Magus (Advent Mage Cycle) (39 page)

This might be a story that just never got old.

~*~

The next morning, I got up and bolted down a quick breakfast that Aletha cooked, and went to work.

This wasn’t like the normal scrying that I usually engaged in. For one thing, scrying pools like this one have a seal on the bottom of the pool. Part of it is to moderate how much power seeps into it from the ley line, but part of it is to keep Mages out. Don had actually warned me about this before we left Coven Ordan—no one wanted a Mage accidentally popping into a pool by accident, so they sealed the bottom of it to prevent such a thing from happening. I’m sure this was an excellent precaution under normal circumstances.

But these weren’t normal circumstances.

I slowly sank into the ground, senses heightened as much as I could do so. As soon as I got a good look at the ley lines under that pool, my heart sank.

This simply wasn’t feasible.

I combed the entire area for nearly a hundred miles in every direction, but I still couldn’t find a way to do this without tangling up ley lines past all redemption. Part of me was happy about this—an abundance of ley lines meant fertile soil—but for our purposes, it didn’t help one iota.

“
Garth, you’ve been down for an hour now.
”

Rats, had I really? I lost all track of time when I did this. With a mental sigh, I yanked back into my body.

And, as usual, I felt like I’d been thrown into an arctic pool. I was shivering so hard that I nearly bit my tongue. I really,
really
hate scrying.

“Garth?” Xiaolang knelt next to me, concern tightening the corners of his eyes. “Are you all right?”

“I h-hate sc-scrying,” I chattered back through clenched teeth.

His head cocked at a slightly amused angle. “That didn’t answer my question.”

“He’ll be fine in a few minutes,” Chatta assured him. She wrapped a blanket snuggly around me, which did help warm me up.

Shield reached around her, handing me a steaming mug. “Hot tea.”

My hands were stiff with cold, but I still managed to grab the mug with something like a death grip. “Bless you.”

The first sip scalded my tongue and throat. The heat was delicious. I graduated from sips to gulps, feeling heat seep into frozen muscles. Oh, that was
so
much better.

“I’m sorry, Garth.” Xiaolang was quiet, troubled, and his eyes were focused intently on the ground. “I didn’t realize this was so difficult.”

“The one part of magic I dislike,” I admitted. “But don’t worry about it. I know what’s going on under our feet now.”

“And?” Xiaolang prompted when I stalled.

“Too dangerous,” I sighed. “That pool is sitting on a very strong ley line, and it’s connected to two others that are equally strong.”

“Only three?” Hazard obviously didn’t see the problem.

“Three in the immediate area,” I clarified. “And those three are connected to other ley lines. Picture—” I paused and tried to put what I had seen into a visual image he could understand. “Try to imagine this. The three ley lines are like three strings braided together. Can you remove one string without tangling the whole braid?”

He frowned, considering this. “I see what you mean.”

Aletha was following this closely. “Is there anything we
can
do?”

“I can collapse the building on top of it. But they could dig it out again.” I spread my hands in a helpless shrug. That was the best option I could offer, under the circumstances.

“And it will tip them off that someone with magical abilities is loose, and knows what the pools are,” Xiaolang observed in a tired voice. “Too much danger, too little reward.”

There was no condemnation in Xiaolang’s voice or expression, but I still felt like I had failed, somehow. Like I hadn’t met the expectations placed on me. “Sorry.” I stared glumly into the mug.

Xiaolang sank onto his haunches. His hand grasped my shoulder, giving me a gentle shake. “Garth, this isn’t
your
fault. None of this mess is your doing.”

I grimaced. That didn’t make me feel any better. “I know.”

“Somehow, I heard a ‘but’ in there.”

“But,” I gave him a dry smile, “we both know how much easier this will be without those pools. I feel like…I’m failing all of you by not putting them out of commission.”

“
Garth
.” Chatta rolled her eyes heavenward, as if she was praying for patience. “We’re not blaming you for that!”

I knew that. Intellectually, at least. But I still couldn’t shake the feeling.

“It’s not that you
won’t
do it. It’s that you
can’t
do it.”

