The smoke was so dense it was like a wall against the confines of Raella’s magic. Worried that Peter would disrupt it somehow, I shooed him away from the edges, and he obediently stepped closer to my side. I suppressed a shudder. I had spent the better part of the past week getting myself used to him as best as I could. I was making headway, but there were moments when I would spot him out of the corner of my eye or he’d rush up to me unexpectedly and I’d feel uncontrollable terror take firm hold. Sometimes I’d even squeak or scream in terror, which amused Lexie to no end.

It didn’t help that I felt like I was losing my mind in other ways. Sometimes I could swear I was seeing a bright figure of light out of the corner of my eyes, but no one else would acknowledge it, and when I looked again it was gone. Other times it was like I could smell electricity faintly in the air. It seemed like once a day I heard a high-pitched giggle somewhere nearby. I was getting less sleep because of all of it and my days passed in a strange haze.

Raella continued to glow as she stood at the front of the boat, focusing on holding the spell. I could see that she had the barrier extended well beyond the boat to allow for some visibility. The atmosphere was so oppressive that I shivered a bit, and Peter trilled softly, an almost comforting tone.

The island first appeared as a wall of stone looming suddenly out of the smoke. I almost gasped at how quickly it had materialized. The fisherman, a man named Tanert, called out to his daughter Dustyn, some sort of instruction to help steer the boat. They had gone at a creeping pace the entire way, and easily maneuvered to pull the boat along the edge of the rocks without hitting them.

“Did you want us to continue along the edge until we find a better place to berth?” Tanert asked Raella. She shook her head and held up a hand to indicate that she wanted Tanert to give her a moment. Frowning in concentration, she closed her eyes and suddenly pulsed with a brighter light – the glow of the barrier deepened as the light of magic dropped from around her. The barrier remained in place.

She took a deep breath as she turned to the fisherman. “No, you should be safe if you stay right here. We’ll find our own way up,” she said. Then belatedly added, “Thank you.”

Tanert nodded, raising a hand to touch the glowing magic of the barrier. “You learn that at your University?”

“No,” Raella said tersely, lifting her chin slightly. “Spell mastery is an expectation to even be able to attend. I could do this well before my years there.” Tanert raised an eyebrow, looking mildly annoyed, but didn’t comment further. Chase gave him an apologetic smile as Raella turned to look over us, her hands on her hips and her head tilted. She began to mumble to herself, “Need to be able to protect us each individually from the smoke, to have freedom of movement to climb or somehow reach the top. We’ll need to figure out how high this cliff face is…”

Lyre raised his arms suddenly, speaking Primordial. The light of magic enveloped him and his voice became resonant as he spoke – he shifted his arms in a loose circle and then made a pushing motion. A sudden violent gusting of wind moved against the cliff face, causing the smoke to swirl and clear momentarily. Dustyn gave a yelp as the boat shifted, rocking in the disturbed water. As he ended the spell, the smoke was already closing back in, but it wasn’t quite as thick as it had been and the momentary clarity gave us a view of the cliff we were perched beside.

It was, quite luckily, not very high at all. In fact, it looked like most of us could reach it if we stood on the rails of the boat and pulled ourselves up. Raella looked up, her eyebrows high with her momentary surprise, but then she looked back at Lyre and quickly composed herself. “At least we know we won’t need to magically assist our assent,” she said. We started moving toward the rails – Peyton and Greyjon easily pulled themselves up first, and I followed behind them with Asterollan. Peter easily made the jump, and began to run back and forth behind me in excitement. We helped the others up a few at a time – Greyjon and Asterollan grabbed Cassandra’s arms and easily pulled her up, though she looked annoyed by it. Peyton and I pulled Lexie and Chase up, and Zolambi and Lyre followed.

I was already doing my best to suppress coughing against the smoke that was settling in around us. Lyre cast his spell again, and the smoke shifted and swirled away – not completely dispelled still, but giving us a momentary reprieve from it. Nodding, Raella lifted her arms and focused on her own magic, and a barrier erected around us. “I could create multiple individual barriers for each of us if we find we need them, but that will take much of my concentration. Too much. If it is needed, someone will have to protect me. For now, between this large one and your winds,” she nodded to Lyre, “we should be able to move forward. But be careful, and stay close together. Now follow me.”

“Are you expecting danger?” Peyton asked as she fell into step next to Raella.

Raella frowned. “I am… uncertain. There are rumors that those that have tried to extinguish the flames have seen a monster. The flames may be magical in nature.”

