The Adventures of Benjamin Skyhammer (6 page)

Four Hills' locals held an annual contest to see who could come up with the most creative answer and they enjoyed hearing any stories the tourists had learned.

* * *

Two hours out from Four Hills, Skyhammer could see, from the prow of Higgins' sloop, a dark column hovering in the distance. Floatilla.

Skyhammer thought it looked like a giant shiny earthworm hurtling towards Four Hills.

"Isn't it beautiful?" Higgins rested her forearms on the railing next to him, a delighted smile etching her face.

"I suppose." Skyhammer craned his neck to see the top. He'd never been up. What would the world look like from so high? Everything below you would seem very insignificant. He chuckled. Below Floatilla resided the King, the most significant person in the citizens' lives. If he died, the Kingdom had ten days to find a replacement, or the Royal Circle disappeared and no one could do magic until a new King was made at the Kingmaker Tower.

"What is it?" Higgins couldn't take her eyes off the city. One hand crept to her hip, fondling the glass slate resting in a low-slung pouch.

"Just feeling sorry for the King." Unable to leave the Palace, the King had it worse than Skyhammer. At least he could escape the Royal Circle whenever he wanted and exist outside, where magic was not the most important part of daily life.

Higgins nodded. "Can you imagine if he just ran out of Four Hills and didn't tell anyone?"

"A lot of people would come crashing down." He grinned. "Might be good for them." He pictured the King making a dash for freedom one lazy afternoon, buildings and people plummeting to the ground as he fled, like a storm front chasing a dolphin across the sea.

Higgins frowned. "There are good people up there too. You're as bad as them sometimes."

"Ouch!" Skyhammer nudged her with his hip. "Too cruel."

"I'm one of them." Higgins' voice was low.

"You're the only good one."

When the ship entered the shadow of Floatilla, they both stared up to where it started, a couple hundred feet above their heads. Skyhammer looked behind him, back out where sunlight still danced on the waves, where freedom beckoned. When he turned back, Higgins' magic slate was in her hand and the ship was rising above the water and gaining speed. Her sails disappeared and the wooden deck beneath Skyhammer's feet became slate.

They had decided to disguise the ship and themselves as soon as they arrived back in the Royal Circle. If humans outside the Royal Circle were ready to murder Skyhammer over the changed Retrographs, then inside the Circle would be a million times worse, Skyhammer figured.

"Skyhammer!" Higgins pointed over the bow, a puzzled look on her face.

He followed her finger. "I see them!" A black line of flying objects resolved itself into five airships, each twice the size of Higgins' yacht.

Higgins brought her boat to a halt. The contingent of airships surrounded them. Skyhammer felt the strange warming of his skin that meant Higgins had put a body shield in place. It calmed him. To be accosted so soon after entering the Circle did not bode well.

"King's Guard," Skyhammer noted as the airships came close enough for him to discern the orange and black chevrons on the side. He stood with Higgins at the wheel and watched as three flying carpets left the airship that hung just off their bow. The three orange carpets landed on the deck. Off each carpet stepped a King's Guard, male, wearing the black and orange livery of the King. Skyhammer could see a slight shimmering around each man; they were all shielded, slates strapped to their palms.

"Higgins and Skyhammer. Welcome back to Four Hills." One of the men stepped forward. "I am Captain Acidophilous, head of the King's Guard. The King has sent us to escort you to the Palace. If you will proceed at our pace, it would be appreciated. I am leaving these two guards on your ship to protect you."

Skyhammer and Higgins exchanged a glance.

"Captain Acidophilous, I'm Captain Higgins." She emphasized the 'captain'. "I'm sure there's some mistake. We don't need an escort to the Palace. Both of us have been there before and the King knows us. And
I
don't need your men protecting me."

Skyhammer smiled to himself. Acidophilous could not be aware that Higgins was one of the most powerful magicians in Quasianti, probably second or third only to the King's personal magician.

Acidophilous looked from Higgins to Skyhammer then back at Higgins. "Captain Higgins, this force has been sent to protect you and your ship. Since you've been away you may not know-" He hesitated. "There is a sizeable contingent of the population who believe that Skyhammer is responsible for the King's changed Retrograph. They wish to-" He paused again. "Take revenge. Of a sort. The King would like you to reach the Palace alive. I do not doubt that you can defend yourself but there are several hundred people back in Port Hill who are raring to try your defences."

