Galaxy of Hyperion: Mystic Heir

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Frozen Prison

Jay found a strange sense of familiarity as she made her way throughout the castle. The layout was the same that she had gotten used to during her youth, and everything was in the same place that she remembered. Her feet slammed into the ground below, and Jay unsheathed her sword when she was alone in a hallway. As soon as her sword was out, Jay leaned out of the nearby window and winced, realizing that she wasn't going to be able to fight with a sword up close. The enemies made of Ice were too far away, and she doubted that they were going to want to crawl up the side of the building right off the bat. Magic was going to be necessary to defeat her enemies. 

Jay sheathed her blade once more and looked down at her hands, watching as purple sparks flew between her fingers. She wasn't the best when it came to magic. She never had been, if she was being honest. Her magic had only grown strong enough for regular casting after Lyloc provided Jay with her powers, and that wasn't exactly a long time for Jay to get used to manipulating her magic. She had a decent enough sense of control over her powers, but making grand displays with energy wasn't exactly her strong suit. Still, Jay knew that this was no time to be picky, and she couldn't spend too long focusing on other matters when the Ice creatures were already starting to crawl their way towards the building. If ice covered the castle as a whole, they were going to be in trouble. The plan would likely shift to making sure that the inhabitants of the castle couldn't survive the freezing temperatures, and Jay didn't think that many of them would be able to endure it for too long, so she took to focusing on making sure that her foes were held off for as long as possible. 

Jay snapped her fingers and created purple blast of energy before sending it flying down to the nearest crowd of Ice fighters down below. There were far more of them than she had been anticipating seeing, and Jay felt her stomach start to twist into a knot. She was used to battle, but fighting with people who she wasn't familiar with from a distance didn't make her feel any better about the situation. Her head gave a distant, annoyed pound. She would work on getting rid of the pain as soon as the battle ended. 

An explosion of fire made contact with the ground below, and Jay realized that it had come from an upper floor of the castle. Jay glanced up briefly before forcing herself to strike back with another rocket of purple energy. She wasn't entirely aware of what type of magic she was attempting to draw from throughout this encounter, but Jay didn't care much for trying to figure out details. All she wanted to do was survive this mess of a battle. 

Jay heard footsteps rounding a nearby corner, and she looked over her shoulder to see who it was. She let out a gasp, and her eyes went wide when she recognized the person in question. For just a moment, she wasn't thinking about the fight in the slightest. Jay's magic died on her fingers before it could be unleashed and create something more. All that mattered was the person standing with her in the hallway. 

It was none other than Jayler Rose himself, and Jay felt as if the air had been taken from her lungs. 

Jayler froze in place as well, his eyes wide in the very picture of shock. He took a step closer to her, one hand reaching out hesitantly. "Is that... Is it you?" Jayler questioned quietly. Jay could see that his hands were shaking, and she did her best to keep from swallowing anxiously or showing other signs of nerves. 

Jay wasn't sure of how she was meant to respond to his question. It was clear as could be that she was going to have to answer in the affirmative despite her urge to deny it until they could talk. She had to get out of that habit, and telling everything to her companions the day prior was meant to pull her away from her previous thought process. Jayler had always been different to her anyways. They were bound by blood, and everything seemed so much simpler as long as he was around. 

"You can call me Jay," she wound up telling him instead. "We'll talk more after this fight is over. How does that sound? We have a lot to take care of at the moment, and I don't think that it would be good if we allowed ourselves to get distracted now."