"Wait… Faerum? You're talking about Rubicon, aren't you, the missions to Rubicon?"
"This is yet another word I do not know. Our home is called Faerum."
"Your world, Faerum, it's the source of magic, isn't it? That's why there's so much mana, so much magical energy near where a gateway was opened. It pours into this world like water."
"I am not a mage-scholar, Lizbeth-Chambers, but I am considered well schooled in the magical arts."
"She's being modest," said Kargin. "Tlathia is probably the greatest mage on all of Faerum."
"Doubtful, old friend, but I have some knowledge of the esoteric arts. Know this, then—Faerum is not the source of all magic—at least not as you perceive it. There was always magic on this world, but for some reason, it has atrophied in the time since the Banishment, when we were tricked into leaving. I suspect magic on this world is somehow tied to the ancient ones, but whatever caused magic to disappear, it is coming back now, and coming back strong. When my sister Maelhrandia first arrived here a year ago, there was barely any magic at all. Now it is spreading. Our return may have released magic through the gateways, focusing its power in these regions, but our magic is now interacting with the long-dormant magic on your world, awakening it, creating something … different. This awakening has only intensified since my mother opened gateways all across your world, creating a dozen ripples across a vast pond. We have altered the dynamics of magic here. I do not know where this will end, but unless I find the ancient ones, I fear it will be your doom. As I said, my people do not share."
"I've told you already, we don't have ancient ones on this world."
"You may not know them by these terms. But they are powerful magic-users, more powerful even than my people are."
"There are no such beings here," Elizabeth said with conviction.
Tlathia's shoulders slumped; her dark skin seemed to lighten. "Are you certain, Lizbeth-Chambers? They are giants, with limbs covered in thick fur. My own sister, Maelhrandia, bragged of defeating one in combat a year ago."
Elizabeth gasped, suddenly understanding. "You're talking about Sasquatches. Big Foot. Big Foots. That's what you call an ancient one?"
Tlathia's eyes narrowed in confusion. "Big Foot?" she repeated, shaking her head. "This does not sound correct."
"It's a poor name, but I've actually seen one—or rather, a dead one."
"Dead," Tlathia repeated sadly. "So Maelhrandia didn't lie."
"Are you sure?" Kargin asked. "My people's records said they were nearly invulnerable, immeasurably powerful. Almost like gods."
"I'm sure. Your sister's pet lizard, this Gaze-Killer, crushed its chest."
"Damn that monster," whispered Tlathia. "What of others?"
Elizabeth shook her head. "I'm sorry. My people don't believe in them. They are—were—urban myths, legends. There may be more, I suppose, hiding in the wilderness, but I don't know where you might find them. This one seemed drawn by your sister's presence, but if an entire army of your kind hasn't drawn them out…"
"They must still be here," Tlathia insisted. "Otherwise, I don't think we can stop my mother."
"Stop her from doing what?"
Tlathia removed a glass globe from a pouch beneath her cloak. She held it up for Elizabeth to see. It was all black, roughly the size of a baseball, and within its dark depths, she saw small flashes of light, electrical sparks. "Stop her from recovering this orb."
Elizabeth, her heart light with wonder, leaned forward to see it more clearly. "What is that?"
"A Shatkur Orb, one of only three. The second sits within my mother's fortress. The third is lost."
"Lost?"
"My mother lent it to my sister Maelhrandia to facilitate her mission here. None has seen it since her death at the hands of your warriors a year ago. Do you know its fate, by any chance?"
Elizabeth shook her head. "I'm sorry. That was a … difficult time for me. I was badly burned by your sister and almost died." As she spoke, her fingers trailed over the waxy patch of skin on her left cheek, the only portion that Cassie had never been able to heal, no matter how many times she had tried. Once again, Elizabeth saw the flames pouring over her. She shuddered.
Tlathia swept forward, moving quicker than Elizabeth would have thought possible, and reached out for Elizabeth's face, trailing her fingers over the rough patch of unhealed skin. "I am sorry for the pain my sister caused you, for the pain she continues to cause you long after her death. We are not all as she was."