Higgins' eyebrows rose.

Skyhammer gulped. And he would've only had Higgins to protect him, had the King not sent his guards. He was suddenly thankful to see the airships and Acidophilous.

"We appreciate your support." He smiled at Acidophilous.

The head of the King's Guard looked at him unsmiling, then bowed to Higgins. "At your service. We are flying at two knots. Do not leave our formation no matter what happens once we get to the port. We will leave guards with your ship then take you to the Palace in our airship. Nice to meet you, Captain Higgins." He stepped on his carpet and was gone.

Skyhammer scowled at the Captain's back. Even from the captain of the King's troops sworn to protect him. Let's see them fight a jungle cat and survive in the desert for three weeks, he grumbled to himself. If this Retrograph Sorcerer sabotages the ceremony, they may have to learn.

The two other guards nodded to Higgins, ignoring Skyhammer, then moved to opposite sides of the ship.

Higgins led the way back up to the wheel deck.

Skyhammer perched on the bench off to the starboard side. Chin resting on his palm, he opened his Retrographs and flicked through them, then closed the Whorl. Restless, he jumped up and moved to his hammock, lolling and watching Higgins spell everything in sight.

Her slate was in constant use now. She laughed as she made a drink fly into Skyhammer's hand. He didn't begrudge her playfulness, of course. He set the drink down next to the hammock with a curt thanks.

"We're entering the Bay of Biscuits."

Skyhammer tore his eyes away from her slate and looked ahead. The port was just ahead, embraced by two headlands lined with dark, mussel-covered rocks. Floatilla loomed overhead.

Higgins brought the ship down into the water next to a dock. The airships matched their movements, staying in exact formation around them.

A bolt of fire sizzled overhead and struck a shield above them, creating a huge shower of sparks. Skyhammer started.

What he had thought was traffic in the air above them now converged into an all-out attack. Forty or fifty carpets hovered above them. Each spell that struck the shield burst into sparks. Encapsulated in a sphere of light and noise, Skyhammer couldn't see beyond the tight circle of airships that held the King's Guard.

"Are they strong enough?" Skyhammer shouted to Higgins.

She laughed. "They're Mage level magicians! They do this for a living! And they've trained together. They can hold off pretty much anything, especially a rag-tag bunch of humans."

"Captain Higgins!" one of the guards shouted.

Higgins and Skyhammer hurried over to him.

"We're getting you off this ship and onto one of ours for the rest of the journey. You have one minute to gather your things. We'll take care of your ship while you're gone."

They raced down to their quarters and grabbed their backpacks. Noise from the exploding spells made conversation almost impossible. It seemed to be getting worse.

When they arrived back on deck, the guard had unrolled a carpet.

"This will take you to our Captain's ship over there." He pointed to an airship hovering about one hundred feet off the bow of Higgins' ship. "I've spelled it with shields and directions. Get on."

A second after they stepped on, the carpet leapt into the air.

Clutching his backpack, Skyhammer fell to his knees and closed his eyes. "I hate the Royal Circle," he groaned. All this Nasuchu-damned flying.

Skyhammer opened his eyes only when he felt the carpet touch down on the airship's deck. A pair of boots barred the front of the carpet.

"Glad you could join us, Captain Higgins. Please come this way." Acidophilous. The boots marched towards the command deck.

Overhead, spells continued to bombard the shields. Most of the ship's main deck was covered by seated troops, slates in hand. Maintaining the shields, Skyhammer supposed. There were two rows of ten guards. He strolled behind Higgins and Acidophilous.

"We have orders not to harm any citizens, so we are attempting to bring them down to the ground," Acidophilous explained. "They are not amenable." The group paused to watch two of Acidophilous's troops cast a spell at an attacker and force her carpet down to the docks. "They have had a chance to blow off some steam though, so that should help."

When they reached the command deck, Acidophilous pointed to two chairs with a good view of the ship. "Please have a seat. We are leaving for the Palace." He called movement orders out to his commanders and the guard magicians.

All but two airships began to rise.

