Wake up…. Wake up….

Milius heard the voice, as though from a great distance away. A gentle, comforting sound, like a whisper of love. There was something familiar about that voice….

Wake up!

The voice came again, more urgent this time; Milius stirred. He was lying on a cold, hard surface, but his hand was resting on something warm … the blade Palpatunde. He sat up gingerly and looked around. Sirius, Shakil, and Ariana were all sprawled on the ground around him.

“But then … who…?” he started to say, then he suddenly leapt to his feet — which was a mistake. Every inch of his body ached. His legs wobbled dangerously, but, using Palpatunde, he managed to keep his footing. Looking up, he saw a trickle of silver streaming in from what looked like a tiny crack in the ceiling above. Then it started to come back to him … A horde of monsters had appeared, and in desperation, they had jumped … But if they had fallen from such a height, how were they still alive? And then a new thought came to him, unpleasant and unwelcome — were they alive?

He moved as quickly as he could to Sirius’s side, ignoring the protests of his searing limbs. He shook him gently. “Sir?” No movement. Milius, though it felt like torture, did the natural thing: he slapped him — hard.

“OW!” Sirius yelped, springing up. “What was that for — ouch! — and why do I feel like I was beaten by an angry mob — again?”

Milius pointed towards the shadowy ceiling, and Sirius remembered.

“We survived that fall?” he said incredulously.

“Well, we did, anyway. Not sure about them,” said Milius, gesturing to Shakil and Ariana. “Come on, help me with them.”

“Do we have to?” Sirius grumbled. “Okay, okay,” he added, after an uncharacteristically stern look from Milius. They dragged themselves up, wincing and grumbling (mostly Sirius), and each knelt beside one of the other two.

Shakil leapt up the moment Milius reached out to touch him. “He's awake,” said Milius.

“So is she,” Sirius said as Ariana jerked awake, not troubling to keep the disappointment out of his voice.

“Where are we?” Shakil groaned.

“I don't know,” Milius said. He looked around again, but this time he actually paid attention to their surroundings. They were standing inside a vast hall with green and gold walls, lit by yellow lanterns whose light reflected off them (“Which explains the golden light I saw up top,” Sirius said). The tiled floor formed patterns of puffs of clouds, but they, like the walls, were cracked and faded in some places. Apart from them, it was completely empty.

“I don't like this,” Shakil muttered, raising Oceannerva with trembling hands.

“Me neither,” Milius said, hefting Palpatunde as high as his battered arms would permit.

“How did we survive the fall?” Sirius asked again, in a tone that suggested that he wouldn't like the answer.

“I think it was me,” Ariana said unexpectedly. They all turned to look at her, but she was looking at Stormpyre. “The emerald started glowing after we jumped in, and just before we landed I felt a kind of breeze, like a literal airbag, to break our fall.”

“So that'd be the first useful thing you've done all this time, huh?” Sirius said scathingly. Ariana went red.

“Is this really the time?” Shakil squeaked.

“Actually,” Sirius snarled, rounding on him, “I think it —”

“What was that?” Milius said. Judging by the bemused looks on their faces, no one else had noticed it.

“I didn't hear anything,” Sirius said, shrugging, but then he stiffened. The sound had cut the air again: low, piercing growl, somewhere in the distance. Despite themselves, they drew closer together.

“I think we should keep moving,” Milius suggested.

“Excellent idea —”

“We should really —”

“Yeah, definitely —”

They trudged forward slowly, hardly daring to blink, lest something get the drop on them. They approached a door at the end of the hall, and after exchanging apprehensive looks, they opened it. The door opened onto a kind of auditorium, much larger than the hall they had just exited. For some reason, the further they went, the brighter Stormpyre’s emerald seemed to glow. This, Milius thought, was strange; every other sword’s jewel was as dull as ever.

“So, uh,” Shakil said, “I don't know if anyone else has thought about this, but um — how are we supposed to get out of here?”

“Quiet!” Sirius hissed, but then he added, in a low, anxious voice, “Seriously, though, how are we going to get out?”

“You said the wind slowed us down,” Milius said to Ariana, “could you use it to propel us up?”

“For one thing, I don't know if it's possible, for another, even if it was I don't know how to do it, and three — there's nowhere to go up to!” This was indeed true. The ceiling, though it was lower here than the previous hall, was still very much solid and whole. “I just wish the Elders had taught us more before —” She stopped so abruptly that everyone froze in place, raising their swords and staring wildly around, believing she had seen a monster.

“Does anyone else feel that?” she asked.

The question took them all by surprise. “Feel what?” Shakil asked nervously. Without answering, she broke into a run and veered off through a door to their left and into a corridor.

“What the hell is she doing?” Sirius shouted, as they started after her. They thundered along the corridors, pressing their already worn feet to keep up. Stormpyre’s abilities seemed to have been activated, because Ariana was almost a blur. Had it not been for the trail of half-open doors she left in her wake, they would have lost her long ago.

When finally they caught up with her, she was standing inside a square room, large but suspiciously smaller than any other they'd been in so far.

