Free Iron and Blood by Auston Habershaw

through his eyes.
    Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the pain stopped. The cold rushed back to embrace his body; he was on his knees on the terrace, his right hand cradled in his lap. He blinked the tears away from his eyes and looked down.
    The ring sat where it always had, as black and hard as an iron manacle.
    Dohas was also on his knees, his body smoldering with the heat of the ritual. “It . . . it . . . cannot be done . . .”
    Tyvian struggled to his feet. “What? What did you say?”
    â€œIt is not fused to your body.” The Artificer’s eyes were closed, his body shivering. “It does not meld itself to flesh or bone or blood.”
    Tyvian’s heart seemed to stop. “What does it attach to, then?”
    â€œIt is fused with your soul, Tyvian Reldamar.” Dohas opened his eyes, meeting Tyvian’s gaze. “You and the ring are one.”
    â€œI can still cut it off,” Tyvian said, half asking.
    The Artificer nodded. “At the price of fracturing your own self. This is an artifact beyond my arts.”
    Tyvian grabbed the wiry monk by the necklace and hoisted him to his feet. “I don’t accept it! Your order is among the finest in the world at this sort of thing, and you’re telling me you don’t know how to remove it? Someone must! Someone else among the Artificers, perhaps? Surely you aren’t the best they can offer!”
    Dohas’s voice never wavered. “I have never seen nor heard of anything fashioned by mortals that can do what this ring does. My order and my Arts can offer you nothing.”
    â€œWho can?”
    â€œI will not name them; they are creatures of legend, not to be trafficked with by mortals.”
    â€œTell me!”
    â€œNo. For your sake, no.”
    Tyvian clenched his teeth to keep from screaming in the old Kalsaari’s face. He wanted to throw the worthless charlatan off the roof, to beat him bloody, to hear him apologize for his utter failure. Instead, he only dragged Dohas inside and threw him at the feet of Hool, who was waiting for them. “Tie him up. Get him out of my sight.”
    Hool put a foot on the Artificer’s chest, but thrust a thick finger in Tyvian’s face. “You go talk to Artus now. You have made him very upset because you are stupid.”
    â€œI am not in the mood.” Tyvian scowled at the gnoll. To think that this beast presumed to order him about in his own home!
    Hool bared her teeth. This close, they looked like they were as long as Tyvian’s fingers. “You go and talk to him or I will make you.”
    Tyvian sighed. “Sometimes, Hool, you remind me of a nanny I once had.”
    â€œGood,” Hool announced, and threw Dohas over her shoulder. The Kalsaari appeared to be frozen with terror at the gnoll’s proximity. Tyvian hardly blamed him.
    â€œYou . . .” Dohas hissed, “You leave me for the Defenders?”
    Tyvian groaned and rubbed his eyes. “Spare me the blubbering—­I have quite enough of it on my hands already.”
    The Artificer, though, didn’t look like he was going to beg. His eyes hardened instead. “The Yldd. They are known as the Yldd.”
    â€œThe . . . the creatures of myth who can help me?” Tyvian blinked. “Wait, why tell me? Why do me the favor?”
    Dohas grinned mirthlessly. “I have done you no favor, Tyvian Reldamar. No favor at all.”
    Hool carried him away, muttering to herself about wizards and nonsense. Tyvian sighed and left to speak with Artus.
    Tyvian found the boy dragging a knife across the bedsheets in his bedroom. He couldn’t help but notice there were tears in his eyes. Feathers were floating through the room, and Tyvian spied a set of fine goose-­down pillows that had been savagely murdered not moments before. Tyvian knew he should have felt angry—­he wanted to be angry—­but he found himself only