Chapter 10: Black Halo Alchemy

  Cole and Faelen were dying.

  The slow, ugly kind of dying.

  At this point, Cole had become more intimately aware of pain than he ever had been in his life. Ever since the Convergence. Ever since the first elite he killed.

  Pain had been there.

  It had been in his shoulder when the sword had slipped past his shield. It had been in his ankle when he tried to move too fast. It had been in his throat when he realized he had fallen into a dungeon rift and there was no door that led back to Indianapolis.

  But Cole had known pain well before this point. Not necessarily the physical kind.

  The kind you could not see.

  The kind that kept you awake at night, staring at a ceiling, wondering how you could feel hollow and heavy at the same time. The kind that whispered you were not enough. Not a good enough man. Not a good enough father. Not a good enough anything.

  He had never admitted it to anyone, but he had dealt with depression and mental health for a long time. Sitting there in his apartment, lights off, phone face down, letting hours disappear while his mind chewed on itself. Wallowing in that uncontrollable sadness that did not need a reason to exist. It just did.

  Cole had only ever been happy when he was with his family, yet that had been stolen from him.

  Or maybe, the ugly part of him whispered, he had helped steal it.

  He worked long hours. He told himself it was for them. He told himself it was how you provided. The overtime, the routes, the constant grind, the constant tiredness. It had made him short tempered, and he had lashed out a couple of times.

  He never hurt Jennifer or Nathan. That simply was not the kind of man he was.

  But he had a yelling problem. And that was just as bad.

  It was the look on Nathan’s face that haunted him. That tight little expression kids got when they were trying to be brave and did not know how. Like Nathan had decided he needed to be smaller to survive the room.

  Cole could see it now, even as he stood over a dented cauldron in a dungeon cottage that should not exist.

  It had taken a lot for him to get some help. He had swallowed pride. He had sat in a chair and said words he hated saying. He had tried to change.

  But by then, it had been too late.

  He had pushed Jennifer into another man’s arms.

  Did his problems excuse her actions? No. He had played that argument back and forth a thousand times. There were lines you did not cross. There were promises you did not break. There were things you did not do.

  However, he certainly had some of the blame.

  Nathan had been caught in the middle of it.

  Jennifer had gotten a great lawyer, a family friend. Someone who smiled at Cole in a courtroom as if this was just paperwork.

  Not that Cole had given them much of a fight. He had been exhausted. He had been ashamed. He had been convinced he deserved whatever came.

  He had given most of it up so Nathan could have it all.

  The thoughts ran through his head like an old movie. Frame after frame of his mistakes. Every scene ending the same way, with Cole wondering why he had not fought harder. Why he had not shown up at more school events. Why he had not demanded more time. Why he had not let shame make his decisions for him.

  All while poison roiled in his gut.

  The physical reality of it kept pulling him back to the cottage. Back to the cauldron. Back to the journal and its thin, cruel instructions.

  His vision had gone hazy. Objects were wobbly. Even as he put ingredients back into the pot, he had to wipe his eyes to see.

  His hands shook.

  Fever thorne, ground too fine the first time, ground too coarse the second. Thistle, the smell sharp enough to sting his nose. Spring water, pure and cold, poured into a pot that smelled like smoke.

  Stir slowly.

  Two minutes.

  Distill.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  That was what the journal said.

  Cole’s body did not care about instructions. His body cared that something inside him was trying to kill him.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw a little boy.

  Small shoulders. Dinosaur shirt. Same messy hair he remembered. Same smile.

  Cole’s breath caught.

  “Nathan?”

  Someone replied. He could not hear. Or maybe the reply was not real. Maybe it was just his brain trying to give him something soft before the end.

  Faelen was near him, in just as much pain, but of a different kind. The elf’s poison seemed more agonizing than coming with visions. Faelen would go pale, then sweat, then clench his jaw until the tendons stood out in his neck. His hands would shake around the edge of the table. Sometimes he would shut his eyes and breathe through his nose while he tried not to scream.

  Cole knew the visions were not real.

  He knew it.

  And even despite that, they still came at him.

  The little boy held out a dice set.

  “Want to play DnD, Daddy?”

  Cole blinked.

  The boy was gone.

  Only the cauldron remained. Only the smell of herbs and smoke. Only the little flicker of the hearth and the sound of Faelen’s breathing.

  Then another voice slid into his ears, sharp and familiar.

  “Maybe if you weren’t so angry, Cole. Maybe if you had been here more.”

  Jennifer.

  He could see her face appearing right in front of him. Tired eyes. Arms crossed. The way her mouth tightened when she said his name.

  Stir.

  It had to work this time.

  He could not afford another failure. Not with Faelen swaying on his feet ready to drop at any moment.

  “I’m taking Nathan, Cole. He’s better off with me, and you know it.”

  “Is he?” Cole spoke aloud.

  The words surprised him. They came out rough, half swallowed.

  At the time, it had seemed true. He was a wreck. He had been a wreck. He had been a man drowning, and he had thought letting go was the only way not to drag his son under with him.

