Fire Within: Book Two of Fire and Stone (Stories of Fire and Stone 2)

by Stephanie Beavers

  The world was ablaze through the eyes of an eagle of flames, but the upside was that there was no night when there was only fire: No smoke, no earth, no sky. Just fire. Esset had practiced sinking his consciousness into his summons, and now not only was it easy for him to adjust into the radically different perspective, he could “hop” between his summons at will. He kept his creatures in an arrow formation to cover the most ground. He also had a few of his bats flying just beyond the light of his raptors, invisible in the darkness but providing extra eyes.

  Before the phoenix, this feat would have been impossible. Back then, his control had only allowed him to control one summon if his consciousness was submerged elsewhere. Even had his mind remained inside his own body, he wouldn’t have been able to keep the number of summons he had now in line. He hoped the phoenix was getting whatever she wanted out of this bargain too; he couldn’t afford to lose her help anytime soon.

  Esset didn’t spy anything other than some startled wildlife until they reached Snowhill, and as the report had warned, there were no survivors in the village. There had been no more than a couple dozen people living in the village, but even so, it was a sad sight. Given the urgency of the news, the patrol that had discovered the carnage hadn’t stopped to bury the dead—even though he knew that intellectually, Esset felt further saddened to see the bodies scattered so indiscriminately about. On the flipside, he hoped the nature of the undisturbed scene could help him figure out what had happened.

  Esset and Jess landed, leaving the other summons to circle and scout from above, but they didn’t stay long. Esset could only confirm what the patrol had reported—every person had been slain, and the slaughter had taken place with edged weapons. There was no trace of the one or ones who’d committed the act—at least not when searching what was visible. Esset summoned a wolf, and using the summon’s keen senses, detected something odd heading off in one direction. Esset couldn’t have said whether it was smell or some other sense; it was enough that they had a clue which way their enemy had gone. Moments later they were airborne again.

  They came upon the second town in much the same state as the first, but they didn’t get a chance to land and investigate. Screams and yells sounded from over the next hill, and Esset didn’t waste any time getting them over there. His birds lit up the hillside like the rising sun, diving earthwards and then flaring their wings, talons extended towards the enemy. It wasn’t difficult to tell who was friend and who was foe.

  Less than a dozen people fought with their backs to some rocks: three armed soldiers, two farmers wielding pitchforks and a villager with a fire-poker. A woman and child took shelter behind them; the little girl hid her face in her mother’s skirts. Esset’s flaming birds smashed into the enemies nearest the people to give them a brief reprieve while Esset landed next to them.

  The enemies weren’t human—that was the simplest way to put it. The too-bright fire of the summons cast a ghoulish glow on the already diabolical appearance of the attackers, so much like the grim reapers they’d been mistaken for previously. They were similar to the skeletons of men, except their bones were a shiny black and most of them had too many arms. Esset counted as many as six arms on one, and he spotted one that seemed to be built like a centipede, with six legs as well. Another he spotted had a long, whip-like tail. Others were more human-like, with only two arms and legs, and most of them had a shroud-like cape bound about them. But they all had one thing in common: every hand grasped the haft or hilt of a bladed weapon—blades of all shapes and sizes, from daggers to scythes—that flashed in the firelight in never-ending, deadly motion. They were slaughter incarnate, or as the witnesses had called them before: “Death itself.”

  The group of people shrank back fearfully from Esset when he landed, but Jess rushed forward to reassure them and help—he drew his blade and faced the enemy with them. Esset mostly ignored the people to concentrate on the black skeletons. It was soon obvious that they were nothing like any of the undead—including raised skeletons—that Esset had fought before. They were far stronger.

  Polished metal flashed against flesh of lava and fire, and both came away worse for wear. Blades melted against the incredible temperatures within the fiery summons, but some of the summons disintegrated after taking enough damage. The summons bit and clawed at the skeletons, but it took a fair bit of damage back to defeat them—and when defeated, they simply vanished. Esset was surprised when he saw it, but he had no time to think on it.

