Drahn stared at the monstrous wolf that Ilrolik had become, awe and sadness warring for control of his emotions. He’d watched her change. Watched her solar energy warp and alter in time with her body. He’d personally experienced something similar—painfully so—though his transformation had been stopped by Hiral. Reversed, even, in a lot of ways.

  So, out of everybody on that battlefield, Drahn—perhaps better than anybody else—understood just how permanent the Shaper’s choice was. She wasn’t a Maker anymore. Hells, if even a trace of her personality remained, it would be a miracle. And, by the way the beast raged, spittle dripping from its maw as it stalked forward to leap at the Raze, maybe it would be a bit of a curse, too.

  He could only shake his head as he turned away, arrow taut on his bow. Him! Feeling bad about the fate of an islander. Somehow, Ilrolik’s choice to become that thing—to make that sacrifice—wormed its way into his head worse than Yully’s—his own sister’s—death did.

  She’d died, and it would break his heart as soon as the fight was over, but they’d both come into this knowing it would be a battle. That anything could happen to them. The strange fact let Drahn compartmentalize her loss enough he could keep fighting. Ilrolik, though? It was just different, and he couldn’t even explain to himself why.

  “Drahn, Igwanda,” Nivian’s voice came over the raid chat, snapping the Grower out of his thoughts even as his arrow pelted Ilrolik’s opponent with another dose of Pollen Poison. “Go help Yanily contain his Raze. He’s been fighting on the edge this whole time, and he doesn’t have the durability for even one mistake.”

  “Got it,” Drahn said, his eyes flicking to the distant tower where Igwanda sniped from. While he didn’t have quite the same Atn Hiral did, it was more than enough to see her nod, and leap in the direction of the spearman’s fight. One more shot at his current target—just for good measure—and he was off as well.

  Rooftop to rooftop he leapt, firing off an Explosive Arrow at an Endless with each landing. The Blightfire Spite numbers had dropped drastically from their initial rising, but those that remained, individually, seemed to be getting stronger. Strong enough, in some cases, to genuinely injure the Endless. They weren’t killing the constructs yet, but it was getting closer. The sheer power it must’ve taken to summon those…

  Drahn couldn’t stop his eyes from going to the section of sky where Seena and Li’l Ur—though he wasn’t so little—battled one of the Raze by themselves. Really, Yanily he could understand soloing one of the S-Ranked monstrosities, surprises like that were kind of what he did, but Seena? The woman packed a lot of firepower—literally—if she had a frontline keeping a target off her. Without the build-time to really get her abilities charged though? Usually that meant she was darting around and throwing out her weaker attacks.

  Not this time. Now, she was hurling building-sized spears of that weird plasma-fire thing she did like they were Cinders. And they absolutely devasted that section of the city, to the point even the Endless had stopped trying to interfere in the battle. Those stupid enough to make their way in that direction quickly found themselves reduced to Endless Puddles.

  But… those black flames running up Seena’s chest and across her shoulders, then down to her elbows, something about them made Drahn’s heart want to stop. As in, instinctively stop, like the hand of Death herself was reaching out and squeezing. Seena’s thing was all about the cycle of rebirth—new life from death, specifically the fiery kind—while whatever she was doing now went against that. It was too final.

  And though that contradiction to her path was giving her power now, it would definitely cost her later.

  Which, oddly, made Drahn smile. Not because the girl—no, the woman—would get hurt, but because of how much she’d grown. And, because he knew she—or Hiral—would find a way to make it work. He could trust them. He would trust them. They’d earned that.

  Another Explosive Arrow to swat an Endless chasing Laseen out of the air fifteen blocks away, and he leapt yet again. Looking at the distance between him and where Yanily battled his Raze, Drahn decided he needed to figure out how to fly. Hiral made it look easy. Seena and Yanily seemed to have picked up the trick along the way. How hard could it really be?

  Drahn fired off a dozen more shots as he went, activating Petal Protection—now that it was off cooldown—again. A small flower, with five glowing petals sprouted from his shoulder. As long as he had at least one of those, any hits he took would see their damage reduced by eighty percent. The last time he’d used the ability, he’d been hit the full five times in depressingly short order.

  His Atn and Dex were respectable for his build, but they weren’t enough to deal with these Raze monsters—or a dozen Endless looking to pull him apart. How Yanily was holding his own—by himself—was something Drahn just couldn’t understand. He was sure about to find out, though, with one more leap taking him to the top of a nearby building.

  Looking down from the leaning structure—though he was still almost five-hundred feet up—Drahn almost tossed his bow away in exchange for taking up farming or something. Maybe Laseen would teach him how to knit.

