Werewolf Mage 5

by Harry Nix

  He landed awkwardly on a toppled bookshelf, but managed to bound out of sight of the monster, up to the next level.

  It had shot darts at him, long, bony spines with a small, hardened bulb at the end. Alex carefully checked the one in his shoulder to see if it had ridges preventing it being pulled out, knowing that he could cause even greater damage if he pulled it, but it appeared that the spike didn’t have thorns and was smooth like a hypodermic needle. He pulled it out of his shoulder and then removed the one in his leg and dropped it to the ground. When they landed, they flickered for a moment, some remnant of the chameleon ability. Alex brought his hand up to his shoulder and cast healing flame, but nothing emerged from the end of his finger. It took just a moment for him to realize that all of his manas were now grayed out.

  He still had Know Thyself open, and could see that the active spell lists were now a new lot of question marks. But he couldn’t do anything. Whatever he’d been stung with had cut off his access to magic entirely.

  Alex heard a thud from below and quickly ran to the edge of the balcony, the pain in his leg and shoulder beginning to catch up with him. The monster was on the move and seemingly not concerned with stealth now that it had been damaged. Alex knew he only had moments before it could be out of his reach, and he didn’t like the idea of having to cat and mouse it, hunting it through the library. Sure, he didn’t have his magic, but he still had the rings, and his teeth and claws. Making a sudden decision, he leaped from the balcony over the railing and down onto the monster’s back, casting a fireball from the ring as he did.

  Like he was making a touchdown, he shoved the fireball into the wound and then was immediately flung off as the monster rolled.

  Alex ducked out of the way as an enormous claw swung over his head. He tried to leap again, but the monster must have anticipated it because it hit at him and his flame shield burst into pieces with an enormous gulp of heat. The monster screamed as Alex landed, crashing through some tables. The pain of it was immense, and he realized that as he was cut off from magic, he wasn’t healing at the speed he usually would. With his leg and shoulder bleeding freely now and not healing, he had to kill the monster soon, otherwise it was possible he’d succumb to his injuries.

  The monster screamed at him again, appearing to Alex as though there were bookshelves and chairs with the faint outline of jaws overlaid on them. He cast fireball and flung it, hoping the thing was stupid enough to keep its mouth open, but it turned its head at the last moment and the fireball splashed harmlessly against its scales. Alex cringed for a moment as the remnants of it hit some of the piles of books which began smoldering, but thankfully no flame caught. Figuring he had a successful move worked out, Alex leaped from the ground up to the second floor again, neatly passing over the iron barrier and landing behind it, despite his injuries. As soon as he was up there, he launched himself again, down onto the monster’s back, flame shield and fireball at the ready. He managed to land another one, pushing the fireball into the wound, which was now becoming a large, charred hole.

  The monster attempted to roll, and this time Alex jumped straight up in the air, perhaps applying a little too much power as he almost touched the ceiling high above. For a moment, he hung up there, seeing the faint rippling shape of the monster before he plummeted back down and crashed onto its back again. This time, as he planted the fireball, he slashed with his claws, digging into the flesh, hoping to hit a spine or some other vital organ. His arm went in up to the shoulder and it felt as though he was pulling his claw around through thick custard. Just as his claw encountered bone, the monster rolled and this time Alex wasn’t fast enough to get free. He cast flame shield again, and as the giant thing rolled over him, both shields burst as it crushed him into the ground.

  For a moment, he was surrounded by fire, the enormous wave of the monster crashing into his body, and then suddenly it was off him and he found himself in the air again, his claw lodged deep inside its body. He caught a breath and knew that his ribs were crushed. There was an agonizing pain in one of his feet, that felt as though his ankle had been broken. Knowing that he couldn’t put up with much more of this, Alex unloaded everything at once, the remainder of the fireballs, the shock ball, deep inside the monster’s body at the end of his claws. He managed to set them off, and pulled his claws out and attempted to leap away, but then something hitched in his body, the muscles not obeying him, and instead of a graceful landing up on the second floor he crashed directly through the metal barrier and into a bookcase.

