Gell and Scarlet could see the flames long before they reached Grady’s Quay.

“Shit,” Scarlet cursed, “they’re already here. Now what do we do?”

“We go a little faster,” Gell replied, breaking into a run.

“Gell, what are you doing? You can’t! They’ll catch you!”

“It happens, it happens. It’s my fault this is happenin’, darlin’. Least I can do is lend a hand.”

Scarlet continued to protest, but Gell paid her no mind, running off toward the burning village as quickly as he could. Scarlet, low on options, followed him.

When they reached Grady’s Quay, it turned out to be a worse scene than Gell had imagined. The thatched shanties were highly susceptible to burning, and fires raged unchecked through the small hamlet. The street was filled with the charred forms of what used to be fishermen, tradesmen, and housewives, struck down as they went about their daily routines. Gell paused only a moment, staring at the still-burning body of a rugged young fisherman, wondering if he’d seen his death coming or if it fell on him unheeded like a bolt from the clear blue sky.

Gell clenched both fists and teeth, and swore under his breath. These people did not deserve such a fate — he brought it upon them himself. He would see them avenged somehow, he vowed. Then he tore off down the street to the seeming shanty belonging to his friend the wizard.

Reaching it, he saw that it, too, was in flames; the front of the building was halfway collapsed, revealing the empty shell within. Of course, the actual shanty itself was of no importance; what mattered was gaining ingress to the mage’s proper dwelling. And that required —

“The knocker,” Gell stammered, “find it! Quick!”

The two dug through the rubble as rapidly as they could, biting back the pain of the flames, searching for the front of the door. Scarlet’s hand fell upon it finally, and she lifted it from the debris.

“Gell,” she cautioned, “are you sure about this? You have no idea what’s waiting for you in there. For all we know, Thierry’s already dead. Or… worse.”

“No,” he replied, “I ain’t runnin’ away. He’s my friend, dammit, and I aim to do what I can do. You don’t gotta come if you don’t want to.”

With that, Gell grabbed the knocker and pounded it into the board, vanishing into the aether. Scarlet paused a moment, took a deep breath, and followed him. Come what may, she would follow him.

The interior of the mage’s residence was as much a mess as the exterior of the village. The floor, once gleaming white and gold, was charred and pock-marked, the aftermath of great magical devastation. The columns of marble were cracked and breaking, the crystal vines shattered and now serving a secondary purpose as impromptu caltrops. The two great curtains flanking the staircase slowly smoldered, much of the force of the flame being drawn upward into the gaping void in the stained-glass celing, beyond which swirled the nothingness beyond existence. The chamber’s air supply, magically-created and unending, was being constantly sucked out into the void, with the result that the entire chamber was filled with a roaring wind, almost like a hurricane. And in the exact eye of that hurricane was the wizard Thierry, being held by the throat by another man.

His assailant was a large man, seemingly middle-aged and balding, dressed in ostentatious red-and-orange velvet robes marked with countless and indecipherable (to Gell, at least) symbols and runes. He was missing his right arm and his right eye, the empty socket burning with the angry light of the animus, and the stump extended by an odd metal apparatus that crackled with arcane power. It was this artificial limb that held Thierry in its grasp, and the old wizard struggled in vain against the dark metal grip. Struggling is good, thought Gell. Means he ain’t dead yet.

Their entrance had not gone unnoticed by the stranger, and he cast his baleful eye over them and cackled. “Well now, this is a pleasant surprise! Your arrival could not be more fortuitous; now I no longer need this wretch.” The magic flowing through the constructed arm surged, and Thierry gargled with pain.

“Put him down!” Gell hollared, leaping forward toward him, and swiftly drawing the sign of Nullification. The mage simply laughed in defiance.

“Or what, Puritan?” He spat the word in disgust, and in mockery. “Or you’ll do what?”

Gell drew up in front of him, and slowly lowered Saturnine to his side, the black glow fading. “If any echo of the heavenly Word still resides in this world, Blackwell, I will personally see your corpse delivered to the gates of Hell,” he hissed. “And that’s a fact.”

Blackwell’s laugh and Thierry’s gasping grew. The sound of the wind intensified.