by Hylton, PT
He’d grown to appreciate Viktor’s unique outlook, especially on storm magic. The Barskall thought about it in a very different way than Dustin. He just wished he’d open up to the group more often.
After a few wrong turns and bit of backtracking, the crew reached the water. As the docks came into sight, Syd stopped short.
“What the hell is all this?”
Three dozen Stone Shapers stood on the docks, staring at The Foggy Day. The ship appeared to be intact and Dustin saw movement on the decks, so what were all the Stone Shapers doing there?
He turned to Syd. “Any vague notions, Captain?”
Syd thought for a moment. “Maybe we can grab one of them. Interrogate him for information.”
Sigmund shook his head sadly. “You lot are pathetic when it comes to clandestine work.”
Olaf turned to Syd and shrugged. “He has a point. We usually just stab everyone.”
“Come with me.” With that, Sigmund marched right over to the nearest Stone Shaper.
He gestured up at The Foggy Day. “The dirty foreigners are still here, I see.”
The Stone Shaper frowned at him. “Congratulations on your astute powers of observation.”
Sigmund spat on the ground. “Aren’t you supposed to be doing something about that? They’ve sullied our waters long enough.”
The Stone Shaper grinned. He spoke in a quiet, conspiratorial tone. “Chief Magnus happens to agree with you. He’s tired of waiting. If their friends don’t return by nightfall, we’re going to destroy their ship.”
Sigmund let out a hearty laugh. “I knew old Magnus would take care of them.”
“Hasn’t he always? Going all the way back to Ragnar.”
Sigmund led the group a block away, then stopped.
“What now?” Fannar asked. “Do we go back for the others?”
Dustin glanced at sun and saw it disappearing below the horizon. “There’s no time.”
“Dustin’s right,” Syd agreed. “We have to take our shot, and we have to do it now. Olaf, you said you wanted to tangle with Stone Shapers. You’re about to get your wish.”
Chapter Eighteen
Tomas led Abbey down a long, narrow tunnel lit by torches mounted in stone holders. “Are you certain you don’t want to wait until morning? We could have some nourishment brought to you and your friends, and you could rest.”
“Nourishment? What does nourishment consist of down here?”
“We have a wide variety of mushrooms. You haven’t lived until you’ve tasted a Stone Shaper stew of roasted hare and mushrooms.”
Abbey’s stomach began to growl at the mention of roasted hare, but she ignored it. “Maybe once I’m through. This really can’t wait until morning. We need to speak to the council.”
The old Stone Shaper sighed. “I can’t believe I’m letting you do this. It’s disrespectful to the Way of Stone to walk the Path without the proper training. Stoneshaping isn’t like your storm magic. Wind and water are already moving; you simply learn to direct them. Stone magic is different. We must convince the stone to change the very thing that makes it a stone: its stillness. The Way of the Stone is much more difficult than the other forms of magic.”
Abbey wasn’t so sure. “I’ve been taught that all magic comes from the same place. That it’s all different ways of using the same power.”
Tomas groaned thoughtfully at that. “If that is the case, we certainly use the power best.”
They approached an opening in the stone, and Abbey saw sunlight beyond it.
Tomas stopped and turned to her. “Once you begin, there is no turning back. Your cries for help will be ignored. You must walk the Path alone. Are you absolutely certain you wish to do this?”
Abbey nodded, looking past him toward the light. “Can we get on with it? I’d like to try that stew. You’d better get going on that, because this won’t take me long.”
“The stew will be waiting if you survive. Listen, in order to walk the Path, you must first go past, then go through, then go out.” He stepped aside and gestured toward the opening.
Abbey raised an eyebrow. “Another damn riddle?”
Tomas frowned. “If you were properly trained, it wouldn’t be a riddle at all.”
She clapped him on the arm as she walked past him. “You’re a cheery guy, Tomas. A real beam of sunlight in a dark cave.”
