So you sat there doing all this financial mumbling and I love doing stuff like that by the way.

I actually love sitting there and working out, is everything going to be okay?

It is so rewarding when you get to that point where the business has finally turned around.

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Sage helping business flow.

Xavier? Xavier? Wake up! Wake up, please wake up!

I was shaking me old sorcerer by your shoulders and trying not to get stabbed at any of the sharp rose stones which poisoned him.

They were still sticking into a skin and covered his robes with barbs.

The two of us had gone through a portal to fight Sam, his former apprentice and master of emotional magic, whatever the hell that is.

But as soon as Xavier fell to the portal, he had been impaled by rose storms.

Those storms had incapacitated him with a lethal toxin and it now caused him to completely cease breathing.

I felt for a heartbeat.

There was nothing. His lips began to turn blue as he remained motionless,

sprawled out in the field of roses.

I realized he could actually die. He wasn't invincible after all.

Once upon a time he had been a boy just like me.

You can't die, you can't die like this. I was just beginning to learn something from you. You can't leave me yet. I'm not ready!

I realized I was crying as my tears padded softly to the soil beneath my feet.

For a while I just stood there, staring at his body.

It didn't seem possible that it could be true.

It made me want to go home to give up hope, give up on this entire ridiculous goal of becoming the next guardian.

...