Wizard Dawning (The Battle Wizard Saga, No. 1) (16 page)

He set a glass of water and pill on the nightstand. "Here's just what you need for that. Let me help you sit up so you can take the pill, eat breakfast, and go back to LaLa land."

While she downed the pill, Sig fluffed and tucked pillows behind her and laid another across her lap. The tray went on top of that.

Stepping back he said, "I understand that I owe you thanks for getting me out of the spell placed on me."

Her mouth quirked on one side. "It wasn't anything any self respecting momma bear wouldn't do."

"A polar bear in this case."

She shivered. "I've never been so cold."

He leaned over and kissed her cheek. "Thank you momma bear." Straightening, he pointed at the small bell on the tray, and then at her cell phone. "When you're done, use that or that to call me and I'll come get the tray. I expect you to clean the plate and drink everything. You need to build your strength."

"Yes baby bear," she said with a smile.

He smiled at her as he closed the door.

Sig filled his plate and joined Grampa at the breakfast table. Grampa eyed the pile of food Sig set down. "Why don't you just use a platter? Your food hardly fits on the plate."

He poked at the food with his fork and looked up. "I didn't think of it. I should have. I'm really hungry today." He dug in and proceeded to demonstrate what he meant.

"I shouldn't wonder. You went without food for almost thirty hours before we found you. Did you eat last night?"

"Just two apples and a banana after I dropped Mom at the hospital. Things were a little crazy. I had a hundred questions and no answers. I thought I'd be awake all night, but fell asleep almost as soon as I sat down."

Grampa sipped on a cup of tea while Sig demolished his breakfast.

Sig finished most of it in a remarkably short time before Grampa asked, "You were still tired after sleeping all that time?"

"That's the problem, I wasn't asleep. I could still see until Madeline closed my eyes. Even after she did that, I could hear. I listened to her footsteps growing fainter. I heard loud crashing and grinding. Then I kept listening for someone to come. I couldn't move or see—anything."

He took a deep breath as he remembered the hours spent listening, with no other connection to his body. An involuntary shudder washed over him.

"I must have finally fallen asleep. I didn't hear you and Mom come. The constant 'plinking' of dripping water driving me crazy was my last memory before I saw Mom."

"Your little friend is a witch. Black magic is a major ingredient in the potion she gave you. How did she get Aðalbrandr away from you?"

Sig blushed. "She stood in front of me giving me a neck and shoulder rub while I sat on the ledge. I was very relaxed and her . . . chest was in my face. The next thing I knew she had Aðalbrandr off. I grabbed for it but knocked it out of her hand into the water. My mouth must have been open because she shoved something in. That's when my body stopped working. It tasted awful, but I couldn't spit it out."

"Now you've had two encounters with black magic—necromancy with the zombies and now this. Luckily, you've lived through both of them. Most don't."

He motioned at the talisman. "The Dragons Eye is the only thing that protects you from magic of all kinds, both White and Black."

"Dragons Eye? Why did you call it that?"

Grampa looked surprised. "That's always been a name for it. I guess it's because of the carving of the dragon that surrounds the blue stone."

Sig lifted it to look closely. "What kind of stone is it?"

"I've never known. Only the Gnome who made the amulet knew and he died long ago."

"Hmmm. Dragons Eye." Sig let go and the chain swung down.

"Yup, like I said the only thing protecting you from magic is that and your training. We need to focus on training now, in what time we have left."

Sig's eyes grew sad. "Ready and willing sir. Shall we start now?"

Grampa groaned. "I guess we should, although I'd like to sleep for another ten hours." He pushed himself up from the table. "Let's go."

After several weeks, Sig's magic proficiency, or lack thereof didn't change. His warrior skills continued to improve in both his normal and Battle Wizard forms. Some of the advances were significant. In warrior form, he could fell an eight-inch diameter tree with one sweep of Aðalbrandr. When Grampa Thor caught him at it, he made Sig trim the tree and haul it to the barn. "Don't waste. That's a good oak tree. After you're done, find four seedlings and plant them here. Practice sustainable harvesting."

Embarrassed at being caught exuberantly trying out his new power, he knew Grampa was right. That made it worse.

All Sig's fat melted away and his muscles became rock hard in normal form under Grampa's intense training regimen. His quickness neared supernatural. He displayed evidence of it one day when he and Grampa were sitting at the kitchen table while Meredith prepared a cake. She knocked her measuring cup off the counter and Sig sprang out of his chair and caught it before it hit the ground, without spilling a drop.

After Sig placed it back on the counter, she looked at Grampa with amazement. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. "He's gone past all my expectations."

They held magic training in the barn or the covered arena, away from spying eyes.

Sig's progress fell far short of what either of them expected.

Grampa demonstrated distance viewing yet again with a pan of water.

After filling the pan with fresh water, he sprinkled powder over the still water. The powder floated on top, dulling the reflection from the water.

He explained as he progressed. "This is powder made from the dried flowers of Tuscan Blue Rosemary. Rosemary is an anathema to demons of all types, but for this purpose it focuses the viewing."

Sig nodded, having heard it before.

After muttering the Farsi words of enchantment passed down through generations, Grampa bent forward and bent his head sideways, face close to and parallel to the surface of the water. "Gently blow, more like shallow exhale, across the water breathing life into it." He exhaled softly, lips parted, not pursed.

