‘Osrik,’ Sawwse whispered, with a smile.
Fzzz-boom! Ba-boom! The sky continued its thundering as Ruby did her best not to be startled. She wasn’t always able to fully control her transformations, so instinctive animalistic behaviours would sometimes overrule her human logic. The firework display was relentless, and it was all she could do to keep running rather than cowering.
Ffyeew! Ffyeew-po-pop-pop-pop! Disoriented and frustrated, Corinne knelt atop a slanted tiled roof. ‘But there were no chimes. I thought I had more time,’ she thought. Corinne tried to meditate like Vadania had taught her. The unceasing explosions around her left imprints in the sky. Her mind was full of these marks. Where one faded, five more appeared. Corinne focused and slowly tilted her head this way and that.
‘What’s that?’
Away from the roofs, away from the sky, in the streets she could hear fire, working its way up a building: crackling and burning, but not yet roaring.
‘There.’
The fireworks’ imprints around Corinne melted away as she focused her mind and flew from the roof, following the cracking fire’s sonic trail of destruction.
Sawwse turned sharply into the blacksmith’s yard and her eyes darted around, looking for her sturdy elf companion.
‘No, no, no, she’s supposed to be here.’
She could hear and feel the burning doom of Alla’fyr approaching, but couldn’t see Vadania anywhere. Sawwse tucked herself behind a stone slab in the workshop, facing the forge.
The ball of fiery rage flew into the yard and slowly returned to a more human form. Her left hand still burned red hot and tiny flames lit the tips of her ears.
‘It’s almost over, gnome,’ Alla’fyr growled. ‘The chase is at an end.’
The mage stomped her foot and a small pillar of fire shot up from the ground, before melting back into the asphalt. Another stomp, another pillar.
‘Which crevice did you crawl into?’
Sawwse kept as still as she possibly could. Long, slow breaths.
‘You and your team won’t win. I guess you must know that.’
Fwoomph. Fwa-fwumph. Alla’fyr scattered her flames around the yard, as though she were planting seeds. Gardeners across the realm would be jealous at the speed at which these roots took hold and fire sprouted.
‘There are forces at work in this world that you just do not understand.’
Ffyeew! Ffyeew! Ffyeew! Alla’fyr mimicked the fireworks in the sky above them, firing sparks from her fingers across the yard. Juxtaposed against the explosions in the sky, these bombs were a dull, blood red.
‘To live in interesting times, eh? Another bloody idiot looking for adventure.’
Ba-koom-boom! Ba-boom-boom! The strobes of greens and blues from the sky above mixed violently with the crimson fire blazing in the yard’s buildings. Sawwse felt her heart beating faster and faster. There was nothing she could do. Pinned in like this, she was but a mouse in a trap waiting for death. Where was Vadania?
‘I must give you credit for the trap, the projection. Clever.’
Fwoomph. Fwoomph.
‘But not good enough, you see. Anyway, if you don’t die here, you’d only perish in the feral times ahead.’
Fwa-fwumph! Alla’fyr stomped her foot and another pillar of fire sprouted in the centre of the yard. Reaching into the flames with her left hand, Alla’fyr began to shape the fire into an orb, which she tossed into the air above the yard. Sawwse watched as this miniature magic sun burned away all the shadows around her.
‘Enough of this. Sawwse. Bohge. Perhaps I should tell Eugenie to set the Blue Forest ablaze.’
The little gnome’s throat tightened as her home’s name dropped from the lips of a force so evil. But wasn’t the Blue Forest hidden? ‘I can’t let that happen,’ she thought. Sawwse closed her eyes and thought back to Con Duco’s lesson. If she could strengthen her fortitude, perhaps she could force Alla’fyr to weaken. Sawwse pictured the familiar black pool, but immediately knew something was wrong. Rather than the still pool, she saw fiery hot ripples dancing on the water’s surface. She tried to think of something strong. Something that could overpower the fallen mage. But she didn’t have a chance.
‘Foolish gnome,’ Alla’fyr said scathingly. ‘You’ve given yourself away.’
