by Devin Hanson
“There you are,” Andrew gasped, “I was looking for you.”
Bircham stopped a few paces away, staring at Andrew with hate in his eyes. “You’re resourceful, I’ll grant you that,” he said. “There aren’t many alchemists who could get the better of Tarsis.”
“This can only end one way, Lameda,” Andrew said. “I’m not leaving without your head on a stick.”
“I hardly think you’re in the position to make threats,” Bircham said darkly. “In fact, it looks like you can barely stand.”
The Incantor was right. The impact with the beam had left Andrew shaken and woozy. The thread of the Song had left him, and it was all he could do to concentrate on holding the shield firm. “All part of my plan,” he said, unwilling to give Bircham the satisfaction of seeing him weak.
“Is that right?” Bircham cast about, searching the room, and his attention seized on an enormous wooden maul used to drive barrel heads home. “Did you plan on this?” He swung the maul with both hands and the full strength of his torso into Andrew’s shield.
The impact knocked Andrew sprawling again, and he barely pushed himself to his knees before the maul struck again. Bircham raised one hand and shot fire at Andrew, forcing him to hold his shield up while Bircham closed the distance again, hefting the maul high.
Despite getting knocked around until his head felt loose on his shoulders, Andrew couldn’t help but feel better about his chances. Lameda had a cruel streak a mile wide and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to play with Andrew the same way a cat might play with a mouse.
It was a mistake, probably the only one Lameda would make. Feigning more disorientation than he felt, Andrew let Lameda drive him through the outbuilding. It wasn’t a bad tactic, Andrew thought as he picked himself off the floor again. Punish someone inside a shield enough and they would lose the focus necessary to hold up the shield. A smaller man than Bircham might find it hard to deliver sufficiently powerful blows, but Bircham was huge, broad of shoulder and thick of arm. And the maul he was using with such effectiveness against Andrew was enormous, like a tree stump on a six-foot handle.
The next blow drove Andrew out the door of the outbuilding. He let the shield collapse and sprawled out on the grass. The rain drummed down on his upturned face and he scrambled backward on his elbows as Bircham came out of the building, maul in hand.
Bircham saw him without his shield and yelled in triumph, jumped forward with the maul raised high overhead. Andrew called out the shielding rune again and threw the full strength of his will into making a shield as hard and inflexible as possible. He made the shield oversized, so he lay on the ground beneath a shallow dome with the majority of the spherical shield running beneath the ground, including several tons of rock and dirt within it.
“Now!” Andrew shouted.
Bircham stared at him then cried, “Ban!”
Andrew saw the Incantor’s shield pop into existence, but Andrew’s shield ran beneath Lameda’s feet so the Incantor’s shield could only form so large.
In the trees, a warden shoved down on a lever and a dynamotive spark leapt down the wires to the explosives nestled outside the door, a bare five feet from where Lameda stood. With a roar of sound and a flash of light, the Maari explosives detonated. The explosion deafened Andrew despite the muffling quality of the shield. He felt a jolt run through him as his shield caught the explosion and turned it aside, but the weight of the rock and earth inside his shield was enough to absorb the force of the explosion.
Bircham Lameda had thrown up his own shield in time to keep the blast from ripping him to pieces, but the vast majority of his shield was above ground and caught the entire blast. The tremendous impact of the explosion against the shield was focused in the center of Bircham’s chest and he was flung into the air. Human muscle and bone can withstand a great deal of force, but nothing like this.
Andrew found him several minutes later, following the trail of snapped branches and torn up grass a hundred feet into the forest. Bircham was lying in a tumbled heap at the base of the tree that had finally stopped him. The Incantor’s chest was torn open from the inside. What was left of his internal organs was a paste that oozed from the gaping wound.
Andrew let out a sigh of relief.
The Incantor was dead.
Chapter 13
Back into the Fire
Iria felt the ground shake from a tremendous explosion. She very much wanted to go and find out what was happening with the Speaker, but if she took her attention off the alchemist she was fighting for even a second, it would be the end for her.
