The door to the tower groaned open in quiet complain to those who would intrude in it after its master had left, but for all of that, the pair walked in without fanfare. 

Dew walked in first, carrying his signature weapon in his arms. Where that noon he had had trouble lifting it with his right hand after suffering an injury from Pithy’s rapier, the bandages and pain killers had done his arm more good than she had thought possible. Then again, she had learned in her bout with him that Dew himself could not be physically described as an average human.

He paused inside, and after a moment where nothing happened, Pithy joined him inside.

“No traps at the door,” he commented.

“The fireplace is still lit,” she added, nodding at the flame lighting the center of the room.

“Probably didn’t care enough to kill the fire. Or maybe he left in a hurry.”

“Perhaps he hasn't left at all.” Pithy felt the need to voice the possibility, though she felt little confidence in it. What would be the point of hiding from them inside the tower? Their quarry was long gone. “You head upstairs and look for something that might help us. I’ll search this room and see if there is anything in the basement.”

The man gave her a look she could not quite place. He opened his mouth, closed it, then finally turned away. “Fine.”

Pithy watched him ascend the stairs with a slight frown before she turned towards the door. Drawing her rapier from her hip, she pushed the tip against the wood. With a flourish and a flash of the weapon’s runes, she tapped at the frame, above and to the sides. At the last tap, there was a small spark and a breeze of cold air, signaling the boundary’s completion. It was a simple cantrip, similar to the ones she used when sleeping in unfamiliar places, but it would alert her if any crossed the threshold. 

Satisfied that she would not be surprised by anyone coming from the outside, she turned to the spiraling steps that hugged the wall to her right. 

Not long after she had began her descent, she summoned a wisp of light to hover over her head. Whereas the main entry was lit up by the fireplace’s glow, it seemed the rest of the building was draped in shadows. 

When her light finally fell over the contents of the basement, Pithy felt her brow rise. Rows upon rows of barrels spread throughout the room, giving the space a scent of old, damp wood covering over the smell of fruit. 

Taking a short glance towards the stairs to ensure this was indeed the tower’s lowest level, she approached one of the lowest barrels. A faucet was affixed to the side facing her, and turning it released a stream of reddish liquid. Pithy shut off the faucet and knelt, dragging a finger across the floor where the liquid had spilt. She sniffed, then licked it, savoring the taste of the wine. 

It seemed the tower had a cellar under it. [i]Had Nero been indulging himself while playing the announcer? It would explain his whimsical manner.[/i] Pithy ruefully shook her head. That was hopeful thinking. She was fairly certain the man had been completely sober when they had met. What she had seen then was the face he presented to everyone else in the world.

The woman stood, giving the room a searching glance. A quick search around the room turned up no hidden exits or trap doors, nor did the floor show signs that barrels had been moved around to conceal an escape. 

[i]Wouldn’t that be convenient? If I found a simple path to follow leading to the College’s doorstep?[/i] Alas, she knew the world was not that generous. If Nero had left, he had done it through the front door while she had been cluelessly playing decoy to draw out their target while Dew had been sleeping. 

[i]There is nothing for me here.[/i]

Wordlessly giving up on the cellar, Pithy began the climb to the tower’s peak, the long walk punctuated by the sound of her heavy footfalls bouncing against the stone walls. She found the trapdoors barring progress unlocked and opened, evidence of her ally’s passage. 

She found her ally at the room where they had confronted the Crucible’s announcer, his face illuminated by the light coming from the screen in front of him. He glanced at her as she approached, eyes going to the orb of light following her before returning his attention to her.

“Did you find anything?” she asked. With a gesture, the magelight floated up to the ceiling, fully illuminating the room with its cold, bluish light.

“Nope.” He shook his head. “Thought we might use the computers at least, but when I came up here, the thing was shut off. I got it to turn on again, but it’s password protected.”   

Pithy moved closer, looking over his shoulder to see the squarish white message stating “Enter Password:” sitting idly at the top left of a black background. She thought back to the machines she had come across when she had first arrived at the city and felt her meager hope plummeting. 

“Have you no way of unlocking it? You are clearly more familiar with this machinery than I am.”

“I’m not a hacker, lady,” he drawled, though the word itself did not tell her much. “I’d rather not be doing this.” 

Pithy gave him an irritated glare. “I’d rather not be rummaging through Nero’s things either, Dew, but we lost the chance to follow him out.” [i]Because of you[/i], she wanted to add, but she swallowed down her bitterness.

The man grunted, a conflicted frown on his face. “Unless he wrote the password down somewhere in here, best I can do is guess at it. I tried looking with my lighter, but I didn’t find anything I would call a password. Hell, we don’t even know if the thing is related to Nero at all. Without anything to go on we could sit here guessing at it for days and still not get in. At least it looks like it won’t lock us out entirely even if we keep getting it wrong.”

