The Blood Wars Trilogy Omnibus: Volumes 1 - 3

by T. A. Miles

  Sharlotte began to walk quickly in the direction of the battle. Korsten accompanied for the time being, whether that had been her intention or not.

  “There’s been no word of troops along the cliffs,” Deitir explained to one of the new mages present—a very young looking woman with bright blonde hair and brighter eyes. At a glance, she and Vlas could have been siblings. Even their manner was similar, particularly in the sense that it was so remorselessly forward.

  “So, those are troops that are occupied with waiting,” she decided. “Perhaps needlessly.”

  “Not needlessly,” Rahl told her, disregarding her apparent youth, her gender, or her station as a mage. He spoke to her in the same firm tones he typically addressed any of his men—and any of the women—under his supervision. “If forces arrive on the cliffs, we’ll be crushed between both sides, above and below.”

  “Yes,” Vlas agreed. The agreement seemed to surprise Rahl momentarily. It at least kept the elder silent while the mage furthered to explain. “It would be a risk to leave it exposed, but it’s a risk also to leave them there, as it was a risk to visit the nearest island, as it was a risk laying the fire trap.”

  “I wish I’d witnessed that,” Lerissa said, and Deitir struggled with how to regard that … whether it was misplaced enthusiasm or an important regret in the sense that she was legitimately without certain information and therefore could not implement that information into her tactical considerations.

  Deitir took it for the latter, since he’d gone through the effort to formulate it as an option at all. He couldn’t say that he felt entirely comforted by the presence of the other mages yet. One of them had vanished with Korsten, whom Deitir had only just in recent moments met and Lerissa was peculiar in a way that moved too quickly around Deitir for him to comfortably absorb. At least he was accustomed to Vlas, and thankfully, his previous behavior had not made things awkward in Cayri’s presence. The worst sensation of stress now, other than the invasion itself, was his mother’s old friend.

  He immediately banished further consideration of the elder, however. There was far too much to focus on, all of it far too urgent for even important family concerns, let alone something that could not possibly matter now.

  Leave it be, he instructed himself, and continued to observe Vlas and Lerissa. The latter seemed to be studying the map as if it were a platform upon which her thoughts were pieces of a puzzle awaiting correct placement. He suspected that she was quite intelligent. As the girl mage slid along the table, rearranging her view of their city upon parchment, Deitir was forced to move aside as well. His arm brushed with someone’s, someone who scarcely budged.

  Deitir looked over at Firard, noting that the man’s attention seemed divided between the map and the doors … or the side of the room nearest the doors. Deitir’s gaze went in that direction as well, but he saw nothing important and so returned to the map. Firard stayed less focused beside him, and now that he was thinking of it, Firard had come to be at his side frequently in the short time since his father passed. Deitir presumed it was over suspicion of an attempt on his life, especially now that events had made him the most prominent figure of authority and leadership in the city, and at an exceptionally vital hour.

  “If a portion of the troops were to be brought down from the wall,” Lerissa was saying, tracing a path along the map with narrow fingertips, “it might be possible for them to circle about this way and divide the surge of Morennish troops.”

  The surge, Deitir considered. It was a wave after all that would destroy them, even if it wasn’t one of water.

  “It might work,” Vlas said. “But it might also be a maneuver the enemy is waiting for, and we’ll find them atop the cliffs with greater force than we’re prepared for.”

  “Can we lay more traps?” Lerissa asked next.

  “We’ve no more of the fire tactics,” Deitir inserted, his gaze catching sight of Fersmyn, who was bent over the table trying to follow the mages’ logic and correlate it with his own.

  “But there must be something else,” Lerissa continued. “What of the water? Is there no reason why we can’t use the water against them?”

  “The water?” Deitir echoed. “What do you mean?”

  He looked to Vlas and others at the table only to see that none of them seemed any better able to imagine her scheme than he was, though Vlas eyed his fellow blonde in a way that indicated he was swiftly assembling notions of his own and deeply interested in hers.

  “I mean the waterfall, my lovely,” Lerissa said to Deitir’s question.

  “What of it?” Deitir wanted to know, failing to be flattered by this exuberant, probably ancient girl. She was peculiar, and if not for the circumstances and the fact that she was a mage, he might have been inclined to ask that she leave.

  “It’s a natural trap, of course,” Vlas said, in collusion with her in the market of peculiarities and an almost secretive wit. The both of them together scarcely fell short of insufferable.

  “How do you suggest we persuade an army of experienced, potentially demons-driven soldiers to slip into a waterfall?” It was Fersmyn who asked it, and if not him, Deitir had surely intended to.

  Alledar huffed nervously from his place just a chair away from Master Brierly. The stress of this recent onslaught seemed near to finishing him while the much older man beside the overweight officer seemed only irritable over having to attend such a meeting at all. Deitir felt a pang of pity for Alledar, considering how stress had largely contributed to his father’s suffering, even before recent events.

  “I’m suggesting a Mist spell, of course,” Lerissa said to Fersmyn, and Deitir almost felt it necessary to mock her matter-of-fact delivery just to spare himself feeling like a fool over it. In that moment he happened to glance across the table at Cayri, and then he did feel the fool. He was behaving impatiently, and childishly again. He found it remarkably difficult to control since his father’s passing. He would strive harder.