Before learning about alchemy, Iria often wondered why a particular alchemist would favor an element over the others. She knew now that the alchemist’s favored elements were dependent on the kind of scale he started learning from. Andrew, for instance, got his start learning from a dragon scale that heavily favored fire. Only a few alchemists, such as Lady Vierra, had the funds to acquire more than one scale to learn from. Most only had access to additional scales late in their education, if at all. The alchemist she was fighting right now, for instance, had a lot of affinity for ice and not much else.
The tree Iria was hiding behind shuddered as an icicle the size of her arm slammed into it, splintering a five-foot length of sapwood from the side of the trunk. She ducked reflexively and threw herself into a short sprint. Shards of ice howled around her head, then she was behind a thick cluster of bushes. Without a clear view of Iria, the alchemist ceased his attack. Vitae was too precious to waste tearing up the foliage with the hope of hitting her.
Over the sound of the rain, she heard a bowstring twang and the now-familiar sound of an arrow splintering against a shield. At least there was another warden alive. She had rushed to engage the alchemist with six or seven wardens. It was hard to tell what was happening in the dark and the rain, and one by one they had been picked off. Fighting alchemists was not like fighting brigands; it took a completely different mindset to survive the encounter.
Through a gap in the bushes, Iria saw the alchemist peering into the forest looking away from her. The rain pattered on the alchemist’s shield. It was a full dome, which meant it was consuming an awful lot of vitae to maintain. That was fine with her. The more vitae the alchemist wasted on a shield, the less he’d have to throw at her.
An owl hooted to Iria’s left and she glanced over to see Adnan Hakhim wave at her from behind his own tree. Iria frowned then decided it couldn’t be helped. The faster they killed this alchemist, the faster they could all get back to making sure the Speaker survived the night.
Adnan leaned out from behind his tree and hurled a rock at the alchemist. It bounded harmlessly off the shield, but the alchemist spun, saw Adnan and released a whirling cloud of razor-sharp ice plates in his direction. Iria put an arrow to her bow, but before she could draw, the alchemist had restored his shield and was stalking around, trying to get a better angle on Adnan.
Iria cursed to herself. She needed a clear shot while the alchemist wasn’t looking, but it would have to be fast, before the alchemist could speak his Saying and deploy his shield again. Two seconds, give or take. A difficult proposition.
She signed to Adnan that the alchemist was trying to flank him and he nodded. His face was grim. Some part of his arm must have been out of cover during that last blast of ice, because his sleeve was torn to ribbons and blood dripped from a hand hanging limp. The tree he was hiding behind was a thick one, but not enough cover by a long shot to play cat and mouse with an alchemist.
Iria pursed her lips and whistled the lilting call of a dove, calling for help if anyone was within hearing range. After a moment, the call was echoed on the far side of the alchemist and Iria caught the hint of movement from behind a copse of birch trees. The warden had survived whatever attention the alchemist had paid him.
Three wardens against a single alchemist. Adnan needed a distraction so he could reposition himself. The warden in the birches wasn’t in a good position to draw fire. T
he birch trees were good for breaking up his form and making it hard for the alchemist to see him, but the relatively thin trunks wouldn’t stop a determined attack.
It was times like these that made Iria hate alchemy.
It was up to her, then, to distract the alchemist. If she did, she’d lose her opportunity to strike. If she didn’t, Adnan wouldn’t survive much longer. With a last curse, Iria stood and released an arrow at the alchemist. Without waiting to watch the arrow shatter against the shield, Iria started running, trying for an angle that would force the alchemist to turn away from Adnan in order to attack her.
The distraction worked, perhaps a little too well. The alchemist saw her break from cover and sent a hail of ice spikes in her direction. A near-miss ripped through a sapling, showering Iria with wood splinters. She dropped into a slide through the water-slick leaf mold and fetched up behind a rocky outcrop. Shards of ice hissed through the air over her hair for a moment. Iria glanced back and saw that Adnan had taken the opportunity to make a dash for better cover. With a wounded arm, he wasn’t going to be drawing a bow, which made him good only for a distraction in this fight.
