Forging Divinity (13 page)

Taelien walked back to the metal door and hovered a hand near it. “I’m opening the door. Leave, and I’ll follow you when I am done here.”

Jonan rushed to the door. “We both need to leave. Please. These things can kill entire squads of soldiers by themselves,” Jonan pleaded, putting a hand on Taelien’s arm.

“Stand outside, then, and be ready to make me invisible as soon as I step out. I may have the Esharen with me, if he’s cooperative.”

Taelien pressed his palm against the door.
Open.

“You’re insane,” Jonan whispered, slipping outside.

Close.

The door slammed shut, and Taelien turned to see the Esharen’s torso directly in front of his face.

The creature’s hand – more accurately a claw – was around his neck before he had a chance to react. It lifted him off the floor with seemingly no effort, pressing him against the metal door.

“Ashavan kor de sahu mes,” the creature said, pressing him harder against the wall.

Taelien lifted his hands to grasp the creature’s arm, knowing his neck could not support his entire body’s weight. He didn’t understand a word the creature had said, which was unsurprising. He only knew a few words in Xixian. “Stop. Peace,” he said, trying to remember something relevant. When the pressure failed to ease, Taelien released his right hand and slammed his open palm into one of the damaged sections in the Esharen scales. He felt the scales cave further as his hand connected, pressing the stone-like plates into something softer beneath. The creature released him instantly, stumbling back a step, its hand reaching down to clutch at the injured area.

Taelien looked up toward the massive creature, seeing something that looked like disbelief in the Esharen’s eyes. The expression lasted only an instant before being replaced by fury, and with a growl, the creature swung its other claw straight at Taelien’s head.

He was ready this time, ducking beneath the swipe. A sharp whine erupted as the Esharen’s claws ripped into the metal of the door. Taelien slammed another palm into the other side of the creature’s chest and then sidestepped to the right, trying to avoid being boxed in against the wall.

The Esharen stepped back, surprising Taelien, and spoke again. “Your sorcery has failed you, human,” it spoke in deep, reverberating tone.

“No,” Taelien said, “Hold on, I just freed you. I am not working with your captors.”

The Esharen tilted its head to the side, bending its knees and assuming a catlike pose, its claws scraping against the ground. “Indeed?” It glanced back toward where it had been bound, coughing deeply for several moments before spitting a mouth full of white powder on the floor to its side. “And why would you help me?”

“It looked like you were being tortured,” Taelien stammered. The creature’s eyes narrowed at him, and Taelien took another step back.
Wrong tactic. It doesn’t believe I’d do this for moral reasons.
“I also wanted information. What are the runes that were binding you here? Who captured you?”

“Ah,” the creature said, nodding. “You share one of my enemies, and you think this makes you a friend.”

The Esharen pounced, and Taelien was forced to fall backward to avoid a swing at his chest. He kicked at its face with his left leg, but it grabbed his foot en route.

“You were mistaken,” the Esharen pulled him across the ground by his foot, bringing a claw down to disembowel him, but Taelien grabbed the creature’s arm with his left hand. The Esharen pushed downward, but Taelien held the huge arm in place. Remembering the creature’s difficulty with breathing, he slammed his right palm into a cracked section of the creature’s neck. It held tight this time, but began coughing even more fiercely than before.

“Please, I don’t want to hurt you,” Taelien pleaded. The Esharen released Taelien’s foot, swiping it claws up Taelien’s leg, tearing through pants and flesh. Taelien tried to roll away, but the claws dug deeply before he managed to tumble aside. He found himself on the floor a few feet away from where the creature was still coughing fiercely.

Taelien tried to push himself to his feet, favoring his wounded left leg, and fell back down almost instantly. The Esharen began to rise, finally seeming to recover from its coughing fit, and Taelien’s right hand went to his sword.

No,
he told himself.
I won’t kill a prisoner I failed to free.

The Esharen dove for him again, but Taelien reacted faster this time, rolling out of its path and smashing a closed fist into the damaged section at the back of the creature’s skull. Brittle fractions of scales caved beneath his fist and the Esharen crumpled, unmoving, to the floor.

Gods curse it.
Still on the ground, Taelien unbuckled his belt and removed his sword and scabbard, using the sheathed weapon as a cane to push himself to his feet.

He took a moment to breathe and inspect his leg injury. Blood was flowing freely from where three of the Esharen’s claws had rent his skin, from the top of his left foot up to nearly his knee. He had nothing aside from clothing to bind it with, so he removed his coat and tore off a wide swath of his shirt, pressing it against the bleeding wounds. As he watched the blood seeping into the shirt, he noticed the rhythmic rising and falling in the chest of the unconscious Esharen next to him.

I’m going to regret this,
he told himself, but he had already made his choice. He couldn’t stand the idea of leaving a torture victim behind to face certain death.

