As soon as she finished speaking, I was out of bed and on the move. However, it wasn’t very fast, considering I just pulled at my wound, but hey, movement is movement.

Samira said nothing choosing instead to fall into step beside me, which is nothing but a blessing as far as I’m concerned. She thinks I’m doing what I’m doing because of Tolwren, and I’m okay with that. Better than thinking I’m running from the crazy doctor lady who may have been the one to kill the aforementioned brother.

Still, just moving would hardly work for long. Samira would question where I was headed at some point, so I pointed myself toward the one location that I would have to go to eventually today.

In every culture, there is some location that garnered some form of significant importance to said culture. Likely because humans, on the whole, cannot accept that places are in no way special. Churches had their pews and confessionals. The ancient tribes held altars, both sacrificial and otherwise.

So I felt the need to place at least one such useless location into the kingdom.

The Wishing Tower.

As far as cultural importance, the one structure held massive significance. On their day of birth, the child is taken atop the tower and presented to the mother goddess. Her eyes were the suns and all. When turning seventeen, the age this culture recognizes as the beginning of adulthood, one must be waiting with the representatives chosen as the sun’s rise over the horizon. Finally, they are taken to the tower on the evening after one’s death, so they are the last thing in the city touched by the sun’s light as it settles over the horizon.

Of course, since I’m not the type of person who creates something for no reason, I added a few secrets hidden within it. There is nothing nuclear or anything, but three handguns are hidden in a stone safe. Plus a few other less helpful goodies.

It’s also what I happen to be doing at the moment. If Rue’s gone bonkers, and I’m willing to bet that she has if she’s killed off Tolwren, then she’s going to find me a much harder target. But, even then, there’s no way I can beat her in a sword fight.

I’m still not sure how I know it, but the fact of the matter is I’m all the more certain that if she wanted, she could turn me into a pretzel.

Though I don’t remember giving her some kind of broken power or gift. Hell, I didn’t give anyone a broken power.

Samira jabs me in the ribs with her elbow. Before I can snap at her, she’s gesturing to the front where the drummers beat steadily as the priest dressed in the tie-dyed robes featuring all of the colors available to the people, purple, red, green, white, and gold, anointed Vandel’s brother with the holy oils.

Though no one could see, I knew the priest was drawing the same interconnected broken circle like the one he wore on his pope-like hat onto Tolwrens forehead.

The second sun begins to cross the horizon, and the ceremony starts.

The symbol of the Romabaec people. Technically, R.O.M.A.B.A.E.C not that anyone would know what it means. I swear I wish I were better at writing down the acronyms for these people. But, in their case, at least it was a really good one.

Oh, well. It’ll come to me.

Anyway, back to the symbol they’re marking the dead guy with. The symbol they use just so happens to be a damaged tie-dyed peace sign on an otherwise unremarkable white t-shirt. But, of course, that was before it became their national symbol.

I wince as Samira jabs her elbow into my side, and I grunt at her warningly. I don’t care how often she notices my attention wandering. Tolwren was and is many things, but brother, he is not. Not to me, at least. I’ve not even been properly introduced!

Raising a hand, I catch the next of the elbows she throws and turn my attention to the front where the priest began to speak of Tolwren’s deeds.

Honestly, the list was short.

Survivor of the Maisalim venom.

Sounds impressive until you realize that every King candidate before him has survived the same type of venom given by a giant scorpion just taller than the average man with three tails.

Destroyer of the Concussects hive.

Again from the outside looks pretty awesome, especially considering it’s a hive of ants that come up to the knee and could make themselves explode. Instead of sneaking in and murdering the queen while she slept so the little bastards would be more or less brain dead and ready for harvest, what Tolwren did was panic and set one of them off.

It started a chain reaction.

Not to say that mine, in either world, were any better.

One time, almost published writer, uncle of six, and the guy who knows a total of four words in another language.

Un, Deux, Trois, okay, maybe just three words.

As for my time in this world, killing the kirusk isn’t that impressive. Not when one thinks about all the forewarning in my head. Not to mention the knowledge of where to and not to step.

She tries to pull her elbow away. I take hold of the thin layer of skin just above her elbow and squeeze and twist.

Her eyes immediately start to water, not that I can blame her. Shit hurts.

