by M. J. Putney
CHAPTER 16
Frowning, Jack pulled a spyglass from his bag and raised it to his eye. He whistled softly. “I didn’t see the war mage before, but this fellow radiates menace, and he’s scanning the hills around the cove. Is he the one you saw at Blakesley’s place?” He handed the glass to Cynthia.
The spyglass brought the distant figure so close that Cynthia instinctively stepped back. He was lean and black like a carrion crow. The mage was standing by a man who might be the captain. As she brought him into focus, the mage swung around and stared straight up at her. She felt an energy line twang between them. A painful line.
Heart pounding, she said, “He’s looking right at me!”
Jack snatched the spyglass back and muttered an oath as he saw the war mage glaring up at their position on the hill. “Cynthia, you’re better at aiming lightning. Can you blast him?”
She reached into the weather they’d been gathering for the squall and concentrated the jittery energy into a bolt of lightning. Then she hurled it at the mage. Faster than the eye could follow, he lifted a hand and deflected the bolt so that it missed the ship altogether, though the accompanying thunder made the timbers shake.
Cynthia was so furious that she wanted to spit. “No point in wasting another bolt on him,” she growled. “He might be able to ward off the squall we planned!”
“Let me see.” Allarde took the glass and stared down at the mage. “He’s smirking at us. Overconfident. Time to try something other than weather magic.…”
Cynthia felt the power gathering around Allarde. Then she heard a crack so loud that it carried all the way up on the hilltop and the energy line that connected her to the war mage snapped. Squinting, she saw that a spar had snapped on the ship and crashed down onto the evil creature. “Oh, well done, Allarde! You’ve flattened him!”
“I don’t think he’s dead.” Allarde frowned into the spyglass, then passed it back to Jack. “I have the feeling we haven’t seen the last of him. But since he’s unconscious, this is a good time to blow the ships away.”
Cynthia drew a deep breath, centering her energy and calming her roiled nerves. When she took Jack’s hand, he gave her a comforting squeeze. She wanted to melt into him, but this wasn’t the time or place.
She nodded to indicate she was ready, so he said, “This will be quicker if we work together. Allarde, take Cynthia’s hand. Tory, take mine.”
Tory and Allarde obeyed so that the four of them formed a line with energy flowing freely between them. “And so we begin…,” Jack murmured as he began collecting weather energy.
Cynthia joined her energy to his. This time was very different from the wild exultation of shaping the storm that blasted the ships heading to Ireland. Instead of painting a huge canvas, they were creating a tiny portrait to put inside a locket. Or rather, a squall to ravage a cove.
She and Jack gathered modest winds and light rains and concentrated them in the cove. Wind began rising and waves became larger, rolling the four French ships. With wicked delight, Cynthia sent in a blast of wind that almost flipped one ship over and pushed all four toward the jagged rocks at the side of the cove.
Efforts to haul the spar from the war mage were abandoned as the captain began shouting orders to his crew. The ship lifted anchor and raised enough sail so it could use the wind to escape from the dangerous confines of the cove. As it sailed out into open water, the other three French ships followed.
“Bravo!” Tory said gleefully. “I assume you can send your squall chasing after them so they’ll not be able to return?”
“That’s the intention.” Jack breathed a sigh of relief and put an affectionate arm around Cynthia’s waist. “The last ship out of the cove was heavy in the water. I don’t think it will survive in the open seas.”
“They won’t be back,” Allarde said confidently. “The French invasion troops are on their own.”
Cynthia smiled with satisfaction as she cuddled into Jack. Their weather plan had worked well, and they were rid of the war mage, at least for now. She hoped there were no more like him around.
Now it was Allarde and Tory’s turn.
* * *
The Irregulars collected Elspeth and the horses and rode to a concealed spot near the hill fortress. Tory and Allarde walked the last distance on foot, circling the crag until they were at the base of the cliff on the side opposite the entrance.
Though Tory had known the crag was high, it seemed much higher now that she and Allarde were contemplating flying to the top. A top she couldn’t even see because of the thick, suffocating fog.
Allarde murmured, “Are we ready?”
“I suppose.” She laughed a little. “At least we start with the one part of this I know I’ll enjoy.”
He laughed and put his arms around her. “Dance with me, my lady?”
They’d learned that combining her ability to float with his talent for lifting great weights made it possible for them to literally dance on air. Her tension faded as their bodies and magics came together with sweet intensity.
But there was no dancing this time. Theirs was a critical mission, and Tory was not at all sure how high they could fly together.
Only one way to find out. She blended their magics into a powerful oneness, and they soared upward a few feet away from the cliff face. It felt so right. “I love doing this,” she whispered into Allarde’s ear.
“So do I.” He nuzzled her hair playfully. “Magic might have cost us our normal lives, but I wouldn’t give up this feeling, or you, for anything!”
“Nor would I.” Tory provided the flying magic and the steering while Allarde supplied raw power—enough that reaching the fortress was not a strain.
They came even with the broken wall that surrounded the fortress. She glided into a hover and they listened. Voices were speaking in French, some of them using regional dialects so thick that Tory could barely understand what they were saying. Mostly the comments were complaints about the fog.
