by Layton Green
She could not spend her life as the cloistered daughter of the Chief Thaumaturge. She had to make her own mark and prove her worth, to herself and to him and to the entire Protectorate. To do that, she knew, would take something extraordinary.
Something like committing treason and embarking on a perilous adventure to bring back the head of an outlaw spirit mage, thus reclaiming an important symbol of the Realm and winning back her freedom.
Yes, she thought as she curled into the blanket and closed her eyes, at peace with her choice despite her terror at what the future held, that should do nicely.
Val and the others set out for the wall of fog the next morning. The townspeople paused to watch them leave, leaning on hoes in their vegetable patches, slowing as they stepped out of shops, clutching children to their sides. Defiant stares were thrown, unlike when Cyrus had been present.
“Don’t they know we killed the demons?” he asked Legate Wainwright. The portly bureaucrat had decided to escort them out of town.
“Another child disappeared last night,” the legate said, with a nervous glance at the crowd. “A five-year-old boy.”
Adaira clapped a hand over her mouth, and Val swore. “More demons?”
“The boy was taken out of a third-story window. One can only assume.”
“Tell them we’re doing everything we can,” Val said. “And that we’re sorry.”
“Wizards don’t apologize, boy,” Rucker growled. “Don’t ye know that?”
Val exchanged a look with Dida and Adaira. “These wizards do. Why haven’t more guards been sent?”
“You weren’t told?” Legate Wainwright asked, with a lift of his eyebrows. “Tobar was born in a wagon nearby, and the town is known to harbor revolutionaries. Why do you think I’m here?”
Adaira looked as surprised as everyone else. “I’ve heard no talk of an entire seditious town.”
“They’re sympathetic, not seditious. They pay their taxes and, for the most part, take their Oaths. Still, certain elements are present, and the queen has decided to teach a lesson.”
“By letting demons take their children?” she said.
The legate lowered his eyes. “We thought you eliminated the threat yesterday.”
“There should be a constant guard. I’ll speak to my father . . .”
She trailed off, and Val winced at the sudden silence among the group.
Legate Wainwright dropped off at the edge of town, wishing them luck as the party set out along the road leading to the old fort. They warily circled the hill, wondering if more demons had taken up residence in the ruins.
No sign of danger. The curtain of fog was farther off than they thought, at least two miles past the fort, across a field of yellow gorse and heather. Val approached the unnatural barrier with a mixture of dread and fascination. When they drew to within a dozen yards, he realized the fog was thicker and more textured from up close, a filmy gray substance stretching from ground to sky.
“Remarkable,” Dida said, leaning in to peer at the phenomenon.
Rucker waved his sword through the stuff, then drew the blade back and studied it. It came out clean.
“This looks more akin to ectoplasm than fog,” Adaira said.
Val gave her a sharp look. “Ectoplasm?”
Rucker grunted. “The stuff spirits are made of, when you can see ’em in this dimension.”
Val knew what ectoplasm was. He was just shocked this world used the same word, which derived from the protoplasm of cellular tissue. How much biology did cuerpomancers understand?
“Does that help us?” Val asked.
Adaira crossed her arms. “Not really.”
They walked for a mile in either direction and found the barrier unchanging. Val and Adaira tried flying as high as they could, until the fog merged with the clouds and the air got too thin to fly. Still no variance. In exasperation, Synne put an arm into the fog, then held onto Val and stepped inside before anyone could stop her.
Val tensed. “What do you see?”
“Nothing,” the majitsu called back, though her voice sounded farther away than it should. “Come in.”
Val grimaced and took a tentative step closer, forming a chain by holding onto Adaira. As soon as he passed through the barrier, he experienced a sense of vertigo and had to force himself not to jerk back or cry out.
Once he found his balance, he realized he could barely see his hands in front of his face. Synne, who was standing right in front of him, appeared wraith-like, insubstantial.
“This is bizarre,” Val said.
