by Guy Antibes
“You’d better change your strategy. Myra will tell them you are here.”
Jack sat down. “I should have—”
“Does it matter now? I still think you should lock up and leave the house. The Black Fingers might burn it up.”
Jack sighed. The situation was going from bad to worse. They fled and told Fasher what had happened.
“I can justify defending my house. Torlo and Corina should position themselves close to the eastern pub, and Penny and you can take the western one. From there, close in on the mansion. If you have to burn it down, do it,” Fasher said. “I can deal with the Ephrams.”
Jack looked at Penny, who nodded at Fasher’s words. Torlo needed a bit of armor, but all Jack’s father could cobble together was a metal shield and a metal rod to act as a wand. The monk and Corina left to get in position.
Penny had a sword and Fasher’s wand. Jack carried his own objects. They spread out, but the plan instantly failed when Black Fingers were seen walking as a group on the main street of Raker Falls.
Fasher ran across the street and headed to his house, which the horde of Black Fingers seemed to have ignored. Tanner and Helen, wearing full armor, joined Jack and Penny, while Torlo and Corina still lurked in Raker Falls’ side streets.
For the first time, Jack wondered what had happened to the village guard. He guessed they didn’t care to commit suicide going up against so many wizards.
The Black Fingers approached and lined up across the street. Myra lurked in the back. That wouldn’t save her this time, Jack thought.
“Myra isn’t to be spared, or Ferrio either,” Jack said.
“I agree with that,” Helen said. “I don’t know what possessed you to let her go at Rockedge,” she said.
“She saved Fasher and Corina. She made me promise to take her out of the village before the Black Fingers attacked. I protected her then, but I didn’t promise her a lifetime of forgiveness,” Jack said.
Ferrio stepped out from the lineup. “You can give up now and tell us where the feather is, or you can die on the street.”
“You intend on killing us all anyway, Ferrio. I’ll not go down without a fight. You’ve lost at every turn, and you will lose today,” Jack said.
Ferrio raised a wand. He hadn’t carried one before, but now that he was a Black Finger, his pledge to Grishel was over.
Jack raised his sword and shot him in the head with a wizard bolt. Ferrio’s life ended as the first casualty of the battle for Raker Falls.
“Scatter!” Helen said.
The four of them went in different directions as the air filled with wizard bolts. Tanner even tried to return a bolt, but it hit the ground. He hadn’t learned to aim. At least he had a longer-range weapon than his sword.
Penny ran with them. A bolt grazed her torso, but she made it to Jack, who had taken shelter behind a building. The Black Fingers still stood in the middle of the street. Jack couldn’t figure out why they would do that until he felt a bolt burn into the back of his cuirass. He turned, but Penny had already taken care of the Black Finger with her sword.
“See? I can save you too!” she said. “And I didn’t have to use magic.”
“Thanks to you I’m still alive,” Jack said as he punctured another Black Finger. Bolts from the other side of the street hit two more, but they didn’t go down.
The Black Fingers dispersed, with most of them running back down the street. As much as Jack didn’t want to, he shot two more in the back with either Torlo or Corina taking another down. That was six of the Black Fingers. That was as good as he could have hoped when he thought of taking out the patrollers.
Six down and Helen had miscounted by one. He hoped it was only one. That meant there were nine Black Fingers on the loose, including Myra and not including Torlo. Jack stepped out into the street and looked down at Ferrio’s body.
“I’m sure your mother would be disappointed in you,” Jack said, “if she knew what a bad boy you became.”
Penny stood close to him. “He disappointed me,” she said.
Jack turned back to Ferrio, talking to the dead man, “Grishel is a hawk, but you will probably never find out since you won’t wake in his bosom. Perhaps you are learning what Borigore is like right now.”
He nudged Ferrio’s outstretched arm, pushing it closer to his body with the toe of his boot.
“Are you all right?” Helen said.
“Armor is a good thing,” Jack said, even though he could still feel the burning on his back. He would die with a lovely set of scars, that was for sure.
“Time to head to your house,” Tanner said to Penny.
She nodded. “Maybe we shouldn’t be standing so close.”
“Scattering is the right idea. Don’t walk up the center of the street,” Tanner took Helen’s hand, and they veered off to the right. Torlo and Corina disappeared, leaving the street.
“We will walk along the left side,” Jack said. “A pair of us can take one side of the street, and the other can head toward the mansion on the next street over.”
“It looks like we should use the next lane over,” Penny said. “Tanner and Helen are already heading up the main street.”
Jack nodded. “Then let’s go,” he said.
She had said the obvious that Jack hadn’t even thought of. They walked through another alley to the other street and spotted two Black Fingers creeping in their direction.
They moved forward, but Jack had an idea. “Take my hand.”
“I’ve already gained enough strength from you,” she said.
“No, take it!” Jack insisted. “Be ready to use your wand on the wizard on the left.”
“What?” Penny said. She held out her hand anyway.
Jack teleported to the street behind the two Black Fingers.
“Oh,” Penny said, without lifting her wand.
