Crystal Cache (Crow Hill Book 2)

by Tom Larcombe

  “Good night you two, again,” Rynn said.

  She went back to the table trying to keep from smiling and chuckling over the scene she'd just interrupted.

  If that's what they want to do, I won't stop them. I will make it more difficult for them though so nothing happens unless they want it enough to work for it, she thought.

  She paced the kitchen for a while, not tired enough to sleep. Returning to her research on the devices didn't appeal to her for some reason.

  I know. I'll go check the raiders' progress. They should have some sort of camp set up and be easy enough to spot.

  * * *

  She moved out to the living room and settled back in an armchair. This time she'd be sending enough of her awareness out that her body might have trouble retaining its balance. The armchair should keep her upright if that happened.

  I'll go out with enough of myself to perform some magic if necessary. I imagine there's a number of ways I can slow them down some.

  She detached a large portion of her consciousness, leaving just enough in her body to keep it functioning. The walls were no barrier to her now as she passed through them and soared into the sky.

  Freedom! she thought. Flying is great, but this is better, you're able to go wherever you want just by willing it.

  She focused her attention on the horizon to the northeast and raced across the sky. When the river came into view in front of her, she slowed.

  They should be on the other side of the river. I'm sure they aren't practicing any kind of operational security so they'll probably have bonfires or something of the sort. Unless they've been taking over houses again.

  She scanned the flatlands laid out in front of her. There was a slight glow almost directly north of her, but not as far north as she thought she'd find the raiders.

  I wonder what that is? I'll check it out, just in case, but the raiders should be farther north, on or near the road leading to Las Animas.

  The glow was coming from a house, or rather a small group of them clustered along a country road that was in bad condition. What piqued her curiosity the most was that the glow was steady, more like an electric light than a flame.

  She swooped her consciousness down towards the cluster of houses. The glow was coming from the windows of the different buildings.

  I can't believe they aren't making any effort to conceal that they have something like that. I suppose they must be used to having no-one anywhere nearby.

  She willed her consciousness towards the most brightly lit house's largest window. As she approached, she saw that there was a large number of men in the room behind the window.

  What's this? It looks like it could be the raiders, but what are they doing?

  She turned and willed herself towards one of the other houses, but found herself continuing to drift towards the house she'd just looked at.

  What's going on? Why can't I move away from here?

  She tried to use her power to force herself to move, but the more effort she put into it, the faster she found herself drawn towards the house. She cut the extra power off and her movement slowed.

  I knew you'd come out if I made my intentions clear enough, a voice stated in her mind.

  Rynn jumped. She hadn't noticed anyone nearby when she looked. A trickle of power fed to her Sight showed her a number of things she hadn't noticed earlier.

  The voice was apparently coming from someone else who was out of their body at the moment. He was sitting on the roof, in the middle of a giant web of magic. The strands were spun like those of a spiderweb and that was what was drawing her towards the house.

  I must have flown straight into his web, she thought. And if I had been thinking of anything other than a straight out physical attack by raiders I might have realized that the light was from sun crystals, not electricity. Damn me for being careless.

  She wove her power around her, using it as a shield.

  What? No witty comeback like you had for Raymond?

  Raymond? Rynn thought to herself. Wasn't that the name of the guy the council sent after Michael? Does this guy think I'm Michael?

  She didn't reply and focused even harder on trying to use her power to shield herself, and her identity.

  A probe came from the man, pressing against her shields.

  You aren't Hart. That's Fire magic, not Earth. Who are you?

  Rynn tried sending a probe of her own back to find out anything about the man, but the magic of the probe brushed against one of the webs and stuck to it.

  I asked, who are you?

  The man's mental voice was arrogant and uncaring. It was as though it didn't matter what her answer was, but that he was more curious than anything else.

  She sensed the mental shrug that preceded his next statement.

  Don't answer me then. It's not like it really matters who you are.

  His probe was still in contact with her shields. Now it thickened with his power and began to spread, slowly encompassing her entire shield.

  When it covered her shield, his power began to contract. Her shield was slowly forced back towards her. With her total lack of preparations for any sort of magical battle, there was nothing she could do to prevent it.

  * * *

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  Michael rolled out of bed, not looking forward to the day's work. He knew he'd be going down to see both Dan and Father Anderson and wondered if it was worth using some of his remaining gasoline to do his errands today. It would save him both time and energy.

  A glance outside the window showed him that it was still dark.

  I can't believe how easy it is to fall back into the 'go to bed when it gets dark' mindset, and we've got lights still. I imagine those without them got back into that rhythm almost instantly.

  He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to blink out the last bit of sleepiness. With a jaw-cracking yawn, he started gathering up his clothes for the day and got dressed.

  I'll snag some breakfast then water the garden just as it's getting light out. Best time for it, both for the plants and for me if I don't want to be dripping with sweat.

