by Kim Wedlock
And that sickening, sublime melody that had stitched itself into every desperately forgotten and clearly recalled moment of entrapment, but only six bars, replaying on an endless loop, prickling the skin beneath beads of sweat while the heart was sent hammering into a frenzy.
Rathen swallowed hard. He was sure he would succumb to madness here.
His eyes flicked towards Anthis. The young man, a little more than half his own age, carried himself identically: tight and hunched, his footsteps spiritless.
He looked then to Eyila. She'd walked all morning in silence, displaying open distaste towards the cluttered trees, roots and mud, but now there was something new in her eyes, something that had been trapped in the background and was now uncaged, released to prowl at the surface. Her arm was looped through Petra's, who was surreptitiously restraining her from racing on ahead in her strange state. And as they neared the looming gates, open and unmanned, the intangible had seized her like the grasp of a rusted gauntlet.
His eyes turned forwards again and he continued, internally braced, along Garon's lead.
The town appeared unharmed from the road, but the moment they stepped through the gates, the tense mood plummeted even further.
The guardhouse just inside the walls had been raised and split by a thrust of the land so abrupt it was as though the meagre town walls had contained the worst of the magic themselves. Its front and furthest faces had crumbled with the force, their stones laying scattered over the road which itself had been tilted at a sudden and dramatic angle like a scuffed carpet runner, while the rest of the abandoned building remained upright and exposed along with everything that remained inside - the desks, the cells, the reports, the teacups.
On the other side of the road, the houses appeared unaffected, but the windows were too illuminated; a single glance through revealed that only the facades still stood. Everything behind them had fallen into crevasses which had also claimed a portion of the town wall, a detail obscured on their approach by the outlying stables.
They tread slowly, carefully, staring at the desolation and speaking not a word. Fendale had been evacuated to Morton as soon as the crisis had struck, but not everyone had made it out alive. And so every pile of rubble and every snaking crack in the road drew the eye, conjuring the dreadful wonder at whether that particular calamity had claimed a life. The crevasses summoned the worst of their thoughts; bodies couldn't be retrieved so easily, if, from some, at all.
Rathen chose to turn his mind away. He, at least, had other things to think about, and he leapt into them eagerly, walling out the world around him and stifling the beginnings of an anxious sweat. He wasted no time in withdrawing the Zi'veyn, and in doing so immediately grasped the desperate attention of the others.
"What will happen when you use it?" Petra asked as she moved closer to him, dragging the transient Eyila along with her. Her voice was low, wary of being overheard, though there was none but the dead to disturb. "Will all this be returned to normal?"
Rathen's head twitched. "I couldn't say. But I guess we'll find out..." Reluctant necessity seized his stride, carrying him ahead to survey the area with more than sight alone. The others watched him uneasily as his eyes discovered and chased something beyond the realms of vision, and hesitated to follow as he set off purposefully after it. But whatever had grasped him had missed Eyila; she continued to stare up towards the top windows. No one could decide just how discomforting that was.
They wound through the shattered streets, following his steadfast trail, climbing over the fallen walls and carts that blocked their way, jumping over fissures, avoiding the touch of pools of golden sunset, vibrant enough to rival the true sun, and breathed none too deep of the apple-scented breeze. They had all been in Khryu'vahz, they had all witnessed the disturbingly sanguine nature of the magic, but that it could also cause such havoc, such destruction, such death...
More than a few of them felt themselves itch under its contact. No one wished to linger. But their pace faltered in spite of themselves when they spotted the edge of a sail rising from the muddy ground.
No...from a monstrous chasm. One filled with brown, red and golden autumnal leaves, each perfectly shaped, perfectly coloured, like a funerary bouquet, gently enshrouding the remains of Fendale's iconic mill. A mill that had stood as a memorial for nearly a century, as a testament to the value of every skill, the strength that lies in ordinary folk, a bravery not limited to soldiers.
A mill that had been sundered by a force unconcerned by the skills, strength or bravery of either.
Absorbed in grim matters, they were slow to notice the huge and ancient oak tree that loomed at the head of the road. Still and silent with an imposing beauty, it was curiously untouched by the chaos as equally as the road veered around it. But despite its apparently unnatural protection, the tree was not born of the displaced magic; its full, vibrant boughs had always shaded the clearing, a village square that had grown into a town garden as the settlement had flourished, and its knotted roots pushed apart the flagstones laid once out of their reach. The Grandmother Tree; it was once believed to house an oak wife, a relict woodland spirit, as a means of explaining how it could grow to such a great age and size without succumbing to disease or a woodman's axe. A child's fairytale - but a fairytale that, perhaps, had some kind of credence after all.
For Rathen had finally come to a stop, just at the edge of its shadow.
The others slowed behind him and stared up into its reaches.
"This is the point of magnetic focus," Rathen told them with a touch of effort, his attention still somewhere between the tree and the air. "Seems the most likely place to start."
"It doesn't look like the centre," Anthis murmured as he glanced from the untouched garden and back to the ruined mill that stood like a ghost at the edge of all their sights. "Are you sure it's not--"
"Of course he's sure."
