Letting a knife come so close to her skull was an exercise in trust, but Mithra let Leah shave her head completely. The knife let out a barely perceptible buzz as Leah worked, and Mithra was free to think.

  And she did need to think. Leah wasn’t being entirely honest. Mithra cycled some energy to her emotion mark during the conversation but got nothing from her. The woman either had absolutely no emotions—which Mithra knew wasn’t true, no matter how hard she tried—or had a way to stop the mark from sensing them. With how well-informed she was, it was obviously the latter.

  But even without the mark, Mithra could tell she was lying. Things weren’t as clean cut as she presented. There was something more to the story, something deeper.

  On the surface it made sense. If the Veil really was the problem—doubtful—then it made sense that the Church would cut ties with the outside. If her experience with the priests taught her one thing, it was that the clergy hid many secrets. She could see them branding Leah’s parents as heretics to protect the Gods’ work that was the Veil. It didn’t matter if the Veil was or wasn’t a problem, just that it was under threat. It was hard not to agree with their decision.

  But the Guardians weren’t as religious. There was no way they all would just silently agree to what amounted to a genocide. They’d have tried to find a way to help without destroying the Veil. They wouldn’t resort to indiscriminately hunting the outsiders. But if the Priests used their mind marks to supplant key members of the Guardians… It was possible.

  That wasn’t to say Mithra believed that’s how it happened. There were a thousand different explanations that made sense too, especially if Leah wasn’t entirely truthful. Mithra could tell that the woman was completely sure of the science part at least, though she still couldn’t see why the Gods would create the dinosaurs. But They worked in mysterious ways. They must’ve had some grander plan in mind.

  There was only one thing that she was entirely sure of. Leah wanted to help her people. And that was something worth assisting with.

  The last clump of her hair fell to the snow. Mithra ran a hand through her hair—or the lack thereof. Her head wasn’t entirely smooth; Leah left just enough length that there was a pleasant scraping resistance when she touched it.

  “We need to get going,” Leah said. “We’ve been here too long. We’ll need to ride through the night.”

  They did. It was uncomfortable, but Mithra managed to doze off a few times so she wasn’t entirely wiped out by morning. It was hard to see at night, but the landscape around them slowly changed. The snow wasn’t as deep, and soon, ground started peeking out from under it. The sound of the bike was different as they rode over patches of gravel and sand. By the time the morning light hit, there was no more snow. They were in a desert.

  It was cold, as cold as it was in the snow-covered city, but the ground heated up rapidly with the rising sun. Mithra was starting to sweat under her coat and the hatchling wiggled uncomfortably.

  Leah slowed down enough that they could hold a conversation while riding. The dunes still blurred around them, but the bike was a lot quieter. It seemed to have an easier time driving on the sand.

  “So, what’s the plan?” Mithra asked, straining her voice a little to be heard over the rush of air.

  “We get to the Enclave, as planned,” Leah said. “I still think your mark is the key. I’ve got the rest of the cubes in the Enclave. With your help, we’ll find a way to use them.”

  “What even are they? You showed it to me briefly before, but never explained.”

  Without taking eyes from the road, Leah produced the small metal cube. It glowed green from a multitude of small tubes arranged around a symbol. The same one that marked Mithra.

  “Try not to drop it,” Leah said, twisting her hand back to give the cube to Mithra. The hatchling sniffed at it curiously before dismissing it. “It won’t break, but it’ll be a pain to find in all this sand.”

  Mithra gingerly took the cube into her hands. It was heavy, much heavier than she expected.

  “What does it do?” she asked.

  “It’s an energy stabilizer. It has a hidden function, though I don’t know what it is. I was hoping your mark would help me find it,” Leah said.

  “Do you want me to try now?”

  Leah shrugged. “It won’t work without the other five anyway. It shouldn’t.”

  Mithra examined the device anyway. It had no obvious buttons or levers to press. The only parts with an identifiable function were the two small indents, one in the front and one at the back. Probably an intake and an exhaust. It made sense that it’d need to take in energy to stabilize it, whatever that meant. Divine energy needed no stabilizing as far as she knew, but maybe the energy the outsiders used was different, inferior.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  Nothing obvious on the exterior, but what about the symbol itself? Mithra traced it with her finger. There was some resistance there, not friction but more spiritual one. It felt like touching a glyph lamp, a small tug, the device looking for compatible energy to draw from.

  Channeling divine energy into an item wasn’t easy. When released into the air uncontrolled it just dissipated, but controlling it wasn’t easy. Divine energy wanted to be used in accordance with its purpose and resisted anything else, so while a Light Shaper could easily control light with it to create illusions, when they tried to imbue it into an item, into a container that served seemingly no purpose, they had to force it into obedience. Glyphs were supposed to help with that, to guide the process, but it still took training.

