Aingeal, go ahead, I direct the little elemental. He’s been dancing around my head – even as fast as I’m pushing, he can clearly still go faster. And if I increase the mana going to my wings, I’ll risk running low by the time I arrive at the fire. That wouldn’t exactly be great – making a spectacle of myself in the sky and then being unable to help when I get there.

  My friendly fire elemental responds to my request with eagerness, arcing against the sky like a meteor. He curves down towards the closest ship, merging with the flames present.

  I see the movement and try to dodge. I fail and I’m abruptly doused in water.

  It swarms all over me, constricting around my neck, and trying to enter my mouth and nose. I fight back with my own Water-Shaping, but whoever is controlling this water is far stronger and more experienced in this element than I am. The best I can do is push it away from my orifices enough to take a deep breath.

  If I can’t take control of the water, I’ll need to get rid of it.

  I release my hold on the water, physically closing my mouth and eyes, and using my fingers to pinch my nostrils shut. I can’t do anything about my ears. Focussing on fire, I try to do something which was experimental even in the other world.

  Flames begin to lick from my fingers, and spread from there. To my shoulders, to my neck, to my hair, down my body, down my legs, to my feet. The fire is hot and singes the skin not covered by my hide armour, so I use Sensation Management to reduce the pain enough that it’s not distracting me. Fortunately, my fire affinity enables me to withstand just a bit more flame than most.

  When my transformation is complete, I look more like the Human Torch than my usual self. I can’t maintain control for too long – especially not with wings already demanding my concentration and providing oxygen that makes the flames fight my control even more than usual. But it’s enough.

  The water trying to subdue me evaporates with a hiss. I release the flames with relief, already sending healing to my skin – it feels like I have a bad case of sunburn.

  “Put me down!” A frightened voice inexplicably meets my ears. I look over only to stare incredulously – a man in deep blue robes is dangling by his wrists from Noir’s claws. From Ivor’s smug appearance, he must have had something to do with it too.

  What happened? Noir and Ivor start sending me images simultaneously – it’s a little confusing to see the same event from two different angles, but my higher Intelligence stat works to help me process them. It seems that my companions spotted this man attacking me with water and decided that he needed to be taken out of play – literally. Ivor distracted him while Noir snuck up behind – no wonder the white dragon is smug.

  Good teamwork, I tell them and they emanate joy in response.

  I haven’t forgotten that we’re in a hurry – we all start flying again towards the fire even as I move closer to the man. I activate my magic sight and scan the area around me – I don’t want to be blindsided again. Seeing no signs of magic being used nearby, I nod with satisfaction and turn to the man.

  “Why did you attack me?” I ask. The man splutters, blue magic forming around his hands. Then he glances down at the earth far below him and the magic fades. That explains why he hasn’t tried to attack Noir yet.

  “I’m defending my city from you, fire mage! Why are you attacking us?” he demands.

  I frown briefly.

  “I’m not attacking your city. I’ve only just arrived here!” Anyway, I only started using fire magic in response to his attack with water – why did he attack me in the first place?

  “I saw you! You threw a fireball at the ship! And perhaps your coconspirators were here before you, but that doesn't excuse your actions!” The water-mage is furious at the obvious misunderstanding.

  “I didn’t throw a fireball – I sent my fire elemental ahead of me,” I explain. The man’s face twists in horror.

  “That’s even worse-”

  “To eat the flames,” I interrupt, then gesture at the ship in question. “Look.”

  As it turns out, Aingeal is able to eat this fire – the flames are already being drawn away from the blackened extremities of the ship. Seeing as he’s getting this one under control, I change course for the next.

  “Who are you?” the man breathes, barely audible with the speed of our flight.

  “Heir Titanbend,” I answer easily – I can thank my time in the palace for that, at least. “And I’m here to help.” The different shades of horror that the man can express might be amusing at another time, but not now – not when I’m close enough to see hundreds of people doing their best to get the fire under control, only to have another house burst into flames. Not when the sound of screams and shouts underlain by the ever-present crackling of the fire is all I can hear. “Why were you attacking me rather than helping to put the fires out?”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  His face tightens, but he seems to feel the same urgency as I do as he doesn’t equivocate.

  “I can’t get close enough. The attack I hit you with was my only long-range one, and it requires a living target.”

  “But you can do something if you can get close enough?”

  “I can create a jet of water, but it only goes a few paces in front of me.”

  “If you’re trying to do it horizontally,” I muse. Noir or Ivor, is one of you willing to carry him on your back? I check with my companions. Neither seems all that pleased with the idea, but Noir accepts it if it’s necessary. Thanks – pull from me so you can understand his words.

  Feeling Noir’s agreement, I hover close to the man and grab his hands.

  “What are you doing?” he asks fearfully.

  “Just hold on tightly,” I warn him a moment of time before Noir releases him. The man slams his eyes shut and gives a strangled scream. It cuts off when he realises he’s not actually falling. His eyes peek open just as I’m settling him on top of Noir’s back. I reach into Noir’s body to briefly remove three of his spikes, mentally apologising to him as I do so – impaling him on them would be rather counterproductive. He responds with grim resignation. I’ll put them back afterwards, I promise.

