Firehurler (Twinborn Trilogy)

by J. S. Morin

  “O, ho! This one has some fight in him,” the first voice called out, now clearly visible even in the scant light. He was a smallish man, his bald head reflecting the starlight, and he was dressed in dark work clothes. He looked like a longshoremen.

  Kyrus heard blades being drawn all around him. He spun about to see that the ring of men around him was drawing closed.

  “Now why not set that sword down and hand over the sack and whatever else you got on ya,” the first man said, clearly not asking despite the phrasing of his statement.

  “No man has crossed blades with me and lived,” Kyrus bluffed, trying to manage his best impression of Rashan Solaran. He could not help but think that if the demon warlock had been present, these ruffians would have already been washing the cobblestones with their lifeblood.

  “Sure. I heard that one before,” the first man said, obviously the leader of the group. “Bag him. We can sell him off to that Hurlan merchant ship that’s short on oarsmen.”

  The ring of ruffians responded at once, approaching from all sides.

  Kyrus was holding the weapon correctly, as Brannis had learned to wield a sword, but again his brawnier counterpart’s training failed him. The first time one of the ruffians tried to hack at him, he blocked the blow full on, and his sword was smashed back into him. The second strike, from behind him, he had no time to even attempt a parry and the ward absorbed the blow. By the third strike, a third man had also closed to arm’s reach and joined in as well. Kyrus managed to parry one blow to the side before the other nicked him in the arm—stopped thankfully by his ward—and managed to recover in time to slash back and catch one of his attackers across the chest.

  All pretense of proper sword-fighting technique blew away like a fog before a gale, and Kyrus lashed out at any exposed limb or body he could find, trusting in the ward to deflect any blows and his aether-vision to keep an eye behind him.

  “What the…?”

  “I thought I got him!”

  “Hey, what gives?”

  His opponents began to catch on that there was something not right. Each blow they landed seemed ineffective. It was understandable when a single cut did not fell a foe, especially one who might have leathers on beneath his comically oversized tunic, but too many hits were being landed for their prey to have shown no effect. Finally one enterprising thug took a new tactic and, with a great swipe, smashed the cutlass from Kyrus’s hand after parrying one of his less graceful thrusts.

  Uh-oh! Kyrus thought as the sword fight became a wrestling match.

  Men who were intent to take him captive and sell him off as slave labor aboard a ship no longer needed swords to defend themselves, and dropped them. Arms grabbed at Kyrus, some pulling away the rucksack that he had carried over his shoulder the whole fight and others latching on to hold him. Someone threw a sack over his head, and all but the aether went dark. With the press of bodies all around him and none of them identifiable by their Source, Kyrus was not sure who was the one who pressed a big, meaty hand over his mouth and nose, but it instantly made it impossible to breath. As Kyrus was already beginning to breathe hard from the fight, the effect was immediately dire.

  Kyrus panicked and drew all the aether he could.

  A moment later, Kyrus was coughing and choking, gasping in the smoke-filled air to try in vain to catch his breath. He hastily grabbed the scorched rucksack and stumbled away, picking no direction in particular. All around him, buildings burned, and the ring of buildings closest to him had been reduced to fiery rubble. There were screams and panicked shouting filling the night air as people raced to escape the flames, but not from any of Kyrus’s attackers, who were now nothing but ash on the night breeze.

  * * * * * * * *

  Kyrus sat in his cabin, protected behind two wards now, the door’s and his own. The smell of smoke was unmistakable about him, even though the scorched rucksack had been thrown into the bay once he had unpacked its contents; the smell had gotten into his hair and clothing as he had escaped the scene of destruction he had created.

  He wondered what Davin would say if he had seen him destroy a moderately sized chunk of a city. He wondered what Abbiley would think of him if she knew that he had just killed not only eleven men who had threatened his life—which she might easily forgive—but uncounted others who had just happened to be too close by when it happened. Magic was so alien to their view of the world that the fact of his magic use alone might easily cloud their opinion of him. He then wondered what Iridan would think, or Rashan. He could not help but wonder, despite his own and even Brannis’s better judgment, what Juliana would think of him.

