Aspect Of Winter

by Tom Early

  We both stepped out of the bed, and I began to form more ice, setting it to spiral around my hands and arms until I had need for it. The air around me glittered with shards of ice, and I formed a second, shorter sword, more like a gladius than a spatha, and tossed it to Tyler. We padded barefoot to the door, and I gave Tyler a nod. He pushed it open and rushed out, immediately turning right as I moved with him and turned left. The corridor continued onward into the darkness, and I saw nothing. The torches that were normally lit were all out. I heard the clashing noise from behind me, probably in the Gathering Hall.

  “Tyler, do you see anything?” I asked just as I heard a sharp clanging noise from behind me. I whirled around to see Tyler block another sword strike with his spatha, from a creature that seemed to be made out of the shadows itself. It was tall and supernaturally slender, only the barest outline of form given, made of roiling darkness. Two pale white eyes glowed in the darkness. It seemed almost to absorb the noise of our breathing, making no noise of its own, and I watched as it swung a blade made out of the same darkness as it at Tyler again. Tyler used both of his swords together to block it, grunting from the impact. I set up a Connection with Tyler a second later.

  Tyler, the Ward! Bait it!

  Tyler nodded and dropped his weapons down to his sides. The creature reacted immediately, and swung its blade at his neck. The ward crackled to life, and a thick layer of ice stopped the attack short. Tyler wasted no time, angling his weapons upwards as the creature was momentarily unguarded, and stabbed his spatha into the area beneath its chin, where a soft spot would be on a human, and slashed at its chest with his gladius. The pale white eyes disappearing was the only sign that it was gone.

  Panting, Tyler turned to look at me. “Fay, what the hell was that thing?”

  “I don’t know. Come on, we have to find Sam!” I cast Darksight quickly on both of us, and glanced back down the corridor I had been facing. It was empty, thankfully, and we ran onwards. We had barely taken a step, however, when what seemed like hurricane force winds slammed into us, strong enough to make our Wards manifest a protective sheen of ice, and a strong golden glow illuminated the hallway in front of us. There was blur of motion and Aria was suddenly pinning three more of the shadow creatures to the wall by reciting some sort of windstorm spell. Her black-and-white wings beat the air behind her, and her normally shy face was drawn up in focus. Sam then turned the corner, appearing next to her, and we stayed a safe distance away as she commanded the ercinee to devour the creatures entirely. The ercinee dipped its beak into the chest of each of the creatures, draining them into nothingness. Its glow increased in radiance, banishing the darkness around it.

  Sam caught sight of us, and motioned Aria to follow her, the ercinee trailing behind, illuminating the corridor. She ran up to us, and we met where the hallway turned left for the Gathering Hall.

  “Fay, what the hell is going on? These things just showed up, and came into our room! If Aria hadn’t heard them, I think they might have killed us in our sleep!”

  “You think they’re targeting us?” I asked. “What the hell did we ever do to them?”

  Aria spoke up then, her words quiet and measured. “It’s not anything personal, I don’t think. But think about it; Janus University is at its heart a teaching institution, even if it’s also extremely powerful. If you want to hit it where it hurts, you take away its students. This is an attack on the University, through attacking us.”

  Tyler nodded his head thoughtfully. “That makes sense, in an entirely ruthless sort of way. But… doesn’t that mean we need to check on the other applicants, like right now?”

  Sam snapped into leader mode almost immediately. “Okay, Fay and Tyler, you’re going back down the way you came, and you’re checking every room. Break down the doors if you have to. If they’re alive, wake them up and tell them to join the fight. We don’t know how many of these things there are. Aria, you go to the Gathering Hall, and take a look at what’s happening. If the fight isn’t one-sided, and you think you can help, then help. Otherwise, wait for the rest of us. I’m going with the ercinee back down this way. These things are at a disadvantage against my familiar, so I can handle it. Contact me with Connection if you need help, okay? Good.”

  Without waiting for a response, Sam turned and ran back the way she came. Aria looked dazed for a second from the overload, and then grimly set out for the Hall. Tyler and I shared a look, the familiar bond still on full alert, and we turned back the way we came.

