by Eric Vall
The forest edge was almost entirely deserted aside from a few burrowing creatures and more of the stout black birds nesting on the cliff face, but as I sent my Terra magic through the soil, I finally picked up on one creature back in the forest that struck me as out of place.
They were two legged, but not nearly as heavy on their feet as an ogre would be.
“Half a mile south of us,” I muttered to Hulsan. “Do you sense that?”
The old Terra Mage sparked his magic, and he didn’t even have to work his way there like I always did when I scanned the terrain. The old Terra Mage was able to direct his powers exactly to where I’d found the creature, and I sensed his magic touch down for the briefest second directly on the spot.
Then he nodded. “It’s a man.”
“Move quickly and quietly,” I muttered to the others as I motioned for them to fan out a bit. “He’s stationary right now, but he’s half a mile off.”
Everyone nodded as we broke into a run, and once we were back in the forest, the padding of pine needles underfoot helped to mask the sound of the five of us running at full speed ahead.
I kept my Terra Magic directed where the man was standing, but when we came within fifty yards, he suddenly broke into a sprint.
“Heading west,” I told the others. “Stick together, we don’t know what his powers are.”
“Whatever they are,” Hulsan panted, “he’s got them at the ready.”
“Shit,” I growled as I sensed the man veering north, and I led everyone in the pursuit as he began taking a more complex route. “He knows we’re following him.”
“Yep.” Hulsan nodded.
The man we were tracking took us in a full loop de loop, but the gap between us and him only increased regardless of how carefully I tracked his route. He was just too fast, and the fact he was toying with us and running us in circles like a pack of dogs grated on my nerves as I forced my legs to pump faster.
“He’s about to jump,” Hulsen suddenly said, and within a few seconds, I completely lost a read on the guy.
I frantically rescanned the last place he’d been even though my Terra Magic wasn’t picking up anything in the area, but I could faintly hear the pounding of a heartbeat when I zeroed in on that direction, and we all slowed to a walk again to catch our breath.
“He could be in the trees,” Aurora said quietly.
I nodded my agreement. “He had about seventy yards on us before he jumped.”
We proceeded cautiously as we all drew our weapons, and I had my revolver cocked and at the ready while I scanned every low-lying branch in sight. I could get a decent read on the place despite the shadowy boughs of the pines and the slimy moss draping down, but I focused more on my hearing because I had the sense the man was still in motion.
His heartbeat wasn’t stationary even though he wasn’t making any contact with the ground, and I began to wonder if he could hover. It made more sense he might be working his way along the limbs, but I didn’t hear any boots scuffing along the branches anywhere.
As we came closer to the heartbeat, I held up my hand to halt the others, and I advanced between a triangle of pines where the sound was coming from. He was very close, and I could hear his hand slip across the bark now and then, but as I slowly turned and scanned the boughs, I saw nothing but dense blue needles and shadows.
Then I heard a sharp intake of breath, and a streak of white broke through the boughs above my head on its way to another limb.
Cayla had her shotgun already aimed as I quickly turned full circle, and she fired on the moving target before I could even blink.
But she missed.
Chapter 14
All three trees around me ignited at the same time, and the two lowest branches above me snapped. I dove out of the way as the fiery boughs crashed down right where I’d been standing, and as I hit the dirt, I saw another brief flash of white.
Then another flame spurt ignited the next tree, and I leapt to my feet as Aurora sparked her Ignis magic to try and rein in the man’s trail of fire.
Haragh and Hulsan were right behind me as we ran beneath the trees and attempted to trace him, but every glimpse I got was gone in an instant as he climbed, leapt, ducked, and ran along the branches. He was as agile as the elves we’d come across in Nalnora, but with flames shooting out all over the place, and this added element made him nearly impossible to track. Every time we got close, flaming branches seemed to crash down before I could take aim, and then, in a sudden blaze, every tree within thirty feet of us ignited, and we were completely blocked in.
“Use the dirt!” Hulsan hollered over the roar of the flames, and we all sparked our Terra Magic to send the soil spiraling upward as piney smoke grated in my lungs.
The dirt shower prevented the flames from growing larger around the trunks, but the fire was just too big to contain as it ate through the boughs above us. More stout branches crashed down as we tried to find an exit that wasn’t barred by a twenty-foot-tall blaze, but then Aurora finally caught up to us.
The Ignis Mage doused one tree after another as she fought to reach us, and when a smoldering path opened, we all bolted to escape the inferno. Aurora managed to have everything under control in another ten minutes, and we were still coughing up smoke when she rejoined us.
Hulsan and I had already tried to track the man again, but there was no sign of him now that his trail of flames had ceased. I couldn’t feel him in the soil, and Hulsan didn’t sense any magery being used in the vicinity either.
“Bastard,” the old man growled as he coughed up some black mucus from his lungs.
“At least we got out of there alive,” I said as Haragh dropped down on the dirt to catch his breath.
“Ye’ believe that guy?” Haragh panted. “I’ve never seen a mage so fast.”