  Yanily was—as Seena would say—“doing Yan things”.

  Lightning fell like rain. Half the area was glass instead of crystal. The spearman himself—Tempest Roar whirling in his hands—actually parried aside one of the giant punches trying to turn him into a red stain, before leaping up for his own counterattack.

  “Drahn,” Igwanda said over the raid chat. “You aren’t shooting.”

  As punctuation to her point, consecutive, vertical blast waves traced the path of her shot from a building nearly a mile distant. By the time her Momentous Shot hit the Raze—building power the longer it flew—it hit with the force of a falling star, rocking the Raze to the side, and leaving the arrow imbedded in its shoulder. Though it barely looked like a pin in the giant’s huge body, the Raze’s head turned in her direction.

  A shift of its body, and both shoulder cannons disgorged powerful bursts of energy in Igwanda’s direction.

  Drahn wasn’t worried. Over that much distance, she’d easily have time to dodge the attacks. At worst, she’d complain about leaving her sniper’s nest. For a lizard, she sure talked like a bird sometimes. A cute, bow-loving bird.

  If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  On second thought, he should really forget he ever even considered the similarity. If he accidently said that out loud, she’s stop massaging his neck when it got stiff.

  Drawing back his own bow—loaded with a hefty shot charged with Pollen Poison—Drahn released his arrow. He didn’t have quite the same range and accuracy as Igwanda did, but as a second, third, fourth, and fifth shots tasted the air before the first even landed, he made up for his weakness with rate of fire. He could easily fire half-a-dozen shots for each of hers, considering how much build-up her big-damage hits needed.

  Explosions and puffs of orange pollen spread across the Raze’s back, while a second shot came from Igwanda, though she’d slightly shifted position. Her second arrow slammed into the center of the Raze’s chest, forcing it back a step, where it took another barrage of shots from Drahn. During this brief second, Yanily hadn’t been idle either, unloading his own powerful Chain Lightning that sent clawed bolts of electricity rampaging across the giant, crystal body.

  Under the onslaught of attacks from three, focused damage dealers, even the monstrous opponent staggered back, lifting its arms to protect itself from the assault. That was it, they could do this, and Drahn took a step forward to the edge of the building. Bow practically singing with the unceasing stream of arrows he released—mixing up the types—his solar energy plummeted. Given how much they had the Raze on the ropes, though, he couldn’t be stingy now. If they could put one of these beasts down, and move to assist the others, they might actually have the advantage.

  And, maybe he could get a little bit of payback for what had happened to his sister.

  A snarl escaped his lips, teeth clenching. He hadn’t compartmentalized Yully’s death as well as he’d thought, but it brought a new strength to his arms. Increased the speed of his shots by a few percent. Anger wasn’t a good emotion for a fight, he knew it. It made people miss things they should notice. Clouded judgement.

  In that moment, though, it also pushed him harder, and that was what he needed.

  From her distant perch, Igwanda’s arrows came at a steady, consistent pace. Each impact of her shots was like a bomb going off, and, unlike Drahn, she wasn’t angry. She saw opportunities and openings, and her next arrow slammed into the back of the Raze’s knee.

  As soon as the shot struck, the giant’s leg gave out from beneath it, dropping it down to its other knee. More lightning and arrows rained down on it, like the combination was trying to hammer it straight into the ground.

  And it was working!

  The pounding on its head and shoulders forced the Raze forward, its four hands going to the ground to try and brace itself. Seeing the chance, Igwanda’s next arrow went straight for one of those arms, cracking into it with enough force to topple a building. It wasn’t enough to break the arm—or knock it out from under the giant—so Igwanda tried a second, then a third time.

  Part of Drahn wondered why she wasn’t just aiming for the thing’s exposed head like he was. If he could just put an arrow through its thick skull, he could make it feel just a bit of what Yully must’ve felt. If he could taste a tiny bit of her pain, it would be a start. Then he could pile it on. Pry the crystal thing open and step inside, where he’d rip it apart with his bare hands if necessary.

  After his next arrow, Drahn found himself blinking rapidly, something in his eyes, and a noise echoing around him like a buzzing. What was that? He ignored it for two more arrows, but then everything was getting blurry. Why couldn’t he see properly? A debuff of some kind? Low solar energy?

  And what was that screaming?

  … screaming?

  Suddenly, Drahn felt how raw his throat was. How his lungs burned for air. How his cheeks felt wet from the tears running down his face.

  Yully…

  How was he going to tell his parents?

  Drahn’s next arrow fell from his bow before his fingers could catch it, his barrage of arrows faltering for a fraction of a second.

