by Tom Hansen
He looked at her quizzically. “Poor woman? What about me? I was the one almost dead there.”
She punched him in the arm. “You obviously turned out just fine. What did they feed you anyway?”
He flexed his arm at her. “I was raised on frost bear milk, lass. All us men up here in the northern Razorclaws are.”
She chuckled, but stopped after glancing back at the townsfolk. It reminded her too much of life in Reyoarfjell, with all the prisoners huddled together in the center. How had this enigmatic oaf gotten her to laugh in such a time as this?
She studied his face, curious what he was thinking. Despite the joke, he had already gone back to studying the patterns of the guards and the paths they walked.
He is a puzzle, for sure. Bluster and bite all in one huge package.
She focused her attention back on the village. “Five soldiers of the original twelve. I’m impressed your town took out four of them when I only took down two myself. How many were your doing?”
“Just the messenger one, and that was the next day, mind you. At the time I wasn’t trying to kill anyone. I was simply trying to keep them off of you while you wandered blindly and fell off the dock into the freezing water.”
She chewed on her lower lip while scrunching up her brow. “Yes, that. I thank you for keeping an eye on me. I wasn’t in my right mind at the time.”
He glanced at her. “What do you know of Caldin’s abilities?”
Her stomach knotted. “Not much, I’m afraid. He is well-favored of the Queen, spending significant time in the Skarfanes. Soon after he returned is when I managed to escape and here we are. Rumor is that he gained special abilities there, but in the studies I’ve done, I haven’t found any way to change magic, only gift it. As far as I can tell, once you are born with them, that’s all you have.”
She paused, looking back at him. “A gift from the Gods, I suppose?”
He nodded slowly. If he understood her reference to their earlier argument, he didn’t let on. She wasn’t sure if he simply didn’t understand, or was just being polite.
Borym scrunched up his eyebrows as he focused on something in the village. “So what about yours? He seemed to take them away from you when you got close?”
“Aye.” She shivered as the memory ran through her. “I wasn’t expecting that. I don’t know if he has to be close enough to do it.”
“If he could do it at range, you wouldn’t have your magic right now, would you?”
She realized he was correct. “Good thought. I suppose he has to see me or at least be close enough to smell me in that case. I don’t have any other information, but the only thing I do know is that you must separate his head from his body or he will still have magic. It’s the only way to truly know that you’ve killed a mage.”
Borym grabbed the massive axe from behind his back, weighing it in his hand for a moment. “Then we’ll just have to make sure it’s a clean cut the first time.”
Having grown up here turned out to be a boon for remaining stealthy. Borym spent most of his adolescence hiding from his parents among the rocks outside of town, and consequently knew which rocks would allow you to be seen from the village.
Talia followed him down the cliff to the cove below, crouching behind a small barn with clucking chickens inside.
Borym spun his axe in his hand. “I’m going to go right, to take out the patrol. Can you incapacitate the one to the left?”
Talia nodded and the two separated. Here she was, sneaking through the same place a couple days later, only this time it was in broad daylight. It seemed like a stupid plan, but time was of the essence. At least Borym got her into the village without being seen, allowing her to get within casting distance of the soldiers.
She listened to Borym’s light padding footsteps as he circled around to her right. She had one chance at this again, and needed to make sure she didn’t mess it up.
She felt bad, knowing she would have to use Borym as a distraction in order to allow her to get close.
To her right, a soft grunt was masked by a howl of wind above them. She only recognized it because she was intensely listening for the blow. How he managed to take out the guard knowing there would be wind to mask the noise, was beyond her, but she would take any blessing she could at this point.
It was her turn to take out the next guard, and she heard him before she saw him.
His methodical footsteps crunched through the crusted ground with such regularity that she was practically transported back to Reyoarfjell once again.
She pushed down the memories and moved closer to the end of the barn, waiting on the soldier to come closer.
Crunch, crunch, crunch. Pause.
She sprang from her hiding spot, aiming for his kidney with a small knife Borym had given her. It was the only other weapon he had on him, one made more for gutting fish than killing trained soldiers, but it would have to do for now.
But as Talia rounded the corner, she realized her mistake and tried to stop time on her enemy.
The syncopated steps of the soldier hadn’t come from any other soldier, they had come from Caldin himself. She felt her spell slough off him, like he wasn’t even there.
There he was, a grin on his face from ear to ear.
“Hello, Talia. So nice of you to come back to me.”
Chapter Fourteen
She swung her knife, but was too far away to come even close. He didn’t dodge the attack.
In fact, he didn’t even flinch.
Reassessing the situation, she took a step closer, adjusted her stance and swung again.
Her blade cut cleanly through the air where he should have been, whiffing as it contacted nothing of substance.
He’s not here.
A shout rose up from the front of the village, close to the ocean where the villagers were corralled.
“Dammit. I’ve done it again.”
Talia crouched down, wishing she had realized Caldin might use a glamor of some kind to lure her out. He’d been successful, too. Before even taking out a single guard, she’d managed to give up her location.