Sawwse opened her eyes and watched as the forge hearth began to glow. Pale yellow at first, but soon it burned a familiar crimson.
‘You lack the fortitude of an adventurer.’
Sweat began to roll from the gnome’s forehead. The workshop began to shift and sway in the haze. Sawwse closed her eyes and concentrated every fibre of her being on not passing out.
Corinne followed the fiery trail, closing in on the furnace of the blacksmith’s yard. She knew she should put out these flames, but she couldn’t face the thought of her colleagues losing to Alla’fyr. Racing forward, she could hear a particular fire growing louder.
‘That must be it.’
Dunnn-dinnn-dunnn-dinnn-! The cathedral peal rang out throughout the city and shattered Corinne’s orientation. Her mind shook-shimmered as she fell out of the sky.
The heat of the blacksmith’s hearth had begun to burn Sawwse’s exposed mossy coloured skin, browning the bridge of her nose and her cheeks. Having invaded the gnome’s mind and narrowed in on her location, Alla’fyr walked slowly towards the forge. The orb of white fire had begun to fissure in the air behind her, haloing her as she approached, before cracking apart. The raging flames consumed the buildings about the yard, returning the area to its red glow while creating thousands of shifting shadows.
‘Your friend Osrik died with honour,’ the wizard gestured behind her. ‘But fine. Die like a rat in a hole instead.’
Alla’fyr turned an invisible dial and the fire in the hearth slowly glowed from crimson to violet to a ferocious blue.
Sawwse held her hands inside her tunic and covered as much of herself as possible. She tried to open her mouth to speak, but her lips had started to scab; she tried to hum, but her mind wouldn’t fix on a tune; she tried to open her eyes, but didn’t want to burn them; she tried to breathe, but the intense heat scolded her nostrils. Sawwse forced herself to count, to force her mind into some kind of focus. ‘One, two, three-’
A scream of anguish ripped through the roar of the yard’s fire. Vadania had jumped from the roof and planted her twin short swords into Alla’fyr’s shoulder blades. Just as she had done with the drake, she drew them down the fallen mage’s back, marking her signature, a bloody ‘V’.
The fire in the hearth disappeared and Sawwse gasped for air, somehow summoning strength to crawl from the forge back into the yard.
Alla’fyr collapsed to her knees as Vadania withdrew her swords from her quarry and quickly ran towards Sawwse.
‘Are you okay, my friend?’ The elf switched from fierce to friendly, pulling a water skin from her back and placing it to the little gnome’s lips.
Sawwse managed a weak smile, but quickly winced as her burnt lips stung. She drank the water, which Vadania had somehow managed to keep cool. ‘Gotta love elves and their fancy water,’ she thought. As she drank, her eyes narrowed, focussing on Alla’fyr.
The flow of blood down her back had started to slow, but Sawwse watched as it began to thicken and bubble, steam escaping the bubbles as they popped. The lava blood hardened and crystallised, forming a shell of sorts on Alla’fyr’s back. Sawwse’s exhausted eyes were enough of a signal to Vadania, who stood and drew her swords once more.
As she walked towards Alla’fyr, Vadania could hear the thrum of her heartbeat. She was calm under pressure, but something did not feel right about this. It had been her desire to finish the mage in one fell swoop.
‘Do I run to her now or wait for the attack?’ she considered.
Vadania quick-stepped her way towards the wizard, closing the gap in a second. A bright blue flash: Alla’fyr unleashed a force that flung the hunter across the yard,
throwing her against a burning building. The blast sent Sawwse into the air as well, landing with a thump at the entrance to the yard.
Alla’fyr stood slowly. Her left hand burned with a bright blue flame, which also tickled the encrusted lava on her back. As she walked towards Sawwse, the extra weight on her spine caused her to stoop. The calculating evil had gone from her eyes, leaving only brute magical power and desperation. Now surrounded by a blue fire, she shot into the air: a firework stuck in perpetual explosion.
From Sawwse’s perspective, there was a beauty to this doom. Her eyes still hurt, so the flickering cyan, sapphire, navy, ultramarine flames, came in and out of focus against a night sky of fuzzy, exploding colourful lights.