"You didn't do anything."
"Yes. To my shame." Tlathia channeled, sending a throb of healing energy into Elizabeth's cheek.
Elizabeth gasped, this time staggering away from the dark elf woman. Her fingers flew up to her cheek and found the skin smooth and tender but completely healed, no longer waxy. "I … what did you … thank you. Thank you."
Tlathia moved away again. "We are not all like my sisters, just most of us, sadly."
"But not all," insisted Kargin. "Some are noble, kind, and brave—worthy of fighting alongside."
"Thank you, my friend. Yet there remains a sickness that poisons my people, Lizbeth-Chambers, the worship of a foul deity—the Spider Mother. Her taint runs deep. Now, there are only a handful of us who honor the old god, the Benevolent Grandfather, and we are hunted as heretics."
"Pity about the third orb," Kargin muttered. "I dislike thinking that an object of such power remains unaccounted for."
Tlathia shook her head. "The only pity is that they are not all lost and beyond my mother's use. Your father made them too well, indestructible."
Kargin snorted. "Not indestructible, just nearly so."
"Why are they so special?" Elizabeth asked. "What do they do?"
"Store magical energy," answered Kargin, "which may not seem impressive until you understand just how much magical energy they can store."
"Like batteries?"
"I don't know what a battery is," Tlathia answered.
"I do," said Kargin. "And our new friend is correct, more or less. They are magical batteries—although in a vastly oversimplified sense. The orbs act as both a power source and a container for mystical energy. With them, you can power enormous machines, or if you're a mage, you can cast more powerful spells than would normally be possible, like opening a gateway between Faerum and this world."
"But only once," said Tlathia. "The power required to traverse the Red Ether is staggering. After such a use, until it's recharged, an orb can only open localized gateways, but it can open as many of those as a mage wishes."
"Your sister, this Maelhrandia, she did that. When she kidnapped Colonel McKnight, our commander, she created a gateway back to Rubicon … I mean, Faerum."
Tlathia nodded. "Such was her mission. And this is how Kargin and I travelled to your world. Now, with this orb, I can travel almost anywhere on this world at a whim."
"Really? Anywhere?" Elizabeth asked in wonder.
"Not anywhere," corrected Kargin. "First, it takes a mage. I, for example, can do nothing with it. Second, you must know the place where you wish to open a gateway. You must have knowledge of the terrain beforehand so that you can picture it in your mind and create a firm enough connection to it."
Tlathia inclined her head. "It is so. Still, a powerful tool, no?"
"That's amazing," Elizabeth said. "But I still don't understand why this orb is so important to your mother."
"It is … difficult to explain. But without this orb, my mother's plans on your world will fail."
"What plans?"
Tlathia met Kargin's eyes, and something hidden passed between them. Tlathia looked down at her hands, considering her flawless white nails. "To speak the dishonor aloud gives shame dominion over me. Know this—I am trying to save your people. But to do so, I must make contact with the ancient ones. They will help me keep this orb safe from my mother, my sister Horlastia, and her army. If we can keep it from her, she will fail here and be forced to bring her armies back to Faerum, perh
aps to never return."
"This is very confusing," Elizabeth said. "But if you help me get back to my people, we might be able to safeguard the orb. We're not helpless. We have technology, powerful weapons."
Kargin sighed heavily then stared at Tlathia. "If the … if the ancient ones truly are gone from this world, an alliance with the manlings may be our only hope."
"Humans," corrected Elizabeth. "Manlings is not a term we use. In fact, it's more than a bit sexist against females."
"I don't know what sexist is," said Tlathia, "but on Faerum, females hold dominance. Is it not so here?"
"The opposite," said Elizabeth, "but we're working on it."
"How enlightened you … humans are," said Tlathia, "to share power with your males."
"I'm the only human you've met, aren't I?"
Tlathia smirked. "Indeed. But what a human you are, Lizbeth-Chambers. How many other mages are there like you?"
"Almost none. Until your sister arrived on our world, magic was just a trick, a myth. Since then, there were two others—now three, two other women and a man. But the man … died."