Pithy drew back, bringing a hand up to massage her temple. What were her options? If there were no clues leading her to Nero’s whereabouts and she could not operate the machinery tracking the contestants, would she be relegated to waiting for her opponents to come for her? Contrary to the message the competitors had received, it had already become painfully clear that no drone would come to guide her, likely the last insult Nero would deliver onto her before he left the stage. That left going on the offensive and searching for her next enemy out of the table. 

A long, frustrated sigh escaped her. “Keep guessing. I’ll see if I can find any other clues.”

“Seems like a waste of time to me.”

“Shut up and do it, Dew,” she snapped.

The man gave her a dissatisfied grimace before wordlessly turning to the machine. The sound of sinking keys quickly arose from the workstation.

Pithy let out an irritated huff and marched towards the supply cabinet Nero had used to blockade the room’s door earlier that day. There were clear signs that Dew had rummaged through it recently, but Pithy was not in a state of mind to care. Instead, she began methodically poring over the contents. 

She found food and water aplenty for the room’s occupant, along with a small assortment of medicinal supplies. There were also numerous writing utensils, some she recognized and some she did not, along with multiple white sheets of that parchment that was so plentiful in these city’s buildings. A few contained a few notes written over them, and these she passed on to Dew, to little success. She also came across a map of the city, identical to the one she had seen on the machine’s screen earlier that day, but seeing nothing special about it, she returned it to its resting spot.

[i]Nothing for me here…[/i]

Searching other cabinets and shelves was similarly fruitless.

[i]Nothing…[/i]

Neither did trying to make sense of the tangle of cables coming from Nero’s announcer machinery did her any good. 

[i]Nothing at all…[/i]

Her eye turned to the lonely cot in the room. Nothing under the mattress. Nothing under the sheets. Nothing under the pillow. She was not even certain what she was looking for anymore.

She had drawn one of her knives, intent on gutting the pillow in her hand when something stopped her. It was the sight of a small, blonde hair, barely visible on the white fabric by the sliver of cold light reflecting from it.

It gave her an idea so simple that she was baffled it had not already crossed her mind. 

[i] And yet at the same time, I know exactly why I never considered it and option.[/i] 

Spells and curses that used a catalyst to bind to a target where as old as the practice of magic itself. Particularly for curses, discarded hair, nails, skin and blood were popular tools when it came to binding curses to a target, but what she had in mind was simpler than that. A tracking spell, using the connection between the residues she could gather from the bed and Nero himself. 

Most magic users with her knowledge of the arts would be hard-pressed to botch the spell. That said, the affinity of most magic users would not restrict them to the degree that Pithy's aspect did to her. She had not attempted this kind of spell in years for that very reason.

But what else could she do? At the very least, she had nothing to lose by attempting it.

Taking a slow breath, Pithy shifted her grip on the knife and leaned over the bed, next to a pillow. Instead of using the knife to gouge into it as she had originally intended, she slid the blade along its surface, brushing what hairs she could into her waiting palm. 

Once she had enough, she sheathed the knife and produced the badger’s phylactery. She wrapped the hair around the needle, then drew her rapier.

“What are you doing? I’m sure it must be someone’s fetish, but collecting someone’s bed hair is kind of gross.”

Pithy glanced behind her, suddenly realizing that the sound of tapping buttons had been absent for the last few minutes. Dew was leaning on the back of the chair, studying her with a curious look. The mage glanced at what she had been working on, choosing to ignore the man’s latter comment.

“I am working on a spell. If it works, this pendulum should tilt towards Nero, wherever he is, giving us a way to follow him.”

“Really? Should have done that from the start, then.”

[i]I would have if I did not think it will be a waste of time,[/i] she wanted to tell him. Rather than admitting as much, she said, “Quiet. I need to concentrate,” instead.

Wrapping the phylactery’s chain around her hand, she brought the heart closer to her rapier’s glowing blade. The spell began to form in her mind, and she began to draw onto the power she needed to mold. 

She found resistance almost immediately. The power struggled against the shape she wanted to impose, seeking to twist into the crystalline lattice the came so naturally to it. She imposed her will against it, forcing it to conform to the weave in her mind, and little by little, she felt the power yield to her designs. 

A barely audible crack reached her ears. A thin band of ice had replaced the strands of hair wrapped around the phylactery, and as she watched, the ice fractured and dispersed into tiny crystals. Without its focus, the spell lost its cohesion, leaving the power to disperse. 

Pithy unwrapped the phylactery and let it dangle from her hand. It simply swung back and forth, tethered only to gravity.

Only a few seconds had passed while she worked her magic, but to Pithy, it felt like it had been minutes. She keenly felt Dew’s eyes on her. He must have realized by then that she had failed, but, uncharacteristically enough, he had remained quiet. For that, at least, she felt a grateful.

Sighing, she returned her attention to the failing spell. She was not so incompatible with the magic that she was completely unable to cast it, of that she was sure, but it seemed the raw materials she had available would not be able to survive the casting. Worse than that, if that was the reaction that the spell brought about, even if she succeeded at first, whatever she used as a focus for the connection would likely be worn down and frozen after a few seconds. Minutes, at best. This meant that the idea of creating a lasting connection to follow was flawed in the first place.

