by Guy Antibes
“Have her tell Shira that we are close. Get Shira’s description of the captors,” Pol said. With the two Shinkyan horses communicating with each other, Pol would know exactly what he faced.
Demeron stopped. Five powerful Winnower magicians. Kell’s shield is barely hanging on, and Shira can’t do any magic. Are you worried?
“I’m worried for my friends, but not for me. Stop for a moment. I want to see if you can remove wards.”
Pol applied a ward to a tree trunk. “Remember to visualize it blowing away in the wind or evaporating.”
The ward disappeared. Pol grinned. “You can do it.”
I thought I could when you taught Shira and Pol. I like the ward blowing away like sand in the wind. That worked quickest. I’ll use that.
“Work on the magicians when they are distracted. If Kell has succumbed, remove his ward and mind-control, too. It’s the same tweak, but you have to think of mind-control as a film on the brain, where the ward is more substantial if you can’t get it to leave.”
Demeron nodded. They have stopped.
“Let’s save our friends.”
Demeron sped up again and then slowed down when he neared a meadow. Pol spelled invisibility as they closed in on the resting place. Two magicians sat next to Shira and one next to Kell. That left two others watering the horses while the others ate trail food.
Pol’s stomach grumbled. He hadn’t eaten. The food he brought from the inn would be a mess, but that was better than nothing. He promised himself a jumbled feast once he retrieved Shira and Kell.
He checked his location and sensed another five riders riding behind him a few miles away. Pol guessed that the Winnowers had sent ten magicians to capture them. Someone must have discovered the team they had killed.
Pol needed Shira and Kell to fight them all. Leaving Demeron in reserve, he sneaked close to the camp and let Demeron communicate with Amble, who talked to Shira. His lips drew into a smile at the stealthiness of it all.
Two of the magicians did not have anything constricting their thoughts. Pol yanked the compulsion from the other three magicians, who fell to the ground. He transported a sliver to one of the ward-less magicians. It slid off a protection ward. He was not close enough to remove it, so he drew closer and waved his invisible hand, and both wards dropped. He took care of them with metal splinters.
Shira rose and helped Kell to his feet.
“There are another five coming behind me,” Pol said. “We don’t have time to clean up the site. Get on your horses. We will let them chase us for a bit.” He looked at Kell, who appeared haggard. Pol checked his brain and saw traces of a compulsion spell. He gently removed it. Kell looked more alert.
“They had just about penetrated the shield,” Kell said.
“Three of them worked together,” Shira said, “after they failed with me. They don’t know who I am, just that I wore a disguise. They thought I was an older man,” she snorted. “Not very perceptive.”
She sounded disappointed, but Pol was not. “We will take their horses. Demeron, can you work with the Winnower mounts if we need some muscle?”
I can, Demeron said. Nothing fancy.
“I leave it to your discretion,” Pol said. “We need to leave now. Demeron, lead us on.”
They rode out the same way Shira’s group came in, but once they were in the forest, Demeron found a trail of sorts that led perpendicular to the road. Shira obliterated their tracks.
The magicians hurtled past them.
“Let’s remove five more magicians from the Winnowers,” Pol said after refreshing Kell’s shields.
“The restraining spells were identical to the ones Elder Furima used,” Shira said. “It’s not a coincidence. Elder Furima taught Winnower magicians how to do it.”
“I can break the spell,” Pol said.
“I can’t,” Shira said. “I tried, but…” She shook her head.
“They can’t apply it when fighting, right?”
Shira nodded. “It took two to apply the spell and one to maintain it. That’s why we had to ride in tandem. I barely managed to throw my knife into a tree. Is that what brought you along this path?”
“It is,” Pol said. “Let’s attack the attackers. Ready Kell?” Pol saw his bare sword glinting in the dappled sunlight.
Demeron led them back along the path. Pol’s group moved faster now that none of them had to cover their tracks.
The magicians all wore masks with the Winnower device of the scythe over a pentagon embroidered in white over black cloth. They threw fire Pol’s way.
Pol and Demeron shielded the rest, but the magicians had acted too soon, and the streams of flame barely touched their shields. That would not happen the next time when they closed in on the magicians.
Demeron instructed the horses under his control to spread out around the magicians. While they were distracted, Pol waved his hand to remove any compulsion wards. None of the magicians was affected. If the Winnowers sent loyal magicians to capture him, they must have known who he was.
They fought fire with fire. Waves of spells railed against their mind shields. Pol drew close enough to send splinters, but every magician had protection. He needed to get closer to defeat the protection wards.
Demeron had the horses charge, and the magicians’ horses began to buck. Demeron carried Pol close enough to remove the protective wards, so Pol pulled out his Shinkyan-style knives and sent them into each of the magicians.
He nearly fell from Demeron; his reserves were tapped out because of both fights. He staggered to the dead magicians. The three magicians under compulsion still slept. He had to sit. Shira brought him the smashed bread and cheese mixed in with cake crumbles somewhat held together with frosting. He shoved them all in his mouth and drank water.
“Care to join me?” Pol said with his mouth full. “I need food.”