After staring at the creature for a moment, Taelien refastened his sword on his belt, took a deep breath, and bent down to the fallen creature. It was over seven feet tall, and its stony hide undoubtedly made it weigh several times more than a human of similar size. Gritting his teeth, Taelien wrapped his arms around the creature’s chest and lifted its body over his shoulders.

It was only a couple steps to the door, but the pain from each of them nearly sent him back to the floor. When he reached the door, he brushed up against it, unable to free up his hands to use them directly.
Open
, he told it, nearly falling through as the window opened in the metal to comply with his demand.

Jonan stood on the other side, an incredulous expression on his face. The sorcerer took a step back as Taelien lurched through the doorway, Esharen still atop his shoulders, and turned to nudge the metal with his skin and shut it tight.

The sight sorcerer down the hall, and then back to Taelien. “Put that back.”

Taelien shook his head, whispering. “No, we need to take him with us.”

Jonan tightened his jaw, raising a hand to cover his eyes. “How exactly do you plan to keep that thing – nevermind. We can’t talk here. Just follow me.”

Jonan made a gesture at him and the Esharen, and then turned to walk back toward the building’s entrance. Taelien hoped the gesture was refreshing whatever invisibility spell Jonan had used before. He didn’t know if his invisibility had ever worn off – perhaps the Esharen could have seen him through its unusual eyes – but it was the wrong time to ask Jonan about it.

The guard near the door was still reading a book when Jonan walked by. Each step took Taelien several times longer, and he was fairly confident he was leaving a trail of blood behind him, but he pushed himself on regardless. As he neared the exit, Taelien fell to his knees.

Resh
. His injured leg had gone almost completely numb, but Jonan was there a moment later, wordlessly stepping in to help him lift the Esharen and stand once again.

With Jonan’s help, the climb up the stairs was almost tolerable. They were forced to pause when they discovered the door to the main entrance locked, and Taelien took the moment to adjust how he was carrying the Esharen. A couple minutes later, Taelien saw the pair of guards approaching. Jonan put a finger to his lips in the universal gesture for quiet and waved his other hand – revealing to Taelien what the guards must have been seeing all along.

A perfectly uninjured – and unarmed – Taelien, following behind a much less frustrated Jonan, trailing the pair of guards.

As the guards reached the door, Taelien shifted out of their way, gritting his teeth at the continued strain on his leg and back. When the door opened, Jonan surged through immediately, not waiting for his illusionary duplicate. Taelien followed suit, ducking awkwardly to shift the Esharen through the door. He nearly fell again, but managed to slip to the side instead, merely stumbling into the main room of the bank.

Jonan shifted his stance until he was nearly overlapping with his illusionary double, and then Taelien watched as the illusion faded.

“Thank you, gentlemen,” Jonan said calmly to the guards.

“You have a nice day,” one of them said with some pretense at warmth, but with a slightly irritated tone.

And with that, Jonan led Taelien out of the building.

It only took a few more agonizing moments to slip around the side of the structure and find an area with no civilians visible.

“Let me look at that,” Jonan said, kneeling by Taelien’s leg. “Resh it, that’s bad. You need to -,” he started looking up at the Esharen, “I can’t believe you just did that.”

“Help me carry him?” Taelien asked weakly, trying at a smile.

“Fine,” Jonan said, rolling his eyes. “You’re still insane.”

Chapter V – An Introduction to Sorcerous Theory

Lydia awoke in darkness. She rubbed blearily at her eyes, waiting several moments before rising to find her discarded glasses.

Seems I slept a while,
she mused, stumbling toward her wall. A brush of her hands displaced the heavy drapes concealing her window, bringing the shimmering light of the nightfrost into her chambers. Even that scant light was enough to force her to blink for several moments as she mumbled to herself and found her way to her closet.

The nightfrost’s presence signaled the temporary dominance of the dominion of ice over the dominion of heat – two of the many opposing dominions that influenced the world. While earlier cultures had associated the dawnfire and nightfrost with living entities, modern sorcerers thought them to be inanimate satellites that circled the world. The methods of their creation – and their ultimate purpose – were broadly debated.

After precisely zero moments of deliberation, Lydia picked out the first tunic and pants she came across, setting them out on her bed. She didn’t have any formal meetings on the agenda, so she didn’t need to wear her robes of office – at least for the moment. Eating was currently much higher on her list of priorities.

Dressing herself in what turned out to be a white tunic and dark brown pants, Lydia belted on her saber and lazily grabbed three silver pins to set on her collar. The pins were typically worn with her robes, but strictly speaking she could wear them with any outfit to identify her rank. At the moment, she didn’t foresee needing them, but it helped her feel ready to challenge the world.