The water became murky and then the clouds cleared revealing one of his favorite viewing locations in Knightsbridge. "Voila, the most famous store in the world, Harrods. A loverly little establishment. One of the few places in the world where shopping is enjoyable."

He waved his hand over it as if brushing the scene aside. The water turned clear again.

"Now you try it."

"Again? It never works for me. I've studied and practiced, ground my own rosemary flowers, used your powder. It's pointless."

Grampa gave him the look. Sig shrugged and picked up the pan to refill it with clean water.

When Sig finished with nothing but a pan of clear water with a small amount of dissolved rosemary flower, Grampa shook his head in frustration.

"Your pronunciation of the words is perfect. You exhale just the right amount, the ripples in the water are nearly invisible, but it just doesn't work."

"I've heard that the definition of crazy is doing the same thing over and over that doesn't work."

He received a disgruntled look from his great-grandfather.

Sig reported for physical training sessions, under Grampa's less than gentle ministrations, in the wooded area of the farm. They called it the hundred-acre wood, although it encompassed 500 acres of pine, oak, beech, birch and maple trees on the slopes of three rocky hills standing over a meandering stream. The wood provided shelter for local wildlife. Family and friends harvested turkey and deer during hunting season.

It also provided a haven from prying eyes while Sig trained in Battle Wizard form with Grampa Thor.

One day, while performing kendo kata, practice exercises, in his normal form under Grampa's watchful eye, Sig faltered to a stop in the middle of a drill and stood with his head cocked as if listening for something. The smell that wasn't a smell, again. The tang of evil, worse than garbage or disease, wafted through the air like old death and ancient anger. It reeked worse than the stink of hot tar with an overlay of fury.

Grampa Thor called out. "What happened, did you pull something?"

Eyes narrowed, Sig raised a hand. "It feels like the Watchers, coming closer." Dark clouds now filled the sky in the same direction.

Grampa slid off the boulder on which he sat while watching Sig practice. "Where?"

Sig pointed with his practice sword downhill along a game trail. "That way."

"You say it feels like the Watchers—zombies?"

"The same but different. There's something else with them." He shivered with the familiar tingle that made the hairs on his neck stand up.

Grampa stepped next to Sig to get a view in the same direction. Through the tree trunks, barren of leaves, they saw movement in the shadows, and then saw it again. Down the hill, a bright light flared. "Holy shit, down!" Grampa shoved Sig in one direction and dove to the ground in another.

A lance of fire flashed down from the sky to the bottom of the hill, and then changed direction to fill the space he and Grampa had occupied. A hissing sound grew into a roar as it rocketed past. It radiated heat like a furnace. A loud crack snapped from behind. From his prone position, Sig swiveled his head in the direction of the noise. A tree fell into the small clearing where he and Grampa had stood.

The lightning bolt had carved a hole through the trunk before it passed on to catch other trees beyond on fire. The flames spread to the branches as the tree fell.

Over the noise, Grampa Thor hollered. "Change, change, Aðalbrandr!"

Sig smelled sulfur as he dropped his practice sword, reached into his shirt, clasped the amulet and whispered "Aðalbrandr." The now-familiar feeling overcame him. It felt like everything around him shifted but he knew he changed. He sheathed Aðalbrandr over his shoulder, getting ready to move.

The tree landed on the rocky ground with a crash. It sizzled in snow that lingered in shaded areas. A figure dove through the flames and rolled across the ground toward Sig. Grampa Thor stopped rolling and batted at flames on his clothes. He turned his smoke blackened face to Sig. "That was lightning driven by hellfire. Use the sword when it comes again. You can block it. Swing at it like it's a baseball. Deflect it."

Sig rolled onto all fours and looked around the tree to see what else might be coming up the hill at them. Shapes flitted from tree to tree. Watchers. This time simulacra spells didn't disguise the rotting forms. He grasped the handle of the sword and pulled it from the scabbard on his back.

He tensed as he rose to his feet and stepped from behind the tree. Eager to see what Aðalbrandr could do to a zombie; his adrenaline raced. Before he could close with the one, another fire bolt redirected from the sky streaked toward him. Raising the sword into a kendo defensive position, he swung to block the bolt. To his amazement, it split and passed on either side of him, doing no damage, except to the trees behind.

"Watch it. You're not the only one around here. Try not to deflect fire into me."

Sig looked back. Grampa stepped out from behind a large smoking tree.

"Are you OK?" Sig asked.

"I'm fine, but remember I'm here." He nodded down the hill. "Keep an eye out for our friends."

As Sig scanned the hillside, six ragged figures shambled out of the woods. Stepping forward, he raised Aðalbrandr and sliced through the first two at waist height with a single sweep. The next two he sheared from shoulder to opposite hip, each with a single blow.

Sig parried a pitchfork thrust at him by the next zombie. Then he thrust Aðalbrandr completely through the zombie. Instead of dropping, it continued trying to walk at Sig along the sword stuck through its chest. Sig whipped the sword to the side and slung the zombie into the woods.

The last one had an ax. Sig caught the handle when the zombie swung it and ripped it out of the zombie's hands. Then just to see if he could, he grabbed the zombie's head and ripped it off its shoulders, slinging it into the woods. The zombie shuffled about, groping with his hands, trying to find Sig.