  He made his way downstairs carefully since the only lighting was a pair of the nightlights they'd been making. Spaced at the top and bottom of the stairs it was plenty of light, as long as you paid attention. He'd decided that conserving his own electricity was necessary with as many people as were living in the house.

  I'll grab a thick slice of that bread Anne made yesterday, Michael thought. Smear it with a little honey and it will do me just fine for breakfast.

  As quietly as he could he made his breakfast. At the first bite he closed his eyes with pleasure for a moment.

  Michael made his way out into the living room. The thick front curtain did double duty as a blackout curtain since he didn't actually want the rest of the town to know how much electricity he still had available up here. It served to block the electric lights, or the glow of the television when they stretched a day out by watching a movie.

  Since there was nothing electrical on right now, he opened the curtains wide. The dimness of predawn was still brighter than the interior of the room had been before he opened the curtain. He turned to go back to the kitchen for some water and nearly dropped his breakfast.

  Rynn sat in the easy chair, her body rigid. He dropped his bread on the coffee table then went to his knees beside her. Her wrist was cold when he grabbed it, but he could feel a pulse. It was slow but steady and he realized that she was probably in a trance state.

  She shouldn't be rigid in a trance state though, she should be more relaxed. Something must be wrong.

  “Rynn,” he said aloud, trying to startle her out of the trance.

  She didn't reply, didn't even blink.

  “Rynn,” he called louder.

  That's not working. I'll try speaking directly to her mind.

  Michael projected his thoughts at her. With the amount of effort it took him to break through, he realized that her consciousn
ess was much farther away than he'd thought.

  Rynn, he sent.

  Michael? came a faint reply.

  Rynn. Where are you? What's wrong?

  I went out to scout for the raiders. They've got a wizard with them and he's got me trapped in some sort of power web. He's using it to try to crush my shields down into me. I don't know what will happen if he succeeds, and it looks like he is.

  Michael's thoughts raced.

  Can't you burn it? he sent. Even something like that should be vulnerable to fire, shouldn't it?

  I would, but I've got all my power in my shields right now. I don't dare pull any out to try it.

  He reached out and clasped her wrist, moving her fingers so they were clasped around his as well.

  Here, take some of mine, Michael sent.

  He sent a surge of power out through his arm and into Rynn, but her reaction wasn't at all what he expected.

  There was a flash of some sort on her arm where the power was entering her. A moment later the burning pain of being stabbed shot through his arm. He managed to maintain his focus and continue to send power to Rynn. Then there was a second flash and the pain lessened. It didn't go away and he felt the warmth of blood dripping out of the wounds, but it no longer felt like there was something piercing his wrist.

  Rynn shuddered in his grasp before her legs came up off the floor and struck Michael. He lost his grip on her wrist as her legs struck him, sending him staggering across the room. She curled up into a fetal position and Michael saw the glint of fire shield forming around her.

  He wasn't going to try to touch her right now, he'd been burned that way before. But if she was shielding her body, then she was probably back in it now. He looked down at his wrist and decided that tending the five puncture wounds in it should probably be his top priority since they were still bleeding.

  The first aid kit was in the kitchen near the back door, so he headed for that.

  * * *

  Five minutes, several gauze pads, and a roll of bandages later he was back. Rynn was no longer tightly curled in a fetal position. She'd relaxed a bit, although she still had her legs drawn up on the chair. She didn't appear to be tracking well though. When Michael walked into the room, she didn't even glance in his direction.

  “Rynn? Are you okay?” Michael asked.

  “No,” she said, “but I will be. Just give me a few minutes.”

  “You want something to eat? I bet you burned off a lot of energy.”

  Her eyes lit at the thought of food and she nodded vigorously.

  “I'll be right back then,” he said.

  A minute later he was back with another thick slice of bread coated in honey and two glasses of water to go with it. Rynn tore into the food while Michael retrieved his own breakfast and finished it, this time with something to wash it down.

  She devoured the last crumbs of the bread and her eyes flicked around the room. When she saw Michael's wrist, she stopped and pointed.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “I don't know. When I started feeding you power there was this flash and something, several somethings from the looks of things, drove through my wrist. Four on the top of it and one on the side.”

  He stared at her intently for a moment before finishing.

  “Oddly enough, very close to all the places where your fingers were,” he said.

  Rynn blushed and pulled her hands in next to her stomach.

  “I'm sorry,” she said. “It was probably me. The amount of power you sent to me took me by surprise and I think my body might have reacted as though it were being attacked.”

  “What, exactly, would do that kind of damage?”

  Her face scrunched up as though she expected him to snap at her.

  “That's part of the thing I can't tell you until I get permission from some other people as well,” she said.

  “I was afraid you were going to say that. Alright then. So what happened to you?”

  She gave him a quick rundown on what happened. Then finished with a question.

  “Who is this guy? He seems to know what happened to Raymond when the council sent him here. But not the end of it, just that you were giving Raymond lip to make him angry.”