“Divine is what they were saying? Since it’s a temple,” Peyton pressed.

Raella nodded, not commenting.

We moved forward as a group. When the smoke became too thick to see through, Lyre would cast his spell and shift it away. It was an eerie walk – I could hear the crackling of fires from around us, and it was unseasonably hot. I found that I was constantly wiping sweat from my brow. The others looked similarly miserable, beads of sweat dripping down temples or soaking through shirts. I couldn’t wait to return to the inn and indulge in a bath.

There was no plant life – everything seemed to be bare stone and dust. Despite the fires around us and the thick smoke, I realized there was no visible trace of ash or soot anywhere. Sometimes we moved close enough to see some of the fires that raged, only to see that they crackled evenly over the stones, with no visible fuel. The first time we spotted this, we stood for a dumbfounded moment. “The rocks are on fire,” Greyjon said, his tone strangely flat.

“This island is a stone in the sea, with a stone temple built at its heart. And in that temple, there stands an altar that houses a small ever-burning flame,” Raella spoke. “It has always been barren of life.” I felt the truth of what she was saying somewhere inside myself. This place had never been hospitable to life. I just… knew. It felt completely wrong to me – unnatural. Perhaps sensing my momentary discomfort, Peter bumped against my leg and trilled.

“Let’s move on,” Raella said, turning and continuing her walk.

“So there’s a fire here that’s always been burning?” Lexie asked curiously, hopping forward to stand closer to Raella.

Raella nodded. “Yes. It’s been known about for years, being such an obvious sight at sea. They say that the temple used to be bright as a beacon, and was commonly used as a landmark or a lighthouse for sailors. The divine flame that burned here never produced smoke like this though.” She paused for a moment, squinting at the smoke that pressed in all around us. “When the gods touched our world, the faithful of the fire god would make pilgrimages here to walk through the flames, unburnt.”

“Is that true?” Lexie said in awe.

Raella shrugged, a strangely human gesture for her. “We’re getting close now,” she said after a moment. The sound of the fires had grown to such a roar that she had to raise her voice to be heard above it. She paused a moment, then gestured ahead of us. “The temple should be right in front of us.”

Lyre summoned another bout of wind, larger than before, and aimed it ahead. The smoke swirled, clearing the area, revealing an open building ahead of us. There were stone columns that stretched out before us, forming a large oval around paved stone floors. The temple was open on all sides. Something bright loomed, flickering, near the center of the floor. Since Raella had been talking about an ever-burning flame, at first I thought it was only a large fire. But it shifted, and turned to face us, and I realized it was a colossus made of flame. White hot eyes narrowed and focused on us.

“Really,” I heard Cassandra groan under her breath. I watched it open its mouth, a void of shadow, and it bellowed. Then it unleashed fire from its mouth, a massive cone of curling flame.

“Shit,” I heard myself say. I could see out of the corner of my eyes as several of my companions instantly lit up, could see the flurry of movement around me as they each scattered. Peter screeched and jumped, shoving me back several feet and causing me to fall.

“Wait!” Raella shouted, and then began cursing. I could see that the barrier she had erected appeared to be keeping the flames out, but several of us had darted out of its protection. She dropped the barrier and moved to take cover behind a column, closing her eyes to focus. A massive barrier pulsed into existence around the entirety of the building, then seemed to pulse again, shrinking suddenly. I realized I was surrounded by a soft glow of light – she had erected a personal barrier around myself. Peter, also, was surrounded by his own personal bubble of protection. I froze, wondering if I had to stay inside of it, but when Peter jumped up onto the top of a column, I watched the barrier move with him.

I quickly pushed myself to my feet and also took cover behind a column – the one next to Raella’s. “What the hell is that thing?” I shouted over to her.

“I don’t know!” she shouted back, sounding annoyed. “Don’t distract me! Just do something about it!”  

“Peter! Protect Raella!” I called out, hoping that the spider wouldn’t go launching itself at the fire giant. I heard it trill from somewhere above, but couldn’t see it. Glancing out from behind the column, I could see that Peyton and Asterollan had rushed the colossus, pushing it back several feet with their onslaught. It was an almost shocking sight – they barely came up to its chest, almost looked like children standing in front of it. It was roaring in anger at them. Cassandra knelt on the ground, near the prone form of Greyjon – he looked badly burned, and I realized she was healing him. I took a deep breath and moved out of cover, reaching for my magic as I rushed in to help – the flood of power was almost calming. The colossus was preparing to slam a massive fist into Peyton, who was raising her sword against it. I summoned vines from behind it, which struck forward and grasped its arms, pulling it back.

