Breaking Step (Dungeon Runner 3)

Breaking Step, Chapter 113

Having the trapped plaza to compare it to, Tibs found the cell wasn't particularly effective at keeping him from using his essence. The weave through the bars, floor, ceiling, and wall only acted to push on the essence. It resulted in etching being harder to hold in place while creating them, due to the added pressure, but raw essence was only a question of having more will than the weave could handle. Unfortunately, the weave became stronger the closer to the edge of the cell Tibs pushed the essence.

Effectively, he could use essence within the cell, but not send anything through the bars at the four guards standing against the wall, watching him. Each had water as their element, by the color of their eyes, which was all Tibs had to go by; his sense couldn't cross the bars.

All the weave affected, as far as Tibs had worked out over the two days he'd been here—going by how often he was fed and the guards changed—was 'unformed' essence. Once he made the essence into a tool, such as a lockpick made of ice, the weave ceased to affect it. But if he even took a step toward the door, all four guards took one too, and Tibs was confident that the weave only acted in one direction.

He scratched at his neck again. The shirt and pants he'd been given to wear when they took his clothing were roughly woven and irritating. He'd seen other prisoners in the cells wearing them during his multiple previous stays, but he hadn't been considered enough of a threat to be forced into them until now, he figured.

The guards had let him study the door's lock, so long as he didn't have a tool with him. A visual inspection told him little, and he couldn't sense anything of it. Still, so long as there were no extra weaves, Tibs expected he'd be able to open it, given enough time.

Which wouldn't happen with the guards' unwavering attention on him. So he'd remained seated, eyes closed, pulling at the essence that naturally floated within the cell to add to his immense reserve, which had been left lower than he'd expected; not even half full. He'd used a lot against the Them, but he has also absorbed most of their essence at the end. He couldn't remember where all the essence had gone in the hectic events that followed his victory.

Pulling the essences in revealed something else about how the weave worked, and why once they were formed, tools weren't affected. It didn't affect the essence themselves, but how his will interacted with them. It was why essences could flow on their own, but the moment he actively pulled on one to add to his reserve, the weave added the complication of pushing it in every direction.

If, instead, he used his old trick of 'tilting the table', and let the essence flow toward him, it slowly came without obstruction. One method meant he had to maintain a constant effort of will, while the other was extremely slow.

He endured the mounting headache, alleviated by the occasional suffusing with purity. The resulting increase was still barely noticeable by the time the unseen door leading to the cells holding the rest of the prisoners, the 'safe' ones, opened and closed. He didn't think it was time for food, so maybe now was when they were going to take him to his punishment.

He channeled water again and opened his eyes when the steps paused before his cell, but the door didn't open. Alistair looked at him without expression.

"Who paid you to assassinate Supervisor Marger?"

"No one." Had he been so focused he hadn't paid attention when others used the title before? Or had everyone simply referred to him by his name, leaving Tibs to make the wrong assumptions?

"Tibs." Annoyance slipped through. "We found so many Promises hidden in your armor an army could have been hired. Who gave that to you? Who gave you that armor?"

"I stole the Promises." It had been too much to hope the weaves would keep his hiding place secure.

"No one here has that kind of money for you to steal," Alistair replied in a tone that was close to his 'try again' one he'd used anytime Tibs hadn't been entirely honest in how little he'd practiced between training sessions.