"I'm sure," Rathen replied over Petra's sudden and malicious retort, but it surprised neither after the sharp and mistrustful looks she'd sent the historian once her relief at their return had subsided. Anthis barely acknowledged it, and Rathen's eyes dropped heavily to the Zi'veyn.
His shoulders tightened. He could feel the sudden breath of expectation prickling the back of his neck, the inescapable approach of a critical moment. It was a familiar sensation, and an unwelcome one. The last time it had imposed itself on him he'd been standing over a foreign battlefield, waiting to give his regiment the order to break concealment and launch the first volley. The memories it summoned were just as distasteful.
He shook them off and raised the Zi'veyn, sending fragments of golden light flickering across the trunk. His mind focused, delving into the surrounding magic, whittling out the absolute centre of the magnetism as best he could while gritting his teeth against the doubt and distraction swelling in his skull, heart and gut. He didn't notice everyone else take a cautious step closer.
Slowly, he grasped it, as precise and minute as a pinhead, and released his tightly held breath. He had the centre, the point at which the pooling magic was at its strongest, where the amalgamation of spell fragments tangled back on itself, where their power looped and reverberated back against the magic in his own veins, humming perpetually in his chest. Infinitesimal chains of melody, solitude, anticipation; of sunset, lechery, perfection...and peace, present after all, if too small and weak to impose itself over the madness...
Yes, this was the magnetic centre, the point where the veil between their world and the gods' was at its thinnest, where the magic gathered, where it was drawn to. The best place to start...
The garden had been silent for a long while. Rathen shifted his weight. Glances were exchanged behind him.
Anthis cleared his throat delicately. "Hhhow...do you tell it where...to...?"
Rathen didn't respond. He turned the Zi'veyn in silence, pointing its golden lotus towards the tree so that its crown of thorns guided the trunk towards its centre, and extended it at arm's length. Again
he focused his magic, driving it this time into the artefact and seizing the spell concealed inside, and began channelling his will and concentration to power it.
The local anticipation was finally pertinent; shared breath quickened and all eyes stared sharply from the oak to the relic as though they expected to see the intangible magic move, then to their surroundings, searching for the slightest change - for the ground to close up, the puddles of sunset to evaporate, the buildings to repair themselves, and the return of musical birdsong. No one dared to blink in case they missed anything, or moved more than an inch in case they distracted him.
But minutes ticked by, and impatience crept in. The local anticipation, it seemed, was prophetic, for nothing of what they waited for happened.
It was a long while before Anthis dared, carefully, to speak. "Maybe it's upside down?"
Rathen rotated it brusquely, turning the lotus towards himself and the jagged tip of the pyramid towards the tree, and channelled his power, his focus, his will once again. But still nothing happened.
"What if," Petra began even more warily, "it was the right way up, and you've just...sucked the magic out of yourself?"
Rathen paled further and one hand moved in a flurry, forming the signs of the first spell that came to mind. A ball of light, the very first taught to novice mages, promptly appeared before him. But his relief was fleeting. He hadn't missed, and as he'd cast, there came the subtlest flicker in the magic surrounding them - magic that hadn't moved or diminished in the slightest.
His jaw tightened and eyes dropped resentfully to the artefact. The others exchanged another series of doubtful looks behind him as the silence pressed back in.
"You said," Garon began rigidly, "that you'd fixed it."
Everyone cringed. Rathen straightened and fought against his own hideous smile. "I did."
"Then you don't know how it works."
"I'll figure it out." He spoke through his teeth and glared at the Zi'veyn, humiliation burning beneath his skin. 'I can't have missed anything, Kienza would have noticed it... It's the spell, it must be. I'm such a fool - as if it was really going to be so easy...' He turned around, his frustration successfully masked, and levelled himself to Garon. "I'll have to analyse it further, but I can work this out."
"Eizariin's scrolls might have something that will help," Anthis added. "I'll keep going through them, see what I can find."
"I want to stay here in the mean time."
"What?" They turned to Petra, who looked quickly from one face to the next in alarm. "We can't! Just look at Eyila - we don't know what will happen to her if she stays in all this bloody magic for much longer!"
"Then take her away," Garon replied impatiently. "How will we know if it's working if we leave? And remaining among the magic may well help him."
"I understand your concern," Rathen offered with apology, "but Eyila will be fine. She survived the magic in Khry's Glory and that was far more potent than this."
Petra regarded him carefully. "...You're sure?"
He ignored what he was sure was the itch of lunacy creeping over the back of his mind. "I'm sure."
"Well...all right - but that's only one concern. Is it honestly wise for us to linger anywhere? Right now, we're close to several villages--"
"I don't believe we're being followed," Garon cut in, removing his jacket though the day was mild. "We haven't been for some time."
Petra looked then to Rathen as he nodded his agreement. "How can you be sure?"
"Magic. It's not sustainable, but while we were...away, I worked out a detection spell. It's based on the elves' perception of magic, but it searches for life rather than magic."
"Like...bugs and stuff?"
"No - human hearts."
