Rise of Shadows (22 page)

“We have to go, and now,” she said as she got our horses ready to ride.

“Umm, why?” I asked.

“No time for that now, just trust me,” she said and mounted her horse.

I quickly followed suit, and soon we were quietly slipping away from the caravan. As we passed one of the sentries, she tossed him a coin and said, “You never saw us.” He caught the coin and turned his back. She then commanded our horses to pick up speed to a point where I felt as if my grip on the great beast would fail.

Sometime after sunrise, she slowed us down, and I felt as if I would collapse from the effort of staying on while my horse followed hers at what seemed like an insane speed. “Shea, what is going on?”

“Sorry, Dusty, I should have told you from the beginning, but we must keep moving. There is a river ahead. We can rest there and let the horses drink. Until then we have to get as far from that caravan as possible as fast as possible. Keep those magic seeing eyes of yours peeled. Trouble could come from any direction,” she said as she kept her attention focused on our surroundings.

My magical awareness had faded, and I had not taken the time to recast it in days. It took a few tries but eventually I was able to cast it without the horse’s movements interfering with the spell. As soon as I cast it, I noticed that Shea was wrapped in a pure white power similar to what I had seen around Craig just before he charged into battle. All of the magic that I had seen before coming here was in weaves of color, sometimes with white mixed in, but always with lots of color. Color patterns were unique to each and every magus; whether they were sorcerer or wizard did not matter. Every single magus had their own magical signature on their powers. Even the old man that captured me had a distinct color pattern, yet the power around Shea and Craig was completely colorless. Since Craig was not with us there was no way he had cast this colorless power on Shea, so that meant that it was not unique to him, which was even more baffling than the lack of color.

Shea held the lead rope on my horse while she seemed to steer her own horse without even looking. Her head continued to snap left and right as we rode. “Shea, I’ll take my side, you take yours,” I suggested.

“Okay,” was all she said and then stuck to watching only half the world around her while I took the other half.

We rode on until the sun was a little past overhead, when we finally reached the river. Shea quickly dismounted and led both horses to the water to drink. I hopped off and drew my axe to examine it. It bore the mark of the magus that created it with a unique color pattern as I would expect from any magus, which meant that magic did work the same way here, at least to some extent. However, that was not the strangest thing. The strangest thing was I saw some of that white power wrapped around myself. It was somewhat comforting to look at, despite how strange it looked.

“Okay, Shea, I trust you, I really do, but I think it’s time you explained what is going on,” I said.

She sighed and seemed to be gathering her thoughts. “Dusty, I should have said something sooner. I am sorry, but traveling with me has put you in grave danger.”

I almost chuckled at that comment, considering the danger that I had been facing since leaving the school as part of Operation Show of Force, but instead I just said, “Go on.”

“You see, there are many groups out to get me. Some want to capture me, and others want to kill me,” she said.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because I am an alchemist, and no alchemist has been born for centuries. Some want to capture me and abuse my abilities; others want to destroy me so that the art is lost again.” She went on to explain that she and Craig had been on the run for the last decade, hiding in small towns and hovels from all kinds of people who were trying to capture her. Tears filled her eyes and ran down her face as she told me of town after town that was destroyed in their quest to get her.

As she was telling her story and apologizing for dragging me into her dangerous life, a thought struck me. “Shea, when you showed me the healing potion, you acted like it was common knowledge and that you were surprised that I did not know about it. If it was truly unique to you, why should I know it?”

“Sorry, but your appearance was too much of a coincidence. I assumed you were after me too and was surprised to find out you knew nothing about the potions, especially since you knew so much about the healing herbs. Not Craig though, he trusted you fully. He kept insisting you were exactly what you claimed to be,” she said.

“Well, so far you have not done anything to make my life any more dangerous than it was,” I started.

“What do you call the army of goblins that chased us through the woods? Or the sorcerer with that trap on the trail?” she asked.

“Um, random encounters?” I asked.

“Hardly,” she said.

“They were after you?” I asked. “How could you know?”

She sighed and drew out her dagger and pointed to a strange symbol on the hilt. “This symbol represents a nasty group of men that have been the most persistent of my pursuers, and the goblins were wielding weapons with this marking.”

“And that last sorcerer?” I asked.

“I do not recognize him, but I assume he was just one more enemy in my long list of enemies,” she said.

“He is the sorcerer that captured me, the one I had just escaped from before finding you,” I said.

“So he was not after me? That’s a first!” she said. “We need to start riding; the horses should be ready by now.”

As I mounted my horse I asked, “Why are we leaving the safety of the caravan?”

“I overheard the men talking, and there is trouble on its way. I can only assume they are after me, and if that is the case then the only way I can protect the good people in that caravan is to get away from them,” she said.

“We left good armed men though. Would not our chances have been better with them?” I asked.

“No, they would be overwhelmed if it is the same group that took out my previous home,” she said. “Hopefully they will soon discover that I have left the caravan, and they will leave the travelers alone.”

We rode on for hours in silence as I thought about what she said. She had apparently discovered a powerful tool, and that gave her powerful enemies. It should also have won her some powerful allies, but she did not seem to have any. This seemed odd; surely the rich and powerful would want the healing potions also and might pay well to keep her safe.

After we set up camp for the night, I asked her about that, and she merely said that she would then be no better than a slave, and that was not a life she wanted to live. I thought that would still be better than the life she was leading, but I just let it go at that.

We rode on without incident for several more days. Each night we would camp without a campfire and each sleep half the night while taking turns at watch. The route was safe, but if the bandits Shea had heard about really were after her, then we did not want to draw any attention to ourselves. As long as we were careful and did not light a fire, it was highly unlikely they would find us this far from the trail. Fortunately, the nights were warm and comfortably humid, so there was no real need for a fire.