Her return to the palace had been uneventful. The guards didn’t ask her any questions on her way back in, nor did they show any signs of suspicion. That didn’t mean that no one suspected her, but apparently no one had given orders to arrest her on sight. She had sealed her door and window with protection sorcery before going to sleep.

As she finished preparing to leave, Lydia noticed a note on the floor – apparently, someone had slipped it under the door while she slept.
Someone slipped something inside without me noticing? I must be getting soft in my old age,
Lydia chided herself.

Shaking her head, Lydia picked up the letter, inspecting the wax seal on the back – a stylized letter “M”.
Morella. Huh.

Lydia’s mind pushed itself further toward wakefulness as she processed the significance of the note. Morella had always been something of an enigma – she had always come across as extremely loyal to the interests of the city, but she rarely wanted to work with others.
And Sethridge thinks she’s involved with Taelien somehow,
she reminded herself.

Lydia broke the seal, sitting back down on her bed to read the letter.

Court Sorceress Scryer,

I have pertinent information for you, as well as questions. Meet me at my chambers at your soonest convenience.

-Morella

Lydia considered the content of the note, folding it and setting it down on a nearby table. It was odd that Morella was referring to her by her title. The contents were vague, too, but that was a good precaution in case the note was intercepted somehow.

Maybe I need to make some preparations of my own,
Lydia considered.
Jonan could be watching me through the walls right now, invisible, and I would be completely unaware. And he’s probably not working alone.

Lydia remembered that Jonan claimed to use mirrors for most of his reconnaissance, but that didn’t mean that it was the only way he could use his sorcery. If he could mark mirrors, there was nothing saying he couldn’t do the same to any glass or crystalline structure – like any one of the numerous windows or statues in the palace.

Time for a quick test to see if I’m being watched.
Lydia walked to the mirror by the side of her bed, subconsciously lifting a hand to adjust her glasses. “Dominion of Knowledge, illuminate that which is touched by your cousins.”

There was no change in the surface of her mirror, nor did she see a telltale aura on the glass of her window. On a hunch, Lydia glanced at the note Morella sent her, but she did not detect any signs of sorcery on that, either.

Well, I suppose sometimes a note is just a note.
Something still nagged at the back of her mind, telling her she was missing something important, but she couldn’t quite place what it was.

While Lydia continued to ponder the note, she left her room, locking it on the way out. The halls were near to empty, indicating it was even later than she had expected – but the noise from the dining hall told her that she had not yet missed the tail end of dinner.

With her rank, Lydia was able to skip to the head of the small dinner line that remained, retrieving a helping of boiled beef and seasoned potatoes. She could have easily ordered something to be cooked for her, but she never liked to make people go out of their way. She went to the kitchen next, setting down her tray of food, and brewed her tea herself – partly to save the cooks the trouble, and partly because she preferred to make it to her own tastes.

As she finally settled down to eat at a small table in the dining hall, Veruden sat down next to her with a plate and mug of his own. Lydia tensed for just a moment before turning to send a polite half-smile at him. “Veruden,” she acknowledged. “How’s your hand?”

“Doin’ better now, thanks,” he said, displaying his bandaged hand and opening and closing it. Presumably, he was displaying that he had regained some movement in his fingers, but she didn’t know how bad it had been before. “I’m not bothering you, am I?”

Well, actually–

“No, not at all,” Lydia said, taking a sip of her tea. She winced at the heat of the liquid, but she forced herself to swallow it.

“You ever figure out anything about the sword, or the prisoner?”

Time to see how much he knows.
“Not much. I tried testing the sword with a basic identification spell, but it nearly knocked me out. After that, I ran into Istavan and spent some time catching up with him.”

Veruden blinked. “Istavan’s back? Bugger never tells me anything,” he lamented, poking his fork into the top of an ambitious stack of potatoes that strove toward the skies. “I’m always the last one to hear anything. But you know Istavan. He likes to keep us guessing.”

Okay, good. Istavan didn’t talk to Veruden yet, at least.
Lydia adjusted her glasses, thinking. “If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t realize he was back until I ran into him.”

“Huh. Maybe he’s on some kind of secret assignment. I guess he could be doing something for Edon or M--,” he started, but Lydia raised a finger in a silencing gesture.

“Public,” she said meaningfully. Veruden sat up straighter suddenly, startled.

“Oh, sorry,” he said hastily, “I lose track sometimes. Guess we can talk more about this stuff later, then,” he said, grinning fiercely.

“Yeah,” Lydia said, forcing a slightly more genuine smile than she had presented before.
He seems sincere in his concern, at least. I wonder if he’s lying about not knowing Istavan is back in the city. I wish I had a spell for detecting lies...But different people have different tells. Maybe I could start with my Illuminate Hidden spell and add a Deception Key and a Stability Key to make a persistent effect that detects the use of the Dominion of Deception...But would a simple lie be enough to trigger it?