She moved through the opening and came out in another narrow passage. Stone walls stood on either side of her, but above her was nothing but open sky.
“Okay, I can do this. Just need to walk the Path.” A sound behind her made her turn. The opening behind her had closed with a thump, leaving only a solid rock wall. “That was predictable.”
The only direction available was forward. From the dim quality of the light overhead, she guessed it was almost sundown. If she didn’t want to do this in the dark, she had to get moving. She took a deep breath and started down the canyon.
“First go past, then go through, then go out,” she muttered to herself as she walked. Her soft voice bounced off the stone walls, creating an eerie echo.
She spotted something in the canyon ahead. A break in the path. She trotted toward it and stopped at the edge. Looking down, she let out a whistle.
It was a pit. Abbey guessed it was about twenty feet across. The distance to the bottom was more difficult to judge, but it had to be at least a hundred feet. The floor of the pit was dotted with jagged rocks.
“Go past, huh?” she muttered to herself. “Well, he never said it was going to be easy.”
The stone on either side of her groaned, and she felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. The canyon walls were closing in on either side of her, slowly but steadily. If she kept standing there, she’d be crushed.
What would a young Stone Shaper do to go past this obstacle? There were dozens of possibilities. He could raise the floor of the pit. Or create a bridge of stone across it. Or stop the walls from moving.
But she wasn’t a Stone Shaper, so her options were decidedly more limited, and she didn’t have long to settle on one.
“Okay, I got this,” she said aloud. She took a few steps back and then sprinted forward. Just as her foot planted on the edge of the pit and she launched herself into the air, she reduced her weight.
She risked a look down as she floated over the pit, and her breath caught as she imagined what it would be like to plummet to those rocks down there. Then she looked up again and realized she’d miscalculated.
For a terrible moment, she thought she wasn’t going to make it. She was descending too quickly, and the edge of the path was too far away. She should have made herself even lighter. But it was too late to think about that now.
As she descended, she reached out as far as she could. At the last moment, her fingers touched the edge, and she grabbed it hard. She let herself dangle a moment, catching her breath as she held on with one hand. Then she pulled herself up.
“Ha!” she shouted. “I’ll bet you never thought I’d get past that one, did you? Either your test isn’t as impossible as you thought, or I’m just that good!”
There was no response other than the echo of her voice in the distance, which made the taunt a little unsatisfying.
“Fine, be that way,” she muttered. Then she started down the trail.
She began to trot. The light was fading fast, and she wanted to be done with this nonsense before it was completely gone.
First go past, the old Stone Shaper had told her. Then go through.
But go through what?
A few minutes later, she found out.
A boulder, twelve feet tall and almost as wide as the canyon, blocked her path.
She gave a little whistle. It was no wonder Tomas assumed a non-Stone Shaper wouldn’t be able to make it through this. The boulder was smooth, and would be impossible to climb.
Thankfully, she didn’t have to.
As she bent down to pick up the boulder, her mind flashed back to the yea
rs she’d spent in the near isolation of her father’s blacksmith shop. Now she was in the mythical land of Gren, trying to get help from a secret tribe of stone magic users. It hadn’t been that long since those days in the blacksmith shop, but it sure felt like another life.
She channeled magic to reduce the rock’s weight. She thought, My life has gotten really freaking weird.
Picking up the rock, she had to remind herself to be careful; the moment she let go of it, it would return to its natural weight. She lifted it over her head, turned around, and carefully placed it on the ground. She let go of the rock an inch off the ground, and it crashed to the stone path with a boom.
“Two down, you stony weirdos,” she muttered. “What’s number three?”
“Go out,” the man had said. Sounded easy enough.
She walked two more minutes before she came to the site of her third challenge. She stopped.
“Well, shit.”
A craggy rock wall rose in front of her. It stood fifty feet high, and it looked golden in the last of the sunlight. A groaning sound caused her to turn; the canyon was closing behind her.
