by Eric Vall
“Baron?” Haragh asked with surprise.
“Oh, yeah,” I chuckled. “I’m a baron now, I forgot to tell you. Temin gave me Falmount and the surrounding land. It should be about ten miles around. He’s gonna have a mapping of the parcel drawn up and sent over.”
“A baron with that much land’s gotta have some heirs,” the half-ogre mused as he casually turned his gaze out the window. “Just sayin’.”
I grinned as we drove through the capital toward Temin’s castle, and I had to admit, the man wasn’t wrong. Plus, if I built up Falmount a bit more and got my security in order, four kids would certainly be well protected there. They’d grow up with their own village to romp around in, too, which was something I never imagined for my offspring, and Cayla’s point about our child ruling over Cedis made my chest swell with slightly greedy pride.
So, by the time Bobbie was parked in the castle courtyard, I’d devised three different designs for strongholds, and I was trying to decide if I wanted my moat to be filled with eels or not. I didn’t want the kids falling in, but moats always seemed like a solid security measure. For a baron anyway.
“You good?” Haragh asked as I came around the side of the Mustang, and he clapped me on the arm.
“I’m great,” I assured him despite the permanent crease between my brows. “This is totally fine. Pregnant or not, I’m on board, so I’ll just let it lie.”
“Let it lie,” the half-ogre agreed.
“I trust my women, and they can do what they please. It doesn’t matter to me.”
Haragh nodded his approval, but I could have sworn he raised his brows just as I headed toward the enchanted entrance of the Oculus.
Chapter 3
Big Red offered a crisp salute when we emerged from the shadowy tunnel, and Haragh held up a fist that the automaton had no idea what to do with.
“Like this,” I chuckled as I bumped my knuckles against Haragh’s, and Big Red imitated the gesture.
The half-ogre let out a deep laugh that echoed through the tunnel, and we were both shaking our heads in amusement as the stone gates of the Oculus parted for us.
Then Haragh halted. “What in the gods … ?”
“Yeah,” I muttered as I looked out across the ancient city.
My heart ached at the sight of the destruction the Oculus had suffered during the attack yesterday, and knowing Hulsan had done the bulk of the damage over me didn’t help matters at all. Countless buildings were obliterated into dust while others had only a wall or two still standing, and the entire blacksmith’s quarters were flattened under a massive shard of stone from the cavern ceiling. The elaborate, glittering dome of the Great Library was gone, and most of the small bridges crossing the waterways were broken away.
“Bastards,” Haragh growled, and I could feel his Terra Magic already spark as his expression darkened. I knew his connection to the place was just as acute as my own since we shared the same element, and I didn’t doubt he was thinking of all the Terra Mages who’d worked to form the ancient city for years.
I was too, but there was no way I was going to let them down.
There was already a group of Defenders in the streets reforming structures and using Aer magic to clear away the dust and rubble, and as we headed to join them, I caught sight of Defender Urn among the crew.
He had his palms raised as he used his Terra Magic to carefully stack shattered stone together and mend their seams, and his thick moustache twitched side to side in the effort of replicating the previous design.
“Defender Urn,” I said once he got the last stone in place, and he turned a smirk my way.
“Ahh, Defender Flynt,” the burly mage replied. “Finally get those women of yours in order?”
Haragh snorted and quickly turned away, and I cleared my throat.
“Uh, yeah,” I muttered. “Sorry about that. Deya gets a little sneaky once in a while, but I’ll make sure they return everything to their proper owners.”
“Don’t bother,” Urn chuckled. “No one will remember anyway. That was one hell of a celebration. I had to drag this lot up out of the lanes to get them going on the repairs this morning.”
He jutted his large thumb in the direction of the other Defenders, and while half of them were hard at work, the other half shuffled from one building to the next in a similar fashion to Shoshanne.
“I appreciate it,” I told him. “We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.”
“There’s a handful of mages in town getting some lunch, but then they’ll be coming to lend a hand as well,” Urn assured me. “So far, we’ve got the front section repaired, and there’s three Terra Defenders assessing the damage in the blacksmith’s quarters.”
“Perfect,” I said with a nod. “What are we doing about the dome?”
“Well,” Urn sighed, and we turned toward the shattered library, “that dome took our predecessors three years to piece together, and each color was varied in ten different shades throughout on account of a special balance of minerals decided upon after about a decade’s worth of research.”
I nodded blankly. “Right.”
“So, we’re leaving the dome on the floor for the time being,” Urn chuckled. “Here’s hoping we can sort through the shards of glass and reorganize it all, because I don’t know shit about staining glass.”
“Me neither,” I admitted. “Where do you want me to start?”
“With Markus over there,” he said as he pointed to a Terra Mage with short black hair. He didn’t have on Defender gear, just his Terra robes, and he was working alone to lift boulders as big as Bobbie and reform two columns. “He’ll show you how to tap into the previous designs, and then you can get to work anywhere you like.”
“The original designs?” I clarified. “That’s possible?”
“Sure is.” Urn nodded. “Although, I’m just as surprised as you. I’m not really clear on how it’s possible, but he gave me the schematics he extracted through a circuit. This should save us a lot of guesswork and a little time. Plus, we can uphold the integrity of the city, which is what I’m most concerned about.”
