by R. L. King
“Sure, no problem.” She laughed. “Plenty of room. Just let me know if you need anything.”
Stone took a seat at the table nearest the window, where he could keep an eye on the door and the people walking by outside. Aside from the small, chunky vase containing a fresh flower, the only thing on the table was a copy of the Palo Alto Weekly someone had left behind. He glanced at the headline, then tossed the paper onto the table behind him. He didn’t want anything distracting him.
A few more people ambled by before he spotted what he was looking for. A dark-haired man of medium height approached slowly from the right. He wore a buttoned overcoat and slacks, and carried a large green shopping bag. The top of a brown cardboard shipping box poked out of the top.
Stone narrowed his eyes, continuing to watch the man. Oddly, he seemed nervous. His aura was watchful, and a couple times he glanced behind him as if expecting someone to be there.
Either he was a damned good actor, or he was twitchier about this meeting than Stone was.
Maybe they’re scared of me. He could use that to his advantage, perhaps. But it still didn’t mean he could afford to get sloppy.
The man pushed open the door, scanned the shop’s interior with obvious magical sight, and entered. His shoulders dropped a bit with relief when he spotted Stone, and he hurried over to take the seat across from him.
“Did you bring it?” he muttered.
“Did you?”
He patted the bag. “Right here.”
Stone patted his pocket.
“Do you want to get some coffee or something?”
Stone snorted softly under his breath. “Thank you, no. Forgive my lack of trust, but—well—I don’t trust you, so I won’t be eating or drinking anything.”
The man gave a thin smile. “I don’t blame you. I don’t trust you either. Shall I do the illusion, or do you want to?”
“I’ll do it.” He glanced around first. The male barista had returned to the back. The woman was rinsing blender pitchers with her back to the room. The laptop couple were still oblivious. Quickly, he summoned an illusion around the table to make it appear that the two of them were sharing an innocuous conversation.
“We’ll have to be careful,” he muttered. “If we actually do get this thing working, it’s likely to interfere with the illusion.”
“If we get it working, I won’t care.”
He had a point. They weren’t doing anything wrong or illegal, even if someone did spot them messing with a two-foot-tall black obelisk. “All right—let’s get on with it. I don’t plan to stay here long.”
“Nor I.” He reached down, pulled the box from the shopping bag, and set it on the table. “Show me yours.”
Stone didn’t laugh, but it was a close thing. Instead, still keeping an eye around him, he withdrew the pyramid and placed it in front of him.
The man gazed at it a moment, then lifted a larger black object free of the box.
Now it was Stone’s turn to stare. The base looked identical to the pyramid in materials and construction. The lines of symbols and sigils along its sides were clearly in the same language. The two nubs at the top appeared to exactly match the holes on the bottom of the pyramid. Even without magical sight, he could tell it was the real deal; in fact, being near it made him feel vaguely uncomfortable.
The man seemed to notice Stone’s discomfort. “I don’t like being around it either. It’s making my head hurt. Let’s do this quickly.”
“Do you have the instructions?”
He tilted his head. “Instructions?”
“From what I understand, there might be a set of instructions explaining how to make it work. I don’t have them—and it appears you don’t, either. So I hope my understanding is wrong.”
“Let’s put it together and find out.” The man looked around again, nervously. Stone’s illusion allowed them to see the room as it was while hiding their activities from the outside world. So far, nothing had changed.
Moving with caution and keeping magical sight up, he lifted the pyramid and settled it on top of the base, lining up its holes with the projections on the larger piece.
Both he and the Ordo man leaned closer in anticipation.
Nothing happened.
Stone narrowed his eyes. Both pieces were still putting out the unsettling anti-magic field, but it didn’t seem to be any more powerful or reach out any farther than it had when the pieces were separate. The illusion remained strong, unaffected.
“It isn’t working,” the Ordo man said. “The symbols line up perfectly. It’s obvious the two sections were meant to fit together.”
“Yes.” Stone sighed. “But if there’s some sort of ritual required to get it started, I haven’t got a clue what it is. I wouldn’t know where to start looking for it.”
The man looked up sharply, almost as if trying to determine whether he was lying. “We don’t have it either, obviously, or I’d have brought it.” He looked at the black obelisk in frustration. “This was pointless. If you thought there was another component, why did you call me if you didn’t have it?”
It took only a second for that to sink in. Stone jerked his head up and fixed a hard stare on the man. “What? I didn’t call you. You called me.”
They got it at exactly the same instant—but by then it was too late. Next to the obelisk, the chunky flower vase emitted a powerful cloud of shifting green gas. So did the ones on the two tables next to them.
The Ordo man moved fast. Stone moved faster. Both of them lunged free of their chairs, trying to get out of the cloud’s reach, but neither made it. Stone’s legs seemed to belong to someone else, for all the control he had over them. He crashed to the floor, twitching.
The instant before he passed out, he spotted two things: the Ordo man lying unconscious next to him, and the sly, triumphant grin of the barista as she came around the counter toward them.
35
Stone noticed three things when he regained consciousness, all of them without opening his eyes.
First, he was cold.