  The gem in Esset’s chest glowed with red light, mixing with the yellow aura of the phoenix’s power about him, but Esset was no more aware of that than the constant stream of syllables that poured from his lips to summon creature after creature to aid them. The great molten panthers and sleek wolves streamed away from him to engage the skeletons, and more great raptors burst into existence in the sky rain fury from above.

  It was only when the sheer number of summons he’d called upon began to weigh upon his mind—despite the phoenix’s aid—that Esset realized just how many of the enemy there were. They extended up over the hill back to the town itself. The air grew hot despite the chill of the night with the number of creatures born of fire. Even so, Esset had no choice but to keep fighting—these people were depending on him.

  The battle waged for some time; it began as a desperate struggle to stay ahead, as Esset’s creatures were cut down before being able to drive the enemy back. Then it slowly evolved into something more controlled, with Esset’s force holding its own. That was the good news—the bad news was that there didn’t seem to be any progress past that point. Esset could only hold the tide of the battle, not push it back.

  “Summoner! We need to get these people out of here!” Jess had come up beside Esset and was yelling over the clash of battle and roar of fire. The skeleton creatures were eerily quiet as they fought, silent except for the sounds their weapons made when striking something, but Esset’s summons made plenty of noise. Their sounds were those of fire—the crackle and roar of flames devouring, immolating, and exploding.

  “We have to stop these things!” Esset yelled back. “If we leave them, they’ll just attack another village!” Judging by Jess’s frown, Esset guessed he hadn’t thought of that.

  “I can get them out later, if need be!” Esset added; it was the best reassurance he could offer. “But I—we—need to find a weakness!” At Esset’s words, Jess frowned and nodded, his eyes scanning the battle. They could afford to observe a bit now, since the legion of fire-beasts kept the tide of skeletons back for the moment. Esset had to pay attention to summon back any creature of his that was defeated, but those wielding physical weapons had a moment to rest.

  “They don’t seem to think much—they just keep pressing forward to kill!” Jess yelled. “It’s like that’s all they’re here for!” Jess’s words triggered something.

  “They’re summons!” Esset realized aloud.

  “What?” Jess yelled back.

  “Watch my creatures—there, that one’s getting weak. Watch it.” Esset pointed at one of his wolves. It made a last leap for a skeleton’s arm but was caught by the sweep of its sword. The wolf vanished into a puff of ash and embers.

  “They simply vanish when they die. Now watch the skeletons—the same thing happens!” Esset said. They both scanned the battle, and they spotted a skeleton beset by two massive panthers. Together they brought the skeleton down, only to have it vanish into a handful of dust.

  “They’re the same! And if they’re summons, we have to find their source! Someone has to call them!” This revelation bothered Esset a great deal. Whoever was calling these things had to be as strong as Esset himself, and he had the phoenix’s aid. Then again—yet another realization struck Esset. The most difficult part of summoning was controlling the summons. That was the single greatest limitation to summoning. But what if a summon were just set loose after being called, to do what it willed? That would be a great deal easier. Esset had taken advantage of that in the past himself,
before the phoenix had joined forces with him. He would summon extra beasts and set them loose on enemies if he knew there were no allies around that he might be endangering. He’d done that a great deal in the tunnels around Salithsa when they’d been fighting the Reshkin. Esset had had little remorse fighting non-sentient creatures, and the tactic had been effective. And as Jess had pointed out, the skeletons used no strategy—they just pressed forward mindlessly, without their summoner’s directions.

  “How?” Jess asked. They all looked to Esset for an answer—no, it was more than that. They were looking to him for leadership, for rescue, and for hope. That would have scared him senseless if he hadn’t been so focused on getting them all out alive. He just wished he had an answer to that question.

  “There just has to be someone calling them!” Esset yelled.

  “Then send me aloft!” Jess suggested. Esset considered that, but he couldn’t see it working. Finally the summoner shook his head.

