Chapter 1

Pia sweltered in the tropical heat as she stepped off the Island Federation boat and onto the first land she had seen in weeks.  The shore was stone, worn smooth by millennia of waves, but as she crept inland with her team the interior was densely covered with wet vegetation that seemed to only be able to take root in the smothered remains of its forebears. Trees seemed to erupt through a canopy of moss. Each step on the green and golden leaves collapsed them beneath the feet before they sprung back like risen dough. Pia scarcely saw more than traces of the beasts that lived in the forest, but the air was alive with insects and the sound of distant birds. 

Pia’s heart raced.  It always did in anticipation of executing her next mission, no matter how far afield or close to home.  This was the greatest one she had yet been given.  Concordia’s priests had told her to find one of the thirty-six Anima they believe to be located on this island, weeks away from home.  There would be no greater glory than being able to return with it, the power of a god given physical form.

Ahead of Pia, she could barely see the back of her son’s, Cai’s, head through the dense jungle.  Her scout, Felix, was invisible ahead of them.  Behind Pia, Rudmila’s rifle clicked rhythmically against the buckled strap that held it close to her body.  The length of time she had known Rudmila was one half the reason she could feel comfortable with a Hunter’s Guild member behind her.  The other half was Miles, the brawny subordinate who brought up the rear of her team.

That day, they found nothing of the Anima. Rudmila brought an animal down for supper, something like a hare with the ears of a donkey on long, spindly legs.

Miles appeared half-asleep with boredom, but Pia knew him to always look that way unless he had the immediate prospect of getting some beast's blood on his sword. Rudmila had taken a seat at the edge of the clearing, leaning against a tree where she could read a tactical manual undisturbed.  Her cloak and dark features blended with the forest. Though no stranger to Pia’s team after some missions attached to the unit, Rudmila had never stopped acting the part of the outsider she would always be.

"And you Felix, what'll you do when we're back?" Miles asked.

"Taking my pay and going shopping," Felix answered, "My fiancée and I will need staff for our estate. By the Anima of Order, I hope she still doesn't have ideas of getting elves."

"What's wrong with elves?" Rudmila asked, suddenly interested in the conversation. She closed her manual, holding one finger between the pages to mark her place. With her free hand she brushed back her thick, dark brown hair back behind her shoulders. Rudmila’s equally dark eyes watched Felix closely for his response.

"I guess you wouldn't know, living in the Guild. As far as subhuman races go, elves are the more intelligent, and certainly better looking than most humans or any kobold cur or dwarf. The problem, though-" Felix tapped the ground at this side with one finger for emphasis, "Is just that. Even if you only need to train an elf once and be good for the next few human generations, they're smart enough to be nothing but trouble. That, and their females seduce our men, and the males defile our women. There's a reason an elf is cheap on the market. No, I'd rather go for a human slave any day."

Rudmila wrinkled her nose in disgust. Pia, having listened in, sympathized a little. The girl had spent her whole life fighting for life and rank in the Hunter’s Guild, and only now was granted her rifle and sent out into the world. She might understand what it meant to go on a mission such as this with the Palatine Guard, but she would never be able to see the world with the clear blue eyes of herself, Felix, or Miles— or any other pure-born citizen of Concordia. If it weren’t for her finances, far poorer than her parents’, let alone Felix’s, Pia might have considered a mere kobold slave for herself. If it weren’t for work that carried her outside of Concordia for much of the year, she might have owned one.

“Your fiancée was going to bring a large dowry, wasn’t she?  Why not get another mana crystal, instead of a slave?”  Miles asked, “Surely that would pay more dividends.  Take a handful of more dangerous missions, take your promotion to an administrative job and a real salary.”

“Did you forget?  I’m not suited.  Maybe you could have two or three mana crystals, if you could afford them, but my body can only bear one.  All-Father forbid, I hope it protects me against the whims of the Anima of Change, if it’s actually here. In any case, I don’t need more than what I have to secure my promotion.”

If a mountain could wince, Miles did.  Pia pressed her lips closed, not wanting to say what she thought. Felix was right, of course.  She knew her subordinates, and while she and Felix could only bear one mana crystal, Miles was capable of having two and Caius, three.  Rudmila would never be able to wield the magic that came from a mana crystal.  It could be comfort enough for Felix and Rudmila.  Rudmila could rely on her rifle and Felix’s mana crystal already granted him supernatural speed.  Neither of them, as far as the priests had advised her, would need to worry about bearing an Anima.  They would never need to fear the curse of an endless life and the undeniable power of a god.  In the awkward silence, Pia’s looked for her bag for comfort.  Inside it was another promise from the Concordian priests, that the Anima sphere would capture what they sought with no fear of it finding a human host.