  So when Mithra forced some energy out of her hand, she didn’t really expect anything to happen. When the symbol sucked the energy from the air, she was surprised. But when she felt it tug on her soul, taking her energy by force, she panicked.

  She threw the cube just in time. It glowed brighter than the sun for a second and exploded. It wasn’t a normal explosion with shrapnel flying everywhere, but a silent ripple of energy tearing through her soul. Blind pain filled her whole being and she felt herself fly briefly. Her energy recoiled—the cube didn’t take enough of it to dull the impact—and she convulsed.

  Mithra was on the ground now. Her divine energy threatened to tear her apart, but she’d dealt with it once before. Slowly, she cycled it throughout her body, letting it flow but guiding it somewhat. One rotation, three, ten. It calmed slowly with her every ragged breath. When it was as still as it could be, she opened her eyes.

  Leah was standing over her, without her mask on. She was saying something, though Mithra couldn’t hear her. There was desperation in her face, though. The kind of desperation that told her whatever was happening, it was deadly serious.

  Mithra tried turning to look around her, but her body didn’t obey her. Something was holding her head in place and she lifted her hand to free it.

  Blood. Exposed bone. Sand and small stones stuck in the flesh of her arm.

  Pain.

  A scream.

  Leah, talking to her in an urgent tone. “...shock. Use your mark, Mithra.”

  She let go of the mental dam that was holding her energy in check. It flooded her body, dulling the pain. It focused on the right side of her body, pooling there and being spent as fast as it could flow. She was cold, though the rational part of her mind knew that she shouldn’t be—they were in a desert.

  “... too slow. You…” Leah’s voice was coming from somewhere far away. “...break down the reserve. You’ll die.”

  Some meaning made its way into Mithra’s mind. She was healing too slowly, she’d bleed out if she didn’t speed it up. That made no sense, she’d suffered worse in the raptors fight than one mangled arm. And besides, she was sleepy. If she just rested for a bit, she would…

  The hatchling’s panicked screech cut through the fog in her mind. She managed to open her eyes and look down. The whole right side of her body was a bloody mess. Her ribs were exposed, skin and muscle simply sanded off. Blood was gushing out of her like a river.

  Panic threatened to overtake her mind again. Mithra did the only thing she could, and focused inward, on the sparks of magic inside her. There just wasn’t enough of them. In her fight with the raptors her injuries were serious, but not as extensive. Now, with half her body in tatters, it was inefficient. It was devoting as much effort to fixing an insignificant scrape, as it did to mending an artery. At this rate, she’d bleed out before it could save her.

  She tried steering the energy towards where she thought it was needed most. It resisted her, almost as much as it did when she tried stopping it completely. With one agonizing heartbeat after another, she pushed. Pulled. Steered. She gathered the energy from every part of her body, filtered it through the mark on her hand, and threw it at the wounds. It wasn’t enough. Healing took time. It took her a whole night of rest to heal less extensive injuries last time. She had minutes, maybe seconds.

  Desperately, Mithra looked for any way to save herself. Her mind caught on every word Leah had said. What did she mean by the reserves?

  Her mind mark.

  Without divine energy flowing to it, it was inactive. But she could still feel the energy there. It was inside the mark, fueling it on a base level even when inactive. Sweet, precious energy. She grabbed at it like a starving man. The mark resisted the intrusion, but her desperation was stronger. She tore down the barriers around it with sheer will, one after another. She cracked the shells protecting the divine piece of machinery, chewed and spat them out. It hurt, it hurt so much, but she couldn’t stop. Her will to live was greater than any pain.

  Energy flooded out of her mark, far more than she could handle. Mithra gasped. There was no controlling the torrent of power she unleashed. If she grabbed onto it in any way, she was afraid it’d shear off her metaphorical hands. Bones straightened and mended, flesh knitted itself together and veins filled with fresh blood.

  Mithra sat up, disoriented. Sun hurt her eyes and she looked away and around her. The bike was laying on its side in the sand. The hatchling was still screeching, poking her leg with its beak. Leah was standing over her, her mask back on.

  “You almost killed yourself, holding your energy like that,” she said. “I’m glad you didn’t.”

  “...” I’ll need new clothes, Mithra tried saying, but no sound escaped her. It was all her mind could focus on. Her tunic was still on her somehow, but the right side of it was gone, threatening to expose her with the first gust of wind blowing her way. Her pants suffered a similar fate, resembling a slit dress more than a functional piece of clothing.

  Leah startled her when she crouched down and touched her neck softly. The steel fingers were cold on her skin.

  “Your mark,” Leah said. “It’s not flowing anymore.”