It was dark.

            And it was hot.

            Kevza turned with a frown, brushing away the feeling along his arm, but it only caused it to burn more, the cuffs of his jacket turning yellow, orange, and then red as fire spilled from the seams. He cried out, the flames licking blisters along his skin as he ripped the article off, throwing it to the ground.

            It was hot.

            It was so hot.

            He stumbled away from the burning cloth, getting twisted in the rocks and falling. The fire spread, scorching all around him, illuminating the broken hunks of stone that scattered along the earth, each catching flame like a white-hot ember.

            Faren burned all around. Everywhere he looked, he was ravaged by the sight of the dead, watching him from the flames. He couldn’t turn away fast enough, there was nowhere to look that wasn’t filled with the fires and the burning, lifeless stares.

            “No…” he gasped softly, stumbling away to press himself against a clearer patch of stone. “Please no.”

            “You brought this on us,” a familiar voice said from behind him, and he looked up with a gasp. Half of Nidi’s face was left charred and ashy from the flames. “You brought this on me.”

            “No,” Kevza said softly, shaking his head and scooting away. “I… I didn’t mean to! I didn’t mean to!”

            “You never mean to,” Nidi said with a frown as a line of green began to trace out of his burned face. “That’s what makes it worse. You never mean to, but you did.”

            The vines slithered over him, down between the burning rubble, inching ever closer to Kevza, twining over his legs and pulling him down into the ash-covered earth.

            “No!” he cried, tears leaking down his cheeks as he fought to move, not to be swallowed down. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry, please!”

            “-za. Kevza,” a voice called, echoing through his graveyard of fire and ivy, and something grabbed him by the arm, rattling him.

            “Kevza!” Natavali whispered, and the arcanist’s eyes flew open, the image of fire and stone replaced by the sight of rafters above him.

            He bolted upright, his forehead smacking into Natavali’s chin along the way as he all but rolled out of the bed, fumbling to pull a wastebasket from under the nightstand and beginning to retch. The knot in his stomach was slow to ease, even as it emptied all its contents from his meager dinner. It wasn’t the first nightmare he’d had since the accident, but it was the only one dire enough to draw someone from the outside. Dimly, he was aware of Natavali poised over him still on the bed, but it was a minute before the nausea subsided enough for Kevza to sit back on his heels and wipe the last of the spittle from his lips.

            “Sorry,” he said weakly, running a shaky hand through his hair.

            “You were having a nightmare,” Natavali said softly, offering him a handkerchief. Concern laid out bare on his handsome features.

            “Yeah…” Kevza gingerly took the scrap of fabric and wiped his hands and nose with a solemn frown. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

            “It is no matter,” Natavali dismissed. “I have not been sleeping well either way. Are you alright?”

            “I will be,” he answered, sounding more hopeful than he felt. With a small chuckle, he rubbed a sore spot on his forehead. “What about you? I hope I didn’t clock you too badly.”

            Natavali rubbed the right side of his jaw with a ghost of a smile, giving a small huff. “This? Your head is still thick as ever, but it is nothing. We were worse as kids, after all. You know you’ll have to do more than that to hurt me.”

            “Master?” came a quiet call, the sleep-mussed form of Baru poking up out of his covers. “Is something wrong? I heard noises.”

            “Everything is fine, Baru,” Natavali assured him with a soft smile. “Go back to sleep.”

            “Thank you,” Kevza whispered softly, getting up and back on the bed.

            “Try to get some rest, all will be well,” Natavali whispered back, settling under his own covers once again. Kevza couldn’t help but feel a little less tightly coiled with the smooth, calming words slipped over him like an extra heavy blanket, lulling him back into a dreamless sleep.

***

            After a hearty breakfast at the inn, they prepared for the final leg of their journey. While Kevza had been right that few horses remained available, the innkeeper had been kind enough to offer them a ride on two of his wagons that were headed to Domen to pick up a shipment of food. So, with a grateful wave, they all settled in behind the innkeeper’s two nephews, bouncing along the road.

            Having to pull the carts slowed them some, but Domen still appeared on the horizon with a few hours of daylight to spare, and beyond it, the path up to Domen Keep rose steadily into the mountains.

            “I can smell the sea,” one of Lynette’s younger Magi said, smiling, their woes of the last week seemingly slowly melted away with the soft reminders of home. “We’re almost there!”

            The youth, who had for the most part been quietly talking among themselves throughout the trip suddenly perked up, their voices growing louder and more animated the closer and closer they got.

            Kevza, for his part, felt smaller and smaller with each passing mile.

            Soon enough, the wide dusty lane of the cross-country road was traded for the smooth cobbles of Domen, and the two young men acting as their drivers pulled to a halt in front of a wide-open space filled with growing foodstuffs.

            “This is our stop,” the older of the two said. “We’d take you all the way up, but our horses are too old to be suited for the mountain path.”

            “It is no matter,” Natavali assured them. “We are grateful for your help in any regard.”

            Kevza knew this part of Domen well, easily remembering the weave through the streets to reach the foot of the path to the Keep. After all, he’d spent the first several years of his life living on these streets. There was the shoemaker’s shop… the bakery… the smithy… all the regular haunts and trades of a well-off town, all burned into his mind from the remnants of his early childhood.

            The people of Domen had been kind to him after his parents had died from illness, for the most part. The old baker’s wife, in particular, had given him food, and blankets, and if there was space in their barn, he’d been allowed to sleep there in exchange for doing chores or running errands. And it had been the people of Domen who had called Magus Draan down to see him when he’d shown signs of magic, whisking him up and into a steady, sheltered life of hope in the Keep.

            He wondered if the old woman was still around, or her husband, or even their unruly daughter who hadn’t liked him much. Maybe her parents had died, like his had. Maybe she’d gotten married and moved off to stars knew where. But the faces he saw now were no longer the ones he remembered.

            Soon enough Domen, too, fell behind them on their path, the wide grass planes settled around it quickly changed into the tall pine trees of the mountain as they walked the last couple of miles.

            Kevza had walked this path countless times, but he was still struck breathless as they came around the final bend in the road, the trees suddenly clearing to reveal the massive black stones and towers of Domen Keep, backed by the ash-colored mountains rising on one side, and the slate-gray cliffs to the sea on the other.

            The great black banner with a white obelisk surrounded by five stars snapped in the wind over the main gate, several Magi and Magus milling about in the courtyard beyond. Natavali sent the kids running off with a wave of his hand, their excitement quickly carrying them through the gate and to their respective places beyond.

            “It’s beautiful,” Danae said. “I can’t believe you used to live here.”

            “Yeah,” Kevza answered, sounding and feeling small.

            They continued to walk, but Kevza’s steps slowed, falling to the back of the group as the impending feeling of doom laying on his heart grew heavier and heavier with each and every step. And as they got closer, he could feel a buzzing under his skin, and a ringing in his ears.

            He gasped as he took one more step and several thin, gossamer lines of dull blue began to weave into one another, locking together into a wall in front of him, buzzing in a warning. He had known that he’d been required to leave and instructed not to return…

            …but for them to lock him outside the wards?

            “Kevza?” Danae questioned, looking back.

            “You made it,” the arcanist said with a weak smile, stepping away from the ward. “You’ll be safe here.”

            “What…?” Natavali questioned, stepping up to the barrier between them, his gaze narrowing. “They must have increased the sensitivity, but this can’t be right.”

            “You have some nerve to show up here again, boy,” came an angry voice, and they all turned to see a trio of elderly black-clad Magus stalking towards them from the gate.