Wind-Scarred (The Will of the Elements, Book 1)

by Sky Corbelli

  Chapter 40

  Flame On the Horizon

  “So that's the situation.” Ezra finished giving Kirsten the details of Jeffries's assault on him and Liza. “I need to take care of something concerning the Guild of Sundry angle. If I don't show, the whole thing could come crashing down around us.”

  Kirsten's eyes were focused off-screen. Behind her was the interior of a skiff, and if the ambient sounds were any indication, she was either in the middle of a war zone or doing some creative piloting. “Explain again why you need to leave during what is without a doubt a rather crucial moment for not one, but two very important Legacy houses.” Her voice was tight with carefully controlled anger.

  “I can't.”

  Kirsten shot him a glance before returning her eyes to the road. “And you say that you have to leave immediately?”

  “I'll be taking a wormhole directly from the house to my destination,” Ezra said as he shoved his wormhole controller into his glider's pack. Pausing for a moment to consider, he added the worn copy of The Will of the Elements for good measure.

  “Have you notified the Crawfords of the situation?” Kirsten's voice was tinged with annoyance.

  “I thought it best if you handled the diplomatic side of this debacle, Miss O'Donnell.”

  “Debacle indeed,” she growled under her breath, turning the skiff violently. A woman screamed. Something splattered across the window. Ezra tried not to think about what it might have been.

  “Kirsten, please. You're the only one I can trust.”

  She gave him a startled look, then flicked her hair in irritation. “I'll have to come up with a plan of action. DOLT takes the safety of their officers very seriously, even the ones who are out of favor. Do I have your permission to use any means necessary to bring this to bay?”

  Ezra hesitated for a moment, glanced at the time, and sighed. “Of course, Miss O'Donnell. I'll leave you a blanket approval.”

  “That should do nicely.” A feral grin lit Kirsten's beautiful face. Ezra shivered in sudden fear of whatever scheme she was hatching.

  “I won't be gone any longer than necessary,” he said, pausing to glance back at Liza. “Please... take care of her.”

  Ezra looked back to find Kirsten's intense emerald eyes staring back at him, lit with an almost manic fire. “Will that be all, Mr. Hawkins?” The connection closed before he could respond.

  That was not disturbing, Ezra thought to himself as he arranged the approval Kirsten would need to access house funds or issue statements in his name. I should definitely not be disturbed by that. He paused as he reached the lab, then granted her back-door access to the wormhole portal network, just in case that was deemed 'necessary'. He dialed his lab's wormhole generator directly to the Guild of Sundry, new equations for wormhole hacking and connectivity humming through his head as he ensured that it didn't disrupt existing connections. A viable source popped up, and he jacked the power stream for the half-second it took to step through into the Guild.

  Walking out to see the shocked faces of Mat, Sarah, and Mr. Blair made the last few months of research worth every second. “Untraceable wormhole,” he said nonchalantly, like it was no big deal, cutting the connection to let whatever portal he had hijacked resume its function. “Where's the fire?”

  Mr. Blair continued to stare at him for a few moments. “How did you...” He shook his head. “Oh, just a turn of phrase. As it happens, however, the fire is where you will all be going.”

  Mat let out a triumphant crow as Sarah glared at Ezra and Mr. Blair each in turn. “I thought we were off active duty, sir.”

  Blair ignored the sarcasm in her tone. “Desperate times, I'm afraid.” His tone turned serious. “What you three may not realize is that the Guild of Sundry has been under attack. Over the past two years, the incidents of violent rogue wind-scarred have grown at an alarming rate, faster than ever before observed. In addition, we have seen a marked increase in thunder-struck activity. There has also been an alarming trend in the thunder-struck conversion campaigns. Contacts are being found and tortured to death. Traps are being set for the responding Guild teams.” Ezra felt Sarah stiffen beside him. “Our field teams are stretched to the limit. The fact of the matter is, yours is currently the only combat capable team in Sanctuary, and the situation is dire.” Mr. Blair gestured with his left hand, and a video screen materialized. At first it looked like a thick fog covering a small valley. The image switched to a thermal view.

