That first breakthrough had led to a number of new discoveries, ways I could use my power. Probably the most useful application for traveling ended up being an ability I had come up with while walking. I had been practicing floating forward a few inches after getting some momentum as I traveled. I had kept getting better at this until eventually, I could even isolate one foot or the other.
This development had led me to start experimenting with movement in general. To an average person, I must have looked like a crazy mage, the way I was kicking forward and gliding, then using my other foot to continue forward.
I thought of this ability as air skating. The name seemed to fit based on old stories my father had told me, tales about his time on Earth. I’d never actually been ice skating myself, or even seen it, but my father had drawn me a picture.
At first, the name had brought back memories and been a bit painful. I really missed my father, even after all these years. But eventually, the sheer concentration I needed to air skate muted out everything else. Air skating was hard, and I fell down a few times. Well, I crashed. If I didn’t get enough clearance from the ground and I hit something that didn’t move, I went down hard.
I was happy nobody was around to see that sort of thing, especially after a particularly hard fall when I’d come up with a mouth full of dirt.
Practicing air skating, air jumping, air dodging, and other variations of my Flight ability ate up most of my day when I wasn’t trying to find food. While I wasn’t exactly flying, I definitely didn’t think the power was useless anymore. Doing too much at once with my power was really tiring, so sometimes I needed to take a break. My powers could really wear me out, but I was driven to practice, to improve.
The memory of Vitaliya effortlessly throwing a column of flame motivated me. If I ran into someone like a natural or orb-Bonded mage who meant me harm, I would need to have my own abilities to survive. Having new powers and not learning to use them would be like carrying a sheathed weapon that wasn’t sharpened.
With that reminder, I had also began practicing with my new short sword. In addition to running through forms at night, feeling the balance and the weight, I also began experimenting with my Vibration ability. This power proved a lot more straightforward than figuring out Flight had been.
In addition to using Vibration to empower a weapon to stab, I also learned I could use it to cut. The activation sequence was also really similar. I began practicing, trying to get faster. As a result, I ended up holding my sword a lot while I air skated. Probably not the smartest or safest thing to do, but my life hadn’t exactly been cozy for a long time. I was working on a deadline and didn’t have time to waste.
My Vibration abilities were getting stronger, and I had figured out a simple test to measure my growth. Every night, I found a big tree and chopped into it using my sword while I empowered the cutting edge. The vib-blade bit deeply into the tree each time, and I realized after three days that I was starting to cut deeper. Some of the improvement was probably because I was getting stronger, but I could tell that the vib-blade sensation was getting stronger, too.
I started using my little utility knife as a vib-blade as well. This was especially useful when I realized that my knife didn’t dull when I used it this way. Without the ability on, it wasn’t exactly as sharp as an obsidian knife, or ceramic. Bronze blades didn’t get super sharp, but they were fairly durable. However, while my little knife didn’t have the greatest edge in the world, thanks to my power, it didn’t dull.
My little knife and my vib-blade ability came in handy in a number of ways over the days that I traveled. One evening, I chanced across a little stream and saw a fish. I hadn’t had any luck the day before catching any food, so this was a great opportunity to get some protein.
I found a good-sized stick and fashioned the tip into a wicked spear. Then, I cut into the spear tip a few times, creating a bunch of individual points. I took a bit of twine, tied the spear about a couple hand spans down from the tip, and pushed twigs and rocks in between the sharp points to form a fishing spear, the type that tide pool hunters would use near Bittertown.
This entire process wasn’t exactly difficult, but when I’d tried to fashion a similar tool as a girl, getting straight cuts down the stick had been very difficult. With a vib-blade, it was easy. I’d made a spear and caught dinner in very little time.
My odds of catching a fish or snaring animals began to grow lower on the fifth day when I realized I was heading towards some more arid surroundings. I wasn’t sure why at first - the weather was still the same as the rest of Berber - but then I realized where I was. The land I had just started walking through was the site of an ancient battleground where so much magic was used by both sides that nothing really grew there anymore.
The land was getting spooky, but at least I’d realized what was happening ahead of time so I could stuff my pockets with wild vegetables. The realization had also let me know where I was. I was actually heading towards my destination, traveling the right direction. Not bad for a city girl!
I was learning a lot during my little journey. After growing powerful enough to cut down a tree the size of my leg with one swipe of my vib-blade short sword, I stopped to think about what I was becoming. The fight I’d had with the bounty hunters would probably turn out differently now. That thought made me grin, and I knew the expression was probably savage. Those bitches had speared me through the gut and left me for dead. I’d love to repay the favor one day.
In the past, some of the Jackals had called me Hazardous Nora, a play on my full name. It was true that I’d had a reputation, but I still didn’t understand why. I considered myself a nice person. I really didn’t enjoy conflict, but, well, some people just needed to be punched in the face. Then some special folks really needed a shiv of justice.
My reputation was a bit silly. I was not a violent girl, just a realist who had to punch people sometimes.
However, since I was a realist, I knew I still needed to avoid trouble. Although I’d love to have a rematch with that bitch who’d shot me on the road...and her little gang or family, I also knew I needed to keep a low profile. I’d learned from my brief stay with Gonzo and Vitaliya that there were some scary people on Ludus. People I wasn’t really able to fight yet.
