by Guy Antibes
“You are new to Kernel,” the woman said.
“Very new,” Jack said. “I arrived this afternoon and came in for a quick prayer.”
“You have a relationship with Our Lady?”
“A very personal one, as a matter of fact,” Jack said.
“You aren’t one of the…” She reached out and touched the butt of Jack’s wand. “An object of power! You aren’t dressed like a wizard.”
“Technically, I’m not,” Jack said. “I’m more like an apprentice.”
“But you are armed.”
“Wizardry doesn’t work in all situations,” he said before something hit his head.
Chapter Twelve
~
J ack woke tied to a chair. Four sisters watched him carefully. His objects of power were laid out on the table. He could see his veil wadded up along with his other things.
“You really do have a close relationship with Eldora,” said the woman who had spoken to him while one of the other sisters had knocked him out. “We didn’t know that before we defended ourselves against an armed stranger.
“I do,” Jack said, staring at the tiny shabby box. “Did anyone get hurt touching that?”
“No,” one of the priestesses said. She had a single band of gold on her hood. “Those kind of boxes are part of the legend of Eldora, which we have all memorized. Which bone is it?”
Jack looked at them. He twisted to look behind him and into the eyes of a burly man carrying a thick rod. The sisters hadn’t attacked him, but the fact gave him little comfort.
“I honestly don’t remember. Yes, I do. River. The name is River, but don’t touch it!”
“We are not foolish, young man,” the head sister said. “River. It was in Pestersee.”
“That is where it was given to me by the head sister, Halippa.”
“She used that name?”
Jack shook his head. “How else would I know it?”
“It is an ancient code name, but I shouldn’t have told you that,” a much younger sister said. That woman looked at the head priestess who shook her head with pursed lips. “Sometimes we have used code names in the sisterhood to hide our true identities. During these perilous times, it has become commonplace.”
“Where were you headed?” another sister asked.
“My friends and I are going to Gameton first, and then we will be meeting the grand wizard in Wilton to open the other box on the table.”
“You are full of surprises. That is an object as well? We can sense something odd about it, but it isn’t an object of power.”
“It is warded as well. It contains the message I have to deliver to the grand wizard.”
“And Eldora’s box goes to Gameton?”
Jack nodded. “Just to prove I am who I am.”
He leaned over and touched the box, which turned into the little, deep-blue jewel of a box. He heard the proper oohs and aahs.
The priestesses gathered in the corner of the room and whispered among themselves. They returned.
“You mentioned friends?”
Jack nodded. “They were captured east of here. We bypassed Kernel, but the Black Fingers caught us anyway,” he said. “I am hoping my associates are still in the village.”
“We think they are, but under guard by the Black Finger Society. They have no power over us as long as we stay in the temple.”
“But if you run out of food and water?” Jack asked.
The women laughed. “Water is no problem, but the food is,” one of them said.
“Can we help each other?” Jack asked.
“What can we get from you?”
“I’m a good fighter.”
“With the sword?” the man holding the bludgeon asked.
“Touch it,” Jack said.
The head priestess touched it with her finger. “Oh. You have so many objects!” she said.
“I’m the most important,” Jack said pointing at himself with a smile.
“Helpers usually are, but you are so unique.”
Jack wondered. “Do you come across many helpers in Tesoria?”
“Rarely do we meet one. Those attracted to Eldora are women, of course, and they are useful, but men, not so much. They don’t want to have anything to do with Eldora. They end up gravitating to the north where there is more Alderach worship. More respect, I suppose.”
“Then you can borrow me for a bit. I will free you, so you can get food, but I will need help to displace the Black Finger Society.”
“How will you do that?”
Jack puffed up his chest, and without any plan at all, he said, “You can leave that up to me.”
~
The streets were empty when Jack and ten other villagers crept from place to place, cognizant of the light of a full moon, keeping to the darkest of shadows. They led Jack to the village square. On the other side, lights still glowed. A few men stood guard, but their heads drooped from time to time as they fought off sleep.
Jack’s plan, as he put most of it together with the help of Matt, the husband of one of the priestesses and the possessor of the bludgeon, consisted of a simple head-on attack. Another group of villagers would seize the food stores and take it to the temple.
“It is time,” Jack said.
He pointed to the drowsy guards and led the villagers across the green. All wore black veils. They walked silently, carrying their weapons. Jack held his sword in one hand and the wand in the other. He had left his two warded boxes at the temple.
The guards didn’t take more than a moment to disarm. None were wizards. Jack stepped inside the building and found there were two wizards wearing gloves. Both had their heads on desks.
“You are Black Fingers?” Jack asked.
The men looked up bleary-eyed. Matt and his men stuffed cloth gags in the men’s mouths. A wizard needed to say a trigger word before a spell could be produced, and it was the same for the Black Fingers. They were tied up and left struggling on the floor.
Jack grabbed a ring of keys and began letting people out of the cells of the Kernel jail. In the end, Helen and Tanner were sleeping in the same cell.
“You took your time,” Helen said.
Jack could only shrug. “Where are Ralinn and Lark?” Jack asked.