She was about to suggest they enter the fort when a voice sounded so close that she almost jumped out of her skin. Allarde felt her shock and his embrace tightened.
The man was swearing, “No point in keeping watch when I can’t see a bloody yard into this bloody fog. Bloody wet, boring country! A bloody elephant could come over the wall and I wouldn’t see it.”
Another man laughed. “As long as the bloody elephant isn’t armed, we’d be all right.” They must have been walking a circuit around the inside of the wall, for their voices faded away.
When she thought they were safe, she squeezed Allarde’s arm to signal that they were going in. Then she swooped them over the wall and toward the center of the fort, staying well above head level.
Jack had used his finder talent to locate the arsenal, and he’d drawn them a map. The building where the ammunition and powder were stored was low and stone built and a little west of the center. Finding it had seemed easier when he’d drawn his map. Now that she was here, the fortress was as confusing for her as for the French soldiers below.
“Stop!” Allarde said urgently, tightening his arms around her.
She lurched to a ragged stop and saw they’d almost crashed into a stone wall because she hadn’t seen clearly around Allarde’s arm. Heart pounding, she glided to the ground. They landed by the wall she’d almost hit and stayed wrapped in each other’s arms as she recovered.
Voices sounded above their heads. Tory glanced up and saw an empty window above them. Surprisingly, the voice was speaking English with an Irish accent. “Why aren’t these damned Welshmen rising up to join us?” the man barked. “They have every reason to hate the damned English as much as we do!”
“They don’t understand yet what’s best for them, Colonel O’Brian,” another man said patiently. “We’ve been here less than a day. Once we’ve conquered more territory, the locals will flock to our side.”
If they thought that, they didn’t know the British at all. Allarde released his embrace and took
Tory’s hand as they walked soundlessly around the building. The ground was rough, so she had to watch her footing.
She felt the mental pressure of so many men around her. Not the whole invasion force, she thought, but a large part of it. At least half.
They rounded the corner of the building and got a clear view of the central courtyard of the old fort. Huge numbers of tents were pitched in the area, their light color making them almost invisible in the fog. Small fires were scattered through the encampment and most of the soldiers were sitting around them, huddled for warmth.
No one seemed to be looking in their direction, so Allarde turned to the right and led Tory to a low, sturdy-looking stone building that fit Jack’s description of the arsenal. Allarde slid his palm across the stones, then gave a nod. She wondered if he could sense explosives inside.
Hardly daring to breathe, she followed him around the building to the front. They’d wondered if the arsenal would be under guard, and it was. But because of the dangerous gunpowder, the guards had built their fire thirty feet or so in front of the door. Half a dozen men sat around the flames, looking relaxed because of course no Britons could get into this fortress.
Praying that the combination of fog and their stealth stones would make them invisible, she followed Allarde to the building’s door. The knob didn’t turn, so he put a hand over the lock and opened it.
The click of the mechanism unlocking sounded as loud as a gunshot. A man by the fire raised his head. “Did you hear that?” he asked in French.
“Hear what?” another man asked, his voice slurred. “There are more’n a thousand men on this rock. Of course there’s noise.”
Another voice, equally slurred, said, “A good thing the scouts found that wine cellar so we have something to warm us. I’ll be glad when this bloody fog is gone, though. Not natural, I tell you.”
“It will be gone soon. Then we can march out and conquer Wales.”
“Hardly worth the effort,” the first man said glumly. “Too bad we couldn’t land in Bristol like we was supposed to. That’s a proper city, they say.”
As the idle conversation continued, Allarde opened the door to the building and they both slipped inside. Tory closed the heavy door behind her as silently as possible.
As soon as the door was shut, Allarde created a mage light and held it high above his head. “Eureka,” he whispered.
The light illuminated dozens of kegs of gunpowder and musket balls. There were also wooden boxes shaped to hold firearms. A small cannon sat against one wall. This was a temple of death. Tory said, “Time to get to work. The sooner we’re done, the better. As long as we don’t blow up ourselves and half the countryside!”
They’d planned ahead and brought the right tools. Allarde produced a small crowbar and pried the top off a cask of gunpowder. Tory had brought a tin cup that she used to scoop up the black powder. She then poured it into little piles in different areas of the arsenal. Allarde followed her, setting unlit candles into each pile of powder.
The last part was the most frightening. Very, very carefully, Allarde used his tinderbox to light the last candle. Then he moved around the storeroom and lit each of the candles that had been set into the powder.
Scarcely able to breathe, Tory pressed her back against the door and prayed. If a spark accidentally fell into the gunpowder, they’d be dead before they knew it.
When all the candles were lit, Allarde moved toward the door slowly to avoid stirring the air. When he reached her, Tory opened the door. Panic spiked through her when a draft from the door caused the candle flames to sway dangerously.
Biting her lip, she slipped outside and closed the door after Allarde. When and if she got to safety, she was going to curl in a ball and howl!
As they headed toward the back wall of the fortress, a commanding voice bellowed, “Légion Noire, form up! We’re going to march out of here. The fog must be lighter lower down.”