The drumbeat picks up as the King steps forward and inclines his head in silent prayer. After the first ten minutes, I bite my lip, watching the greens still cranking out the drum beat at a steady pace. They’d not get a break until the King raised his head. Fools the lot of them.

“Highness, it’s almost time for us to go. First, however, we must let His Majesty mourn till the suns set.”

I hung my head. I’d forgotten I put that bit in. The loss of a loved one requires a day of prayer.

Great, now I have to find a way out of a day’s worth of prayer.

“Highness, it is time for us to go, if you’d please let go of my arm.”

Blinking, I found I’m still pinching her. Hurriedly I released her, “Sorry about that.”

She raised an eyebrow before moving on.

I let her lead me out.

However, at the bottom of the stairs is Rue, and she seems almost excited?

“Samira, I’m going.” Turning, I bolted off, one hand holding my wounded side.

When their attempts to call me back resulted in nothing, they attempted to chase me down.

It had the same result. I’m not surprised about it, considering I created every shortcut in the city.

I didn’t stop until I reached the orphanage. A good thing, too, as the three guards in red were loading two cages with a weasel/ferret creature in them onto the sled. For their part, the Tuviat were lurching backward in circles hissing all the while.

“I need you guys to wait for a minute.”

The guards didn’t seem to hear me as each took up a lead and began pulling at the sled.

My eye twitched, and I moved into their path. “You can either stop for a few minutes, or you can leave your cargo to me.”

This time I knew they heard me. The shortest of the three’s teeth-baring grin told me as much. Great, she’s a sadist.

Then again, it was supposed to be a reasonably common thing amongst the reds considering they’re the combat specialists. So I’ve no excuse save for the fact that it amused me.

“Apologies, we’ve been told to bring these to Ryver.” Said the one in the center. She must be the leader. She glanced at me before adjusting the rope over her shoulder.

“Yet your prince orders you to wait but a few moments.”

A cold shiver rushed down my spine. A glance off to the side confirms that Aster has once again managed to find me.

The guards looked at me, “I’ve heard the youngest prince wears the garb of the purple.” The second tallest murmured to the one in the center.

The bloodthirsty grin of the sadist fell, and she and the other two dropped to a knee.

“Apologies, Highness! We didn’t recognize—.” Center started before shaking her head, “please, allow me to atone for my mistakes, grant the other two mercy.”

I blink. The scene in front of me is exceedingly cliche, yet where was the other two piping up to offer their lives?

From the looks of them, they’ve no intention of doing anything to save Center, choosing instead to save their own lives.

Worthless. And where do they get off suggesting that I’m violent or wrathful?

“Just be quiet.” I snapped at Center.

Instead of contemplating the three of them, I move to stand in front of the cages.

Closing my eyes, I fish around for the feeling of the energy while waiting for Endurance’s snarky comments to begin.

After a minute and a half, I have the energy, but I realize there hasn’t been a single snide word about how slow I am to recover. Now that I’m thinking about it, I haven’t heard from Endurance since I woke up.

Joy and no small amount of it begin to swell within me. Then, luckily, something happened that left him muted, though I doubt it.

Still, I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth and began threading the energy into the Tuviat as I’d done with the Twanlad. I won’t fail and be left unconscious this time around with any luck.

“You know you could announce who you are before expecting them to listen. So, I mean, it’s not like you’ve ever really called attention to yourself and who you are before.”

Even if she’s right, I hardly have the time for her right now. The Tuviat’s energy is different from the Twanlad’s as if one was lethargic or even complacent while the other was desperate and savage. Any time I managed to weave my energy into the source of the waves, everything seemed to become erratic.

And my energy is wholly blown back.

I tried again. This time the energy lasts longer than before but is ejected moments later.

It was almost like rolling a dice to see if the energy would remain. But, of course, if that was the case, then all I have to do is change the odds.

After all, it’s not too surprising to win a raffle when your name is entered four times more than anyone else’s.

“What are you even doing, just staring at it like that?”

Waving her off, I take hold of even more of the energy and shove it forward again. However, this time, instead of trying to use one strand of thread, it was more akin to nine.

All of a sudden, the weasel creature started slamming itself against the cages screeching and hollering. Its futile attempts to bite through the bars fail one after another.

