Chapter 24 - Battlefield Blunders

  "Vass Karan has been led, in the name of the Undying Queen, by the Marcni family for over 250 years. They rose to the ranks of the Great Houses some 150 years before that, building their wealth through mining and loyal service to the Throne. It is recorded that the whole city came out to celebrate when Her Eternal Majesty raised House Marcni to ducal status and named its then head, Duke (previously Count) Larza Marcni, as Governor of Vass Karan. Ever since then, House Marcni’s strong and wise leadership has helped the city through times of crisis and prosperity. Some highlights include: the Golden Decade under Larza Marcni; the Great Purge of Vass Karan under Tarxi Marcni; and most recently the defiance hurled from the city walls at the forces of the Republic by Arnth Marcni.”

  Two Thousand Years of Empire by Jahangir Amini

  =====

  “Really? He said that?!” Abiel laughed uproariously and downed his flagon of beer before gesturing to the serving girl. “Another round over here and make it quick!”

  “I swear he did! You should have seen Hercna’s face, she looked like someone had slapped her with a fish.” Cerve Marcni swayed slightly as he spoke. “Of course Uncle Marce challenged him to a duel, he could hardly have done anything else.”

  “Of course.” Abiel nodded sagely, his previous levity vanishing as he pretended to take Cerve’s words seriously. “What else could he have done?” It was yet another ridiculous affectation of the nobleborn.

  Cerve shrugged. “I hardly enjoy these things, but sometimes there really is no choice.” Then he grinned, seriousness disappearing in a flash. “You do not know the best part though.”

  “Oh, what is that?” Abiel leant in, making sure to look like he was trying very hard to focus.

  “Well, as the challenged party he had the right to set the terms of the duel. He requested pigs bladders filled with crowns.”

  “He what…” Abiel snorted.

  “Pigs bladders. Filled with crowns.” Cerve giggled back at him. “After what he said to Hercna too.”

  “He must have truly hated her!” Abiel shook his head. It was a safe thing to say since Cerve seemed to despise his cousin. “What happened in the duel?”

  Cerve grabbed a new flagon off the serving girl and took a swig. “Oh.” He seemed to have almost forgotten what he was talking about. “Father had him killed before the duel. What else could he do really?”

  Abiel could only nod at that, trying very hard not to think about what the Duke would do to him and his friends if they were caught. “Quite right too. Anything else would have made a mockery of the whole affair.”

  He took another swig of his ale. He supposed this was more enjoyable work than trying to pretend to be a servant.

  =====

  “Great Spirits, no!”

  At Lars’ shout, ice spiked through Ester’s veins. Magic was flaring around them, wild and out of control and her head felt like it was going to explode. Something was wrong, badly wrong. There was no time for self-indulgence. She had to ignore the pain.

  A horrid, grinding, groaning sound tore through the air around them.

  Desperately Ester sprinted through a basic exercise to force her mind back into clarity. As she finished repeating its precepts, she murmured the last words out loud, “I see reality and reality is mine,” and forced her eyes open.

  Magic flowed around them, thickening in places into shimmering, eerie green vortexes so full of power that even someone without a hint of Talent must have been able to see them. Worse was the movement from within. Ester had to wrench her eyes away from one as her already pounding headache spiked into agony. It was wrong, perverse, unreal and there were things moving inside it.

  For a moment she considered trying to force the vortexes away, but she had no idea what they were, or what might make them worse. Looking around with wide eyes she saw a formless, black mass almost fall out of one of them. The vortex vanished behind it, leaving the thing writhing on the ground, gradually gathering itself into a fluctuating facsimile of an animalistic shape.

  Around her, Velxe and Lars each vortex disgorged its own mass. Eight of them. Each a shapeless form moving in disturbing undulations as it struggled to come together. Velxe and Lars stood frozen in place by the sight, horror painted across their faces.

  None of them moved, just watching in frozen terror as each mass gained shape. Alien shape, that was painful to look at. Too many limbs, teeth, eyes all in the wrong place, none quite the same and none constant, just a writhing body mass of limbs and hands grasping at nothing before vanishing and being replaced.

