

  “…was that me?”

  She crouched and brushed her fingers across the dead grass.

  The bdes crumbled into dry fragments at her touch.

  Ruby stared at her hand.

  Dark magic.

  The thought sat heavily in her mind.

  She lifted both hands slowly and studied them in the moonlight.

  “So this is it…” she murmured quietly.

  Arkhavel’s power.

  His soul.

  His legacy.

  Ruby tried to focus on the feeling inside her chest.

  The mana there felt different now.

  Colder.

  Heavier.

  Older.

  She inhaled slowly and tried to imagine something.

  Darkness.

  A bck mist.

  Something shadowy and ominous.

  Ruby pushed mana outward from her chest.

  Nothing happened.

  She frowned.

  “That’s disappointing.”

  The forest remained silent.

  Ruby exhaled and lowered her hands.

  Then she noticed something else.

  Her shadow.

  The moonlight stretched it across the forest floor behind her.

  Ruby tilted her head slightly.

  “Wait…”

  She knelt down and pced her fingers against the dark shape on the ground.

  The shadow moved slightly as her hand touched it.

  Ruby pushed a small thread of mana into it.

  The shadow twitched.

  Ruby blinked.

  “…hm.”

  She pushed more mana into the dark shape.

  The shadow began to grow.

  It stretched outward beyond where her body should have cast it, sliding across the ground like spilled ink.

  Ruby’s eyes widened with curiosity.

  The shadow twisted and spiraled across the dirt in long swirling patterns, moving in ways a normal shadow never could.

  She stood slowly and watched it.

  The darkness didn’t spread death the way it had earlier.

  The grass it touched remained alive.

  Ruby tilted her head thoughtfully.

  “Okay…”

  Her mind began working through the problem the way it always did.

  Shadows were just the absence of light.

  If she controlled the shape of that absence…

  Then maybe she could shape it.

  Ruby focused harder.

  She imagined the shadow rising.

  Not ft.

  Three-dimensional.

  A shape.

  The shadow beneath her feet bulged upward slightly.

  Ruby leaned forward.

  The bump grew higher.

  Slowly the darkness lifted from the ground like a small hill made of liquid night.

  Ruby’s breath caught slightly.

  The shadow stretched upward until it formed a long bck tendril hanging in the air.

  A tentacle of darkness.

  It stood several feet tall, perfectly still.

  The moonlight touched it…

  But the darkness cast no shadow of its own.

  It was as if the light bent around it.

  Ruby stared in fascination.

  “…that’s weird.”

  She reached out cautiously and touched the dark tendril.

  It felt solid.

  But not cold.

  Ruby blinked in surprise.

  “…warm?”

  The surface radiated a faint warmth like human skin.

  Not hot.

  Not burning.

  Just… alive.

  Ruby pulled her hand back slowly and watched the strange construct hover beside her.

  For a moment she simply stood there in the moonlight, mesmerized by the impossible thing she had just created.

  Then she rexed her concentration.

  The darkness colpsed.

  The shadow slid back across the ground and merged seamlessly with the one beneath her feet.

  Ruby exhaled slowly.

  “The past two years…”

  She looked up at the stars.

  Arkhavel had never really taught her spells.

  Not the way Lyriel did.

  No incantations.

  No techniques.

  Just discipline.

  Control.

  And one constant warning.

  Do not let the darkness consume you.

  Ruby closed her eyes briefly.

  Right now she was sad.

  But the grief wasn’t overwhelming her.

  Her thoughts were clear.

  Her emotions steady.

  Whatever Arkhavel had done to prepare her…

  It had worked.

  Ruby opened her eyes and looked back toward the clearing one st time.

  “Thank you, master,” she whispered softly.

  Then she turned and began walking home.

  Ruby slipped back through her window as quietly as she had left.

  The roof tiles were cool beneath her hands as she climbed up the slope, pulling herself over the edge and easing the wooden frame open just enough to slide inside. She nded softly on the floorboards and paused, listening.