  The first door we came to was number 12, and it was shut and locked. Tyler moved out of the way as I forced water into the grooves of the lock and then froze it, expanding the ice outward to effectively break it. Tyler then opened the door as I readied my ice to attack whatever was going on inside. My Darksight revealed nothing amiss in the room, and the two beds were filled with sleeping forms. Tyler marched in and bashed his swords together, making a hell of a noise. Both of the applicants forced themselves to wakefulness immediately. It was the small brown-haired boy from before, and the African-American boy. They stared at us blearily, wiping their eyes for a second.

  “We’re under attack,” I stated flatly. “Get up now, or you’re going to get killed in your sleep. Head to the Gathering Hall, and join in the fight if you can. Go!”

  All of a sudden, there was a leopard where the African-American boy had been a second before, except it was a hell of a lot larger than I think they normally were. It stared at us for a second with human intelligence in its still-brown eyes, and then padded silently past us, moving towards the Hall. The mousy-haired boy just looked at us for a second longer, and then started whispering incantations furiously to himself, pulling out a miniature chessboard from his pocket, with intricately carved medieval-themed pieces. He pulled off the black knight and two black pawns, and dropped them onto the floor in front of them. They immediately shuddered and grew to full size, an armored knight on his horse and two foot soldiers. The boy rubbed his eyes, reached for a pair of thick-rimmed glasses, and then followed his chess pieces out of the room. Tyler and I followed him out, and then continued to the left.

  I spotted another of the shadow creatures moving towards us from the end of the corridor, and stepped forward to deal with it myself. The ice I had been steadily gathering around me stiffened, and formed into deadly-sharp ice shards, like they had with the Dullahan. They filled the hallway, and then all shot unerringly towards the creature. It made no noise whatsoever and vanished, reappearing only a few feet away from us. Tyler immediately lunged in with a slash from both swords, forcing the creature back. I gathered the shards that had missed the creature back into the air, and then sent them firing into the creature’s back as it backpedaled away from Tyler’s frontal assault. All of them seemed to hit, and the creature dissolved as silently as it moved. We stepped over where it was, and moved to check the next room. It was empty, as was the next one.

  The next door, however, was lying open and lit with a deep red color from within. Inside was the demon boy I had seen earlier, his black hair rumpled from sleeping on it, surrounded by bloodred flames that kept five of the shadow-creatures at bay. A twisted batlike creature rested on the boy’s shoulder, occasionally spitting a jet of fire at one of the shadow-creatures. There was a bloody mess on the other bed, and I didn’t dare look at it for fearing of being sick. Splinters of broken furniture lay across the floor. The five shadow-things were all swinging their blades at the boy, but they would dissolve from the heat of the red fire before connecting. Still, I could see the strain on the boy’s face.

  “Well,” he snarled, “don’t just stand there! Help me kill these things before they break through! They already got to Elliot, and I do not want to die like this.”

  He summoned an orb of crackling purple-black fire in his right hand and pitched it at one of the creatures, which swayed to one side just far enough out of the way to avoid it. I sent an icy whip cracking out at one of the creatures as Tyler buried his swords up to their hilts i
n the back of another one, scissoring his blades up and down until the creature dissolved. My whip snapped once, wrapped around the shadow-creature’s neck, and squeezed down while sending out razor sharp spikes, severing its head from its body. It too dissolved. The remaining three creatures turned silently towards us, aware of the new threat.

  One of them swung at Tyler, and the Ward stopped it with a thick layer of ice. I felt sweat bead on my forehead from the strain, and then the other two shadows also attacked Tyler, causing me to sway dizzyingly as the energy drain tripled. Tyler could sense my sudden exhaustion, and dropped low, angling his spatha in an upwards slash toward one of the creatures while his gladius bit into the feet of another one. The one that was slashed across the chest dissolved into darkness, while the one whose feet were hit fell backwards, landing directly in the bloodred flames covering the boy. It burned up immediately. The final one drew back its blade, and attempted to plunge its sword into Tyler’s heart. I sent a shard of ice to bury itself in the things arm, causing it to draw back in pain instead. Tyler took the opportunity to stab it in the heart instead, and then the room was empty of enemies. The demon-boy extinguished the flames immediately, and looked at us curiously.