A missile now, Alla’fyr scorched through the air.
It was the second time in a matter of moments that Sawwse Bohge felt certain that she was going to die. If she had had more time, she might have been able to use her voice to summon some kind of defence. But she didn’t. It was all she could do to keep her eyes open: watching the gorgeous furious fire come crashing down towards her.
‘Tsk tsk tsk. This is a health and safety nightmare.’
Sawwse couldn’t understand what was happening. The ball of blue fire was raging a foot in front of her, but she wasn’t dead.
‘There are about a dozen Level Four violations at work here.’
A yellow film of rippling energy separated Alla’fyr from Sawwse. The little gnome turned her head and saw Corinne knelt beside her, head bowed, palms to the ground.
‘No protective gear of any sort. And I’d be very surprised if she even had a permit.’
Alla’fyr howled: half rage, half agony. Rationality had returned to her eyes. Perhaps vulnerability too. She placed her feet on the ground before bursting to the other side of the yard. A deep knot in her throat forced her to cough up tarry blood and black saliva. Now, panic bloomed in her eyes: ‘I can survive this,’ she thought.
It was clear to Sawwse that whatever magic was keeping Alla’fyr going was finally wearing thin.
The colours hitting the sky had begun to peter out, but there was still the occasional amber or lapis or emerald. Firing into the air, Alla’fyr flew to the roof above the yard. Her feet touched down on slate, and she saw the tiny frame of Ruby. Even amidst her pain, she grinned.
‘Let me pass, waif.’
Ruby stood ten feet from her, feet braced against the slanted roof. She desperately wanted to stand her ground.
‘No,’ Ruby said, screwing up her face.
Alla’fyr snorted. With one arm limp by her side, and the other clutching her shoulder, she started to walk past the tiny shapeshifter.
Ruby willed herself to change into a gorilla, but her nerves played havoc with her system. One hand turned into a paw, but the other, a tentacle.
The fallen mage laughed at Ruby.
‘Pathetic,’ she said, spitting blood onto the ground. ‘Fly away, little bird.’
Alla’fyr summoned the last of her energy and created a fiery portal. She threw herself through it, retreating from the carnage of Spearca.
Sawwse and Corinne watched Ruby fall from the building. They saw her slight human body shrink and shrink, until they lost track of her. A moment later, there was a loud crash from a nearby wooden cart. Corinne rushed over to investigate.
Back in her human form, but looking tinier than ever, Ruby sat holding her knees and trembling.
‘I let her get away.’
‘It’s okay. The important thing is that we survived,’ Corinne said. She rubbed Ruby’s back gently. ‘Perhaps you could go and let the city folk know what has happened. I will need some help with this fire.’
In the corner of the blacksmith’s workshop, Vadania got up and brushed herself down.
‘We survived,’ she said. ‘And we kept the idol.’
Vadania regrouped with the others, when another figure entered the yard. Larn stood facing the others, burns across his face, cloak torn and singed, and a large claw mark across his chest. They watched him for a moment, before he collapsed to the floor.
Chapter 21: The Third Idol
Ruby rushed into the city’s main square and alerted the city folk to the disaster. The off-duty guards and councillors, who had been enjoying Spearca’s annual fireworks festival, followed the shapeshifter to the multiple fires spreading around the city centre. As the guild adventurers were new to Spearca, many of the city folk were initially sceptical and suspicious of Ruby’s intentions, but once they saw Corinne doing her best to put out the raging fires in the blacksmith’s yard, they readily gave their trust and support. The councillors sent for the city’s clerics and together with Corinne, they summoned great waves of water, which crashed against the buildings and did much to extinguish the worst of the fire.
Fortunately, Vadania had not been too badly injured by Alla’fyr’s blast. She quickly found Osrik and carried him to a safe distance from the flames. Then she brought Sawwse and Larn to the same spot, in the city square, under the glare of the huge clock tower. Finally, the elf retrieved Rangrim from the alley down which she’d left him. His beard was still wet with ale, and he was still unconscious.
