Our sneaky escape didn’t get us as far as I had hoped, but further than I feared it would. Somewhere halfway to the boundary of Racoon City, roughly in the area we usually used for our attacks on the Withered, we, quite literally, stumbled upon a Withered Skulker. This one, in contrast to the majority we had seen of them, used to be a Rat before it became a Skulker, making it small enough that Lia reflexively punted it aside as it came scurrying out of a storm drain. Sadly, while it got knocked around and took some damage, it wasn’t killed by her kick. Even before it landed, I could feel its psychic squeals calling out for all its brethren, drawing their attention to our location.

Normally, that was the moment where we killed the Skulker and prepared an ambush to put down a few Hunters but with the number of enemies I could already feel heading towards us, that seemed to be a rather reckless idea. It was one thing to challenge half a dozen Hunters and a completely different beast to tackle two dozen of them. Not just due to the sheer weight of their numbers but because each individual hunter added to a greater whole. Their abilities as a group far outstripped the sum of the individuals.

We had managed to invent a few tricks that allowed us to take groups of them, regardless of their nearly seamless coordination, but that didn’t mean we could do so with groups of any size. Surprise was the major factor, reducing their number by either crippling or killing them before they had time to organise, and so was the idea to use their bond against them. Striking with Mind Magic, or inflicting horrifying pain on individuals in the group could briefly interrupt their coordination, thus giving us openings where there would be none. But in a larger group, those tricks greatly diminished in value, the larger group had more individuals to withstand the pain, and even if we managed to take out four out of twenty-four in our initial attack, there were still more than enough left to destroy us.

So, fighting was effectively impossible.

Thus, we ran.

Once again, I felt my mind flash back to that last, desperate struggle with Sigmir at my side. How we had been running through the forest, repeatedly getting cut off and engaged by the elves, herded until we were trapped. In response, I felt my magic flare up, my entire being was enraged at the prospect of history repeating itself, at the idea that my path would be cut short here.

For a second, I considered who I could sacrifice. Would sending one or more of my companions off to die mean I could save my skin? Could I send my daughter off to get torn apart by the Hunters? Or would I be able to sacrifice Silva, the dear, loyal friend who had stood with me in the beginning, saved my life more than once and made sure that I didn’t spiral into complete insanity in the wake of the change? Or maybe Alex, the newest member of our group, physically even weaker than me, but there was an interesting mind lingering beneath the fur. Could I sacrifice them, in order to save myself? And would Lia even let me sacrifice them, at the end of the day, they were far more her companion than they were mine. Just like Silva had a much stronger bond with me.

Shaking my head, I banished the idea. Together, we could stand, divided we would fall. We needed to work together to escape, as companions. As family. There was still a path for us to escape, the Hunters were primarily behind us, and only a few Husks and Skulkers were ahead. We could get past those, if only we stuck together and kept going. And even if we didn’t, as a traitorous voice in the back of my head remarked, even if we didn’t make it together, I could always escape into the shadows.

“Faster!” I commanded, my mind pushing some Astral Power into my Blood Magic, forcing my body to perform beyond what its physical attributes normally could provide. I would pay for pushing myself, but the pain was a cheap price to pay if it meant we could escape.

Lia and Silva luckily didn’t need magic to perform at this level, their physical attributes were up to the task, but Silva wasn’t content to let things slide. She must have realised how dangerous our situation was getting and let out a growl that morphed into a howl, shattering the silence around us. I could feel the sound, feel the power wash over and through me. Only, it wasn’t Silva’s power, it was another’s power. Divine Power, Hecate’s Power, pure and potent in its purpose. Unable to stop myself, I stretched out my own power, trying to feel and understand what miracle Silva had called upon, only to feel a wry feeling of amusement flash through me. As if a teacher was looking at a curious student who tried to figure out something far beyond their ability.

But I didn’t let the sensation stop me, instead, I doubled my efforts, even as I felt my own performance increase. Titanic Ambition, the ambition to never let myself be stopped from searching for knowledge. Even in the middle of a deadly chase, I would spare some effort to learn.

And in this case, I could feel the effect, now even clearer than before. How it worked was far beyond me, but I could get a glimpse of what it did and with that glimpse, my mind was off to the races. At least the part that wasn’t focused on running away. Luckily, I didn’t need my magic to increase my pace, not while I was trying to figure out the divine magic, which was a somewhat amusing interaction. Who could say that letting part of one’s mind drift through primarily theoretical thoughts about divine magic in the middle of a deadly chase was a good idea? I could, simply because my drifting, pondering mind was engaged in the pursuit of knowledge, and my secondary thought-stream was enough to keep my body running.

I didn’t even need my secondary thought-stream to figure out our path, a realisation I made when we reached an intersection. The magic Silva had called upon shifted and for a moment, I could almost see the different paths before us, how our journey on them would continue. It wasn’t scrying magic, at least it didn’t feel like it, it wasn’t showing me what the conditions were now, it felt less distinct, somewhat vague. Maybe how the conditions could, or would, be by the time we got there. Divining the future, something I had read about on Mundus. Maybe the hardest magic to learn, unless one had a talent for it, a talent that was almost always combined with a curse just as powerful as the talent. Truly mastering it, conquering the curse, was considered impossible, a feat only spoken about in legends of the past, and only with Divine Intervention.

In this case, it felt like the divination was context-bound to Hecate’s domain of the crossroads, allowing us to find the safest, or maybe fastest, path out of danger. The moment the thought coalesced in my mind, the strange, amused sensation from earlier returned, almost making me stumble when it morphed into the closest thing to a mental head-pat I could imagine. Maybe the stress was getting to me and I was starting to turn insane because the alternative was that I had just received the equivalent of a gold star, or maybe a silver moon would be more appropriate, from the Goddess of Magic.

Barely managing to stifle a rather inappropriate giggle, I forced my mind back onto the task at hand, namely, running away. I had learned something and I even put a small part of my attention to the task of figuring out how the magic affecting us actually worked, but it was of lesser importance. Figuring out how to divine the future wasn’t something I could do on the fly, or rather on the run, even if it was fascinating.

Instead, I moved in behind Silva, who had pulled ahead, driven by her magic. Another growl, and she was enveloped in a dim glow, almost like the gentle light of the full moon, the light shielding her body. A shield she desperately needed, as she didn’t even try to go around the small groups of Undead and Withered ahead, instead she simply broke through.

Watching her move, I started to wonder. Why did she rarely use her magic like this? Surely it would allow us to fight far more efficiently, wouldn’t it? Unless the magic was only as potent as it was because she rarely used it.

Maybe that was the case, that the Gods themselves would get annoyed and only do the bare minimum if the divine caster asked for help too often. Somehow, the image of an annoyed teacher on their fifth cup of coffee sprung to mind, an annoyed teacher who just couldn’t be bothered to deal with some snot-nosed kid.

I might have imagined the pearls of laughter echoing through my mind at the thought but I wasn’t sure I had.