  “You’d have no way to tell me where he is until you got back!” By then the summoner could easily hide elsewhere. Esset could send his summons on search-and-destroy, but they weren’t terribly effective without direct guidance, and he couldn’t afford to send more than one or two away from this front. One or two would likely be an inadequate number to deal with the summoner himself unless Esset were right there with them. No, there was only one option he could see.

  “I have to trance down and look for him myself,” Esset said.

  “What?” Jess yelled, forcing Esset to repeat himself, louder.

  “No! You can’t fight here and be elsewhere at the same time!” Jess objected.

  “I can. I have to. Watch over me. If I need to wake, shake me,” Esset said.

  “No! You can’t!” Jess was terrified, and justifiably so.

  “I must!” Esset said, grabbing Jess by the collar and pulling him eye-to-eye. If Esset had known what was in his own eyes, he would have understood why Jess shrank back, immediately cowed into submission. Esset’s eyes didn’t just glow with the light of fire. Nor did they simply hold the reflection of the fires of the battle, as Jess had thought before looking him straight in the eye. No, a full inferno raged within the confines of Esset’s eyes, as if the summoner were transforming into one of his own summons, with nothing but molten fire within him. Flames hotter than a volcano twisted and danced in his eyes, as if there were an infinite abyss of fire inside.

  “I’ll watch,” Jess whispered. Esset couldn’t hear him, but he understood the nod. Without ceremony, Esset sat down on the scorched earth and chose a summon to inhabit.

  A single bird peeled away from the battle to circle above. It wheeled around the battlefield in widening circles, scouring every area it could see, and from above, it could see everything. Esset gazed through its eyes with increasing disquiet; there was no sign of a summoner. There were, however, reinforcements coming from somewhere. Intermittently, he would pass over a lone skeleton racing to join the battle. They ran far quicker than they should have been able, and they were difficult to see; it was almost as though they knew how to hide in the fires of the summon’s vision as well as the darkness of the world they terrorized.

  Frustrated, Esset stooped upon one of the skeletons and snatched it up, carrying it high into the sky. He felt the blades it carried slicing and hacking the bird he inhabited, but he hung on until he was high enough to drop it earthbound and be confident it would die upon impact. Then he kept his new height and peered earthward to try to determine where the reinforcements were coming from.

  There—beyond the village, he saw one of them come. He flew to take a closer look, but he felt an extreme vertigo overcome him. The fiery bird he controlled began to fall from the sky, and a moment later, Esset was blinking against vision from his own eyes—Jess had brought him back to his body.

  “They’re too close!” Jess shouted. Esset surged to his feet to survey the battle—Jess was right. Too many of his summons had fallen while he’d been in the trance. He called reinforcements, but it took time to push back the army of skeletons again. Only once he was confident that his summons were holding back the legion of skeletons again did he attempt to find their source.

  It was futile. He tried twice more, but each time he “left” the battle, it would turn against them and he would be forced to return. He considered just evacuating the people, but according to the farmers, the next village was quite close, and Esset knew this army would head straight there and slaughter each and every one of them.

  There was no way out.

  Toman waited. Invulnerability was a two-edged sword; nothing could touch him, but nor could he touch anything. When he used the Ashiier’s gift and turned to stone, nothing could physically harm him, not tooth or blade or even plague. But there was a cost—he could move, but only slowly, as if he were underwater. He felt as if his mass had doubled, or heavy chains were bound around him, and he was required to struggle against them. He felt as if he were made of stone.

  Stone: that was the gift the Ashiier had given him. Thanks to this ability, he had been able to find the courage to resume the fight against Moloch. When he gave himself completely over to the stone, he was protected entirely from magic as well. Nothing could touch him—he could never be entirely at Moloch’s mercy ever again. It was a poor alternative, but at the same time, it was an incredible alternative to having no alternative at all.

