Infinity: Reborn

Hugo moved to the centre table, spreading a map across the scarred wood. Jill and Adam flanked him. Mathias stepped closer, noting the familiar geography of Landskavia's border regions.

"Five operatives vanished three months ago." Hugo's finger traced a route along the western edge. "Investigation found blood but no bodies. Working theory was mutual elimination—our people caught the smuggler, stray predator killed everyone during the confrontation."

"Until the smuggler showed up again." Adam leaned over the map. "Someone matching her description facilitated three crossings in the past two weeks."

Jill's hand settled on the table. "We track her the traditional way. Standard surveillance, establish patterns, close the trap when we have certainty."

Mathias's pulse quickened. "And my role?"

"Support." Jill didn't look up from the map. "Your tracking skills will be useful once we've identified probable routes."

"I thought—"

"That you'd be bait?" Jill straightened, meeting his eyes. "Using corrupted blood to draw out sympathizers has its place. This isn't one of them."

Hugo shifted his weight. "Sister Jill, we discussed—"

"We discussed sending a half-breed into territory where a half-breed smuggler operates." Jill's voice remained flat. "I raised my concerns. You noted them. The decision stands—but I won't compromise our mission by relying on methods I consider theologically unsound."

"The Conclave approved his employment specifically for—"

"The Conclave makes policy. I make operational decisions regarding spiritual security." Jill turned back to the map. "He'll serve in a capacity that doesn't require trust."

Mathias forced his breathing steady. Relief and frustration tangled in his chest. As bait, he might have warned their target—slim odds, but possible. Now he’d have to guide them toward their target with no sure way of stopping them. Any obvious mistakes would expose him.

"Tracking works." Adam's scarred eyebrow lifted. "Half-breeds can smell their own, right? Pick up trails humans miss?"

The question landed somewhere between inquiry and mockery.

"My nose functions adequately," Mathias said.

"Then we're set." Hugo rolled the map. "We depart for Landskavia in two hours. Jill, if you need to conduct your purification—"

"It can wait until we've secured lodging." Jill's gaze settled on Mathias again. "But it will happen. Any sign of corruption, any hesitation when we engage the target—I'll know."

Mathias inclined his head. "Understood."

"Good." Hugo tucked the map under his arm. "Pack light. Border crossings draw attention we don't need."

* * *

The bonfire crackled between stone markers. Mathias pressed his forehead to the dirt, extending his arms forward in the ritual prostration. His fingers dug into soil still cold from the night.

“Almighty Solaris, burn the corruption from my blood.”

The words tasted like ash. He’d recited them a thousand times—first with desperate conviction, then with rote habit, now with hollow performance. His tail lay pressed against his spine beneath his coat, the sensitive appendage cramping from hours of forced stillness.

He still believed in Solaris. The god existed, granted power to his faithful, answered prayers with tangible miracles. But the empire’s interpretation—the doctrine demanding he hate half his own nature, the teachings that condemned his mother for existing—that had crumbled to dust.

“Purge the taint that mars thy servant’s flesh.”

Jill sat cross-legged on the opposite side of the fire, lips moving in synchronized prayer. She’d insisted on the full purification ritual before they could proceed. Hugo had permitted it, Adam had wandered off to scout, and Mathias had knelt.

Because raising suspicions meant death.

He lifted his torso, struck his chest with his fist. Once, twice, three times. The self-flagellation served no divine purpose. Just theatre to satisfy Jill’s paranoia and prove his submission.

“Make me worthy of thy sacred mission.”

Adam wouldn’t care about these rituals. The hunter’s faith was lazy, obligatory—prayers mumbled between kills because Hugo expected it. And Hugo himself only cared that Mathias followed orders. The former paladin’s tolerance extended exactly as far as Mathias’s utility.

Mathias struck his chest again. The fourth blow stung through his shirt.

He’d do his job. Track the half-demon guide operating in this region, follow Hugo’s commands, maintain his cover. The guide would be captured regardless. Throwing his life away to save a stranger accomplished nothing except adding his corpse to Jill’s tally.

But he could slow them. Plant false conclusions, let Hugo believe tactical delays were his own ideas. Draw attention to cold trails while fresh ones cooled. Small acts of sabotage that might buy the guide some time.

“Grant me strength to serve thy righteous cause.”

The prayer concluded. Mathias rose, brushing dirt from his knees.

“Finally.” Jill stood, grey eyes reflecting firelight. “Rats passed through here three days ago. Maybe four. Prove you’re worth more than bait.”

Mathias met her stare. “You want me to track them?”

“That’s your specialty, isn’t it?” She gestured toward the surrounding forest. “Being useful to the Flame despite your… nature.”

“I’ll examine the area.”

