To Challenge a Maestro

by John Buttrick

  “You didn’t twitch or make a sound, how did the meeting go?” the drummer asked in a soft voice.

  “Well enough. He believed we were in Aakadon, knew about the official escort, and the excitement in the royal court. I let slip that, thanks to him, Efferin Tames cannot hold me anyplace I no longer wish to be, and that he was right about the Grand Maestro’s reaction to my rank. By his reaction, he knows we are not in Aakadon and I expect company in the near future. No doubt, he will have teams of Accomplisheds teleporting from Ecoppia to Aakadon along the route he knows I have traveled,” Daniel told him in an equally soft voice. It was late into the night and soft voices seemed to be called for even though there was no real need.

  “Why that particular area?” Tim asked.

  Daniel sat up. “Because of the teleportation spell, I must be able to visualize in detail where I want to be. I cannot transport myself to a place I have never been to, unless someone shows me a highly detailed holograph. So, they must search in places they know I have been. The Serpent Guild has thousands of Accomplisheds and, I expect, hundreds of teams that can be devoted to the purpose.”

  Tim pursed his lips together while his eyes scanned the campsite. “You might want to cast a spell and see if any of them are near,” he suggested, and wisely so.

  Daniel scanned the area for humans, yetis, Condemneds, and Aakacarns. Instead of focusing the potential in a radius, he concentrated a tighter scan in quadrants, granting him a range of twenty spans using the same amount of life force energy. Tim was the only ordinary human and there was not a trace of the Dark Maestro’s minions. “All is clear for now, but I think we should start preparing for an attack.”

  “I have my bow and a quiver full of arrows, what more do you have in mind?” Tim asked while giving a tug on his quiver.

  Daniel walked over to the dead oak and summoned potential at the dry wood. Twin beams shot from his hands reducing the wood to dust, creating a huge pile where the tree once stood. “Tim, loan me an arrow,” he said while holding out his right hand. Feeling the arrow slap into his palm, Daniel drew dust from the pile up into the air and pictured five hundred arrows identical to the one in his hand, and then solidified them to the point where they were stronger and sharper than the original.

  “Now that’s handy,” Tim observed. “Why didn’t you do that for the battle of Bashierwood?”

  “At the time I only knew the spell would work but had never tried it and I was conserving my energy for the coming battle. Had I known I could make hundreds of arrows so easily, I probably would have,” Daniel replied with a shrug. Learning the source of the spells was giving him greater confidence in himself and he no longer worried when his mind began forming notes into an original Melody.

  Harmonic ripples washed through Daniel as he contemplated forming some sort of fortification from which he and Tim could defend themselves. They did not have the feel of one spell, more like hundreds and hundreds of powerful spells releasing potential in clusters running north to south. The Serpent Guild had begun their search. The crickets stopped their nocturnal concert and all was quiet, not an animal stirred.

  “What is that?” Tim asked while drawing an arrow and fitting it to his bow.

  “If the amount of potential used is great enough, every living thing can feel the harmonic ripples. The Serpent Guild has teams of Accomplisheds teleporting up and down the continent. I wonder what the Maestros in Aakadon are making of this. The Eagle Guild must be scrambling to find out what is happening.”

  “Are they close?” Tim asked.

  “The ripples mean Balen Tamm’s Accomplisheds are still search for us,” Daniel began to explain.

  “When the ripples stop, they’ve found us,” Tim finished accurately.

  Daniel went to the center of the broad clearing, summoned potential, and focused on the ground. Blue life force energy radiated from him deep down into the bedrock. He pictured a hollowed out hill and a mound began to rise as the dirt and rock moved to conform to the image in his mind. The interior was fifteen paces high at the apex and fifty paces in diameter with arrow slits spaced evenly around so Tim could shoot at every possible approach. Daniel created an arched opening wide and high enough to get the horses in without difficulty.

  Tim led Tremor and Sprinter into the fortification while Daniel levitated the five hundred arrows, lashed them together with bands of air, and brought them in with him. It was dark inside so Daniel played the Melody, Ball of Light, in his mind and a blue sphere appeared at the center of the ceiling.

  “Wow, all this in just under a tenth of a mark,” Tim said while inspecting the arrow slits. The walls of the mound were about a cubit and a half in thickness; the inside was smooth as glass while the outside looked like a grass covered hill. “Are you going to secure the entrance?”

  Daniel summoned potential and pulled dirt and rock up from the outside to fill the opening, they would not be leaving that way. He then summoned potential, focused a shield into the cubit an a half of dirt and rock that made up the wall and then down a pace into the floor, added a Da Capo, and tied it to his life force. They could hold off an army if necessary, for awhile, but that was all he and Tim required.

  Daniel summoned the potential and once again scanned the area in quadrants. He focused to the north and counted to one hundred, focused to the East and reached eighty-seven when Aakacarns suddenly appeared along with Condemneds.

  “Quarry at sixteen spans to the east,” Daniel warned. “I count forty Accomplisheds on horseback and a hundred Condemneds running this way.”

