by D. R. Rosier
Of course, in a weird way that too proved it was all real, because as alluring as all the women were, especially the two attracted to me, this was far from any fantasy I’d ever had about women. It hadn’t even been on my radar that way. These women truly needed me, and although it was clear I had a chance with both Sharon and Lia because of their society, it was also clear I could fuck it up.
No, losing the feeling of the goddess’s presence as it faded or not, I still knew this was real, and I was scared. I was truthfully, scared to die. I was scared of the power that existed in me, partly because I had no clue how to use it, and partly because I feared I would grow arrogant and embrace that power for power’s sake.
I doubted that would happen, I couldn’t imagine turning into a person that would enslave the women around me, it was so far from who I was it seemed impossible. Yet… the goddess had told me I’d be tempted, and would have to resist. They called it corruption of power for a reason, because no one started out with the worst intentions, it was a part of human nature, and I’d have to watch for it.
I looked up and saw Sharon studying me thoughtfully, and we locked eyes for a moment. I could so easily get lost in those blue eyes, if I let myself. I supposed maybe I’d gotten lost in my thoughts a little too long, and wondered how long I’d been staring at the last of my food as I returned her gaze. A clatter of a platter next to me broke that connection and I turned my head.
Another beautiful woman, of course, and one I hadn’t met yet. I wondered when that would stop surprising me. She had long wavy hair the color of liquid midnight.
She nodded at me, with curiosity in her light blue-green eyes, and said, “Maria, I’m one of the navigators.”
That explained why I hadn’t seen her before, I was told to stay away from the helm.
“Tony, nice to meet you.”
She had a cute body too, except, she was obviously pregnant, five or six months, not that I was a great judge of such things. One more nail in the coffin of the delusional fantasy theory, not that I really believed that to be the case. But then, crazy people never did think they were crazy, did they? Regardless, I definitely had no weird pregnant woman fetish.
Lia asked, “Doing okay?”
Maria sighed, and gave her superior a look.
Sharon choked out a laugh, and explained to me, “We’ve been trying to get her to cut down on hours, she won’t hear of it though.”
Maria shook her head stubbornly, “I’m pregnant, not disabled. Although I think this is my last mission until this one is weened, I’m coming up on my seventh month.”
Lia nodded, but wisely didn’t comment.
The rest of the meal I didn’t say much. The three ladies gossiped about who was pregnant, and other things I felt completely unqualified to comment on.
One more coffin nail, I definitely would never ever have a fantasy about girl talk.
I did learn a few things though, Maria had a husband, and shared him with two other women, one of which happened to be Marie the cook, which perhaps explained a few things. From what I could tell from following along, about half the crew was married that way, the other half were dealing with a men shortage.
I wasn’t normally a self-doubter, I was fairly confident in fact, but a part of me wondered if Lia and Sharon’s attraction to me was for a lack of other choices. But I dismissed that idea quickly. The women on ship were too confident and sure to settle, if they weren’t, more of the ladies would be sending me signals. That it was just those two, said a lot.
The confusing part, was it was the two that I was most attracted too. I had no idea what to make of that, in my experience life was more complicated than that. Still, that didn’t mean I or even they couldn’t screw it up, and things were very tentative and obviously on hold with me being a prisoner still, even if in name only. We hadn’t really done anything more than share glances, and a shy smile or two.
I shook my head, and tried to push it all down in my mind. I was overwhelmed, and getting back to my original point, I was quite worried about the future. The six ships hunting us, was only a small part of that…
Chapter Six
Nine ships.
After a night’s rest, and breakfast, my watchers, potential mates, girlfriends? Most likely a mix of all three. Regardless, the three of us headed up onto the top deck, upper deck? I wasn’t really big on nautical terms. Plus, another world, I decided to ask about all of it, later, when we weren’t being hunted.
The original six ships hadn’t lost us, they were maybe a two miles out at our five o’clock, assuming the bow was twelve. Almost a stern chase but not quite. There were three other ships coming from nine o’clock, slightly turned and cutting at an angle to rendezvous with us, and I doubted they’d be throwing us a party.
Lia cursed, and then said, “It was a risk. When we turned in the night, we knew we’d be going closer to an established trade route between the islands. Three vessels is a normal patrol group, so I doubt they were looking for us specifically, but…” she trailed off, instead of stating the obvious. They were after us now, which meant nine ships to fight.
I heard Melinda’s voice behind me.
“Suggestions Lia?”
Lia didn’t hesitate, “Turn to port, and take the patrol head on. If we’re lucky, well destroy them before the six ships reach us. If we let them maneuver us into fighting all nine at once, which is clearly their goal, we’re dead.”
Melinda nodded sharply, “Agreed. Make it happen.”
Melinda turned and went toward her ready room.
Lia yelled, “Turn to port, run down that patrol.”
I heard Maria’s even reply, as if Lia had just ordered tea and biscuits, and not a collision course with a battle for life and death, and my respect for these women and the crew went up another notch. They were truly impressive.
