A Sorcerer's Fist

by Guy Antibes

  He gently moved Pira aside and stared at his great-uncle, standing with six sorcerers and four guards. It didn’t take much to realize that they were positioned to neutralize any sorcerers who reached the corridors of the castle.

  King Leon’s voice came from out of sight. Pira pushed Ricky out of the way.

  “Take care of Valian if it is the last thing that you do. Today, he will join his pesky parents. I made the mistake of not insisting that Valian die when they did. Make sure he suffers when he loses his magic. As for my cousin, if you see her, include her in your duties. I’ll be hidden while you do your work.”

  Pira shut the peephole and turned around. “We must take care of the sorcerers,” she said, looking at the battle sorcerer, “while Ricky and Nania eliminate the four guards.”

  “Those are lousy odds,” Ricky said.

  “Better those than face fifty guards in my bedroom.”

  Ricky nodded. “Do you know where the king will hide?”

  Pira nodded. “There is a storage room that’s not part of the secret passages, but it is much like the one at Cistia Palace.” She looked at everyone. “Are you ready?”

  Ricky nodded along with the others. He drew his sword and his long knife. “Sound shields and a personal shield for both of you,” he said.

  Pira grimaced. “I almost forgot.”

  “A knight never forgets to help his lady,” Ricky said, smiling, trying to stay calm. He would fight like a common man.

  Pira slid the bolt open and quietly stepped into the room. They ended up in the midst of the sorcerers. Ricky began to stab as many of the sorcerers as he could. Each one down would mean less to contribute to a sorcerers’ circle.

  Gobble Bangatelli’s eyes grew as he saw Ricky fighting a guard. He backed up and waved his sword. Ricky noticed that Gobble carried his old Naparran heirloom and wore his wand case at his belt. He vowed he would retrieve the sword and wand that Gobble had stolen from him.

  A man rushed him and drew him away from Gobble. Even without magic, Ricky found he could use a sword just as well. He backed up into a sorcerer. The man turned his eyes to Ricky’s, but Ricky grabbed the sorcerer’s wrist just as he was about to release a spell. Ricky could feel the resonance of the spell fill his body. He breathed in power. His magic had been restored.

  The sorcerer’s eyes grew wide. “What?” was the last word of his life.

  Pira fought another sorcerer, but a guard raised his sword behind her, ready to cleave her skull. Ricky sang his freeze spell. It didn’t work! He remembered his ears didn’t work the same, so he tried again, and the world stopped. He slipped through the motionless bodies. The edge of the sword had barely touched Pira’s hair. Ricky gently pushed the sword away from Pira’s head and ran the man through. At the same time, he slew the rest of the sorcerers.

  Ricky spotted Gobble, his body arrested in flight. He grabbed his weapons, and when everything started to move again, he held the Naparran sword in his hand and looked into the old man’s eyes, seeing Gobble truly afraid for the first time in his life, before he struck the man down. Ricky wailed as a result of some emotion, but he didn’t know what it was. He ran back to the fight, but all the opponents had been killed.

  “What happened?” Nania said. She looked at Ricky. “You have your power back?”

  Ricky nodded. “I do, and I have my weapons back,” he said. “Before we capture the king, let me take care of your wounds.”

  They all had cuts and nicks, which didn’t take Ricky much time after he calibrated the song.

  “Where is the storage room?” Ricky asked Pira. He marveled that he now held his Naparran sword and his black steel wand, with the blade extended. He sang a sound shield and a personal shield and breathed deeply as if to draw in more power from the air.

  “One of the sorcerers was about to cast a sung spell with me holding onto his wrist. His power filled me up rather than produce a spell,” he said as Pira sought out the room.

  “Here it is.” She pulled on a book and opened the door.

  “Just like the library at Cistia.” Ricky jumped in front of her, but the room held no occupants. It did hold something else of interest. “The ancient library we recovered from the Home,” Ricky said to Nania. “We will return when this is all over,” he said to Pira.

  Nania called to Pira at the far end of the secret library. “King Leon has been busy. This door looks new.”