“Me as well,” I agreed, and Urn sparked his powers as he turned back to the structure behind us. Then I nudged Haragh as I headed toward the mage with the black hair. “Did you know it’s possible to read the original designs of this place?”
“No,” the half-ogre admitted. “How ye’ know that?”
“This guy does,” I muttered, and I cleared my throat as we approached. “Markus?”
The black-haired mage looked over his shoulder with his palms still raised to support the two large columns that had collapsed against each other, and he furrowed his brows.
“Yeah?”
“Defender Urn told me I could learn a thing or two from you about the original designs,” I explained. “I’m--”
“Defender Flynt,” Markus finished for me, and he smirked. “Everyone knows who you are. Let me just solidify this entrance real quick.”
The mage lowered the two columns into place, and he spent a few minutes piecing together the upper portion of the arch from a stack of rubble below. Once he finished this, he closed his eyes, and I assumed he was studying the design because he shifted the whole massive arrangement a few centimeters to the side with a grating screech of stone on stone. Then he nodded and turned to head our way. His eyes were a muddy shade of green beneath his black brows, and he couldn’t have been much older than Pindor because his attempt at a goatee was only slightly superior. He was almost as pale as Cayla without the silky smoothness to his skin, and he walked without any haste.
“It’s kind of weird you need me to teach you anything,” Markus admitted. “I saw you rip a mountain open once.”
“You did?” I asked. “When?”
“Up in Orebane,” Markus chuckled. “How often do you rip mountains open?”
“Hard to say,” I laughed, “but that’s cool. You fought with us against the ice giants then?”
“Yeah,” he rep
lied. “I live in Falmount too, actually. One of your women was robbing the mages last night. It was hilarious.”
“Ah. Yeah, two of them were, but that’s been addressed. Don’t worry.”
“I’m not worried,” he snorted. “The pink haired one giggles like a maniac even when she’s invisible, so we were placing bets to see how many times people thought they were going crazy. I won, and now I have this sword.”
He gestured to an impressive broadsword sheathed at his hip, and I nodded my approval.
“At least some good came of it,” I muttered.
“You should tell her to bump into more people next time,” he suggested, “that really got them going.”
“I’ll do that,” I chuckled. “So, about these designs … ”
“Here,” he said, and he knelt down to place his palms against the ground.
Haragh and I mirrored him, and as I sparked my Terra Magic, I could sense Markus’ was decently developed.
“Do you want me to just give you the designs through our circuit, or do you want to learn how to find them yourself?” Markus asked.
“Definitely the second one,” I said, and Haragh nodded eagerly.
“Alright,” Markus said with a shrug, and I decided I liked the guy.
His demeanor was approachable and unaffected, but he also didn’t call me sir like a lot of the other mages had started doing, and I honestly appreciated it.
“Just wondering before we begin,” I said. “How did you learn this yourself?”
“My grandpa was a Terra Mage, too,” Markus replied. “He taught me the six fundamental ways to gather information through our element, so this is--”
“Wait, there’s six ways?” I clarified. “I only know of two. Sensing a physical presence and sensing the use of magery nearby.”
“That’s pretty good,” he said with a slightly impressed nod. “A lot of Terra Mages around here haven’t learned either of those. My grandpa said Abrus tended to favor the Ignis and Aer Mages in his training, so a lot of specialized knowledge hasn’t been revisited in a long time.”
Haragh let out a low whistle. “What are the other four?”
“Well, the one we’re about to do is kind of a combination,” Markus explained. “You focus from within the stonework in the same way you would when searching for a physical presence, but instead of lingering near the surface to seek out magery reacting with our element from above, you seep farther down. It isn’t the same everywhere, because it takes advanced mages to manage it, but here, you can locate layers of memory in the stones, and those layers hold traces of the magery that’s come before.”
I nodded as I realized this kid really knew what he was talking about, and Haragh just stared from my side.
“What’s interesting is the rubble itself doesn’t hold the designs they were used in, because they were only pieces used for the grander scheme,” Markus continued. “That’s how I realized what the previous mages had done. So, if you took that pile of boulders over there and directed your focus inside, you wouldn’t find the image of the building they came from. That’s because the deepest layers of the cavern hold an overall mapping of the entire city instead. The Terra Mages who first began forming the Oculus used a technique of fusing their own mental memories of the schematics with their element deep under the surface. This way, it wouldn’t matter how many years it took to build the place or what damage occurred over time, the current Terra Mages could seek out the original design and be able to work with this without sacrificing the more impressive elements.”
“Holy shit,” I chuckled. “That’s incredible.”
“Yeah, it’s amazing,” Markus said with a grin. “Wanna try?”
Haragh and I quickly followed suit as Markus closed his eyes, and I focused on following the trail of his magery beneath the stonework.
We travelled thirty feet deep, and then forty, and as we neared the sixty-foot mark, I felt Haragh’s commitment wavering. Then we slowed down and leveled off around seventy feet underground, and my veins began to heat painfully under my skin.
