by R. L. King
“Right. Am I helping you close it?”
“No. I will close it, but you will need to defend the area around us until I am finished. I can maintain my mental shields, but I must focus the rest of my effort and energy on the task.” He turned back, fixing a hard stare on Stone. “When I say you must defend the area, I mean you must do whatever is necessary to do so. Do you understand?”
Stone took a deep breath. “I…do. I don’t like it, but I do.”
“If we are overrun, it will not be only we who suffer the consequences.”
“I know that too.” He looked away, watching the shadowy figures in the distance. So far, no one seemed to be coming close to the tear in reality—whether that was by design or by accident, he wasn’t sure. He hoped it remained true, because he knew Kolinsky was right. The dragon had never shown any particular regard for mundane humans in the past; he didn’t go out of his way to injure them or cause them trouble, but if they got in his way, that was their misfortune. In this case, though, this was about more than Kolinsky and his plans. If this thing were allowed to remain, it could grow larger until it engulfed the city—or worse.
“Don’t worry about that,” he said grimly. “I’ve got that part covered. Let’s do it.”
Kolinsky regarded him for several more seconds, as if trying to gauge whether he’d meant what he said. Then he nodded again. “Let us go, then. I will conceal us until we reach the ground.”
They floated down together, landing twenty feet from the tear. As they approached, Stone began to sense a sort of…build-up of energy pressing against his shield. It was a profoundly unsettling feeling, and he was certain nothing good would come if he allowed any of it to get through his shields.
“Hurry up,” he growled.
Kolinsky didn’t seem any keener to approach the tear than Stone was. He moved forward, stepping with care, ignoring everything except the hole directly in front of him. The closer he got, the more the same strange, flickering energy seemed to engulf him.
A tingle of dread ran through Stone, setting the little hairs on the back of his neck on edge when a thought occurred to him. The way the mundanes were running around here like mad things, destroying property and killing each other—what would happen if the otherworldly energy got to Kolinsky? If the dragon came after him, he didn’t think he could hold him off.
Don’t worry about that. All you’ve got to worry about is keeping him safe while he gets this done.
Kolinsky seemed to have found a spot he was satisfied with, ten feet in front of the hole and directly at its center point. His body tensed as he raised his hands.
Showtime, Stone thought grimly, and looked around.
From off in the distance to his right came a loud, muffled boom. Were they blowing things up now? He couldn’t worry about that, unless they started doing it a lot closer to here. He wanted to urge Kolinsky to hurry, but that was pointless. Closing the tear would take as long as it took, and judging by how long he’d needed to close the smaller one in Louisiana, they might be here a while.
He looked around, taking in the general area around them for the first time. They were in a typical small-city intersection: four lanes on each of the four sides, two in each direction. The traffic lights had long since ceased to function, as had the streetlights. The tear itself was in the middle of the intersection, slightly closer to the side opposite the one Stone was standing on. On the far corner was what looked like a toy store, its picture window either blasted out or destroyed by marauding mundanes. Moving clockwise around the intersection, Stone saw a gas station on one corner, a Starbucks on the one he was standing on, and a clothing store on the fourth. The clothing store’s window was still intact, and for a moment Stone thought something was wrong, but couldn’t figure out what it was.
Then he got it: the intact window should have been flickering with the reflection of the tear in the intersection, but it wasn’t. From where Stone stood, all he could see were the toy store, the gas station, the intersection itself, and the dark figure of Kolinsky. The dragon looked small and insignificant in front of the massive fissure.
He wished he had a camera, but the little burner phone he carried didn’t include one. His hunch was that the rift wouldn’t show up in a photograph—which was probably a good thing, given that almost everybody carried a high-end camera in their pockets these days. If a bunch of photos of this thing got out in the world—
A loud whoop came from Stone’s left, followed by the roar of an engine. He whirled in time to see a red Chevy Camaro barreling toward Kolinsky. One figure poked through the open sunroof, and another leaned out the rear passenger-side window.
Stone didn’t have time to think. The dragon was fully focused on what he was doing now, paying no attention to what was going on in the real world. Stone had only a second to act.
Moving purely on instinct, he reached out with his power, hitting the car’s front end with a powerful concussion blast. If he’d done it right, the Camaro would veer off course, miss Kolinsky, and keep going, hopefully without injuring the car’s occupants.
He didn’t count on the driver panicking when his car suddenly veered violently to the left. The guy’s whoop turned to a scream as the car slewed left and struck the tear.
Stone watched in horror, almost forgetting about everything else around him. The Camaro hit the rift from the edge, half on one side and half on the other. The sight was almost like watching someone unzip a zipper. It would be a cliché to say the tear’s edge sliced through the Camaro’s front end like a knife through butter, but sometimes clichés existed for a reason. That was exactly what it looked like. The car would have split neatly in half down the middle except for one thing: it was still veering to the left, following the last instruction its driver had given it. Instead, the tear’s knife-edge drifted to the right, cutting a chunk out of the Camaro’s hood and slicing silently through the passenger with his upper body extending through the sunroof. The man barely got a scream out before half his body simply disappeared, falling into whatever was behind the tear. His top half flopped free and landed, neatly severed and cauterized, on the ground in front of the tear.
