“That’s something, at least, although probably on the level of an Oriceran five-year-old.”
“Bite me.”
Her laugh was quiet. “Such sophisticated banter. I’ve identified at least five different sources of sound in the next room, which appears to be fairly large based on their spacing. I also detected something that sounded like scraping, which might be anything from weapons being dragged on the floor to large-scale magic moving blocks around.”
Diana shook her head. “Your magical super senses aren’t all that helpful, are they?”
“More helpful than yours. I’ll get the door. You lead the way. Head toward the smallest threat you see, I’ll take on the largest.”
She nodded. There was no need for pretense with her teacher, as she was still far more powerful where magic was concerned. But the distance is narrowing, every day. Her inner voice laughed at her optimism, but before she could muster a thought in response, the door was open and her body darted across the threshold into the dangerous space beyond.
There were considerably more than five beings. The room was crammed with dwarves in one corner and Kilomea in the other, each group focused on disassembling their own trio of large ornamental columns. Two of the four corners were already covered in rubble, which suggested that they had been occupied with the task for some time. Diana froze at the unexpected sight, and Nylotte stepped up beside her. The Drow whispered, “This is not good. The Dwarves are mine.”
“I thought you said you’d take the more powerful ones.”
Her teacher chuckled and shook her head. “Trust me, I am. Dwarves can be wicked with magic. Kilomea, mostly, are focused on physical attacks.”
She grumbled under her breath, then gestured at a high spot in the room in the middle of the far wall, where short staircases led up to a throne of some kind. On one side of it stood a dwarf and on the other, a Kilomea. They appeared to be overseeing the work below. “I assume those are the ones in charge. Should we kill them first?”
Nylotte shook her head. “They’re defended by a shield that follows the lip of the raised area.”
Diana cursed softly and wished once again that she had the sort of natural affinity for magic that her teacher did. The one time she’d mentioned it aloud, the other woman had offered a simple reply. “Patience. It’s there, waiting to be discovered.” So far, she hadn’t found it and was increasingly convinced that she never would. So, I guess I’ll go with the skills I do have a natural affinity for.
She rushed forward toward the pack of Kilomea. “On the ground, scumbags.” Some part of her required that she give them the opportunity to end the situation peacefully, even though she knew there was no chance of success. The way they turned and brandished the hammers and axes they’d used to demolish the structure confirmed her belief. The sounds of a magical battle resounded from across the room as Nylotte confronted the dwarves.
There were eight Kilomea, far more than she’d ever imagined facing alone. She skidded to a halt as they began to move toward her and fired. Two bullets each thudded into the chests of the front-rank duo, but they seemed to not notice. Armor. Hide. Whatever. Damn. She lowered the barrel and sighted carefully to fire at their knees. The joints were less well protected, and she managed to bring them down. Even wounded, they continued to crawl in her direction.
Double Damn. Another two pressed toward her, and she sensed movement to the left and right. She fired at the ones ahead and they dodged. When her magazine clicked empty, she drew her pistol and fired every round in rapid succession. She managed to eliminate one of them completely and slow the other before she had to abandon ranged weapons. A hasty scramble took her under the swipe of a pickax from the left. She blocked an overhead strike from the right with a shuffle inside the attacker’s guard and a raised forearm armor plate to catch the blow. The headbutt she’d normally throw would have landed on his breastbone, given their differences in height, so she kicked at his groin instead and connected hard enough to drive him back a few steps.
She couldn’t follow up, though, because the other two who had circled from the sides were suddenly on her, melting out of the shadows. Diana managed to roll with the hammer blow as it struck her ribs and the motion and the armor mitigated most of the damage. She landed painfully, bounded back to her feet, and tried to bolt to the side. One of the bastards she’d kneecapped grasped her shin and threw a punch at her knee.
Her reaction was instinctive and the force blast hurled her back. She used her magic to hover and cast about for a safe space to land. One of the other Kilomea had outdistanced the others in its pursuit. She dropped the magic and plummeted at an angle and her heavy boots connected with his shoulders and shattered his collarbone with a loud crack. Three all the way out, one still crawling, and four at full strength.
When the next adversary appeared from around a corner, she had the time to draw the Ruger and pepper his legs with bullet wounds. She wasn’t sure she’d caught the knee, but at a minimum, he wouldn’t be able to move very fast. That left three whole and hearty. She discovered the rest had encircled her while the other had played prey as a distraction. Dammit. They’re hunters, right. Get your head in the game, Diana. She considered and discarded grenades as an option, afraid that she’d bring the place down on them. A loud noise from across the room was followed by a flaming dwarf hurtling into the barrier that protected the two near the throne. At least Nylotte has her end handled.
She summoned a sword in her right hand and a shield in her left and for a brief moment felt like a combination of Ronin and Captain America. Both were made of force, and she applied another surge of power to light the sword aflame. Her attackers recoiled momentarily as she turned in a slow circle with the weapon extended. “Last chance, scumbags.” She growled with as much menace as she could to emphasize her intent. “Get the fuck out or die.”
The lead Kilomea, a female, laughed at her. “Come along, little human, let’s see what you have.”