Amid complaints and thudding boots, the soldiers began forming directly across their path, so close that Tory could almost have touched one. Clutching her stealth stone, she backed away, forcing herself to move slowly so she wouldn’t attract attention.
Allarde was beside her, and when they were far enough from the troop formation, they turned and headed for the nearest section of wall. They were almost there when a gruff voice shouted, “Hey! Who are you? Halt or we’ll shoot!”
Tory saw a pair of guards to their right, and they were raising their weapons. She threw herself around Allarde and yanked them straight into the air. For an instant it was a struggle. Then his arms came around her and his magic joined hers and they soared over the wall, followed by two gunshots and a string of curses.
The fortress exploded.
CHAPTER 17
The blast of sound and air smashed into Tory and Allarde like a giant’s fist. They hurtled toward the ground as she struggled to regain control. She grabbed as much of Allarde’s magic as she could, but they were falling too hard and fast.
At the last possible moment, she was able to slow them into a tumbling roll across moist green turf. Allarde wrapped one arm around her waist and the other around her head to protect her from the worst of the impact as they skidded to a stop.
Tory’s breath was knocked out and her awareness briefly grayed. When her mind cleared, she found that she was lying on top of Allarde and his beautiful, strong-boned face was still. “Justin!” she gasped. “Are you all right?”
His ridiculously long, dark lashes fluttered open. “Next time we dance”—he drew a labored breath—“please restrict yourself to stepping on my toes rather than throwing me off a mountain.”
She gave a choke of laughter. “I’ll try to remember that.”
He rested his hand on her arm. “Perhaps you could remove your delightful self from my chest so I can breathe?”
“Sorry!” She slid to one side, feeling bruised all over. Sitting back, she gazed up at the fortress. The hilltop was ablaze and she heard shouting. “I wonder how many men died,” she said somberly.
“Too many.” He pushed himself to a sitting position and draped an arm over her shoulders. “But this is war. If I must choose between us and them, I choose us.”
Shivering, Tory burrowed against his side. “I know you’re right, but I lack the killer instinct.”
“You wouldn’t be you if you didn’t care about people,” he said softly.
They sat in silence for several minutes before she said, “Time we looked for the others and returned to the Royal Oak.”
He nodded and stood, offering her a hand up. As they headed to the grove where they’d left their friends and horses, Allarde was limping a little. They were still surrounded by the heavy fog, which made it hard to be sure of their direction.
Luckily, Jack’s finder magic located them. He and the girls emerged from the mists leading the horses.
“You survived!” Cynthia gave Tory a swift, hard hug.
“Ouch!” Tory squeaked at the pressure on her bruised ribs.
Cynthia stepped back hastily and pretended she hadn’t forgot herself so much as to hug another female, but Tory found the gesture endearing. Her roommate’s surface might still be prickly, but she was having trouble hiding her warm heart.
Elspeth said, “Do either of you need any healing? Allarde, you’re limping.”
“Just a twisted ankle.” He helped Tory onto her pony, then mounted his own horse. “Let’s get away from here. You must be tired of holding this fog, Cynthia.”
“I have to work harder and harder to pull enough moisture for it.” Cynthia swung onto her mount. “I so want to get back to the inn for a bath and a good rest!”
“I wonder how our actions will affect the French,” Tory said thoughtfully as she fell into line with the others, Jack leading the way. “Maybe the idiot militia colonel will be prepared to attack now.”
* * *
The colonel was still an idiot. Bran Blakesley slammed into the Royal Oak shortly after the Irre
gulars had arrived and were wolfing down an enormous supper. Cynthia regarded him with critical approval. In his scarlet uniform, he was almost as good-looking as Jack.
Bran crossed to their table. “We heard an explosion all the way in Carmarthen. What happened?”
“Tory and I blew up the French arsenal and Jack and Cynthia drove their ships out to sea.” Allarde pulled up a chair for his friend. “You look like you can use some food.”
Olwen Morgan appeared and set a plate before the newcomer. Bran stared at it for a moment. “I’d almost forgotten what food looks like. Thank you, Mrs. Morgan. I’ve spent the day trying to persuade Dawson to at least send out scouts to see what the French are up to, but he’s determined to stay put until troops arrive from Cardiff.”
“Does the colonel mind that you keep disappearing to meet us?” Allarde asked curiously.
“He’s glad when I’m not around to badger him to behave like a real soldier.” Bran dug into his sliced beef ravenously. “Dawson would order a retreat except he’s afraid the militia and yeomanry would refuse his orders. They would, too.”
“Can’t you stuff the man into a barrel or something?” Cynthia suggested. “Not only is the French arsenal gone, but with the ships gone, the invasion force has no way to retreat. Even I can tell that this would be an excellent time to attack, while the French are battered and confused.”
Bran gave a twisted smile. “You’ve just proved you have better military judgment than Dawson, but he’s the ranking officer. If only my father was here! He could take command and actually do something useful!”
A thought struck Cynthia. She turned it around in her mind. Yes, this could work. She visualized the portrait she’d seen at the Blakesley manor house, then clasped Jack’s hand and summoned her illusion magic. “Your wish is my command.”
Bran glanced up, then gasped and shoved his chair away violently from the table. “Father? What strange magic is this?”
