Battle Mage: Winter's Edge (56 page)

Instead of heading down the stone stairs, the mage turned and led the others back to the stands.

“What are we doing?” Katya asked looking a bit frustrated.

Helping Yara and then Katya up the first steps to an empty row, Sebastian replied, “If she is as good as people say and not just a pretty face, then maybe I should see what everyone is talking about.”

Groaning, his little sister sat and made sure that everyone knew it was under protest just by her sulking.

Wendle sat with them as well and leaned closer to Sebastian to say quietly, “I hear that she beat an air wizard from New Harbor. He was supposed to be pretty good too. If she’s as good a wizard as she is beautiful, you would be wise to check out her skills.

“Now since I am out, maybe I can just get lucky and get a dance with her later. I have nothing left to lose.”

“She might if you dance with her; at least if there are no healers around. Do you remember poor Rilena?” Sebastian asked with a laugh. The wizard’s two left feet had never gotten any better despite Rilena and Ashleen’s continued attempts on their trip. The mage had healed more bruised toes and feet for the girls than he could remember.

Wincing at the mage’s words, Wendle looked ready to argue when Annalicia and her opponent made their way out onto the battlement to a chorus of cheers. Quickly sidetracked, the wizard decided to ignore Sebastian’s brutally true words and watched as the two prepared.

Like Wendle, the lady had several buckets of water standing ready behind her. Her fire wizard opponent prepared his defenses much the way Serrena originally would, the mage thought. Firewalls three deep but flat to his opponent were erected and ready, while the lady called on the wind in a whirling tornado encircling her battle ring. The high speed defense completely surrounded the woman and rose for more than twenty feet above the wall from what he could see thanks to the dust in the air.

The fire wizard looked at the tornado nervously. Such a magic draining spell used as a defense was rare to see in a duel. In the center of the spinning wall, Annalicia’s hair seemed to barely move in the calm within the storm. If her strength was great enough to withstand such a draining use of magic, then the woman was strong indeed or using a risky tactic that would require a short match.

The battle began and the fire wizard tested the wall with fireballs and streams of fire. Virtually unaffected by the man’s attacks, Lady Annalicia began her counter spells. Like a dancer, the beautiful woman not only used her arms and hands to gesture, but used her whole body to cast the spells.

The water rose from half the buckets and used the spinning speed of the wind to whip around the tornado towards the fire wizard. What should have been just a few gallons, seemed to expand into a flood writhing in the air. The first firewall shattered as the water rebounded into the air and became a liquid serpent.

A pair of fire dragons rose to snap at the serpent. More water rose from the buckets forming two more serpents. Striking at the fire dragons, the two elements fought for dominance. Steam rose from each strike. Fire dimmed as water sought to put out the flames.

The third serpent crushed the second firewall, while the other two kept the man’s attention diverted. When the third wall broke, the fire wizard was ready however. A fiery bull charged the snake snapping the spell as one dragon expired. Two more streams of flame struck the remaining serpents at their base as the bull charged forward towards the whirling tornado, but her defenses were shifting already.

Spinning even faster as the wind rose to a roar, the tornado rushed past the wizard causing her to stumble as it whipped past. The girl was so petite, no one could understand how the little wizard wasn’t bowled over with the move, but the tornado did her bidding without disruption. It caught the bull tightening its grip and ripping the construct to shreds. The two serpents were absorbed into the tornado with the remains of the buckets.

The last dragon flailed in the wind just a moment before being whisked into the tornado to be shredded into a flicker of flame before vanishing and the fire wizard screamed a last spell. A giant wall of flame rose up magnificently to counter the tornado. Swirling in reverse of the tornado, the fire served as a defense and attack.

Forgetting about the water within the swirling wind, Annalicia had not stopped her dance. Spinning with the tornado, a flood of water rushed around the giant firewall. Breaking into multiple streams of water, the serpents returned to strike at the unprotected man. He screamed again, but no spell would come swift enough as the water struck him forcefully. Five streams hit him so quickly, that their momentum drove the wizard from the ring and off of the wall.

Once more, the wizards protecting him were put to the test. Their spells saved him from certain death. In a crueler time, a fallen wizard might have been left to die, but every wizard was precious in Southwall. Their spell replaced the wizard on the wall as the wind and fire died.

“Your winner is Lady Annalicia from Malaiy!”

A cheer even larger than for the mage erupted from the stands. Sebastian couldn’t fault them for loving Annalicia more than him. It had been an impressive match and her flair for the dramatic between her dancing and spells was hard to ignore. Standing with the audience, the mage could see that he had his work cut out for him.

Round two had not only claimed Wendle, but Nara had a loss to one of the wizards from Grey Hall. The grey wizards as many called them, were a force to contend with in the ring. After a perfect first round, the Hedges and Two Houses arenas finally saw two of the six wizards from Grey Hall defeated, but those arenas had taken their toll on Southwall’s wizards as well.

The Hedges had started with ten nature wizards from the host country and only one made it way to the third round. The Two Houses had fared a little better. Nine of their wizards had been whittled down to three. Serrena had survived as well as Magnus representing White Hall, but they had been hard fought matches. Sebastian had a feeling that there would be no more easy wins from now on, if there ever had been.

Out of the original two hundred thirty four contestants, they had been whittled down to sixty. The winners and a couple selected favorites from extraordinary fights were all that remained. They all wondered how the tournament would go from there. With ten arenas and only sixty wizards, it meant fewer matches per arena if they kept all ten arenas running.