“The last few I’ve come up against have been the same,” I told him as I wiped the sweat from my brow. “That’s what I’ve been trying to get Urn to understand. He thinks we should give some kind of clearance to the possessed mages, but there’s not a lot to work with there once one of them is trying to kill you.”
Haragh shook his head. “Unbelievable.”
“What’s unbelievable is Cayla missed a shot,” Aurora snorted, and we all glanced over to see the princess stiffly loop her shotgun over her shoulder.
“You’ve missed shots before,” Cayla pointed out.
“Yeah, but you don’t miss anything.” Aurora laughed. “I thought I imagined it for a minute. Are you feeling alright? Maybe you should sit down and rest or something.”
Cayla rolled her eyes and didn’t respond, and I could tell by the flush of her cheeks that her pride was a bit injured on this one, so I cleared my throat.
“Alright, we have to regroup fast,” I told the others. “They know we’re in the area now, and we can’t lose them or we might end up here for weeks trying to get these guys.”
Hulsan nodded his agreement and stood up, and we all brushed the soot from ourselves while we worked on a plan.
“Now that we know at least one of the mages behind this is an Ignis Mage,” I began, “Aurora, I want you to move solo on this one since you can take him on. Head northeast, and if you get a lead, say something, and I’ll come find you before you pursue them. Hulsan and Haragh, stick together and travel straight east from here, and Cayla and I will head directly north. We’ll circle back once we reach Izig Cliffs, and one of us has to find something to go off by then. If not, we’re moving beyond the hunting grounds.”
Everyone agreed to the plan, and we branched off to begin covering every inch of the hunting grounds once again.
I kept an ear trained on the others as we went in case they found anything, and I scanned the immediate vicinity with my Terra powers while I kept my sights on the branches above. More creatures were out in the forest now, which meant more ogres would be joining the hunt soon, and this might increase our chances of locating the culprits. So, I listened more carefully to the whereabouts of the
ogres to get an idea of where the others had most likely disappeared to.
Several of them were heading to the eastern edge of the hunting grounds, and I guessed this was because the river was close to there. Then I realized their prey would frequent the water source and make it easy pickings for them, which meant easy pickings for the mages as well. So, after we spent a half hour scanning every nook and cranny in the northern sections of the forest, I gestured for Cayla to follow me as I circled back toward the others.
That’s when I noticed Cayla’s cheeks were still flushed, and she hadn’t said a single word since Aurora teased her about the shot. I’d been completely focused on tracking the mages all this time, but now I was starting to wonder if the princess’ pride had taken a bigger hit than I expected back there.
“Still thinking about that shot?” I asked as I eyed the woman, and she didn’t look at me when she nodded. “Don’t let Aurora get to you, you know she didn’t mean anything by it.”
“Aurora could never bother me,” the princess mumbled.
“Then you should give yourself some slack,” I chuckled. “It was one shot. You’re only human.”
“You could have died,” she hissed, and I slowed my pace as I realized what was bothering her.
“But I didn’t,” I said more gently. “Besides, I put myself in that ring of trees as bait to begin with. I wanted to keep the guy from moving around, and I knew if I was right beneath him, he’d be more likely to hold still and go after me instead. If I did die, it would have been my own fault, not yours.”
Cayla just shook her head without responding, but after a few minutes of silence, she spoke up, and her voice was low as she kept her eyes on the ground.
“It isn’t only you,” she muttered. “It could have been Aurora, Deya, Haragh, or even me. Our enemies are getting stronger and faster, Mason, but like you said, I’m only human.”
“Hey, I didn’t mean it like that,” I said as I reached out to stop her walking, but she still kept her gaze averted when I turned her toward me. “Cayla, you’re an incredible woman, and your abilities are unparalleled when it comes to shooting. You know that.”
Cayla looked up. “It doesn’t matter how good I am at shooting if I can’t see my target. He was too fast for me to keep track of.”
“Usually you do just fine,” I reminded her. “I’m having trouble catching him, too, but that’s what we’re up against. The new weapons will help us, but right now … this was just one miss. I honestly don’t think you should be so hard on yourself about it.”
“Well, I do,” Cayla countered with a severe frown. “I think I should be prepared to take on enhanced fighters because that’s what we’re coming up against. So, I want you to brand me.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I want you to brand me with the sight rune. The moment we’re back in Falmount. I know Dragir gave you the branding iron.”
“I’m not branding you,” I said firmly. “These runes are irritating as hell to live with, the process is outrageously painful, your skin is flawless, and--”
“And I could die missing a shot one day,” Cayla interrupted, and my jaw locked shut.
Her words hit me in the gut like a ton of bricks because I knew she was right, and I couldn’t even think of what to say to her. I’d teased my women about the brandings before, but I honestly had never taken the idea seriously, and neither had they. Until now.
Cayla’s blue eyes were steady as she held my gaze with her jaw set firm, but I could hear Haragh and Hulsan were getting close now, and there was no way I could expand on my side of the topic in the next ten seconds.
“We’ll talk about this when we get back to Falmount,” I finally told her, and the princess nodded curtly before Haragh came through the trees and let out a heavy sigh.
