Chapter 58: The Scouring Run
The sound of the river claiming the Old Mill was no longer a roar, but a sickening, prolonged shriek of tearing wood and grinding stone. The roof, now deprived of the massive millstone’s weight, pitched sharply. Ronan didn't waste a second arguing; the panic in his eyes was genuine, the fear of the Mill becoming their tomb overriding the exhaustion of his injuries.
"The back window," he gasped, pushing himself toward the small, grime-caked opening near the flour sacks. "It opens onto the higher bank, away from the immediate current."
Elara moved first, not waiting for him. She didn't trust him to lead, but his knowledge of the structure was sound. She channeled a low, controlled blast of Phoenix heat—a focused beam that cauterized the rotting wood around the frame. The window shattered outward, sending glass shards scattering into the driving rain.
Ronan reached it an instant later. He didn't try to climb; he simply fell through, landing heavily on the soggy earth outside. A ragged groan escaped his lips, and he lay there, winded, his segmented green armor now smeared with mud, blood, and gray flour. He looked less like an elite Commander and more like a ruined beetle.
Elara scrambled out after him. Below them, the foundations of the Mill gave way with a sound like tearing silk. The entire south wall, where the Justicar had plunged in, collapsed into the furious brown torrent.
The Justicar did not immediately reappear. The river, fueled by the storm, was a powerful, violent entity, dragging its prize deep below the surface, smashing it against the bedrock. But the water, Elara knew, was only an interruption.
She turned to Ronan, who was already struggling to his knees. His confession—Malak, the betrayal, the three Seals—was a toxic knot in her stomach, but she had to compartmentalize. The priority was the Black Seal of Will.
"New Hope Bridge. How far?" she demanded, grabbing his good arm and hauling him upright. The metal of his armor was cold beneath her fingers.
"A few miles downriver," Ronan choked out, leaning heavily on her. "It's the first natural choke point where the Serpent’s Tooth narrows. The Seal will snag there, or it'll be washed ashore nearby. We run the banks."
She glanced at his blood-soaked ribs. "You can't run."
"I have to," he countered, forcing his legs into a weak, staggering trot. "It has the bulk. It will follow the current. We have to outpace the river—or rather, outpace the golem's reboot time."
The rain intensified, a sheeting curtain that turned the riverside trail into a slick, treacherous path. Elara adjusted her grip on Ronan, turning their shared movement into a scouring run—she became his engine, using her own strength and focused determination to pull his weight, ensuring they didn't fall.
As they ran, the fear began to translate into bitter, sharp thought.
Malak. High Priest. The name reverberated in her mind. Her mother had fled the political order, but she had never spoken of Malak as a true monster, only a tool of the bureaucracy. Was Ronan telling the truth? Was the most revered figure in the city truly the architect of the Phoenix, and now, the wielder of the Justicars?
"If you knew the Justicars targeted the Seals," Elara grunted, dodging a fallen log, "why did you bring me—and the Will—to the city at all? Why not flee the moment you found me?"
Ronan stumbled, managing to catch himself. His breath hitched with effort and pain. "The Seals must be together, Elara. Divided, they're just lures. Malak knows the moment they start moving, he knows the endgame is reunion. If we try to flee the realm now, we risk separating. We need the other two, anchor and body, to have any chance against him. The city was the only place complex enough, chaotic enough, to hide long enough to devise a plan."
A plan that involved me being a distraction, she thought, but didn't say. She saw the desperation in his eyes, the deep-seated exhaustion that went beyond physical pain. Whether he was a traitor to the Order or merely a traitor to her, his current objective was the same as hers: secure the Seals and survive Malak's net.
They covered the distance in a brutal, blurring rush, the roar of the river a constant companion. The path finally opened onto a wide, muddy embankment. Up ahead, spanning the turbulent Serpent’s Tooth, was New Hope Bridge—a graceful, ancient stone arch, its base built from massive, moss-covered blocks designed to withstand the river’s winter fury.
Elara stopped, her breathing ragged, her heart pounding a frantic rhythm against her ribs.
"The current will push everything against those central pillars," Ronan wheezed, collapsing against a small boulder. He didn't have the strength to stand. "Look for the pouch on the upriver side of the abutments."
The river was a brown, churning chaos. Debris—branches, logs, even pieces of the Mill—slammed against the stone pillars with deafening impact. Finding a small, black leather pouch in that churning maelstrom seemed impossible.
Elara scanned the water, focusing her vision, pushing the Phoenix energy out like sonar. She couldn't see the pouch, but she could feel the cold, distinct presence of the Seal. It was snagged, just as Ronan predicted, lodged deep beneath the water line of the second pillar from the far bank.
But then, an entirely new sensation crashed into her awareness—not the freezing cold of the Seal, but the raw, terrifying, telepathic pressure of the enemy.
The Justicar was back.
It didn't climb out. It simply rose.
A massive, obsidian arm—scraped raw by the underwater violence but otherwise intact—shot up from the foam, gripping the very base of the bridge’s first pillar. The water around it instantly boiled and steamed as the remaining runic energy fought off the cold.
The Justicar’s head broke the surface. Its rune-etched chest, which had been dark, now flared with an aggressive, stable RED. It had rebooted, and it was fast. It pulled itself out of the water with impossible ease, its bulk dwarfing the stone bridge.
"Designation: Artifact of Unbinding. Location Confirmed. Proximity to Secondary Anchor Point: Dangerous." The telepathic voice hammered into their minds, even over the sound of the river. "Protocol: Extraction and Containment. Targets: Termination."
The Justicar ignored them and moved directly toward the second pillar, where Elara knew the Seal was snagged. Its massive hands began probing the underwater section of the stone.
"It knows exactly where it is," Ronan yelled, struggling to draw his silver dagger. "We're too late!"
Elara didn't hesitate. She had to create a distraction, a shield, something to buy her time to dive.
She turned and sprinted toward the bridge’s entrance. The Justicar, sensing her movement toward the only crossing point, shifted its focus for a split second, lifting its head from the water.
This time, she wouldn't use fire or concussive force.
She drew on the full, raw power of the Phoenix, concentrating on the only thing that could stand up to the golem’s immense mass: the bridge itself. She channeled the golden flame, not into an attack, but into a single, ancient load-bearing seam near the center of the arch.
The Phoenix power struck the granite. The effect wasn't explosion, but instantaneous, catastrophic structural fatigue. The stone didn't shatter; it failed. The center span of New Hope Bridge groaned, buckled, and then, with a terrifying, protracted CRACK, the entire arch split down the middle.
The bridge fell into the Serpent’s Tooth.
A huge wave of displaced water roared up and slammed against the banks, engulfing the Justicar in a temporary curtain of spray and foam. The golem staggered, the falling stone and the water’s new surge momentarily confusing its sensors.
Elara used the distraction. She sprinted down the bank, not onto the bridge, but toward the pillar nearest the Seal. She didn't have time for elegance. She took a running leap and plunged into the ice-cold, muddy, churning water of the Serpent’s Tooth.
She hit the frigid river, the cold instantly shocking her muscles and driving the breath from her lungs. She fought the violent current, diving deep toward the pillar, toward the cold beacon of the Black Seal.