"Then it wouldn't detect elven pursuers?"
"If there are elves out here, then both myself and Eyila would notice their magic." He moved out of the sudden stream of warmth as the sun broke through the clouds and sat himself down beneath the tree, Zi'veyn in hand. "We're safe to stay."
Uncertainty further creased Petra's brow, but she left the matter alone. Then frowned at Garon as he fastened a thin, weather-stained jacket about himself and slipped his officer's badge inside. "Where are you going?"
"As you said, we're close to a handful of villages. Rather than waste time waiting around, I'm going to see if I can't find some information."
"From villages this close to the mountains? You really think it's worth bothering? Because I don't think collecting complaints about the local quality of cow dung for the farmland on the lower reaches is going to do much to stop a half-elven psychopath."
"When this place was evacuated," he explained calmly, "my informant chose not to follow. There's better business in the village - at least in war time - but their remaining in the region works in our favour: there's no distraction by the masses and the people we need information on will still be moving around out here. Their commands, royally sanctioned and otherwise, are above evacuation orders." He unfastened his sword and dropped it among the bags, mussed up his hair just a little, and scuffed his boots in the mud. Suddenly he was a vision of ordinary. He turned towards Rathen, and Anthis who sat down close by, rolls of parchment in his arms. "Good luck." He spared Petra only the briefest glance, then set off back through the ruins towards the eastern gates.
She watched him go in defeat, then looked to the others who already appeared absorbed in concentration. "I guess that's the end of that," she mumbled. She turned towards Eyila who hung at her side, her wide, pale eyes searching beyond the half-standing buildings, and sighed uneasily to herself. "Come on, then. Let's get you out of all this."
Climbing through the last of the wreckage that barred the city gate, Garon forced the knot of irritation out of his shoulders and settled the clench of his jaw. Petra had always been outspoken, but something had gotten into her, and just what was beyond him. But he hadn't the time to worry about it. There were more important things to turn his mind to, things that deserved his attention, his thought, his fret, more than whatever was bothering such an easily incensed young woman. Things they all had a stake in. Things far bigger than any one of them. Things that rendered everything else inconsequential.
He rolled his shoulder against the knot that tried to creep back into his muscles and caught himself clenching his fist in his frustration. He looked down at it, though he knew what he would see: only the third and fourth fingers were curling.
He stiffened and moved his hand to rest it upon the pommel of his sword instead, but it wasn't there. He managed not to growl.
Garon forced his mind to close against pointless thoughts and focused instead on navigating the sundered land, and after an hour and eighteen minutes, he crested a hill and descended into the shallow dale that veiled the village of Trinn.
Fendale's destruction was a ways behind him, and here the village lay untouched. But while Rathen had assured them that the magic wouldn't grow with the destruction of the arcane realm, its reach could still broaden, and Garon had overheard gossip in other settlements of depressed locations flooding, some from diverted rivers, others quite unnaturally. If Fendale's magic was so inclined, Trinn and its capillary of the river Suul could soon number among them.
But he'd closed his mind against what-ifs as well, and didn't entertain the concern for long.
The quaint buildings of since-reinforced drystone were dwarfed by the verdant slopes of the dale, and the stream that trickled through the weeds alongside the road was, by comparison, barely there at all. But despite appearances, Trinn was not a secret from the world. A quarter mile north the valley levelled out and opened onto a high road that skirted the thick Korovor Woodlands, used by neighbours, travellers, and traders carrying goods as local as honey and as exotic as the weaves and spices of the far-flung tribes. But, so close to the mountains, there were few places along this stretch of the road to rest out of the elements, and the village took full advantage of that fact.
The old inn that stood ju
st inside the boundaries, visible above the other buildings from the narrow valley path, seemed to sprout a few more rooms with every passing decade, and a small brewery had been established further in. Its product was not excellent, but it was enough to smooth the journey, and for that the village was flourishing. And with Fendale's destruction and Orton's evacuation, there were even fewer lodging options for the weary and desperate.
Garon passed three guards as he neared the village and walked as openly as any man with nothing at all to hide. They paid him little attention for it, and as he crossed the ramshackle boundary walls, the villagers seemed to share in their disregard. But there was a collective nervousness in the air that was impossible to miss. Every village, town and city he'd set foot in over the past month had radiated the same, with fevered eyes surreptitiously checking every individual for the umber of eastern skin or golden insignias on the shoulders of even the most weather-beaten cloaks, even though any mage looking to make trouble would have surely discarded it.
But the atmosphere didn't get beneath Garon's skin.
He moved calmly through the village, his sights on the inn's broad chimney rising ahead as a point of bearing, higher even than the local Temple shrine. He nodded politely to almost everyone he passed, setting them at ease with a smile, but while his gaze was brief and his movements unhurried, his hearing had sharpened. He picked out every conversation through the jumble of afternoon activity, listening for even only a passing mention of anything that might be pertinent: war movements and closed roads, tribal incursions and traps, escalating arcane interference, new arrivals and anything at all out of the ordinary. Even hearsay had value, if one knew how to filter through the muck.