I shifted to look at Shad, who was standing behind me. That statement had a wealth of understanding behind it.

Everyone was looking at him now, but it was Eagle that put the question out loud. “What do you mean?”

Shad’s eyes never left mine as he explained. “By moving or tampering with a ley line, he risks destroying the land. As an Earth Mage, the idea is abhorrent. It would be a crime worse than murder, wouldn’t it, Garth?”

I couldn’t have explained it any better than that. “Yes.”

New understanding dawned on their faces.

“Ah!” Xiaolang lit up, like a man who had just been handed an epiphany. “So
that’s
the source of it. Hmmm.” His eyes went vague, unfocused, as he thought on something the rest of us couldn’t detect.

“Ignore him,” Hazard advised good-naturedly. “He’s gone into deep thinking mode.”

“Well, what do we do now?” Aletha wondered. “Garth, do you need much time to recover?”

I waved this worry aside. “No, I’m practically fine now. We can move on if we need to.”

“Assuming our illustrious leader snaps out of it…” Shield casually smacked Xiaolang in the back of the head.

“Ow!” Rubbing gingerly at the abused area, Xiaolang turned a dark glare on his first lieutenant. “What was that for?”

“Daydreaming,” Shield drawled.

“You didn’t have to hit me!” he complained in a near whine.

“Oh, but I did.” Shield’s smile was not at all nice. “I really,
really
did.”

Xiaolang muttered something under his breath in Q’atalish. I was just as glad that I wasn’t able to understand it. Eagle’s understanding wince was enough to tell me that.

Hoping to divert a fight I asked, “So where to next?”

Still rubbing at his head, Xiaolang answered, “We go back to our original task. I think we should continue to head south, following the coastline for now. Are you sure you’re up to moving right now, Garth?”

“I’m fine,” I assured him.

Xiaolang nodded, accepting this. “Chatta, you used the pool earlier this morning. Did you see anything?”

She shrugged, her palms spread helplessly. “I found another Watchman’s Pool, but I couldn’t see inside. There’s a very strong glamour over the building. I think I caught a hint of movement near it, though. There might be someone hiding out in that area.”

“Then, people, let’s move.”

~*~

Once back on the road, I went back to searching. I was focusing more on it than I usually did, partly out of guilt, I admit. Despite my comrades’ understanding attitudes, I still felt like I should have done more, somehow.

Chatta has a sixth sense for when I’m sliding into depressing thoughts. It’s the only way I can explain why she knows when to come and poke me in the ribs.

I flinched and twisted to frown down at her. “What?”

“Stop it,” she ordered with a pointed look.

“Stop what?”

“Stop being needlessly guilty.”

Easier said than done.

“I mean it, Garth.”

What, she reads minds now? I looked at her out of the corner of my eye. “How do you know I’m feeling guilty?”

“Because you get this little crease right
there
,” she pressed her fingertip between my eyebrows, “when you worry about something.”

She had me there. I blew out a resigned breath. How do you argue with someone when they’re right?

“Garth, remember what you always rant about when people call you the Advent Mage? You always say that you’re not a demi-god—you can’t do everything, or fix every problem. Remember?”

“That’s not it,” I refuted. She gave me a look that silently said
oh really?
“Well, that’s not entirely it,” I amended. “This is just the first problem that I’ve been given that I couldn’t solve, somehow. The feeling…rankles.”

She was trying not to smile, but one leaked past her guard despite her best efforts. “Surely you’re not arrogant enough to believe that you can solve all the problems in the world?”

Put like that, and it seemed absurd. “Maybe I spent too much time around Kartal.”

“Clearly.”

I was about to make some sarcastic remark when I realized that there was someone approaching us. I frowned, turning in that direction. How very…odd.

“Garth?” Chatta looked the same direction I did, puzzled. “What are you looking at?”

“Someone’s coming toward us.”

“Magical, not magical?” she pressed, curious.

“I’m not entirely…sure,” I responded slowly. “They don’t even really feel human.”

“Not human?” she parroted in surprise.

Apparently her response was loud enough for Xiaolang to hear, because he turned Hayate about and came alongside Night. “What’s this?”

