Raising an eloquent eyebrow, Ravi replied, “Now, Bel, you know us well enough by now. Torture is not our way, nor is violence, if we can avoid it.”
“Right, yours is the weak way,” Bel simpered mockingly. “You would just find some other sad bargain we can’t refuse.”
Ravi sighed wearily. “Not at all, I am tired of this enmity between us. We want no more conflict with you two. I think we have caused enough damage to each other in the last eighteen years, don’t you? We don’t have to be fast friends, but can’t we just agree not to hurt each other anymore?”
Bel’s lips tightened, but she didn’t disagree.
“There’s more to worry about than just the ship on the ground,” Ric reminded them. There are still several ships circling in the air. If we win this battle by hand, or you two destroy the ship on the ground, won’t another just take its place? Can you think of a spell that would solve both problems?”
The sisters eyed each other. “Perhaps,” answered Suul. “Let us discuss it and see if we can think of something. Now that we have seen that moving portrait, we might have better ideas.”
Lacey felt a tap on her shoulder and she stopped and turned. Matt was beside her and he beckoned her to step aside and let the others continue.
“I need you to make a quick trip with me,” he said. “If we do need to set the sorceresses loose at some point, we’ll need those spells the Voice hid in her cavern for us. I’d rather have them close by instead of having to go get them later.”
“Oooh, good thinking!” agreed Lacey. “You know right where they are hidden? Let’s jump up there and jump back really quick, and maybe they won’t even know we’re gone. We won’t tell anyone you have them unless they’re needed.”
Matt nodded and hurriedly flipped to the correct page in the grimoire. “I really need to memorize this one, since we use it so often,” he commented. The two locked arms and Matt began reading.
They appeared in the Voice’s familiar cavern, but it was in shambles after the explosion in the mine. A few stalactites had fallen down completely, and there were chunks of rubble large and small scattered liberally all over the chamber. To their dismay, the Voice’s ridiculously sized throne had cracked, and a large portion of its back had slid sideways down to the cavern floor.
“Oh, how sad,” sighed Lacey.
“I know. Come on and help me, so we can get out of here.” Matt stepped carefully but quickly to the foot of the big throne and began tugging at the footrest. Lacey lent her strength and together they moved the footrest forward a few inches, revealing a small crevice. “Got ‘em,” he said, and retrieved the scrolls, tucking them into his satchel. Promptly, he opened the grimoire again, locked arms with Lacey, and began to read them out of the cavern.
Just as the riviere began to glow, two suited aliens appeared from behind the throne, unaware of their presence. Lacey gasped involuntarily and the two spotted her. The three stood regarding each other in shock, and Matt sped up his spell. Suddenly the aliens pointed at the glowing gems on Lacey’s throat and began to chatter excitedly.
They surged forward. Instinctively, Lacey summoned the only power of the riviere that she could access without help. Gathering energy in an instant, she pushed. A wall of energy hit the two aliens and threw them back. One toppled end over end and the other slammed into one of the weakened mineral columns with a mighty crack. Seemingly unfazed, they picked themselves up and charged again. Luckily, the spell fired in the nick of time and Matt and Lacey winked out of sight.
“That was close!” Matt exclaimed when they appeared back in the conservatory.
“What was close?” asked Isa.
Lacey and Matt turned to see the entire group looking at them and Isa with her fists on her hips, tapping her foot. “Where have you been?”
Matt’s voice quavered as he tried to tell the truth without alerting the sorceresses that he had their reversal spells. “We, uh, we jumped to the Voice’s cavern, to see if we could find anything to help. If she might have scrawled a message somewhere before she got too weak.”
Jumping in to assist the distraction, Lacey added, “We ran into two of the aliens. Either they climbed up the mountain or they went up through the tunnels from the mine.”
Ric breathed through his nose. “I don’t like that. If they can reach that deep into the mountain, they could set off an explosion that could cripple the entire continent.” He nodded to Ravi in wordless communication and then turned to the sorceresses. “We need to go make sure we are ready for tomorrow. If you think of anything that might be helpful, I would be grateful to hear it.” Promptly, he turned and headed back down the conservatory path, with Ravi, Alex, and Matt in his wake. The rest of the group stirred, thinking of their own tasks that waited.
Alex halted and turned. “I’m sorry, that was rude of me. Are you ladies feeling well enough to walk about and reach your chamber when you like? Or might you need assistance?”
“I can stay,” offered William, “if you prefer, that is. If you’d rather be alone, I can just check back later to make sure you’re alright.”
Sharing a look with Bel, Suul answered, “No, we’d like you to stay. I want to see more of these moving portraits.”
Lacey grinned at her dad and rolled her eyes. “Charmer,” she said teasingly. She and the other women nodded politely at the sorceresses and began to exit as well.
“Wait,” Bel called after them. “Would you really consider removing our collars and setting us free? No deals, no taking away our magic again as soon as you don’t need us anymore?”
Again, Ravi turned and sighed. “Bel, if I was reasonably sure you wouldn’t immediately turn me into a ball of flame, I’d do it right this minute. Hopefully, soon we can both find a way to trust each other.” With that, he turned and made his way out of the conservatory, leaving Bel staring after him, open-mouthed.