  Alex came out of the dark, unsure whether a minute or an hour had passed. He could smell blood and burned flesh, and also smoldering paper and smoke. He took a breath, pain shooting through his chest. His spell screen was still up, and whatever the monster had stung him with was still working. He had no access to magic and he was cursing himself now for not enchanting a single healing flame ring.

  Alex managed to get to one knee and then he carefully dragged himself over to the edge of the balcony. There, on the ground floor, was something that looked like an enormous maggot covered in pale scales. On one side, it had a leg and a claw, but they appeared stumpy, and then Alex realized they’d only emerge from the thing’s body when it needed it. It had two wounds, one down near its thick tail, and then the enormous burn hole in its back. Alex hoped it was dead because there was no way he was getting off the floor for quite a while, and if the thing came at him now, it would win.

  “Hello? Can you make your way over here?” he heard a man call out. With great effort, Alex managed to turn around and saw that in one of the branching corridors off the floor there was what appeared to be a study room, and in it, a man sitting in a luxurious red chair, waving his hand at him.

  The appearance of him was so incongruous that for a moment, Alex wasn’t sure if he was hallucinating or not. His head felt muzzy from the injuries and blood loss, and then he felt a cold shock of adrenaline as he wondered whether the monster had managed to breed over all the years it had been locked in here. It had cast some kind of illusion on the upper floor while it had stalked him despite its enormous size. Could there be others?

  “I can heal you. Don’t worry, the Abcartros is dead,” the man called out. Alex took a breath, and heard a wet gurgling sound that he realized was him.

  “Come here. I’m having trouble moving,” Alex gasped.

  “I can’t, I’m sorry. I’m bound to this space here, but if you can make it, I can help you.”

  Gritting his teeth, Alex managed to get a knee under himself and then got up. His ankle was definitely broken, and he couldn’t put weight on it at all. He grabbed onto the bookcases that were still standing and managed a kind of shuffling hop, although each movement was agony. When he reached the room, he got a proper look at the man. He seemed to be in about his mid-30s with blond hair and was wearing business attire, looking like an accountant on a lunch break. He had on a blue striped shirt with his sleeves rolled up. As Alex pulled himself into the room, he saw that there were open books on the floor, spread around the chair where the man was sitting.

  “Just get any part of you into the circle,” the man said, indicating the faint line that was a demarcation between the dust on the ground and the clear spot around the chair where he was sitting. Alex took another hop, then his leg gave out, and he crashed to the carpet but managed to get his hand inside the circle. The man knelt down and brought his hand close to Alex, a small black spark jumping out to cross the gap. It stung through him, running from his arm into his chest, feeling very much like Alex’s homebrew healing flame spell, but seeming to use electricity rather than fire.

  The spell worked rapidly, and Alex felt the pain in his chest easing as his breath came back. It then zapped down to his ankle and he gritted his teeth as bones realigned and healed together. It was only a few moments, but the man had managed to take care of the worst of Alex’s injuries before finally standing back and collapsing into his chair. Alex got himself to a sitting position. He was still injured
, but there was no chance of dying right now.

  “Thanks for that. Who are you?” Alex asked.

  “My name is Darwin. I’m just a projection, bound mostly to this circle and then a little outside it, if I really exert myself,” he said. Darwin waved a hand through the arm of his chair that he appeared to be sitting in. Alex took a few deep breaths before managing to get to his feet.

  “Are you part of the library magic?” he asked.

  “No. The Abcartros destroyed most of the defenses of this place. The iron golems were torn to pieces,” he said.

  “That thing was an Abcartros? What is that?”

