by Renée Jaggér
The girl mimicked the expression. “Shit, I kinda want to join you. It’s been forever since I hunted for food.”
The blank-faced valet cleared his throat. “No, young lady, you will not join him. You are to report immediately. You’ll be allowed to eat later if circumstances permit. Come!”
Taken aback, she almost cussed the man out but forced herself to bite down on such a stupid reaction. The powers that ran the place must have good reasons for running it the way they did.
“Okay, fine,” she muttered.
Bailey followed the attendant and the rest of the crowd through the hall and out into the broad yard before the manor. She examined her co-trainees. They were a strange and diverse crew, though all fairly young, in their twenties or thirties. They’d formed a line. Bailey stood near the far end on the right.
The quality of light suggested mid-morning, though despite the half-clear sky, there was no sun that Bailey could see. She supposed an enchanted realm didn’t need one, based on Old England though it was.
A man stamped up before them, dressed in full steel plate armor, hefting a large black mace in one hand and a large white shield in the other. Most of his face was hidden by his helmet, but a butt-chin and scowling mouth were visible.
“Some of you,” he announced in a loud, imperious voice, “have met me before. For those who are meeting me for the first time, know that I am your trainer. My name is Malkeg Ironfist, and my job is to whip you upstarts, with your power incontinence and your beginner’s luck and your general ignorance, into proper shape. Proud as you might be of your cosmically empowered asses, they are still the pink behinds of amateurs as far as the heavyweight players are concerned.”
Oh, fuck, Bailey thought. The gods studied the Marine Corps and took notes on how to train people. This is gonna be tons of fun.
“Some of you,” Malkeg said again, “are demigods, or fledgling gods-to-be, or mighty half-breeds, or who knows whatever the fuck else. I do not care. I will teach you to control your powers. I will make you control your powers, because if your sorry asses cannot, consider that asses can explode. Then there’s projectile shit flying everywhere, and no one needs or wants that, particularly with the amount of arcane strength you children are capable of putting behind your supernatural diarrhea.”
A couple of guys snickered, and Malkeg glared at them until they shut up. Then he continued his spiel.
“I’m going to run you ragged,” he vowed. “In combat, in labor, in mental exercises; intensive training of all sorts. Make damn sure you listen because if you can do that one simple thing, then you might qualify for godhood, complete with realms and mantles and portfolios. It’s a possibility for some of you, namely, those who can put duty before themselves. An understanding of duty is a thing you’ll need.”
Bailey felt borderline relieved. As a shaman, duty was paramount. She had a head start.
Malkeg waved his mace in the air. “Now, run! Move! You’ll get breakfast after. Go, you cretins! Run, fucks!”
The trainees who’d been here a while fell smoothly into a fast jog. The newbies all started, then broke into a sprint to catch up with their fellows. The line of initiates moved across the castle’s outer grounds, through the gates (and under the watchful eyes of the anti-magic golems), and out onto the moorland beyond.
Their trainer jogged along behind them, keeping pace despite his heavy armor. “To the woods! Straight through the middle. And pay attention to what you’re doing!”
The column ran into the center of the forest. Bailey, near the back of the formation, heard a couple guys up front issuing a warning to the people near them, but they used a language unknown to her.
The light dimmed as they entered the thick forest with its old dark-green hardwood trees. There were no sounds of birds or insects, only the stamping of feet and the huffing of breath. Nothing happened ‘til they’d gone deep enough into the woods for the sward and the castle to fall out of sight.
Then the shadows came alive and attacked.
“Shit!” Bailey gasped. She’d been growing a little short on breath, cursing herself for having relied too much on magic and not enough on physical activity recently, and the ambush caught her by surprise. Screams and curses went around the group.
Wraiths, the indigenous pests of the Other.
The werewitch had fought small armies of them alongside Roland, but she was rusty, and these somehow seemed larger, nastier, and more frightening. The inky black of their semi-liquid forms suggested horribly deformed faces, gaping mouths, and reaching claws.
