Meta Gods War 2

by B N Miles

  “I saved you first,” he said.

  She grimaced. “You didn’t need to,” she said. “I was fine.”

  “You were overwhelmed and assaulted on all sides,” Cam said. “If I hadn’t stepped up, you would’ve fallen.”

  Her fists tightened and Cam caught her two lieutenants give each other a look.

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. “And I don’t like the implication.”

  “I’m not implying anything,” Cam said, head cocked. “I’m stating a fact. I saved you out there, and most people would be grateful.”

  She got in his face, still in her armor. Sweat dripped from her brow, and despite the anger that broke across her expression, he could still remember the soft, beautiful woman he’d seen in the camp earlier that morning.

  “You ran,” she said. “I might have needed help, but you ran.”

  Cam gave her a long look and shook his head. “You’re right,” he said. “I don’t have good control over my magic yet. If I had stayed, I think I would’ve burned you and everyone around me.”

  She hesitated, but her expression didn’t drop. “You can talk about saving me all you want, shaman. But twice now, you ran away when we needed you most.”

  Cam felt a stab of anger then. “You don’t know what I’ve done,” he said. “And you don’t know what I’m capable of. You can run around in your armor all you like, Captain. But when I’m on the field, I can burn you to ash without breaking a sweat. I’m not going to risk your life just to sate my own pride, and I hope you won’t ask me to do something reckless.”

  She glared at him for another long moment then turned away. He could see anger ripple down her body. The two lieutenants looked away, staring down at the ground like they saw something interesting down in the blood and muck.

  She took a few steps away then turned back.

  “All right,” she said. “You saved me back there. And for that, I’m grateful. I don’t think we would’ve been able to set up that counterattack if it weren’t for you.”

  Cam inclined his head. “I appreciate you saying that.”

  “But you still ran. And I won’t forget it.”

  “No, I don’t expect you will.” He relaxed his posture and looked around the field. “What happened after I left?”

  She grunted and gestured. “Light infantry hit their flank,” she said. “That caused enough chaos for us to get a good foothold. We rolled over them until they broke and fled.”

  Cam nodded and squinted into the distance. “How far back would you say they are?”

  “Can’t be sure.” She glanced in the direction he was staring and let out a breath. “But they’re close enough to harass us the rest of the way back.”

  “Do you think they’ll attack in numbers again?”

  “I doubt it,” she said. “If I were their leader, I wouldn’t try it.”

  “How many men did you lose?”

  “Thirty,” she said. “Another fifty were wounded. I can’t say how many the light infantry lost yet, but similar numbers. It was a good day, shaman.”

  “My name’s Cam,” he said.

  She looked at him and her expression faltered for just a moment. He saw the beautiful girl behind the anger and cold strength. But her face arranged itself into her customary scowl.

  “Just because you saved my life, doesn’t mean we’re friends,” she said.

  “I guess not, but I’d like it if we could be.”

  She turned away. “Not interested.”

  Cam watched her. He didn’t understand why she was so hostile toward him, but it only made him that much more determined to crack her shell.

  “Where was Sirrin during all that?” he asked.

  “Hiding in his tent,” she said, waving a hand dismissively. She walked a few paces away then turned back to him. “Are we done here?”

  “We can be,” Cam said. “But one more thing first. Do you really think Sirrin should be in charge of this army?”

  She snorted. “Of course not. He’s a coward and he’s high half the time.”

  Cam stood up straight. “High?”

  “That pipe he was smoking.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “You really didn’t notice?”

  “I don’t… I’ve never smelled anything like it before.”

  “Opium,” she said. “He’s high more often than not.”

  Cam knew what opium was, but only because his father had mentioned it during some of his stories. Some of the other men in the village spoke about it in muted whispers, but he’d never actually seen the drug before.

  “I see,” Cam said. “Then you wouldn’t mind if he stepped down.”

  “I’d be grateful,” she said. “I’m guessing that’s what you two talked about.”

  “Among other things. He thought you’d be angry and need convincing.”

  Her mouth pulled into a tight line. “Not at all,” she said. “If he wants to walk away and go be the coward we all know he really is, then he’s more than welcome.”

  Cam inclined his head. “All right, then. Thank you, Brice.”

  She gave him a sour look then turned away. “And thank you, Cam. But work on that control. I’m sick of you running from the battlefield when there’s fighting to be done.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  She walked over and rejoined her two lieutenants, who looked away from Cam like he no longer existed. He turned away from them and walked back across the killing field, doing his best not to step into too much gore and blood. When he reached the camp, he risked a glance back over his shoulder.

  Captain Brice stood staring at him with her arms crossed over her chest.

  Cam nodded to her, but she only looked away.

  He sighed and set off to find Sirrin and to help the rest of the army break camp.

  36

  Sirrin wasn’t in the command tent, so Cam settled for helping the army get organized as they prepared to break camp for the day. He found himself giving orders, and though there were more than a few strange looks thrown his way, he noticed very little resistance to his stern suggestions.

  He wasn’t sure if that was because they were so used to having a shaman in charge that it made sense for him to step into a leadership role, or if the army was so desperate for someone to be in command that they’d follow anyone’s lead. Either way, the officer corps responded to him like they would any general, and soon the camp was gathering itself together and preparing for a march.