I felt Sharon’s hand touch my back, and was surprised for a moment, she’d never touched me before. I realized a moment later when she spoke, that she’d done it to take the sting out of her words.
“You should go below and get in your quarters, right now you’re helpless, and an easy target. Any wielder could kill you with a thought with your magic suppressed.”
The obvious concern in her voice also took some of the sting out, but it sat wrong in my gut. My instincts were to protect these women. Unlike back home, that meant fighting at their side, instead of standing between them and danger, but it amounted to the same thing in my mind. The idea of hiding in my cabin while these women fought against great odds turned to ashes in my mouth.
I nodded reluctantly, but didn’t speak. I was afraid the bracelets wouldn’t let me stop talking when I said I’d go to my cabin, and might make me say that I intended to try and get around the magic, and help from there.
Even though I was terrified I’d do something stupid and actually help the enemy out of inexperience by mistake.
She gave me a wan smile, and rubbed my back as I moved toward the hatch and steep ladder stairway down, and walked back to my room. For the first time since I’d been shot, I felt alone…
I started to wonder if my theory had been wrong. I’d sat on my bunk in a meditation posture, and for the last hour I’d failed to connect with the magic in the bracelets. I flinched, when the sounds of battle reached me, and still I sat there, helpless. I could feel the magic of the bracelets buzzing in my mind, but when I reached out for it nothing at all changed, and I wished someone would magically just tell me how to touch and connect to the magic.
It buzzed in the back of my mind, mocking me. I also felt a little stupid, as if the idea that I had magic was insane, and trying to connect was feeding that delusion.
Then I frowned in thought, as something very obvious occurred to me. If I couldn’t connect with the magic, how was I feeling it? What if I couldn’t connect with the magic because I already was. What if that was the natural part of my gift, all the noise that first time when I landed on the deck, before the lovely captain Melinda kicked
me in the head, was my magic automatically connected to all magic within my range.
I changed tacks, instead of trying to connect with the magic in the bracelet, I merely tried to control it, suppress it, and crush it with my mind. What followed was complete and utter chaos, as my head started to buzz and was bombarded from all directions at once. For a brief moment, I was flushed with my success, and then the chaos destroyed my concentration, and once again I felt nothing but the buzzing of the bracelets.
Well, fuck.
I braced my mind, whatever the fuck that means, and then did it again. This time when the chaos hit me, I was ready for it and managed to hold the thought which suppressed the magic of the bracelet clearly in my mind. I felt the buzz of magic, and the feeling of the four elements now available to me again. Just like that first night, but less shocking without the events that preceded that first time to overwhelm me.
I felt wet, hot, the coolness of the air, and the pressure of the earth gently pressing on my mind. This part wasn’t instinctive, I had to work at it. Like a chef that knows the scent of spices, I had to learn the flavors and scents of the buzz of magic. The major elements were obvious, but isolating them to the owners of that magic wasn’t.
Worse, I felt other things, like the wards and spells they talked about. I felt the light spells, the heating elements in the kitchen, the persevering wards on the food in the hold. There was also a large blanket of magic around the ship itself, and I studied it in my mind, while trying to shut off the cacophony of all the other magic. Not the magic itself, but to filter it out in my own mind. Like ignoring the din of a restaurant, but so much harder because I’d never done it before. It wasn’t just from the women on this ship, but from the three ships around us. Everything was a huge distraction.
That made sense too, obviously there was a range limit to the magic, I didn’t feel the other six ships for instance, yet, but all the ships had to be within that range if they wanted to fight. I tasted the blanket of magic with my mind, but I had no real way to judge what it did. Except, it felt like ownership. Obviously, it would have been better to have someone to ask questions of, but I think I had an idea of what it did.
It made everything within the wards owned by the magic of the crew, those that were keyed into the spell. Sharon had explained another wielder couldn’t wield something owned by another’s magic, except for me and the other diviners of course. This blanket ward would prevent wielders on the other ships from using our own ship against us. Either an Earth wielder pulling it apart, or an air wielder from sucking the air off of the deck, or freezing it, or… the possibilities were endless.
Which meant the only way for fighting ships to damage the other ships was to use the ocean, the air above the ocean, or what they brought along in their own ships.
Except, I wasn’t constrained in that way at all. Like the bracelet, that large ward was connected to me, through my magic. I may have been powerful, but I realized quickly I was also limited, by being a mortal man with one mind. I could probably do a few things at once, but there were many enemy wielders out there. The idea of me controlling and choking off all their magic at the same time was ridiculous. I may have been powerful, but I wasn’t a god.
Connecting to magic was automatic, but controlling it took a focused will, I understood that already. I couldn’t just wish them all suppressed, I’d have to concentrate on each one. Which meant… that approach was worthless.
Marie had told me Lia was the strongest air wielder she’d ever met, which made her magic obvious to me. She felt like a hurricane, amidst a few typhoons and small tornados. I tried to connect with her, and then laughed at myself, since I already was. It was just… counterintuitive, and automatic.