The godlings had no weapons, so in their panic, they retaliated with huge blasts of magic. Raw elemental force engulfed half the forest, blasting the wraiths into oblivion. Explosions chained together until mushroom clouds rose into the sky. Tornadoes sucked up mountains of debris. The sky turned white with lightning.
Bailey turned to a trio of wraiths near her and swept out her hand, intending to hit them with a modest wave of concussive force combined with flame since the creatures seemed vulnerable to heat and light.
Instead, a nuclear holocaust erupted before her, blasting four dozen trees into whitening cinders riding a rippling shockwave. The wraiths had simply vanished. The earth had turned black. Deafening and blinding, the destruction and chaos she’d unleashed scared her more than the attack had.
Then it was over, and the trainees stood looking upon a bare and ravaged wasteland and gibbering at each other.
The trees grew back in the space of what seemed like minutes, as though they were watching a time-lapse spread out over a hundred years.
Malkeg barked, “Move on! Did I tell you to stop and gawk?”
They obeyed.
The forest’s shadows attacked them three more times, and in each case, they reacted by destroying everything around them. Bailey tried to restrain herself better, but it appeared that her magic had four or five times the power for half the effort now.
Nonetheless, after what felt like hours of running, fighting, and occasionally leaping over ravines or piles of rock, everyone was exhausted when they emerged from the woods. As they stumbled back toward the castle, the forest rose behind them, betraying no sign of the terrible wrath to which it had been subjected.
Malkeg finally called a halt once they were within the castle’s outer wall and a stone’s throw beyond the golems. The trainees struggled not to collapse.
“You fucking idiots!” Malkeg roared. “Piss-poor performance, all of you. Oh, sure, you’re great and mighty gods and goddesses or whatever, and you have the power to blow away anything that jumps out at you. Is that what you’re going to do when your followers beg you for help? Nuke their city in the process of saving it?”
Bailey frowned, but she got the point.
“You’ll have to try again,” Ironfist went on, “but next time, you need to focus your strength and either take out specific targets or work in subtler ways. You can’t just be walking bombs set to explode at any moment. For now, go eat.”
The crowd started to disperse. In the past, Bailey had noticed that the Other suppressed the needs of the body, but this place was different; she was starving.
“Yes, sir,” she murmured, then followed the others toward the mess hall.
The werewitch sat down at the end of a long wooden table within a crude but oddly cozy structure that was half-building, half-tent, a wooden framework with cloth in place of walls. In front of her was a broad platter heaped with food and an equally large flagon of sparkling cider. The entities who managed the castle didn’t skimp on rations. She’d assembled an impressive deli tray of meats, cheeses, pieces of hard bread-like crackers, as well as sliced fruits, berries, and a cup of yogurt. She tore into the feast as soon as her ass touched the bench.
Midway into her repast, a man came up beside her. She glanced his way, seeing a tall, muscular young man with ebony skin, a shaved head, and, she realized with curiosity, heterochromia. His left eye was a very dark brown, while his right eye was a light haz
el-orange.
“May I sit down?” he asked. His voice was higher than she’d expected, smooth and pleasant. She nodded and he sat next to her, leaving about a foot and a half between them.
She extended a hand and swallowed the food in her mouth. “I’m Bailey Nordin. I’m new.”
He took her hand in a firm grasp. “Carl Robertson, a scion. And what’s your story?”
She cocked an eyebrow, confused. “What do you mean by that, exactly? Your question, that is, plus I dunno what a ‘scion’ is.”
“I was asking what you were,” he explained. “As for what I am, I’m the product of one supernatural being mating with another. ‘Scion’ is the common term. In my case, my father was a shapeshifter who seduced a minor witch goddess. That makes me like a demigod, only minus any human element.”
