Mancer raised his hands in surrender. With his eighth circle as damaged as it was, he couldn't risk another spell. Even one as simple as teleportation. Blood dribbled from his thin lips as he calculated his options. He looked around at the gathering crowd. The cottage wasn't terribly far from the Baron's manor, and many of the party goers had sent a servant to investigate the loud display, or even gone themselves. In his solitude, Mancer had forgotten just how conspicuous the summoning process was. 

Othello's extreme sensitivity to mana had immediately alerted him to the summoning spell being cast, and so he'd rushed over just in time to see Angelina disappearing with this peasant boy. 

“Answer me!” he shouted. 

Mancer stared up at the older boy with wide eyes and did exactly what was expected of a six year old in this situation. He cried. 

Jerumel and Eclesia, who were already rushing out of the cottage, ran over to stand between their son and his accuser. Jerumel picked Mancer up and held him in his arms. Eclesia stood over Othello, who was tall for a nine year old, but still too short to be intimidating. 

Eclesia glared at him with her hands on her hips. “Just what do you think you're doing?!” she said sternly. 

Othello looked anxious. “I was just…” He searched for a suitable explanation, but when none was forthcoming, he jabbed a finger in Mancer's direction. “He kidnapped Angelina!” he accused. 

Mancer buried his face in his father's shoulder and cried all the louder. The onlookers whispered quietly to each other. Following the loud flash of light, all they had seen was Othello pointing his sword at a small child. 

“Did he just threaten that little boy?” someone asked. 

“I expected better of Duke Rigby’s son,” another said. 

The whispers continued, and Othello looked around as the crowd turned against him. His eyes flashed with anger. 

“What did you do to Angelina?!” he insisted. 

Eclesia pushed her face closer to him, and he stepped back instinctively. “Why don't you try asking that again?” she said scornfully, “politely this time?” 

“You can't do this to me!” he protested, “I am the son of Duke Cressenta Rigby! How dare you lay your hands on me!” 

Eclesia took a step forward. “But I haven't even touched you yet,” she challenged. The point of his sword pressed against her stomach, and a golden light enveloped it. The blade shattered, and Othello staggered backward in surprise, falling to the ground heavily. 

Eclesia turned her back on him and took her son from her husband's arms. “I'm sorry, baby,” she said soothingly, “mommy's here. I've got you. Everything's going to be okay.” 

Mancer's cries quietened, and he put his arms around his mother's neck, feeling her warmth and love embracing him. She set him down and looked into his eyes, brushing his hair away from his face. 

“Pericles, I need you to tell me where Lady Angelina went. It's important.” 

Mancer's heart broke when he saw his mother's worried face. He couldn't hide anything from her, now or before. 

“She's on the spirit plane,” he said quietly. 

Eclesia was aghast. “You… you just left her there?!” she said incredulously, “you left the Baron's daughter behind in another dimension?! Pericles, you can't do that. Just because you don't like someone–” 

“I never said I don't like her!” Mancer shouted, “she just… gets on my nerves sometimes.” 

His mother grabbed him by the shoulders and tried her best to look stern. “You need to bring her back,” she commanded, but Mancer shook his head resolutely. 

Eclesia sighed in annoyance and frustration. Whenever Mancer acted like this, it was nearly impossible to change his mind. 

“Do it, Pericles. Now. Or else there's no dessert for you for the next month!” 

Mancer weighed his options. To his adult mind, a month without dessert was a relatively light punishment, but his six year old body wanted cake. He stared pleadingly at his mother. 

“But I can't, mommy!” he wheezed desperately. His breathing was beleaguered, and his heart pulsed rapidly. Veins were popping out on his neck. He suddenly felt very tired. 

“Why are you so pale, baby?” Eclesia asked, but Mancer couldn't answer. 

He coughed as he pitched forward, coating the front of his mother's shirt in blood. She scooped him up and immediately ran into their cottage, bounding frantically across the ground. She laid him in their bed and cried out hysterically. 

Jerumel burst into the house behind her, catching Eclesia just as she was about to faint. He held her for a moment, staring at their child in fear. 

“Seiche!” Eclesia yelled, “you've got to save him!” 

“I'm already on it,” the water spirit said. She was standing on his chest, water flowing from her dress and sinking into his skin. She forced the water gently through his body until she found his punctured lung. The liquid brushed lightly against the shard of mana piercing all the way through his lung, and it sparked, sending a violent jolt coursing through Mancer’s body. 

Seiche cursed. “Rixi!” she called, “I need your help for this!” 

Rixi popped out of her contract symbol, surprisingly calm and alert. “What do you need me to do?” she asked evenly, but inwardly, she was distraught. She should have realized something was wrong, but she had been too caught up in her own pathetic feelings to notice the crack in his eighth circle. It was her first failure as his mana guardian. 

“There's a shard of raw mana piercing his lung,” Seiche explained, “I need you to remove it so I can patch the holes.” 

Rixi nodded and prepared herself for surgery. The most important part was her mindset. If she let herself get preoccupied with things like pesky emotions, his death could be on her hands. And then she'd have to live the rest of her life with the murder of her only love on her conscience. She focused her mind and turned to Seiche. 

“Are you ready?” the water spirit asked. 

Rixi nodded wordlessly. With a beat of her wings, she became a rushing wind and whispered down Mancer's throat. She blew gently into his lung, careful not to expand it more than she had to. The mana shard in question was long and jagged, crackling with the energy of eighth circle lightning. 

She approached it cautiously and grasped it in both hands, absorbing the stray mana within herself. As Mancer's first summon, she'd been afforded the position of his mana guardian, which meant that she held quite a bit of authority over his mana. To some extent, she could shape and control it as she desired. 

In fact, it was Rixi who had designed his first two mana circles. 

The mana shard melted at an agonizingly slow pace, and every second Rixi held it, the flood of magic power increased. It was potent mana; far stronger and more dangerous than any other substance known to man, and Rixi was taking in all of it. 

If she hadn't aided in the creation of his eighth circle, she wouldn't have survived the operation. 

After what seemed like hours of labor, she somehow managed to absorb the last of the mana shard as Seiche's healing water fixed the holes in his lung. Rixi blew cautiously from his throat and out of his mouth, changing back into her tangible form. 

Mancer's eighth circle mana surged through her tiny body, destabilizing her elemental structure. She floated aimlessly through the air, dipping and weaving unsteadily. Eclesia reached out to catch her. 

“No!” Seiche cried out as she darted forward and slammed violently into Eclesia’s chest. 

Eclesia stumbled backwards, away from Rixi, who spiraled down erratically and hit the ground with a thud. The floor of the cottage exploded as the excess mana abruptly flowed into it, leaving a small crater with Rixi in the center, clinging desperately to the last vestiges of Mancer's mana. 

It had taken him decades to amass this much, and she wasn't going to let any of it escape. 

She tugged on the threads that had woven their way into the earth, pulling them back with immense effort. As a wind spirit, she had no authority over earth, and thus was forced to rely upon her waning mana control. She strained and stretched for his mana, refusing to let even a whisper escape, even at the expense of her own life force. 

At last, she had gathered it all, and she formed it into a dense, tiny sphere that fit perfectly in the palm of her hand. She hugged it to her as she lay sprawled on the ground. Mancer's mana was always comforting, and she found that her fatigued and exhausted body could not resist its warm and welcoming pull. Her eyelids grew increasingly heavy, and she drifted off to a deep, heavy slumber.