“We already ate. We might have been restrained, but they fed us,” Kell said. He walked over to the sleeping magicians. “We can get some good information from them.”
“I’ll start using a truth spell.”
Pol felt strong enough to inspect the magicians he had killed. He removed the masks and gasped at the third mask removed. He looked down at the face of Backburn, the chief constable of their first town in Zalistya. Pol yanked a Winnower medallion from his neck. All five magicians wore them. True believers.
“So much for trust,” Shira said. “He even knew Malden and so much more.”
Pol nodded. He looked through the saddlebags of the horses and found the rune book. Pol wrote a message to Malden and put his own code in it.
They dragged the dead magicians into the woods, far from the spring that started at the meadow. When they returned, Malden had written back saying that he had suspected Backburn for the turning of Seekers, but had been pleasantly surprised he had cooperated with Pol.
Pol could no longer trust any magician who was familiar with Deftnis and Seekers that they knew in common.
After cleaning up the camp, Pol had regained enough strength for a restraint spell on the three compelled magicians. None of them wore the amulets, so that was certainly in their favor.
He spelled restraint as Shira woke one of the magicians up. All three were men in their thirties or early forties.
“Who are you?” the magician said, rubbing his head. “I’m free. You’re Pol Pastelle?”
“I am,” Pol said. “And you’re an ex-Seeker?”
“Ex is right. I’ve spent the last year-and-a-half living with the Winnowers under a spell.”
“It is a compulsion spell,” Shira said.
He looked at her. “It is? I never even had a desire to wonder about it. I just did as I was told, all for the greater glory of the Winnow Society.”
“How many Seekers are compelled?”
“Twenty or more. We are a select group led by Backburn. I don’t know what his story is. I worked with him once, and he seemed normal, but then he’s the one who changed me, I’m sure.”
>
“He had me fooled,” Pol said. “I thought to trust him.”
“A bad move.”
“Not really,” Kell said. “As it turns out, we now know he was a Winnower.”
“Was?”
“They followed me to Grinderton and then to here. They didn’t survive.”
The ex-Seeker narrowed his eyes at Pol. “You are everything we were warned about.”
“And more,” Shira said.
“You can defeat the protection spell?” the magician said.
Pol nodded. “With a flick of my wrist. If I remove it quickly, you faint. I can remove it more slowly, and you don’t faint. The compulsion spell—”
“That’s how we defeated the South Salvans. I was there. Hazett—” he looked at Pol and cleared his throat. “The Emperor enlisted every magician he could to defeat them, and now it happens again.”
“I don’t think it ever really stopped,” Pol said. “This is the same war. The enemy learned their heavy compulsion spells ended up a weakness, so they developed a new ward that worked better than mind-control. That can wear off, especially from strong magicians. This new ward doesn’t kill a magician if removed. They have another ward that will do that.”
“Not so smart. I’ll return to the Emperor’s fight.”
“Can you be trusted?”
“I’ll happily submit to a truth spell. I’m sure my two companions will, as well. We were together when Backburn turned us against the Empire,”
“A truth spell it is, then,” Pol said.
~
Pol’s group had grown by three when they rode into Grinderton. Malden recovered three of his Seekers. There would be more as soon as they trained these men to remove compulsion wards, mind-control, and the nasty protection spells that were proliferating among the Winnower army.
He had endured another mistake in trust. This time he was not sentenced to four years on a distant continent. He had protected himself in Grinderton with a full circle of physical protection, and he turned a possible deadly trap into a victory. Pol didn’t think he would have survived all ten magicians at once, so splitting up had been the mistake his enemy had made. Demeron’s mastery of horse leadership contributed to Pol’s success, and he promised a big bucket of grain at the inn.
Now he would travel into West Huffnya with three magicians and send Kell back to Loa in Fen.
~~~
Chapter Eight
~
A fter reporting to Grinderton’s mayor and resting the horses for a full day, Pol and Shira said goodbye to Kell in the stableyard.
“This was about as far as I was going to go anyway,” Kell said. “There is a caravan of wagons ready to head south to Hentz in a few days. I talked them into letting me join them. I’ll be safe enough.”
“Give your parents our best,” Shira said, “and keep your shields up. We’ve reinforced them as much as we can.”
“I’ll be destroying mind-control spells and eliminating wards on everyone I meet. I might even be successful, although I’d be more than happy if no one is affected.”
Pol agreed. “Don’t do anything stupid. No gambling.”
Kell blushed. “Those days are behind me.”
That was the moment that Pol gave his friend a hug. “My adoptive father said he led a hugging family. I’ll take his advice this time.”
Shira did the same, and the pair were soon headed west for the Barnan capital.
When they stopped for the night, Hay, the first Seeker Pol interrogated, got on the rune book with Malden. They had a conversation that lasted most of the evening after dinner at a small inn.
Pol leaned over and watched the conversation take place.
Malden asked a series of qualifying questions and then interrogated Hay on what he knew about the Winnowers. Pol knew most of it, but Malden asked other questions that Pol had not thought to. He wondered if others were looking over Malden’s shoulder like Pol did with Hay.
