“He’s dead?” Aris Ascarian shouted, his voice a volatile mix of rage and panic. “Curse this morning! How is that possible? Ring the bells—all of them! Notify the fools in the city that there is a threat. Inform the Guard Commander.”

“My lord, Lady Kazar—” a small voice tried to interject.

“Organize the Guild! Ensure the Specthroni are confined to their rooms. Direct the Lucidarchs to prepare to open alignments to the lower tiers. I want the Temporal Guard dressed and drilled in front of the tower!”

“My lord Ascarian—”

“I want every Aetherach recalled to the tower immediately! Tell no one of the Arcanarch’s death! Absolutely no one other than the senior leadership of the guild.”

“Perhaps—”

“Ring the damn bells! Why have we not rung the damn bells yet?” Aris spun, roaring into the face of a junior Lucidarch who looked ready to faint. “And where in Riven’s ass is the Mystarch? Where is Kazarian?”

“The Prime is at the Fulcrum, my lord—”

“Why is she there? No matter. Dispatch a message through the Warlocks. She is to return at once. We must convene. I must be proclaimed Arcanarch post-haste. This city needs leadership, and it certainly won’t come from those childish fools.” Aris said with a wide flourishing gesture over the city, directed at the arrogant, self-centered Tier Commanders.

Aris stormed toward the ledge overlooking the northern wilds—only to stop dead as the cold morning air hit his bare skin. He was standing on the balcony fully nude. 

“Fetch my robes! And get some light in this room!” he barked, retreating into the bedchamber. “Throw open the drapes. How is he dead? The Arcanarch is dead? And Commander Wallant? You’re certain?”

“It is what the Sixth’s Warlock relayed, my—” the junior Lucidarch stammered.

“Who was his second? Who is the current commander of the Sixth now?”

“I believe ‘Captain Lane’ authorized the communication to be sent, my lord.”

Aris paced the floor, his mind racing. He had been rousted from sleep by violent knocking after spending half the night analyzing the unusual, fascinating signatures humming through the weave.

Before he could bark another order, the first great bell atop the tower chimed—a heavy, rhythmic boom that vibrated through the floorboards.

“Wake Estusian.”

“He’s awake—”

“Already? Good.”

“I don’t believe he slept, my lord.”

“Has he been informed of the Arcanarch’s death?”

“We had runners go to him as we came to your door, my lord.”

Moments later, a second bell joined the first, igniting a cascading alarm across the upper tiers.

Aris forced himself to stand still as a second junior Lucidarch hurried forward to drape him in his formal robes. He dismissed her with a sharp wave, cinched his own cords, and stepped back out onto the organically cultivated ledge.

He closed his eyes, reaching out to align the magnetic energies to form a vantage point. Immediately, a heavy, suffocating resistance slammed into his mind. He gritted his teeth. Improper alignment. He knew he had to recalibrate. But he had done this hundreds if not thousands of times before. But the same sensation. Immediate rejection from the weave.

Aris raised his arms and grit his teeth and began the process to recalibrate. He studied the intricate ink tracing his flesh. He pointed his right forearm; the ink flared, radiating a faint luminescence. Pressing his thumb against his skin, he dragged it along a secondary line. The ink brightened.

Yes. There. He was just tired. This is trivial for the future Arcanarch. The new Arcanarch, Aris Ascarian reminded himself.

Those savages from the Strands were raiding Shrine’s vassal cities again? And they had slain the Arcanarch of the Temporal tower? What an absolute fool the Arcanarch had been, venturing out to investigate that disturbance personally with a mere handful of Sixth Tier barbarians. But the Commander of the Sixth had gone with him. How could this be possible? Aris thought. What force assembled could mortally wound the most magically gifted man in the city, not even, by all many accounts, the most physically gifted man in the city?

He needed a glimpse. Just a single peak at the invading force. Perhaps they were merely raiding Azureden. That’s fine. He would assemble the AMS guild. He would lead the Temporal Guard himself if he had to without the Mystarchs. He was not going to rely on anyone. Especially not The First Tier. But no—Azureden lay far to the east of where the threat had registered. Kasure Island was even further north. No. Something else is happening.

Aris focused his mind and found an anchor in the weave. His tattoos blazed with the vivid blue glow of positive alignment. He didn't need to open a full pathway—just an aperture. A pinprick in space and time to see what is transfolding.

The weave fought back instantly, rebuffing him with violent force. The ink on his arms scorched white-hot. Aris gasped, slamming both fists onto the lignin balustrade.

Above and from below him, the bells roared, but penetrating the noise, a single thought echoed in his head: I will be the Arcanarch. Aris Ascarian, of the line of Ascari—the first of his blood to rule the Temporal Tower in more than three hundred years.

“Shut those damned bells up! I can’t–” he screamed to the Lucidarchs waiting nervously in his chambers behind him.

Patience was gone. He needed answers. He was going to succeed where his predecessor had failed.

Aris flooded his body with energy, the small hairs on the back of his neck elevated from his skin, every tattoo flaring bright blue. Crossing his forearms, he aligned the glyphs, twisted his torso, and caught the flash of the weave snapping into place. The focus opened further east than intended, but close enough for an aerial view. He channeled every drop of power he possessed.

I am now the Arcanarch. Who dares resist me?

He forced a positive, vertical polarization into the negatively charged threads, tearing a tiny needlehole aperture high above the northern reaches of Shrine. The view snapped into clarity—and Aris nearly lost his grip on the weave entirely from the view being presented.

Row upon row of Drengers and Ghyll filled the northern passes, moving in terrifyingly precise rank and file. Looming behind them were a dozen massive, multi-limbed, slug-like monstrosities—colossi of stone and flesh. Behind those lie long, cylindrical objects being dragged along by the colossi. The shapes appeared to be arrows in bizarre, yet remarkable proportions. Hundreds of Drenger corpses littered the mud, surrounded by the massive two-handed swords and axes of the fallen Sixth Tier warriors just behind the impressive formation. Surely a formidable force has been assembled for any single Tier, but certainly not a match to the collective might of all of Shrine’s power.

But as Aris adjusted the aperture, his eyes widened in disbelief.

Among the formed army stood six metallic bodies equidistant from another along the rear ranks, between the ranks–Warlocks, most definitely the common machines of Shrine. But why were they moving as if they were independent? They weren't telemancers. They couldn’t access the weave, but still they radiated the glow as if they were accessing–impossible. Simply impossible. As if choreographed, in unison the six lifted arms and directed their hands upward, pointing directly at his tiny aperture tear in the sky Aris had created.

Before he could sever the connection, a violent surge of reversed magnetic energy traveled back through the thread, throwing him backward. Aris crashed onto the balcony tiles, clutching his arms as his long, dark hair matted to his face in sweat.

The junior Lucidarch rushed to his side and gasped. “My lord!”

Aris raised his head to look at the frightened expression upon her face. He had nearly been thrown from the balcony. It was almost a remarkably short tenure for the new Arcanarch.

“Your illustrati—they’re bleeding!”

Aris lifted his arms. The pain was excruciating, the ink along his arms were split wide and weeping dark red onto his robes.

“How strange…” Aris whispered.