The smile fell from Tlathia's face. "He died by magic, didn't he?"
"He … yes, Duncan did. He set himself on fire one night, trying to channel too much magic."
Tlathia sighed. "It is the same on my world, Lizbeth-Chambers. Magic favors the feminine. Most—almost all—males are simply unable to control magic. I don't know why. Some would tell you that the Spider Mother only favors daughters, but I'm certainly not one of her daughters, and I have some strength. I've only ever known of a handful of males who survived the first weeks following the manifestation of their magic, and almost none who survived long enough to master it. I suspect this is what happened to your friend Duncan. I am sorry. Magic can be cruel."
"The other women, Cassie, Leela, and I … we have different strengths."
Tlathia nodded. "It is so among the fae seelie as well. My sister Maelhrandia was a mage-scout, a master of subterfuge and concealment magic. But Horlastia is a mage-warden, a disciple of combative arts. You do not wish to ever face her in battle."
"And you?"
Tlathia smiled. "I am a mage-master, Lizbeth-Chambers, as is my mother. My focus is too poor to specialize, so I study all the disciplines."
Kargin snorted, shaking his head. "She's being modest again."
"Can you … can you help me, help us learn?"
"Yes, Lizbeth-Chambers, I can help guide you on your journey to master the magical weaves. And I will do so gladly. But first we—"
From kilometers away, a cavalcade of gunshots shattered the calm. The gunshots were followed by a long, loud burst of heavy machine-gun fire.
Someone's fighting!
Tlathia bolted out of the bunker, up the wooden stairs, and out into the surrounding woods.
Kargin ran after her, an ax in each hand.
Elizabeth chased after them and found both standing silently outside the bunker.
Kargin's ax-heads burned red-hot, as if they had just come out of a forge. "What is it? What's wrong?" he asked Tlathia, looking about for a foe.
Elizabeth spun in place, seeing the entirety of the paintball range for the first time, including the office building and dirt parking lot near the tree line. A dirt road led into the woods, and a single vehicle, a rusty, old, paint-splattered school bus with the words Sniper Mountain Paintball painted on its body, sat abandoned in the parking lot. Her guess had been right. They were still near the bridge, which meant the Peace River would be only a few kilometers north.
At that moment, Tlathia gasped, her eyes growing impossibly wide. "It's them, old friend. I feel them for the first time since we arrived—the ancient ones are nearby."
"Truly?" he asked.
"The magic is powerful, wondrous, stronger than anything I've ever felt. Even my mother can't do that. It has to be them. We've done it."
"Where?" Kargin asked.
"That way," Tlathia said, pointing in the direction of the dirt road that led into the trees.
"That's south, I think," said Elizabeth. She pulled her compass from beneath her shirt and took a quick bearing. "Southeast. The Alaskan highway is in that direction."
"What is this?" Tlathia asked Elizabeth.
"Someone's fighting a battle. It must be the army—finally!"
"Whoever it is, there's an ancient one involved," said Tlathia. "We must go quickly, before we lose the trail." She gripped Elizabeth's forearm and squeezed it, looking her square in the eye. "Will you come with us, Lizbeth-Chambers, mage of the humans? Will you help us so that together we can stop my mother?"
"Of course I'll come with you. Gladly."
Tlathia smiled, her teeth bright white against her dark skin. "Thank—"
She flew back, as if punched, her hot blood spraying Elizabeth's face.
A heartbeat later, Elizabeth heard the echoing crack of the gunshot.
27
Ulfir Dunwalker stalked through the odd forests of the Old World, his manticores prowling at his side. He was south of the river again, secretly trailing the boggart cohort Horlastia had dispatched across the narrow metal bridge. As the sun began to dip below the trees, darkness spread, bringing with it a chill that presaged a frigid night. He hated this cold world with its strange, alien trees. Bale-Fire and the queen can fight over it.
The boggarts he trailed numbered two hundred, with a handful of trolls as additional muscle, and a pack of hunting gwyllgi-hounds as scouts. Of course, none of them, not even the gwyllgi-hounds, knew he followed them, slipping through the woods that bordered the wide manling road they marched down. The boggarts, lazy cretins that they were, marched arrogantly down the open road, oblivious to the risk they took. Thus far, the manlings had done little more than flee from Horlastia's army, but such things could easily change, and overconfidence preceded disaster.