Chapter Five
Dawn was breaking on the mountainside when the makeshift army of Alinn appeared. Even bunched together in a tight scrum, the clearing they had chosen was barely enough to hold them. Efficiently, they formed a large arc in the tree line beside the main ship and readied their weapons.
The aliens were about their usual business, but there were even more guards posted around the mine and on top of the ship. This time, a few held some sort of tubular weapons, like runner’s batons, while others still carried the silver communicators.
Standing on the side of the line nearest the mine, Alex and Matt murmured the tandem spells to throw William’s voice to the center of the clearing. Lacey activated the riviere. “People of the night!” he said in Sumerian. “Return to your sky-dogs and flee from the power of the mountain god! Here you await your death!”
One of the aliens on top of the ship aimed his baton toward the point of sky from which the voice seemed to emanate. A beam of blue, crackling light shot into the sky and disappeared ineffectually.
“There’s your target,” said Ric to one of the soldiers with a pistol. Nodding acknowledgment, the soldier aimed expertly and fired. Material fluttered near the alien’s calf, and blue liquid spurted from the entrance and exit holes in an impressive arc. The alien panicked and started wobbling toward the portal in the center of the ship. It looked like he was in a panic but not in pain, so the bullet may have damaged only the suit.
“Do you think they will get the message with just one example?” Ric asked.
Just then, all of the aliens with batons began firing bursts of blue light in all directions.
“No,” Ravi replied mildly.
Some of the blue beams hit the ground and trees where the army was hiding, and many of the soldiers had to dive for cover. Unfortunately, Lacey heard more than one stifled groan of pain. Ric gave the signal, and the army appeared from their cover and began to fire, steadily advancing on the aliens below. With the enemy visible, the aliens with the batons aimed more carefully and took out a few more humans. They laid down covering fire while the other aliens lumbered across t
he field and entered the safety of the ship through the open ramp.
“Wait, something is wrong,” said Lacey.
“What is it?” asked Matt, turning in the grimoire to the next spell in their arsenal.
“I can’t tell yet, but something is off. This doesn’t look right.”
The last unarmed aliens disappeared inside the ship, and the armed ones began to back toward the ramp. Those that had been hit immediately turned and ran, while the uninjured covered their retreat. In only a few minutes, the last of the aliens disappeared behind the walls of the asymmetrical ship.
“That’s it!” Lacey cried. “The ship; the angles are all wrong, and the ramp is pointing in a different direction. This is not the same ship!”
Just then, a horde of headless, four-legged robots stampeded down the ramp and spread out, heading toward the human army at full speed. They had batons mounted on their backs, and they shot a continuous fan of angry blue beams; this wasn’t the army that they had prepared to fight. But now they had no choice but to continue. They aimed for the batons and hoped for the best.
While the battle raged near the ship, the magic users tried to fulfill their second objective to disable the drill. If they could cripple the vehicle while it blocked the mine entrance, that would at least slow the aliens’ progress. Alex, Matt, and Lacey flipped the veils closed on the camouflage cloaks and ran unseen down to the mine opening.
“There’s no drilling vehicle!” Alex shouted in frustration.
“Because it’s not the same ship!” Lacey yelled back.
Matt thought a moment. “We can still stop them getting in! Let’s try the old barrier spell.”
“Over the mouth of the mine?” Lacey asked.
“Yes!”
“Great! Hurry!” said Alex.
Only two of them were needed to cast the spell. Matt walked in front, reading the grimoire, Lacey stood in the middle as she drew the spell with the glowing riviere, and Alex walked at the rear with a pistol, keeping watch. Matt walked and talked as quickly as possible while keeping the other side of the cave mouth in sight.
As they passed the darkest part of the cave opening, four aliens pelted out of the blackness and knocked them all flat. Matt staggered to his feet to see Alex still on the ground, trying to regain his senses. To his horror, he saw the aliens carrying Lacey’s limp, senseless body up the ramp and into the ship. As soon as they were clear of the ramp, it lifted up and folded neatly into place. The thrusters fired with a whump, and the ship lifted neatly into the air.
The nimble robots continued their onslaught until the ship was perhaps a thousand feet in the air. Then without warning, they collapsed into dead, metallic heaps. If the robots had not lost their connection with the ship, they would have decimated Ric’s army.
Matt and Alex staggered back up the hill to rejoin what was left of the army. Both Ravi and William were staring in dread at the sky and William was in a full-blown panic.
“Get her back!” he wailed. “What are you still doing here? Go and get her!”
Matt, shaken physically and emotionally, put his hands on his knees. At the same time, Alex collapsed onto the ground, his head still spinning from the blow. “We can’t,” Alex said, in a tone as grave as any William had ever heard from him.
“What do you mean? Go get her, like when you jumped into the ship and got me. You’re wasting time!”
“We can’t!” roared Alex, angry and despairing. He put his hands over his face, partly to help the headache, and partly so no one would see his tears.
“Why can’t you? William yelled back.
“Sir,” Matt panted, trying to keep his tone even. “We can’t. Lacey has the riviere. The spells don’t work without it. She’s trapped up there.”
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