“See that you do.” Jill’s mouth thinned. “Hugo was generous, letting you join as an operative instead of nailing you to a cross. Don’t make him regret his charity.”

Mathias turned away before his expression could betray him. His boots crunched through undergrowth as he moved beyond the firelight, putting distance between himself and Jill’s scrutiny.

The forest opened into a small clearing. He crouched, examining compressed grass and broken twigs. Multiple travelers, at least six. Heading northeast.

His fingers traced an indentation in the soil—clawed foot, three toes. Goblin, probably. And there, a deeper depression. Orc weight.

Mathias stood, scanning the treeline. The trail continued northeast, clear enough for even Hugo to follow.

Which meant he needed to suggest they search southwest first.

* * *

Three days later, Mathias stood at the forest edge, watching a group of figures move through the clearing below.

Wrong clearing. Wrong group. Wrong everything.

He’d spent seventy-two hours leading Hugo southwest through false trails and abandoned campsites. His plan had been simple: waste time, let the real guide escape, claim the tracks were too old to follow.

Except the southwestern route had led them straight to an active smuggling operation.

Fate had a sense of humor.

“Excellent work, Whitefield.” Hugo’s hand clapped his shoulder. The former paladin smiled, sunlight catching the golden stubble on his jaw. “Your tracking skills are exactly what we needed.”

Mathias forced his expression neutral. “Thank you, sir.”

Below, a hooded figure led a group of gnolls and orcs along the treeline. Nine bodies total. The leader gestured toward the northeast, speaking words too distant to hear.

“That’s our smuggler.” Jill’s voice carried brittle satisfaction. She stood to Hugo’s left, fingers already tracing the pendant at her throat. “Has to be.”

“We take the leader alive.” Hugo’s tone shifted to command cadence. “Kill the rest. Clean sweep.”

Adam materialized from the shadows, bow already in hand. The hunter checked his quiver, counted arrows. “How many prisoners?”

“Just the hooded one.” Hugo drew his greatsword. Light ran along the blade—not divine fire yet, but preparation. “The remaining demon spawn can burn.”

Mathias’s tail cramped beneath his coat. “What do you need me to do?”

Jill’s grey eyes fixed on him. “Stay here. You’d jeopardize the ambush.”

“I can—”

“You’ll stay.” Her voice dropped. “Unless you’d like to explain to Hugo why you’re so eager to defend rats.”

Adam’s scarred face showed nothing. The hunter nocked an arrow, testing the draw. “She’s right. You move like prey, not predator.”

Mathias stepped back. “Understood.”

Hugo raised his hand. The three fanned out, descending the slope toward the clearing with practiced coordination.

Mathias crouched behind an oak, amber eyes tracking their approach.

Adam struck first. An arrow took the lead gnoll through the throat. The creature dropped without sound, body folding mid-stride.

The camp erupted. Hugo charged from the treeline, his blade catching firelight as it descended. The orc barely raised his axe before the great sword cleaved through his shoulder and into his chest. Hugo’s voice rang out, fervent and clear: “By Solaris’s light, be purged!”

A second gnoll ran. Adam’s arrow punched through her spine.

Jill emerged from the opposite side, flames already wreathing her hands. An orc swung a crude club at her. She sidestepped and pressed both palms to his chest. Fire erupted from the contact point, consuming his torso. The orc’s scream cut off as his lungs charred.

“Stains!” Jill’s laughter carried a manic edge. “Filth upon the world, all of you!”

A young gnoll—couldn’t be older than twelve—scrambled toward the forest. Hugo intercepted, bringing his blade down in a vertical arc that split the child from crown to sternum. Blood sprayed across white grass.

“Solaris judges the wicked!” Hugo pulled his sword free, already turning toward the next target.

Mathias’s fingers dug into bark. His tail coiled tight against his spine, phantom pain radiating from where it pressed against his coat. He couldn’t look away.

Adam killed the remaining orcs with methodical efficiency. Three arrows, three bodies. Jill burned a gnoll attempting to flee north, cackling as the creature collapsed into charred meat.

The hooded figure stood motionless in the clearing’s centre, surrounded by corpses.

Hugo approached, blade levelled. “On your knees.”

The figure knelt.

Jill stalked closer, tilting her head like a carrion bird examining prey. “We have questions. Answer truthfully and your death will be swift.”

Adam dragged two bodies aside, clearing space. Hugo sheathed his great sword and drew a coil of rope from his pack.

Mathias remained in the underbrush. His options played out with mechanical clarity: attack now, kill maybe one of them if surprise favoured him. Adam would put an arrow through his eye before he reached the second. Hugo outmatched him in straight combat. Jill’s flames moved faster than his blade.

