by Guy Antibes
Jack didn’t want to remind anyone that he could teleport, so he quickly went to the commissary and loaded up on food and water before he began the trek up the long ramp to the surface of the steppes. He reached the top, hoping to read tracks, but there were too many visitors to Deep Mist for Jack to find Grigar’s.
He looked down at the massive hole in the ground. Where could they have taken Grigar? Jack smiled. Perhaps Grigar could tell him.
Jack concentrated on the older wizard’s face in his mind and reached out to talk to him.
Jack? Grigar said.
How did you know it was I? Don’t you communicate with other people?
Jack picked up a sense of humor.
You have your very own signature, lad. Didn’t they say telepathy wasn’t permitted?
Jack nodded his head to no one in particular. No rules. They didn’t give me a horse. My mission is to find you and bring you back to Deep Mist. What is your mission?
To evade you as long as I can. They are playing us against each other. What do you propose we do?
Jack laughed. Did they give you a definition of evade? If they didn’t, we could stay out of Deep Mist for a long enough period before we teleport back. Where are you currently headed?
I am heading southeast of Deep Mist toward a mystical spot. It is a cluster of mountains in the middle of the desert. A tribe used to live there, but now it draws a certain kind of Masukaian looking for enlightenment. That is enlightenment capitalized. They seek to pledge themselves so they can live in Zukori’s bosom. It involves a trek up the mountain to a shrine at the very top. My three escorts have been there, but they insist they aren’t one of the crazy people.
Jack thought for a minute. I’ll get there before you and reconnoiter for a bit. We can meet up and decide how long we want to stay so you can get sufficient credit for your mission.
You don’t lack for confidence, do you, Jack? Be careful. My escorts tell me there is a big mystery wrapped up in the shrine. It might be a campfire ghost story. Let’s not communicate unless there is an emergency.
I forgot to check. Do you have your anti-coercion charm?
First thing I grabbed. Take care of yourself and don’t overextend. We don’t know what surprises might be in store.
Jack gazed at the arid land to get his bearings and teleported toward the southeast.
~
Jack flipped up the hood of his cloak and entered a small inn. Horses filled the hitching posts, so he hoped the food and drink might be noteworthy. He stepped toward the back of the common room and sat on the floor at a table for two.
The customers drank rice wine out of tiny cups. Jack half-heartedly wished for some ale, but Masukaians drank wine more than beer. Masukaian beer was pretty awful, so Jack didn’t drink it either.
An old man shuffled over to Jack. “Drink or food?”
“Both,” Jack said. “You look busy.”
The man nodded. “Payday for those who are free,” he said. “I’m indentured and have been half my life, so…” The old man shrugged.
“Who hires out here on the southern steppes?”
“There is a place two day’s travel from here. This is the closest place that sells wine.” The man stepped away and brought back a small bottle of wine, a bowl of rice, and a mixture of vegetables and chicken in a sauce. “That is all we serve at midday.”
“I’m looking for some people who have a short, older man in their custody. He is a bit younger than you, I would imagine,” Jack said.
“They ate breakfast here and headed for Zuri Mountain. That is where the mine is. Why do you seek them?”
“The old man is a friend. I want to make sure he has gone with them voluntarily.”
The server looked back at the room. “If he hasn’t, I might be worried. They do strange things at Zuri Mountain. There is a village at the bottom, and they are constantly in fear for their lives. A few of them are regular customers. Wine can erase fear for a short while.”
“Is the mountain hard to find?”
The old man frowned and shook his head. “Just follow the tracks. It is where most people come and go.” He asked Jack to pay and left him.
Armed with some knowledge, Jack ate his meal happy he wasn’t bothered by the others in the common room. It looked to him that they were still getting started when he left and walked out of the village, following the tracks.
Once he traveled far enough so he wouldn’t be seen, he teleported in line of sight, and four jumps later, he could see an eruption jutting from the steppe in the distance. It had to be Zuri Mountain, and Jack hoped that Grigar was on his way there.
Jack hoped he wouldn’t overextend his teleporting capability, but after his next jump, he could feel his stomach rebel. He sat down in the shade of a gully wall to rest up. He was out of the sight of anyone on the road that ran along the top edge.
A little sleep would do his stomach some good, so Jack grabbed an extra shirt out of his bag and balled it up for a pillow before he settled down for a nap.
The sun was edging down from the horizon when Jack woke up. He rubbed his eyes and shook off the sleep before he crept up the wall and surveyed the road. Riders were coming from the village. Jack hid behind an outcropping of rock and spotted Grigar’s shape on one of the horses. His hands were bound together. Jack began to teleport, and three jumps later, he was in walking distance of the village at the base of the tallest mountain.
He looked for an inn, but the place was too small. At least half of the houses looked empty. Jack stopped a man carrying a child on his shoulders. “Is this Zuri Mountain?”
“No,” the man said. He looked up at the mountain’s slope and pointed. “That is Zuri Mountain and those who seek it are at the top, not down here. We are servants for them.”
“Indentured?”