Glaring at the creature, I sighed, all nine strands struck, and immediately something changed, but he couldn’t tell if it was something good or the beginning of the ache in my gut.

Aster must’ve noticed my discomfort as he placed a hand on my shoulder. “I think you should stop. It doesn’t look like your doing yourself any favors here.

I opened my mouth to tell her where exactly she could shove it when my stomach throbbed.

“That’s it. Ladies, take these little monsters away.”

Aster took me by the arm and marched me around to the side of the building, and lowered me to the ground. Once she loomed over me, she spoke.

“What were you doing with Endurance? I’ve never seen a stabilizer active for so long without the manifestation popping up.”

Sighing, I allowed my eyes to close, “I’m sure you can guess what I was doing.”

“You know people have tried to inject their manifestation into animals before, even ones as special as the Desert Sons. But, unfortunately, all of them died.”

Of course, that wasn’t nearly as true as she believed, though it wasn’t without some form of merit. The difference being all the ones who tried it on the Desert Son’s previously tried it outside the village walls to avoid issues of the more fervent believers. They also brought a witness to vouch for the attempt. But by doing outside the village, the animals weren’t in cages. If I tried it with the Tuviat free, it would have eaten my face.

And I’d so deserve it for being stupid enough to try.

“I’m being careful. I’m making sure I don’t pull out so much energy I end up getting hurt. It just takes a lot out of a person.”

“Huh?”

And, of course, she doesn’t understand what I’m saying. So why didn’t I make a school-based system again? Oh, right, because I flipped a coin.

Moving on.

“I’m making sure not to overdo

What was with that weird fight with the Tuviat? Its energy was borderline violent.

It wasn’t something I created.

I only ever described one instance because it was the only one to ever happen in the first book. Were there others that didn’t make it into the completed draft? Sure. But they were full of flowery prose.

From nowhere, a swarm of gleeful chatter erupted. “Do not wander too far!” A new voice called.

I didn’t even need to look up to see the source. The children must have finished their morning duties and been released for free play until supper.

“Hey! Hey! Did they leave already?”

“Yeah, where are they!”

The words came from two girls, both wearing green garb. Someone had marked them for the artisans.

“Can we help you?” Aster asked almost stiffly. She kept glancing at me. Almost as if she were expecting me to blow my top at the children. I wonder what made her so wary?

Who gets angry just because children are children, though? Certainly not me.

Slapping a smile on my face, I looked at the leader. She kept her hair short and her bangs long. “If you’d hoped to see the guards catch, you’re a little late. Sorry.”

Though they didn’t look particularly pleased, it didn’t stop them.

“If they’re gone, why are you here?”

“Yeah! Do you think they missed one?”

That caused the first girl to shove the second.

“The guards are the greatest! They wouldn’t miss one!”

I snort, “as much as I wished we got everything and never made mistakes, the fact is things go wrong.”

“See!” The second one all but yelled. “Even he says things go wrong all the time!”

Who said all the time?

“He didn’t say ‘all the time,’ little one. Just that is happening.” Aster interrupted.

Of course, she chooses now to read my mind again. Perfect.

And if that’s not enough, Cola, the useless feline that it is, has decided to improve upon its phantom status by climbing up the stone wall beside me as if it were scaling the average couch. It seems even without Endurance around to worsen my day; another has stepped up to fill the vacancy.

Enough, two annoyances on top of the kid, yeah, I’m done.

Shoving myself to my feet, I do my best to ignore the onset of exhaustion. “You know, putting words in people’s mouths isn’t a good thing.”

“You sound like Lady Veht.” The second girl cried and jabbed her finger at me.

I wonder if she’ll accept the idea of being a mime by trade when she’s older.

Huh, I guess kids annoy me more than I thought they would. Who knew?

“Get out of the way!” Some guy down the road yelled. “You need to move!”

Peering toward him, I had a hard time telling what he was talking about, but my best guess was it was the animal of some-

Damn. Damn. Damn!

Just as I recognize the Twanlad, its heads loosed two chillingly deep barks. I’d hardly call it pleased to see me, and worse still, there was no fencing between it and myself now.

Running isn’t an option either, not with the kids right there. Still, that is something I can do something about.

I shoved Aster toward the kids.

“Get them inside!”