Second, wherever he was, it wasn’t the coffee shop. Instead of the pleasant aromas of coffee and baked goods, the air smelled dank and sour.
Third, his head swam like he’d just awakened from general anesthesia. His thoughts moved sluggishly, foggy and disorganized.
A moment later, he noticed something perhaps more important than all three of the others: stout bracelets encircled his wrists. When he lifted his hand, something rattled against the floor.
Chains.
It seemed this evening wasn’t going well at all.
He opened his eyes, and confirmed it.
He lay on the concrete floor of a small room, perhaps eight feet on a side. There were no windows. The room’s only illumination came from a bare lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. The concrete explained part of why he was cold—the rest came from the fact that he wore nothing but his black boxer briefs.
As he’d surmised, someone had locked thick metal manacles around his wrists. Chains attached to them extended a short distance to the room’s center, where a metal cage protected a familiar object. The chains were fastened to a thick metal anchor bolted to the floor.
“Bloody hell…” Stone murmured.
The black obelisk was inside the cage, which had also been bolted to the floor. Both parts were still there, but it somehow seemed more complete than before. It was hard to tell through the narrow spaces between the cage bars from Stone’s angle, but it appeared the faint line between them was gone, as if the two pieces had been fused into a single whole.
From the other side of the cage came a soft groan.
Stone snapped his gaze up. He’d been so focused on his own misery and his shock at seeing the obelisk that he hadn’t noticed he wasn’t alone in the room. He sat up a little, setting off a cascade of swirling confusion inside his head, and lowered himself back down again. All he could see of his cellmate from that position were the light-blue plaid boxer shorts and pal
e, hairy legs of a white man.
“Who’s over there?” he croaked. His voice echoed hollowly in the small space.
The other man moaned again, but didn’t reply.
Stone took in the rest of the room with a quick glance. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all water-stained gray concrete, with a drain in the floor near the cage. On the wall closest to his feet, a heavy metal door was currently closed. Aside from the cage, the obelisk, the chains, the lightbulb, and the two occupants, the room had no other features. No furniture, nothing on the walls.
It was indeed a cell—and not a very hospitable one.
At least there weren’t any cameras he could see. If they were present, they were well hidden.
His brain was clearing now, at least enough so he could recall his last memories before he’d passed out.
The coffee shop.
The green gas erupting out of the flower vases.
The barista’s nasty, triumphant smile.
Had the Ordo planned an ambush? Had they somehow managed to hide their presence from him, lure him in, and drug him?
That didn’t make sense, though. He clearly remembered the Ordo man falling next to him, looking as shocked as he’d been. Was that a ploy? Was the man even now off in another room, watching him through a hidden camera and laughing at how gullible he’d been?
But why would they even bother with all this if all they wanted was the device? Why bring him…where?
Snippets of their conversation flooded into his mind:
Why did you call me if you didn’t have it?
And his own reply: What? I didn’t call you. You called me.
He let his breath out, sinking back to the cold floor.
They’d been played.
Both of them had been played.
And now he was sure he knew who his fellow captive was.
The chains were barely long enough to allow him to sit upright, but nothing more. He wrenched himself up, shivering, noting it didn’t seem his captors had injured him physically beyond the effects of the gas and the cold. It didn’t matter how he felt, though—he needed to get out of here before whoever had done this to him returned.
He shifted himself until he was as far away from the cage and the obelisk as he could manage, then attempted to switch to magical sight.
Nothing happened.
No, no, no…
Bright panic stabbed at him, increasing his heart rate, but he drove it back down. If he panicked now, everything would be lost.
Just focus. You can do this. You’re stronger than they are.
He closed his eyes and concentrated, trying to open the familiar connection to Calanar. Even if his captors had managed to get the obelisk functioning, it shouldn’t work against Calanarian magic, right? Even in Windermere, when his mad grandmother’s people had dosed him with an alchemical concoction to block his magic, it hadn’t stopped him from pulling power from Calanar. All he’d need to do was keep his focus, pop off these manacles, and then whoever had done this would quickly learn the consequences of messing with him. If he could free his cellmate too, maybe he’d add his magic to their effort.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend, after all…
He took several slow, deep breaths, did his best to clear his mind, and visualized the pattern that would connect him with Calanar’s burgeoning wellspring of energy.
Nothing.
It was as if someone had built a solid wall between him and what he was trying to reach. He couldn’t even feel it anymore.
No…
With a growl of sudden rage, he yanked hard on the chains in an attempt to pull them loose from the anchor with nothing but physical force.
They didn’t budge. All he accomplished was to scrape his wrists and wrench the muscles in his shoulders.
He lunged forward, trying to force his hands between the cage bars. Maybe if he could knock the obelisk over, it would break apart again. But the bars were thick, and the spaces between them were too narrow to fit more than his fingertips past.
Clearly, whoever had done this had planned it with care.
His gaze fell on his cellmate again. Now that he was seated, he could see it was the dark-haired Ordo mage from the coffee shop, as he’d suspected. The man’s eyes were closed, his face pale and blotchy, his breathing slow.
Stone shifted his body as close to the cage as he could, then reached out with a foot and prodded the man’s leg. “Oi. Wake up.”