“We believe they’ve been taken out of Kernel,” Helen said. She put her hand on Jack’s upper arm. “They have been converted.”
“No,” Jack said. “Not for long. Let’s find them.”
They walked back to the front office. Jack pressed the point of his wand into one of the wizard’s chest. “Where are my friends’ weapons?”
The wizard’s eyes grew as he answered every question. He was gagged again. Helen and Tanner retrieved their things. Jack was surprised to see his armor in the stack. He put it on along with the two mercenaries. Their saddlebags hadn’t been pilfered yet.
They learned a Black Finger spy spotted them at Faring Flat. There were only four Black Fingers and five more of their thugs in Kernel. Matt and his men took care of the rest of the invaders, tying them onto horses to be left closer to the town, but far out of the village. That would give the Kernelites enough time to stock up their larders.
Jack retrieved his boxes. The women looked as tired as he felt. “We wish you well, Helper,” the head priestess said. “Our men needed a little prodding, but they did most of the work on their own. We are Loyalists in this village.”
After a quick meal at the temple, Helen, Tanner, and Jack rode out of town trailing a string of unwanted invaders bound and gagged on horses. They had a long night ahead riding to a small town to the north where the Black Fingers had their headquarters. Jack was miserable as the horses splattered mud from the previous day’s rain all over them.
The sun hadn’t yet begun to lighten the sky when they reached the city. Their erstwhile captives were tied up about an hour to the south and told their lives were forfeit if they showed up in Kernel again. It was only the good graces of the villagers that had saved thei
r lives. At least that was the story they were told.
The armed men were freer with information about the town than the wizards, and between the two groups, the mercenaries and Jack learned enough to have a good idea where Ralinn and Lark would be kept. Recent converts underwent intense indoctrination. That made sense to Jack. A coercion spell might not be enough for a long-term conversion of more powerful wizards.
They found the house where the pair were supposed to be. The door was locked, but Jack teleported on the other side and let the others in. They went through room after room as stealthily as they could, but Lark and Ralinn weren’t in the building. They entered an office dominated by the snores of two Black Fingers.
What could they do? Lark and especially Ralinn knew all about Jack’s Eldora secret. The Black Fingers would be after him if they told the Black Fingers that Jack had a task to undertake at the Eldoran temple and message to deliver to the grand wizard of Tesoria. Jack was sure the Black Finger Society would want to stop both missions.
Helen shoved stockings in the mouth of one Black Finger, while Tanner pressed the point of his sword at the other’s throat.
“Where are the two wizards that were captured at Kernel?” Tanner asked.
Jack pointed his wand at the same man. “At the leader’s house,” the man said. “You can’t get in there.”
“We got in here, didn’t we?” Helen said.
The wizard was gathering his power when Tanner ended the spell prematurely. The remaining wizard obviously feared for his life. They left him tied up after she told them where the leader lived.
“I’ll go in and find where they are,” Jack said. He teleported through the back door and crept inside the house. Jack and Ralinn were sleeping in separate beds in the same room upstairs. Jack lit a flame, and his heart sank; both had blackened fingers on their hands. He wondered how much they had revealed.
He pressed his lips together and invoked invisibility as he took their hands and pushed power into them. The sensation of having magic leave him and return through the bone box was more than odd, but the process gave him a sense of the coercion spell leaving both wizards. He held onto Lark a bit longer. They had stayed asleep during the process.
Jack wiped the black smudge from her fingers and then looked at Lark as he sat up, alarmed.
“What—” Jack put his hand on Lark’s mouth as he ended the invisibility spell. “I’ve come to rescue you,” he said. “I have reversed the Black Finger spell on both of you.”
“How?” Ralinn said, rubbing her eyes.
Jack shook his head. “How should I know? This is my third time, and I still have no idea how I do such a thing. I don’t even use a trigger word. Get dressed and let’s get out of here.”
Their saddlebags were on a bench in the room. Jack turned around for Ralinn to change her clothes. He felt something behind him and turned in time to see Lark collapse to the floor. Ralinn held a candlestick in her hand.
“What did you do?”
“He is still converted,” Ralinn said. “I’m not!” She put the candlestick back and picked up the candlesticks from the floor.
“How can you tell?” Jack asked.
“I’ve been around Lark long enough to know he still wasn’t his normal self.” She smiled. “Aren’t you lucky to have me along?”
Jack managed a weak grin back, but this was hardly the time for any kind of smiling.
“Help me get him dressed. We will have to drag him out of here,” Jack said.
In a few moments, Lark was dressed well enough. There were steps outside the door. The guards, or whoever they were, didn’t stop, but Jack didn’t think he would be able to carry Lark through the house without alerting them.
“What will we do?” Jack whispered to Ralinn.
“You are asking me?” she said. “You are as much a wizard as anyone. Levitate him out the window.”
Jack blinked. “I don’t know if I can do that.”
“Then let’s both do it.”
Jack opened the window, and they both moved Lark down and on the other side of the fence around the house.
“You next,” Jack said. “Take the saddlebags.”
