The Swordmage Trilogy Bundle, Volumes 1-3 (31 page)

Faxon screamed and Tia turned toward the sound. This wasn’t a cry of warning, this was pain, pure, unfettered agony. She saw him from across the sea of bodies, a crossbow bolt sunk deep in his chest. The wound was too high and too far to his right to have hit his heart, but the blood that stained his cream-colored robes was spreading too far, too fast. Faxon collapsed on his uninjured side.

For the first time, Tia could see Wynn. He was fighting at least, but he wasn’t using his full potential. He handled the staff well, swinging it to and fro, shattering an ankle here and crushing a skull there, but he was no match for Faxon’s spells or Tia’s speed. The highwaymen were converging on him, recognizing his weakness and Faxon’s predicament.

Tia prepared to spring, to launch herself into his attackers and save him from the menacing mob. Just before she leapt, her legs were swept out from under her, throwing her face first into the ground. She tasted blood from her lip as it split and struggled to roll over. Her assailant was the woman with the ruined arm, who grinned up at her with unbridled malice. Her teeth were a broken row of yellowed chalk, stained with blood. Tia kicked out hard, the heel of her boot connecting with the woman’s nose. There was a satisfying crunch and the woman was still.

The exertion was taking its toll and Tia had to struggle to get to her knees. One of the men at the edge of the group advancing on Wynn saw her vulnerable position and called to his mates. A moment later, they had abandoned the young apprentice and converged on her. Hands tore at her armor and she felt the shoulder seam of the material give. The witchmetal rings held, but even those she could feel flex under the relentless assault.

Fighting against a wave of blind panic at the mass of hands grabbing at her, she screamed, a raw, primal sound that tore at her throat and burned her lungs.

“Wynn! HELP ME! PLEASE!”

Tiadaria heard Wynn’s cry of rage and it was the last thing she heard. Suddenly all the air was gone. She struggled to breathe and felt her lungs move, but there was nothing to fill them. An instant later, the air rushed back, scorching hot and smelling of burning rock. The wave of air caught her, lifted her, ripping her away from the hands that tried to drag her back down to her death.

Suddenly she was surrounded by flame, dancing black-orange across her vision. She tried to shield her eyes, but couldn’t raise her arms. She could feel the roar of the expanding fireball in the pit of her stomach, but she couldn’t hear its unholy thunder. As suddenly as it had appeared, the conflagration faded and she slammed into the ground. The world went black.

All she wanted to do was sleep, but someone was shaking her and calling her name over and over again. Why wouldn’t they just let her sleep? She was so tired. Something pungent and repulsive was waved under her nose and she tried to move away from it. She opened her eyes to see what produced such an offensive smell and saw Wynn crouched over her with a vial of some foul smelling liquid.

“Tia?” His voice was full of anguish. “Tia, are you alright? Can you hear me? Please! Say something. Say anything.”

Tiadaria tried to lick her lips and found her tongue dry and swollen. She fumbled for the water skin that hung from her belt and found it missing. She must have lost it during the fighting that was, by her best estimate, a hundred years ago.

Wynn reached outside her field of vision and brought a water skin to her lips. She tried to gulp it down, but choked and ended up spitting most of it down her chest. He offered her the skin again and she took a small sip, relishing in the cool soft feel of the water against her tongue and parched lips.

“Tia, can you hear me?”

“I’m okay, Wynn. I think.” Her voice was barely more than a croak. She didn’t sound okay. Even to herself.

She managed to turn her head to one side and saw a mass of smoking ash in a neat little pile. She turned her head to the other side and saw a dozen of those piles. Moving was painful, but she managed to look at Wynn.

“You fought for me,” she whispered. He looked sick.

“For all the good it did us. I need you, Tia. I think Faxon’s dying.”

Faxon’s dying. The words seemed to echo down a deep well in her mind, hitting bottom and sending ripples through her entire body. She groaned, trying to sit up. Wynn offered her his hand and managed to get her up on her knees. She thanked all the minor deities that Faxon was propped up against the wall not too far away. Wynn was right. There was too much blood.

Tiadaria managed to crawl to Faxon. He was white as linen and his head lolled to one side. His eyes were glazed and dull. She looked at the bolt in his chest and realized that neither she, nor Wynn, had any hope of removing it without ensuring that he died.

“Turns out,” Faxon said weakly, his eyes rolling back under his lids. “Wynn does know how to fight.”

“What do we do, Faxon?”

“My pack.” The quintessentialist coughed and blood bubbled at the corners of his mouth. “Get the callstone.”