Ulfir didn't care. He was counting on the boggarts' stupidity to draw out Tlathia.
And two hundred boggarts, trolls, and gwyllgi-hounds made a tempting target, especially when they moved without the support of a mage.
In the distance behind him, to the north, the glow of the fires upon the bridge turned the sky crimson. Those fires would burn all night, he guessed, and even when they had burned out, the metal would remain hot for hours. Before that time, the heretic would be dead, he'd have recovered the stolen Shatkur Orb, and there would be no reason for the army to go any farther at all.
Only the culling would remain.
Of course, Tlathia might not react to the boggarts' presence at all. After all, she hadn't interfered in the attack upon the manling city. But Ulfir didn't think that would be the case. Tlathia was a heretic but no fool. She'd have known there was nothing she could have done to stop the slaughter. As dangerous as she was, Tlathia was but a single mage-master and couldn't fight an army, even with that foul dwarf at her side.
A single cohort, on the other hand…
Ulfir paused in the trees, peering through them at the terrain ahead of the boggarts, his intuition telling him something was wrong. His manticores watched him as he laid his spear against the tree trunk then began to scale the tree, gaining height in order to see more clearly. Ahead, the road twisted about, funneled between high ground and short rocky cliff walls on the east side and open stony ground to the west.
"Killing ground," he whispered, seeing it at once.
The boggarts and trolls, of course, saw nothing but a winding road bordered by a sheer rock face. The gwyllgi-hounds paused before the cliff-face and turned about, perhaps smelling something. That should have clued the boggarts in to send scouts to clear the high ground before proceeding.
But they didn’t.
Ulfir sighed. Boggarts.
He peered intently at the foliage atop the high ground, seeing nothing. But then, had he been hidden up there, no one would have seen him either. He held his breath as the boggarts marched forward. The gwyllgi-hounds snarled, but their handlers whipped them to keep movi
ng. His skin tingled with excitement, and he found himself nodding in anticipation. A moment later, the cliffs erupted with a cavalcade of cracks and smoke—manling fire weapons, shooting onto the boggarts on the road. In seconds, most of the gwyllgi and dozens of boggarts were down, cut apart by the wonderful weapons. One particularly loud, long burst of fire ripped apart the boggarts, literally disintegrating a handful of them and several trolls. Another troll, a massive brute with plate armor, tried to reach the ambushers, but then an awe-inspiring bolt of lightning—more powerful than any bolt Ulfir had ever seen—flashed down from the high ground, sending the troll flying, its torso burning.
Ulfir gasped, with spots of light dancing before his eyes.
Such power!
It must be Tlathia. I was right.
The boggarts broke, what little courage they had now shattered. They ran back along the road the way they had come, at least a third of their number left behind, dead or dying. The ambush had been so effective that Ulfir was certain none of the boggarts had even seen their enemy.
But he had.
IT TOOK Ulfir little time to slip across the road into the woods on the other side and make his way behind the ambushers. As he and his manticores snuck through the woods, he half feared Tlathia and the manling warriors had already left, moving on to find another ambush site.
He would have.
But he also realized they were trying to protect the manlings that had fled along the road and therefore would want to keep such a strong defensive position. He hoped that was the case. Had they slipped away, he'd have to trail them and find their new location, and that would take too much time.
He wanted to kill Tlathia and leave this frigid ice world.
Even now, he rubbed his arms, wishing he had brought a better cloak.
At least one of his manticores always remained at his side while the other two slipped forward or trailed behind. Other fae seelie believed Ulfir had somehow captured these beasts, forcing his will upon them, but only a fool hunted manticores. He had found them by chance when they were cubs, tearing them away from their dead mother's teat in order to raise them himself. And that was the only reason they had bonded to him. Clever beasts, they intuitively used pack tactics to hunt.
Gunz (The Dark Elf War Book 2) Page 19