  Tim notched and arrow and peeked out the eastern slits. “The moon and stars are not giving enough light for me to sight. I can shoot at random and hope to hit something.”

  Daniel pulled the baton from his belt and went over to stand beside the drummer. “I can place a ball of light above the mound to light the clearing, but I want to wait, make them think they have caught us by surprise, and then I’ll light up the entire clearing and we will bloody their noses. Remember, we cannot make this easy for them or they will get suspicious. We’ll fight for awhile and then teleport away, build another fortification, and then bloody their noses some more.”

  Tim nodded his head affirmatively. “Sounds good, how many times are we going to teleport away before we allow them to capture us?”

  Daniel shook his head. “I’m not sure. A lot depends on how resourceful they are. Eventually they will have forces waiting everywhere we have been, if we teleport amidst them or they arrive before we can fort up, we will surrender.”

  Tim took a deep breath, obviously not happy about the prospect of surrendering to the Serpent Guild, doing so was part of the plan, yet there was no small amount of danger; even with low power shields to protect against stabs, punctures, bites, and scratches. “Are you absolutely sure of this?”

  Daniel placed his left hand on Tim’s shoulder. “The only other way is to track down Balen Tamm. Given enough time, teleporting, and scanning I think we could do it. The thing is; we will still be confronting all the forces we are now. This plan saves time and I have only had less than half a night’s sleep since this cursed link was formed. I’m not sure how much longer I can stay focused enough to finish this chore.”

  “I just wanted to know if you were sure. We will get the chore done together and you’re right, finishing it sooner is better than drawing it out,” Tim replied with steady courage clear in his voice.

  The harmonic ripples ceased, which meant the rest of the teams had stopped searching. A huge fireball sailed in from the east, striking the mound with a roar. Smoke filled the room and the screeching of the Condemneds filled the night. Daniel cleared the air with a wind spell and took a breath of relief as the shield held strong against the spells of the enemy Accomplisheds.

  Daniel summoned a ball of light sixty cubits above the mound, the clearing was bathed in bright blue light, and the enemy forces were plain to see. Tim shot arrow after arrow into the on rushing Condemneds, not missing one, w
hile Daniel focused his death spell through the baton; killing everything that was touched by the thin blue beam of light. Scores of Condemneds fell dead and at least five Accomplisheds. The spell requires little enough potential to be deadly, but amplified through the crescendo, the energy level was so great that whatever shields the Aakacarns conjured were not adequate to save them.

  A quarter of a mark passed and the attack intensified. Serin Gell was leading the assault and made several voice amplified demands for them to surrender. Daniel scanned a five span radius and found hundreds of Aakacarns and thousands of Condemneds coming from all directions with more teleporting in as he observed them in his mind. Fireballs were hurled at the mound relentlessly, the shield held but the air was again filling with smoke. “Tim, mount up and grab my arm,” he shouted over the noise, and then swung into the saddle just as his friend did the same. He summoned potential to teleport, focused through the baton, and pictured the north bank of the Gosian River firmly in his mind. Darkness consumed them for three heart beats and then they arrived at their intended destination.

  “I’m glad you brought the arrows,” Tim said while eyeing their surroundings.

  “We may need them,” Daniel replied and dismounted.

  Moonlight shimmered in the swift moving current and bullfrogs croaked from hidden places along the muddy bank. Dawn was about two marks from arriving. They were now about thirty spans south of their former position. Daniel scanned twenty spans northward and found no trace of Aakacarns or Condemneds. The enemy Accomplisheds would have felt the ripples from the release of six bolts of potential. It would not take them long to figure out the energy was from the Teleportation spell; then the search would resume.

  “When we start feeling ripples again we’ll know they have realized we escaped and are searching for us,” he told the drummer.

  “I figured as much,” Tim replied while dismounting. He took a swig from his canteen and then wiped his mouth.

  Daniel drank from his canteen while scanning in the remaining three directions for natural predators as wells as Balen Tamm’s hordes. “We are safe for now, no enemy forces within my scanning range.”

  “Can you scan farther?”

  “Yes, but the potential required would be detectable to any Aakacarn being scanned.”

  Tim shrugged his shoulders. “How are we going to fortify our position here?”

  The fort in the clearing had the look of something that took time to build. Daniel wanted the Accomplisheds chasing them to think he and Tim had been there for awhile. Their escape had been abrupt so whatever he created here would need to look as though it had been thrown together in a hurry. He scanned the riverbed for something that could prove useful. Three quarters of a mark passed and he found a sunken riverboat, a forty-strider. He summoned and then focused potential through the baton and beneath the waves, striking the hull, and began levitating the vessel. It took quite a lot more energy to lift the boat than it did to suspend four people, but the baton made the job far easier than it would have been.

  The blue beam of light was powerful enough to be within Tim’s visual range and he stared with his mouth wide open as the river boat floated four cubits above the current. Water poured out of two holes in the bottom and what remained of the smashed bow. Daniel levitated the vessel up onto the ground a good fifty paces from the bank. He ceased that spell and went to work on the bow. Summoning potential, he warped the planking from the sides, snapped off the odd lengths, and made each plank even, bent them until they touched, and then bonded them together, creating a new bow on a somewhat shorter vessel.

