Fire Within: Book Two of Fire and Stone (Stories of Fire and Stone 2) (42 page)

“That ash trick is a new one. Thanks,” the Baliyan captain said.

“You’re welcome,” Esset said absently. The incident was quickly forgotten as they walked over to the farmer who’d nearly shot the captain.

“I’m sorry! Please don’t kill me!” the man cried, cowering in the dirt.

“Stand, citizen,” the captain commanded him. The farmer did as he was told, nervously brushing dirt from his pants to hide the shaking of his hands.

“Sir, I didn’t mean—” the farmer began, but Captain Langson held up a hand to stop him.

“It’s okay. You saw the fire birds and panicked, that’s natural. Next time keep a steadier hand,” the captain said.

“Yes, sir, I will, sir,” the farmer stuttered.

“But you’d have to be pretty wound up to get that jumpy. Were you keeping watch here, acting as a sentry?” Esset asked. The farmer nodded emphatically.

“Yes, sir, there’s been, ah, sightings, and the folks, all of us, are scared. We’ve been taking watches in shifts, just in case,” the farmer reported.

“What kind of sightings?” Captain Langson asked. The farmer shifted his feet, not meeting their eyes. He seemed as hesitant, or more so than the healer from the last village to impart the nature of said sightings. They each knew how it sounded to someone who hadn’t seen what they had, and it made them reluctant. They had a problem, but they couldn’t figure out how to present it so it didn’t sound like foolish nonsense and superstition.

“Sightings of Death,” Esset supplied for him. The farmer looked at him in wide-eyed surprise.

“Sir, yes, sir!” he confirmed. “Almost all of us have seen it now. Death himself is stalking us, sirs!”

“How many people have you lost?” the captain asked.

“Three, sir,” the farmer said, subdued again, this time in sorrow. “My son Charlie turned up two nights past. Only a monster could have done what was done to him.”

People started to gather by the nearest house of the village, peering at them from a distance. Some were so bold as to start coming forward, but the captain didn’t want to stick around.

“Thank you, citizen,” the captain said to the man, clapping him on the shoulder. “You’ve been a great help. We’ll scout the area, to be sure Death isn’t near now, and we’ll get to the bottom of this.”

Esset just hoped they’d be able to catch Moloch in time. These people were terrified, and rightfully so. He glanced back at the huddle of people they left behind, and tried not to think of what might happen to them. He’d do everything he could, and that was all he could do. At least, that’s what he told himself.

Esset and Captain Langson returned to Castle Ballan after gathering reports from across Baliya. Their shoulders were slumped with exhaustion by the time Esset landed them in the courtyard and banished their mounts.

“Well, looks like you were right, and your bogeyman is very real and here after all,” Captain Langson said with a rueful shake of his head. “Don’t get me wrong, I believed you when you said Moloch was real, but…”

“I get it,” Esset said. “But the reports we gathered definitely point to Moloch. That many horrific deaths…” They were both silent for a moment; they’d seen one of the mutilated corpses that had been found just that morning. It had been slashed and cut to pieces, just as all the others had been described.

“Although…” Esset mused aloud. “I do wonder at all these sightings of Death. Moloch isn’t known for playing charades.”

“And you said Moloch wasn’t one to shy away from opponents, but reports are fewer the closer they are to the castle,” Captain Langson added.

“But Moloch was just sorely beaten, so he may be playing it safe,” Esset countered.

The captain only shrugged. “Regardless, I have orders and briefings I need to give.”

Esset nodded. “I need to let Toman know what’s going on too.” The summoner pulled a tiny stone snake from his pocket and held it next to his face so the tiny creature could curl around his ear.

“What is
that
?” the captain asked, squinting at it.

“One of Toman’s creations. We have a mage helping us, and he put a communication spell on these so we can talk to each other,” Esset explained.

“Convenient.” Captain Langson looked impressed.

“More so than ferrying physical letters across great distances,” Esset agreed.

“Well, I’d better get going.” The captain saluted Esset and walked away before Esset could return the gesture.

“Communication pending,” Erizen’s voice said in his ear, issued from the tiny snake’s mouth—Erizen had enchanted the thing to say that until the spell was activated on the other end. Esset rubbed his hands together against the cold, then lit a tiny fire in his palm to warm them.

“Toman here.” The Animator was the first to answer.

“Hey Toman, it’s Esset,” the Summoner replied.

“And here I thought I’d be the one calling everyone,” Toman said. “Since I’m pretty sure Moloch is here.”

“What? That can’t be right. I’ve found his handiwork
here
,” Esset replied. They were both silent for a moment as the implications of that discovery ran through their heads.

“Tseka and Erizen here,” the Nadra said in Esset’s ear.

“Esset and I are here already,” Toman told them. “What have you found there?”

“Well, something’s going on,” Tseka replied. “People have been going missing, but all that’s been found are skeletons—the bones have been picked clean. Erizen says he’s never seen the like of it, but he wouldn’t put it past Moloch to do something like this.”

“If the victims were alive when the flesh was being picked off their bones, it would be right up his alley,” Erizen drawled. Esset felt his stomach churn and he shoved the horrible mental picture away.

“But it’s following a pattern, right? First a couple people went missing from disparate areas, and the bodies weren’t discovered until later. Now more are going missing more quickly, and their bodies are being found faster too. Am I right?” Toman asked.

“Yes,” Tseka confirmed.

“Same here, except the bodies have been mutilated by blades and animals—well, that’s the guess, anyways,” Esset put in. “The bodies are so destroyed, it’s difficult to tell.”