  The cabin was silent.

  No footsteps.

  No voices.

  Just the quiet breathing of a house asleep.

  Ruby closed the window and climbed into bed.

  For a long moment she simply y there staring at the ceiling.

  The silence felt different tonight.

  For two years Arkhavel had always been there. Hovering nearby. Commenting on her mistakes. Asking questions that twisted her brain into knots. Correcting her posture during meditation. Lecturing her about discipline.

  Even when he said nothing, she had always felt his presence.

  Now there was nothing.

  No voice.

  No faint blue glow.

  No sarcastic commentary about her training.

  Just silence.

  Ruby turned slightly and looked at her hands resting on the bnket.

  A heavy mencholy settled in her chest.

  He had been something like a proud grandfather. A strange, stubborn ghost who watched her grow and pushed her to be better.

  Now he was gone.

  Ruby sat up slowly.

  Crying again would not help.

  Arkhavel had never tolerated emotional spirals during training.

  She crossed her legs and closed her eyes.

  Meditation.

  Focus.

  Her awareness slipped inward toward the familiar network of mana pathways that ran through her body.

  They felt strong.

  Stable.

  Two years of constant training had changed her completely.

  When she was born, her mana had felt like a small puddle.

  Now it felt more like a ke.

  Wide.

  Deep.

  It would take a long time to drain it completely.

  It was possible.

  But difficult.

  Ruby allowed the mana to circute slowly through her body.

  A ke now.

  But that wasn’t enough.

  One day she wanted it to become something rger.

  Something immense.

  A great ke.

  Then an ocean.

  Then something deeper still.

  An endless abyss of mana that never ran dry.

  If she could reach that level of power…

  Maybe she could make her master proud.

  Maybe she could truly become an Archmage.

  Ruby continued tracing the flow of energy through her pathways.

  The new affinity for dark magic hadn’t changed the structure of her mana channels much.

  They still felt familiar.

  Still stable.

  The only difference was the strange new ability lingering at the edges of her awareness.

  Shadows.

  Decay.

  The quiet power she had felt in the forest.

  Technically she had already possessed simir destructive abilities through fire.

  Burning pnts wasn’t that different from draining their life.

  The mechanism had simply changed.

  Ruby inhaled slowly and continued circuting her mana.

  The rest of the night passed quietly as she worked through her routine.

  Meditation.

  Absorption.

  Control.

  By the time the first light of dawn crept through the window, Ruby finally y back down and closed her eyes.

  Sleep came quickly.

  Morning arrived with noise.

  Ruby woke to the sound of small feet running across the floor.

  “Attack!” a tiny voice shouted.

  Ruby groaned softly and pulled the bnket over her face.

  The bedroom door burst open.

  A small figure charged inside holding a wooden toy sword above her head.

  “Soldier Ruby! The monsters are attacking!”

  Ruby slowly lowered the bnket and stared at the tiny warrior standing beside her bed.

  Her little sister Evelyn was barely three years old and took her role as battlefield commander extremely seriously.

  Her hair stuck out wildly in every direction and she wore a pot lid tied to her arm with string like a shield.

  Ruby sighed.

  “Good morning to you too.”

  Evelyn climbed onto the bed and shoved the toy sword toward Ruby.

  “You fight!”

  Ruby sat up slowly and rubbed her eyes.

  “Okay, okay.”

  She raised one hand and flicked a small spark of mana into the air.

  A tiny dragon made of fme curled into existence above her palm.

  It spread glowing wings and fpped zily in the air.

  Evelyn froze.

  Her eyes widened.

  Then she shrieked.

  “DRAGON!”

  She scrambled off the bed and swung her toy sword wildly at the fming creature.

  Ruby had modeled the dragon after the ones she remembered from Earth.

  Large wings.

  Long neck.

  Horned head.

  A proper western dragon.

  Evelyn swung her sword again.

  The dragon dodged zily.