“Fine. It’s your funeral. I’ll kill you last.” She delivered the line in its appropriate Austrian accent. Rath would be proud. She charged the one to the female’s left, a large male who seemed to be the least agile of the trio. He spun aside from her blow and turned the motion into a foot sweep that she had to leap to avoid. He’s still damn agile, though. His eyes tracked the sword, which left him unprepared for the shield she smashed into his face with a surge forward and a shout. He stumbled away, his arms flailing, and she stabbed the blade deep into his stomach, then yanked it to the side to widen the wound as she wrenched it free.
Diana raised it again barely in time to catch the head of a hammer before it pounded into her skull, courtesy of the other male. The female aimed a kick at her a moment after and she caught it on her shield. She realized she was trapped and dismissed her weapons, replacing them with an instant force blast that hurled her enemies away and launched her upward again. Her telekinesis effectively adjusted her trajectory and she landed behind the male as he struggled to his feet. She delivered four punches to his body before he regained his balance and a kick to the back of his leg forced him to one knee. With his head finally at a height she could reach, she lunged into a spinning hook kick and drove her heel into his skull. He teetered for a moment before he fell. The blow would most likely have killed a human, so she hoped it would keep him out of the fight for a while, at least.
The agent straightened and faced the female, who was the only one left standing among her enemies. The sounds of battle from the far side of the room had ceased and for a moment, she feared Nylotte had been defeated. She’d no sooner considered that when the Drow appeared, striding toward the duo near the throne with her hands in guard position. Diana shook her head and looked at her opponent. “It appears I need to finish this so my partner doesn’t have to fight your bosses alone.”
The Kilomea spat to the side. “Only Pesharn is my superior. I hope your partner kills the dwarf before she dies.”
She shrugged. “Whatever. Bring it,
sister.”
The massive combatant attacked, leading with one of the wicked pickaxes. Diana ducked the blow and landed two force-assisted punches before her foe whipped the ax in her direction and released it. She threw herself onto her back and triggered a panicked blast to deflect it, but it still managed to clip her ear as it spun past. She grimaced as warm blood flowed and flipped to her feet in a rage. Her enemy had closed while she was down, and the kick struck home before she even saw it. She careened away to land heavily and slide until her spinning form impacted with one of the columns and stopped abruptly.
She focused on the Kilomea through the stars that filled her vision as her foe barreled in for a final kick and lobbed a fireball at the aggressor’s head. Her target shrieked and fell, keening as she rolled blindly with her hands pressed over her face. Diana used the column as support to climb to her feet and crossed to the wounded creature, then used the last charge in her shock gloves to knock her unconscious.
Each step was accompanied with a flare of pain that stole her breath, and she knew she’d broken at least one rib, probably several. She took the healing potion flask from her belt and downed it, then followed it with the vial of energy magic. Diana was grinning and feeling fantastic by the time she reached Nylotte’s side. The Dark Elf stared at the two remaining adversaries near the throne. Diana clapped her teacher on the back, which earned her a withering glare before the Drow returned her attention to the others.
Her voice was filled with scorn, an enraging technique the Dark Elf had used on her many times. “Two of us, two of you. Don’t tell me you’re afraid.”
The dwarf laughed. “Of you, outcast? Hardly. Of your pet? Impossible.”
The agent bristled. “Who are you calling pet, short stuff?”
“Who are you calling short, human?” He laughed again.
She turned to whisper to her teacher. “Okay, he has to die now. Who are these pricks?”
Nylotte spoke loudly so their enemies would hear. “The one on the left is Pesharn. She is a leader among the Kilomea. The one on the right is Jakko, an otherwise undistinguished dwarf.”
The Kilomea laughed and drew a dirty look from her partner. “In any case, you are too late. We have finished our search and discovered nothing worth keeping, including you.”
She nodded and the dwarf raised his bare arms. Glyphs or runes of some kind—different than her own—glowed as he cast a spell, and the ceiling above began to shake. Nylotte grabbed her arm. “It’s time to go.” The Drow created a portal under their feet and they dropped through it. She saw rocks plummeting toward them and scrambled out of the way, but her teacher closed the rift before they could come through.
Diana leaned back on her elbows and looked at the ceiling of her arming room, which had apparently become Nylotte’s preferred portal home in the bunker. “Remind me again why I don’t have healing and energy potions every day?”
The Drow chuckled in amused disbelief. “Let’s get you back to your house before all this wonderfulness leaves you and you sleep for two days.” She frowned. “Did you drink all of both?”
She laughed. “Yep.”
“Okay.” Her teacher sighed. Three days. Let’s go, giggly-face.”
The moniker only made her laugh more, and the Dark Elf had no sooner dumped her in bed at home than the good feelings vanished under a wave of exhaustion so profound she couldn’t imagine ever surfacing from beneath it.
Chapter Seventeen
The coin had grown warm around her neck some hours before, but Sarah had been at the office and was unwilling to communicate from there. Her enemies had done her an unwitting service by bugging the warehouse. The security threat compelled her to return home before speaking with Dreven, which in turn, allowed her to delay the effort as long as desired.