The attackers' spells stopped coming for a brief moment, and Skyhammer caught a glimpse of the people who had so much hatred for him. Most of them, now looking confused, sat cross-legged in the middle of single- or double-person carpets. They looked like ordinary men and women and an interesting mixture of rich and poor.

Who was the Retrograph Sorcerer who had turned humans into panic-stricken and angry citizens? One person with more power than all the King's Guards put together, that's who. It was not who the Sorcerer was, but what he or she had done. Performed magic on a Relic. It took great confidence or arrogance to change a Retrograph, to change so many people's Retrographs. And to give the impression that they were going to sabotage the ceremony! Skyhammer knew the Sorcerer had to be higher than Wizard level to affect a Relic; he had sold Relics to collectors whose first action after buying was to take each Relic to a Wizard level magician and see if they could take the Relic apart or change it in any way.

Skyhammer clenched and released his fists, watching the veins on his forearms pop out. Being dependent on someone other than Higgins made him nervous.

The airship sped forward, rising at the same angle as Port Hill. While Higgins watched up ahead, Skyhammer looked over the ship's side onto Port Hill's collection of bars, warehouses and run-down buildings. Only those that didn't have at least an Enchanter level of magic power lived on the ground. But they were looked down upon less than those who lived outside the Circle altogether. Even if, like Skyhammer's family, they were farmers who supplied the capital and Floatilla, and couldn't afford to move inside.

Port Hill's buildings were made of cheap materials - all other resources went to supplying the floating city. No plant life grew under Floatilla; the city gripped the land in shadow except around sunrise and sunset.

Skyhammer's stomach rumbled. Would the King feed him or just kill him straight away? If the King went to so much trouble to protect them from the attackers, Skyhammer reasoned, he probably did not believe that Skyhammer was the Sorcerer. Perhaps his Royal Highness thought Skyhammer knew the identity of the Sorcerer and would try to torture the answer out of him. Skyhammer, nervous now, began to crack his knuckles, over and over. Higgins glared at him and he stopped. He'd never heard of the King torturing anyone. But that didn't mean it hadn't happened. His breath was shallow and quick. He forced his mind to stop imagining tortures and focused on the airship.

The attackers had stayed in the port presuming Skyhammer and Higgins still to be with their ship, Acidophilous told them. The magicians on board the airships were resting now, although some still maintained the shield. Skyhammer, staring hungrily at all the slates, encountered a number of baleful looks coming from the main deck. He glared back.

Once they had left Port Hill behind, Market Hill rose to their left and Palace Hill lay ahead. The area between all three hills was hard bare ground in the barren shade of the floating city. Mostly carpets zipped through the air between Floatilla and the Hills. Low-level magic humans and a few members of other species travelled the roads on wagons or horseback. Each species' magic powers only worked within that species' Royal Circle.

Higgins sat down beside him and began to spell clean their packs and clothes. After a couple of minutes, she stopped and surveyed them with a critical eye.

She sighed. "It'll have to do - oh!" She made an adjustment on her slate.

Skyhammer watched Higgins' face. She was grinning; her head held high and her fingers spread, suffused with power.

"Does the amount of magic you can do increase?" he asked. "As you get closer to the King?"

"No." She shook her head. "But the feeling is like a high. I feel I could do so much more, sometimes I feel like I'm about to explode with magic. I envy the people who are near him all the time."

His mood blackened. He opened his Whorl and watched again as the glove was snatched from him forever.

"I wish you could feel it too," Higgins blurted out. "I'm scared that the ceremony will be sabotaged."

Skyhammer's lips twisted. "Me too," he whispered under his breath. "Me too." Skyhammer closed his Whorl.

The airship started to climb the long, steep hill topped by the Palace. Halfway down, a high stone wall encircled the hill, intersected only by a gate and guardhouse. Below the wall, the ground was brown and bare. Inside the wall, the grounds were lush. Gardens bursting with bright flowers, paths lined with low bushes, ponds hidden under hanging tree branches. The palace covered the top of the hill like a carefully crafted pile of round, hard candies. The buildings were fat, squat cylinders of orange and pink stone, piled next to and on top of each other. Farthest away was a tower made of four purple cylinders, the tallest structure on the Palace grounds.