  “I need to meditate,” Cam said as he finished helping Key get a cart loaded with lentils and root vegetables. “I think I have enough time before the army sets off, and I’ll catch up either way.”

  She wiped sweat from her brow. “Want me to come with you?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “No, I need to do it alone. I almost lost control out there again. If it weren’t for Miuri…” He trailed off.

  Key walked over and kissed his cheek. “Do what you need to do,” she said, squeezed his hand, then walked off to help Felin break down their tent.

  He watched her go. He briefly wondered what he did to deserve a woman like that, then set off toward the cliffs. He skirted along the far edge of camp, found a shallow portion of the stream, and crossed into the rockier, more treacherous part of the mountain path. There were large boulders strewn about as he hiked along a small goat path that wound its way upwards toward the peaks. He didn’t go far, and angled toward a grouping of large rocks off to his left, but came to a stop when he a spotted a figure already sitting in their midst.

  He was about to turn and find a different spot when he saw a plume of smoke rise above the figure’s head. Cam took a deep breath and sighed as he trudged across the rocks, climbed up onto the boulders, and moved toward the smoking man.

  “Sirrin,” he said as he got near.

  The shaman turned. His eyes were still glassy, but he smiled as Cam came closer.

  “I was wondering when someone would find me,” he said. “But I
expected Captain Brice. I’m waiting for her to tell me that I’m a coward and a pathetic worthless excuse for a man.”

  Cam smiled a little and sat down next to him. “Does she even need to say that out loud?” he asked. “Her expression says it all.”

  Sirrin laughed and puffed on his pipe. Cam frowned at it and shifted away, paranoid that he’d breathe some of it in and feel its effects.

  Sirrin noticed that and held the pipe out. “It won’t bite,” he said.

  “No, thanks.” Cam hesitated. “That’s opium, right?”

  “I guess you spoke to Captain Brice after all.”

  “She mentioned it.”

  He shrugged. “It’s opium,” he said, and was quiet while the wind picked up and played through Cam’s hair. “They wouldn’t understand, though.”

  “Understand what?”

  “This.” He waved the pipe in the air. “And this.” He lowered the pipe then reached out with his left hand. A long, shimmering rod began to reach out from his palm, cool mist rising off it in streams. It took Cam a moment to realize it was ice, freezing outwards into a smooth, thin staff.

  Sirrin stopped and let the ice fall down onto the rocks. It shattered and glittered like diamonds in the sunlight.

  “I’m not sure what magic has to do with opium,” Cam said.

  “Best way to quiet the Need,” Sirrin said. “Aside from fucking, of course. And I take it that you chose the latter, considering all your girlfriends.”

  “I, ah,” Cam said and stopped himself. “Smoking opium can quiet the need?”

  He nodded. “Doesn’t work as well as fucking does. Doesn’t make it go away, but quiets it enough.”

  “So why don’t you just…” Cam trailed off and made a futile gesture.

  “Not that simple,” Sirrin said. “Besides, who wants to sleep with a coward like me?”

  Cam went quiet and stared down at the boulders. They were on a small cliff overlooking the valley, and the trees down below looked like nothing more than green smudges broken up by black shadows. He could still hear the army preparing to move, and he knew he could talk strategy and logistics with Sirrin, but he got the sense that the shaman couldn’t have cared less about any of that.

  “What did you come out here for?” Sirrin asked. “I’m guessing it wasn’t to talk about smoking opium with me.”

  “Oh,” Cam said. “I came to meditate.”

  Sirrin gave him a look. “That work for you?”

  Cam shrugged. “I need to learn more control,” he said. “And my father used to say that helped.”

  “I suppose it would,” Sirrin said, tapping the stem of his pipe against his chin. “But there are better, faster ways.”

  “Like what?” Cam asked, trying not to sound too eager.

  Sirrin gave him a look then sighed and shook his head. “All right,” he said. “I promised I’d teach you, so let’s start with this lesson. When you reach for it, and you touch it for the first time, how much do you bring in?”

  Cam hesitated. “All of it,” he said. “As much as I can.”

  Sirrin laughed. “Well, that’s your first problem,” he said. “The priori is shapeless, it’s nothingness. No, it’s potential. If you take in too much of it and don’t give it any shape, it’ll just linger inside of you and drive you wild. That’s what the Need is, after all. It’s the priori still inside of your body, begging you to use it.”

  Cam frowned and tilted his head. “I didn’t know it just… stayed like that.”

  “However much you draw from outside stays within you. So if you open yourself all the way and let it gush through, then you either give it all shape or it just… lingers.”

  Cam grunted and looked down at his hands. That almost made sense to him. He’d drawn so much power earlier, but he knew he hadn’t used it all, and when he cut himself off from the magic the Need had hit him harder than he’d expected.

  “So I need to control how much I take in,” he said.

  “For a start,” Sirrin said and took a long draw on his pipe. “All right, I guess we’re doing this.”

  Cam tilted his head. “Doing this?”

  “Close your eyes,” Sirrin said. “I’m going to talk you through an exercise.”