“Huh,” Bailey marveled. “Never heard of you guys.” She also felt a pang of dread at the mention of witch-goddesses. How many of them were there? If Freya and Aradia weren’t the only ones, the Venatori might find a new patron.
Carl smiled. “Most people haven’t, but that’s fine. So, yeah. I’m part paranormal monster, part deity, which conveniently gives me immense magical potential, combined with all the usual shapeshifter powers: extra strength, and of course, the ability to change form.”
“Nice,” Bailey commented. If he was telling the truth, she felt less impressive next to him, but also less unusual and lonely. “Shapeshifter, as in, you have an animal form? Or, like, you can mimic anyone, like a doppelganger?”
“More the latter,” he responded. “My powers have grown lately. I could already control the shifting ones well enough, but now my witch side is getting stronger, which is why I’m here. Honestly, I don’t know how to control both types of magic yet.”
The girl shook her head. “I thought I’d seen and heard everything. That’s interesting, Carl, and I’m being honest. As for why I asked about the shifter thing, it’s because I’m a werewolf. Well, werewitch. And shaman. I killed a goddess and absorbed most of her powers.”
Carl blinked in mild surprise. He listened, relaxed but curious, as she related the gist of her background and what had led up to her presence here. She decided that she liked him. With guys like Malkeg in charge and some of the other students conversing in foreign tongues, it would help to have a nice person around who spoke English to boot.
“So,” Bailey concluded, “I think I can handle whatever they have in store, but I have to wonder what’s next.”
“Same,” said Carl.
They got their answer a moment later. One of the brightly-dressed valets came in and shouted at them to assemble outside the castle’s inner gates. It was time for their next training session.
Bailey grimaced. “Damn. I was hoping we’d have time to digest the food as well as eat it.”
Carl sighed. “Oh, joy.”
Chapter Four
Bailey, Carl, and the others lined up in the yard before the manor once again. This time, rows of mannequins had been set up and appointed with all manner of clothing, armor, and utility gear. Beside and behind the dummies were racks of weapons.
Out came Malkeg Ironfist, still clad head to toe in steel.
“All right, O mighty divine ones,” he growled, with exaggerated sarcasm, “it’s time to suit up as you see fit. Take your pick from the selection we have here. You’re about to be thrown into combat in a place where all our magic—yes, including mine—will react in interesting ways.”
Bailey assumed that when Malkeg said “interesting,” what he meant was “bad.”
“Choose wisely,” the trainer continued. “Not that I’m going to help you choose. Some of this armor can shed magic like water off a duck’s back, meaning you’d have to use a lot more arcane energy to see the same effects or smaller effects. Among these weapons, we have ones that can bat spells aside, resist enchantments, or cut through arcane fields. The section of the Other we’re headed to warps magic oddly for gods as well as mortals. Deities occasionally go there to settle their differences on a more level playing field, because everything is fucked up there.”
Carl smiled. “Sounds like a great place,” he whispered.
Malkeg marched back and forth. “Therefore,” he concluded, “this exercise will allow you all to train without resorting to total planetary annihilation every time a bird shits on your head. It’ll also teach you to be creative and fight in other ways, not rely on overpowered magic all the fucking time. That’s folly—a common one, as it happens, among gods who were born into godhood. I expect better of your kind.”
Bailey thought back to Aradia. The Venatori Order’s deity had arrogantly relied upon nothing but spellcraft and the fanatical loyalty of her followers, and it had cost her everything once Bailey bled her dry of her arcane essence.
The werewitch went to suit up, deciding that Malkeg’s program made a certain amount of sense.
She found some light armor that looked like leather that fit relatively snugly over her normal clothes but was constructed in a way that offered good mobility. To give herself more protection, she added a cloak whose outer side was covered with interlocking metal scales that shimmered with a brightness beyond anything normal.
“Hey,” she called to the trainer, “what does this thing do? What are these scale things?”
Ironfist looked at her with vague, patronizing contempt, as if he’d expected her to keep her mouth shut and play Russian Roulette with her selections, but he answered the question.