  I worry that Abbiley and Davin would fear me. Iridan and Rashan would probably applaud me. Juliana … she would make fun of my aim.

  Kyrus was pulled from his musings by someone stopping outside his door. He had not lapsed back into single vision again since the incident with the thugs, so he could see the figure on the other side of his door by its Source. There was a pause for a moment, then Kyrus heard a knocking coming from the wall just next to the door.

  Ward works. Kyrus could not help a small smile at that.

  “Captain wants to see you,” came the voice of Tawmund, who seemed to be settling into a role as Captain Zayne’s bodyguard and personal servant.

  “Very well. I will be along directly,” Kyrus replied.

  Kyrus began to sort himself out, taking off the sword belt and tugging at the folds of his clothing to try to air the smell of smoke out of them as best he could.

  “Now!” came the impatient reply from outside his cabin door.

  Kyrus was sorely tempted to just let the man stew outside while he readied himself, but thought better of it when considering that the captain might be upset with him already if he suspected that Kyrus was involved in the fire.

  Kyrus opened the door to find Tawmund just outside. He glared up at the huge thug without saying anything, until Tawmund backed away. Kyrus strode past him and across the deck to the captain’s cabin. Kyrus did not think to knock as he opened the door. He found Captain Zayne inside, along with Stalyart. They were looking over papers at the captain’s desk. Denrik looked up at his entrance and gazed testily at him.

  “Close the door, Mr. Reggelend, and see they we are not disturbed,” he called out to Tawmund, who had followed Kyrus to the captain’s cabin. When the door had been closed, he turned to Kyrus. “Is this how it is going to be? First night in port and you bring down hellfire in the middle of the streets? If they connect this back to us, we will be lucky to escape with our lives.”

  “I was attacked in the streets. I tried to fight them off with a saber, but … well … I am not much good with one. They disarmed me and grabbed me—the rest was just a reflex,” Kyrus explained.

  “Reaction? You cast a hellfire spell and call it a reaction? You cannot—”

  “No, I just hurled fire. I do not know any real sort of war spells. I mean … I want to someday, mind you … but … it may not be easy to just stumble across someone I can watch to learn them from. I tend to stay away from battlefields,” Kyrus said.

  “No. Just … no. I refuse to believe you did that just firehurling,” Denrik protested. “Firstly, you would have charred yourself to a husk from the inside channeling that much aether through you raw like that. Secondly, you could not have caused that much destruction. By the waves, boy, we felt that here by the waterfront. I was in the Man-Eating Shark buying ale for every worthless wretch I could find, hoping to find a few pearls among the oysters, and everyone took note of it. The building shook.”

  “It was very loud, Mr. Hinterdale, and we see smoke block out the stars in that direction,” Stalyart added.

  “I was … scared,” Kyrus protested weakly.

  “Well, one way or another, just think not of leaving the ship until we shove off. Remember that ‘Kadrin behavior’ we spoke of? Consider this sort of thing added to that list. I shall not have you burning down half of every port city we stop at,” Denrik said
.

  “Well, then, teach me something easier to defend myself with. You said you would teach me magics as I needed them. If this is not evidence enough that I need some spells to defend myself with, I do not know what would be,” Kyrus answered back, growing a little bolder. Something was beginning to dawn on him. “If it was not for the ward protecting me, I likely would have died tonight.”

  “They are called shields, not wards. Wards are for protecting objects,” Denrik corrected him.

  “Are they?” Kyrus asked.

  Denrik looked at him suspiciously. Kyrus watched for the telltale sign of a sorcerer losing himself into the aether and saw it, followed shortly by a look of surprise on Denrik’s face.

  “What is it, Captain?” Stalyart asked.

  “This fool had a ward tattooed into his arm,” Denrik told him. “Mr. Hinterdale, you do know that thing is going to eat into your own Source, do you not?”

  “What?” Kyrus was shocked.