A wizard in the black and silver diplomat robes stepped up to a podium raised a few steps in the main administration building. All sixty wizards looked to the man on his raised podium to await the news. “Greetings contestants, I am sure that you are curious about the next round. You have all afternoon and evening to recuperate for a special round to be conducted outside the city tomorrow.

“The Hedges, Colonnades and Two Hills arenas will host round three and the duels will be switched up in a completely new way. Only fifteen matches consisting of groups of four will take place. Five matches on each field with four battle circles and competitors will reduce our field to just fifteen with only one lucky challenger allowed to return that fights the best according to your judges.”

The wizards began to talk and even shout at the official.

“Groups of four?” one man shouted. He was a foreigner by his dress, Sebastian thought. “How is that fair? Your wizards still outnumber those of us from farther away. How will we compete?”

Others called the idea unfair as well. The wizard patted the air with a sympathetic gesture as he spoke over their raised voices calming the room, “We have been working to either separate those from Southwall or grouping all four together. We also will not have any that have fought in those arenas before getting an advantage. If you fought in one of those three arenas, you already know that it will be one of the other two for round three.

“There will even be changes to those three arenas such as the Two Hills now have four. The Colonnades central pool has been separated into four near each circle and even the hedges will have extra stone in addition to the pools of water for any earth wizard to use.

“With the larger battles, there will be three held in the morning at each arena with the remaining two in the afternoon. Tomorrow evening, the winners will assemble here to learn about round four. Enjoy the rest of your day and you can find tomorrow’s assignments on the board outside before the evening meal.”

The man stepped down and quickly moved to a door in the rear of the room to escape the voices raised in confusion.

“Four in a duel?” Collin asked aloud as Sebastian led the others out into the street. “That’s not even a real duel then.”

Liam and Serrena agreed looking unhappy with the idea. Ashleen grabbed Sebastian’s arm looking surprisingly happy. “Well, they are certainly making this event different,” the girl said with a grin. “I did not see a four way match coming that is for sure.”

He nodded thinking about the tactics required for such a match. There were bound to be those that would start out helping one another. As the only battle mage in the event, that could either work to his advantage or against him. Either way, the mage was pretty sure that he would have to use Bairh’loore to keep up with such a duel.

“It should be interesting,” Sebastian admitted. “With three opponents, everyone is going to have to keep an eye on three directions and potentially three different kinds of spells. On the bright side for me, I don’t think anyone has prepared for it, so for once I am on the same learning curve as the rest.”

Ashleen giggled at the idea. “That’s true. I don’t think anyone practices fighting three wizards at once. No one wizard can harm three, which is why they use three to protect us in a match. I wonder how many wizards they will have there for these matches?”

Thinking that she had an interesting point, the battle mage wondered about the safety of so many wizards waging battle. If three wizards united against one, could three protectors even be enough to save
them? The chaos of battle left everyone in danger sometimes; perhaps this was the newest risk to make the tournament even more exciting for the fans.

Chapter 31- A Change of Plan

Plans changed. Whether the flow of combat dictated it or new conditions were introduced, a battle mage had to be ready and adaptable. Entire classes had been created for the cadets just to help them as falcons to remember to be ready to think on their feet.

For Rilena and the rest of the Windmeer army, it was such a time.

“Nico, Sercea,” Elzen directed a pair of mages already on foot to his left. “Rilena, Zerra cover our wizards on the right.”

Rilena would have taken the time to stare at the falcon that had seemed like such a boy only a day ago, but now took charge like a veteran leader. Dolfeen, another friend and water wizard had their backs with two other wizards now that their plan of assisting Falcon’s Keep had turned into a pure mess. It was the polite wording for it, the girl thought, as a mass of wolves and lions seemed to swirl around the darker, slower, upright forms of goblins and orcs in their armor.

While she couldn’t say that she liked Falconi Ralto’s personality from her dealings with him, the falcon barely knew him, and he had always seemed a little too full of himself. If he was a Falconi, however, Rilena also knew that he must be an excellent commander no matter what her opinion, since it wasn’t a position buyable by some rich lord’s family. At this point in his choice of plans, the falcon had
little love for his blunt and audacious approach to the joining up with their allies. The enemy had simply waited for a better place to attack and the assault sprang up as a trap all around them.

The enemy’s assault had been perfectly planned. After the front of their column had entered into a passage between the trees that narrowed their numbers once more, a group of wolves had attacked the rear. The cries of men and horses gave warning to the rest, but Rilena with her friends had been in the center and still the enemy was upon them before much of a defense could be raised.

What had happened to Falconi Ralto and Wizard Delfar and the rest of the lead group no longer mattered as the beasts and soldiers of the enemy came at their line from all sides. Flashing from the brush and deeper woods, the enemy had been among them too fast for many of the army to react.

Elzen had been one of the quicker ones to respond. Calling out orders to cancel the disarray, soldiers, falcons and wizards began to fight back. The emperor’s armies had never been ones to play fair after all, so the men and women of Southwall were sadly used to it. Still the ambush had been unavoidable save to never have tried to get to their allies from Falcon’s Keep at all.

Voices rose throughout the column as leaders arose to pull the army of Southwall together. Fire and other spells lashed out lighting the night as well as consuming the slowest of enemies. Rumbles in the earth heralded wizards fighting back and raising new defenses.

Rilena slashed at one of the lions. Striking a front leg, the animal seemed to half shift between animal and human form. Claws on the unharmed arm slashed at the mage only to be blocked by a mage shield. So intense was the personal battle, the falcon missed a second attacker. Luckily, Elzen suddenly appeared at her shoulder warning her, “On your left.”

The words only served to let her know that he was there to meet the attack of a second lion. They were quick and required constant shifting of lines and focus as the swift creatures moved in and out of range.