Maverick

by Curtis, Greg

  The sadness from that filled him, as did the grief from knowing that too many of those blackened and broken bodies belonged to his friends. There was outrage too as he saw far too many smaller bodies lying in the streets, children, and Snowy Falls always had children running around wild in the streets, generally making a nuisance of themselves and annoying the town guard as they did, but also bringing good cheer and the sound of laughter. This enemy was no respecter of age or innocence, nor a creature of any other decency. Not far behind that though was the sheer rage as he thought of those who had done this terrible thing. He wanted to go out and find these murderers and do to them what they had done to his friends, and with magic as his ally he might well be able to. But he had other responsibilities. It took discipline to control all those emotions, but he had always had that. All wizards did. In time he found the strength to carry on describing the scene, to pull out the salient facts and the matters that would affect them.

  “It happened some time ago, there are carrion birds in the sky and a few even on the ground, feeding. Wolves and other creatures are circling the village, waiting to join them, but the bigger beasts, more of the dire wolves and some sort of great hell boars are keeping them away while the soldiers search the village. They torch each building as they finish searching it and soon the town will be only ashes. Some of the people must have got out, the stables are empty and there are no horses anywhere as far as I can see. But I doubt it was many, and since the soldiers have torched the fields they’ll be hungry, while those that escaped are probably being hunted.”

  “Yet how did the enemy get there? There are no horses among the soldiers either, yet there are at least a hundred of them searching the town.” Even as he noticed the oddness the wizard in him, curious by nature, started wondering about it. A few perhaps could have ridden drakes as had the one this morning, although there were no drakes anywhere near by as far as he could be certain, but where had the rest come from? Had they ridden the wolves? What were they hunting for? And what was wrong with them?

  Even from the hawk’s vision so high above the town he could see that the soldiers were wrong. They had deformities. Spines sticking out of some of their backs, tusks from their mouths, hair in strange places, and their skins weren’t all normal looking skin, they were odd colours. And yet they weren’t all the same. Some had one deformity, some had another, and a few had several. In fact the only thing they had in common was in the wrongness of their essences. In that frightening, evil, darkness, they were all one.

  “Is there no one left?” He was glad when her words made him look away from the soldiers.

  “No one alive. Not human anyway. The soldiers, whatever else they are, they aren’t human. They look it, mostly, probably act it, maybe even were once, but the darkness that lives inside them, it’s like some sort of tear in the weave of life itself. A hole of pure darkness. Pure evil. And the beasts they control, if they control them, they’ve been damaged somehow. Like the wolves yesterday or the drake, they simply aren’t right.” He had no other way to describe what he was seeing, and in truth he didn’t even know what he was seeing. All he knew was that the colours of the beasts were all wrong. They seemed to live in a black world full of chaos, pain and rage, while their masters flashed the same colours as well. Were they truly masters and beasts, or all just monsters? Whatever they were, they were the opposite of life though not death, and the darkness at their centre, it frightened him.

  “Its like Gunder. There too there was no true attack no alarm was raised. The soldiers and the beasts were simply inside the city causing havoc and killing without mercy or reason before we knew they were even getting close.” Essaline’s words were welcome even though they explained nothing. At least they pointed to a common problem to be solved, and he liked problems. But this one would have to wait to be solved. Marjan let his thoughts leave the hawk and returned to his own body in front of the elf maiden and her students, all of who were staring at him.

  “It doesn’t matter how they attack, or even why. In the end it really just leaves us with one option, we can’t go to Snowy Falls any more. We can’t stock up with food and provisions or purchase some horses. And we can’t take the roads. If they’re here already, then the roads are theirs and the forests soon will be. We’ll have to go around the town as we keep heading south until we reach the chasm. There we’ll have to find another place to cross since I’m sure the great southern bridge will be guarded.” Of course there was only one other place within any reasonable distance where they could cross, and he didn’t want to mention its name. If nothing else it would frighten the children. In time Essaline would no doubt guess the truth for herself.

  Then she would be even less happy with him. There was another possibility though he was loath to use it. He could speak to the guild that evening, as far as he knew he was still permitted to do so and they hadn’t taken his crystal from him when he’d been expelled, and they might be able to offer an alternative or some knowledge, but he had no idea how they would receive his call, whether they would answer, whether they would help, or what they could even do if they wanted to. Still that was a matter for later. For the moment they had to travel on.

  “We should leave soon, if everyone has eaten their fill.” They had he knew, but the children were naturally reluctant to start marching once more and they protested their hunger and tiredness. It just wasn’t a choice. The longer they stayed in one place, the longer the beasts had to catch them, and they were too close already. He had to insist.