  Ruby couldn’t help ughing.

  Behind them, Mira stood in the doorway.

  Her mother’s expression was… complicated.

  Concern.

  Confusion.

  Suspicion.

  She looked at the dragon again.

  Then at Ruby.

  “…where did you see a dragon like that?” she asked slowly.

  Ruby blinked.

  “Uh…”

  She dismissed the construct quickly.

  “…imagination?”

  Mira narrowed her eyes slightly.

  “Mm.”

  Ruby suspected she would be asked about that ter.

  After breakfast Ruby walked outside toward the old mill.

  Lyriel and her family had fully moved in a year and a half ago.

  The building had become a strange mix of workshop, training ground, and home.

  Ruby helped around the pce whenever she wasn’t training.

  Which was… most of the time.

  Lyriel’s training style had turned out to be very different from what Ruby expected.

  There were no daily lectures or rigid lesson pns.

  Instead Lyriel would simply give her a challenge.

  “Combine two spells.”

  “Create a new construct.”

  “Improve your control.”

  “Come back and show me the results.”

  Ruby actually liked it.

  It felt like solving puzzles.

  Over the st two years she had discovered several strange workarounds using her fire affinity.

  If she superheated air while condensing moisture…

  She could fire liquid bullets.

  If she melted rock and stabilized it with mana…

  She could form solid va constructs.

  If she drained heat from water rapidly…

  Ice manipution became possible.

  It was like searching for loopholes in a magical contract.

  Except she had never actually signed a contract with a fire spirit.

  Still, the principle worked.

  Lyriel’s newest challenge was proving difficult.

  Light.

  Or lightning.

  Neither Ruby nor Lyriel possessed that affinity.

  According to Lyriel, light mages could create solid constructs of light.

  They could also heal injuries and produce incredibly strong barriers.

  Lightning users were the offensive specialists.

  Fast.

  Violent.

  Precise.

  Ruby had tried several approaches already.

  So far the only thing she could manage was… making fire glow brighter.

  Which technically produced light.

  But that obviously wasn’t the same thing.

  Ruby leaned against a wooden fence and watched Lena practicing wind bdes across the yard.

  The two of them had grown surprisingly close over the past two years.

  Lena still treated Ruby like a rival.

  But it had shifted into something almost friendly.

  The two girls constantly tried to outdo each other.

  Unfortunately for Lena…

  Ruby still had a pretty rge lead.

  Though Lena was improving quickly.

  Her own growth had slowed recently.

  For months she had felt like she was circling the same pteau.

  But now…

  Now something had changed.

  Arkhavel’s final gift.

  The dark magic sleeping inside her.

  It wasn’t just new power.

  It was new potential.

  A new direction.

  One more step toward her goals.

  Toward the academy.

  Toward becoming an Archmage.

  Toward seeing her family again.

  Ruby stared at her hands.

  Her family.

  Ryan’s family.

  The thought felt strange now.

  Two years ago those memories had been vivid.

  Clear.

  Now they felt… distant.

  Faded.

  Ryan had been a thirty-year-old software developer.

  A man with a wife.

  A life.

  A different world.

  Ruby looked down at her reflection in the water bucket beside the fence.

  A twelve-year-old girl stared back.

  Freckles.

  Red hair.

  Bright eyes.

  Magic humming quietly in her veins.

  Ruby frowned slightly.

  When she tried to remember what it felt like to be Ryan…

  The memory felt blurry.

  Like a dream fading after waking.

  She could barely remember what it was like to be a boy. Have a cock for goodness sake. Ruby wasn't much for self pleasure in her life before. She was raised on Mormon values after all. And In this life she has been busy, and always had a ghost watching. Now she was alone, only 12 years old but the temptation was there. And the fear that one day she would have to explore her sexuality further.

  And with every day that passed…

  She felt a little more like she knew there was no way she would be into guys.

  Ruby leaned against the fence, watching Lena practice across the yard.