  “Hold on with your knees, like you’re riding a horse,” I advise him tersely. “Tell Noir which way you want to go and he’ll listen as long as it’s to help fight the fire. From above, your jet of water should go further.” The water-mage stares at me, clearly speechless. I’m itching to get going – the situation isn’t improving as I hover here and chat. “If you hurt him in any way, I’ll kill you,” I warn, and then push more mana into my wings to almost double my speed. He’ll figure it out, or he won’t.

  Good luck Noir, I tell the little dragon-like creature. If he does anything you don’t like, tell me. He sends me his determined agreement.

  I’m almost at the second ship in the line of burning vessels. Aingeal’s progress is impressive – almost half the fire has been pulled into the centre of the ship. Even better, it doesn’t look like the blackened and smoking areas revealed are catching light again.

  Twisting my head to look back, I see the bright spot of Nicholas and his storm griffin approaching quickly – though they seem to have angled themselves to aim for a different line of defence. Fair enough.

  Close enough to the flames of the ship that their furnace-like heat is making me sweat copiously, I stop. Ivor sends me a sense of plaintive question – he wants to know how he can help. I consider quickly, then pull out the chest of spidersilk I’ve been working on.

  Use this like a bag and scoop up water from the river, I tell him, sending him some images to illustrate my words. But be careful not to fill it too full – water is heavy.

  He takes the hide with careful claws – hopefully he won’t rip it to shreds or we’ll be delayed leaving tomorrow. I put the empty chest and wrapper back in my Inventory. While he shoots off to the river in a streak of white, I concentrate on the fire. Sirocco sends me a sense of worry, but I try to push it away – if this is anything like the inferno of the vine-stranglers, I can’t have any distractions.

  Unlike the inferno, I had no hand in building this fire. As a result, there are no connections already there between me and it. But, as I learned in the other world, all fire is the same fire. My connection with the fire I create must be able to expand to connection with this fire. And with connection, comes control.

  I close my eyes and activate my magic sight, immediately seeing the familiar tendrils that quest for more fuel, more oxygen, more, more, more. They’re far bigger here than in a hearth, but the principle is the same.

  I pull mana to the tips of my fingers and transform it into fire-mana just as it exits. With that, I reach for the closest tendril.

  It latches onto me immediately, tugging at the mana I’m proffering. But I don’t release my hold. It tugs again; I tug back. It tugs harder, the fire seeking to consume what it has in its grasp. But it can’t consume itself. And as it recognises our kinship, its tugging becomes less demanding and more explorative.

  I feel my awareness spreading down the tendril and into the body of the fire itself. I feel how it licks through the rooms, how it attacks the anti-fire magic which seems to have been built into the ship’s beams. It does not fight as most would, with determined forays and intentional strikes. Instead, it merely burns what it can, trusting that exposure to its heat and flames will eat through the protections in time.

  Unconsciously, I have been drawn closer to the inferno, something I only realise when my feet hit the deck. But as the flames surround me, I don’t burn. Not even as much as I burned when I covered myself with flames. I feel myself slipping back into the mindset I had when I dealt with the last inferno. The fire is me and I am the fire – what could be more natural?

  I reach out with my fiery limbs and stretch. Flames billow from beyond the ship, the inferno growing abruptly. And then, like I’m bringing my arms in to give myself an embrace, I pull the fire in close to me. Earlier, I transformed mana into fire-mana. Now, I do the reverse, filling my reserves to near-bursting. And still there’s more.

  Connections. My connection to fire isn’t the only one I possess.

  I feed mana down those connections too, unconsciously managing something I have been trying to do for months without much success. I push mana down the connections until I sense that feeding more would be actively detrimental. One connection remains available for far longer than the others. But even that one becomes saturated in time.

  It frustrates me that so many of my connections are blocked. I try to force the mana down them regardless, feeling more like I’m dreaming than fully awake – fire is the reality; everything else is the dream.

  I shove mana against the blockage, feeling it crack, but not break. I draw even more mana and force it against what lies in my path. It cracks even further, but holds. I somehow sense that trying to do more will damage my connections before it breaks the blockage.

  Frustrated, I give up on that option.

  By this point, the flames around me have reduced significantly. But I sense the huge concentration that lies not far from where I stand, my connection with fire informing me of its location even more easily than my eyes.

  I draw all my fire around me and then I leap, somehow knowing that I can make the distance. Behind me feels cold and empty, but where I aim is full of light and heat.

  I dive right into the heart of the next inferno – it welcomes me eagerly, it recognises its own.

  This time, as I gather the flames around me, I don’t know where to direct the mana. And it must be directed somewhere. Fire desires to move, to transform. It cannot just stay in one place.

  Except…. I know of one form in which fire is willing to rest.

  here!

  here!

  here!

  here