“The scales,” he elucidated, “like most pieces of metal, are hard to cut or pierce. They also will deflect certain types of magical attacks, mostly things like heat, cold, electricity, and arcanoplasm. Doesn’t deflect physics, though. An explosion might not burn you, but it’d still throw you far enough to bust open your head.”
She nodded. “Okay. Thanks.”
For her weapons, she chose a pair of double-edged short swords. She didn’t know much about pre-modern weaponry, but she guessed they were from the Viking Age or thereabouts. They weren’t too heavy, but with her extra Were strength, she was able to flick them around like knives. She wasn’t used to dual wielding, but two weapons meant she’d still have one if she lost the other.
Finally, she found a round steel shield a foot or so in diameter and strapped it on her left wrist and forearm. If offered protection without taking up a hand or hampering her movements.
She glanced up and saw Carl. He’d donned a tunic of brigandine, dotted with studs that held thin metal strips within the fabric and reinforced vulnerable areas on his limbs and torso with partial steel plate. He also wore a helmet with an open front and carried a heavy mace, much like Malkeg’s. Oddly, he had neither a shield nor a second weapon, but then Bailey saw a big, scary, spiked gauntlet on his left hand. It was a weapon in itself, and it would allow him to grab other people’s incoming armaments.
Malkeg looked around. “Everyone ready? If not, hurry the hell up! Find someone else to fasten your armor if you can’t do it yourself. We leave at two hundred.”
He began loudly counting upwards from “one,” stomping back and forth in front of the trainees to rush them along. Bailey and Carl checked each other’s armor and found it to be fitted properly, though neither of them was expert. They’d have to hope for the best.
Everyone stood at attention when Malkeg was only at “ninety-seven,” so he stopped counting and ordered them to follow him through the inner gates to a domed structure near the keep. Within was a wide and glowing portal of deep violet light. “In,” the trainer barked.
Bailey and Carl were among the first to hold their breath and step through.
For whatever reason, Bailey had expected to find herself in a hellish waste of eldritch weirdness, but in fact, it was more like an illustration from a book of fairytales. It was an English forest, dense but not gloomy, lush, lovely, and full of wildlife noises, though no beasts or birds or bees were in sight. The sun shone overhead. The air was on the cusp between warm and cool.
>
Good fighting weather, the girl decided.
Then she realized that she was alone. The portal had sent the trainees to different locations at random.
Malkeg materialized right behind her and she jumped, startled.
“You’ve all been displaced,” he barked, and she wondered if this were him, or an astral holograph; it was hard to be sure. “This event is a battle royale for supremacy among you. Killing is not permitted; you may only batter your opponents into submission or unconsciousness. Those who yield or surrender are to be spared further violence. Beyond that, there are no rules. Fight, and survive.”
The werewitch’s palms sweated within her leather gloves, and she twirled her swords to get a better feel for them.
Malkeg’s image went on, “Winners and losers will be decided by us.”
“How?” Bailey asked.
The big knight glared at her as he flickered. It was a projection after all, but she’d drawn the real Malkeg’s attention. “Don’t ask me that, girl.” The image flickered again, and she was once more looking at a message broadcast to every participant.
“Other trainers as well as I will be watching you, scoring points and keeping track of your endeavors. Watch your asses. Be ready. Go!”
Malkeg vanished and a horn blew, its note in a disturbing warble. The games began.
Bailey walked forward. One direction seemed as good as any other until she met her first opponent.
A long skirmish of ambushes and one-on-one duels, she surmised. Hoo, boy.
She met her first adversary all of fifteen steps from her starting point. Or, rather, she heard them.
Whoever they were, they must have over-armored themself, since the clanking, jangling, and scraping was obvious well before she saw the individual. Bailey drew in her breath and fell behind a thick tree trunk opposite the direction from which the racket came. She peered around the edge.