  “I’m sorry children, but we have to move. By nightfall we need to have crossed the next valley so that we can shelter in the caves at the crest of those hills to the south. We will be safe and dry there for the night, and a goodly distance from Snowy Falls.” More importantly they would hopefully be well away from whatever creatures now called the small village home, and they were the real threat.

  “But once we’re there I’ll catch a rabbit or two and cook a good meal for us all, and let you sleep for the night.” It wasn’t much of a reward but it was all he had to offer, and with Essaline’s help it slowly became enough as she got the children once more to their feet.

  The journey on that afternoon was shorter than the one they’d already made that morning, only a few leagues, but somehow it seemed far longer, every step an effort, every sorrowful breath a pain in his chest, and every check he made to make sure they weren’t followed, another reason to hold back pain. He had to be strong, he had to be watchful and ready, and he had to protect these children. But one day he promised himself, one day he would make these monsters pay.

  ****************

  “What are you doing?” It was late and the children were busy sleeping after their hard day’s travel, the first of many to come, leaving only Essaline and himself awake and free to talk, and the maiden was curious as usual, perhaps it was an elven trait he hadn’t heard of. There were sure to be a few. On the other hand he realised as he set up the crystal in its frame and then extended the complex lens arrangement around it, perhaps she had reason to be curious given what she now knew of him, and in any case what he was doing was not something she would have seen before. The crystal of far sight was not something normally shown to anyone outside of the various Magic Guilds, and not spoken of either. Wizards guarded their secrets well.

  Regardless this was a good time and a good place to speak of such things. The cave, an ancient hole in the rocky cliffs of the valley wall that had once surely had water rushing through it, was warm and dry. Plenty of fresh grass had been gathered by the children to form mattresses to sleep on and even for Willow to chew on. The fire he’d carefully lit in the entrance way kept predators away while he’d heated some stones at the back of the cave to give them enough warmth to be comfortable through the long cold night, and he’d even cooked a quite acceptable evening meal of rabbit stew and potatoes which had gone down well. He doubted that if any of the enemy were in the region that they would have spotted them, and if they had he
was prepared. So they were safe and comfortable and surely very tired after their first day’s travel, even he as an experienced woodsman was tired, though the ache was truly of his heart, and it was perhaps time to speak more openly about things he hadn’t wanted to discuss earlier, before even Essaline fell asleep.

  “I’m sending a message to the Guild.” He smiled at her, knowing she wouldn’t understand and somewhat glad of that. After having revealed so much of himself already, it was nice to have a mystery or two left to him, if only for a few more minutes.

  “Ohh.” She didn’t sound as if she believed him though she had surely been given enough reason by then, but he didn’t care. She was beautiful, her skin glowing orange in the flickering firelight, her eyes dark and yet filled with the sparkle of green diamonds in them, and perhaps most wondrous of all, she hadn’t condemned him once that day after learning of his crime. She could have said anything and he wouldn’t have cared right then. Instead of telling her off, not that he had any right to do so, he simply carried on patiently with his work while he explained the why of it. The fact of it would reveal itself in due course.

  “We need to know if they still stand and what they can tell us of the enemy, and they need to know of us. Perhaps they can send help, or grant us some useful knowledge, or even guide us to others who we can aid or who can aid us.” He had doubts about the last, the enemy was simply too ruthless to allow many survivors, and despite keeping all his senses sharp all day he hadn’t felt anyone else nearby, but he had a need to know that the guild still stood. It was almost an instinct within him even if he hadn’t spoken to them in many years. They were family even to an outcast.

  With a quick gesture of his fingers he set the crystal alight, causing it to shine with a brilliant white light like that of the stars themselves, and then focused the large lens so that the light it gave off was cast on to the cave wall in front of them in an oval of brilliance. The smaller lens he’d already set so that he could look through it into the crystal and be seen by whom so ever made contact with him.

  It was a useful magic. Elves were renown for their ability to fire talk, to cast their voices into the flames of one fire and have another hear them coming from the flames of another fire many leagues distant, though not all could do it. Though they seldom spoke of such things wizards had their own methods and they could cast more than just words across the leagues.

  “I am Marjan. Are there any in Gunder who can speak with me?” He spoke normally knowing his voice along with his image would be cast into the crystal and reflected upon the walls of any set up to listen, and he knew that every guild would always have someone on duty night and day, waiting to hear from wayward wizards. Especially now. What he didn’t know was whether there were any wizards remaining in Gunder to hear him. Whether there was even a guild remaining.