Tia scanned the pass and saw the pack laying tattered and discarded against the far wall. She half ran, half crawled to it, snagging the strap in one hand and dragging it back. Her fingers tore at the threading around the neck and she cursed loudly when she couldn’t get the knot free. Wynn reached over her hands and pulled the end, loosening it. Tia pulled the mouth of the pack wide and upended it on the ground in front of her.

There were a dozen objects that Tia had never seen before. She looked to Wynn, her eyes pleading.

“What’s a callstone?”

He shook his head, his eyes haunted. “I don’t know, Tia! I don’t know.”

With a considerable amount of effort, Faxon managed to lift his wrist. He waved at a small package wrapped in leather. Tia managed to get it open with numb fingers and a large, cloudy crystal fell between her knees.

She picked it up and felt its latent power thrum through her body. It set her chest to aching all anew, as if she was still holding her swords. Faxon’s head pitched forward suddenly, his chin touching his chest. Tia reached out and shook him.

“Faxon! You need to tell me what to do! Faxon! WAKE UP!” She shook him again, harder this time. She was afraid of hurting him more, but she couldn’t let him go. Tears spilled from her eyes, running hot down her cheeks. “Please, Faxon, don’t leave me.”

Faxon opened his eyes, his pupils were so large there was barely any iris showing. “Call...for...help.” He managed, and then slumped sideways.

Tiadaria crushed the crystal in her hands, she could feel its power. “Help,” she whispered to the crystal. Then she found her voice. “Help! Help us! Please!”

Nothing happened. She folded the crystal in both hands, held it to her chest, and squeezed her eyes shut tightly. Help us! Help us! Help us! The thought tore through her, each mental cry punctuated by a sob. Still nothing happened. She opened her eyes and looked to Wynn. He shook his head sadly.

There was a loud crack from above them and a shower of sparks in every color of the rainbow fell around them. A creature hovered above them on rapidly beating wings. Her skin was so pale it was almost translucent, pale blue veins tracing underneath its surface. Her hair was so ridiculously red that Tiadaria had reason later to wonder if it was even real. Her eyes were violet and huge, drinking in the surrounding scene. The rapid beats of her pearlescent wings wafted cold air across their faces.

“Oh Faxon,” the foot-tall creature said, her voice like a songbird. “What have you gotten yourself into?”

“Please,” Tiadaria pleaded. “Please help him, he’s dying. He told us to use the stone.”

“Fret not, Tiadaria. I’ll see that Faxon recovers.” The diminutive being landed and took a handful of Faxon’s robe. She looked up at Tia and Wynn, towering over her, even though they were kneeling.

“I’m afraid you’re on your own now, younglings.”

With a crack like thunder, Faxon’s body and the tiny winged woman exploded in a shower of rainbow sparks.

Tiadaria stared at the spot where Faxon had been. It seemed almost like a dream, but there was a bloodstain on the ground. He was definitely there a minute ago. She looked at Wynn, who sank to the ground, shaking his head. He was staring at the spot where Faxon had been too.

“Wynn? What just happened?”

“I don’t know. I think--” He stopped, licked his lips, and tried to find words. After a moment, he managed to start again. “I think that a Pheen just took Faxon into the Quintessential Sphere.”

* * *

Zarfensis and the rest of the Xarundi war party had made good time down the near edge of the ravine. Going up the other side proved to be more of a challenge. There was no regular path up from the floor of the gully, so they were forced to find each new hand and foothold, often holding on, quite literally, by their claws. They were burning through entirely too much time.

One of the warriors lost his footing above and nearly slid down the face before managing to find purchase on an outcropping. They tried to stay spread out as they climbed, but if one of the vanguard warriors slipped off the face, chances were good that they would take at least one of the other Xarundi with them on the way down. While the ravine was hardly insurmountable, Zarfensis didn’t relish the thought of falling twenty feet to the jagged rocks below.

Slowly, carefully, they picked their way up the edge of the ravine. By the time the last of them had crawled over the far edge and lay panting with exertion, the eastern sky had begun to lighten. The High Priest ground his teeth. They had lost an entire night to skittering around the rocks like insects. The only consolation was that the girl and the other vermin would be hard pressed to descend as skillfully as they had, nor would they be able to scale this face as easily.

It was likely that they would be hung up here for the better part of a day. Meanwhile, Zarfensis and the other Chosen would be well on their way to possessing the relic. Crouching at the edge of the ravine, the High Priest slipped into the Quintessential Sphere and backtracked along the way they had come. He hoped to find some sign of the vermin, to get an idea of where they were along the path to the ravine, but he was unable to find them. He wasn’t worried. The further away from the physical place one was, the murkier the sphere became over long distances. It was also likely that the vermin were actively working to counter his surveillance. Zarfensis had certainly cloaked his war party with spells that would help them avoid detection both physically and in the sphere.