The man made a face. “Might as well be. We can’t make enough extra of anything to sell in the few villages that surround the mountain, so we remain here.” The boy squirmed, and the man let him down. Both of them watched the man’s son disappear around a corner. “Why are you in the village?”
Jack turned to the mountain. “My friend has been abducted and taken there.” Actually, Jack wondered if Grigar had arrived yet. He didn’t know.”
“You think you can save him from the Zurians?”
“That’s what they are called?”
The villager looked up at Jack. “Who are you? A foreigner, now that I take a good look at you?”
Jack nodded. “So is my friend. I’m from Corand, but I’m in training in the steppe.”
“Deep Mist?”
Jack raised his eyebrows. “You know about them?”
The man nodded. “They think they are so righteous, but what have they ever done for us?” he said.
“I can’t answer that. Is there a place I can curl up for the night? A flat patch of ground where I won’t be disturbed is good enough for me,” Jack said.
“Behind that house,” the man pointed. “There is a plot of dirt. Used to be a garden, but the water dried up.”
“How do you get your water? Is there a well?” Jack asked.
The Zurians control the water. We were getting a bit too prosperous for them, so they raised their prices. That was when they started taking our people to serve them up the mountain. Sometimes, the miners that seek gold and silver are used as their guards.”
“I don’t know how I can help you, there,” Jack asked.
“I didn’t ask for your help. Have a good night’s rest, since it might be your last. The Zurians don’t like strangers. You can take that as a friendly warning.”
Jack didn’t think it was particularly friendly, but the man did talk to him, and for that, he was grateful. He was about to thank him, but the man walked away toward where his son disappeared.
Jack found the garden easily enough. There was a broken rake that Jack used to smooth out a place to sleep. He ate some trail rations and drank cool water provided by Eldora’s cuff. His stomach wasn�
�t fully settled, but he slept until the sun bathed his face.
A few villagers were already up. Jack didn’t bother them and consumed a meager breakfast before heading around the village looking for the way up the mountain. He discovered the only road that wound around the mountain out of sight of the village and began to head up when Jack encountered Grigar’s escort coming down from the mountain.
One of the men stopped in front of Jack.
“How did you get here?” the vaguely familiar face asked.
Jack sighed. He didn’t know he would be recognized so easily, but then the Deep Mist guards were dressed just about the same as Jack.
“I am a fast walker,” Jack said. “Grigar is up there?”
“The little wizard? Yeah. He cooperated. Do you know what you are to do?”
“Will we have to fight?”
The men laughed. The one who spoke smiled at Jack. “He is now in the custody of the Zurians. They follow Zukori. Zuri is short for the god of battle’s name. You’d better hurry before your friend becomes enlightened.” That was all he said as the men passed him on the road.
Jack followed their progress down the mountain until they were lost to view and began his climb up the top. He smiled. He gave them less information than they gave him. No matter how he pieced the fragments of information together, Jack didn’t look forward to his next few days in the steppe.
He didn’t travel much farther up the road when he passed a small plateau that jutted out from the mountain. The flat top held a few buildings, horses, and equipment. This must be the mining operation, and that meant the Zurians lived further up the mountain.
Jack wished he could teleport all the way up the mountain, but he decided to grab a bit more information and walked toward a cluster of miners. Their faces were wary as he approached them.
“I have a friend up there,” Jack pointed to the sky with his thumb. “Have any of you visited the Zurians?”
The men laughed at him. One of them knocked off Jack’s hood revealing his Corandian features.
“I thought you were a foreigner. Why do you want to know?”
“As I said, I have a friend that was taken up there.”
“To be enlightened?” The men laughed.
“What does ‘enlightened’ mean?”
“You’ll find out when the Zurians catch you. We work for them, you know.”
“They own the mine?”
A few of the men grunted, and one of them said, “You shouldn’t be poking around up here.”
Jack backed away, his hand drifting to his sword.
“Hey, none of us have any weapons,” one of the men said.
“Good. I don’t want to use this. I’ll be heading up.” Jack backed up a bit before turning around and heading back to the road. He heard a few steps approach. He whipped his sword out as he faced three men with knives in their hands. “I have no reason to fight you,” Jack said.
The men backed up a bit. “You know how to use that?”
Jack just nodded and looked as menacing as he could. Not knowing if he succeeded or not, he walked backward all the way to the road and began to climb. As soon as the miners disappeared from view, Jack teleported up to the road in tiny jumps. He reached a switchback and teleported to the middle of the segment to look down. The three miners must have run up the road since they stood in the middle. Jack smiled. He wouldn’t have minded looking at their astonished faces.
By using shorter jumps, the teleportation barely fazed him as he made his way up the mountain. At one point, he heard roaring to his right and decided to investigate. He found a trail that led a few hundred paces at the same level and discovered a waterfall, of all things.
It plunged from somewhere above, but as Jack looked down, the waterfall fell into a pool of turbulent water, but then disappeared back into the mountain. No water spilled over. He spotted the village further out from the mountain and wondered if the water had made it down the mountain at some point, making the village’s site make more sense.