So on the seventh day of traveling, when I realized there was a group approaching from behind, I decided to hide. I had no idea whether the approaching people were friendly or enemies, but I wasn’t going to take any chances. Taking risks sometimes was worth the trouble or unavoidable—but if I were the type of person to take stupid, unnecessary risks, I definitely would have died a long time ago.
Hopefully, the riders would have nothing to do with me, but I was out in the middle of nowhere. I tried to think optimistic thoughts even as I began looking for hiding spots.
Tremble-sense
I’d actually felt the approaching group while they were some distance away, sensing the ground tremble using my Vibration power.
Tremble-sense was another ability I’d been practicing during the journey. I had been beginning to wonder if the trick even worked before I’d felt the group of riders approaching through my boots.
The sensation had been very strange. My tremble-sense wasn’t very powerful right now; the most sensitive I could get was ‘listening’ for a group of riders, but when I had sensed this group, I’d just…known about them, including how far away they had been.
I didn’t have a lot of time to hide, so I used my Flight ability and feather-jumped right up the side of a cliff. Then I quickly climbed up a small ravine to a vantage point looking down on the road below. This would be a great opportunity to practice my enhanced hearing.
The directions in my head for how to use my Vibration abilities had awoken old memories of time spent with my childhood tutor. She’d tried to teach me something called ‘physics’. I’d forgotten most of it, but I guess she’d been a good teacher because some concepts had stuck. As a result, a lot of the stuff I’
d recently learned about my powers seemed familiar.
To paraphrase what was in my head, sound was just a vibration of sorts through the air, which meant I could make my hearing more sensitive by actually focusing in one direction. I could enhance my own voice too using the same principle, but I hadn’t had an opportunity to practice that ability yet.
My tremble-sense informed me that the riders were almost on top of me by the time I was settled in my observation point. But then when they actually arrived, I was extremely confused. I could definitely hear riders, I could feel them through my tremble-sense, but I couldn’t actually see anything.
Eyes narrowed, I observed the road more closely. I stifled a gasp when I realized that there was a small dust cloud and signs of zebra riders right in front of me. I still couldn’t see anything else, though. Uh oh, I thought grimly. Then my concern turned to horror as the riders slowed and stopped, only a short distance down the road from my position. I turned my enhanced hearing in that direction, to the stretch of road I imagined the riders occupied. Voices came to me instantly.
“—you sure that she’s over here?” came a deep, gravelly voice.
“Yes, or at least someone is. My senses never lie.” This voice was curt, female, and grumpy.
The gravelly voice said, “Well, where is she then, Shen Shi? I see a lot of nothing out here. This was supposed to be an easy job.”
“Don’t be an ass, Venu,” snapped the grumpy female. “If this job were that easy, we wouldn’t have been hired in the first place. A bunch of people want this girl dead, and something has people spooked. In fact, you saw the crater yourself. The first group to deal with this Nora left her for dead, but she obviously still had the orb she’d stolen before. Those amateurs hadn’t checked her well enough.”
“Yes, yes, all of which we’ve already discussed…at length,” said a new voice with a sigh, this one lilting and feminine with inflections I usually associated with Areva people. “There really isn’t anything to do other than search the area, Venu. Shen Shi is almost never wrong. Plus, even I was able to see the tracks in the dust a ways back.”
The gravelly voice of Venu responded, “Fine; then we will stop here for a bit. Tilka is right. That means Hafessi needs to actually work now. What a surprise. Usually ‘work’ and ‘Hafessi’ don’t go together very well.”
A high, growling voice said, “I am a specialist, Venu. I find things. If you could do more than lift heavy objects and take a hit, maybe you would be less expendable.”
The Areva woman, Tilka, laughed, then said, “You should know better than to verbally spar with Hafessi, Venu. We may be orb-Bonded and mages, sure, but the rest of us know better than to antagonize the tracker.”
I slowly began inching my way backward, trying not to make a sound. My blood ran cold, and I breathed quietly but evenly, staving off panic. Orb-Bonded and mages. Dear Creator. I needed to get away. Fast.
From the snippet I’d heard, the crater in the road must have both alerted my enemies that I still lived, and also made them think that I was a powerful, dangerous ‘Bonded… Damn that Enheduanna! I thought furiously. She’d made my situation worse!
I retreated, ignoring my damaged knees as I worked my way into a thicket. I didn’t really have a plan other than to get away, but I knew enough to decide that going through rough terrain or difficult areas might throw off my pursuit.
My orb-granted toughness was evident as I crawled forward and barely took any damage from the ground, the sharp rocks and such being more of an annoyance than the cutting, bruising torture it might have been a month or two before.
The physical discomfort was far less frustrating than the damn noise. It felt like I was making the greatest racket of my life, with sticks cracking and the brambles catching on my clothing. Damn. I could only hope the invisible group had checked the other side of the road first.
I was actually making good time, somehow always finding a path forward through a huge, dense thicket of nettles. I’d even begun to feel a bit of optimism before a patch of ground I was crossing began to crumble, and I fell head first into darkness.