The Camaro kept going on momentum—it still had three wheels, even though most of its engine was now gone—and finally pancaked what was left of its front end into the toy store’s yawning broken window. Nobody inside moved.
Through all of this, Kolinsky had remained in position, appearing neither to notice nor care about what was going on around him.
Stone’s heart pounded. He’d killed those people! He knew they probably would have killed themselves if he’d left them alone—and they’d certainly have injured Kolinsky and disrupted him if allowed to continue on their original course—but that didn’t change the fact that Stone had been directly responsible for at least one death.
You haven’t got a choice. A lot more people will die if that thing isn’t closed.
He looked around again, shifting to magical sight and trying to spot anyone else getting close. At night, it was normally easier to see people by their glowing auras, but tonight that wasn’t the case. Whatever energy the fissure was putting out overwhelmed everything else around it, lighting up the entire area in its eerie glimmer.
Was it getting bigger? Stone couldn’t tell. Kolinsky seemed to have hold of one of its sides now, and was doing the same thing Stone had done in Louisiana—trying to zip it up. He was doing it faster than Stone had, but this one was a lot bigger and a lot wider. That meant it would also be a lot harder to manage. He was glad Kolinsky was doing it and not him.
The energy was behaving differently than the Louisiana tear, though. He hadn’t seen anything physical trying to escape from it since they’d arrived: no black tentacles, no spider-things, nothing that looked like it might be alive. Instead, the thing seemed to be leaking energy. It rolled out and crept across the ground like low-lying fog, visible both to magical sight and the mundane gaze. From where Kolinsky stood, it engulfed his lower half up to
his knees, though it didn’t seem to be doing anything to him. Stone wasn’t sure if that was because of the dragon’s powerful shield, because he simply wasn’t vulnerable to it due to his dragon heritage, or because it hadn’t reached his head yet. Either way, it didn’t seem like the kind of thing they wanted hanging about for too long. He wondered if it would dissipate once the tear was sealed.
If it was sealed. Even though Kolinsky was moving faster than Stone had, it appeared he was moving unbearably slowly, having only sealed less than a foot of the massive fissure in the time they’d been here so far. At that rate, it would take him at least half an hour to finish the job—and that was assuming nothing interfered with them that Stone couldn’t handle.
More booms sounded from the distance, followed by a loud crash and a scream. Stone levitated to the roof of a wrecked car and scanned the area again, but whatever had happened was out of his sight. No way was he going to leave Kolinsky unprotected to check it out. The mundanes would have to fend for themselves.
A twinge of guilt struck him at that thought. I’m starting to think like Stefan. That did worry him occasionally, late at night when he was lying in bed with Raider snuggled in the crook of his shoulder. Verity had once accused him of “going somewhere she couldn’t follow.” Was she right? Was it true? He’d changed a lot in the last few years. Between what had happened on Calanar, the apparent immortality he still couldn’t explain, and his new scion-based travel abilities, he had very little in common with the average mage on the street anymore. Would that change him? Had it changed him?
No time to get introspective now. Do your job and worry about it later. He made another scan, turning in place on the car’s battered roof. So far, nobody was approaching, though he could still hear plenty of sounds of carnage in the distance. He hoped, whatever was happening to these people’s brains, they would take it as a sign to get the hell away from here, not group up and try finding the source. He might be able to hold off a lot of them at once, but it wouldn’t be pleasant for either them or him.
Another boom, this one closer. This time, though, it didn’t sound like an explosion. It sounded like something heavy being thrown against a wall.
To Stone’s left, someone screamed.
He spun in time to see a figure entering the intersection.
“Bloody hell…” he whispered.
The figure was bigger and bulkier than a normal human, but still humanoid in shape. The strange energy clung to it like an aura, along with the darkness obscuring its features. As Stone watched, the creature grabbed the end of a car and shoved it away as easily as a human might kick aside a stack of boxes blocking his path.
Whatever it was, it was heading straight for Kolinsky.
“No, you don’t, mate,” Stone muttered. He pointed both hands at the creature and let loose with another battering concussion spell, hoping to knock it backward. If it was mindless, maybe pain would dissuade it from its plan—and if it wasn’t, maybe letting it know it had opposition might change its mind.
The spell hit the creature and blew it back into another wrecked car. It hit with a loud thud, denting the vehicle’s side with far more force than a normal human would have. It slid down, stunned, but all too quickly leaped back to its feet, apparently uninjured. Around it, the energy flared with more intensity.
And now it had noticed Stone.
With a quick glance at Kolinsky, it shifted focus and took off at a fast, ground-eating jog toward the car where Stone was standing.
Brilliant.
As it drew closer, Stone got a better look at it.
This wasn’t good.
He could see now that it was human—or at least it had been before the energy got hold of it. He had no idea how big the man had been originally, but now his body strained at his hoodie and track pants as if trying to burst free of them. He looked like he might have been a black man before, but now his dark skin was almost a rocky texture, shot through with veins glowing with purple light. His face was set in a glare of rage as he approached Stone.
