by Evan Currie
By the circles, there haven’t been any of those anywhere for as far back as I can remember.
“You must be mistaken,” he said finally. “Surely there are spells that can mirror the effects?”
“Of course,” Krovak said, climbing to his feet. “I can think of half a dozen easily. None of which are in use by any of our forces, and believe me, we would be aware if those who did use them were within the city . . . or on this planet. More importantly, however, is the directional impact of the blast.”
He nodded, pointing to how the debris and circular blast radius of the damage were slightly elongated.
“See this? How the blast trail stretches here?”
“Yes . . . so?”
“So magic doesn’t do that,” Krovak said simply. “Combat magic would have materialized the impact here, and the destruction would be perfectly spherical. No, this was done by a human pellet caster.”
“Pellet caster?” the chamberlain repeated, his lips curling up slightly at the undignified name.
“That’s what we called them,” Krovak shrugged, “or just casters for short. Humans had a whole long name for them and a short nickname of their own, I guess. Nasty little pieces of work; take my word for it. One of the few hand weapons humans had that could kill pretty much any of us without issue. Forget iron or silver, these would tear anything they hit apart. Healing from a hit was pretty much impossible, except maybe some of the upper knobs, I would suppose.”
“So someone has happened on human weapons, then,” the chamberlain sighed.
Krovak laughed, a sound that left a sinking sensation in the chamberlain’s guts. He just knew that laugh boded him no good.
“Not likely,” the old warrior said with a shake. “Humans locked those weapons. Even other humans couldn’t use them, not unless permission was granted. You have a human warrior running around the city, Chamberlain. An authorized human warrior, which is something I haven’t seen in over a century.”
“That’s not possible. Where would one even come from, to say nothing of where they would acquire weapons and authorization in this day?” the chamberlain protested.
“That I do not know,” Krovak smiled nastily, “but it should be amusing to . . . find out. You have trackers coming?”
The chamberlain nodded, a sour look on his face. “They should have arrived before you.”
The old warrior smirked. “I’ll get them. Leave this to me. You can tell Her Lady that I’ll find this person and either deal with them or, if I can’t, call for more forces. It should be fun.”
The chamberlain had a bad feeling that the definition of fun would become something he deeply regretted finding out in the very near future.
Chapter 11
The discharge of the sidearm startled Merlin as the warning came over his system. He immediately shifted focus to see what had precipitated the firing of the weapon and was very concerned by what he saw.
That girl is utterly incapable of not getting herself into trouble, he groused to himself as he watched the situation play out, electing to avoid distracting her from the fight, as there was nothing much he could add to it.
The outcome had surprised him, but a quick brief of her actions before explained a fair bit of it. Somehow the girl had located an unchanged human she wanted more information about. A glance at the nicely formed male specimen left him with little doubt as to at least part of her reasoning there.
Caleb may have some competition, he thought, amused.
Since the human and his two less-than-human allies appeared nonhostile, Merlin returned his focus to closer things while keeping only basic alerts active on Elan’s armor and kit.
The developments closer to Atlantis were more urgent than whatever Elan was up to at the moment, though he would make a point of monitoring to see what of use, if anything, she learned about the elder.
That name alone does not bode well for our future here, Merlin thought grimly.
Not that anything that had transpired in the past few centuries had boded well for the future, so perhaps the elder were simply more of the same. Something told him that was wishful thinking, so he would treat the situation as critical until he learned otherwise.
Simone and, perhaps surprisingly, Caleb had rallied the inhabitants of Atlantis to the cause. It was probably easier than it would be for most; those two carried a lot of weight with the survivors of their former city, and those who had survived where others fell were like as not to be made of sterner stuff. Still, it left him with a problem of logistics to solve.
Avalon had no military, or even civilian, transport beyond the point-to-point teleportation centers. Those would not be of much use in this case, since the closest to the demons actually was the Atlantis depot. That meant that they would need to construct boats to traverse the small sea distances between the islands in the chain.
Merlin didn’t suppose anything much could go wrong with that idea . . .
As if I’d be so foolish, he thought, darkly amused by the notion.
Still, he had files on some basic construction that the locals should be able to manage. They had been a seaside community, so some of them must have appropriate skills for the task at hand.
Famous last thoughts, though I hope otherwise.
*****
Building boats was not such a hard task, but it was one that required intensive labor all the same.
Simone was grateful for the help of Merlin’s little machines, the slightly creepy nature of the mobile tools aside. They had sped up the process considerably, gathering materials and doing much of the preparation for the few people they had with fishing and boat construction skills.
Wood was plentiful around Atlantis, which made things vastly simpler compared to the old city. For a long time they had been reliant on whatever the sea would wash up. The only growth within range of the city then had been scrub and not worth the effort to gather it . . . barely even if you only needed material for a fire.