  “Mage Lerissa,” he began after a breath to even his feelings. “If there’s a means by which you can force or trick our enemy into drowning, then I encourage you to please do so.”

  “We shall, Governor,” she said, and then she smiled at him, oblivious to or unaffected by his prior tone.

  “I’ll take you,” Vlas volunteered, and it was noted that Constable Imris adopted a departing stance in the same moment Lerissa was agreeing to go with her fellow mage.

  “What of the division of troops?” Fersmyn asked while the mages were withdrawing from the table.

  “Yes, that should happen,” Lerissa replied.

  “Firard,” Deitir said, looking over at the man, who seemed not to anticipate being addressed at the moment.

  He looked back at Deitir with a questioning expression.

  “Would you accompany the mages and assist them and Captain Gairel in the reorganization?” Deitir asked him.

  Firard hesitated. In the same moment, Ilayna came forward. “He shouldn’t be out there. His arm….”

  “Ilayna,” Firard began with a protesting frown.

  The exchange between the two seemed to roust some focus from Sethaniel Brierly, though no words yet from the elder. He merely raised his brow that was heavy with age and his paling dark eyes moved between the two.

  “The situation is not yet so dire that the injured need be among the fighting,” Ilayna decreed.

  “There’s less risk on the cliffs currently,” Cayri interjected, which seemed the release Firard was waiting for.

  “Yes, I will go,” he said. He stepped around the table to join the mages. Along the way, he told Ilayna not to worry, though it would make no difference and the manner in which she tilted her face said as much. Deitir knew well that his mother defied instruction from anyone on how to feel or think, no matter how well-intentioned or practical. It had been a point of mild to severe conflict between Deitir’s
parents throughout his growing up within their house.

  Ilayna watched Firard depart with the blue-dressed, blonde pair of mages and then slowly made her way to Deitir’s side. Deitir observed her hand slip across Sethaniel’s shoulders when she passed him. He could tell that they were a comfort to each other. He determined yet again not to consider why.

  Upon arriving at the battle, Sharlotte wasted no time. Korsten could not help but to be impressed, if not somewhat disturbed by the swift and forceful manner in which she isolated a group of the enemy and cast a combination of quickly and expertly gestured spells upon them. It was his own assault all over again, but several times more powerful as the magic augmented itself in a casting that withheld nothing. The Blast struck the men as solidly as a boulder, one encircled with Fire. Korsten watched, almost horrified, while Morennish soldiers were literally thrown smoldering into the air. He’d yet to witness a battle specialist before now. It was an entirely different process to the more precision efforts of a hunt. Worse might have been the way it seemed to satisfy Sharlotte. She was an extraordinarily aggressive woman.

  In the wake of her assault upon the enemy, Indhovan soldiers exhibited a moment of startled pause, then seemed to sort matters out for themselves and moved in quickly to finish survivors among their thrown enemies before moving on to new opponents, of which there were plenty. From their vantage atop one of the city’s many sloped roads, Korsten could see torches riding in from the water as if a glowing tide. It was to Indhovan’s advantage that Morenne had to make their way up hill, but their numbers were fantastic; far more than Korsten wanted to realize, though he knew better than to expect another Lilende. He was realizing only now how minor a battle that had actually been, in spite of its strategic importance to the larger part of the war. He realized also that it was Morenne’s numbers, along with their demon allies that posed the greatest challenge. If only the Seminary had more with Sharlotte’s specific skill set, though he imagined many of them were already occupied along the western front. What Sharlotte had accomplished in a first strike was astounding. He could see, though, that she was in no rush to make a second attack, and that was the downside of the ability…of mages in general; both they and the magic could become exhausted if not properly administered. They had to pace themselves. Demons, on the other hand, did not tire and they strengthened the bodies they were in as much as they damaged them. The damage done was of no concern to the demon and the toll their presence took on the human soul would likely never be consciously realized by the host.

  “Be alert for possessed soldiers,” Sharlotte said to him, almost telepathically, and then she stalked ahead of him, following after the men she had opened a path for.

  Korsten sensed none of the Vadryn immediately present; either possessed soldiers or demons without vessels. They were there nonetheless, in the near distance, blended among soldiers elsewhere. He took a step after Sharlotte, then considered Song. Even without Song seeming to work itself since it came to Resonance, Allurance alone could draw the Vadryn to him. And that would draw them to Sharlotte and to any soldiers nearby. He would have to take more care than he had when alone with Merran in the caves. If he was going to move through this quagmire of heated blood and reckless affliction of suffering, he would have to do so separately of others. Perhaps in doing so, he could draw the greater threat to him and turn the trending swell of this particular tide.

  Could he do again what he’d done to Serawe and the lesser demons surrounding her? He had no idea whether or not he could, or whether or not it would be the proper method. He didn’t know the proper method, in all honesty. And in this, there was no one to teach him. The one person who might have been able to might well have died as payment for daring to master what may not have been intended for anyone to wield. This talent and the spell which came of expressing that talent may well have been a trespass upon the gods’ domain.