“Aye.”
He kept a firm grip on both Synne and Adaira’s hand, sensing that if they lost their connection to the outside world, they might not be able to find their way back.
Val tried peering into the distance. The longer he stared, the farther he seemed to be able to see, though maybe it was just in his mind. Everything was gray and lifeless. Odorless. He was about to turn back when he saw a shadow approaching, a winged mass darker than the gray matter surrounding it. Val got the sense that it had noticed him. It drifted nearer and began to pick up speed, growing larger as it approached, until it towered twenty feet above them.
Val hurried out of the fog, yanking Synne with him. He was breathing hard. “Did you see that?”
“Aye,” she said, her eyes wide.
They told the others about the experience. Val thought about what had happened and said, “I need to go back in.”
“You’re certain?” Dida asked. “That does not sound like a promising tactic.”
“There’s something I want to try.”
Synne and Adaira both insisted on coming with him. They formed another chain, with Dida and Rucker anchoring the outside.
“Probe with your mind,” Val said to Adaira as they entered, remembering the earlier sense that he could see into the distance. This time, he tried to expand his eyesight using magic.
It did seem as if he could see farther, though he saw the same vista wherever he turned. Nothing but gray.
“Anything?” he asked Adaira.
“Just fog.”
Val wondered nervously what that heaving dark shape had been, and whether another would appear. After a moment, he tried moving forward not with his feet, but with his mind. Pushing through spirit as he had at the Planewalk. He gathered his power and tried to sift through the gray fog, willing himself forward.
It worked! It was strange, though. He felt not as if he had moved, but as if a miniscule crack had opened in the fog. A crack to somewhere else. He pushed harder—as hard as he could—but it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough. Whatever this stuff was, it was the mental equivalent of trying to walk through concrete.
He just wasn’t strong enough.
Disappointed, he brought Synne and Adaira back outside. “You were right,” he said to Adaira, then explained his discovery.
They stopped to eat a lunch the innkeeper had packed. As Dida finished off his cheese and egg sandwich, he said, “Tellurian energy lines vary greatly in strength. What if the same variance applies to a barrier such as this?”
Rucker grunted. “Interesting theory.”
No one had a better idea, so they walked another mile and Val tried again. To his surprise, he found it easier to push through the veil of spirit fog. Easier, but not easy enough. Still a crack instead of a doorway.
But the knowledge emboldened him, and they kept hiking along the wall of fog, trying to access it at various points. At times the barrier felt weaker to Val, at times stronger. Eventually he grew too tired to probe.
Rucker glanced at the darkening sky. “We should get back before dark. Conserve what you have left,” he told Val, “in case we meet a demon on our return.”
The frank words unsettled them, and they headed for Porlock in a single file, scanning the countryside for danger. Val breathed a huge sigh of relief when the village came into view. His relief turned to unease as he noticed the flames licking the sky above the town.
“Is that some kind of bonfire?” he asked.
“ ’Tisn’t the season to celebrate the harvest,” Rucker said.
Val and Adaira debated flying in for a closer look, then decided not to put themselves at risk. As the party reached the outskirts of the settlement, they realized the flames and smoke pouring skyward emanated from the center of town.
Yet there were no people. It was only dusk, but the streets were strangely deserted. They drew closer and heard shouting from the town square, commingled with shrieks of agony. Rucker’s sword appeared in his hand, and Synne took the lead, stalking forward like a predator.
The screams of pain increased in volume as the party hurried through the isolated streets. When they saw the source of the commotion, Val’s step faltered and his stomach twisted with rage and horror.
In the center of the village square, a huge bonfire had been built, surrounded by hundreds of torch-wielding villagers. Tied to a stake atop the pyre was Legate Wainwright, screaming as the flesh melted from his bones.
Someone saw the party and started shouting. More heads turned. A woman pressed through the crowd with a dead child in her arms, mangled almost beyond recognition. She held the child out as if in offering to Val. “Do ye see what ye and yer kind have wrought? What ye’ve brought to our town?”