  The wind mage stood about twenty paces away, staff in hand, slicing thin crescents of air through the branches of a pine tree. Each flick of her wrist sent another bde whipping forward, snapping twigs and scattering needles across the grass.

  Ruby tilted her head slightly, studying the flow of the air currents.

  “Your control is getting better,” she called out.

  Lena lowered her staff and gnced over her shoulder. “Wow. A compliment from the prodigy. Mark the calendar.”

  Ruby ignored the jab and pushed herself off the fence.

  “I’ve been thinking about something,” she said, walking over.

  Lena raised an eyebrow. “That sentence always leads to property damage.”

  Ruby held out her hand as if presenting an invisible object.

  “Imagine a ball of air,” she said slowly. “Not just spinning like a little vortex. I mean yers of air spinning inside each other. Some clockwise. Some counterclockwise. Each current colliding with the others.”

  Lena frowned, trying to visualize it.

  Ruby continued, moving her fingers in slow circles.

  “The collisions keep it contained. Instead of bursting outward, the pressure stays inside the sphere. The air currents grind against each other and build force.”

  Lena leaned slightly closer.

  “…like turbulence trapped in a bubble?”

  Ruby snapped her fingers.

  “Exactly.”

  Lena crossed her arms thoughtfully.

  “And what does that do?”

  Ruby shrugged.

  “If it hits something… all that grinding pressure releases on contact.”

  Lena stared at her for a second.

  “…you’re describing a shredding like wind.”

  Ruby smiled faintly. “I guess.”

  Lena grinned and pnted the end of her staff into the ground.

  “Alright.”

  She stepped forward and extended one hand.

  “Let’s try your crazy idea.”

  Ruby stepped back to give her room.

  The air around Lena’s palm began to move.

  At first it was just a simple swirl.

  Then Lena compressed it.

  Harder.

  Ruby watched carefully as the currents inside the forming sphere began colliding with each other. Small spirals twisted inward, then reversed direction as Lena forced additional yers of airflow into the structure.

  The sound began as a soft hiss.

  Then it grew louder.

  Like sand grinding inside a storm.

  A small sphere of violently spinning air hovered above Lena’s hand.

  Ruby’s eyes lit up.

  “That’s it.”

  Inside the sphere the currents fought each other, constantly colliding but somehow holding the shape together.

  Lena stared at it with wide eyes.

  “…oh.”

  Ruby pointed toward the treeline.

  “Try it.”

  Lena grinned.

  With a quick thrust of her arm she unched the sphere forward.

  It shot across the yard and smmed into the trunk of a pine tree.

  The moment it made contact the spinning currents erupted.

  The ball clung to the bark and began grinding into the wood like a furious storm trapped in a single point. Bark exploded outward while splinters sprayed through the air.

  The sound was vicious.

  A ripping, shredding roar like a miniature woodchipper.

  After a few seconds the sphere destabilized and colpsed into harmless wind.

  Silence returned.

  Both girls stared at the tree.

  A deep gouged crater had been carved straight into the trunk.

  Lena slowly turned toward Ruby.

  “…that worked.”

  Ruby crossed her arms, clearly pleased.

  “Told you.”

  Lena walked over to inspect the damage and ran her fingers along the shredded wood fibers.

  “That’s insane.”

  Ruby shrugged.

  “Compressed turbulence.”

  Lena kicked a chunk of bark loose and leaned back against the tree.

  “You come up with the weirdest ideas.”

  Ruby smirked.

  “And you’re the one who actually made it work.”

  Lena looked at her sideways.

  “…are we a team now?”

  Ruby tilted her head.

  “More like rivals who occasionally colborate.”

  Lena grinned.

  “Magic obsessed rivals.”

  Ruby nodded.

  “That sounds about right.”

  Lena pushed off the tree and picked up her staff again.

  “Alright,” she said with a competitive spark in her eyes. “Your turn. Show me invisible fire.”

  Ruby smiled faintly.

  “I like it... let's give it a try."