He successfully moved Ralinn out. He had to take a deep breath. He was told a wizard couldn’t fly, and yet that was what he was about to do. Jack stopped doubting himself and concentrated on levitation. He said the word “float” a little more loudly than he had with Ralinn and hit his head on the window frame. He was afraid he would have broken the glass, but he didn’t. He pushed out from the window and floated through the air and thought of the effect gradually diminishing. Jack began to drift down.
A wind picked up and pushed him back into the yard of the house. He landed on the wrong side of the fence. Jack was about to panic until he remembered he could teleport, which he did.
Ralinn knelt next to her mentor.
“Float,” Jack said, and Lark rose up about four feet in the air. Jack could feel his strength ebb, but Eldora’s box continued to replace his power. Ralinn put the saddlebag on her brother, and they walked around the fence until they met Tanner and Helen.
“What happened to Lark?” Helen said urgently.
“He is still a Black Finger,” Ralinn said. “We have to get out of here.”
Tanner pulled out his map and lit a tiny flame. “There is a road leading into the foothills on the north side of the mountains. we still have to pass through them to the road that runs to Yellowbird.”
Ralinn sat behind Jack, and Lark was tied to Helen’s horse as they fled from the town of the Black Finger Society.
Chapter Thirteen
~
J ack hadn’t checked Lark’s fingers thoroughly enough. In the morning, he spent half an hour holding onto Lark’s wrist until the black stain changed to a smudge, but Jack was still uncertain about the wizard’s condition.
“I still don’t have any idea how you do that,” Ralinn said yet again.
“I’ll try a trigger word,” Jack said. He had an inkling that if he said “clean,” Lark would recover sooner. “I haven’t learned anything more about it since last night when you asked me the first time,” Jack said, “but I will try to make it a spell.”
Ralinn’s lips turned into the faintest of pouts, but that was enough. Jack was sensitive to pouts. They never lead to anything good. Unless he had made Penny pout, then he counted it a victory.
“I’m sorry. I’m a bit tired from using so much magic last night and from lack of sleep,” Jack said. He took Lark’s wrist and built up will and power and thought of the conversion spell fading away. “Clean. I hope that does the trick.” Jack rubbed his eyes.
“I’m tired too,” she said looking at her hands and comparing them to Lark’s. “Oh. His fingers are much better. I will try to wake him,” she said, touching Lark’s forehead.
The wizard’s eyes popped open. He sat up. He looked at Jack and relaxed. “You tried to save me last night,” he said.
Jack nodded.
“You weren’t ready to leave, but we took you anyway,” Tanner said.
“Do you feel all right? Do you remember what they did to you?” Helen asked.
“I have a headache.” He looked at Jack and then Ralinn. “I don’t know who knocked me unconscious.”
“Me,” Ralinn said. “You would have done something you shouldn’t have if I didn’t stop you, Mentor.”
Lark barked out a laugh. “Mentor. I was the one who they had in their clutches.” He raised his hands. “Help me up.” He took a step and looked down at his feet. “Where are my shoes?”
Ralinn looked a bit sheepish. “Back at the town.”
Tanner tossed the wizard some soft shoes from his own bag. “Those should fit for now. We will have to get the two of you horses. Do you remember what they asked you?”
Lark nodded. “They didn’t ask about Jack’s mission, if that is what you mean. Ralinn and I had other things to concentrate on not revealing. We will leave it at that.”
Tanner looked at Helen who nodded.
“Good, then we won’t have to kill you,” Tanner said with a smile. “We’ve wasted enough time. We have to take this road into the mountains and then return to the road that will take us to Yellowbird. One gauntlet passed, but another one or two are ahead of us.”
~
They chanced one last village before moving through the mountain bandit territory. Lark and Tanner declared there was no pursuit, but then high-level Black Fingers could use Fourth Manipulation magic to talk to one another.
The village seemed normal, but it could house bandits, Lark warned. At least there was a small market in the town with merchants and farmers doing the selling. Lark found a pair of roughly made boots that would have to do for now. There was an inn and Jack, Helen, and Tanner still lacked sleep.
Jack settled down on a rough bed, but it was enough to let him sleep. He was shaken awake in the dark.
“We need you!” Ralinn said.
“Black Fingers?”
“No, wolves,” she said.
“In the village?” Jack asked.
“Downstairs, quickly!” She left him alone.
Jack rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and struggled to get his clothes on and headed downstairs. There were anxious people in the common room.
“You are wizards?” an older woman with iron-gray hair asked. She was dressed in thin decorated leather.
Lark looked up at Jack, still walking down the stairs. Three of us are,” the wizard said.
The woman let out a sigh of relief.
“What is wrong?”
“Wolves,” she said. “Packs of mountain wolves. I’ve never seen such a thing before! They have come down to our pastures,” she said. “There are too many for us to fight off. They are eating our sheep, and those sheep are our livelihood.”
“Can’t you eradicate them on your own?” Lark asked.
“Do you think I would be asking strangers for help if we could?” the woman said, suddenly looking exasperated.
“We will help,” Jack said. He looked at Tanner walking down to join them. “Packs of wolves. They want us to help.”