And even if he somehow killed all three—an impossibility—returning to Solarian territory as the sole survivor would mean execution.

The hooded figure’s hands were bound behind their back. Hugo hauled them upright and pulled back the hood.

An elf. Male, sharp features, dark hair pulled into a tail. Not the half-demon woman they’d been sent to find.

But a valid target regardless. Heretic, aiding monstrous races in illegal border crossing.

Jill circled him, eyes bright. “Not our rat. But you’ll know where she is, won’t you?”

The elf’s jaw tightened. He said nothing.

Hugo gestured toward Mathias. “Bring him. We’re taking this one back to camp for proper questioning.”

Mathias stood, branches cracking beneath his boots as he walked toward the clearing.

* * *

They set up camp two hundred yards south in a depression sheltered by oak trees. Adam gathered firewood while Hugo drove stakes for the prisoner’s bindings. Mathias hauled supply packs from the brush where they’d cached them before the ambush.

Jill worked on the elf.

She started with his fingers. A brief touch of flame to the first knuckle of his left hand made him gasp. The smell of charred flesh filled the clearing. Before the elf could scream, golden light wrapped around the injury. Skin knitted back together, pristine and whole.

“Smuggling routes,” Jill said. “Safe houses. Names.”

The elf’s jaw remained locked.

Mathias unpacked bedrolls with mechanical precision, keeping his hands busy. The potion bottles clinked against each other as he set down his pack. His tail pressed flat against his spine beneath his coat.

Jill moved to the second finger. This time she let the flame linger. The elf’s teeth ground together hard enough that Mathias heard enamel crack from fifteen feet away.

Hugo stood watching, arms crossed. “This can end whenever you choose, friend. We’re not monsters.”

Jill healed the finger. “Third one now. Or we move to the palm.”

“Please.” The elf’s voice came hoarse. “I don’t know what you want.”

“The half-demon woman.” Hugo crouched to the elf’s eye level. “The one who guides your kind across the border. Tell us about her, and this stops.”

Adam returned with an armful of branches, dumping them beside the fire pit Hugo had dug. “Want me to take over? Got better methods than pretty flames.”

“I handle the sacred work, Hunter.” Jill grabbed the elf’s wrist. “The corruption must be burned out properly.”

She pressed her palm to his forearm. Fire erupted along muscle and tendon, consuming flesh to the bone. The elf’s scream tore through the camp. Birds scattered from nearby trees.

Mathias’s fingers dug into the bedroll fabric. He kept his breathing steady, measured. His amber eyes tracked the scene through his tinted spectacles.

Jill healed the arm completely. No scar remained.

“I’ll make you an offer.” Hugo’s voice carried that warm, paternal timber. “You’re an elf, not a beast. Not corrupted by demonic blood. Give us what we need about this woman, and I’ll release you. You have my word before Solaris.”

The elf’s chest heaved. Blood ran from where he’d bitten through his lip.

Mathias knew what Hugo’s word meant. The elf would walk free from this clearing. Adam would track him for three miles, then put an arrow through the base of his skull. Clean, efficient, away from witnesses.

But the elf would die believing he’d been spared.

Jill moved toward his face. “The eyes next. I wonder if you can see the light of Solaris when I—”

“Wait!” The elf’s voice cracked. “Wait, please, I’ll tell you.”

Hugo raised a hand. Jill stepped back, disappointment flickering across her gaunt features.

“Smart choice.” Hugo straightened. “Now. This guide. Tell us everything.”

The elf’s words came in ragged bursts. “She worked these lands for years. Maybe three decades. Then she vanished—three months, maybe four. When she came back, she was different.”

“Different how?” Hugo’s tone remained gentle.

“She talked about the Wastelands. Said something changed there. Kept telling stories about…” The elf swallowed. “About a demon queen rebuilding an empire. Said there was sanctuary for their kind.”

Mathias’s hands stilled on the supply pack.

“She went south two days ago,” the elf continued. “Said she had three more settlements to visit. Recruiting, maybe. Or spreading those stories.”

Jill tilted her head. “Where south?”

“I don’t know the exact locations. She moves between communities. Goblins, orcs, whoever needs passage.”

Hugo nodded. “You’ve been helpful. We’ll keep you with us for now—insurance that your information proves accurate.”

Adam snorted. “More dead weight to haul around.”

“We move at dawn.” Hugo gestured toward Mathias. “Tie his hands. Make sure he can’t reach anything sharp.”

Mathias approached with rope. The elf’s eyes met his, searching for something—mercy, perhaps.

Mathias bound his wrists with efficient knots and said nothing.

The group settled into camp routines. Adam took first watch, perched on a fallen log with his bow across his knees. Jill performed evening prayers, her voice carrying harsh syllables about purifying flame and righteous cleansing.