  Their shocked trance was broken when the first threw itself at Velxe with an unnatural shriek that tore at their ears, streaming the green light of the Weiryd behind it. It was fast, but with an inarticulate cry he leapt back, drawing his sword in one smooth motion that flowed straight into a downwards slash into the Weiryin.

  Velxe’s sword passed straight through the Weiryin like a knife through butter in an explosion of light and magic. Before he’d even returned to a guard position the two halves of the Weiryin were dissolving into black dust.

  That was incredible! Ester hadn’t seen anything like that before! If they survived this she wanted that sword. Not to keep, just to study. She’d even let him patronise her for it! With a jolt she yanked her attention away from Velxe’s sword as one of the Weiryin leapt towards her, running on disjointed limbs.

  It was already practically on top of her. There was no time for anything clever. She snapped a single word.

  “Gan.”

  The Weiryin was blasted away in a tumble of misshapen limbs, forming and reforming as it rolled.

  Ester blinked in surprise as it hauled itself back to its feet. That had been easier than she’d expected. Surely that panicked spell wouldn’t have done so much to the Weiryin she’d encountered a week ago. Regardless, the Weiryin was back on its many twisted feet, coming at her again in moments. However, she had space, time to think. She didn’t need to hurry, could focus her mind on the spell.

  “Saig.”

  The Weiryin erupted into fire with an unearthly shriek. It stumbled mid-step and fell, writhing on the ground as it rapidly burnt away to nothing. Relief shot through her. These were nothing like the other Weiryin. They didn’t even seem to be able to think. The only problem was numbers. Fear spiked again, the others!

  Magic flared from Lars. “Saz?ch Weiryin’fa ai’dooskur.” An advancing Weiryin was engulfed in flames, but it still kept coming. Slowing as magical fire gradually wore its perverse imitation of flesh away, but Lars had to hold his spell to keep the fire going and Ester could already see beads of sweat forming on his forehead.

  On the other side of Lars, Velxe smoothly pivoted around a charging Weiryin. One of its limbs bent unnaturally to follow him and he sliced straight through it before thrusting his sword into its centre in a flare of magic. She really needed to get a proper look at that sword. Maybe then she could make one for herself.

  Velxe seemed to be doing fine. He even managed to look good doing it. The whole experience would probably just make him more insufferable. Ester made herself look back to Lars. The first Weiryin had collapsed, still burning as he held the spell. However, more were advancing on him while he was distracted.

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  Another Weiryin leapt for Ester.

  “Saig.” Almost without thinking she obliterated it in fire before it could even come close, but in that moment of distraction she almost missed what happened with Lars.

  As his first target finally crumbled away, he shifted his attention to another Weiryin.

  “Saz?ch Weiryin’fa ai’dooskur.” He barked the spell and started backing up as his target erupted into fire. It was slow though, too slow. In the time it took for the Weiryin to start to burn two more were already past it.

  Just as Ester was about to blow one of them away, Lars released his spell, leaving the Weiryin damaged, but still advancing behind its two fellows. He stumbled backwards, trying to get away from the rapidly advancing monsters, his face twisting into a panicked snarl as he shouted a new spell.

  “Os’ellende ai’kattreachd saz?ch Weiryin’fa ai’dooskur.” The green light of the Weiryd flared and the world bent, distorting around him.

  “No!” Ester wasn’t even sure it was her that had shouted. One of the Weiryin in front of Lars flashed into fire so fast it practically vanished, but the magic was reacting. It swirled around them, flaring in bursts of colour and broken runes as more vortexes opened.

  More and more Weiryin were crawling out of holes that broke reality around them. She needed to deal with them, Lars would need to look after himself.

  “Saz?ch.” Ester focused her power on the closest Weiryin and slammed her magic into it, burning it away in a second.

  “Saz?ch.” She cast again a moment later. Another Weiryin obliterated. And again, she blasted a third. It wasn’t enough though.