  Ricky smiled when he produced a sorcerous light and examined the door. “It isn’t spelled,” he pronounced.

  Pira wasted no time pushing on the door, but it did not budge. Ricky inspected the hinges and found that it needed to be pulled open. He pinched on a strip of molding and door opened. Pira rewarded him by giving him a view of the surface of her tongue and walked through the door, with a tiny ball of light floating above her hand.

  “We can expect an attack at any time,” Nania said as she slipped through after Pira.

  Ricky looked back at the library. He urged the battle sorcerer through to close the door of the secret library. As he closed the door, he glimpsed the feet of Gobble’s body. He sighed. He shouldn’t feel so bad about the man who had betrayed him so many times, but he couldn’t help but sense part of his life had died along with the weasely man. Shantyboat Town gone and now Gobble. He wiped his watery eyes as he closed the door to the library and sealed the wood shut.

  He looked down at his steel wand. It was more scratched than he remembered and wondered what Gobble had done to it after he had taken it from Ricky. Thoughts for another time. He took a deep breath and left the library, sealing that door behind him as well.

  Ricky followed the light ahead and quickly caught up with the others. The battle sorcerer had moved to the front to check for magic traps, but Nania put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Stop,” she said quietly. “See that string running across the passage?”

  The battle sorcerer sighed. “I missed it.”

  They stepped over the string and walked a bit more slowly.

  Pira looked at a junction. “Now I know where we are,” she said. “The question is, where did my cousin go?”

  Ricky looked at the passageway and shrugged. “You’d know better than I,” he said.

  “Forward,” Pira said. “It’s as good a direction as any.”

  They had walked for less than one hundred paces when Ricky heard the discordance of the resonance-killing spell. “They know we are here and seek to kill our power,” he said. “Hold hands. We will share our power like a sorcerer circle. Nania stood, sword in front of her, towards the spell as the three sorcerers stood behind her.

  The small circle worked well for Ricky. The pressure lessened even as their enemy approached. Ricky pressed his way forward and found the resonance he sought after a few tries and threw the same spell back at the sorcerers. The pressure stopped to wails of frustration in front of them.

  “Move forward, Nania,” Ricky said.

  He didn’t extend the wand on his blade since they were in so close to each other, but he drew his sword. Ricky looked over the heads of the women and saw the glow of torchlight. Their enemies were around the corner. He chanced to look behind him and saw glimmers of light approaching them from the rear.

  “We are trapped,” Ricky said. There would be no flying away this time. “I’ll take care of those behind me.”

  Nania pushed Pira behind the battle sorcerer. She bumped into Ricky.

  “Throw some flame when the those behind us come,” he said. “Just don’t burn me.”

  “I won’t,” Pira said.

  Ricky moved his light to shine between them. “One good look before we fight,” he said.

  Pira looked very scared, so scared that she nodded and touched his face as he touched hers.

  “Enough of that, you two,” Nania said. “Should we go forward?”

  Ricky shook his head. “We can use the corner as a shield. Our enemy will determine our direction. Reinforce your shields.”

  The close
confines of the passageway reduced Ricky’s options. He couldn’t use his explosion spell, or he’d bring the castle down on their heads. Large firebolts would make the passage an oven with the same result. However, he could put people to sleep. It seemed his only option, but he didn’t know if the University sorcerers had found a shield for that spell.

  Torches entered the passageway behind as men filled up the far part of the passage. Ricky sent a sleeping spell towards the group, but as he suspected, the University sorcerers obviously had a defense for that. He used the resonance-killing spell and then sent the sleep shield again. Nothing happened. He would have to engage.

  “Throw a little fire their way,” Ricky said quietly to Pira.

  A thin bolt of fire splashed into a shield.

  Ricky advanced. “Protect the other two,” he said to Pira as he advanced on the guards and the sorcerers. He had his freeze spell, but Ricky would keep that as an option if all else failed.

  “Throw your weapons down, Valian.”

  “You know my name?”