Iria risked a peek over the outcrop and saw the alchemist was still focused in her direction. She ducked back down under the rock as ice shards sprayed in her face. With silent thanks that the alchemist wasn’t using fire, Iria got her feet back under her in preparation to run again.
She heard arrows strike the alchemist’s shield again, three rapid splintering noises. At the same time, she heard Adnan roar a challenge in Maari. This was the distraction she had been waiting for. Adnan and the other warden were giving her the chance at a clean shot.
Iria stood, drew and fired all in one motion. The alchemist was turning away, mouth twisted around unnatural syllables, his glare focused on Adnan, when Iria’s arrow took him high in the thigh.
The alchemist shrieked, losing the thread of his Saying, and Adnan darted out of his cover and plowed into him, lifting him clear into the air before slamming down into the ground. Iria vaulted the rock outcrop, fumbling another arrow from her rapidly depleting quiver.
Adnan had one of the alchemist’s arms locked out, but his wound made it impossible for him to fully immobilize the alchemist. The man slipped free of Adnan’s grip and rolled the warden onto his back. He stretched out one hand toward Adnan’s face, lips curling back to spit a Saying.
Iria’s second arrow slammed through his shoulder below the clavicle. It wasn’t a great shot, but she was running over uneven terrain and the rain was making her bowstring loose. The impact of the arrow knocked him off Adnan and the warden lashed out, one booted foot catching the alchemist on the tip of his jaw.
Partially stunned, the alchemist rolled to his feet, swaying. Iria ground to a halt in a spray of leaf litter, dropped to one knee and sighted down her last arrow for the space of a heartbeat. She had to make this arrow count. The alchemist raised his head and focused on her just as she released the arrow.
There were only a few places you could shoot a man and guarantee an instant kill. The heart, the eye, the throat. All of them were difficult shots and Iria’s heart was hammering in her chest from her recent sprinting and diving. She doubted she’d be able to hit any of them with certainty. But she didn’t need to kill the alchemist, just prevent him from speaking.
A heart or throat shot at twenty paces against a moving target was a feat of prowess that Iria frankly didn’t have, let alone an eye shot. But the human body had a great deal of delicate membranes and muscles dedicated to producing speech, any of which could be disrupted with an arrow far easier than an instant kill shot.
Iria let her breath out evenly and released her last arrow. Her aim was true, and though the alchemist twisted away, it didn’t matter. The arrow punched between his floating ribs, straight across the bottom of both lungs and shredded his diaphragm on the way through.
Unable to draw a breath and his lungs rapidly filling with blood, the alchemist choked and died, a few last desultory bloody bubbles rising from his lips.
Iria jogged over to the warden captain and helped Adnan to his feet. “How is your arm?”
Adnan winced as he flexed his hand. “Painful, but not serious. No tendons were cut, I think.”
“Lucky. Run back to the Speaker,” Iria said to the third warden as he joined them. “Tell him we’ve dealt with the last of the alchemists and will be with him shortly.”
Adnan watched the warden leave, and heaved a sigh. “I miss the simple life of a balai,” he grumbled, talking to keep himself distracted while Iria tightened a tourniquet around his arm. “And these woods are miserable. Who could have imagined so many trees in so little space? Ow.”
Iria patted him on the shoulder. “Come on,” she said with a smile, “You will live. Let us get out of this place.”
Andrew got back to the Dancing Horse at the head of a much smaller group of people than had left a few hours ago. The sun was threatening to rise and the clouds above the rain were starting to break. Of the twelve wardens, five survived, one of which was badly wounded and was being carried on a makeshift stretcher.