  “Os’ellende ai’kattreachd saz?ch Weiryin’fa ai’dooskur.” Ester stumbled as Lars desperately cast another spell on the Weiryin closing around him. He looked like a distorted parody of himself, the world twisting ever more around him. In seconds there was so much of the Weiryd flaring that she could barely tell he was human. Worse, the magic over the scar was somehow feeding off it.

  “Stop Lars! Stop!” Ester’s shriek went ignored or unheard. She didn’t know how to stop the Weiryd. She didn’t even know why the magic was reacting to it. It should have been impossible! It was infuriating, they didn’t teach this at the Academy. She’d probably have been beaten for even asking.

  As she frantically cast about her for a way to stop the intrusion of the Weiryd into the world Ester steadily blew away Weiryin, but Lars’ frantic casting was somehow pulling more in. Faster than she could destroy them. He was going to get them all killed. Velxe was on his hands and knees, unable to stay upright as the world warped around Lars. Even Ester was struggling despite her own magic, as the waves of Weiryd from Lars’ broke around her.

  She needed to do something, but she couldn’t stop the Weiryd. It wasn’t even meant to do that. No one at the Academy had ever suggested it could allow Weriyin into the world. Great Spirits, she’d deliberately flared the Weiryd around her in Vass Karan! What if she’d caused something like this?

  The Weiryin weren’t even attacking Lars. There were enough that if they wanted to reach him they would have. With growing horror Ester realised they were provoking him, pushing him enough to keep him flaring Weiryd to increase their numbers. She need to stop them. Or Lars. She needed to act or they were all going to die.

  “Dolox ai’diwaien sgrog’fa.” Ester forced the spell into being, she just needed to judge it perfectly.

  The impact of the invisible fist of air on Lars’ jaw was enough to slam him off his feet. He crashed into the ground and the Weiryd vanished around him in an instant. Ester only had a moment to hope she hadn’t hurt him too badly.

  There must have been twenty of the Weiryin left, even after her efforts at thinning their numbers. Most of them were around the now defenceless Lars, but some immediately turned to attack Ester. Velxe could look after himself. Probably. He’d have to.

  Ester’s mind was working as fast as it ever had. There was no time for fear or indecision. She needed the Weiryin gone before they killed her or the others. The closest launched itself forward, straining to get at her.

  “Gr?nn nvatn ai’diwaien ai’saig vlidsich jel’ai’sjuuf xekera na’dechlaid ai’Weiryinalan.” Ester spoke the words quickly, but precisely, pushing the full force of her will, the full weight of her power behind them. She felt her legs sag at the sudden drain on her magic and forced herself to ignore them. She needed to be perfectly focused. She was casting right at the limits of her ability, setting out the spell in full, but there could be no flare of Weiryd. She couldn’t afford it.

  For a moment nothing seemed to happen. Then, lightning speared down from the sky into the nearest Weiryin with a deafening crack. The Weiryin vanished in the flash of the explosion as the lightning hit the ground, blasting straight through it. Before the thunderous boom of the impact had really started the lightning jumped to the next Weiryin, momentarily connecting them with blinding, blue light.

  Crack! Crack! Crack! Lightning jumped from Weiryin to Weiryin, blasting each one to dust. The rolling thunder of the explosions that followed each impact turned into an almost continuous wall of noise as the magic surged through the Weiryin.

  In a matter of seconds every Weiryin was gone, blown to dust. Ester released the spell with a gasp, exhaustion flooding through her.

  =====

  Velxe stumbled backwards, covering his eyes as blinding light speared across the monstrosities writhing their way across the ground. The noise was almost unbearable, sharp cracks sounding through the rolling thunder of constant explosions. He let out an involuntary shout, almost falling over, when the Weiryin closest to him exploded, spraying him with black dust that faded even as it spattered onto him.