  Just enough time to the Raze to react.

  Leaping to its feet, the giant tore the crystal street with it. In two hands, it lifted a sheet of the road in two hands to block the constant stream of lightning, while a third hand braced another section as a shield against Igwanda’s next shot. The fourth hand, though, it didn’t use the crystal to block an attack. No, it used it as an attack itself.

  Twisting at the waist, the Raze spun and hurled the third piece of crystal like a side-armed disc. Straight in Drahn’s direction.

  Distracted as he was—for barely a pair of heartbeats—he noticed too late what was coming in his direction. Still, being S-Rank came with a lot of advantages, including reaction speeds that bordered on cheating.

  Even as the arrow slipped from his fingers and fell toward the roof, Drahn leapt into the air. He’d clear the thrown weapon then…

  The crystal disc changed direction midair.

  Curving like he had a string attached to it, it followed the Grower higher into the air, its trajectory staying lined up with him. The impact came a second later, smashing into him from the waist down. Agony that even eclipsed the Chimeric Blood in his veins threatened to blot everything out at the same time the world spun.

  Head-over-heels, round and round and round, Drahn whipped around. City, sky, Raze, the images repeated over and over until suddenly they came to an abrupt stop. Along with another shocking amount of pain.

  Drahn groaned and coughed, blood ejecting from his lips, while his addled brain tried to process what had happened. What was happening. The first thing he noticed was the room was still spinning, but this time, likely because of the concussion, not because he was spinning. Second, was the fact he was even in a room at all.

  From the hole in the wall, and the dust still floating in the air—along with the pain in his back—it was pretty clear how he’d gotten there. Then there was the wide trail of blood leading from the top of the broken wall he’d bashed through all the way to his…

  … his…

  … his…

  Where were his legs?

  From the waist down, where his two limbs should’ve been, there was only an expanding pool of crimson liquid.

  “Oh…” he said, an odd sort of stuffing in his head slowing his thoughts. Not having legs was… bad… wasn’t it? How was he going to go hunting with Igwanda?

  Igwanda…?

  She had to be okay, didn’t she? Where was the Raze?

  “… oh, again,” he said, his eyes finally clearing enough to show the crystal giant stomping in his direction to finish the job. It had quite a distance to go, so Drahn must’ve really been launched by that stupid disc. Who knew the Raze could control crystal like that? Probably should’ve guessed it… And, for it to do so much damage though his Petal Protection, just how hard did he get hit?

  Turning his head, Drahn looked for his bow. He could still shoot like this, kind of, and maybe he could put an arrow in its eye or something. At least annoy it before it killed him.

  More importantly, keep its attention so it didn’t hurt Igwanda. What was he even thinking? She was so much smarter than him. She’d keep her distance and pelt the Raze from her ideal range. She wouldn’t make a dumb mistake like he had. She’d…

  “You’re hurt,” Igwanda said, and not through the raid chat. No, she said it from right in front of him. Her bow slipped from her fingers, clattering to the floor, as she ran forward and dropped to her knees. “You’re hurt,” she said again.

  “Just… a flesh wound…” he tried to joke, but even the words took an exhausting amount of energy from him. Why was he so tired? More importantly… “Why… are you… here?”

  Igwanda looked up from where her hands had touched the blood where his legs should’ve been. Something about the constant, blue tears of being an Undead looked different than usual. Looked like real tears, streaking across the scales of her face.

  Behind her, the earth-shaking steps of the charging Raze grew louder. It was almost there.

  “You needed me,” she said simply, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  “I… need you… to go,” he said, the words coming out sluggishly, his body feeling so heavy. “You can’t… stay…”

  “And where would I go?” she asked, the thundering steps of the Raze right outside the building. “What would I do, without the most important thing in my life?”

  “… your… bow?” Drahn asked, strange last words leaving his lips.

  “Silly human. You, of course,” she said, leaning into him to bring her lips to his, kissing him even as the giant, crystal fist of the Raze crashed through the outer wall right behind her.

  Wanna Support Rune Seeker? Check out the Ebook and Audio Here! Thanks for your support:

  Amazon:

  Audible:

  Rune Seeker, Vol. 1 by J.M. Clarke, C.J. Thompson, Hardcover | Barnes & Noble?

  Rune Seeker (book 1) Book By Jm Clarke,cj Thompson, (Hardcover) | Indigo

  If you wanna chat about the book? Come to discord!

  If you're already on that discord? Go to "Get Roles" and you can get Rune Seeker updates, if you want :)

  Note my patreon does not have Rune Seeker chapters.