He retraced his steps and set back up the road. He heard horses behind him. Jack found a spot of shade and invoked invisibility before the horses came into view. All the men wore arms.
One of the miners led the group. “He couldn’t have gotten this far. We should check the trail to the waterfall,” the man said, turning around and heading back the way they came.
Jack continued up the mountain as the sun was setting. He found a sliver of level ground behind a grouping of scrub bushes and decided he would infiltrate into the Zurian enclave in the dark.
Chapter Twenty
~
J ack woke and jumped to his feet. Something was crawling all over him. He created a tiny wizard light and looked down at a swarm of ants where he had just been. Jack quickly removed his clothes in the darkness and washed ants off his body and tried to do the same with his clothes. Luckily, his backpack, which he had hung from one of the bushes, was unscathed.
He examined his cloak and was able to shake off most of the ants and began to pick the things off, knowing that he would be living with little ant bodies for some time. Jack grunted and decided it was time to get going.
Once back on the road in the darkness, he realized he couldn’t safely teleport at night, so he began to hike up the mountain. His idea of smoothly infiltrating the Zurian buildings to find Grigar wasn’t going as well as he had hoped. Trudging up the mountain lasted for much too long. By the time he reached an unlit gate across the road, Jack was bored.
He put his ear to the opening between the two gate doors, but couldn’t hear a thing. Jack teleported to the other side and looked out at the outline of a large, empty courtyard. It was time to communicate with Grigar.
Grigar, I’m in the Zurian courtyard, Jack thought.
Nothing happened. Jack repeated his call, but this time, he received a jumbled reply.
Woke an old man up from his beauty sleep, Grigar said. Where are you?
Jack gritted his teeth as he sustained a tiny bite on his lower back. Ouch!
Grigar communicated a sense of alarm. They caught you?
No. I slept on an anthill or something. I was hoping I got rid of all the little critters, but there is at least one that is happily sucking my blood.
Ants don’t suck blood, but they do bite, Grigar said.
Where are you? Jack asked.
I am bound in chains outside in the cold. Let me think…
I don’t think I can stop you, Jack said, smiling to himself.
If you have your back to the gate, I am past the stables on the left-hand side. I’m not under guard, but I am trussed up.
Jack slipped along the walls like he was taught at Deep Mist, not that he wouldn’t have done such a thing anyway. This was a mission, after all. He found Grigar sitting against a wall.
“I was sleeping,” the older wizard said, smiling, “but I sat up just for you.”
“Can you get out of those on your own?” Jack asked.
“Of course. But I had to wait for you to save me. My escorts here said it would take you a few days to catch up to them since you were supposed to be on foot.”
Jack frowned. “I hated to disappoint them when I met them at the bottom of the mountain. Shall we be off?”
Grigar shook his head. “We have to finish my mission. I am to find out what is going on here. Are the Zurians part of the Red Herons? What do they do up here? Those kinds of things.”
“What are they mining in the mountain?” Jack said. “That is what I’d like to know. There is a waterfall that basically goes nowhere. I wonder about that too.”
“So, do you have a plan?”
Jack raised his eyebrows and sat next to Grigar. “Am I supposed to have a plan? I’m the rescuer, and you are the spy.”
Grigar chuckled. “I suppose we can do both, can’t we?”
Jack nodded. It was dark enough not to know if Grigar could see him move his head. “We can. How were you, abducted?”
“Two Deep Mist wi
zard-warriors came into my room and said. ‘You are abducted.’ Then they gave me a few rules and said I have a couple of minutes to collect a few things, which I did. I’ve already been subjected to a coercion spell. I just played along.” Jack could make out Grigar’s white teeth when the older man smiled. “They did warn me that I’d be left among enemies and I could perish.”
“Lucky you,” Jack said. “I was just told to find you and bring you back, but I guess I came too soon.”
“It will be more fun playing with the Zurians. They are fanatics about what they call enlightenment, but there is something sinister behind it all. We can find out together, eh?”
Jack shook his head. The Pearl Mist didn’t fool around when they tested people. Tanner and Helen nearly perished in their first foray. Jack vowed to do better.
“When are they going to wake you up?”
Grigar grunted. “You tell me.”
They waited until dawn began to lighten up the sky.
Grigar nudged Jack. “Time to find a hiding place. There are plenty about.”
A tack shed was built just on the other side of the stable. He could see Grigar from inside, so he slipped inside and began to wait for someone to show up.
The sun still hadn’t risen when a woman in an orange robe confronted Grigar.
“Are you ready to be enlightened?” she asked.
“Not particularly,” Grigar said. “I am ready for breakfast, though. What is on the menu?”
The woman didn’t look very amused to Jack.
“You are on the menu,” the woman said, displaying a sour look. “Get up.”
“Can you help an old man?”
The woman put her hands on her ample hips. “You aren’t that old,” she said.
He was to Jack, but the helper stayed silent in the little shed.
Grigar popped to his feet. “Am I going to hop to wherever you lead me?”
“Oh,” the woman said. She produced a knife and cut the rope binding Grigar’s ankles. “Come with me.” The woman looked directly at Jack. “And you can come, too, young man.”