He called the shaman up from where he was crouched near the languid warriors. He bounded over to Zarfensis, ears and eyes alert.

“Let the warriors rest, shaman. We’ve made good progress tonight and the vermin will be hard pressed to catch up crossing that ravine. We’ll warren here for the day and tomorrow night, we will be in the hills.”

“As you command, High Priest.” The shaman returned to the rest of the Chosen, relaying Zarfensis’s orders to the warriors.

The others began constructing a temporary warren while Zarfensis gazed north. They were very close now indeed. Close enough that the snow-covered tops of the hills glowed in the early morning light. He turned to rejoin the rest of the Xarundi and nearly fell over. The mechanical leg was like a block of ice, cold and unyielding. Zarfensis cast an eye toward the little window in the contraption and found it black, empty. He took a vial of runedust from his belt and poured it into the compartment, feeling the limb come back to life as the gentle blue glow of the death rune pulsed behind the crystal aperture.

Whole once again, Zarfensis returned to the hastily constructed warren. Try as he might, sleep would not come. They were close to the relic now, he could feel it calling to him, compelling him, urging him to find it and possess it. The sun was high in the morning sky before the High Priest was finally able to rest. When he did, his dreams were troubled by visions of the relic crumbling to dust and slipping through his fingers.

* * *

It was cold on the other side of the pass. Stunted grass and rock had given way to packed snow as they climbed higher into the hills at the foot of the northern mountain range. They had stopped in a grove of stunted pine trees to review the map and for something to eat, though neither of them were hungry.

Wynn had been a sullen mess since the incident in the pass. Neither Faxon nor the Pheen had reappeared, so they assumed that they really were on their own. Younglings, the Pheen had called them. Well, Tiadaria thought, that certainly fit. Never before had she felt so small or felt like a task was so insurmountable.

Though she understood why Wynn felt responsible, his wallowing wasn’t helping anyone. She also knew that his use of magic was weighing heavily on him. More than once over the last few hours, she had seen him stumble because his eyes were locked on his staff, but somewhere far away at the same time. Tia had tried to get him to talk about it, but he had curtly informed her that she wouldn’t understand and she hadn’t pressed the issue. He’d talk when he was ready. She hoped.

Tiadaria had been so immersed in her thoughts that she hadn’t realized how familiar the terrain had become. She stopped, turning a slow circle as she surveyed the gentle slope of the hills and the stunted line of pine trees that dotted the northern ridge.

“Hey!” Her exclamation startled Wynn, but personally, she thought he could use a little startling. “I know where we are. This land is part of the clan’s hunting grounds.” Without waiting for him to answer, she grabbed his hand and all but dragged him toward the base of the largest hill.

“Where are we going?” The peevish tone of voice annoyed Tia, but she wasn’t going to let his sourness spoil her surprise. She grinned.

“You’ll see.”

Wynn began to protest but she shushed him, dragging him headlong behind her. They went down a gentle slope and then even the apprentice had to admit that he understood the source of her excitement.

At the base of the hill, a half-circle about fifteen feet tall had been cut directly into the earth. Massive stone blocks made up the outer wall, carved to fit the curve of the circle perfectly. An iron stovepipe jutted out of the wall next to a heavy banded wooden door. He had resigned himself to sleeping in their tent on the cold ground. This was much, much better.

Tiadaria opened the door and bowed deeply, gesturing him inside. As bad as his mood was, Wynn had to chuckle at her ridiculousness. She smiled at him as she lit an oil lamp hanging from the ceiling before closing the door and dropping the bar across it.

She went down the length of the long room, lighting lanterns that hung from the support beams at regular intervals. When she was done, the light in the hunting lodge was just as bright and warm as in the library in Ethergate. Wynn glanced around, taking stock of their much improved fortune.

There was a stove, some shelves with basic cooking implements, and most importantly, cots piled high with furs. Not only would he not have to sleep on the ground, but he’d be warm too. There was a basin next to the stove with a pipe that extended down from the ceiling. A chain with a ring on the end hung at eye level. Without really thinking about it, he reached up and pulled the chain.

Water gushed out of the pipe and splashed into the basin below. Tiadaria laughed at his startled exclamation and watched as he pulled the chain a second time, slower this time, limiting the flow to a trickle.

“Don’t waste it,” she warned him, coming to stand next to him. “The barrels that feed it are up on the hillside. They collect rain and snow and runoff and the water comes here.”

“Why isn’t the water dirty? If its runoff?”

There are screens on top of the barrels, and then there’s this. Tia pulled the bottom section of pipe off and showed it to Wynn. Inside were layers of rock, sand, and charcoal.