It roared angrily as the vines unbalanced it, easily breaking through them as the flames of its body burnt the plants away, but at least its attack was hampered. Asterollan glowed briefly and flashed so bright that I was momentarily blinded – whatever he had done did not appear to work on the colossus though, and it roared directly in his face, swatting him away.

I could hear Lyre chanting from somewhere nearby, his voice an eerie resonant echo. Ice began to materialize and creep up the ground, like a crystalline flash, crawling up the legs of the giant. Glancing over, I could see that he was standing near to Cassandra – Chase and Zolambi were there as well, also seeming to focus on putting their energy into the same spell that Lyre was working on. For a moment, I felt a pulse of worry quicken my heart – where was Lexie in all of this? She was just a kid.

The fire colossus appeared to be immobilized by the ice for the moment, but had become more enraged. It roared and swung a fist down at Peyton again. She shifted to move out of the way, but slipped on the ice under her feet. I summoned more of the vines to grasp her and pull her out of the way of the fist as it slammed into the ground. Looking back, she smiled at me appreciatively.

“Where’s Lexie?” I mouthed at her. She mouthed something back. Shit, I can’t read lips, I thought to myself. Greyjon was sitting up and Cassandra was moving forward – I realized she was trying to find Asterollan – when the colossus screamed while straining against the ice. It was burning brighter now – the air around us crackled with heat, and I realized the only reason we weren’t burning was thanks to Raella’s barriers. Still, the very air scorched around us. The ice was melting, vaporizing as quickly as it formed. The creature shifted one flaming leg forward, almost entirely freed from the ice.

Peyton was closest to it still. I pulled her further away with the vines, could hear her shout something as she was dragged roughly across the stone floors.

“It’s angry,” I heard Lexie say, somewhere very close to me.

I wasn’t sure where she had come from. Glancing down, I could see that she was standing nearly next to me – she stared out at the creature, seemingly in a trance. “No shit,” I said.

She walked forward. “Wait, Lexie!” I reached out for her, but my hands felt scorched the second they touched her shoulder. I pulled back with a sharp yell. Despite the heat, I felt a chill rush up my spine – she didn’t have a barrier around her at all. I shouted her name again and moved forward once more, but the colossus emitted a massive pulse of heat and flame, and I felt myself knocked back bodily, slamming against a pillar. I heard Chase scream, and Lyre’s chanting stopped. Everything suddenly became strangely quiet.

Dazed, I rubbed my back where it had hit the stone, wincing at the pain. I pushed myself up, turning to see what was happening.

Lexie had stopped right in front of the creature, which towered over her. It stood still, staring down at her. And then it shrunk. It was still a figure of flames, bright and orange, with white hot eyes, but now it was quite small – the same size as Lexie. In fact, seeing her standing and staring at it face to face – I realized it had taken Lexie’s shape. It was like seeing Lexie stare into mirror image made of fire.

The heat around us cooled. The smoke cleared. I twisted my head around – we were at the top of a plateau, and I could see the shoreline and Ylfsport, and the ocean stretching for miles beyond. It was like the smoke had never existed at all. I moved forward – slower than I had intended, my back twinging.

Lexie and the figure stared at each other for several moments in silence, and then it disappeared. I staggered forward until I was standing next to her, and the others were approaching as well. “What happened?” I asked.

Lexie seemed to startle from a trance. “That was the fire god,” she said. “She said I was her chosen.”

“It spoke to you?” Raella said as she approached. The barriers dropped from around us as she ended her concentration on the spell.

“Yes. She told me her name, and said that she’d give me…” Lexie glanced up. Something seemed to catch her attention. Frowning, her head twisted, looking up into the air around us. “What the fuck are those?”

We all looked around, confused, trying to see what Lexie was asking about. “What are what?” I asked.

Lexie pointed into the air, very near me. Then stabbed a finger into the air, above her head, and over towards Cassandra, and then very near Peyton. “Those! The orbs! You don’t see them?” She looked around at us, seeing the incomprehension in our expressions. “She said she was giving me Sight. That was what she meant. I can see these… weird orbs? Floating around us. They must be invisible.”

Raella frowned, looking uncomfortable as she glanced around. “We should return to the inn, for now,” she said. “And you must tell us everything of what happened when you… communed with your god.”