Divided against Yourselves (Spell Weaver)

by Hiatt, Bill

  “Hey!” I heard Shar yell, just as I was about to leave the cafeteria. Turning quickly, I saw Shar on his feet, pointing and yelling, “He stole my…wallet!” The other guys were on their feet as well. I could see the thief, by good chance running straight for the exit I was standing in front of, an odd choice given that the other exit had been much closer to him. Well, his poor strategy would make catching him easy…

  Except that the thief was carrying, not Shar’s wallet, but Zom, Shar’s sword, glinting an unmistakable emerald green.

  I had planned on hitting him with a little magic to slow him down, but as long as he carried Zom, he would be immune to anything I could do. Worse, I would be no match for him unarmed, and drawing White Hilt against him would make it visible to everyone. They would see it as a fencing foil rather than the flaming sword it actually was, but it would still be hard to explain its sudden appearance. Come to think of it, the students in the packed cafeteria were reacting with such surprise that they clearly were already seeing Zom, hopefully as a fencing foil rather than the glowing blade it actually was, but the thief was running fast enough to make even a fencing foil in his hand seem threatening.

  With everyone’s attention focused on the runner, I drew White Hilt, which flamed at once, though its fire would not be useful to me against someone wielding Zom. I realized that might be just as well as I took the fraction of a second left before he reached me to actually look at him.

  It was then I realized he was just a kid, barely twelve at most, but more likely eleven. Either that, or he was the shortest, most baby-faced high school student I had ever seen. Even Stan, before he had his last growth spurt, had looked older than this guy. Hell, even Gianni looked older than he looked. He was black haired, relatively dark-skinned and seemed to be an Arab, though he could also have been a Persian, like Shar. He was at least a foot shorter than I was, maybe more, and his clothes seemed to be far too big for him, suggesting perhaps that his wardrobe was improvised at the last minute, perhaps stolen.

  I could tell by the awkward way he held the sword that he had never had decent combat training, suggesting he probably wasn’t stealing the sword to use, but to sell, and also suggesting I could probably defeat him easily…if I could find a way of having a discreet sword fight in front of most of the student body.

  There was one more factor I needed to take into consideration, besides the number of gawkers: in order to steal Zom, the kid would have to have been able to see it, suggesting that there was something supernatural about him. While he was holding Zom, I couldn’t scan him to assess what his abilities might be, but I knew I needed to be a little wary of him. Just because he didn’t have combat training didn’t mean he couldn’t perform magical mischief.

  The kid looked at me with surprise when he realized that I was barring his way and that I also had a sword. His body language suggested he might try to run back the way he had come, but the guys were only seconds behind him, and Coach Miller, the teacher who had drawn lunch duty today (lucky him!) was not far behind them. That was a stroke of luck, because Coach Miller was, aside from Nurse Florence, the only staff member who knew my secret. He could help us explain this weirdness to the other students.

  The guys had all drawn their swords. Our little thief could see he was outnumbered and “out-gunned.” What could he possibly do except surrender?

  Well, what he actually did was turn quickly and run very fast—at least faerie fast—to his left, away from any possible exit, unless he planned on trying to double back to the exit clear on the other side of the room. If that was his plan, he was never going to make it, fast or not. Shar and the other guys had plenty of friends—big friends—who were not at all happy about one of their buddies getting robbed. They had been too surprised to move at first, but they were in motion now, and there more than enough of them to corner the thief.

  My one worry now was that the thief would try to use the sword, which most students would not realize was as dangerous as it was—that fencing-foil illusion did have its drawbacks. Dan, Shar, Gordy and Carlos, probably thinking the same thing, raced after him in an attempt to get between him and the other students.

  The thief was clearly panicked but still determined not to be caught. He had noticed that the cafeteria wall was mostly windows, and in one swift motion he raised Zom and crashed it straight into one of the large panes. Fortunately, the glass was shatter-proof, but the sword stroke was more than enough to make it crumble. The thief jumped through the opening and was running toward the fence bordering the campus almost before I realized what had happened. Outside the overcrowded cafeteria, his speed was even more apparent.

  Realizing that he would reach the fence in seconds, I headed out the door, bursting into song as soon as I was outside. I might not naturally be as swift as our thief, but a little magic could make me faster. In seconds I could feel myself accelerating. Unfortunately, people close enough to the cafeteria windows would be able to see both the thief’s breathtakingly fast escape and my pursuit, but I would have to worry about that later. Losing Zom was not an option!

  “Coach! Keep anyone but the guys from following! Keep everybody else in the cafeteria!” I had never tried mental communication with Coach Miller before, but I had no time to wait and see if the message had registered.

  Now that I was moving more rapidly, my much longer legs would give me an advantage over the thief—or so I thought. Of course, I had expected he would have to climb the fence, and that was where I planned to catch him. Imagine my surprise when he jumped over the fence! Wow! I sure hoped nobody saw that maneuver.