  Another eruption of magic accompanied the cries of men at war and suffering for their warring. Korsten looked to the hazy, darkened sky overhead, let his thoughts caress over memories of Merran’s encouragement, and trust…and he began pushing Allurance. He was coming to realize that there was a threshold, which when crossed over, set the Song talent and subsequently the casting of Siren into motion. So, perhaps it was a gesticulation after all, but not of hand. Rather it was one of emotion, and thought.

  Whatever it may have been exactly, the response to it came immediately. At first, members of the Vadryn army who were infiltrating the city began drifting into his sphere of awareness, like small clouds in form and curious children in nature. He hoped that meant that they had abandoned hosts throughout the battlefield, but the thought wasn’t allowed to linger. Instead, he concentrated on the fact that here, as within the caves, they were distracted by him, making their way as surely as rats to an unprotected store of food. Casting Siren surpassed Analee’s presence and, in its way, defied her role. The levels of magic emanating from him, in the way it did, would not tolerate hiding. In this, his soul was brazen and defiant, challenging the demons who would chase after it, daring men who would envy it, and defying the gods who had created it.

  And it was in the midst of Song’s audacious rise when Korsten was struck by a force of tremendous power, one more destructive and invasive even than Serawe had been. It felled him immediately. He felt as if he had been literally pressed into the earth, except that he tumbled from the place he had been standing. On reflection, it was as being kicked by a giant, though there was nothing visibly present apart from the surrounding battle. He wondered for the briefest moment if Sharlotte’s magic had gone awry, his memory leaping back to when she had used it against him deliberately. But that wasn’t what had happened, he reasoned immediately. The sounds of Sharlotte’s spells echoed from further down the street, accompanied by the clash of steel and the occasional residual thundering of the ships’ fantastic weapons in the harbor. Surely, they couldn’t reach this far, though.

  Korsten righted himself slowly, numbed somewhat by the lingering sensation of having been struck—as if by the gods. He looked around him for evidence of further destruction, but saw none beyond the splay of bodies and discarded weapons the previous fighting had already put in the street. The longer Korsten sat there, the more abandoned the area began to feel…as if he’d been transported to a vision of the city overrun and left behind. It reminded him very much of the first time he had accidentally Reached somewhere, though he knew this time that he had not, not unless the spell had lately developed a force similar to Blast and one which fell upon the caster. He knew that it hadn’t, but what exactly did happen?

  Korsten scanned the abandoned and disheveled street around him. While focusing, he could still hear the sounds of battle and he could also descry the sound of the waterfall that ran a channel of rushing water through the city. But it all sounded distant somehow, held behind a barrier of some kind. It took on a distorted layer while he listened.

  It was then that he began to feel a presence, one gradually approaching, like a storm front. But unlike a storm, he felt as if this presence had isolated him, specifically…as if it were bent on reaching him, and driving all of its raw power down upon him. He’d felt something similar only once, and this was so far removed even from that in its darkness and purpose, that it terrified him.

  The cliffs appeared reasonably peaceful, compared to the activity beneath them. Soldiers and constabulary men and women were still rushing about, but in preparation for something that had not arrived. From the point where he and Cayri had assisted Ceth in turning back nature’s wave, Vlas now stood with a different mage, a determined constable, and a man whose role in any of this was hindered by injury. It set his thoughts briefly on Merran, but the nature of the light below served as ample distraction. The war had indeed come this far, and it had done so by sea. The question now remained, would it do so by land as well?

  Lerissa may have been pondering the same thing, stood beside him with t
he wind at the city’s highest point turning loose strands of hair that was tinted darker by the mix of fire and shadow in the air. Amid the shadow, a black moth perched on her neck, just below her hairline. The darkness of the soul-keeper, compared to the colorlessness of his own, denoted on what part of the spectrum their similarities branched away from each other.

  When she had taken in enough of the conflict below, Lerissa looked across their higher space, toward the most populated area of soldiers. “Let’s find this Captain Gairel,” she said.

  Firard agreed by stepping back from the railed edge to join them. The immediate area was carpeted in equal parts by grass and stone. Several flat areas had been cobbled to sustain towers with rotating wheels. Their purpose was an intriguing mystery; Vlas was reminded of the water and wind wheels of Vassenleigh, which were of a very different construction, but perhaps served a similar function. Either way, there was not time for it, as there had not even been time to notice it when Vlas was at this point on the cliffs before. The four of them made their way across the field of wheels, toward the central point where the water channeled. The sounds of the waterfall drowned out any sounds from below. Even the explosions from the ships were significantly muffled by the ferocity of the waterfall’s roar.

  Around the central channel, a yard of stone lay, like an impossibly wide street to either side of it with narrow bridges of stone and iron laid across it. The bridges were marked by lantern and the yard itself, populated with soldiers who might just as well have been doing their city a better service by abandoning this place. Beyond the channel was spread more of the city, though the buildings were lower in stature and not as condensed in placement. It did occur to Vlas that, if Morenne were to seize control of this vantage, they would potentially be able to launch their brand of fire tactics down onto the city below, and that would be incredibly disastrous.