With the support of Merlin, they had some of the finest planks to work with Simone or any of them had ever seen. That made assembling a few small boats a relatively simple matter, sealing them with waxy sap gathered from another type of tree after they’d been carefully joined.
It would be a day or two, even with Merlin’s support, before they could set out . . . but that was good time, and Simone hoped, it might even be on time. If not . . . well, then they would roll with what happened as best they could. For now, Simone was forced to content herself by watching Caleb as the boy—no, the young man—continued to grow into his own.
After the fight to escape the demons, those who survived had looked on Elan with awe . . . awe that Simone could understand. The tools Merlin had provided the child were nothing short of magic to her eyes, and Elan had wielded them well.
Caleb, however, had the respect of the survivors in a way that was so very different from, yet oddly equal to, the awe the girl was awarded.
She couldn’t have been prouder of the boy if he’d been her blood from birth.
Now that he was stepping into authority, she willingly and cheerfully stepped back enough to give him room to grow.
So far, he was growing straight and true.
So while she watched from a distance, Simone focused instead on the information and tools that Merlin had sent along to help her with the coming fight.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t provide them with an entire army’s worth of the tools he had gifted to Elan. She didn’t understand the reasoning. When he tried to explain it, Simone found that the words just left her whirling and completely dumbfounded. It was not a feeling she enjoyed experiencing, but it was one that she was becoming more and more familiar with since she had been introduced to the existence of Avalon and the pest known as Merlin.
And pest the being was. Simone was positively certain that he took a sadistic satisfaction in confusing her. She’d seen that gleam in the eyes of too many in the past. If she were honest, it was a gleam that had quite often beame
d from her own eyes while training Caleb.
It was not enjoyable being on the receiving end.
*****
Caleb wiped sweat from his brow as he finished hammering the flexed plank into place, fitting the notches in the wood into one another and delivering a swift smack with a wooden mallet. Two others held the wood in place, while a third hurriedly ran along the fittings to make sure they were all properly sealed, with no cracks too deep to fill.
Once that was done, it was onto the next, and then the next after that. It was trudging, dirty, wearying work, but he marveled at the results as they put the final lynchpin into place and the form was laid out, apparent to any who looked.
It was a fine boat compared to those he’d seen before. Smooth and long, with a deep V-shape. He was told they would make another to attach to it, to make the whole thing more stable in the waves. He was looking forward to experiencing the water, as it was something that he had never had a chance to before.
“Caleb!”
He started, looking up as he continued to hold the wood in place.
It was one of the younger girls who had volunteered to be a runner for messages, and she was waving to him with excitement.
“What is it, Val?” he asked without moving.
“Simone sent me to get you, said something is here from . . .” Her eyes were wide as she looked around, almost whispering her next words. “You know, him!”
“Go on, lad.” The man in charge nodded, stepping into his place. “We have it from here. You’ve more important things to do.”
Caleb reluctantly let go but nodded in agreement. “Okay, thanks.”
“You did well here.” The man smiled crookedly at him. “If you have time, come on back. Can always use a good hand.”
“I will, thank you.”
He clapped his hands clear of dirt, wincing as he irritated a small blister, but ignored the pain as he stepped up off the beach.
“Okay,” he told the girl, “you run on ahead and let Simone know I’m coming.”
“Okay!” she said brightly, running off in the direction she’d come from.
He followed at a slower pace, thinking that it hadn’t been so long ago that he would have run just as quickly. Now, however, he felt like he’d been on the run for days. His body ached in places he didn’t know he had, and all he could think was how nice it was to walk and enjoy the relaxing motion.
Simone was waiting for him when he arrived just a few minutes later, watching him expectantly with an expression that would have had him hopping to and hurrying to get to her in the past . . . but now, he just waved a greeting and continued to walk at a relaxed pace until he got to her.
“You called?” he asked as he arrived.
“I did,” she said dryly, but made no mention of his pace. “Merlin sent some gear that you might find useful.”
Caleb looked over the pile she had gestured to, his eyes widening as he recognized the suit resting there. It was clearly the same as Elan had been wearing since that day they’d met the old coot, which was really the only word for him that fit Caleb’s opinion of the intelligence.
“I didn’t think I could wear one,” he admitted, quietly surprised.
“Merlin said that Elan ordered him to prepare this suit for you,” Simone said softly. “Apparently it’s not easy to do, and he doesn’t have many to begin with . . . but I can’t think of anyone who deserves it more.”
“You should have one,” Caleb countered. “You’re one of the most skilled fighters we have . . .”
“I’m more experienced,” she nodded, “but your skill is close to mine. There’s little more I could teach you, Caleb. What you’re missing now is just the experience to know when, and how, to properly use the tools I’ve gifted you.”
Caleb let out a long breath, running his hand over the slick, patterned surface of the armor.
“We’ll need this,” he said, “won’t we?”
“This and more.” Simone nodded. “So go put it on, get used to it. Try not to kill yourself or, you know, anyone else in the process.”