Even as I finish speaking, I move into the center of the road.

Dammit, Endurance, if you don’t want me to think you are completely useless, now’s the time to get to work.

Nothing but silence. Yeah, fighting is out as an option. A glance toward Aster showed that she and the kids were already rounding the corner. In a few moments, they’ll be safe in the building.

With them gone, at least I can run.

But run where exactly?

I brought up locations after another and just as quickly shot them down.

The training grounds? As its morning, it’s likely filled with primarily those of the purple, and they’d probably get slaughtered.

The square? Plenty of foot traffic, but it wasn’t like one could guarantee the skills of those present would be enough to drop the canine.

The detainment pits? Not a bad choice if someone could figure out how to get the thing to jump into the damned hole.

The Wishing Tower? Yeah, right. My- Vandel’s brothers would kill me for endangering the King, especially while he’s mourning his son.

Could I even make it that far, though? Even If I were attempting to use the more cluttered side-streets and cornered often, it has seven legs while I’ve just the two.

Shit, where was I supposed to take the thing?

“Don’t just stand there, idiot! Move!” Ryver yelled.

The Twanlads eyes, all four of them, were locked firmly on me.

Suddenly its path to me had a handful of warriors in it. Three carried long spears, two wielded swords.

“Get back, Highness! We’ll stop this beast!” One of the spear warriors said.

Of course, that statement would be a lot more believable if they weren’t all garbed in the purple.

Gods, why did they have to show up? And while I’m at it, I wish the world would slow around me. So I’d have more time to think things through and make the best choice.

Of course, no answer came, and honestly, I’m not sure if they can see where I’m at? Scratch that. I’m right here.

Grabbing the spear, I shove its holder to the side and rush ahead. I never had more than two or three lessons with the spear in my world, but that’s fine in this case. No one knew the animal in front of me better.

I barely had the time to set my feet before swinging. For all that it could track anything through the desert day or night, it failed to see the spear sweeping toward its legs. It couldn’t do a whole lot with a broken leg after all.

Or that’s what I thought.

One of the two heads grabbed the spear’s shaft in its mouth and yanked it from my hands. Luck is definitely not on my side.

In that instant, my chances of survival plummeted, but I’m not done yet. Granted, getting to its brain at the center of its body, just behind where the two heads connected, wasn’t that difficult, but the veritable cage of bone surrounding the thing. It’d be easier to go for the veins offered by the heads.

And I would if I had something sharp or the least bit pointy. But I don’t, so I can’t.

Straightening, it cast the remains of the spear away.

The spear is too far away. Strangling the thing it is.

My heart pounded so hard in my chest I thought it was going to stall or burst. I just have to move fast enough to get between the heads and give both of them the biggest hug ever.

Tensing, I prepare to lunge.

Then a tongue slipped from the side of one of their mouths. At the same time, it dropped its body down on top of mine as it shifted back and forth.

Is it trying to get comfortable? I vaguely remember my buddy Dan’s dog, Penny. I think her name was, laying down on top of him like that. So, it doesn’t want to eat me?

“Highness!” One of the purples cried, “hold on, we’ll be getting that thing off of you soon!”

So the Twanlad can eat me because you pissed it off? Yeah, no. No way, not happening!

Carefully, slowly, I raised a hand and waved the soldier back. I think he gets my message cause no one attacks. The Twanlad is staring at my hand, however. Extending my fingers to it, I watch as it presses its nose against my fingers before snuffling and dropping its head onto my chest.

“Well, Here’s hoping you want to be my friend,” I mutter and start scratching at its ears.

The head on the right chuffs and makes a rumbling sound.

I don’t think it is a bad thing, though. Its eyes have closed. So the question now is was it responding to something I didn’t see, or was it directed at me, so I asked.

“Can you understand me?”

The right head opened an eye and chuffed again before snorting.

Surprise swept through the crowd.

“We must inform the King! The mother has a chosen!”

Rue stepped forward and gestured at the monstrous dog that thought itself a puppy.

Narrowing my eyes, I pray for the super-powered ability that seemed to be gifted to those forced into other worlds.

Please, just this once, if some diety remains somewhere, anywhere that can hear me, give me power!

Alas, my plea to be given the ability to blow people up with a thought, isn’t answered.

Damn.