As we rode, she told me all about her life. She just spilled it all out as if she could not contain the secret life she had been living any longer. Apparently, their standard plan was that she and Craig would find a small secluded town to live in, someplace way out of the way of the world. There she would secretly study her art and Craig would travel to trading outposts in the area to sell the potions and buy supplies. Eventually someone would figure out where they were, and they would have to run again. Sometimes they had enough warning to get away before anyone was hurt, sometimes not.

The time I found her was the closest she ever came to being captured. Had I not rescued her, she would probably have been killed before Craig could reach her. Apparently, they had been talking a lot about that incident while I slept or was otherwise distracted. They both agreed that it was too close a call and that they needed to come up with a new plan. Craig wanted her to give up alchemy forever so that they could leave behind this life of danger and start over somewhere far north where no one had ever heard of her. Shea hated that idea. She really wanted to master the art and could not bear the thought of never making another potion, but she did not want to trap Craig with her anymore. She wanted to let him go to live his own life.

Finally, the last day of our ride was coming to a close, and soon we would reach the gates of Syncillia. As we traveled the last leg of the journey, I asked her, “What are your plans once I am safely delivered to the wizards?”

“I just don’t know. For the moment, I intend to stay at the local temple of Light until Craig gets here and then work out our idea for heading north,” she said. She paused a long while after that and seemed to stare off into space. Then she finally said, “I guess his plan is best, so I’ll give up and hide.”

“There has to be another option,” I said.

“Perhaps,” she said.

We rode on in silence after that. It was not long before the massive city walls rose over the horizon, casting long shadows as the sun descended in the sky. The city had huge towers that glittered under the evening sun. These were spread around the walls at regular intervals, which gave the walls a menacing look, like a steel trap laid open and waiting for a bear. The city stood in front of two mountain peaks blocking the only path between them. There was a large series of moats around it, and the cliffs to either side looked unnaturally sheared off, as if some giant with a big knife had sliced them clean.

“Behold the great Syncillia, the mighty fortress and gateway to the Northern Kingdom,” said Shea breathlessly.

As we crossed the many bridges and passed through its mighty gates, I could see very large numbers of warriors patrolling the walls and the grounds around the city. The city walls were heavily embedded with great and powerful magical spells from countless wizards. The guards all had armor and weapons similarly enhanced by great magic, and overhead strange creatures flew. I had never seen their like before. They appeared to be a combination of an eagle and a lion. They were too high up to see clearly, but I was sure they had riders. There were three rings of walls, all highly defended and extremely thick, before we reached the beginning of the city itself. It was beyond my imagination to come up with a power from this realm that could crack this fortress.

Shea asked for directions from one of the town guards, and then we pushed into the crowded streets of the city. We rode for a while until we came to an inn that had stables. Shea arranged for a room for the night and saw to it that our horses would be taken care of.

“Shall we head to the Wizard’s Tower, then?” she asked.

“Yes, please. I am anxious to get a message back home, if nothing else,” I said.

It did not take long for us to reach the tower, but calling it a tower was unfair. It was more of a cube shape, and it had at least four spires that I could see in the early evening gloom. In common with most of the structures in this city, it was massive and guarded by powerful magic spells. As we approached the tower, I could feel Shea getting nervous, and she eventually said, “Okay, Dusty, this is your game now. Knock on the door and introduce yourself.”

I took her hand to make sure she did not bolt away and leave me, and then approached the door, which glowed softly as I came near it. Before I could knock, a voice boomed out, “Who goes there?” from somewhere deep within the building.

Steeling myself with all the nerve I could, I called back, “I am Battle Wizard Second Rank Dusty, of Alpha Academy, of the Vydorian Realm!”

I heard Shea gasp at my introduction, but before I could even look at her the color of the door changed, and then the entire door vanished. I started to enter and felt Shea pulling away from me, but I did not let go. “Come with me, Shea; you will be much safer in here than out there.”

“I guess,” she said.

As soon as we cleared the door it sealed up behind us, preventing anyone else from following us, or us from getting out. I was not sure what to do next, so we just waited there in the entrance for a bit. Soon a wizard wearing the red robes of an apprentice came to greet us.

“Greetings, Master Dusty. I am sorry to keep you waiting,” he said. “Please come this way.”

I thought about correcting him on calling me master, but decided that I did not know the rules here and had better be careful. These wizards were my only hope of ever getting home, so I did not want to risk offending them. We traveled through the building into a large room that looked like a banquet hall. There were many tables lined up; after looking at them for a moment, I realized it reminded me greatly of the dining hall back at Alpha Academy.

“Masters, please sit and let the students bring you food and drink. I will find the headmaster and return,” said the apprentice wizard as he left in a hurry.

“Dusty, are you sure this is safe?” asked Shea.

“Relax, you are with me, and I represent Alpha Academy,” I said as I guided her into a seat and took one myself. Soon the students were bringing us a grand meal the like of which I had not seen since that vacation I took with Phoenix. It felt like several lifetimes ago, but in reality it had only been a few years.

“Yeah, about that … it seems you kept some secrets from me,” she said.

“Sorry, but I did not know who I could trust, and to be honest it was several days before I figured out where I was. Are you familiar with Alpha Academy?” I asked.

“I doubt there is anyone who is not!” she said.

“Then it was probably good that I kept it quiet,” I said.

After that we ate in silence for a while. I am not sure how long, but it seemed like an age. Finally I asked, “Shea, why are you so frightened of this place?”

“You know why,” she said.

“Oh, you think they will be after you. Well, as long as you are under my protection they will not. Besides, I bet you’re wrong about them,” I said.