  “I wasn’t expecting anyone else to be alive right now, to be honest. I’m Septimus, by the way. That unfortunate mess over there was Elliot, my roommate. He didn’t wake up in time.” He looked queasy as he said this, and we all winced.

  “Great. I’m Fay, and this is Tyler. More introductions later, okay? We’re checking the rooms, and then heading to the Gathering Hall. Go there now if you’re feeling up to it.” With that, we turned around and left without waiting to see what Septimus did. There were only two more rooms in the corridor, and both of them were empty. Where the back wall serving as the end of the hallway was, however, was instead what looked like a dark replica of the portals we took to Limbo. I had a feeling that this was responsible for summoning some of the shadow-creatures. Tyler looked at me in frustration.

  “Assuming this thing is bad, how do we destroy it? I can’t stab a portal, I’ll just pass through!”

  “I’m not sure,” I replied. “I don’t think throwing ice at it is going to do much to help either.”

  That was when a pinpoint of midnight purple fire suddenly appeared in the center of the portal. I heard rhythmic chanting behind me, and turned to see Septimus pointing at the portal with a look of intense concentration on his face, his red eyes narrowed. The purple fire began to spread outwards like a ripple does on a lake, until the edges of the portal were outlined by it. Septimus finished the incantation, building up to a shout, and then brought both of his hands together in a fierce clapping motion. The fire snapped back together and disappeared, the portal along with it.

  “I’m assuming gate-closing wasn’t something either of you were ever taught, then,” Septimus said, looking at both of us irritably. “Come on, let’s go to the Hall.”

  The three of us moved back to the Hall, only to be met by Sam and her ercinee approaching from the other corridor along with the girl I’d seen before, the one with flowers in her hair. In fact, flower petals of varying shapes and colors seemed to surround her like a whirlwind, and I think I saw something that looked like a tiny, winged person flitting about around her head nervously.

  Sam looked at us grimly. “My corridor is safe, and thanks to Emilia, we managed to close some sort of weird portal that was bringing the creatures through in the first place. Did you guys manage to close yours?”

  I nodded at her. “Yeah, Septimus here knew how to. We lost a kid named Elliot, though. He didn’t wake up in time.” The flower girl let out an involuntary gasp at that, and her hands flew up to her mouth as her eyes filled with tears. I’m assuming she knew him somehow, but I didn’t have the time to ask. Sam started leading us towards the Gathering Hall, and as we rounded the final corner, we entered a real battlefield.

  Leading the defense was Speaker Sekhmene, who had transformed. Her lower half was that of a luminous silver lion with massive eagle wings spreading from its back. She was holding two giant curved blades covered in steel-gray flames, and was laying waste to the enemy.

  “The Argent Sphinx,” I heard Septimus whisper in awe.

  Surrounding her were dozens of the pale, faceless homunculi, each clutching a bone-white rapier and stabbing and cutting furiously around them. Other kids were already helping battle the shadows as well.

  Standing on the other side of the room was a hooded figure swathed in black, with four dark portals humming with energy around him. I could see the barest outline of black-feathered wings stretched out from its back, like the memory of wings more than actual ones. Any sound near it seemed to just get swallowed up. Wave after wave of the shadow-creatures poured forth, keeping our side at bay for the moment. The figure itself threw spears of pulsating darkness at the homunculi, blasting them into oblivion, but they continued to replicate, nearly matching the numbers of the shadow-creatures. It would occasionally make a twisted gesture and open a portal beneath a crowd of homunculi, swallowing them up without any noise at all. When it seemed like the homunculi were getting too close, it would trace glowing sigils in the air and massive hands of shadow would manifest to slam them to the ground.