“What was that about?” Shakil panted, clutching his chest. Then his eyes widened as they took in the sights of the new room. It may have been smaller than any other, but it was much grander, too. The walls were lined with real, glittering emeralds and finely cut pieces of gold, forming various kinds of mosaic-like patterns. The ground was coated in white tiles gleaming so brightly that it was almost blinding, and two magnificent eagle-headed statues flanked the frontmost wall. But what was truly amazing, was a large ball of what looked like green energy, floating in the dead center of the room, washing the room with a pleasing green light.

They inched closer to the orb, enthralled by its beauty, but stopped midway. A wave of searing heat struck Milius, Shakil, and Sirius, forcing them to retreat, but Ariana continued as though nothing were happening.

“Hey, wait!” Shakil called. “I don't think you should —”

Too late: she had touched the orb. It exploded; the burst of energy solidified into a thousand fragments, which scattered harmlessly across the floor, but something fell out of the mess. An ornate, gleaming silver object. It looked like half of a mirror, but it reflected nothing.

“Look!” Milius gasped. He pointed behind Ariana, where the jewels formed a pattern of an enormous, oddly-shaped bird. Or at least, that's what it looked like at first glance. They approached it (apprehensively, at first, but the wall of heat had disappeared), and as they got closer, they saw that it very closely resembled —

“Vrydius!” Ariana breathed.

“But," Milius said, “what would a picture of Vrydius be doing down here?”

Before anyone could answer, the growling rent the air again, but this time it was much closer.

“Behind us!” Shakil yelled.

Attracted, no doubt, by Ariana’s earlier racket, a large creature stood in the doorway, but Milius had no idea what it was. It looked like a cross between a bear and a scorpion. It raised its long, thick stinger, and fired a barrage of thorn-like projectiles.

They screamed and ran to different sides of the room, and as Milius moved, he felt the most peculiar sensation, as though he had just plunged into ice water. His left hand suddenly felt heavier, but he had no time to look what was happening as, at that moment, a sting pierced the chest of one figure, who was sent spinning by the force.

“SIRIUS!”

His cousin lay on the ground, unmoving. Milius knew that at that moment he should have felt scared, or sad, but he felt neither. A terrible, ice-cold fury surged through him. He roared and raised his sword, then charged the beast.

He had no idea where this newfound brilliance in battle came from, but just as it had happened with Ariana, he was suddenly able to move differently, faster, more precise. He wove his way around the beast’s entire sting assault. The creature howled in frustration and charged him. He ducked under its stinger and swung. The finishing blow.

Or so he thought. To his horror, the sword did nothing. It pierced the creature's jaw, but it did not collapse like the dragon, nor did it fade like the tree. Its eyes simply glowed with anger.

It roared again and Milius, now petrified with fear, knew he was going to die — like Sirius. As it swung its stinger forward, ready to drive it through Milius, a blazing red light streaked through the air. There was a horrible squelching noise, and the creature backed away, still howling, but now in pain instead of fury. Blood — or whatever it was — sprayed uncontrollably from the stump where its stinger had been.

Sirius was standing before him, a thorn buried in the breastplate of his Dragonknight armour, Vulcatrix, searing with heat as though it was just pulled from a furnace, raised high, its ruby shining. He swung again, and the sword flew through the monster's head as though it were water, splattering black slime all over Milius’s front. But he didn't feel it.

As the body stumbled pointlessly away, Milius looked down and with a surge of shock, saw that he, too, was decked out in his glistening, silvery armour, but this time there was a feature that he had never seen before. A kite-shaped shield, silver like his armour, studded with amethysts and a streak of lightning in the center, hung from his left hand.

“You okay?” Sirius asked him.

“I — fine,” Milius stammered. “But you —” He pointed to Sirius’s chest.

“Oh this?” He gestured carelessly at the sting sprouting from his chest. “It hit me about a second after my armour popped up. Lucky, huh?” He grinned.

Milius looked at him. He sported a shield, too, studded with rubies and a ball of fire printed on the center. “Your sword.”

Sirius glanced at Vulcatrix. “Just lit up!” he said brightly. He stuck the point into the gleaming white floor, and the area around it began to melt. “Guess now I know what it does!”

“Yeah …,” Milius said vaguely. He retrieved Palpatunde as Shakil and Ariana (sporting shields studded with sapphires and emeralds) approached. The blade was dripping black ooze. What had happened? Not only did it not weaken the creature, it was now covered in blood, something that had never happened before....

“We should go,” Ariana said.

“How?” Sirius asked.

Ariana pointed to where the green orb was hovering earlier. “Couldn't you feel it?” She did not elaborate, but simply scurried over to the spot and suddenly, without warning, she was launched upwards.

Milius and Sirius gaped, but Shakil blinked, then ran after Ariana. In no time he was soaring after her.

“Should we —” Sirius asked.

“Rarr!”

“I think we should!” Milius shouted, as a new creature appeared behind them. Together they rushed over, standing side-by-side. Then everything seemed to slow down. His feet left the ground, and Sirius moved with him. The high, very solid-looking ceiling was approaching. They couldn't move — they were going to crash — to die —

A peculiar sensation, blackness, and finally, a brilliant white light.