  Clearly, he was no ordinary kid, and I was just beginning to think I wouldn’t be able to catch him when I noticed how awkwardly he landed. Probably having to hang onto the sword threw him off balance, but it looked as if he had twisted his left ankle when he hit. Not only that, but he seemed to be bleeding just a little; probably he nicked himself with Zom sometime during his mad dash or jump. In a pinch the blood would be useful for tracking him, though I hoped I could just catch him now and make tracking unnecessary.

  I was at the fence now. I could have used air currents to float myself over it, but that was slow. I could have flown over it, which was much faster, but both approaches were pretty conspicuous if anyone was watching. Besides, though the battle on Samhain had demonstrated the advantages of being able to fly, I hadn’t practiced flying as much as I should have. With my luck, I’d fly a little too high and get myself tangled, maybe even fried, in the nearby power lines. I could have climbed the fence pretty quickly too, but the thief was already on the move again, despite the obvious pain in his ankle. He was really only hobbling, but it was the fastest hobble I had ever seen, faster than some guys’ running pace. No, climbing would be too slow; I had to do something that ran a much higher risk of giving some passerby an eyeful, though it would at least be easier to explain than flying. Instead of climbing, I took White Hilt and sliced right through the fence in one quick stroke; mere chain link never stood a chance against that kind of blade.

  I could always repair the fence later, but it was hard to even describe how big a disaster losing Zom would be. Anyway, now the guys had an easy way to follow us.

  The kid was still hobbling away at an incredible pace. I recaptured my speed and raced after him, closing the gap with every long stride. No one was going to steal Zom on my watch!

  Unfortunately, the thief could hear my running steps and knew that I was getting closer. Abruptly he flickered, then vanished.

  Why can’t anything ever be easy?

  I hadn’t felt any big build-up of magical energy, so at least he hadn’t jumped into Annwn. He must have become invisible. I kept running in his general direction and squinted, trying to see through his invisibility spell. Normally people like me could see through that kind of spell with a little effort, but this time I saw nothing. Probably Zom’s protection against hostile magic was preventing me from piercing his invisibility.

  Well, he might be invisib
le, but he seemed young enough to make mistakes, like maybe forgetting to make himself inaudible.

  In this life I have never really gotten comfortable with shape-shifting, but from time to time I did make little adjustments to make my senses stronger, so I enhanced my hearing and listened carefully. Sure enough, I could hear his feet striking the sidewalk, and I followed the sound. He must have realized quickly what I was doing, because suddenly I could no longer hear those steps. I increased my sense of smell and tried to track him from the smell of his sweat, but as far as I could tell, he wasn’t sweating, which was more than I could say about myself. Odd!

  Then I realized I was smelling something…

  Blood! He was still bleeding. Apparently, the cut was worse than I had thought, and naturally exertion would make him bleed faster. I could also follow his blood trail visually. He might be invisible, but the blood droplets on the pavement were not.

  If he had realized my situation, he would have headed for a busy street to inhibit my freedom of action more, but instead he followed his natural impulse and ran away from any possible crowd. He must have known Santa Brígida pretty well, because he got away from the school quickly and raced down one of the smaller residential streets. At a time of day when kids were in school, most parents were at work, and the ones who didn’t have to be at work were often involved in some social or charitable activity away from home, a lot of these neighborhoods were pretty empty. All I could hear were my own footsteps and the occasional barking dog.

  Dogs! Of course.

  I might have all the original Taliesin’s magic, and even some twists of my own, but that didn’t mean I always remembered to use all of it. I reached my mind out for the dogs, of which there were a great many nearby, and I told them what I needed. Their noses, like mine, would pick up his blood, and dogs, like some other animals, were very sensitive to magic. He could be as invisible as he wanted; the dogs would still know where he was, and their barking would help me track him.

  I wished I had the guys with me, but I must have outrun them long ago. I sent out as loud a psychic message to them as I could manage, giving them my approximate location and a quick indication of what we were up against. I was just about to make sure that Nurse Florence was in the loop when an enormous German shepherd leaped over the backyard wall of a house about three doors from where I was, bounded halfway across the street, and started barking furiously. Clearly, the dog had sensed the thief and saw him as a threat. That was more than I had asked for, but I would take it. If I was right, that little distraction might be just what I needed to finally catch that kid.

  From the German shepherd’s movements I could tell the kid was trying to run from it, but the dog, snarling, was going right after him. I was pretty sure he could outrun the dog under ideal conditions, but he had been running a lot on a twisted ankle, losing blood the whole time, and the dog had probably surprised him.

  Then the thief became visible for a moment, evidently to try to threaten the dog with Zom. At the sight of the glowing blade, the dog did indeed back off, but it kept snarling at the kid, who looked frightened. I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for him. I know, I know—looks can be deceiving, and the kid could be some kind of shifter who was using that form to play for my sympathies. But what if he really was just a kid? Well, clearly he wasn’t just a kid, but what if he was mentally and physically as young as he looked?

  “Hey!” I yelled as I closed in. “Drop the sword!” I didn’t really expect him to follow that instruction, but at just that moment the dog lunged at him, at which point he fumbled and dropped the sword, which hit the street with a resounding clang. Preoccupied by another lunge from the dog, the kid didn’t immediately reach to pick up the sword, and by the time he thought of it, I had used White Hilt to surround the sword in flames. The dog retreated from the blaze, but I didn’t need to distract the kid anymore. After all, he couldn’t get to the sword, and now I could use magic to subdue him. Case closed!