  But maybe he could have been there more. Tried harder to co-parent. Tried harder to show up. Why hadn’t he done that?

  A voice whispered in his ear, honey-sweet poison on top of poison.

  “Because you’re a coward, Cole Rourke.”

  Cole’s grip tightened on the spoon. His knuckles went white.

  Stir. The liquid looked wrong again. Too dark. Too thick. He blinked hard, trying to focus.

  Was it changing color?

  He shook his head, and the motion made nausea roll up his throat.

  “Go away,” Cole shouted at nothing. “Leave me be.”

  His voice bounced off stone walls that should not exist.

  His authority surged.

  He felt his power.

  The liquid swirled.

  Then it changed.

  The mixture went from wrong to right in the space between heartbeats, as if his shout had cut through the failure and forced the ingredients to obey. Pinkish gold bloomed through the cauldron, and a green tinge threaded through it.

  Cole stared, breath shallow.

  It was beautiful.

  It was also terrifying, because it meant the Ethereal had been waiting for something in him.

  For him to push, to impose.

  “You did it,” Faelen said, and Cole could hear something raw in his voice. Relief. Hope. The kind of hope that hurt because you could lose it.

  Cole’s vision flickered again, and cold text cut through it, crisp as a blade.

  TRIAL COMPLETE.

  WAR-DEED RECORDED: ALCHEMY TRIAL CLEARED.

  Cole swiped at the air, dismissing it. He did not want to look at messages right now. He wanted to finish before the potion decided to fail again.

  He grabbed two vials with hands that felt too clumsy. He poured carefully, watching the liquid fill glass. It steamed faintly. It smelled sharp and clean.

  He downed one.

  He did not check to see if Faelen had taken his yet. He could not spare the attention.

  The liquid hit his tongue, bitter and tangy, and then it hit his stomach and everything inside him went to war.

  Cole retched.

  Vomit splattered the ground, dark and violent. Pain socked him in the gut, so hard his knees hit the floor. His hands braced on stone as his whole body shook.

  He could feel the poison fighting. He could feel it twisting, digging in, trying to stay.

  He could also feel the potion ripping it out.

  He gagged again, and something hot and sharp left him, and the moment it did his vision cleared a fraction, and the fog lifted.

  It still hurt.

  It was the hurt of something being removed.

  His mouth tasted sour. His throat burned. Tears ran down his cheeks without permission.

  He did not know how long it lasted. Time turned into a smear. Pain made it impossible to count.

  Eventually the shaking slowed.

  Cole lay on his side, chest heaving, staring at the cottage ceiling.

  He was aware of Faelen’s footsteps near him. He was aware of the elf’s breathing, ragged at first, then slowly smoothing out.

  He was aware of a blinking light at the edge of his vision.

  PROFESSION AWARDED: ALCHEMY.

  SYNERGY DETECTED: BLACK HALO.

  PROFESSION UPDATED: BLACK HALO ALCHEMY (NOVICE, RANK 1).

  Cole laughed, and it came out as a cough.

  He dismissed the notification without reading it twice

  “I’m alive,” he croaked.

  “Yes,” Faelen said. “We are.”

  Cole turned his head slightly. Faelen was standing, swaying a little, but standing. His face still looked gaunt, but his eyes were clearer. The tremor in his hands was gone.

  “You’ve saved my life twice now, Cole Rourke,” Faelen said. “I think that makes us friends.”

  Cole stared at him, too tired to argue with the word friend, too tired to pretend it did not matter. He had not had a friend in a long time.

  Faelen offered his hand.

  Cole took it.

  Faelen pulled him to his feet, and Cole’s legs nearly gave out, but he stayed upright.

  As hard as that was, it was not over.

  Cole wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve. The fabric had the smell of smoke and vomit and herbs. He did not care.

  Faelen looked around the cottage, then toward the exit.

  “We still have the rest of the dungeon to tackle,” Faelen said.

  “Of course we do,” Cole muttered. His voice was tired, but it held something else now too. Something stubborn. Something that did not bend.

  He looked down at the cauldron, at the remaining potion, at the journal, at the tools.

  Black Halo Alchemy.

  He did not know what that meant yet.

  Cole swallowed. His throat protested.

  “So,” he said, forcing his mind back into the present. “How do we get out of here?”

  Faelen looked at Cole.

  “We have to beat the dungeon boss,” Faelen said.

  Cole let out a slow breath, tasting bitterness and smoke.

  “Of course,” he said. Then, quieter, more to himself than to Faelen, “Of course we do.”

  Somewhere beyond the cottage, deeper in the maze corridor they had come from, stone shifted.

  A low, hollow sound rolled through the dungeon.

  Not close enough to see.

  Close enough to promise it was waiting.

  Faelen’s eyes flicked toward the doorway.

  Cole felt the black halo behind his head.

  Then he tightened his grip on the vial at his belt and nodded once.

  “Alright,” Cole said. “Let’s go meet it.”