  Insippa Baldico walked to the front.

  ~~~

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  ~

  “I thought you were dead!”

  “So did everyone else,” he said. “I’ve been useful to my masters that way.”

  “Who are?”

  “The University has its own Tower, you know.”

  “You are a Botoyan now?”

  “No. You thwarted my attempts to install Forari Griama as Lord of Southern Dimani. I will kill you for that.”

  “You worked with Ducri Wamia?”

  “I did,” Insippa said. “I was on the battlefield at Rassoport, but I fled when it was apparent we were going to lose. You learned sorcery too well, it seems.”

  “Ah, the hooded man. You fled when I was about to close with Ducri and Griama.”

  “You remember. How touching.”

  Ricky sang the counterspell to compulsion. Sippa groaned and clutched his head as did a few of the soldiers. He quickly followed up with the protection song.

  “You’ve been tricked.”

  Ricky sent a sorcerous light towards the others, since Sippa’s face was shrouded in the darkness between them, profiled by torches behind.

  His eyes watered as he struggled with the pain in his head. “It seems I have,” he said.

  A bolt of flame flew from one of the guard’s hands.

  Ricky sang the freeze spell. He pulled Sippa away from the guards behind him and laid him on the ground to stop the flames from spreading when time sped up. Some of the guards carried no weapons, so Ricky used his wand to pierce their personal shields just like he had with Mara Torris at Samira. He could feel shields resist his blade, proving they were all sorcerers.

  He disarmed the guards and put them to sleep, this time with a touch, and quickly dragged the bodies out of the way before the time-freezing spell stopped.

  Ricky returned to Pira just as the torch flames began to waver. The rest of the firebolt aimed at Sippa burst into the wall, igniting wooden support. Ricky spelled wind to blow it out.

  “We can retreat,” Ricky said.

  Insippa rose to his feet. “Ricky, I’ve done some awful things.”

  Ricky pointed to the bodies in the corridor. “So have we all,” he said. “Move.”

  A face appeared around the corner, but it didn’t withdraw in time for a firebolt to find the target.

  Nania moved forward when Ricky wanted her to retreat. The other two women followed. Ricky didn’t want Sippa at his back, so he took him by the shoulder and moved him forward. His back was burned. Ricky quickly treated the burn as best he could in a few seconds before they proceeded.

  “What did you do?” Sippa said.

  “Fixed some of your skin.”

  “You’ve become a healer?”

  “I learned some of their tricks, but I can kill as well,” Ricky said. “If you fight us, you won’t make it. I didn’t want to save your life to take it, but if I must, I will. Besides, the academy needs a better broomball coach.”

  Sippa chuckled. But Ricky still didn’t give him a weapon, but he did withdraw the wand’s blade. Those in front of him retreated while Nania gave chase.

  “No,” Ricky said. “Let’s see how the fighting goes.”

  Pira shouldered her way to the front again. “Follow me, I know the way to the battlements,” she said.

  All of them hurried up a few flights of stairs. Ricky could hear the sounds of battle. Pira threw open a door as sunlight blinded them for a moment.

  “Stay behind us,” Ricky said. “If you fight us, you won’t last.”

  Insippa nodded. “I can believe that.”

  Ricky looked at the fighting. Flying battle sorcerers rose into the air after dropping bricks on the guards. Pira and the battle sorcerer rose into the air, but Ricky extended the wand’s blade and waded into the fight.

  He breathed in fresh air and dispatched the guards armed with crossbows. The fight didn’t last much longer, but it had been going on for at least the time they had entered the passageways. Ricky ran to the castle gate and unlocked a door leading into the mechanism that raised and lowered the portcullis.

  “You can take care of that, now. Don’t kill this man, since we may need him,” Ricky said to the battle sorcerers who now finished off the guards on the walls. He turned back to Sippa who hadn’t yet run away. He flew down to the battle at the gate inside the walls and helped with opening the gate. The castle was theirs!

  Mattia rode in, surrounded by troops streaming into the castle. “Your magic has returned?”