“Kill them!” someone else shouted, as hundreds of hands thrust blazing torches into the air. “Kill them all!”
-12-
“Turn!” Mala screamed, as the Battle Mage and his warriors approached through the field of agave. “Engage!”
Will felt as if he were moving in slow motion as he turned to face the terrifying vision behind him. The giant snake carrying the Battle Mage was a dozen yards away. Mala must have decided that fighting was better than turning themselves in, and he had no time to question her wisdom. She whipped her sash at the Mayan wizard, but it struck an invisible shield and fell to the ground. Gunnar and Mateo, who had brought up the rear, streaked forward. A flick of the snake’s tail sent them tumbling through the spiky agave.
Mala managed to vault over the serpent and slice its tail with her dagger as she landed. It barely seemed to notice. As Will rushed to join her, Mala whipped her short sword off her back and began hacking at the beast while trying to avoid its flailing body.
Selina thrust her hands forward. Two vines shot out of the forest like missiles and wrapped around the Battle Mage, cocooning him atop the snake. Will got a surge of hope until the vines exploded, showering the ground with green mush. The Mayan wizard opened his fist, and a beam of sunlight shot out of it, dissipating an inch in front of Selina’s chest. The sylvamancer had gone rigid, focusing every ounce of her power on blocking the lethal strike.
The group of Mayan warriors caught up with the fight, attacking with obsidian spears and cudgels. Mala and Will were forced to break away from the snake and help the others.
The Battle Mage kept shooting beams of light at Selina. As she backed away, struggling to block them, one got through and seared the side of her arm. She screamed.
“Help her!” Mala shouted to Will. “She’s overmatched!”
“How?” he shouted back. His sword was ineffective against the colossal serpent, and the Battle Mage was seated too high up for him to reach.
“Be ready!” she said, leaving Will to wonder at her meaning.
The rest of the party fared better against the Mayan warriors. Gunnar fought with the kind of brutal efficiency Will imagined he would, using his power and size to overwhelm all who stood against him. Opponent after opponent fell to the swing of his war hammer.
Mateo took out two men in quick succession with his shortbow, then drew a flexible metal sword out of the belt scabbard wrapped around his waist. He slapped the sword back and forth on the ground as he advanced. Whenever the sword struck an opponent, even on the flat side of the blade, it tore through flesh. When one of the warriors parried the blade with a spear, Mateo’s sword bent around his opponent’s weapon and bit into his side.
Even Yasmina held her own. Will could tell she had been practicing. She led with her staff, using the longer weapon to bat away the blades and then crack her opponents on the skull with the bronze owl.
The Battle Mage must have noticed. With a wave of his staff, the snake surged forward, causing chaos by snapping its tail into the midst of Will and his companions. It caught Yasmina this time, whipping her violently to the ground.
“Yaz!” Will cried, holding off two Mayans as he fought his way to her. She retrieved her staff and struggled to her feet, shaken and bleeding.
The snake switched tactics, wrapping its tail around Gunnar and thrusting him high into the air. The big man screamed, his face purpling as the snake crushed him in its coils.
Mala shouted. “Now, Will!”
She sheathed her weapons, reached into her bottomless pouch with both hands, and withdrew two short orange rods. Without missing a beat, she sprinted to the snake and thrust the orange rods against its scales. As the rods glowed and then sparked, the beast’s fanged mouth opened in a soundless cry, and it began to writhe and buck, as if Mala had administered an electric shock.
The flailing of the wounded snake knocked over Mateo and a handful of the Mayan warriors, as well as Mala. It also caused the creature’s head to dip forward. The Battle Mage gripped the harness and managed to remain on the platform, but the snake’s thrashing broke his concentration and stopped the barrage of laser-like sunbeams that were pinning Selina down.