  He had not considered that there may be side effects to the protective ward on his arm. It was the same one he had used to protect the door against physical damage, and the door has seemed none the worse for it

  “Wards are hungry things. They weaken over time, but rarely fail completely unless they are damaged. That is because they take aether from nearby, bits at a time only, but enough to sustain themselves. By the same manner, if they are too close to a Source, they will drain from that Source to keep themselves going. That is why many sorcerers shun warded garments, and if they do wear them, keep the wards away from their skin. You have just attached a leech to your Source,” Denrik said, clearly exasperated with Kyrus’s rash decision.

  “I do not feel it doing anything to me,” Kyrus protested. He had not noticed the ward doing anything to his Source, and if it was, the effect must have been miniscule.

  “I admit, your Source is strong, but be warned … that thing will eat away at you until you rue the day you got it,” Denrik said. “I am starting to truly question whether you are worth keeping around, if this is the sort of decision you are making.”

  “Well, then, just remember this. If Captain Zayne is going to be the most feared pirate in the Katamic again,” Kyrus said, remembering that on a few occasions he had noted that the captain seemed proud of that particular ignominy, “you are going to have to overcome the fact that the navy captured you, and everyone knows it. Stealing a navy ship might help a little, but having a fearsome sorcerer as part of your crew will help not only your reputation but also your capability. Do you think you would even have been captured in the first place, had I been a part of your crew then? If you are rid of me, I think you might not last long.”

  Denrik just raised an eyebrow, not having expected Kyrus to talk back as he had. The old pirate seemed like he knew Kyrus had a point, though. If Denrik could keep him reined him in, Kyrus would be an irreplaceable asset to the ship.

  When neither Denrik nor Stalyart responded immediately, Kyrus asked, “Will that be all, Captain?”

  “Yes,” Denrik replied slowly. “Yes, I think that will do, Mr. Hinterdale.”

  With that, Kyrus turned and left. He passed the stoic Tawmund on the other side of the door without saying a word. He knew without having to ask that the giant had heard every word he had spoken to the captain. He doubted that the brute had understood half the things they had discussed, but there was enough that was unmistakable that it would certainly give the man pause to consider before laying a hand on him. When Kyrus reached the solitude of his own cabin, he renewed the ward on the door and collapsed down onto the bed, his heart racing.

  Did I just threaten the legendary Captain Zayne? Kyrus wondered. I think I just did. And I think it just might have worked.

  * * * * * * * *

  “What do you make of him, Stalyart?” Denrik asked his first mate.

  The clutter of papers on the desk went disregarded. His earlier discussion of the merits of various men vying for places on the crew—names jotted down on those same papers—was set aside.

  “I like him,” Stalyart stated. “He does not know what he is doing, but he does it anyway … boldly! He could have begged from you forgiveness, made promises, but no. Instead he tells you that you need him and threatens you if you toss him off the ship.”

  “You heard his story about his life in Veydrus. I am beginning to question parts of it. He seems to know more spells than he is letting on. I still do not believe that he was just firehurling when he obliterated that district,” Denrik said, looking to Stalyart for confirmation.

  “I believe him, and I do not believe him. Think about you. Here you are a pirate, feared and respected, but not by everyone. In Veydrus, in Megrenn, you are the hero; you fought to free your people from Kadrin; you’re loved and honored, and respected by all. Are you not the same man as him? If your places were switched, would you live as a saint, using magic to protect everyone in Harvin from harm? Would Denrik Zayne be a pirate in Megrenn waters? I think your own people would hate pirates more than even the ones in this world,” Stalyart said. “In the other world, Mr. Hinterdale says he is a robber of merchants, who kills when he has to but not all the time, so he does not attract too much attention. Well, what if this robber was not so strong, and lived where he did not need to rob to make money—maybe he works as a scribe. Maybe that robber takes the easy path of food on the table every day, and no risk of being caught. Then what if that same weak man becomes strong and learns magic. Maybe that weak man learns there is more than meals and safety to be had. Maybe the wolf pup who was raised by sheep grew up and realized it was a wolf all along, that its fangs were not meant for eating grass.”