“Same here too,” Toman said, confirming Esset’s hunch to that effect. “The bodies found earlier looked like they’d been ravaged by disease—or rather, multiple diseases, according to the healer I spoke to, and the diseases seem to have moved at a highly accelerated rate. We even found some of the missing folk still alive, although they didn’t live long. They were easy to find—we just followed the screams. Sedina is under quarantine, by the way, and all the villages are terrified of plague, but it isn’t acting as plague normally does. It’s different than yours, yet still the same as what you describe.”

“But how can Moloch be in all three places at once?” Tseka asked.

“And is he somewhere else we’re not aware of too?” Esset asked.

“We can’t worry about other places,” Toman said. “We’re covering all the area that we can. But what this means is that we’re all on our own. Even Moloch can’t be three places at once, but clearly he’s found a way to act as if he is. But this means we each have to stay where we are.”

“Are we each of us strong enough to face him alone?” Tseka asked. Her tone suggested doubt.

“We’ll have to be,” Esset replied, grim. He didn’t see how they had much choice. In fact, he knew for a fact that if they left one place, that would be the place Moloch would strike. No, risky though it was, this was the way it had to be. Erizen was powerful, and Tseka was strong and cunning too—between the two of them, maybe they could tackle Moloch, or at least hold him off. Esset wasn’t sure he could face the mage alone, but he knew he was stronger than before, and had a fighting chance. Toman he worried most about—he had no magical defenses, per se. He had his animations—and lots of them—but no more than that, nothing that could be called up between himself and a hostile spell. Esset worried.

They each shared the details of their findings before wrapping up their conference and deactivating the little snakes. Esset’s stone snake curled inside his pocket, and for a long time, Esset just stared into the fire cupped in his palms. Finally he resigned himself to his need for sleep—the next day would be a long one.

Toman strode down the hallway away from Sedina’s council room. As he walked, he massaged his temples and stretched his jaw, which was cramped from clenching it so hard. He wasn’t really paying attention to his surroundings until someone called his name from behind.

“Toman? Toman! Is that really you?”

Toman turned to see a childhood friend: Lors. The bear-like man enveloped him in a hug that made it difficult to breathe. The spine of a book held under Lors’s arm dug into Toman’s ribs.

“Lors, it’s good to see you,” Toman squeaked, trying to get enough air to breathe and still speak.

“Brightfire, you too,” Lors said, releasing the animator only to give him a wallop on the back—intended to be a comradely gesture, no doubt. As Toman staggered under the force of the friendly blow, he missed the expression on Lors’s face as the mage spied the scar on Toman’s neck. Lors covered his reaction with conversation.

“I couldn’t believe it when I heard you were dead; you and Jonathan were always so clever. I still remember when you used your magic to get that bully Johnny Cooper in trouble. He never picked on me again after that,” Lors reminisced.

“You were a lot smaller back then. I doubt you’d have trouble with him now,” Toman said, readjusting the map tube across his back. He still had a bit of trouble reconciling the round-faced little boy he remembered with this hulking man in mage’s robes before him.

“Bah, people like Johnny Cooper will always cause trouble.” Lors gave an unbothered shrug. “But what’s going on, Toman? You looked upset when I first saw you.”

Toman pulled a face. “That’s because I just came from the council room.” He briefly explained about Moloch, the plague beasts, and the threat they posed. “All they want to do is quarantine Sedina. I tried appealing to their sympathies for those outside Sedina—I even tried pointing out that they’d have trouble getting supplies in under quarantine. Fool that I am, I didn’t expect it to be so hard to get these idiots to protect themselves.”

“It’s usually like that with the nobility, but not all of them are so bad,” Lors reassured him.

Toman shook his head. “I know. And I did manage to get permission to borrow two mages to help. I was actually going to go looking for you. I have my animations out scouring the kingdom for Moloch or his handiwork, but physical searches are a poor second to magical aid for that task. The council doesn’t seem to see the importance of speed, either, but we have to find and stop Moloch before he can rebuild his power base.”

“Count me in,” Lors said without hesitation. “Who else is coming?”

“I was going to ask for Mage Iskin,” Toman replied. “Do you know where I can find him?”

“Here in the Mage’s Tower somewhere. The servants always know where he is.” Lors caught the eye of a servant refilling the wall-sconces.

“Could you please fetch Mage Iskin for us?” Lors was as polite as ever.

The servant inclined his head, set down his tools, and headed up the stairs.

“So what does the university have you working on?” Toman asked, more out of politeness than anything else. Lors immediately launched into an enthusiastic explanation of some technical magical theory he was studying. Toman didn’t understand much of it, but he made the appropriate noises in the appropriate places. Esset, no doubt, would have hung on his every word or even contributed to the conversation.

Lors was only interrupted by Iskin’s arrival.

“This had better be worth climbing down two flights of stairs,” a new voice wheezed. A decrepit man tottered around the corner, leaning heavily on a cane.

“Good afternoon, Mage Iskin,” Toman greeted him, wondering if Iskin would recognize him—or remember him at all. The old mage had tutored him and Esset a long time ago, and he’d been old
then
. But for all his crotchety attitude, Iskin was far more clever than he let on, and he was a very skilled mage.

“You little upstart, what kind of authority do you have to pull me away from my work? It’s very important, you know!” Iskin’s scowl was fierce and he planted his cane in front of him with both hands atop it. Somehow that was more intimidating than had he shaken it in the air at Toman.