“Someone is coming in our direction, someone strange,” I explained absently. “They don’t feel like anything else I’ve ever felt.”

“Animal, perhaps?” he suggested, looking very intrigued.

That suggestion struck me as wrong, although I couldn’t give a rational explanation as to why it was wrong. “No…definitely a sentient being. It has more…
awareness
to it.” That was as close as I could get to describing what I felt.

Xiaolang’s eyes narrowed in concentration. He normally wore that look when he was actively using his empathy. His range wasn’t that far—somewhere under a mile, or so he told me—but whatever was heading toward us was probably close enough for him to sense at this point.

“You’re right, that’s definitely a sentient creature.” He relaxed after a moment. Far from satisfied, he was even more interested now. “Everyone stop!” he called.

The team came to an abrupt halt, people twisting to look at the Captain.

“Garth, I’m getting the impression that whatever that creature is, he’s coming to talk to you. I think he’s also a bit shy, so we’re going to back up a few feet and give you some space.”

I nodded, playing along for now. “Did you get any hint of his intentions?”

“Not really. But he doesn’t harbor any ill-will, so it should be safe enough to approach him.”

Well, that was reassuring. Somewhat. I slid off Night’s back and approached the side of the road. We were in the middle of the Flats—a thousand or so acres of grassland that dominated this Providence—so the grass was waist high. It was difficult to see anyone or anything until you were practically on top of it.

I had the strangest sense of déjà vu, like I’d done this before—only instead of waiting for a person to come to me, I had gone to them.

The memory hit me hard, for a moment throwing me back almost two years into the past. This was like when I had found Elis dying in that no-man’s land. I could almost taste the smell of blood, and feel the heat of twin suns beating down on me. Adrenaline flooded my system as that long day and night flashed through my mind, when I was being hunted by Manookin and his gang.

“Garth?” Xiaolang’s voice was sharp with anxiety.

Shaking my head, I pushed the memory back into the recesses of my head, sealing it away again. That was not one of my more pleasant memories. “Sorry.”

“
Just a flashback,
” Night reassured them quietly.
“This place strongly reminds him of the time he was turned Jaunten.
”

And the manhunt I had lived through afterwards.

Xiaolang was not entirely appeased. “We’ll talk on this later.”

“I second that.” Chatta’s voice was firm.

We didn’t have time to say much else. A moment later, our visitor arrived.

As soon as he cleared the grass, I felt nearly faint with disbelief.

A Gardener?!

None of the Solians knew what he was; I could tell by the puzzled sounds they were making. Chatta, Night and I, however, froze in recognition.

Most people regarded Gardeners as a myth, or some sort of backcountry superstition. We barely covered them at the Academy. They were reputed to be a race that understood the earth and its underlying power in ways that no human could possibly match. There were some people that claimed that this world would cease to properly function without their influence. I thought that a bit far-fetched, personally.

Some of what I had learned was correct—at least, this one matched the descriptions I was given. He was barely five feet tall with pale skin that was nearly snow white. His eyes were larger than normal, a shockingly deep blue with no iris. He didn’t really have hair, more like the fine down of a swan that flowed to his shoulders. He looked… unworldly, and strangely beautiful.

After a second of gaping, I kicked myself into action. With a very polite bow, I introduced myself. “I am Rhebengarthen, an Earth Mage from Hain.”

He smiled—which strangely made him look like a mischievous child—and extended a hand to me.

Hesitantly, I reached out to take that hand.

And the world as I knew it exploded into a riot of sensations.

Feelings, images, thoughts—all of it was passed on in one lump package. I vaguely felt the impact as my knees hit the dirt, but that wasn’t important enough to distract me from trying to unravel everything jumbling in my head. His hand—thankfully—only held mine for a moment. As soon as he stopped touching me, the tidal wave of pure information stopped.

It was only then that I realized Chatta was grasping both of my shoulders, and Night was hovering on my other side.

“Garth?” Chatta was definitely alarmed.

“
What was that?”
Night demanded. He sounded a little dazed. But as a telepath, I’m sure he was picking up on what I had just experienced.