  It had been a long time since Essaline and the children had fled the city, and the battle had been terrible from what they had told him, he had no idea if the guild still stood. It was strong but so was the enemy. But if it still stood he knew there would be someone on duty to receive his call. It was one of the duties they forced upon adepts with the ability, even making them stand watch throughout the long night. Every guild member with the affinity, which included him even though he no longer was one, had to be able to send back home and be heard at any hour of the day or night. And thanks to his studying the technique in detail and some careful craftsmanship, he still could.

  Marjan waited patiently for a bit, trying to maintain his calm, and then when nothing happened repeated his call, starting to worry. It was strange, but even though he had been cast out, he had never considered the Guild as anything but a friend and a home, and he didn’t like the thought that it might have fallen.

  Then finally and almost as he was preparing to give up, fearing that the Guild had fallen, a figure appeared in the light, a young student’s figure dressed in a wizards robe. It was almost enough to make Marjan cheer, but he remembered his mission instead and remained stoic, maintaining the spell. Few were the apprentices who could use this means of communication, and there were many adepts who couldn’t either. The magic required intense concentration and uncontrolled emotions tended to disrupt the spell.

  “I am Yaris, adept at the Gunder Magic Guild. I can speak with you Marjan.” He looked too young to be an adept Marjan thought, surely not yet eighteen or nineteen, and his face still had the wide eyed look of naivety about it, but he was wearing the basic black robes with the simple gold trim, and surely no one not yet an adept would be foolish enough to do so, while those more advanced would never so demean themselves.

  “I am pleased to greet you Yaris, and more pleased to hear that the Guild still stands as I have been told of the battle you fight. But while I would not distract them from their duties and though they are surely busy I will need you to get a message to the masters when they are able to listen.”

  “I will give them your words.” Of course he would Marjan knew, especially when he saw the sheaf of parchments and a charcoal pencil beside the adept, so many of them already covered in his script. He would take detailed notes of all the messages he received, he wouldn’t dare do any less, even for a maverick, but it might be some time before those words made it to the masters. At the same time he saw nothing in the adept’s face to suggest that he recognised either him or his name and that was good. He had no reason, yet, to distrust him, to doubt his words or ignore his sending. As far as he knew, Marjan was just another wizard with another message, and by the looks of things there had already been many. He just hoped all of them weren’t as dire as what he had to pass on.

  “The enemy has attacked the refugees on the southern road out of the city, preventing them from reaching safety, killing thousands and driving thousands more into the Allyssian Forest where his beasts hunt them down mercilessly. He has captured and destroyed the town of Snowy Falls and at least a thousand lie dead there in the streets, while his soldiers search through the remains for something or someone and his beasts now fill the forests. The city itself is surely surrounded as is the land and he extends his grasp further south towards the chasm.”

  “His army includes werewolves to lead packs of dire wolves, hell boars and drakes with riders. The riders and the other soldiers themselves, dressed and made up to look like soldiers of the Vardan Regency, and seemingly humans, are not. Maybe they were once but no longer. They are something else. Something cold and evil, something alien and dark. Something that goes against sanity and life itself. I have not seen their like before, and yet when I set eyes upon them I am reminded of the same dark magic that I sensed in the werewolf that led one of the dire wolf packs.”

  “Meanwhile I am leading a small group of students from the Goran Academy and their teacher south through the Allyssian Forest. I do not know how many other groups of the students and other refugees are still alive, still on the roads or wandering lost and frightened through the forests, but I do know that they are being hunted, not as potential hostages or even serfs, but only as more victims to murder.”

  “If others should call and are nearby, I will attempt to reach them, to bring them to safety. You have my name, and if any should be able to fire talk, you also have the name of their teacher, Mistress Essaline.” He watched as the adept scribbled furiously on a piece of parchment, his script untidy because of his haste, something the Masters would no doubt make mention of, waiting until he was ready.

  “I will speak with you again tomorrow evening if I can. But until then is there anything you can tell me of other survivors?” He had to ask even though he feared the answer, and the adept’s despairing look confirmed everything that he’d not wanted to hear.

  “There is little, I regret, to report. There are a number of members of the Guild throughout the great southern forests, travellers for the most part caught up in these terrible events. Most are journeymen simply performing their years of service. Some of the other southern towns have been attacked, others are being aband
oned as they wait for the enemy to show. I will give them your name when I hear from them later. I would hope to have news for you tomorrow. Meanwhile the battle rages in Gunder, with every day more thousands of the enemy destroyed, and every day thousands more arriving out of nowhere to replace the fallen.” There in lay the mystery and the danger, and Marjan was glad to have made the decision to leave. The enemy was if not without limit, than the next thing to it, just as the children and their teacher had said.