They ate a while longer in silence, eventually dipping back into small talk until Lydia finished her meal and excused herself. She wanted to pry for more information, but caution was a greater concern for the moment. Too many lives depended on her proper handling of this situation.

If I take a step in the wrong direction now, I may end up starting the war I came here to prevent,
Lydia realized.

She went toward Morella’s chambers next, still considering the vague contents and oddly inconsistent formality of the note.

As she approached Morella’s door, Lydia paused, still feeling an itching at the back of her mind that something was very wrong. Can’t be too careful, she told herself. “Dominion of Protection, fold against my skin and teach me the secrets of the dominions that assault you.”

Lydia felt a chill as the spell completed, a translucent barrier flickering against her flesh for a moment before fading into invisibility. The Comprehensive Barrier spell was her own creation. It was a combination of a standard Protective Barrier spell and Key based on a famous Dominion of Knowledge spell, Intuitive Comprehension.
A spell invented by Donovan Tailor, when he was a priest of Sytira,
Lydia recalled.
Awkward to be using one of his spells, now that I might be working against him. I suppose the sorcerers of old must have run into that type of problem all the time, though, especially in the rebellions against Xixis.
Constructing spells was one of Lydia’s specialties. She had studied the eastern method of Dominion Sorcery, better known as “Velryan Battle Sorcery”. That style of magic utilized incantations, a series of words that were spoken aloud to focus the mind on the intended effect. The words themselves were irrelevant – the sorcerer simply used them to quickly force their mind into the right state. From there, the body would attempt to utilize the spells and Keys the sorcerer had spoken of by drawing on the appropriate dominions.

Spells could be categorized in a number of different ways, but Velryan Battle Sorcerers split them into fundamental spells and complex spells. Fundamental spells created basic effects that only drew from a single section of a single dominion. A simple burst of heat from the flame dominion or a barrier from the Dominion of Protection fell into this category. Complex spells were fundamental spells that had been augmented through the use of Keys – sorcerous fragments that could not be used on their own, but could be added to fundamental spells to change their function. A Flame Key could be added to a barrier spell to make it more potent against fire, or a Wall Key could be added to change the spell’s shape.

The Comprehensive Barrier’s function was relatively simple – it would draw from the Dominion of Protection to block attacks, and if the attacks were sorcerous in nature, the Key she used from the Dominion of Knowledge would immediately inform her of composition of the spell. Her mind would interpret this information as readable text in her vision, similar to how her other identifying spells functioned. Not only did this allow her to analyze the spells of her enemies for developing countermeasures, the knowledge she gained was potentially sufficient to allow her to try to cast the spells herself – if her connections to the relevant dominions were strong enough.

Increasing strength at sorcery worked much like exercising a muscle – it required constant practice, but attempting to do too much at once could strain the sorcerer, potentially causing temporary or permanent damage.

Where most sorcerers struggled to maintain their conditioning with one dominion, Lydia actively practiced with five – improving her power at each gradually over time.

The barrier was one of Lydia’s favorite spells, and she used it at least once per day in spite of the fatigue it caused her. In her sparring practices at the Citadel of Blades, Lydia had managed to train to block as many as three attacks with a single use of the barrier. Now, two years later, she expected that she could block at least twice that – assuming the spells were of a similar magnitude to what she was used to. More powerful spells – or physical attacks with greater force – would weaken the barrier more easily.

With the reassuring tingle of the barrier against her skin, Lydia walked the rest of the way to Morella’s door and knocked politely. Silence followed for several moments, but Lydia waited patiently, and the door swung open after a modest period of trepidation.

Morella stood in the doorway, with Sethridge looming just beyond her. Morella was wearing a simple green dress, but Sethridge was in his formal robes.

“Oh, Lydia, come in,” Morella said, giving an uncharacteristic smile.

Calling me Lydia now? That’s not that unusual, but she was very formal in the note.

“Thank you,” Lydia said, stepping inside. Morella closed the door behind her immediately and beckoned Lydia toward one of three empty chairs at a nearby table. A quick glance told Lydia that nothing in the room seemed overtly out of place – Morella’s bookshelves were a bit more bare than usual, but that probably just meant she had taken out a few books and put them in another room for research.

Lydia took the seat nearest the door and Sethridge silently moved to sit across from her.

“Can I get you anything? Tea?” Morella asked, wandering to the archway that marked the entrance to her bedroom. Morella had been serving Orlyn for several years, and Lydia knew that Morella’s quarters were more extensive than her own – she had three full-sized rooms, as well as her own private water closet.

“No, thank you, I just came from dinner,” Lydia explained, resting her hands on the table.

“We should get on with this, Morella. This is important business,” Sethridge said.

“There’s no need to be rude about it,” Morella insisted, taking the third seat. “Lydia, the prisoner is missing.”