The Ordo mage groaned, louder this time. “What…?” he muttered.
“Wake up. We’re in a bit of a pickle here.”
“What…?”
Stone poked him with his toe again, harder. “Come on. Wakey wakey. We’ve got to figure something out before they come back to check on us.”
A terrifying thought stabbed at his brain: what if they aren’t coming back to check on us? What if they’ve left us here to die? He squelched it fast, though. If they were going to get out of here, he’d need his brain focused on the problem, not on wasting time worrying about hypotheticals.
The man pulled his legs away, rolled over, and stiffened. “I’m…chained.”
“Yes, do keep up. Are you all right otherwise? Did they hurt you?” Stone tried to speak briskly, but his voice shook with the cold. Although it wasn’t freezing in here, they hadn’t bothered to turn on the heater, either. Concrete held cold well, especially when all you had on was your shorts.
“C-cold.”
“Yes. That too.” Stone supposed he should give the man a few moments to get caught up, but they didn’t have time. “Look—do you remember anything about the coffee shop?”
The man glared at him. “You…tricked me.”
“No. And you didn’t trick me. Somebody else tricked us both. And if you haven’t noticed yet, it seems they’ve got our little device functioning, though I can’t imagine how. Does your magic work? Try it now, please.”
“Ugh…” The man blinked a few times, trying to clear his head, and aimed a dirty look at Stone. But then he took a deep breath and assumed the thousand-yard stare that clearly indicated an attempt at magical sight.
Stone didn’t have to wait for his look of panic to see it wasn’t working. He sighed. “You too, then.”
“What’s…happening? How did we—”
“Look—I don’t know much more than you do. I woke up five minutes before you did. We’re in a concrete room, chained to the floor in our pants, and that thing inside the cage is preventing us from using magic.”
“Who did this?” His voice was clearer now, but like Stone’s, it shook with cold. He, too, scrambled around until he was seated upright, staring at Stone through the bars of the cage.
“Don’t know.”
“How are we going to get out of here?”
Despite Stone’s opinions of the Ordo in general, he couldn’t help feeling a bit of sympathy for this particular representative of the organization. This was objectively a terrifying situation, and if whoever had impersonated him had been telling the truth, the man was a scholar, not an adventurer. He looked like a middle-aged accountant who was a long way out of his comfort zone. “Just—don’t get yourself all wound up just yet. We’ll figure something out. What should I call you?”
“Richard.”
“Richard, then. And you already know who I am, so there’s introductions sorted.”
Richard narrowed his eyes. “How are you so damned calm?’
“Calm? Me?” Stone snorted. “Obviously you can’t see what’s flying around inside my head if you think that. But if we’re going to have a chance of getting out of here, we can’t let panic take over.”
“We’re not getting out of here. Not as long as our magic doesn’t work.”
“Now, see, I used to be like you, thinking magic was the only answer to everything. Fortunately, though, I got rather forcibly disabused of that notion.”
“So what are you going to do, then?” Richard twisted around so he could get a straight-shot glare at Stone.
“Rip the chains out with your massive muscles?”
“Well…no. You’ve got me there.” Despite his regular, post-Calanar gym routine, massive muscles and Stone weren’t two concepts that were ever likely to coexist.
“What, then?”
“You’re right about one thing: we’ve got to get our magic back. So, since we can’t rip the chains out, I think our best bet is to see if we can dislodge this cage and knock the obelisk over.” He shifted position, moving as far as the chains would allow toward the back of the cage. “Shall we give it a go?”
“You want to push on it? Can’t you see it’s bolted down?”
“Yes, but who knows how well? Between the two of us, we might have a chance. Not a good one, admittedly, but would you rather sit there on your arse and do nothing?”
Richard shot him a sour look, but sighed loudly and hitched himself backward on his butt. “This isn’t going to work. We’re going to die here.”
“That’s the spirit. Now belt up and push.”
Unfortunately, they soon discovered that whoever had bolted the cage to the floor had apparently taken their plan into account. Despite pressing their combined weight into the side, the thing didn’t even move. The bolts stayed solidly in place, and the black obelisk seemed to mock them from inside, like a Christmas tree fortified against mayhem-minded kittens.
Richard slumped back to the floor. “This is hopeless.”
This man was getting tiresome in a hurry. “We’re still alive. That means it’s not hopeless. I just wish I knew who’s done this.”
Almost as if someone had been waiting for his words, a key rattled in the door lock. An instant later, the door swung outward to reveal a shadowy, broad-shouldered male figure framed in the opening.
“Well,” the new man said. “Settling in, I see. Good.” His voice was deep, serious but somehow also amused. The voice of a man who was certain he had the upper hand.
“Bugger off,” Stone said. “Who the hell are you, and why did you bring us here?”
The man stepped into the light. He was tall, of middle age, dressed in a severe black shirt, jacket, and slacks. His graying hair was cut short and his face clean-shaven. He watched Stone and Richard with a calm, unruffled expression and a steady gaze. “Who I am doesn’t matter,” he said. “I am but one of many. And as for why you’re here? To face retribution, of course.”