If that was the case, continuously acquiring the relative direction of her target would be useless. If she could acquire more information that the heading in a single instant, however…

Her mind went to the map she had seen on the screen earlier that day, with the dots representing the Crucible’s competitors. 

Drawing a sudden gasp, Pithy darted towards the cabinet and pulled the map she had found. She studied it carefully, ensuring it matched with what she knew of the city and and of the map she had seen that afternoon. If she wanted this to work, she would need a proper representation of the space her magic would search.

Nodding to herself, Pithy took a pencil from the cabinet and moved to the center of the room. There, she set the two items down. Next, she pointed her rapier at the ground. A thin sheet of ice began to form around the map, encircling it in a ring. Three outer rings joined the first, followed by a series of interlocking patterns that connected them. Several of the patterns had been taken from magical relics she had studied, and she knew that the power they shaped would serve to remove outside interference and filter out as much of the disruptive influence of her aspect as possible. 

Once she was satisfied with the ritual circle, she turned towards the bed and once again gathered the raw materials for her magic. Once she thought she had enough, she walked towards the circle and sat cross-legged at its edge. She set her rapier over her lap. One hand she held against the blade and its faintly glowing runes, while the other, the one which held Nero’s hair, was held palm facing up, the back of the hand resting on the sword. 

Staring intently at the map before her, she began to formulate the spell. Once again, she began to draw the swirling power from its wellspring, and once again she felt resistance. It was stronger than before, her spell more complex, it’s goal more ambitious, but still she set about enforcing her will. The patterns in the circle began crackled in response, and the ice began to spread ever so slowly between them as her magic’s influence steadily distorting the barriers she had created. It was not unexpected. While they remained, she could continue to mold the power to her needs.

Just as the spell was about to reach completion, Pithy felt a lurch in her stomach. [i]That is… a disconnect. Something’s off.[/i] Pithy scowled, attempting to stave off her panic. If she dismissed the spell now, the leftover energy would destroy the map, but the same would happen if she tarried too long trying to cast her magic. 

Only one ring was left untouched, so she closed her eyes in an attempt to better sense where the mistake had happened. She tuned out unnecessary information, letting the sounds of her breathing and heartbeat recede to the background. Then, one by one she identified the segments of the spell that had already been finalized properly. 

It was then that she saw it, clear as day once all distractions had been removed. There was a problem with the representation of the spell’s sphere of influence. [i]It’s the map,[/i] she thought. [i]There’s something wrong with the map, like a spike was driven at its center, as though there’s supposed to be a… a hole.[/i]

That morning, there had been an explosion powerful enough to send shockwaves to the underground of the Justice Hub. It must have been large enough to significantly alter the terrain in part of the city. The good thing was the discrepancy in her magic told her exactly where.

Pithy opened her eyes. The last ring had been breached, and branches of ice spread over the floor, seeming to stretch like snakes trying to lunge at the map at their center. Pithy murmured a word and a circle of ice formed over the downtown area of the map, and this magic eager to take form at her command. 

That was enough. 

The ice stopped its spread, and Pithy felt the enchantment snap into place. There was only one step left. The mage looked down at her open palm. The bundle of hair and dead skin remained there, rigid and frozen. She knew the slightest movement would make them crumble. This time, it was as she intended.

Pithy leaned forward and blew over her open hand, and the bundle of residue fell apart like a sand castle. The particles flew out, making circles over the map until, one by one, they all landed over the same place in the map. 

Rushing forward so quickly that her rapier clattered off to her side, Pithy took the pencil she had set beside the map and marked the spot with an ‘X’. 

The woman paused. She stared at the mark she had drawn for a long time, as though it would disappear if she so much as blinked. Yet she closed and opened her eye, once, twice, thrice, and when the mark continued to stare back at her from the piece of parchment, finally, Pithy sat back.

She forced herself to take slow, deep breaths. She almost wanted to laugh. So much effort for such a simple cantrip. Had she not been certain that Dew knew little to nothing about the inner workings of magic in general, she would have been embarrassed. 

That hardly mattered, of course. What mattered was that they had a lead now. One she had fashioned from the ether.

“Must have worked,” Dew said from his perch, a smile smug on his lips. “Never thought I’d see you smile like that.”

The remark made her expression harden, drawing a disappointed “Aw,” from her companion. Ignoring him, she drew forward and took the map. The section she had frozen split away with almost no resistance, remaining stuck on the floor at the center of a disk of crystal. 

She handed the map to Dew. “The X loosely marks his current location,” she explained as she picked up her rapier and stood. “As large as this city is, I can’t be sure he is exactly where I marked him, and he might have left by the time we get there.”

The man frowned, considering, then shrugged. “Better than nothing, I guess. Let’s go see what the douchebag’s been up to.”