  Ricky nodded. “We didn’t quite get to King Leon, but I took a prisoner who might be knowledgeable.”

  Ricky flew down to the castle courtyard carrying an astonished Insippa Baldico. Pira, holding onto Nania returned. The battle sorcerer evidently rejoined her unit with some stories to tell.

  “Where would the king have gone?”

  Sippa pointed to one of the towers. “That is the sorcerer’s tower. He is probably there now.”

  “What about the tunnel?”

  “Not all parts are a tunnel at this point, but I’m sure the king used it to escape from the castle,” Sippa said.

  Ricky looked around him. The fighting was down to a simmer.

  General Jackel rode into the courtyard. He said in Hessilian, “We missed all the fun?”

  “There is more work to do. We fight Botoyans now,” Ricky said. He turned to Mattia. “Can you secure the castle? Have your men cover the secret passages.”

  “I can help them with that,” Nania said. She looked at Pira. “I can’t fight sorcerers,” she said apologetically to the princess.

  “Go. You are needed to secure the castle,” Pira said. “I can help Ricky.”

  Ricky and Pira flew up in the air with Sippa and landed on a tunnel. Ricky linked with Kened and told him where he was. It was obvious that the sorcerers had been able to clear enough of the debris to make an external walkway that went up from the tunnel on one side and down into the other.

  “At least I made it easy to find,” Ricky said sheepishly.

  Pira elbowed him in the ribs. “And for that, you lost your ears and your power.”

  “You seem powerful enough to me,” Sippa said.

  “I was helped by Mirano Bespa and one of your sorcerers.”

  “They aren’t mine.”

  “Aren’t they?” Ricky said.

  Sippa shook his head. “I’ve been under compulsion for much of the time you’ve been in the Rings. I worked with Mara Torris on keeping King Leon’s control intact, except we never were able to touch you.”

  “I just about died in the Rings from the first assassin. I don’t think Mara ever needed a compulsion spell,” Ricky said. He sighed. “I have more important things to discuss. I assume the king has fled into that tower. What do we need to know about it?”

  “The sorcerers inhabit the upper half of the tower. Master Sorcerer Golitto lives near the top
. He claims he is Botoy’s messenger to the world. The Duterian branch of the religion differs with him,” Sippa said. “They both believe that their god has given them permission to take over the world.”

  Pira made a face. “I never liked the Master Sorcerer. He always gave me the shivers when he attended a formal dinner.”

  “How many sorcerers are left in their tower?” Ricky asked.

  “Not too many, but they are among the most powerful.”

  Ricky looked up at the tall building. “Is there an open spot to land if we go up? It looks like there is a verandah at the very top.”

  “You may have to fight your way in,” Sippa said.

  “Should we fly up there?” Ricky asked Pira.

  She didn’t answer since General Jackel had just arrived with his troops.

  Zaria landed beside him. “Mattia doesn’t need us,” he said.

  “Good. Take battle sorcerers and work with the Gruntalian forces to take the tower and fight your way to the top. We will take more battle sorcerers and fight our way down to the bottom. We don’t want a slaughter, but there are enough troops to take prisoners. Your sorcerers will recognize the king. Keep him apart from the others.”

  Ricky turned to Jackel and told him that he would be entering the tower from the tunnel. He could use his own sorcerers or Zaria’s to get inside. Ricky turned the possibilities over in his mind. “When you fetch your sorcerers, bring those shields that Mattia no longer uses. They can help fend off firebolts thrown from the sorcerers at the top. We will enter from that verandah.”

  “You may proceed immediately, General. Secure all the exits first and then move up.”

  Jackel saluted in the Gruntalian fashion. Ricky tried to do the same and hoped he didn’t look too silly. He caught a tiny smile from Pira, indicating that he did.

  The general spoke to his officers as his troops filed into the tunnel.

  Ricky wanted to get started at the top, but he paced around the tunnel entrance and grabbed the general, having sent a detachment to head back to the castle through the tunnel to make sure there weren’t royal guards hiding. Satisfied that he had the ground operation started, he began linking to various parties.