Tomas’ words echoed in her ear. “Once you begin, there is no turning back.”
“Looks like I’ll have to go out then.”
Once again, she thought of all the ways a Stone Shaper would get out of this situation. They could transform the stone into a staircase and walk to the top. They could cut a hole right through the wall. They could even have the stone under their feet rise and carry them to the top.
Abbey wasn’t so fortunate. She’d have to improvise.
There were divots in the stone, as well as small cracks that might not be sufficient to use as handholds at her full weight. If she were weightless, she’d be able to pull herself up with no problem.
As she stepped toward the wall, she heard a deep voice from above.
“Unworthy.”
A stone fell from the top of the wall and crashed down next to her, missing her by inches.
“What the hell?” she yelled up at them.
Another voice spoke from the top of the wall. “Unworthy.”
This time she was ready. She spotted the rock as it fell, and she stepped out of its path.
“Seriously, you’re starting to piss me off. Stop it!”
The voices paid her no heed. This time two people spoke the word together and two stones fell. Abbey had to press herself against the wall to avoid them.
“Okay, I’ve had about enough of this shit.” She reached up, grabbed a crack in the stone a foot above her head and channeled the magic necessary to make her as light as a feather. Then she pulled hard and shot upward.
“Unworthy.” This time three stones fell, and one nearly hit her square on the head. She grabbed the wall and pulled herself to the right, narrowly dodging it.
She scurried up the wall, using her hands to stay upright and pushing herself upward with her feet. Each step took her ten feet higher due to her reduced weight, so it wasn’t long before she reached the top. Grabbing the edge, she gave one last heave and pulled herself up.
She shot ten feet above the wall, gradually returned her weight to normal, and landed in a crouch.
Five Stone Shapers including Tomas stood along the top of the wall, stones in hand.
Abbey glared at them. “Thank the seas your aim sucks.”
Tomas stepped toward her. Surprise was clear in his eyes. “You are worthy.”
He held something out with a shaky hand. A black sash.
Abbey took it.
He blinked hard as he looked at her. “I don’t know how you did it, but you have mastered the Way of Stone. You’ve passed the test.”
She slipped the sash over her shoulder. “Thank you. Now my friends and I would like to see the council.”
He hesitated only a moment before nodding. He gestured toward a walkway behind him that led away from the wall. “Please come with me. You and your guests are welcome. The city of the Horg is right this way.”
* * *
Abbey’s friends were waiting for her near a large archway of stone at the end of the walkway. A guard stood on either side of them.
Clemens grinned when he saw her. “What did I tell you? Didn’t I say she’d make it?”
Hekla rolled her eyes. “Yes—you wouldn’t shut up about it.”
Elliot stared at the black sash. “Holy shit, they made you a Stone Shaper.”
“I guess. I passed their test.” She looked at Tomas. “Am I a Stone Shaper now?”
The old man frowned. “I tried to tell them it was an idiotic way to test people. Just hand them a stone and see if they can shape it. But no. ‘It needs ceremony,’ they said. ‘It needs danger.’ You’ve proven the system can be gamed.” He paused for a moment, eyeing the sash. “In answer to your question, you have the sash, which means you’re entitled to all the rights of any practitioner of the Way of Stone.”
Clemens let out a whistle. “Nicely done, boss. Seems we can’t take you anywhere without you picking up some new magic.”
“I repeat,” Abbey said, the exasperation clear in her voice, “I don’t actually know stone magic. I just passed their dumb test.”
Tomas led them through the archway and they made their way up a long stone staircase.
“Let me ask you something,” Abbey said as they climbed the steps. “In Kaldfell, they say that Gren is filled with giants. Any idea where those stories came from?”
Tomas chuckled. “Fear and suspicion, I suppose. We’re no taller than the people of your lands.” He paused for a moment. “Although the courage it took to survive the Time of Madness here was gigantic. My mother told me stories of those days.”