What do I do?
She wouldn’t run and hide again. She was done with hiding. She needed to end this now. Besides, Borym most likely wouldn’t make it out again and would be tortured to death for aiding her.
No more.
Talia was done playing the victim. It was time to rise up and make her own fate. Perhaps a daring move would be just what she needed in order to turn her luck around.
She gritted her teeth, sent out a small prayer to the Gods Above to keep Borym safe, and ran straight at the large hut in the center of town.
Shouts sprang up and fingers pointed, as the few remaining guards spotted and called out her fiery hair bobbing between buildings.
“Come get me you sons of bitches!” She shouted at the top of her lungs.
To her right, she caught Borym’s huddled figure as she sprinted past, a confused and worried look on his face.
I’m sorry, Borym, but plans have changed.
She drew her hand across her throat as she met his eyes, then beckoned to follow her, hoping he would recognize her quick hand gestures.
She didn’t have time to see his reaction, but sensed his massive form moving just after she passed.
She was in a full-on sprint while he would take time to get up to speed, giving her crucial seconds of lead-time.
If Borym wasn’t going to the be distraction, perhaps she could be.
Soldiers from around the place converged on the center of town, but she refused to be swayed in any direction. She was running toward him now.
As she ran, she reached inside her and pulled energy from within, as well as extra from her environment.
It was a funny thing about her particular brand of magic. Time is constant. Time was and is everything, leaving her with no shortage of energy from which to pull. She could stop the world if she truly wanted, and nearly had before she learned to limit her magic.
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br /> She rounded the corner of the big house, the same place she had been two nights before. She took in the dozen or so villagers, mostly women and children, corralled by two guards.
No, three guards.
Talia threw her knife at the woman in the crowd dressed to look like an unsuspecting bystander. This close, the woman’s glamor was blatantly obvious, probably most of her energy had been spent projecting Caldin’s image. She might have fooled Borym, but not Talia.
And yet Talia had been fooled by sound and not visually verifying her first victim.
Never again.
The dagger embedded deep in the woman’s throat.
Planting both feet firmly on the ground, Talia crouched down, placing a fist beside her foot. The massive buildup of magical energy surged inside her, trembling and crashing on top of itself. It needed to be released or it would consume her.
After one final breath, Talia unleashed her magic, stopping time for everything in the vicinity.
This was the second time Talia had blasted out a massive circle of magic as a last-ditch effort to save herself from certain death or capture. If Talia didn’t use it now, she would never get another chance to again.
It was a guttural cast, a desperate ploy only used when out of better options. She was a cornered feral animal retaliating to the threat. The raw, unrestrained energy overflowed her boy and affected everything around her.
Power cascaded from her in eddies, crashing through the village and engulfing everyone in the spell.
All except two people.
She jumped into the fake soldier woman, ripping the knife from her throat, and stabbing three more times to ensure a proper death.
Behind her, she heard a footstep.
“Talia, my dear. Do you always have to make such a grand entrance every time you come see me?”
Talia whirled around, bloody knife in hand as she took in Caldin.
This was the first time she had gotten a really good look at him since Reyoarfjell, given he had on a deep-hooded cloak last time. He looked older than she remembered, much older in fact. Whatever the Queen had done to him had aged him terribly.
Talia remembered that she didn’t have an accurate measure of time herself. It was difficult to properly measure things when your day could be as long or as short as you wanted it to be.
Her magic continued to surge around her, keeping everything frozen. It drained fast, and she knew it, but she needed to hold it all in place for as long as she could. Worry crept into her stomach. She didn’t have long until her well was dry once again. She didn’t have time for idle chitchat.
“I’m sorry, Caldin, but I’m not here for you.”
“No? I’m sorely disappointed.”
She took a step to the right, like she was circling him, but she was trying to edge closer to the other soldiers.
“Your runner is dead, by the way. The Queen won’t know about me or this village.”
He curled his lips, a brief sneer of anger before returning to his fake, calm demeanor. “While that is disappointing news, you will be going back with me today, and the Queen will soon know all.”
Talia shook her head, arriving where one of the villager guards stood frozen in time. She slashed him across the throat. “Not today, Caldin. In fact, not ever.”
She wound up and threw her knife across the square.
Caldin stepped back, a natural reaction. But he didn’t need to move as Talia wasn’t actually aiming at him.
The dagger impaled the other villager guard in the chest. If she hadn’t gotten him right in his heart, she was very close. He wouldn’t last long when her magic ran out.
“That’s four, Caldin. One more guard and we’re done here.”
Realizing what she had done, his anger flashed once again. “No, Talia. It’s time we end this charade. I’m bringing you back right now, and I will make sure that you are constantly devoid of power all the way until Her Majesty takes your power for herself.”
She shook her head. “One of us is going to die before leaving this spot. I will not go back and she will never have my power.”
Caldin huffed, glancing around. “Even if you desired to kill yourself, you wouldn’t do it. I know you too well.”