  “I can think of a couple of reasons,” Michael said. “But my best guess is that the council was using some sort of scrying magic to watch and listen to what happened, but those spells get pretty unreliable when there's a lot of power flying around so they might've cut off when the magic started flying.”

  “He didn't know that I was here, or at least that I was a wizard, because he was surprised when it wasn't you he caught. He thought you'd be using earth magic and not water also, so I guess he doesn't know how Raymond ended up.”

  Michael winced at the memory. His dreams were still occasionally troubled by visions of the first troubleshooter the council had sent to take care of him. In his visions, Raymond was always dead and trapped in the tower of ice that Michael had killed him with.

  “Michael,” Rynn said, “you need to get over that. He was going to kill you. Your choices were to die, or to kill him. If you want to stay alive it's probably going to happen that way again. So I know you hate it, but you have to come to terms with it.”

  “It isn't so much the killing, although that's plagued me. It's that I did it with my water magic. I was just so happy to have it back after so many years and almost the first thing I did with it was kill a man.”

  Rynn shook her head.

  “I don't get you. You should be happy that you're still alive and he isn't. Instead, you let it persist in bothering you. If that makes you hesitate next time, then you may be the one who ends up dead. There's a lot of people counting on you Michael, so don't. Don't hesitate, and definitely don't end up dead, okay?”

  Michael smiled weakly.

  “I'll do my best Rynn, but I can't promise that I won't hesitate. I don't know how I'll react.”

  “Back to the point though. The raiders are coming and they've got magical support now. I'm guessing that they're under the wizard's influence without even realizing it so you might as well consider it magical leadership instead of just support.”

  “This is so not what we needed,” Michael said. “I think I still need to get the Garands to Dan. Even if there is a wizard with them, most of the raiders are just going to be guys with guns, right?”

  “I think so, I didn't get a really clear look at the raiders, but there was only the one wizard involved in the trap I fell into. Hopefully he's the only one with the group.”

  “Well, it's good to have the information. But if we do any more scouting on these guys, let's keep it at a distance, okay?”

  “You don't have to tell me that. I might've been able to take him or at least escape if I'd been prepared, but he took me totally by surprise. I don't want to risk him having any more tricks up his sleeve.”

  “Good, I'm glad to hear it. You might want to get some rest. You're looking a bit drawn.”

  “I feel that way too. I'm going to get some more to eat, drink a gallon of water, then go crash. You don't need my help with anything this morning, do you?”

  “No, I shouldn't. Today is mostly going to be getting the weapons to Dan and the food to Father Anderson. I'll warn Dan that the raiders aren't following the path we thought they would. Beyond that, I don't know. How long are you going to need to sleep for? I know two hours is normally enough for you.”

  “Probably five or six hours at least. Don't worry unless I'm not up by lunchtime though. If I'm not up by then, go ahead and wake me up.”

  Michael glanced down at his bandaged wrist and wondered how wise it would be to wake her up if his wounds were the result of her being startled.

  “Alright. Go sleep then, I'm going to go out and take care of the garden. Even with the Fae's help, it still does better when I'm paying attention to it.”

  Rynn nodded and headed for the kitchen. Michael followed her, then went out the kitchen door into the back yard.<
br />
  The sun had just crested the horizon and everything was bathed in its wan, early-morning light. He settled down onto the large rock next to the garden and sent a fragment of his awareness into the soil beneath the plants.

  * * *

  Michael stood and stretched, looking out over the healthy plants in his garden. Most of them were several times larger than any of their types he'd grown before, primarily due to the assistance of the Fae.

  He shook his head in disbelief.

  I'd heard the stories about what the Fae could do for a farmer, but I never really believed it. Not until now, anyway.

  The soft flutter of wings drew him from his musings. He turned to see Gerry, the Fae he thought of as being in charge of her kind, hovering nearby.

  “What brings you from your berry patch?” he asked.

  “You had asked me of the larger Fae, and when they might arrive,” she replied.

  “Are they arriving then?”

  “Not yet, but quite soon. When you strengthened the current of the essence in the crossing flows, it enlarged the channel enough that some of the larger Fae might travel through it. The largest will still have to arrive by other means, but some of the larger will be able to travel the channels now.”

  Michael translated that mentally.

  When we strengthened the flow of the essence? I bet when we broke the stasis spells all the energy from them went back into the ley lines, plus any energy the spells had built up. I guess she means that larger flows of energy will allow Fae with larger physical bodies to travel here by ley line now.

  “Are they coming already then?”

  “I do not know, but you had asked of them. Now that they might arrive at any time, I thought I should inform you of that.”

  “Thank you Gerry,” Michael said.

  “You are welcome. Have you spoken with Calvin yet?”

  “No, I'm afraid there are many matters that demand my attention. Although he is a friend, it has not seemed as urgent to communicate with him as it has to defend these lands and the town against those who would harm the inhabitants.”