“Nope,” I heard Haragh suddenly say, and his connection disappeared. “Fuck that.”
I snorted to myself and kept my attention underground with Markus’ powers, and for a long, silent minute, nothing happened. Then I began to sense another presence, and within a matter of seconds, I was drowning in a power so strong it made every muscle in my body shake with tension. That’s when the currents began to course through me, and one jolt of magic after another forced itself through my magical connection like razor blades. I couldn’t keep track of them all as their energy began to buzz loudly in my ears, but when my veins began to feel like they were collapsing in on themselves, my eyes flew open.
“What was that?” I gasped, and I realized I was breathing heavily, like I’d just run a marathon.
“That’s the mages,” Markus muttered, and he had his brows knit in concentration as he kept his eyes closed. “It’s overwhelming at first, but that’s just because you’re picking up on the individual presence of each one. There are hundreds of them down there, though, so don’t focus on that. Think of it like listening to an orchestra, and only let the collective presence register. It’s easier that way.”
I was staring and trying to figure out how the hell a mage so young could explain all of this so well, but I immediately took his advice and returned my focus far beneath the surface of the city.
The minute I arrived in the deepest layer of stone, my veins began to burn again, but I took some long and deep breaths this time to keep from breaking the connection. The strength of the hundreds of mages’ powers made my heart start beating erratically, but as I forced myself to zone out of the individual variances, I began to register it all as a singular drone. It was like I was sitting on top of a bass amp at a concert as the frequency shook me to my core, but the longer I kept my attention here, the less my veins burned.
They started to feel stronger instead, and I realized I was suddenly part of the same droning presence while my Terra powers mingled with the rest. Then a blaze of blue flashed in my mind, and I had the sensation I was pitching forward even though I could feel my palms were firm on the ground. My head spun as blue images of buildings and bridges began flickering past in quick succession, and I gritted my teeth against the instinct to pull back from the dizzying scene.
I didn’t know how many minutes passed like this, but eventually, the drone became a high-pitched ringing in my ears, and my limbs suddenly felt lighter than air. My heart beat was slow and steady now, and I found myself looking at every structural outline of the Oculus.
I wasn’t just looking at them, though, I was part of them. My Terra powers surged through every wall and beam of every building like I’d exploded into a thousand pieces, and just turning my attention to one spot brought me spiraling across the city to lock into this exact pinpoint.
“Holy shit,” I breathed, and from very far away, I could hear Markus chuckle in agreement.
Then I turned my focus to the strange buildings crawling up the walls of the cavern, and I saw they had long, winding, rootlike footings that ran forty feet into the mountainside. They sprawled apart from there to interconnect with the others around them like a giant grove of aspen trees, and as my mind scanned the entire perimeter, I realized all the structures lining the walls of the ancient city met with this underground network.
This wasn’t even the coolest part, though, because the droning sound emanated differently from every direction, and I could sense the different mages who had formed it all. There were groups whose magic radiated from full quarters, and others who had individually formed various buildings all across the city. Some of the mages’ powers felt archaic while others were only twenty years old, but the Great Library possessed the oldest presence of them all. I couldn’t even fathom how long ago it was constructed, but it had to have been close to a thousand years ago from how aged the frequency felt in my veins.
My palms were sweating now as my
heart rate slowed to a tired throb, and as I noticed how lightheaded I felt, I realized I was losing my own strength from the connection. So, I reluctantly released my focus and let my magic ease back to the surface of the city, and when I opened my eyes, I felt like throwing up.
“Stand up slowly,” Markus advised, but he didn’t look at all concerned. “You’re gonna feel weird for a few minutes, but you’re fine, I promise. Old magery is difficult for us to process in the present, and it doesn’t drain your powers in the same way. It just overwhelms your senses.”
I nodded and stood up, and Haragh was looking like he regretted bailing on the lesson now.
“What’d ye’ see?” the half-ogre asked with a look of awe. “You’re pale as shit.”
“I’ll show you in a minute,” I chuckled, and I turned to Markus. “How old are you?”
“Nineteen,” he replied.
“And you taught Urn, the other Terra Defenders, and us to do this all in one day?”
“Well, most of the others are pretty hungover, so I just showed them the schematics so they wouldn’t throw up.” Markus shrugged. “You picked it up quicker than the two I did show, though, since they passed out the second they broke the connection.”
I furrowed my brow. “Why are you living in Falmount? You should be teaching here.”
“As an instructor?” Markus asked with a confused frown.
“Yeah,” I chuckled. “You’re very good at this, and you know more about your element than the Defenders do.”
“I don’t know,” he said as he scruffed his black hair. “I’m really just a student. Wyresus said I should--”
“Fuck Wyresus,” I cut in. “You should teach. I’ll talk to Temin about it.”
“Really?” Markus asked, and his muddy green eyes lit up. “I thought only the head of the Order could appoint instructors.”
I just shrugged, and I would have mentioned I’d already been offered the job, but I still wasn’t sure if I wanted to accept it yet. Still, being able to hand select every instructor in the Oculus would be more than convenient where training the mages was concerned, and if they were as skilled as Markus, my job would immediately be made easier.