She’d finally accomplished virtually everything she could at the base, however, and surrendered to the fact that she couldn’t delay it any longer. With one last look around, she locked the office door from the inside and created a portal to an alley behind a south side coffeehouse. After securing her favorite drink of the moment—a flat white with vanilla—she used the secluded passage between the buildings to magically relocate to the parking garage beneath her condo.
Sarah sipped her coffee appreciatively during the elevator ride up and nodded to the other residents of the building as they entered and exited. During the week since the event, she'd reveled in a bout of positivity. The last attack had gone well, even though it had not resulted in a clear victory. The annoying human who liked to speak out against Oricerans was dead at her hands, and she still remembered the sound of all his bones breaking at once with deep satisfaction. They’d winnowed the numbers of the police a little and struck fear into the populace, who would now put pressure on the politicians and thus create additional chaos.
Better still, she’d defeated the leader of the enemy forces and dispatched her to a trap on Oriceran. The World in Between would have been my preferred place to banish her, but it’s something, at least. The stunned expression on her face as the portal swept over her had become an often-visited memory of the event. Her people told her that the troll had been inconsolable and destroyed everything in sight, which was another mental image she enjoyed.
The silence from Dreven was worrying at first, but she'd put it down to the man’s arrogance. She would surely have heard from Iressa if the wizard had fallen to the woman, which was unlikely, in any case. The lack of communication from her new patron had also been a source of concern, but it was in keeping with the dark witch’s style to thwart her expectations.
She set the drink down on her coffee table. The statue’s resting place was on a thin pedestal in the hallway that connected the living room to the bedroom, and she retrieved it before she returned to sit on the white leather couch. She paused for a moment to soak in the quiet and stillness around her. It had been a day’s work to add spells to improve the soundproofing in the apartment and the precautions used only a small daily expenditure of power to keep the improvement active. Now, only the loudest noises of the city far below signaled the existence of a world beyond her windows unless she sought it out. The condo truly had become a sanctuary for her.
One interrupted every so often by an idiot mage from another planet. She withdrew the coin and set it in place, and the hovering blue image of her irritating superior appeared. He did not look happy. “The bitch escaped. She killed several of my assistants and bolted when I was about to eliminate her.”
Sarah scowled and shook her head in what she hoped was an appropriate response. Inside, she was half-laughing and half-annoyed. Now, I have two unknowns running around my city—Diana Sheen and that moron Marcus, who I’m sure hasn’t done me the favor of dying during his disappearance. Neither had been seen by anyone from the Remembrance since the night of the battle. She’d considered torturing Marcus’s two little friends, the henchman and the hanger-on, but hadn’t wanted to expose her interest. And killing them would be inappropriate. For now.
Dreven’s ire was obvious as his small avatar paced restlessly, its hood pulled back to reveal disheveled hair and a furious glare. He seemed to be having an internal conversation and only occasionally remembered she was there. Finally, he turned to face her. “You and your people need to make killing that woman your top priority. Everything else is secondary. If she’s not dead in a week, I'll have to come there and take care of it personally. Believe me when I say that if I have to do so, you will not enjoy it.”
He killed the connection quickly, fortunately, so the laugh that escaped at his threat didn’t cause her further trouble. As if having you on the planet could ever be enjoyable, you pretentious scumbag. She sighed at the complication of Sheen’s continued existence and walked down the hallway, through the bedroom, and into her closet.
It was a large walk-in, and one side was home to clothing and accessories, with a special section reserved for the most expensive and most loved items. She trailed her fingers across a tight black dress
that resembled the ones Iressa wore. She was saving it for exactly the right moment, not sure what that might be but confident she’d know it when it arrived. The other side of the closet was her current focus, however.
It was filled with shelves of varying heights displaying the implements of her trade. Extra wands stood in a shallow holder on the far end, and an assortment of investigative tools—including a fake crystal ball and an actual scrying bowl—rested on the surfaces closest to the entrance. It was the small set of miniature apothecary drawers that drew her attention now. The large box that held the smaller containers was aged wood, and the antique shop she’d stolen it from had dated it as coming from the 1800s. She’d cleaned it thoroughly and put magical seals in place in each drawer to avoid contamination. Another witch might contend that it was wasted time when there were other choices to accomplish the same goal, but the sight of the object gave her pleasure, and that was reason enough for her.
One of the drawers had the letter S written on the ivory card in front, and she removed several strands of hair that lay inside. During their last battle, her foe had been less agile than she’d thought and her re-entry through the shattered window Sarah had hurled her out of had clipped these threads from the dark mess on top of her head. To a magic-user, such items were invaluable. She snagged the magical compass she'd purchased from a black-market mage in a nearby city and carried it out to her table to work.
The device was a combination of magic and human science, albeit an old technology since replaced by satellites. She lifted the part with the dial and arrow from its container and set the pieces of hair inside before she placed it back in its home. With a tap of her wand, she released a thread of magic into it and spoke the word of activation. The arrow spun as she maintained the flow of power into the item. There was no telling how long it would take to attune the device to the woman who’d involuntarily donated the hair, so she used the time to consider her next moves. Eliminating her foe would require the right battlefield, and with a grin, she realized she could merge two of her objectives together.
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