Two of the constable’s lawmen had died and Ryan himself had been wounded. He limped along with the aid of one of his men, only his pride keeping him from a stretcher himself. Andrew had superficial burns and a set of scrapes and scratches that sat on top of what was promising to be some gorgeous bruising. Of the group, only Jules was unscathed.
A muffled exclamation came from inside the building and Travis leapt out into the street. His eyes were haggard and sleepless, but he hurried about, helping get the wounded inside and situated. Time and again, his gaze flicked over to Iria and his relief was palpable.
“Travis,” Andrew called, drawing the man up short.
“Sir?”
“Iria’s fine. I promise. I could use your help, though.”
Travis swallowed and nodded. “Okay, what can I do?”
“Find a doctor and bring him. The wardens can deal with their own wounded, but I want a Salian doctor to look after the constable.”
“Of course.”
“Thank you. And if you see any lawmen, send them my way. We have bodies to recover, both ours and the enemy, and I want to have them gone before the sun rises and citizens start walking the streets.”
Travis hurried away and Andrew went to find Jules. He found her in one of the side rooms helping tend to Adnan’s arm. Iria was carefully stitching a few deep slices together. The cuts looked like sword wounds despite having been dealt by alchemy. It made Andrew realize how much he had to learn. He had a handful of good tricks, but there were hundreds of Sayings in common use and even more hoarded as precious secrets for use in combat.
“How are you holding up, Adnan?” he asked.
“I may need a few weeks to recover,” the warden replied, “but nothing permanent.”
“Good to hear. I’m sorry about the deaths,” Andrew shook his head. “If I had known there was going to be that many alchemists, I would have–”
“Do not apologize, Speaker,” Adnan said firmly. “We went willingly, with pride. And we did not fail.” He nodded at the bulging grain sack on the table across the room, blotched with blood on one side. “Bircham Lameda is dead. One less Incantor is in this world. It is a good day, and a fair price to pay.”
Andrew nodded. He disagreed, but he wouldn’t take away the honor of the fallen wardens by pressing the issue. “I sent Travis to find a doctor for the constable.”
Jules gave him a grateful smile. “Good. He’s a war horse, or at least he’d like to think he is, but he’s getting on in years. Pitched battle against alchemists in a forest is not an activity for old men.”
“Not for the young either,” Iria said. She knotted off the last stitch and carefully wound a clean cloth around Adnan’s arm. “We have achieved our purpose in coming here. It is time to think about our next moves.”
“The constable will vouch for our actions,” Andrew said. “We should have no trou
ble with the law.”
“And what happens when the Incantors meet later today and discover one of their own is missing?” Iria shook her head. “We were victorious tonight only because of surprise. If the Incantors ambush us, weakened as we are, even you would not survive it, Speaker.”
“She’s right,” Jules said. “We need to be on an airship and out of Ardhal before noon.”
“What of the trade deals? Andronath needs those supplies.”
“Once word spreads that Andronath’s gates are open to trade once more, you won’t be able to keep them away with an army. We have done enough here.”
“Besides,” Iria nodded at the grain sack. “That is going to start smelling long before we reach Andronath. I do not want to let it sit more than is necessary.”
Andrew wrinkled his nose, but all the arguments were sound. “A coldbox would keep it from rotting until we can present it to the dragons,” he suggested. “But I don’t think we have a suitable one.”
Ardhal was the city he had called home before circumstances took him to Andronath. There had been many times he had ached with homesickness or sat up late into the night thinking of returning home. Now that he was here, all he wanted to do was leave.
The city was no longer a place he could call home. It was uncomfortable, not having a place you knew you could return to. Andronath would suffice for now, but the city of the alchemists wasn’t truly home either.
“Finding a coldbox of the right size might take all day. Don’t worry about it,” Jules said. “I’ll make one once we’re in the air. Iria, I would show respect to the wardens who fell. What are your wishes for them?”
The warden’s face tightened, but she nodded. “We burn the fallen,” she replied. “Without the soul, what is the body but earth?”