Soon, Pia thought, that worry would be behind them.  With the Anima of Change or without, they would take the hired Island Federation boat home to Concordia, and Rudmila would return to the walled gardens of the Guild, Felix could fret about his wedding, Miles would add his pay to the too-small collection for the dowries of his too-many sisters.  Pia knew Miles’ pain best, but all she had ahead of her was Caius.  She looked to her son, blending into the trees as much as Rudmila did, hesitant to talk, struggling to belong with the other Palatine Guard, marked as different from the other citizens with his fine brown hair and green eyes.  All Caius had was Concordia and her.

The next day, before the morning mist had lifted from the forest they had found their quarry. Caius was the first to sight it.

"Captain!" He whispered harshly and waved Pia over. She followed his finger to a creature pawing through the living ground as if looking for something. Pia was surprised that Felix hadn't seen the beast first, but it must have wandered by only recently. The only trace of her scout was a series of blazes ahead of them.

And it was a beast. Though somewhat humanoid in shape, and as large as a bear, it was covered in a scabrous hide that hung with mosses as a beggar might hang with rags. Wide but sunken eyes looked down a sallow face to watch its long, knotted paws as they worked over the ground.

Not paws. Pia thought. Hands- they look so human.

"I saw the mark on its head," Caius said, "It's just like in our brief."

Pia squinted at the monster. Her son was right. Just like Felix’s hand was marked by a common mana crystal, a mystic sign was burned into the skin on the monster’s forehead. It vaguely matched the form sketched in their briefing. Just as a fire crystal suggested flames and a water crystal’s mark suggested ripples once the crystal’s power was joined with a human, what Pia saw evoked the Anima of Change.

Pia motioned for Rudmila to take up her position against the creature. Rudmila moved as a shadow between the trees. Even Miles had no trouble passing across the soft turf without a sound. Pia nodded, laying her hands inside her bag to feel the cold surface of an Anima sphere. Rudmila would shoot the thing, and the rest would finish it off, extracting the Anima from its corpse with the special smoked-glass vessel given to them by the priests. That was the plan.

Suddenly, the creature looked up with a grunt. Its clouded eyes bored straight into Pia and Caius. Rudmila's rifle let free a single shot with a deafening crack, but the bullet ricocheted off its scaly temple, leaving barely a gouge.

The creature bellowed and looked around for the source of the noise, but it was impossible with the dense trees around them. Her ears ringing, Pia watched Rudmila slowly load another bullet while Felix darted out ahead as fast as lightning and Caius and Miles closed in. Felix ducked low and slashed at the monster’s legs. His sword made only a shallow cut by its back paw, but it was deep enough. A spray of blood soaked the soft ground beneath it and flowed readily from the wound.

Caius and Miles closed in from the sides, leaving Pia to take the front. Thinking of the Anima sphere as a talisman, as a sign of the faith that the All-Father had in her, Pia drew her sword. With any luck, she would not need to even use it. Even with an Anima to command, the monster was terrified. It whipped its head around blindly, looking for its attackers as it whined and growled. Caius stabbed the creature’s flank. It spun around, ripping Caius’ sword out of his hand before it lashed out violently with its front paws. The creature caught Caius square in the stomach, sending him soaring backwards. Pia rushed forward to catch him before he hit a thorny tree. Both mother and son fell into the soft earth.

Rudmila’s gun fired once more, this time hitting the creature’s softer body. It stumbled. Miles took the chance to close in and slash at the creature while Felix ran at it for another strike that crippled its other leg. The monster sank to its knees. Slowly, it reached its great paws to its face. The Anima on its forehead began to glow. The creature wiped the blood foaming at its mouth, then cradled its head.

“Kill it now!  Before it casts a spell!” Pia commanded. She handed her sword to Caius while she opened her bag to take out the Anima sphere. She found only slimy, wet shards of broken glass. Horror filled Pia as she realized that she had crushed it when trying to save Caius.

Pia did not see the final blow. The creature lowed, a deep sound like close thunder that faded into the rattle of dead branches in the wind. Its Anima glowed brighter, shining hot and bright until Pia could see nothing but the orange traces of the Anima on a field of white.

Then nothing at all. For a moment she felt alive in a coffin. She could not move without hitting wood and hear a leaden thunk that told her there was only dirt beyond. Then the wood cracked and splintered, showering her with dirt until the weight of earth against her eyes produced bright stars.

In an instant she was looking through a stranger’s eyes, looking down upon a foreign land filled with people dressed in ancient clothes. She saw millennia pass before her eyes in disparate glimpses, and with it the death of nations. The landscape changed as the people wandered. Crops rotted on the vine, unable to thrive in the new earth. The number of people gathered around the stranger became fewer and fewer. At last there was nothing but gravestones to rule, and these wore to illegibility with years of rain and encroaching moss.

Through it all, she felt the name of the Anima that chose her. It was one half of the Anima of Change. It was the Anima of Decay.