  “Interesting theory. You believe him, then?”

  “No, Captain. That Mr. Hinterdale is a liar. He is changing things in his story. Some of it is true. Some is not true. I think all things you could try to catch him at, he probably tells you the truth. He is Kadrin, because you could ask him to speak it, and he could not fake knowing it fluently. He knows how to use a sword there—we know because you tested him—and he obviously did not learn fencing as a scribe. Maybe some of the rest is true too, but I suspect all of it for now.”

  “What makes you so sure he is a liar?” Denrik asked. He trusted his friend’s judgment but was curious what made the man so sure.

  “He cheated us all at cards.”

  Denrik’s brow drew together and cocked his head to the side, eying Stalyart curiously.

  Chapter 28 - Out in the Cold

  [What news of G’thk and his troops?] the deep sonorous voice thrummed through the forest, the harsh consonants of the goblin-speech she used among her followers snapped and cracked like the felling of a tree.

  The dragon’s footsteps did not shake the ground or rattle the trees the way her voice did. The dragon’s gait was graceful and balanced, despite the awesome bulk of her body. The long claws dug trenches into the ground as she gained traction with each step, and shallow depressions formed beneath each foot in spite of the cold hard soil of the forest floor.

  [The report is that they are eager to conquer but remain respectfully, awaiting your arrival before advancing. The human sorcerer is becoming an annoyance, pressing the general to move sooner,] the priest reported.

  [I begin to agree with the human. Order G’thk to move his troops. We will speed our pace and catch up to him as he reaches the mines,] the dragon ordered testily.

  Ni’Hash’Tk was miserable in the cold, though she tried her best to hide the worst of her discomfort from the goblins outside of her priesthood. The priests were aware and accepting of both her divinity and her few flaws. They played up the former and helped to cover up the latter when dealing with those outside the dragon’s most loyal minions. Ni’Hash’Tk was covered in a blanket of sorts, made from scores of ice-bear pelts, custom fitted to her reptilian form, complete with cutouts to allow her wings a full range of motion; the wings had their own ice-bear furs keeping them warm. She had not ventured out of her lair in winter—and Ni�
��Hash’Tk cared little that the astronomers insisted it was still only autumn—in centuries and was constantly reminded of why. The world was miserable and cold outside her lair, with snows and winds and ground that might have been ice for all she cared to distinguish.

  [I will send word at once, Mighty One,] the priest replied.

  [Be sure to send a skyrider. I wish them to make all haste. Let them leave no more than a token garrison. If the humans retake their city, so be it,] Ni’Hash’Tk added.

  The human mines were in a mountain that was once a volcano. If she was not mistaken, there should be warmth aplenty within its depths. It would be tempting to winter there and wait until the warmer weather before venturing back to her own lair.

  [As you wish, Mighty One,] the priest acknowledged.

  * * * * * * * *

  Jinzan was standing on the balcony of Lord Feldrake’s manor, looking to the north. He could see the Cloud Wall as if they were at the base of it. The mountains were so high that on the two-day trek to Raynesdark, it would barely shift in their view as the army approached it. He was being denied his prize by that arrogant lizard, and it galled him. He knew his plan so well he could have executed it in his sleep. No amount of tinkering or fiddling with it was likely to improve upon it; he had but to be given the opportunity to put it into play.

  With the time he had on his hands, he had taken to trying to solve Denrik’s problems instead. That Acardian sorcerer is such an enigma. He had seemed such an innocent, bookish lad at first, overwhelmed by the enormity of the world outside his master’s shop. Then he nearly single-handedly holds off a navy crew and burns down a ship with nothing but hurled fire. After that, two days of tutoring and he navigated us into Marker’s Point, as if he had been years at the trade. I send him into the city with a guide as good as any native, and he manages to not only lose his guide, but to get accosted as well, and nearly killed. But no, he was not killed; he managed to slaughter everyone threatening him and bring every building in the area down around his ears as well.