  When Sam’s ercinee entered the room, however, the hooded figure’s focus changed instantly. The ercinee’s light washed over the room, forcing back the shadow creatures, and shrinking the portals slightly. The dark figure immediately threw a volley of the shadow spears at the ercinee, which banked sharply to the right to avoid them, and then the figure’s wings seemed to flash, and it was rising into the air, tendrils of darkness trailing all around it. I could see the outline of an immense horned figure begin to be cast upon the back wall, claws extended.

  Upon seeing the ercinee arrive, the Speaker’s voice suddenly filled our heads. “Quickly! Cast whatever sort of light you are able to manage, and offer it to the bird!”

  The students all complied, stopping whatever they were doing to send orbs of light floating up towards the ercinee, which absorbed them all, its own light intensifying further. The radiance covered the room, and now the shadow-creatures were beginning to disintegrate instead of simply being pushed back. The dark figure seemed only to pause when confronted with the light, and began to cast a spell, a deep sonorous voice rolling across the battlefield. The air seemed to tremble as it gathered its power. The being summoned a pulsating blanket of darkness around it, and prepared to throw it at the ercinee so that it would have no chance of escape.

  The Speaker took advantage of its distraction with attacking the ercinee, and the temporary absence of enemies attacking her. I saw the silver light surround her and she vanished. I blinked, and when I opened my eyes a millisecond later, both of the Speaker’s swords were buried in the chest of the robed figure, and their fire consumed it within seconds. A dark wave of energy pulsed outwards from the fire, and then vanished. I thought I saw some sort of ghostly figure rise up from the fire and then fade away, but I sincerely hoped it was my imagination. With the being gone, however, the four portals began to shudder and crack, and shattered a moment later. The remaining shadow creatures then simply vanished, swept away by the ercinee’s light.

  A moment later, it was like nothing out of place had happened at all. All traces of the enemy had vanished, and as we watched, the Speaker’s form dissolved into silver light and reformed into the human shape that we had seen before. She turned towards us, and clasped her hands together, her face once more showing no trace of emotion.

  “Is everyone here?”

  Septimus stepped forward, glaring at her. “No, we aren’t all here. Elliot is dead, because he was stupid enough to think it was safe to sleep soundly here. So much for the University’s reputation of complete safety!”

  The Speaker remained unperturbed. “I see. It is a tragedy, then, to have lost one of our potential students. I wish that we had known and prepared for the attack, but I must regretfully say that our assumption
that this location would remain safe and unknown is the result of our inadequate protections.” She paused for a moment, as if considering her next words carefully, and then continued.

  “I know that all of you have many questions, but let me assure you that we have at least as many as you all do. Janus University intends to find out and punish the perpetrators of this attack, and for that, we will need time. For the time being, please return to your rooms. The homunculi will stand watch, and we shall not be caught off-guard again.”

  We all looked at each other with varying degrees of disbelief at being brushed off so blatantly, and Sam stepped forward to protest. The Speaker gave her a hard look, however, and Sam stepped back again.

  “I understand that you are worried about your continued safety.” The Speaker gave us all a thin-lipped smile. “Let me assure you, there will be no more danger. The University was not expecting this attack. That is the only reason it succeeded.”

  “You know what?” Sam said angrily, “that’s not enough to make me feel safe. A kid just died, and we’re supposed to just go back to bed? I don’t think so.”

  The Speaker let out a noise that sounded suspiciously like a growl, her eyes flaring silver. She pointed at Sam with one elegant finger extended, and Sam swayed and fell to the ground, snoring.

  “Is there anyone else who would like to voice their opinion?” the Speaker asked in a dangerously calm voice.

  There was a collective head-shaking from all of us. I sighed, and helped Tyler carry Sam back to her room before we went back to our own. I had a feeling that nobody really expected to be getting any more sleep that night.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  I woke up covered in sweat, my heart pounding furiously again as I sat up. The dream had already faded, but it left me with the same feeling of dread as the last one. I was shivering again, full body spasms that made it almost impossible for me to move. It took me a full minute of breathing as deep as I could to calm down.