Mathias laid out his bedroll and stared at the darkening canopy overhead.

South. Three settlements. A guide spreading stories about sanctuary in the Wastelands.

His mind refused to make the connection.

* * *

The forest path narrowed between twisted oaks, their branches forming a skeletal canopy overhead. Seraphina walked beside the robed figure, her boots crunching through frost-brittle leaves. Fibula’s wrapped feet made no sound.

“I didn’t expect you to stick around this long,” Seraphina said.

“Someone had to keep you safe.” Fibula’s voice emerged hollow from beneath her hood. “Especially with the number of Solarians crawling through these woods.”

Seraphina glanced sideways at the concealing robes. “Is that all?”

“If you don’t like my company, we can split ways right now.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You implied it.”

“I was making conversation, Fib.”

“Terrible at it, as usual.” The skeleton adjusted her hood, though no wind threatened to dislodge it. “Next time try leading with gratitude instead of suspicion.”

Seraphina’s tail flicked. “Fine. Thank you for following me across half of Landskavia and keeping your wonderful cheerful presence in my life.”

“Wonderful and cheerful. Finally, accurate descriptions.”

“You’re the least cheerful person I’ve ever met.”

“That’s because I’m dead. The dead aren’t known for their sunny dispositions.”

“You weren’t cheerful when you were alive either.”

Fibula’s wrapped hands emerged from her sleeves, gesturing vaguely. “I was a necromancer’s slave for thirty years. Forgive me for not developing a robust sense of humor.”

“Fair point.”

“I have those occasionally.”

They walked in silence for several paces. A crow called overhead, wings beating against the grey sky.

Fibula spoke first. “Three more places on your list. What happens after?”

Seraphina’s hand drifted to the pendant beneath her cloak, the violet crescent moon Lilith had given her. “I return to the Wastelands.”

“To your Empress.”

“Yes.” She met the faint light within Fibula’s hood. “Do you want to come with me?”

The skeleton stopped walking. Her head tilted, cloth wrappings shifting slightly. “No.”

Seraphina halted two steps ahead, turning. “No?”

“If things turn out the way you say they will, you can come find me.” Fibula’s fingers adjusted the wrappings around her left hand. “After all, someone has to work as a twilight guide when you’re gone.”

“Fib—”

“The routes won’t maintain themselves. Safe houses need restocking. And those goblin children you keep filling with hope, they’ll need someone who knows where the Solarian patrols actually operate.”

Warmth spread through Seraphina’s chest. She smiled. “Thank you.”

Fibula’s posture stiffened. Her hands retreated into her sleeves. The light in her eye sockets flickered. “I didn’t—that’s not—you’re welcome. Obviously. It’s logical. Practical distribution of resources and… stop smiling like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I said something meaningful.”

“You did.”

“I said something practical.”

“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.”

Fibula turned away sharply, facing the path ahead. “We should keep moving before—”

A branch cracked in the underbrush to their left.

Seraphina’s hand went to her dagger. Fibula shifted, wrappings sliding across bone as she positioned herself between Seraphina and the sound.

Heavy footsteps crashed through dead leaves. A figure stumbled from behind an oak, catching itself against the trunk. Dark auburn hair fell across amber eyes. His coat was torn, soaked through with blood that spread from shoulder to waist. Tinted spectacles hung broken from one ear.

“Mathias?” Seraphina’s voice emerged strangled.

He looked up. Recognition flickered across his face, followed by something that might have been relief. His mouth opened.

No words came.

His knees buckled. He pitched forward, hitting the frozen ground with a sound that drove ice through Seraphina’s veins.

She was moving before conscious thought registered, dropping beside him and rolling him onto his back. Blood covered her hands immediately, hot against the cold air. His chest rose and fell in shallow gasps.

“Mathias.” She pressed her palm against the worst wound, feeling warmth pulse beneath her fingers. “Stay with me. What happened?”

His eyes had already closed.

Fibula knelt on his other side, wrapped fingers moving across his neck. “Pulse is weak. Multiple lacerations, possibly internal bleeding.” Her hood turned toward Seraphina. “You know this man?”

“He’s—” Seraphina’s throat tightened. “A friend. From Umbra.”

“A friend covered in this much blood raises questions.”

“Later.” Seraphina stripped off her cloak, wadding it against the shoulder wound. “Can you help him?”

“I’m a necromancer, not a healer.”

“Fibula.”

The skeleton was silent for three heartbeats. Then her hands moved to Mathias’s chest, wrappings darkening as blood soaked through. “I can slow the bleeding. Buy time. But he needs proper healing soon or he won’t last the hour.”