Behind Caldin, a massive man with bright red hair came around the corner, wielding a shiny axe.
Talia smiled in return. It was a wistful smile. She wished it didn’t have to be this way. Not him. Not Caldin. She reminded herself that he was not the man she once knew. The old Caldin had died, and nothing she did would ever fix that.
The world had moved on, changed permanently since the Queen assumed power, and they were all doing what they had to survive.
She didn’t blame Caldin for his actions, just as she hoped he wouldn’t hers. But he had chosen to embrace the changes, rather than fight them. He had chosen the wrong path.
Caldin had given in, thinking it the easy choice, when standing strong and resisting had been hers, despite it being more painful.
“I’ll always remember you Caldin. To my dying day.”
Caldin’s eyes shot open and he turned, finally realizing the steps he heard inside Talia’s time bubble shouldn’t have been occurring.
He thrust out his hands, trying to conjure some kind of spell to keep him safe, but it fizzled as Borym’s axe chopped his head clean off.
Talia watched in detached remorse as Caldin’s head bounced along the ground, stopping to rest as he looked out over the ocean.
“Rest well, older brother. I’m sorry it had to end this way.”
Chapter Fifteen
Talia collapsed to the ground as her magic ran out. A vast emptiness inside her took over, pulling her toward the brink of nothingness.
She had felt hollow before, but nothing like this.
This time she felt warmer. This time she felt loved.
This time, she was in the arms of a man who cared about her.
She looked up into Borym’s piercing eyes and smiled.
“There is one more soldier, you can’t let him get away.”
Borym barked orders to kill the remaining guard, then picked up Talia in his thick arms. “I must get you inside.”
“I’ll be fine. I just need rest.”
Kicking in the door to the main house in the center of the village, Borym laid Talia down on the second mattress in, somehow remembering that an innocent woman had been stabbed in the first one.
The next few minutes of her awareness seemed a blur as Talia drifted in and out of consciousness.
Borym reported back that all soldiers were dead and none left the town. He pressed a small leather-bound notebook into her hands. “I believe this is yours.”
At some point he brought food, propping Talia up and feeding her a thin broth one spoonful at a time while his eyes continually pled for changes in pallor on her face. She was vaguely aware that he was worried, but her body was too weak to respond.
Later, she woke to a couple of old ladies stripping her to dress her wounds and bathe her. They were efficient and polite, telling her to get better and commenting endlessly on her bright red hair as an omen from the Gods, though neither could come to a conclusion as to if they were the Above or Below variety.
Then, Borym was back, wrapping her in blankets. Her various aches and pains had diminished to a dull throb and her splitting headache had all but vanished. Part of her magic well had even refilled, though there wasn’t much there but a slight shimmer of magic in the dark abyss. She doubted throwing a pebble would do much to disturb her scant power at this point.
She opened her eyes once again to the same brilliant starry sky that had taken her breath just a few days prior.
“How are you feeling?” Borym’s deep voice cut through her reverie, filling her empty mind with a mixture of memories both good and bad. She settled on the one of him looking to the stars, his rugged profile the most attractive thing about the night sky.
“How long was I asleep?”
“Two days. I
had some ladies bathe you.”
“I remember. They couldn’t stop commenting on my hair, and I think they were planning our wedding given the similar color we share..”
He huffed. “There were more who wanted to. I picked the two oldest ones, I’m sorry if they talked about things you wish had stayed buried.”
Talia smiled, then looked back to the horizon. The Razorclaws to the north cut through the stars like massive talons tearing open the heavens. Her mind drifted to their earlier conversation.
She frowned, knowing what she needed to say and yet not wanting to say it.
“Borym.”
“No.”
His brusque comment took her by surprise and she turned to watch him once again.
He looked up at the night sky, shaking his head. “Don’t tell me, for I already know what you’re going to say. I know you have to leave, I just don’t want you to say it.”
He turned toward her, his angular face blocking out more of the brilliant firmament, but replacing it with two equally bold orbs staring back at her. His eyes were moist, and he blinked in rapid succession.
Borym took her hand in his, a small twig to a thick branch, and caressed her palm with his rough fingertips. She could practically taste the salt brine through her skin. Each peak and valley of his calloused fingers left an individual trail through her spirit, like a sharp knife carving out a design.
He certainly had left an impression on her, and as much as she was intrigued by him, she knew what he said was right.
At least she hoped he was right. She wasn’t entirely sure she should trust herself right now.
“It has been a pleasure knowing you these past few days, lass. My life will forever be altered by our time together.”
Borym bent down, and planted a kiss in the center of her palm. “Do take care of yourself, Talia Oblique.”
Talia didn’t know quite what to say in return, but somehow she felt she didn’t need to. For once, she was satisfied staring up into the void, hand in hand with a handsome man.
She didn’t want to leave, but she knew she must. She had already brought enough death and destruction upon this small group of people. The Queen would eventually find out what happened and would come for her, and there might not be a way for her to escape another attempt.