  “It’s an incredible predator. They spread millions of eggs, but almost all die instantly. They require an incredibly precise set of growing conditions and can lay dormant for decades. Eventually, just one egg out of perhaps millions will manage to hatch and grow, and then you get that thing down there, a super predator that can change its shape and size and camouflage. You’re very lucky that that one had been lying dormant since it appeared. The more they fight, the faster they get, and smarter, too. You essentially caught that one in a slumber.”

  Alex looked back down the corridor. He couldn’t see the Abcartros from here, but now that he was healed, maybe it was a good idea to go back and finish it off if it wasn’t fully dead.

  Darwin seemed to read his mind. “It’s definitely dead. May I ask you a favor? I managed to lure it in here a long time ago to knock some books off the shelves, but it got some of its gunk on the second to last page. I haven’t been able to turn it, no matter how hard I try. Can you turn the last page there?” Darwin said, pointing at an open book on the floor.

  Alex reached down and picked up the book. It was the least he could do for this man or projection or whatever it was, considering it had just saved his life.

  “The Man-Eaters of Tsavo,” Alex read out, looking at the front cover. He carefully unstuck the page, turning it over and then holding the book out to Darwin.

  “I can’t hold it, but you can put it back on the floor,” Darwin said. Alex put it on the floor and then Darwin leaned over, reading the final page of the story.

  “That’s been driving me mad for years,” he said to Alex after a moment.

  With his wounds somewhat healed, the fuzziness in his head was now fading away and Alex was properly taking in the room around him. Books were spread everywhere, open on most of the surfaces. Alex was suddenly aware that he was being incredibly stupid. Sure, Darwin had healed him, but it was some magic thing, surely, and for all he knew he was in a trance while some giant monster sucked his blood. Alex glanced down at another book sitting on the desk, open in the middle.

  “Darwin’s Origin of Species. Have you read it?”

  Alex shook his head and then regretted it, feeling a sharp pain in the back of his neck.

  “I love it. The battle of prey and predator. Faster running, sharper claws, grouping in herds for protection, then hunting in packs. A plant grows more poisonous and the feeder grows to resist the poison. Each of them climbing up the ladder, the constant sharpening of one against the other, and then sometimes out of that, an apex predator arises.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Alex said. He took a step towards the door before Darwin leaped out of his chair, holding up his hands.

  “No, wait. There’s something I need to give you. It’s just that doing so will destroy me and I want to talk for a moment. There’s some parchment over in that desk in one of the drawers. Bring a page over to the circle,” Darwin said.

  Although Alex felt a growing unease, he decided to obey. No sense upsetting some magical projection if he could get out of here without a fight. He found parchment in the drawer, a page of it, and brought it over to Darwin, holding it out before he realized again that it was just a projection. He knelt down and placed it within the circle before stepping back.

  “All the ink is dried up, I’m afraid, but you’re still leaking blood, so I’m going to need some of it. I won’t take much, and it will only hurt a little. Once I’m done, you need to copy the parchment as fast as you can. Do you understand?” Darwin said.

  “Sure,” Alex mumbled. He stepped forward and put his arm, where a wound was still seeping blood, in the circle. He was half expecting Darwin to dip his finger into it, but the projection merely waved a hand and a small trickle of blood pulled itself into the air out of Alex’s wound, formed itself into a point, and began scratching onto the parchment. It took maybe thirty seconds all up, the blood a bright red against the parchment. Darwin collapsed back on the chair, panting with exhaustion, and waved to Alex.

  “Copy it quick. It’s your very own Rosetta Stone. You’re on the right path—the Great Barrier is the greatest harm of all. Complete the spell you carry. Learn this language. Free our people. Free all the supernaturals.” Then he flickered out as though he’d never been.

  There was a sudden burst of light and a clanking sound as metal shutters all over the building retracted. Light flooded into the room as the skylight was uncovered, revealing just how much dust and dirt was everywhere. Alex knelt down with a wince of pain and picked up the parchment. Written in his dried blood at the top were two lines. The first was the alphabet and then below it were a series of sharp strokes that Alex instantly recognized as the same language as the black rune spell. Below that were a series of seemingly random words in English and the black rune translation.