After an hour and a half, Malden asked Hay to give the rune book to Pol.
I learned more than I would using a hundred birds, Malden wrote. Hay is telling you the truth, but you’d know that since you’ve applied a truth spell to all three Seekers. The Winnowers are gathering their troops, so now that you have some backup, I’m redirecting your mission to disrupt the army. Remove compulsion and mind-control. Hay and the two other Seekers are capable of taking out the enemy’s officers. Leave that to them. Stay safe and don’t hesitate to keep me updated as you go. — Malden
Pol let Hay read Malden’s orders. He looked at Pol and bowed his head.
“You are our leader. If you give me orders to kill, I’ll do that for you and the Emperor. We may not return, but we will hamper the enemy’s ability to rebel.”
“Before you kill anyone, try to remove compulsion. The more magicians we can turn, the more soldiers’ lives we will save.
Hay grinned. “Especially if they are Seekers.”
“Right,” Pol said.
~
Shira sat on the only chair in Pol’s tiny room, working on the three rune books.
“What improvements have you thought of?” Pol asked.
“A page of pre-written notes, just like the tribes used. We might not be able to write quickly when we are lurking about the Winnower’s military camps. Just one dot to activate. All the Seekers can activate and erase the dots on their own,” she said linking dots.
“What notes will you write?”
Shira looked up. “Let’s put all five of our heads together. The Seekers have worked in the field, so they might have better ideas than we have.”
“Sounds good to me,” Pol said. He sometimes had to remind himself that others had more experience than he did. Shira knew more about his ducal estate than he, and the Seekers had all been on the kinds of Seeker missions that Pol abhorred.
They finally reached the Barnan capital to find it in an uproar. Evidently, the Winnowers had been busy, and that included the three Seekers who had previously swept through the city spelling as many as they could.
The innkeeper warned them about fights in the streets over supporting the Empire or the Winnowers. Pol sent everyone out on their own to eliminate the spells that caused so much turmoil.
As Pol walked the streets, he saw a curio shop. A lodestone compass sat in the window. He entered the store and asked about it.
“Sailors use them all the time,” the shopkeeper said. “We make the compasses.”
“Where did you get the lodestone?” Pol asked. Something tickled the back of his mind about using lodestones to cancel out rune book messages.
“We find them on the Iron Slopes, close to the coast.”
“You mine them?”
“No. We find the mineral on the surface. You take a piece of lodestone and put it on a stick, and it will dip when a larger piece of lodestone is found.”
“You have any of the larger pieces for sale?” Pol asked.
“I have a lump about the shape of your two fists together.” He put his fisted hands together.
“Can I buy it?”
“It’s too big for a compass,” the shopkeeper asked.
“I want to conduct an experiment.”
“A scholar? You don’t look like a scholar.”
Pol smiled. “Looks can be deceiving.”
Pol walked out into the sunshine with a cloth bag holding an expensive lump of rock.
He followed a man under some kind of spell into an alleyway and put the man to sleep. Now to experiment. The man had mind-control after Pol looked. He ran the stone over the man’s head to see what happened, but nothing did. He eliminated the mind-control and woke the man up.
“Are you all right?” Pol asked.
“I, I don’t know.” He put his hand to his head.
How many times had he seen people do the same thing when he removed the spell? “You looked a little woozy,” Pol said. “I helped you into the shade in the alley. You feel better?”
“More than better. T
he Winnow Society’s tricks consumed my mind. What made me do that?”
“The Winnowers empty tricks, you know.” Pol put a shield on the man and helped him to his feet.
“Thank you, young man.”
Young man? His ‘Buck’ disguise wasn’t particularly young. He went to the nearest shop window and saw Pol Cissert looking back at him. What eliminated the disguise? He looked down at the lodestone.
Pol continued down the street. He colored his hair back to dark brown in the now-vacant alley and kept the lodestone in the bag.
Pol found an argument beginning in front of a feed store. He walked closer to the men. One had a compulsion and two more were mind-controlled. Pol took out the lodestone and showed it to the spelled men who were just beginning to jostle two un-spelled citizens.
“Do you know what this stone is?” Pol said.
The three men looked down. Pol looked into the compelled man’s head to see the compulsion ward fade away. They looked up at Pol.
“Whatever it is, it bleached your hair. Is it magic?”
Pol nodded. “I suppose so,” he said as he put the lodestone back in the bag.
He returned to their inn. He put the bag on one side of his room and colored his hair. He removed the polished steel mirror from the wall and looked at his hair as he approached the lodestone.
Pol could get within two feet of the bag before his hair started to change color. He took the lodestone out and put it on the table close to the room’s tiny window. Uncovered, the lodestone began to affect his hair at three feet away.
Pol warded the doorframe into the room with a complex weave and brought the lodestone close to the door. At three feet, the wards began to fade, and at two feet, they had vanished.
He put the lodestone in the bag, wondering if a metal covering would keep the lodestone from being so active. He walked down to the steaming kitchen and borrowed a big, covered pot, much to the consternation of the cooks.