  “Like meditation?”

  “Just like meditation. But a little more… active.” He grinned and tilted his head. “You ready to learn, shaman?”

  Cam shifted a little and leaned toward Sirrin. He didn’t want to seem too eager, but he felt that hunger deep in his bones, that hunger for knowledge and strength.

  “I’m ready,” he said.

  He closed his eyes, and Sirrin began to talk.

  37

  Two hours later, they descended the ridge together and followed after the army. Sirrin had Cam enter into a meditative state, but instead of blocking out the world, Sirrin walked him through visualization exercises. They were a lot like what his father had done back in the village, and they sounded eerily similar to the Urspell Cam used to create fire. He didn’t ask Sirrin about that and the shaman hadn’t offered any clarification, only that if they kept working together, Cam would understand.

  That was the exact same thing his father used to say. The uncertainty, the mysticism, it drove Cam insane. He wanted hard truths—something tangible he could pursue. That was why he had trained with the shield and spear so hard. When he worked his body, he saw the results.

  But when he worked on his magic, the results came… sideways.

  Still, he had no other choice, and so he resolved to follow Sirrin’s instructions and learn everything the man had to offer.

  They reached the army and rejoined the column. Sirrin was immediately beset by annoyed officers and walked off with a sigh and a wave as they assaulted him with logistical issues and pressing questions.

  Cam lingered for a moment with a little smile. He knew Sirrin was going to get an earful from Captain Brice and most of the officer corps, and he didn’t envy the man.

  They marched for three days, stopping only when the sun began to set, and only until daybreak. Each evening, the army would dig trenches and set stakes, and each morning they’d take the stakes down and move again. Captain Brice kept at least a quarter of her men in armor at all times, and the guard remained doubled even throughout night.

  Cam met with Sirrin for an hour each morning. The shaman walked him through more visualizations, more exercises, none of which made any sense, and none of which Cam thought would remotely help him gain more control. But he kept showing up to the man’s tent each morning, and the man kept trying.

  As they marched, the wolves harassed their rear. Cam fought running battles with them, sometimes fighting alongside Key and Miuri and Felin, and other times falling into line with Captain Brice and the heavy infantry. They lost men every day, but not enough to hamper their march, and they left more and more wolf corpses in their wake.

  Soon, the path became steep, and the switchbacks appeared in the distance.

  Cam tried not to let himself feel a surge of excitement as the army continued to press forward. The sun was beginning to set, so Sirrin ordered lamps and torches lit. They didn’t stop until they reached the base of the switchbacks. Although they were exhausted, the men worked into the night with a pervading sense of elation. They dug trenches, set stakes, and reported for their sentry duty without complaint, and Cam heard more than a few songs sung around the fires and noticed more than a few drinking skins passed around.

  The wolves didn’t come that night, or the following morning.

  Cam was restless. He wanted to feel the relief the other men felt, but he knew that even if they made it to the Mansion, their struggle was far from over. It only meant that they had the chance to make it out alive.

  Instead of sleeping, Cam went over the visualizations Sirrin taught him. The images ran through his mind over and over again, and he couldn’t seem to make them stop.

  After staring at the tent’s wall for an hour while Felin snored beside him, he m
anaged a few light hours of sleep. He woke with the sun and found Key building their campfire, back from sentry duty, her long hair tied back in a tight braid, a dew of sweat on her skin.

  “I didn’t think we’d make it this far,” Key said as Cam settled down beside her.

  Cam stifled a yawn. “I’m not sure anyone did.”

  “But we’re going to make it, aren’t we?”

  “Unless the wolves do something desperate to stop us,” he said.

  She chewed on her lip for a minute then added more kindling. As the fire grew, she leaned back and sat down with her knees in the air, her arms draped over them, her spine curved.

  “I kept telling myself, at least we’re trying,” she said, her voice low. “Even if we all died, at least we were trying.”

  Cam smiled and put a hand on her back. “You’ve done more than most people could, you know.”

  She looked up and leaned toward him. She put her head on his shoulder and let out a breath.

  “Sometimes I wish I had magic like you,” she said. “Then I could do a lot more.”

  “Imagine what we could do if you had magic,” he said.

  She looked up with a grin. “Don’t make this dirty.”

  He laughed. “That’s not where I was going.”

  “I’m sure Miuri would love it if she had two shamans to sleep with.”

  “I’m willing to bet she’d always have at least one of us using magic at all times, just for her own filthy desires.”

  “Can’t say I’d blame her,” Key said. She picked up a twig and tossed it into the fire. “Should we get Felin up?”

  “Let her sleep,” Cam said. “I think we’ll be busy in the coming days.”

  “Really?” she asked.

  “Sirrin wants to step aside as the leader of the army,” he said.

  “I can’t say I’m shocked,” she said. “He’s been lying around in his tent, pretending like the world doesn’t exist for the past few days. I don’t think I’ve seen him take up arms once.”

  “He’s a self-described coward,” Cam said and shuffled over on his knees to rifle through their pack. He pulled out a small copper pot and a bit of oatmeal. He mixed it with water and set it on the fire. “He thinks he’s more of a liability to the army than anything else.”