“Not a single damn mage out here,” Haragh grumbled when I looked over. “Do you think they left the region?”
“No,” I told him as Aurora caught up with us as well. “They’ll be under direct orders from that rune to get the job done out here, so they can’t back out now. They’re probably just being more discreet since they know we’re out here. They might have moved their operation to a different area, though.”
“That’s most likely the case,” Hulsan agreed.
“Did you hear anything out there?” I asked Aurora, but I could have sworn her gaze flicked toward Cayla for the briefest second before she shook her head.
“Ogres, wyverns, the usual,” Aurora replied with a shrug.
I nodded. “We should head toward the river next. The prey are more concentrated there which means the ogres will be, too. The mages might be picking them off and branding them further east.”
“I scanned the bank of the river about ten minutes ago,” Hulsan said. “There’s quite a few ogres there already.”
“I agree with Mason, then,” Aurora said. “It seems logical the mages would focus their efforts there.”
So, we headed east as a group for another half of an hour while we continued to scan the area, and once the river was in sight beyond the trees, we broke off into groups again. Hulsan and Haragh travelled down the bank while Aurora went up stream, and Cayla and I cautiously scouted the riverside before wading across.
Then we made our way up and down the opposite bank, and we took a few detours to avoid the ogres who were decapitating wyvern and occasionally clubbing each other over who had dibs on what kill.
It was more difficult to work in this area because the deafening roars of the ogres as they mauled their prey drowned out a lot, but I kept straining to hear beyond this as I searched the surrounding forests for anything suspicious. Once Aurora joined up with us with no luck along the northern banks, I began to worry we’d be extending our stay in Jagruel much longer than I’d promised Shoshanne.
We definitely couldn’t afford another mishap like we’d had earlier, either, because the more times we tried and failed to get these guys, the more likely it was they’d start hunting us down instead.
Then I heard Haragh muttering in the distance, and I zeroed all of my attention in his direction while I fought to ignore the sound of tendons being peeled off bones nearby.
“We’ve got something over here,” Haragh suddenly said. “Come quietly.”
I abruptly motioned for the women to move silently as I sent my Terra Magic to find Haragh and Hulsan, and after jogging along the bank for about ten minutes, we veered east and found them waiting at the base of a hill.
“Hulsan sensed ‘em,” Haragh told me in a low voice. “Says they’re just over that ridge.”
“How many?” I asked.
“Two men,” Hulsan answered as he eyed the top of the ridge. “One of them’s a Terra Mage, and I can feel he’s altered the terrain to build this hill here. The other is probably the Ignis we nearly nabbed earlier. There’s seven ogres, too.”
“Shit,” I cursed. “Let’s get to that overhang and see if we can’t get a visual from behind the brambles.”
My heart pounded anxiously as we scaled the hill, and I was extremely glad I brought Haragh and Hulsan because if we were coming up on a possessed Terra Mage who could handle ogres, I had a bad feeling it was one of the two I’d been warned about back in Illaria.
Both Dahko and Lokar had been described as scary big and brutal mages with too much power for their own good, and I already knew Lokar had been turned away by Abrus when he pulled a fucking volcano out of the ground for him. Now, I prayed to all the gods this wasn’t who we were about to come up against, but Dahko would hardly be better. From what I heard, he was untrained and unbridled with his power, but he also had a bad temper and a nasty habit of beating the shit out of the other mages before he was even possessed.
Still, this was a prime opportunity to kill either of the bastards before they caused any more damage, and I tried to focus on this as we crested the hill.
We all belly crawled the last few feet to get into position, and from beneath the thick grove of brambles, I coul
d see a clearing in a manmade valley below. It looked like there’d been quite a brawl here not too long ago, because there was fresh blood on the needles and leaves that covered the ground, and rocks were shattered everywhere.
Then I craned my neck for a better view, and beyond the rubble, I could make out the heads of seven ogres in a row. They were badly bludgeoned to a dark gray while some were bleeding profusely, but they weren’t moving at all, so the rocks must have finally done the trick in getting them unconscious.
Now, they were locked in the ground up to their shoulders while their heads hung limp on their chests, and above them, a mean looking mage with matted brown and shoulder-length hair was chuckling to himself.
He paced along the line of ogres with long, careless strides, and every now and then, he kicked his boot into an ogre if it began to come around.
“Hurry up,” the mage suddenly growled over his shoulder, and I rose another foot to see who he was talking to.
An Ignis Mage was stooped and heating two branding irons in his flames, and I guessed he’d be finished in another couple of minutes judging by the glow of the iron.
“That’s Dahko,” Haragh whispered, and his eyes darkened when I looked over. “Should’ve known he’d be the one who could manage an operation like this.”
“Then it’s our lucky day,” I told him with a wild grin. “It’s about time we start working our way down the list.”
Haragh nodded as a low growl started in his chest, and we turned back to see Dahko chuckling once more. He kept doing it, too, but without any provocation, and I got the sense the asshole just really enjoyed his new job. I’d seen plenty of possessed elves and a few men as well, but there was something different about the alertness of Dahko.