Will took the opportunity to leap onto the wooden platform. The Mayan wizard saw him coming and shot twin sunbeams from his eyes, but Will had his sword up and ready, and Zariduke swallowed the magic.
The Battle Mage’s eyes widened in shock. From up close, Will realized he was a boy of no more than eighteen.
“How?” the Mayan wizard said, then swung his hooked staff. Will blocked the blow and kicked the boy in the stomach, sending him flying off the snake. Will jumped down and stalked him. From his back, the young wizard sent a flurry of sunbeams at Will, at different parts of his body. Will couldn’t block them all but his sword must have had a halo effect, because it absorbed each ray with a snick of blue-white light.
Will put his foot on the chest of the Battle Mage, the tip of Zariduke against his throat. The snake writhed towards them but stopped when the boy held out a palm. Proud defiance sparked in the Mayan’s eyes.
“Who are you?”
“We came from the Barrier Coast,” Will said. “From Freetown. We seek only to enter the jungle.”
“And your purpose in our land? How do you deflect my magic?”
Enough talk. Will was in a position of strength and worried more forces were on the way. After a glance at Mala, who gave a tip of her head, he pressed his sword into the hollow of the mage’s throat. “We’re seeking something lost in the jungle. If I let you live, will you let us continue our journey?”
The battle around them had ceased. Will knew everyone was waiting to see the outcome between him and the Battle Mage. He looked into the Mayan’s eyes, seeking trust instead of dominion. “We’re part of a Revolution against the Congregation. The survival of our people is at stake. If we don’t find something to help us, they will destroy us.”
The Battle Mage’s face tightened. “The Congregation is no friend of ours. It is common knowledge Lord Alistair plans conquest to the south.”
“Then let’s be allies instead of enemies.”
A line of blood trickled down from the tip of the sword pressed against the young Mayan’s throat. He locked eyes with Will and said, “Go. You have my word we will not follow.”
Will hesitated, then withdrew his sword and helped him to his feet. In return, he clasped Will by the forearm. “My name is Aahpo Hun-Ahpu. I am a full Battle Mage of the Third Order of the Kukulcan Caste.” He handed Will a silver token. “By my permission you are welcome in the Mayan Kingdom, so long as you obey the laws of this land.” In a lower voice meant for Will alone, he said, “Thank you for spa
ring my life. I shall not forget it. But go with haste, my friend. My elders may feel differently than I.”
Will couldn’t be sure that Aahpo wouldn’t turn on their group as soon as Will turned his back, or that a whole platoon of Battle Mages riding giant snakes wasn’t headed their way, ready to tear down the jungle to find them.
But Will had made his choice. He wasn’t going to kill someone at his mercy, not even his enemy. He gripped Aahpo’s hand a final time and, with a nod to Mala, turned and followed Coba into the jungle.
The foliage was thick and dry, the trees and vines so dense they blotted out the sun. All vestiges of civilization disappeared, drowned amid the chatter of birds and insects.
They were lucky no one had been seriously injured in the fight, though Selina winced in pain as she wrapped her burned arm in a bandage. The High Council had gifted them three small bottles of healing salve, but the sylvamancer never asked for one.
The footpath allowed two people to walk abreast. All manner of animal sounds emanated from the jungle: the booming roar of a howler monkey, the far-off growl of a jungle cat, the piercing screech of a bird of prey.
No one said much for the first few hours, nervous of pursuit. Only Yasmina seemed unaffected, studying her surroundings with a single-minded purpose.
Aahpo stayed true to his word. By the time the party stopped for lunch beside a sluggish, copper-colored stream, the tension had eased and everyone’s spirits had risen.
After he ate, Will walked down to the stream to wash his hands. Mala walked up behind him, surprising him by laying a hand on his forearm. “You performed well back there. With the Battle Mage.”
He had always felt she was different when they were alone. Softer, more approachable. It could be his imagination, but he felt he brought out a side of her that no one else knew.