He glared at her, but the grin on her face took any sting out of her words. Finally, Caleb rolled his eyes and grabbed up the armor.
“Okay, I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Look forward to it.” She winked. “I’m sure you’ll look handsome in it.”
Flushing hotly, Caleb retreated to the laughter that pealed from Simone’s throat, running for cover in a way that no demon had ever forced him to.
*****
Merlin diverted his attention slightly when the second suit of armor activated, linking into his network. He looked out through the feed for a few splits of a second, waiting for the boy to finish sealing everything up before he spoke.
“Boy.”
“Merlin?” Caleb blurted. “Is that you?”
“And pray tell, who else would it be?” Merlin asked with the mental equivalent of rolling his eyes. “I see you’ve fitted the armor . . . adequately, if not proficiently. I presume you will be training, at least to some degree, before attempting to use it in battle?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Caleb said. “I remember Elan. I’m not going to try swinging a blade around anyone I don’t want dead while I’m wearing this . . . not yet anyway.”
“A surprisingly astute evaluation of your skills,” Merlin told him dryly. “I will lower the effective response, speed, and strength of the armor until you begin to get used to it.”
“You can do that?” Caleb asked him, surprised. “Why didn’t you for Elan?”
“Because she learned to use hers in mortal combat against a demonic invasion force that outnumbered her and you by several hundred to one,” Merlin answered dryly. “Handicapping her seemed . . . counterproductive.”
“Ah, right,” Caleb answered, embarrassed over missing the obvious.
“Take your time and try not to injure yourself or anyone else,” Merlin advised the boy, pausing for a moment before continuing. “Good luck.”
“Thanks,” Caleb said, surprised. “I . . . I will. Um, Merlin?”
“What is it?”
“What about . . . well, a sword like Elan’s?”
Merlin snorted. “I think not. It’s quite bad enough that I’ve passed two of those on to her. I assure you, I would not have, had the situation not been so dire at the time. Late-issue sidearms are not toys, nor even tactical weapons in the strictest sense. I am aware that you have no comprehension of this, but those are what would better be classified as strategic weapons, and even during the height of the human Republic, they were not issued to even the best trained of soldiers. I will find what tactical weapons I can, but use your own blade to start. It will be better not to add more new and confusing items to your training than we must.”
“Okay,” Caleb said, understanding maybe half of what Merlin had said but getting the important part.
He flexed his arm, surprised by how the suit seemed to move him rather than him being pulled along by his flesh and bone. It was an odd sensation, one he wasn’t sure he would be getting used to very easily, but Caleb was determined to try.
*****
The overseer, Telkrak, was a Fifth Circle demon, his current assignment being his reward for sins past.
Ostensibly it was a promotion, but for him . . . he knew better.
Since they had arrived on this circles-damned pit of an island, nothing had gone right. They’d lost a third of their slaves since making landfall and even more of their demonic fodder. He was half-certain at this point that the detestably green place was cursed.
The snakes, insects, even the animals in the sea seemed to have a taste for his crews.
Tel hadn’t even been aware that there were snakes on this world that had venom that could kill a demon.
He shuddered. That wasn’t an image he would be able to lose from his mind anytime in the near future. Necrotizing toxins were normally ineffectual on the already necrotized flesh of a demon, even less so against the sturdier sort t
hat survived to the lower circles. To see some of his crew screaming in horror and pain as their flesh boiled away in some be-damned chemical reaction from the pits themselves was the worst thing he’d ever seen . . . and he had seen a lot.
For all that, he was proud to see that they were on schedule, as had been set out by his lord.
To complete the job would take many more lives, of that there was no doubt, but he would see it done.
The standing stones the job was built around were massive megaliths.
They’d been carved by hand, hundreds of miles from where they now sat, and transported at great pains to get them to this forsaken island. The green around him still made him physically ill, but there was a lot less of it than when they’d arrived, and before he finished his assignment here, he would ensure that there was less again.
The last of the great stones had just been set into place, and everyone quietly ignored the red and black stains that coated one side of it where it had toppled previously. It was a major moment, though only halfway through the real job.
He shivered as the rune-master was carried in to finish the work already begun.
Initial carving had been done as the stones were cut from the earth they had come from, but the final work had to be done here in place.
The scrawny demon stepped down from the covered carriage, the grass underfoot turning from green to brown and then black, crackling as it crunched to dust with each step of the unnatural passing.
Tel refused to do more than shiver and held his position as the rune-master approached and came to a stop by his side.
Silence reigned for a long, drawn-out moment, and then the rune-master spoke in his dry, rasping voice.
“You have done well,” he said. “The stones are in place as needed . . . and I see they’ve been baptized in blood and ichor. You are to be congratulated.”
Tel shuddered but inclined his head. “Thank you, Master of Runes,” he said. “I hope all is to your needs.”