In Arcadia, it was called the Age of Madness. In Holdgate, they called it the Mad Days. It all boiled down to the same thing, Abbey knew. A time before magic when insanity ruled. Creatures possessed with a remnant of the madness of those times still lingered deep in the mountains of the Kaldfell Peninsula, or so Abbey had always heard. Other places, too.
Tomas continued, “Times have always been tough in Gren, but those days were the worst. My mother and a handful of her friends fought to keep people safe, and it wasn’t easy. In fact, their base of operations was these caves. They couldn’t shape stone, of course. They made do with the natural caves. Poor primitives! Ah, here we are.”
They reached the top of the stairs and stepped out under the open sky. It was dark now, and the stars shone brightly overhead. They were in a city; a city surrounded by massive stone walls on all sides.
“Welcome to Horg,” Tomas said. “Let’s take you to see the council.”
* * *
The council was led by a woman named Sika. Tomas and three others filled the remaining positions. They sat on large stone seats, not unlike thrones, listening intently as Elliot explained that Magnus had been lying to them for years. When he was done speaking, they sat in silence for nearly two minutes.
Abbey and Elliot exchanged glances. Abbey was beginning to understand that slow was just the speed they did things here, but that didn’t make it any less annoying. Her friends’ lives were at stake. Still, she forced herself to remain quiet as she waited them out.
She spent the time thinking about the roasted hare and mushroom stew she’d been promised but still hadn’t received. If anyone heard her rumbling stomach, they gave no indication.
Finally Sika spoke. “I fear we have done Gren a great injustice. Our desire to remain comfortable in Horg blinded us to the evil of Magnus and his followers.”
The other councilors grunted their agreement.
“Then you’ll help us?” Elliot asked.
“Of course,” Sika responded. “We cannot let this disobedience stand. I propose that we drag Magnus and his followers back to Horg and force them to remain here for the rest of their lives. What say you, Council?”
Again, grunts of agreement answered her.
“A Stone Shaper’s place is here among the rocks and the ice,” Tomas sai
d. “Not on the coast. We never should have let them go.”
It was all Abbey could do not to laugh out loud. She couldn’t believe how easily they’d convinced these people. Not only would they be returning to help their friends, they’d be bringing an army of Stone Shapers with them.
“That’s wonderful,” Elliot said. His voice faltered when he spoke, as if he couldn’t believe what was happening. “I suggest that we stay here for the night. We can leave in the morning and head to Ammaas. We’ll be there by tomorrow afternoon, assuming you have horses hidden away somewhere.”
Another long silence.
Then Sika spoke. There was a bit of tension in her voice this time, though she still spoke slowly and thoughtfully. “We do not have horses ‘hidden away somewhere.’ What use would we have for horses? And your suggestion of leaving tomorrow is simply ridiculous.”
Abbey took a step forward. “Maybe we didn’t explain this well enough. This is an urgent situation.”
“We understand. It will only be a few weeks before we can move toward Ammaas.”
“A few weeks?” Abbey struggled to keep the anger out of her voice. “My friends will be dead in days, not weeks.”
Tomas raised a hand to silence her. “Moving an army of Stone Shapers is not simple. We must plan. Strategize.”
She could see in their eyes they weren’t going to budge on this point. “Fine. Then guide us to the way out. We’ll go save our friends and wait for you to show up when you get around to it.”
Sika chuckled and turned to Tomas. “Old friend, didn’t you explain the rules to them?”
“I tried,” he answered. “They’re not the best listeners.” He turned to Elliot. “You’re outsiders, and outsiders who have seen Horg can never leave. We’re willing to waive that rule if you help us fight Magnus, but we’re not letting you leave before we do. For all we know, you’d run to Magnus and sell him the information that we’re coming.”
“That’s insane,” Elliot growled. “I came here to ask you to fight Magnus. Why would I warn him?”