  He took the excess pieces of wood and reworked them until they fit in the two holes in the hull, then bonded them into an airtight seal. He entered the boat and used spell after spell to clean and repair the water damage and reduce any unwanted articles like rotted tables, chairs, crates, and other odd things to dust. Out of the dust, he created a steering wheel connected to the rudder and two sturdy chairs secured to the floor. He modified a scanning spell to include aquatic life, wood, rocks, and mud, and then named his new Melody, Navigation. With the new spell he could steer the boat without physically seeing a thing, and by adding a Da Capo to the end, he could cast other spells without interfering with navigation. Now the interior was fit for temporary habitation. He walked up on deck. Dawn had come and several boats passed by on the river. A few of the sailors pointed to the modified boat but most just went about their business. Daniel looked down over the side at Tim.

  The drummer had rubbed down the horses and they were nibbling contentedly from their feed bags. A fire was burning and fish were frying on a skillet. “It looks old and water rotted but I guess you can put the same kind of shield on it as you did the mound,” Tim commented.

  “Yes, it looks bad but it will float without leaks and the shield will be just as strong. The masts are gone but we don’t need sails or oars. I am going to create horizontal arrow slits along the sides and aft. We will fight from below deck. Once we and the horses are inside, I’ll seal us in so no one can gain entrance. When the time comes, we will teleport to our next location,” Daniel explained in more detail than he was accustomed to giving, but Tim needed to know.

  “How long do you think we have before our quarry arrives again?” Tim asked.

  “No idea,” Daniel replied while waiting to be sure there were no boats coming or going, and then levitated the boat back into the river, and tethered it to an oak with an invisible rope of solidified air.

  “That being the case, we might as well eat,” Tim replied and went to the skillet and flipped the fish over.

  “Might as well,” Daniel agreed.

  They finished breakfast and Daniel went back to the boat to work on the arrow slits, which would also provide ventilation. He summoned the potential, focused on the wood, and formed the shape of the slits in his mind, then reduced the wood in those areas to dust.

  “Give it a name, call it the Wager, cause we are betting high in this game,” Tim suggested with a smile.

  Daniel summoned the potential and burnt, Wager, deep into the wood of the bow. The large black letters stood out well against the gray planking. He then created a dock out of solidified air and added the color brown so Tim and the horses could see it and be confident it was solid. Daniel doubted he could get them to walk onto an invisible dock and over an invisible gangplank onto the ship.

  Harmonic ripples washed over the land both north and south. The search was on. “It feels like ripples in a pond only without the water,” Tim remarked with a worried frown and then asked, “Why don’t you scan a bit, see if any teams are getting close?”

  Daniel scanned for the enemy force, none were in range. “We’re safe for now. Why don’t you get the horses into the boat while I keep scanning,” he told him, then kept up the scan while Tim led Sprinter and Tremor up onto the vessel.

  The sun was at the mid-point in the sky when a team of forty Aakacarns and one hundred Condemneds, which seemed to be the standard size, suddenly appeared. They were seven spans to the northwest and headed straight south toward the river, right where a fair number of boats would be docked. The stretch of river Daniel had chosen was five spans southeast of the docks, deliberately so; he hoped to keep the confrontations from entangling other people. He had to draw the team away from the innocents, but how?

  “A full team has appeared and is headed towards where the Jennaeva usually docks,” Daniel announced.

  “They will kill or condemn anyone unfortunate enough to be in their path,” Tim rightly pointed out.

  Daniel intensified his scan, reaching a hundred spans beyond the enemy force, making the beam powerful enough for the Aakacarns to see, then abruptly weakened it back below there visual range. Now they knew a spell of some kind had been cast at them, and he could sense them changing their course toward the source. “They are headed our way and should be here within half a mark,” Daniel advised.

  The harmonic ripples ceased, which meant that whatever metho
d they used for scanning had told them the location of their prey. Evidently, the first team gets to move in ahead of the rest, because Daniel’s scan showed them two spans up river and ten other teams appearing all along the Gosian for a ten span stretch. “The first team is about to come around the bend in the river, you will see them then, and ten other teams are coalescing along the banks down stream.”

  “You may want to release the boat from whatever is holding us in place,” Tim suggested.

  It was a good idea. The land was untouched by human habitation for another thirty spans and drifting downriver would take whatever fighting occurred farther away from the docks and any people lingering there. Daniel cancelled the invisible tether and the boat began to drift in the current. He summoned the potential for his new composition, Navigation, and steered the boat into the middle of the Gosian. He was aware of every fish, frog, turtle, and aquatic bird, branches large and small; everything floating on and within the river. He clearly sensed the bottom and the banks and had no trouble avoiding obstacles. He added the Da Capo to the spell and attached it to his life force.

  Tim was up near the bow staring out of the port arrow slit. “How can you see well enough to steer from there?”