Jack teleported to the other side of the street. Penny had quickly caught on and shot a bolt through the back of a female wizard. Jack had never noticed her throw such a powerful bolt. By the time he had processed the thought, the other Black Finger stood and turned. Jack didn’t have time to draw his sword. He pointed his finger and shot a bolt into the man.
“Ow!” Jack pranced around. He finally stood and used his wrist guard to pour a stream of water over his burned forefinger. “Don’t try that, ever!” Jack said.
“Now I’m one-tenth black finger,” he said, holding out the scorched tip.
“Fasher can fix that.”
Jack moaned. “And he will have a good time chiding me about my stupidity.”
Penny patted his arm. “Swallow a little pride.”
She didn’t realize that Jack was becoming an expert in doing so. He took a deep breath and urged her to move on. They heard a scream. It was coming from the direction of Fasher’s house. They ran up the road. Jack saw three Black Finger wizards fire wizard bolts into Fasher, who just stood at his door. The bolts went right through him to burn holes in his front door.
“No!” Jack said. He ran into the street and laid down a course of flame to stop them all, but the spell wasn’t as strong as Takia’s fire, so Penny and he finished them off with wizard bolts before they died screaming. Penny ran to Fasher, but the body had disappeared. Jack used his blue cuff to extinguish the smoldering spots on Fasher’s door.
They heard another scream on the other side of Fasher’s house. Jack ran to the spot. Corina looked down at another female Black Finger. “That is another one.”
“Six more. That leaves three, and one of them is Myra Pulini,” Helen said, walking up to them. “Tanner thinks they have taken refuge at the mansion.”
“That won’t do them much good,” Jack said. He could teleport into the courtyard and into the bedroom he had used the night he killed Penny.
“Watch the exits,” Tanner said to Torlo and Corina.
“What would you like me to do?” Fasher said casually.
“I thought you had been taken up into Alderach’s bosom,” J
ack said.
“That would be a trick, indeed. I was uninjured.”
“A Fifth Manipulation?” Penny asked.
Fasher nodded. “A high-level Second. Wizard bolts aren’t too effective on an illusion.”
Jack certainly had more to learn from Fasher Tempest.
“Can you secure the gates?” Jack asked.
“I can do that,” Fasher said. “Come, my sweet,” he held his hand out to Corina. “You can humor me while I go to work.”
They approached the mansion from different sides. Jack turned to see a wizard bolt strike Torlo in the head. The smell of burnt hair filled the air. Torlo reached up and felt his scalp. “It didn’t penetrate my thick skull,” the monk said. He looked up into the sky. “Thank you, Grishel.”
They took cover and spread out.
“Do you want to come with me?” Jack asked Penny. “I didn’t exactly spend much time in your house, and that was in the servant’s quarters.”
Penny nodded. “I want to see what they have done.” She adjusted her helmet and breastplate. After a deep breath, she said, “Let’s go, but first, we need to go to a different place to get in.”
They ran around the mansion and stopped where a tree’s branches reached over the wall. “Here. My sister and I used to sneak out of the house here. There aren’t any windows facing this part of the wall.” Penny said.
She put out her hand. Jack grabbed it and the next thing either of them knew, they were inside the Ephram’s grounds.
“Follow me,” Penny said.
Jack would have leaped into battle as soon as he teleported, but this was better, he thought.
“We should use telepathy from here on,” Penny said.
Jack removed his shield. “Is that better?”
Penny nodded. She didn’t think an answer to him.
Jack followed her to a short outside stairway that led down to a basement door. She twisted the latch some way that Jack didn’t see, but it opened.
“This way,” she said.
Jack had no choice but to follow her into the darkness beyond. They took another stairway down to the rest of the basement. A wire wall protected the mansion’s wine cellar.
Penny giggled. “They tried to get in, but failed.”
Jack bent over to examine the lock in his magic light. He wouldn’t have failed, of that he was sure, but by the time he figured that out, Penny was moving out of the room. He had to hustle to catch up.
They passed an old, dented and dusty set of armor.
“We can use the shield,” Jack said.
“Go ahead. It was always too heavy for me.”
Not too surprised Penny had tried to use the shield, Jack carefully removed the shield, but the suit of armor began to wobble, and the whole thing crashed to the floor.
“Look what you’ve done!” Penny said. She hunched over and put her hand to her mouth. “You are too clumsy,” she said.
“And you opened your mouth.”
“Not much sound escapes the basement,” Penny said. “This way.”
Jack hefted the shield and followed her up the stairs, ready to teleport in front of her if necessary. He wished he could sense other wizards, but Jack didn’t even know if that was possible.
Penny held up her hand as they reached a landing just before a closed door.
“Servant’s quarters,” she said. “If there were fifteen of them, they would use the beds down here.”
“Did the Black Fingers kick out the servants?” Jack asked.
She turned and glared at him. “How should I know? You put me in a deep sleep. I don’t know the answer to that any more than you do,” she snapped.
That was more like the Penny Jack knew. He put out his hand and grasped the latch. “I’ll go first with the shield.”
Penny let him proceed. Jack put his head around the corner. No one was around. He stepped into the corridor and listened, but the sound above didn’t reach to the servants’ quarters either.