Back when Osrik had been set aflame, Vadania had spotted the drunken figure of Rangrim. He’d stumbled into the blacksmith’s yard, right where the trap was set for Alla’fyr. The dwarf had been incoherent, muttering on and on about silken elven hair. Vadania knew that if he’d stayed like this, he could endanger them all. So, she left her position, led him to an alleyway away from the fight, and, as she had done back when they were journeying toward the ancient tomb, knocked him out with a swift blow.
Sawwse, Osrik and Larn lay next to each other on the ground. The tall man and the old dwarf were on either side of Sawwse, and both moaned about the fuss being made of them, as they drifted in and out of consciousness. Rangrim was left to one side, feeling stomach-wrenching guilt when he awoke later. Vadania applied some basic balms to their burns and sores, but it would take magic to see them right.
After Corinne and the city clerics had ensured the fires burning across the city were smothered, the trainee mage made her way over to the three ailing guild members. By no means a fully-fledged wizard yet, Corinne’s skills had indeed improved over the months since she’d been a member of Actum Tempus.
‘This might take a little while,’ she said, assessing the damage with her hands.
Ruby pleaded with the city councillors for various ingredients, who, pleased with Corinne’s assistance, were more than happy to oblige. When she brought the ingredients back, she cooked under strict instructions from Corinne, and produced a viscous, luminescent substance that took on the colour of asparagus.
‘This should help somewhat.’
Corinne administered the sticky draught, and soon after, Sawwse, Osrik and Larn fell into a deep slumber.
--
Upon waking the next morning, Sawwse found herself in a comfortable bed. She stretched her arms out in front of her: no aches. She felt her face, but only felt a slight tingle across her cheeks and nose. Colourful circles of paint decorated the room around her. In the centre sat a cot with a small, round-faced human baby leaning against the bars, smiling at the gnome.
‘Oh!’
Sawwse jumped out of bed.
‘How rude of me. My name is Sawwse Bohge, and it’s pleasurable to greet you.’
She bowed in the usual fashion, much to the amusement of the baby, who giggled and gurgled.
‘And what might your name be?’
The baby squealed with joy, and Sawwse mimicked the noise.
‘Interesting name. Wouldn’t have guessed that for a human, but expectations are meant to be exceeded. I’ll jot it down in the Gnomeopedia once I’m back in Rhyddinas.’
The door to the bedroom opened and Ruby stood there smiling.
‘Ah, you’re up. Come downstairs for breakfast.’
Sawwse bowed once again to the gurgling baby and f
ollowed Ruby down the stairs. In a small sitting room, Sawwse saw the rest of the guild cramped together eating from a cold platter of meats, breads and cheeses. Osrik and Larn were particularly ravenous, and watching them made the gnome realise just how hungry she was as well.
‘Eat,’ Vadania said, with a nod and a slight smile. ‘Gather your strength.’
Sawwse noticed a young woman standing awkwardly at one side of the room and nodded at her.
‘I’m Rosalyn,’ the woman said in response. She spoke as if in a stupor. There was a dim, faded light within her eyes.
The gnome bowed in her usual manner, but hesitantly. A look of confusion had clearly registered on her face, because Vadania offered a partial explanation.
‘This is Convener’s safe house,’ the elf said. ‘Convener clearly worked some kind of magic on this woman, but he didn’t say what it was. We’ll explain more when we’re on the road, but suffice to say that the idol is safe.’
Sawwse gasped as she continued to look around the room. She’d completely forgotten about Mirrah. But there she was, laid down on the floor behind Vadania, unstirring, the idol still clasped to her hand.
‘She’s stable,’ Vadania said, sensing that the gnome was about to rush over. ‘Now, eat.’
The hungry gnome did as she was told and tucked into the platter. The fresh sourdough bread tasted particularly delicious.
‘Thank you very much for your hospitality, Rosalyn,’ Corinne said in a weary tone. The trainee mage stood from the table, but had to lean on Vadania for support. ‘However, we must take our leave very soon. It’s likely that Dorienne will send someone else once Alla’fyr returns to them.’
The young woman nodded. When she replied it was with a delay, as though she were being fed her lines from elsewhere.
In the Grip of Time Page 23