I reached out to not only increase her magic, but borrow it as well, and channel the air for myself. It was a bumbling first attempt, and I lost the thought holding the bracelet at bay, and the world went quiet again as the bracelets once again trapped my mind.
Crap, this wasn’t easy.
I took a deep breath and focused, and squashed the magic in the bracelets again. I had the feeling I could destroy them permanently if I wanted, kill the spell itself, but I figured I’d be in enough trouble as it was. When I suppressed the bracelet’s magic, I felt four vessels, and then five, then six.
It was obvious the other six had caught up. I didn’t have any more time to figure things out.
I concentrated on Lia again and flinched and lost it again, as I felt five sources of magic above me go out. That could only mean that five of the women had just died.
I was overwhelmed for a brief moment. Five women had just died, and here I was fucking up again. The anger rose and pushed forward, I used it to push the fear and doubt away.
One more time, I held the bracelet while I felt Lia’s magic, and I could see where it came from, the channel. I had another leap of understanding, people weren’t really stripped of magic, they just had those channels blocked, and crushed. No doubt deliberate lies to hide the truth, another diviner could free the magic that was supposedly taken away and stripped.
I had no proof, but felt the truth in my gut. I didn’t really have time right now to think it through though, so decided to keep it to myself for now and think through it later. I opened her channels further to enhance the strongest air wielder even more. I stretched them open a little, and shared her magic. I could suddenly feel all the air around me, and knew it would answer my call.
All except the air in the seven remaining ships, two of the nine had already been destroyed.
I wasn’t done though, I was just getting started.
I somehow kept enough of my mind on the bracelet and Lia, while I reached out and did yet a third thing with my mind. I’d have to practice multi-tasking apparently. It was a strange mixture, because to effect something required focus. It was almost a paradox, that I had to focus on several things at once. Luckily, my very basic and brutal plan only involved two things at once. With the bracelet, that just made three. Even that was hard though, and would have been impossible without my martial arts and meditation background.
I reached out to the nearest ship and demanded that the ward recognize me. I wondered if the people on this world even knew what a vacuum was, as I felt the air in and around that ship, and ordered it to compress, and form a globe around it, while I evacuated every molecule of air inside that globe.
I was conflicted as I murdered every human on that ship, and it took about half a minute. Some died almost immediately, and I knew those were the ones that had stubbornly held their breath, causing their lungs to explosively decompress. I waited until I felt no more magical signatures.
I hesitated before I went to the next ship and repeated my performance, but then I felt three more magical signatures wink out above me. That hardened my resolve, and I felt slightly ashamed when I checked to make sure Sharon was still alive first, and not only felt sharp relief, but even joy, that it had been someone else that died. I don’t know how I knew, but I was sure it was her when I felt her magic.
This was a fight for our lives, and these women were guilty of crimes perhaps, but their mission was just, and right. The Iziral kingdom was sick and corrupt. Sorceresses were persecuted simply for being women of power, and I could make a difference. If I didn’t, they, and I, would all die here, now.
I reached out for another ship, there were four now, the ladies up above had taken out two more. A part of me had noted the fire, water, earth, and air being tossed between all the ships, and wondered what kind of chaos it was up there, but I found my mind tuning that stuff out. I was able to focus on the bracelets, Lia, the air around me, and the wards on the next ship I chose to target.
It was easier this time, the ward welcomed me at the slightest prompting, though I still had to focus enough to continuously send it my intentions so it didn’t kick me out. Then I once again ripped the air from the enemy ship, and used all that air to create a high pressure bubble around the ship. They all died. I wonder
ed then if it had been necessary to wait the thirty seconds, I imagined when I released that high pressure bubble inwardly, the air rushing back in probably tore the wood sailing ship into pieces. I didn’t know for sure though, I couldn’t see anything being stuck in my cabin, I could just feel all the magic.
I was numb when I reached for the third ship, and once again repeated my performance. The last ship was toast already. Somehow I intrinsically knew how many magical signatures I was connected to, and all in all we lost eight of the crew. Two attacks that hadn’t been countered no doubt.
I let it all go, Lia’s magic returned to normal, which was still quite strong, and I could no longer feel the air, the buzzing all around me faded and then stopped, which while it had still been distracting was no longer total chaos. I took a deep breath, and felt a bone deep weariness. Magic took effort.
I waited then, and decided it had been worth it, even if they killed me for saving their lives. That’s what I told myself, as I tried not to think about the lives I’d ended. Self-defense is justified, or as they say in playground parlance, they’d started it, I’d merely ended it.
It had been worth it.
Chapter Seven
The fear on Lia’s face when she came to collect me was a punch in the gut. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected, but it wasn’t that.
Lia said, “The captain wishes to speak to you.”
I nodded, and we made our way up top toward the ready room. Several of the women gave me wide berth, and even changed their direction in order to not cross my path. I sighed as we made it up top, Lia did not follow me into the ready room.
Melinda had a cold look on her face as she studied me, after making me wait a while she finally spoke.