  It took him a moment to gather himself in the silence that followed. He might have been taught how to use his sword, how to fight, like any proper nobleman, but he had not been in a true fight for his life before. That had been… exhilarating and terrifying all in one. He shook his head in an ineffectual attempt to dispel the ringing in his ears and then realised he was still clutching the hilt of his sword so hard that his hand hurt. With an effort he made himself relax. It was over. He was alive. As for the others… worry spiked in him.

  He looked up, Lars was sprawled out on the ground, blood around his mouth. There was no visible injury on him though. Then there was Ester. She was bent over, hands on her thighs, breathing heavily. As his eyes landed on her she looked up, a grin spreading across her face. Maybe the most genuinely happy expression he had seen on her. In combination with the wild look in her eyes it was a little frightening.

  “I did it! Great spirits, that worked!” She straightened up, still gasping a little for breath. “Did you see that?”

  Velxe blinked. There seemed to be smoke coming off her. “That was… rather impressive. Terrifying, but impressive. Thank you.”

  “It was nothing,” she waved off his thanks with a casual gesture. He half expected to see sparks flying off her hand as she did. Suddenly her face fell. “Is Lars alright? I tried not to hit him too hard, but I had to. He had lost control, he was going to get us all killed. Every time he cast a spell more Weiryin came and I was not even sure I could manage the ones I did. I think I hit him a bit too…”

  “My lady.”

  “… hard and oh Great Spirits he’s bleeding…”

  “Lady Ester.”

  “… have I killed him? Oh no they’ll…”

  “Ester!” She finally stopped talking at his shout. “He will be fine, I am sure. Let me check on him.”

  Velxe put action to his words before she could start talking again, hurrying over to the unconscious Adept. Ester trailed behind him, exuberance replaced by nervousness. He bent down over Lars’ prone form and then realised he did not know much at all about medicine. Some things were obvious enough though.

  “He is breathing.” Ester’s sigh of relief was more than audible. “I think you may have broken his jaw though.”

  Lars suddenly groaned.

  “Do you think he’ll be able to walk?”

  Velxe shook his head. “I doubt it, not for a while. He will probably need some time.”

  He looked up to see Ester glance nervously around. “I don’t like the way the magic’s moving. There’s more going on here. I think it’s calmed down for now, but I don’t understand what it’s doing. I think we need to get out of here.”

  That was unfortunate. However, Velxe certainly was not going to argue with her. Whatever she lacked in more general knowledge, she had likely forgotten more about magic than he had ever learnt.

  “Then we will need to carry him out. Can you do it?” She looked at him in confusion for a moment. “With magic.”

  “Oh,” Ester’s face darkened and and she looked down. After a second he realised she was blushing. “No. I don’t think that would be a good idea. I’m tired, but I could probably do it, but the magic here’s all wrong. I don’t know what might set it off again and I don’t want to risk casting any spells unless I have to.”

  Velxe could not help but notice that she had been speaking differently, her accent a little coarser and with more contractions. If he had to guess, it was probably closer to the way she had spoken before she went to the Academy. Given the effort she went to to speak like a nobleborn, it was most likely an affectation to cover up her heritage. She did not seem to have realised and obviously she would not want people hearing that, not with the effort she clearly made to refine her speech. He should point it out to her so she did not do it in front of someone else. Velxe opened his mouth and then clamped it shut before he could speak. Perhaps his grandmother was right that he needed to think more before voicing his thoughts.

  “Very well my lady. We will have to support him, you take one arm and I take the other. I think he is waking up and he is not such a big man, if he can stagger a little we can support him back to the horses.”

  Ester gave him a long look and for a second he thought he had said something wrong. “Aren’t you worried about touching me while we’re doing it?”

  “Touching you?” It took a moment for Velxe to work out what she meant. “We just nearly died and are still in danger. I have better things to worry about than propriety.” Oh yes she was a Mage too. “As for magic, I am sure you can restrain yourself from turning me into a frog should we accidentally come into contact. Now are you going to help me with him or not?”

  Spirits only knew why Ester smiled at that. She really was a strange woman.