  The flaw of the ability was his inability to help others while he was protected by stone. Becoming partially stone was almost impossible to maintain, although he’d temporarily managed earlier by slowing down the transition from flesh to stone. Now, however, he simply had to wait for the mages to destroy or drive away the remaining plague beasts before he could do anything. He couldn’t help—not without changing back from stone and exposing himself to infection. In other words, he couldn’t help without it costing his life. Toman had never been good at standing aside while others fought.

  Over the space of what seemed like an eternity, Toman felt the plague beasts cease to gnaw at him, then heard the sounds of battle subside. Finally he opened his eyes. One of the mages leaned over him; the random thought that her strawberry blonde hair was rather pretty flickered through Toman’s mind. The dying light made her hair glow like a halo around her head. The mage’s expression went from confusion to surprise when she saw Toman’s eyes move. She shouted to her comrades as Toman reversed the magic that had turned him to stone. Another mage—a man this time—appeared in Toman’s field of vision only a moment later, and both of them hovered, unsure of what to do. Considering that touching someone infected by the plague-beasts carried the consequence of a horrible death, Toman couldn’t blame them, but he couldn’t reassure them that he was fine until the stone receded.

  “What’s wrong with him?” someone asked outside of Toman’s limited field of vision. “That doesn’t look like the plague.”

  “I don’t know,” the female mage replied after a moment’s hesitation. She hovered a little closer to Toman.

  “Animator Toman, are you okay?” she asked. Toman closed his eyes and tilted his chin down slightly in an affirmative. His skin was beginning to lighten from its granite texture. Already it was much easier to blink.

  “Not the plague then,” the female mage said, looking up at the other mage.

  “Then what—” the other mage began angrily. He was cut off.

  “Just wait.” It was yet another mage’s voice. “Can’t you see his skin changing? I’m willing to bet he’ll be able to answer us in a few minutes. Give him some space. In the meantime, let’s do another sweep to make sure we didn’t miss any of those creatures. The thought of even one of them escaping gives me chills.” Whoever that last voice belonged to, he must have been in charge, because Toman heard the rest of the group move away. The mage with the pretty hair stayed, but the other vanished from his view.

  Toman was flesh and blood again long before the head mage’s estimated time. Changing to stone was quicker than changing bac
k, but even so it only took a minute. Soon he was sitting up and reassuring the mages that he was fine and not infected. They seemed rather anxious around him, and they kept shooting uneasy looks at his exposed metal hand. He did his best to ignore their discomfort.

  “I need my other glove,” he finally said, all too aware that he was only wearing one. He prayed the other hadn’t made it far, but he was concerned, since his animations had been unable to locate it, and their ability to see was unhindered by the dying light. He needn’t have worried.

  “Here.” One of the mages held it out to him. “It seemed out of place, so I picked it up when I saw it.”

  “Thank you,” Toman replied, taking the glove and slipping it on. Most of the time he tried not to let on that the gloves were the source of his animating ability—it was simply safer that way—but when they were somehow out of his sight, it made him extremely paranoid. It felt good to have his metal hand mostly covered too. A bit of metal was still visible above the glove and below the tattered remains of the long strips of cloth that he always wrapped from bicep to wrist, but it wasn’t terribly obvious.

  Most of his clothes were in tatters now, liberally torn by the plague-beasts’ teeth, but he felt significantly less naked with his gloves on. Thankfully his floppy-brimmed hat had also survived without further damage; it was now planted firmly back on his head.

  Feeling much better, Toman took a look around, but the light was dimming so much it was difficult to see. It was well and truly dusk. He wanted to call Esset and Tseka to let them know what he’d discovered, but he needed the trust of these mages, and they’d probably think he was crazy if he started talking to a little stone snake curled around his ear. He already made them uneasy, Toman knew. Better not to do anything that would need further explanation.

  Toman’s eyes fell on the pyre the mages had assembled. It was hastily made, but Lors’s body had been carefully arranged despite the risk of exposure to plague. Toman joined the mages in a circle around the pyre. Each mage held out a hand and sparked the tinder; the pyre flared to life.