  Except that it wasn’t. Without even blinking, the kid thrust his hand into the fire and pulled out Zom, which dispelled the flames as soon as it touched them.

  I gasped, but there was no smell of burned flesh, no sign of even the slightest blister on his hand.

  Fast and fireproof? What other surprises did he have in store for me? I did not intend to find out.

  By now I was almost upon him. He turned and tried to run again, but the combination of his ankle injury and his blood loss was finally slowing him down enough to make escape unrealistic. His facial expression betrayed the fact that he knew it as well…but it made him look all the more like the frightened kid that perhaps he was.

  He became invisible again, seemingly a desperation play, since he obviously knew by now that I could still track him. Then I heard the whoosh of a sword swing and jumped out of the way just in time. So, the little scumbag was out for blood! I was awfully tempted to give him some—

  Parrying blind was hard, but the kid’s lack of skill with the sword compensated. He was swinging wildly with a blade whose weight he was not used to.

  “Give it up!” I yelled at him. “You’re more likely to hurt yourself than me!” My ears echoed with another clang as Zom and White Hilt collided again with an emerald flash. Every time I parried with White Hilt, part of its fire was extinguished by Zom’s anti-magic touch, but that touch didn’t break permanent spells, such as those embedded in White Hilt, so I knew the flames would return shortly. Their loss mattered little right now, since the kid was clearly immune to fire anyway.

  I could hear running footsteps and knew without looking in that direction that the guys were running down the street toward us.

  “You may as well just give me the sword now,” I said, trying to sound reasonable, though I was feeling less and less reasonable by the minutes. “My friends are here now. You can’t fight all of us.”

  “I need the sword!” the kid yelled in high-pitched, heavily accented English. He sounded more out of breath than I was. The running did not seem to have been a problem, but the sword fighting was wearing him down fast.

  “Why do you need it?” I asked, hoping that if I kept him talking, he would not try to run again.

  “Please, please, just let me have it!” he said in a tone so plaintive it was almost heartbreaking. By now the guys had arrived, and, realizing I was fighting an invisible opponent, formed a wide circle around the general area where the kid had to be. I was pretty sure he was done now. If he had any more tricks, he would certainly have used them to get away before my reinforcements arrived.

  Abruptly, the kid threw Zom up in the air, a move that caused it to become visible. He was trying to use the sword as a distraction, but we weren’t about to fall for that kind of rookie move. Shar grabbed the sword midair, while the rest of us threw ourselves in the general area we knew he had to be. He managed to jump sideways, but the move did him little good, since he landed on his bad ankle, and the jolt of pain caused him to become visible and then nearly fall. In seconds Dan, Gordy, and Carlos were all on top of him—literally.

  “Careful, guys—he’s just a kid,” I said, and they eased up a little. After determining that all the fight had more or less been knocked out of him, they dragged him off the ground. Dan and Gordy held his arms, and both Carlos and Shar stood nearby, waiting to help if they needed to.

  “What’s your name?” I asked him. I got no answer. He refused to even look up at me.

  “Should we get the answer out of him?” asked Shar, who seemed to want me to say “yes.”

  “He’s just a kid,” I repeated.

  “Yeah, right,” said Dan. “A kid who can run at thirty miles per hour or so? What did you clock him at, Tal?”

  “That sounds about right,” I replied, studying our captive, who continued to stare fixedly at the ground.

  “Let’s not forget jumping the fence, turning invisible, and oh, yeah—being able to grab a sword he shouldn’t even have been able to see,” added Dan.

  “He�
��s apparently also fireproof,” I noted absently, still looking carefully at him.

  “Shifter of some kind, if you ask me. No little kid could do all that!” exclaimed Shar.

  At that point our captive began sobbing loudly, his whole body shaking. If he was a shifter, he had the little-kid routine down pat.

  Aside from being too large for him, his clothing was pretty worn out and certainly dirty, and though it was hard to tell his head down, I thought I had seen dirt on his face as well. Unless our “shifter” was also a master of disguise, I would say he was homeless.

  Until that moment, I hadn’t realized there were any homeless people in Santa Brígida. He could have just arrived from somewhere else, I supposed, but how did someone with the kind of power he obviously had end up homeless in the first place?

  I tried probing his mind, but his defenses were strong, and I didn’t want to risk hurting him, so for the time being, I made peace with the idea that we were not going to have all the answers we needed.

  “Let’s get him back to school,” I said after a minute. “Nurse Florence needs to see him. Maybe she’ll have some answers.”

  As we walked, I called up a fog to hide us. There was something vaguely disturbing about the image of two big, athletic guys like Dan and Gordy dragging a crying little kid along between them, and I didn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea. I also figured that there would be a big mess at school, and I wanted to see if we could smuggle the kid in without his being seen. This was no ordinary thief we could just turn over to the police, nor ordinary little kid that we could hand over to social services.