Radeon let his vision slip. The world dimmed at the edges as his Myridion Seersight woke.
Threads appeared. Thin black strands clung to every man and woman in the array, winding around their limbs and throats as they hung upside down.
Then he saw the dust. Tiny specks of gold rose from the carved lines at their feet, drifting like sand caught in a current.
The motes flowed in a single steady stream, all of them drawn back into the dark passage he had used to enter, back the way he had come.
This was what had snagged Radeon's curiosity. He scratched his head, Giovanni's face full of apology.
"Senior, I nearly forgot. My master asked me to go over some work on arrays with him. I'd best return, for now," Radeon said.
"Ah, a pity then," the gilded core guard said with a grin. "Come by whenever you're free. These old folks wouldn't dare give you a hard time. They'll be the ones to show you around, if you've a mind for it."
Radeon rushed back toward the tunnel, urgency burning in his steps. Myridion Seersight drained him dry.
He needed rest and darkness, needed to let his eyes knit themselves whole again before the strain turned to real damage.
He would not risk a few hours of muddle headed weakness under Jekyll's roof.
If the man caught even a hint of what he truly was, he would strip Radeon to the bone and sort him into pieces.
At best, Jekyll would wake him as a bound spirit artifact. At worst, the man would make a hollow soul puppet of him to play with.
The thought kept Radeon's steps sharp as he climbed out of the tunnel and into the dim side corridors.
He did not go straight back. Instead he cut along a different route, one that brushed the outer kitchens.
To squeeze the most from every moment, the body had to be fed.
Radeon pulled his hood up as he walked. The cloth shadowed his face and warned off idle talk.
He had no patience for gossip. Yet when he rounded the next corner, he slowed.
A cluster of seniors and fellow cornerstone stage cultists had gathered ahead.
Their voices were low, nothing like casual chatter.
Whatever they were saying had weight, anyone could see it in the way they huddled.
"Scouts came back with word. The righteous sects are on the move," a bearded cultist said.
"So soon? Hah. We ought to lay a wager, see who draws first blood," a younger, jovial lad said.
"That lot's in a rush to die, aren't they?" another said, working a whetstone along his blade.
Radeon felt his gut tighten at the news. If they launched the attack tomorrow or even sooner, the array he had carved only hours ago would not have time to ripen.
At most, it would yield a low-grade blood vitality crystal. Radeon could use it to reconstruct one, but he hated mediocrity above all.
Who in their right mind would take a seven or an eight if they could have a perfect ten, or more?
Then, his thoughts slid to Fay. Her backup plan.
Where was she now? Was she keeping her head above whatever mess fate had thrown in her path?
Radeon did not gnaw on the worry too long. Heavenly children were rarely so unlucky.
They tended to trip over fortunes instead of graves.
Seeing the men crowding and eyeing him, ready to pull him into talk, Radeon reached fast for a cured animal leg hanging from the rack.
The warehouse keeper narrowed his eyes at the bold grab.
Radeon set five stones on the counter with a soft clack. The man's gaze dropped. His face eased.
Then Radeon took a large waterskin and gave him a questioning look, asking if he needed to pay more.
The keeper only flicked his fingers in a lazy wave, already pleased with the stones and in no mood to make trouble over some water.
Radeon caught one of the seniors lifting a hand, ready to wave him over and drag him into the knot of talk.
They knew him as the one with answers.
The last thing Radeon wanted was questions.
So he ducked his head and burst into a run, ham under one arm and waterskin bumping at his hip, feet slapping the stone with just enough clumsy haste to look like a boy sent on some urgent errand.
By the time the senior's hand finished its wave, Radeon was already vanishing down the passage.
Back in his narrow stone cell in the living quarters, Radeon tore into the cured meat.
He ate with voracity, huge bites and fast slurps, yet his hands stayed neat and careful, grease never roaming where it did not belong.
By the time a kettle would have come to a boil, the great ham was nothing but bone. Warmth settled in his belly.
He folded himself into a cross-legged seat on the pallet.
One by one he shut his senses until nothing remained but breath and the slow turn of qi.
Rest came hard and swift. When he opened his eyes his mind felt clear and the strain behind his sight had faded.
Radeon rose at once and slipped back to the central chamber. If his guest was correct, then the dust he had seen earlier would be here again.
His eyes flashed as he activated Myridion Seersight.
Golden dust bloomed at the edge of his vision, tiny motes drifting in a steady stream that pointed northwest.
The way ahead was unknown to him, yet Radeon followed, trusting those faint glimmers to pull him deeper into unseen corridors.
Radeon studied his eldritch cloak. Three spirit stones were sewn into its lining.
The one at the right edge lay untouched. The one at the left had already crumbled into dull dust.
The middle stone still glimmered faintly, yet only half its former luster clung to it now.
"Good for at least forty-five minutes," he murmured.
As he walked, he sorted his thoughts into clean stacks. He weighed the risks of tampering further with the array on the blood pool, the tempting gains, the extra leverage.
Then he measured that against what was coming, the siege ahead, the eyes that would turn sharp the moment anything felt off.
Every line he traced led to the same answer. Too risky.
If any cultist caught the scent of his meddling, losing a hand would be the least of his worries.
Worse, if Jekyll dragged him back to the sect, all his plans to build a sect of his own could be delayed by decades, even a centuries.
Radeon kept his face calm anyway. He shook his head once, as if dismissing the thought like dust.
He had never been a worrywart. He had vowed he never would be.
"We'll see."