Jack opened the doors along the corridor. The rooms seemed to be a mess. The Black Fingers didn’t seem to have mastered housekeeping, he thought.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
~
P enny opened the last door in the corridor. A familiar woman gasped. Penny put a finger to her lips. They both slipped into the woman’s room and closed the door behind them.
“This is the head housekeeper, Lari,” Penny said out loud.
“Jack Winder,” the woman said. “I know you. What are you doing traipsing around with my Penny?”
“Ridding this house of pests,” Jack said. He had seen Lari in the streets and lanes of Raker Falls often enough, but he had never formally met the woman.
“Oh,” Lari said. “They let me out when they want meals prepared. We are just about out of food. The village isn’t in much better shape,” she said.
Penny told her of the fighting in the village streets and that there were only three wizards left.
“Two of Fasher’s students against Black Finger wizards? Do you think you stand a chance?”
Jack sighed, but Penny answered, “He is Fasher’s helper. I learned what that means. Jack has stronger magic than anybody in the house, and he is not afraid to use it.”
“Keep me out of it, Winder,” the woman said.
“I will let you know when it is safe to come out. Is that acceptable?”
Jack doubted if anyone in the Ephram family had a decent opinion of him. It didn’t matter before, and it didn’t matter now. “We have to get going.”
“We can be friends for now?” Jack said, putting out his hand.
The woman stared at Jack’s hand, but she reluctantly took it.
“Clean,” Jack said.
Lari staggered a bit. She put a hand over her forehead. “You’ve proven yourself to me, lad. I was going to march up the stairs after you left and tell them you were here.”
“I’m sorry I had to do that.”
“Sorry? Why should you feel sorry? I’ve wanted to hate myself ever since they put a spell on me. Whatever you do, don’t let them stay alive, especially that man Ferrio.”
“Already taken care of,” Penny said.
Jack was surprised the woman was so bloodthirsty. “We need to be going.”
“Where would the three of them be in the house?” Penny asked.
“The leader stayed in your parent’s suite. It is a pigpen. They refused to let me clean it. The house will have to be scrubbed from top to bottom when they leave.”
“We will let you know,” Penny said. “Keep the door locked.”
“Now that I can do that.”
They left an angry Lari and took the stairs up to the kitchen.
“The three of them could be anywhere,” Penny said.
“Upstairs to monitor anyone coming toward the house. The next best place would be the stables, once they feel threatened.”
Penny nodded and took Jack’s hand. She took a deep breath. “Upstairs, then. I admit I’m afraid.”
“I’m always afraid,” Jack said. “I just keep doing things to keep my mind focused. Don’t let the fear stop you from thinking or doing.”
“I can’t promise that,” Penny said, but she led him out of the kitchen through a plain door. “Servant stairs.”
Jack would have thought it was a closet or a pantry. He took the lead going up the stairs. It was carpeted with a woven straw of some kind. Jack guessed it was to keep tender, noble ears from hearing the crude footsteps of the servants. It covered their movements. Jack peeked through the door and spotted one of the Black Fingers looking out a window, clutching a wand.
That was good enough for Jack. He shot the wizard in the back and pulled Penny into the bedroom.
“This is my sister’s room. They have turned it into a trash bin.”
Penny was right. Food scraps and discarded clothing covered the floor.
“Stay here, and I’ll take care of the other two.”
“Here?” she said, looking at the body on
the floor.
“Stay out of the way,” Jack said.
He turned down the corridor and looked in each room. A fancy door was at the end of the corridor. This had to be where Penny’s parents slept. Jack took a deep breath and teleported into the room. He faced another Black Finger, counting money. The man looked up, and Jack was the last thing he ever saw.
“Help!”
Myra had found Penny. Of course, Jack wouldn’t have heard Myra move past the door with it closed and locked. He invoked invisibility and teleported out of the room.
Myra was ready for him, and a bolt hit his neck. Jack ran for the woman. Another bolt bit his ear. He teleported the rest of the way and barreled into Myra. She outstretched her hand holding a wand.
“Let me go, or I will kill her,” Myra said.
Jack thought about teleporting both of them, but he couldn’t take the chance. He moved away from the woman.
“Do you want your own life?” Jack said. He spotted Penny cowering in a corner.
“What do you mean?”
“You are a dead woman if you kill Penny, but I won’t kill you if you leave right now, with the clothes on your back, no more. You gave up your right to any reward when you escaped Fasher’s house.”
Jack could see the desperation in Myra’s eyes.
“They are all dead, aren’t they?”
Jack nodded. “You are the last.”
Myra’s eyes shifted as she thought about the offer.
Jack should have killed her, but he had made a promise.
“Very well.”
“Take my hand,” Jack said. “We will do a little teleporting.” He had to get the woman away from Penny.
Myra did as Jack asked. They ended up outside the house on the grounds. Jack spotted the stable and teleported there.
He pointed his wand at the woman. “Put a saddle on. I will let you ride out of here, but no more chances. Return, and you forfeit your life. If more Black Fingers come from Passoran, you lose your life. I strongly suggest you leave Corand and never return.”
Myra nodded and slapped a saddle on the nicest horse in the stable.