“I wouldn’t,” Stone called, still trying to keep Kolinsky in sight. He didn’t know whether these afflicted creatures had maintained enough mental acuity to form plans, or if they were just running around trying to relieve whatever pressure was attacking them. “Go on your way. Do you understand me?”
Apparently, the man, or creature, or whatever he was, didn’t understand. He picked up a piece of rubble from the street and chucked it at Stone.
The mage barely got out of the way with a quick levitation spell. Whatever else the fissure’s energy had done to this man, it had given him the strength and accuracy of a major league baseball pitcher. The chunk of rubble flew through the spot where Stone had been standing and crashed into the Starbucks with enough force to make a divot in the brickwork.
This definitely wasn’t good.
Stone didn’t want to have to maintain a levitation spell in addition to keeping his own shields up and watching Kolinsky. As before, it wasn’t a question of power—he still had plenty of that—but of concentration. The more chaotic a situation became, the harder it was to maintain focus on multiple things at once. If his mental shields slipped, he risked falling under the fissure’s influence. If his levitation spell slipped, it would send him tumbling directly into his attacker’s grasp. Even if he was truly incapable of dying, he didn’t fancy testing what might happen if the creature ripped him limb from limb.
Time for some decisive action.
He backed up and dropped again, landing on the roof of another car farther away from where Kolinsky was still working on sealing the fissure. “Over here!” he called to the creature, waving his arms. “Come get me if you can!”
The big man had glanced sideways at Kolinsky, almost as if debating which way he wanted to go, but Stone’s words stirred him to action again. With a roar, he leaped over the car where Stone had been standing, his legs pumping and his big hands outstretched in front of him.
Damn, he moved fast! With the levitation spell dropped, Stone now had the free cycles to form another—but he almost didn’t get it off before the man was upon him. As it was, his attacker slammed into the car he was standing on, rocking it sideways and almost pitching him off the other side. Stone barely got his powerful telekinesis spell off as he tumbled backward and caught his balance before he fell.
The man’s expression changed from rage to astonishment as he lifted off the ground and sailed through the night sky in a parabolic arc. Stone didn’t see where he landed—he’d put a lot of power into that spell, so it was probably at least a couple blocks away. He hoped he hadn’t killed him, but didn’t have time to worry about that now.
He turned his attention back to Kolinsky, who hadn’t moved. He seemed to have picked up speed now, and had almost half the fissure zipped up. Stone wished he could go down there and help—if he started from the other side, they could get the job done a lot faster—but with creatures like the hulking man prowling the streets, that was out of the question.
Hurry up, Stefan…
At least the man didn’t return. Stone had been afraid of that, too—that he’d land somewhere, make a big crater in the street, and then pick himself up, dust himself off, and wade in for round two like some kind of magic-addled Incredible Hulk. Again, he spared a hope that he hadn’t killed the guy, but rather that his misfiring brain had sent him off in another direction. A lot of distracting things were going on around here right now.
More screams, crashes, and booms sounded, but all of them seemed to be farther away. That was good—Stone had feared something about the fissure’s energy was luring people toward it, but that didn’t seem to be the case. He turned in place, scanning the area all around him. Several figures were out there, their auras indicating they were moving, but none approached.
Good. Just keep it up for a few more minutes and we’ll be out of here.
He wondered a couple of things: where the authorities were, and whether the people afflicted by the fi
ssure’s energies would revert to normal when it was closed. He hoped so, or the cops were going to have their hands full trying to mop up the aftermath.
He glanced at Kolinsky again. The dragon was more than three-quarters finished closing the rift now. He still stood tall and straight, but even from where he stood, Stone could see a faint tremor in his posture. He was tiring. Apparently, even dragons didn’t have boundless energy.
The time crawled by with agonizing slowness, every passing second threatening to produce another impediment to Kolinsky’s efforts. Once, a group of men on bicycles rolled up the street from Stone’s left, but before they could reach the intersection where the fissure was, they all skidded to a stop, picked up their bikes, and began attacking each other with them. Stone couldn’t watch—not because he was squeamish, but because he feared their attack was a distraction, the rift’s attempt to divert his attention so it could make a last stab against Kolinsky before he finished closing it.
That’s absurd, though—it’s not alive.
Even so, he was taking no chances.
It was almost closed now. Five more minutes, perhaps. Kolinsky had slowed somewhat, and there was a definite sag in his posture, but he showed no signs of stopping.
Just a few more minutes…Hang on, Stefan…
From the street behind Stone came a loud horn blast, deafening over the faint crashes and screams in the distance. He spun.
No, no, no!
A massive box truck was barreling down the street, blasting its horn repeatedly—and heading directly for both the car Stone was standing on and, once it pushed that aside, Kolinsky and the fissure. It was less than thirty feet from Stone, and it wasn’t slowing down. At the speed it was going, he had no time to react—and even if he did, he wouldn’t be able to stop that kind of momentum. The truck would blow through any shield he put up, probably knocking him out before he could do anything else.