This figures, I thought, resigned as I continued to fall. The last of my light disappeared as I vanished into the earth.
***
When I woke, it was so dark I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. The last thing I’d remembered was landing and feeling a sharp pain…
I was almost sure that I’d broken my arm despite my ‘Bonded toughness ability, but my arm felt whole again. There was no more pain at all. Luckily, my healing ability must have fixed the problem while I’d been knocked out. Handy.
The thought turned uncomfortable when I wondered if the arm could have set incorrectly. Like, would it be possible that my healing ability could actually cripple me if I didn’t set the bone properly? It was definitely something I needed to figure out, but for now, the highest priority was light.
I sat up with a muffled groan and quickly silenced myself. My flight from the powerful group in the road came back to me in a rush, so I just hissed as I pulled myself from dirt and rubble that had been half covering me.
Everything was just...dirty. I was really, really filthy. My life hadn’t exactly been posh and clean for most of my life, but the past ten days or so had been a new adventure in discomfort. All the adventuring recruiters that traveled to the major cities must not actually adventure or travel that much. They made adventuring sound wonderful, fun. The reality was that walking everywhere and camping sounded great until you actually had to do it. Hiding from murderous, invisible people was turning out to be great fun, too.
I shook my head and spat to one side to clear the mud out of my mouth. Producing light was more important than feeling sorry for myself.
Finding something to burn took some time, and I had to crawl around on my hands and knees in the pitch black. Eventually, I located a dry stick and managed to get a small flame going with the magic Firestarter I’d been smart enough to keep in my pocket.
With my meager flame, I searched around and discovered I was at the bottom of a natural shaft. Probably a sinkhole. There had been a cave-in above me, but a slant in the shaft had prevented tons of dirt and rocks from falling on top of me. Scary.
After poking around in the dirt clods and debris that had landed all around me, I got lucky and found my little pack. I quickly used a little bottle of cooking oil and some rags to make a pathetic looking but functional torch.
With more light, I was able to see my surroundings better, and I soon realized what had caused the earth to collapse. Near me was a stone wall, and a pillar or something coming out of it had broken, causing a shift in the earth. When I examined the wall more carefully, I discovered it had a barely Nora-sized crack that I could probably slip through if I exhaled and held my breath. Maybe I’d have to think small thoughts, too.
Luckily, I wasn’t claustrophobic, but the little crack in the wall was not giving me a good feeling. On the other hand, the massive amount of rock and dirt above me might collapse any minute, and I didn’t see any other realistic way out. I eyed my crude torch and pursed my lips. The light wouldn’t last forever, either.
With a sigh, I moved forward and poked around the crack a little before finally moving, trying to wedge myself forward. The couple dozen feet it took to get through the tiny passage was terrifying. I kept wondering if the rock would shift and crush me, or if I’d just get stuck. Probably the scariest thought I had was when I imagined losing my light and getting stuck at the same time.
Finally, I emerged from the crack and found I’d basically come out of an otherwise solid wall. The room I was in, actually a hallway, had an ancient stone floor, covered in dust. I held my makeshift torch up and slowly swiveled my eyes around, taking it all in. Everything looked kind of plain, but well made, and very, very old.
“Nora, what the hell have you gotten yourself into?” I whispered to myself. The danger before I’d fallen had been real. The bounty hunters, or whoever they were, had r
eally been after me. But the place I found myself in now was...overpowering. The ancient construction made my skin crawl, and I felt an overwhelming pressure, an experience I’d never encountered before.
The sensation of danger radiated into my very bones.
The thick layer of dust on the ground didn’t make me feel better at all. My instincts were screaming at me that this was a BAD PLACE.
I slowly walked down the hallway, eventually discovering the entrance, or what I assumed had once been an entrance. It was caved in now, thoroughly blocked off from the rest of the world. My meager torch’s fluttering light revealed ancient stones, huge boulders and rubble that had filled in the hallway.
I slowly shook my head, wondering what had happened, but then I remembered that this entire area had been the site of a huge battle in the distant past. Maybe the cave-in had happened then...or had gotten worse.
With a falling heart, I turned, and my breath caught when my torchlight fell on the other side of the hallway. Ancient writing, complete with old pictographs I didn’t know the meaning of were carved in the wall. I couldn’t understand all of it, but I was able to figure out enough. Now I knew where I was, or at least what kind of place I was in. My breath came out in an exhale of despair.
I had somehow fallen into an elite dungeon, the type of place that offered certain death for even the largest, most powerful adventuring parties—and I was all alone.
“Great.” I put a hand over my eyes and gritted my teeth for a moment. This had really been a hell of a bad week.
Spark in the Dark
From the wall carvings, I knew the dungeon I was in was called, Dingeramat. The name was unfamiliar to me - which was strange since the dungeon wasn’t too far from a few major cities. I wondered how different civilization in Berber would be if Dingeramat had still been active, not buried.
As a girl, like many children, I’d been fascinated by adventurers. I’d read every book I could get my grubby little hands on, even the exploits of present age heroes like the late Thato Jacobs.
Mitigating Risk Page 11