  He opened up his spell screen and saw he still had no access to magic, but hoped that that wouldn’t affect his ability to copy what he saw. Thankfully, he had the space and he concentrated on the parchment thinking copy and paste. He got 4% the first time and then 5% the next, and gradually over the next thirty seconds, he managed to copy the page. As soon as he was finished, it burst into flames and Alex dropped it to the ground and then very gingerly pressed it out with his foot so it wouldn’t set the carpet on fire.

  “Alex?” Juno’s voice echoed through the library.

  “I’m here,” he called out. He hobbled down the corridor and out over to the balcony. Down below, Juno, Nia, and April were carefully circumnavigating the Abcartros’ corpse, followed by Hera, Ruby, and the other witches. Mirabel was still looking as though she’d eaten poison. The moment she saw Alex covered in blood and clearly injured, she crossed her arms and glared at him.

  “Your favor is complete and this library is for witches only, so you must immediately depart,” she called out.

  Alex heard Juno scoff from where she was standing, and when Mirabel went to take a step, she crashed to the ground, her shoelaces tied together. The assorted witches suppressed laughter as Alex’s mates bounded up the nearest set of stairs, dodging piles of books and broken bookcases. April and Juno immediately cast healing spells on him, even as they helped him down the stairs and out of the library.

  “The gate is down there,” Mirabel said the moment they were outside, having gotten her shoelaces untangled. She was flaring her nostrils like a racehorse that had just finished a run.

  “A little thanks would be nice,” Juno said.

  “Shouldn’t he be thanking us, considering this was payment for a favor?” Mirabel said. Then she waved her arms at them and went back inside. They made their way to the gate, Alex’s strength gradually returning as his mates’ healing spells worked on him. Boris was outside, but there was no one else there, even Hera and Ruby having stayed inside. Alex leaned up against Boris to catch his breath.

  “That thing, it stung me and I can’t use my magic right now,” Alex said. Both April and Juno immediately cast additional healing spells on him, as well as purify, but whatever the Abcartros had stung him with seemed resistant to the magic. Alex welcomed the healing, though, feeling some of the ache in his body disappearing. Finally, he was able to stand properly and stretch out his arms.

  “You know, there are spell books in there. Down the lower levels,” Juno said.

  “I didn’t see any stairs going down,” Alex said.

  “That place has dug
into the earth like a tooth. There are multiple levels below. So, if you want a spell book, I’m just saying… there are spell books there.”

  “Sounds like you’re saying we should rob the witches and steal their spell books,” Alex said.

  Juno flicked her hair out and then tied it up into a ponytail.

  “How do you think the witches got them?”

  8

  April squeezed his ribs with her legs and ran her hands through Alex’s fur. He made a chuffing noise as they walked through the forest, Alex enjoying the comforting weight of her upon his back. About twenty minutes into their journey back from the library the Abcartros poison had worn off all at once and Alex had regained access to his magic. Although he was largely healed by then, thanks to April and Juno, he’d cast healing flame to take care of the final niggling injuries. There was still a slight ache, the deeper level of healing that had to take place at a slower pace, but Alex was almost back to full strength.

  Although fulfilling the witches’ coven’s favor hadn’t been in Alex’s plans, now that they’d come so far out of their way they decided to incorporate a visit to Julius on the way back. On the drive to a remote dirt area that could be barely called a parking lot, Alex had told his mates everything: the battle with the Abcartros and then Darwin, trapped in a circle, who had healed him and then given him what he’d call a Rosetta Stone. Alex tried once again to share it with April and Juno. As had been the case with the black rune spell, he was unable to share the new alphabet.

  They got hints of it only: Juno described it as swirls of black on a deeper black background; April, who saw magic in terms of music, said it was a low thudding grumble of something dangerous coming from a long distance away. They could only see part of the parchment text that Alex had copied, the words in English and not the runes.