  “Blight and thunder,” Mat whispered. The entire valley was practically glowing an angry red. The fire must have been enormous, and hot enough to blacken the earth.

  “This footage is less than an hour old,” Blair said quietly. “There's a small town, Helena, near the center of the conflagration. No flag has gone up, but under the circumstances...”

  “That hardly seems necessary,” Sarah finished for him, still staring at the image.

  “We were founded to protect people from... this,” Mr. Blair gestured to the screen. “If the fire-kissed are going to war again, we need to know about it. We need to be able to stop it. Can I count on you all to use your best judgment, assess the situation, and bring back word of what's happening down there?”

  “Yes sir.” The team spoke as one.

  “Take a skiff, the nearest wormhole is some two hundred klicks to the northeast of Helena.” Blair gave Ezra a hard look. “No heroics, Mr. Hawkins.”

  Ezra flushed and nodded, then followed Mat and Sarah to the hangar. They geared up like for any other mission. Instead of guns, however, Mat and Sarah each picked up several sleek looking contraptions and bandoliers of bolts, each as long as Ezra's hand and as thick around as his index finger. “Crossbows,” Mat explained. “No firearms around a fire-kissed. You're more likely to blow your own arm off than hit anything.” He nodded to bulky weapon Sarah had fitted with a scope and was loading into the back of the skiff. “That one's a railgun. You can't fire it often, or it'll melt straight through the conductive rails. Wouldn't dream of using it within a thousand klicks of a thunder-struck, but you get a bead on a fire-kissed with that, and he'll be dead before he knows what's happening.”

  “Hawkins, open your mouth for a second.” Sarah was fiddling with something between her fingers. Ezra gave her a confused look, then shrugged and opened his mouth.

  Sarah clamped one hand around his jaw, holding it open. Her other hand snaked in and firmly affixed something to his rear molar. “Ahh,” he tried to yell, pulling away. She smirked at him for a moment, then released her grip on his mouth, letting him stumble backwards. “What was that for?” he demanded, rubbing at his jaw.

  “Special considerations,” Mat said, reaching into his own mouth to affix something there as well.

  “Bite down on it, hard, and it releases a pulse of energy similar to the Sanctuary shield.” Sarah checked the firing mechanism of a small, hand crossbow critically. “Should shut down any elementalist working in your area for about two seconds.”

  “Wait,” Ezra said, massaging the area around his molar lightly. “The Sanctuary shield negates their powers?”

  “It was meant to keep us safe, Ezra.” Mat slapped him on the back good-naturedly. “What did you think it was keeping us safe from, huh?”

  “Then... why don't we always go out with these things? Or better yet, come up with a way to project the field all the time?”

  “No can do,” Sarah said as she holstered the little crossbow. “Design plans are all locked away in the Chancellor's family data banks, as far as we can tell. Also, there's some naturally occurring crystal structure here that's required for long-term use. With it, you can maintain the field practically forever. Without it, you get about two seconds. The crystal's also under the Chancellor's direct supervision; we can't touch it.”

  “These little things are the best we've been able to come up with,” Mat said, hopping onto the skiff and checking the fuel levels. “Gotta figure, the only people who want the tech are Guildsmen. Most of the people
who end up in the Guild aren't scientists. Little to no research capabilities plus too much work to go around means they just don't get made.” Mat scratched his chin, thinking. “Also, they're blighted expensive to produce. We're going out with half the Guild's stockpile.”

  “Oh.” Ezra felt a little humbled. “Then... why do we–”

  Sarah interrupted him with a harsh laugh. “Because no-one else was stupid enough to piss off a psychotic, murderous water-seer assassin.”

  “I thought the way she swore bloody vengeance was actually kinda sweet,” Mat said with a grin.

  Ezra scowled as he keyed in the wormhole coordinates. “Could've happened to anyone,” he mumbled, climbing on to the skiff.

  “Not to anyone with a brain,” Sarah taunted. The wormhole engaged, and they immediately caught the faint scent of smoke. “Now come on, let's go mess with a guy who can burn down a valley.”