by Vic Broquard
By the end of that first week, Lida and Rayna both commented on how pooped they were. Lida added, “I’ve never seen students picking these spells up so quickly! It is so hard to keep up with them. If you only had four of them, why, I could manage to keep up with them. But we’ve each got six and boy do they ever keep us hopping!”
Rayna added, “You know, I’ve noted that when they are studying and practicing, they completely forget about their handicaps. Yet, when mealtime comes, they seem a bit embarrassed or something.”
“Yes, we’ve noted that as well. How are the alternate methods of casting working out?” Zdenka asked. The group had just gotten to the Magical Missiles spell. Usual casting had the mage pointing his or her finger at the intended target. These women had no fingers with which to point. Hence, the teachers had to devise alternative ways. This is what was keeping Lida and Rayna so busy.
“Head nods are working well,” Rayna replied. “Verushka suggested it. So far, so good. I guess they’ll have to use their feet when a spell requires them to touch the recipient of the spell.”
“Say, can I ask a question?” asked Lida. Zdenka nodded and she asked, “What are we going to do with the Flaming Hands spell? They have no hands from which to emit the flames. That one is coming up shortly.”
Inspired, Zdenka suggested, “Let’s alter it to Flaming Mouth. Have them cast the flames from their mouth, much like a dragon. I bet that they will go for that variation in a big way.”
“Great idea! You know, they all tried very hard to make the Change Oneself spell give them back arms. Every last one of them tried to do that. It was heart wrenching, but Rayna and I let them experiment anyway. When they get to the Morph Self spell, then they can alter their forms into a person with arms, though such will only be temporary,” Lida pointed out.
“Right, then they can really help themselves and they won’t feel so utterly helpless at other times when they aren’t working on their magical studies,” Rayna added.
“Right, that spell usually comes in a student’s third year, just before they learn to teleport and become mages,” Zdenka answered.
“Somehow, I don’t think these women are going to take that long to get there,” Verushka joked and the four chuckled.
“Say, who is the Door Warden now? Archmage Marek is off on other duties I see,” Lida asked.
“Blanka Kornel is our Door Warden. She’s achieved Mage status and I have hopes that she may well make it all the way. She’s a bright mind and quite intelligent,” Zdenka answered. “Oh yes, Sunday is their day off. Time for us to recover. Boy do I ever need the day off!” Again all four laughed. Indeed, change was occurring at a rapid pace. Some changes were good ones.
The first Sunday in January, Rafael knocked on the tower’s door. The tall, thin, but quite imposing Mage Blanka Kornel opened the door. She stood six inches taller than Rafael, “Yes?” she said dryly, as if Rafael should not be here. She recognized him as one of the blacksmiths who worked just inside the baron’s fortress walls.
“I’ve come to meet Danika. We have a date,” he said timidly, somewhat taken aback by the taller woman.
“Are you sure about this? You know that she doesn’t have any arms and has recently lost her whole family and kids as well,” Blanka did her best to discourage this young man. After all, what could he possibly want with such a woman when Brn was filled with normal women?
“Sure, we danced all night at the Stodgy Inn dance at Yuletide,” he explained.
“One minute. I’ll see if she wants to come.” Blanka shut the door, leaving Rafael standing outside in the cold and snow. A bit later, the door opened. Blanka had Danika with her.
“Hi Danika. It’s Sunday. Ready for a walk?” he said politely.
“Well, I guess it won’t hurt. Blanka, can you. . .”
“Of course, I’ll get your coat for you. Now you be careful. Message me if you need anything. I am sure glad that you’ve learned that spell,” Blanka chatted away, hovering over Danika like a mother hen, Rafael thought. Once her heavy cloak was fastened, Danika thanked her and stepped outside.
“Hi, I am glad to see you again, Danika. I want to show you my humble shop.” He put his arm around her to steady her as they walked through the packed snow there inside the fortress walls. “Plus, I have some exciting news. I am now helping Archmage Karel make his new magical items and weapons!”
“You are?” Danika replied, very much surprised. “We don’t hear much news inside.”
“Well, I’m really doing the blacksmithing part, the heavy pounding, heating, and forming work. Nothing magical about that, but still to know that I am helping make these things — well it makes me feel really good, you know.”
“I can see how it does. Congratulations. Say, I am learning new spells too. I can change my appearance now. We tried to make our arms come back with it, but I guess the spell isn’t that powerful.”
“I am sorry that it didn’t work. I can’t imagine how hard everything is for you and the others. Still, I am impressed with your becoming a real magic user! That is really terrific. Here’s my shop. Pardon the messy floor. I didn’t have time to clean it up yet.”
Danika grinned. “Clean!” she said. All of the accumulated bits of dirt on a section of his floor suddenly vanished.
“Wow! That’s fantastic,” Rafael exclaimed, truly awed by Danika’s spell. She cast it four more times, leaving his blacksmith shop’s floor sparkling clean.
“You are hired! Thank you, my pretty mage,” Rafael complimented her. She beamed. Next, he showed her some of the fine quality swords that he was working on as well as the shells of the dozen rods that he was fabricating for Archmage Karel. In turn, Danika was impressed, but she was totally enamored by his iron grillwork adorning one wall.
“Yes, I am making myself an iron fence to go around my future home. I am putting butterflies on top of it spaced every six inches. When it is done and painted, it ought to look really unusual,” he explained.
“Now that is incredible. You made that from those chunks of metal?” she asked in disbelief. Rafael was more than willing to explain how it was all done and she was a good listener. Later, the two took a long walk around the sprawling inner grounds of the fortress. Danika was getting her first good look at it all. Thus far, she’d mostly been in the infirmary and then inside the adjoining Archmage tower. After that, the two headed over to the Stodgy Inn for mugs of hot cider to warm themselves up.
“Hey, want to go ice skating next Sunday afternoon? The freshwater pond out back which supplies the fortress when it is under siege is all frozen over. Everyone goes skating on it during the winter. How about it?” he asked.
“I used to skate a lot before I was married. Oh, I don’t know if I can possibly skate anymore, not like this,” she replied shrugging her shoulders.
“Hey, we can give it a try. I bet you can; only keeping your balance will be a bit more tricky than before. Please, let’s give it a try, shall we?”
“Well, maybe. I don’t want to fall down and get hurt though.”
“I will make sure that you don’t. I sort of tired it with by holding my hands behind my back. I could still skate, though I will admit it was trickier, but I think you can do it.”
Later when he returned her to the tower door, she leaned over to him, pressing her body against his, frustrated. “Sorry, I wanted to give you a hug to thank you for a really nice afternoon, Rafael, but I can’t hug anymore.”
“Sure, you just did.” He pressed their bodies close again and she flushed. He knocked and Blanka appeared.
She didn’t miss the flush on Danika’s face as the two said goodbye to each other. Once inside, Blanka asked, “How did it go? Did he embarrass you too badly?” She assumed that Rafael would have done that.
“Oh no. We had a really nice time. He’s asked me to go ice skating with him next Sunday. Blanka, do you think that I can really skate anymore? Like I am now? I used to skate well, but now I doubt that I can.”
“Well, you won’t know unless you try, but do be careful, Danika.” Blanka was rather surprised that this afternoon’s date had gone well for Danika. She’d predicted that it would have ended in a disaster for the young woman. Her opinion of these new students began to change.
As the cold days of January continued to pass, the four teachers continued to see amazing progress from Neda and the seventeen young women. By the end of January, the seventeen had already surpassed Neda in terms of the number of beginning “real spells” that they knew how to cast. Neda was going perhaps twice as fast as other normal beginning students due in large measure to her youth and willingness to learn, but these seventeen were going at least four times faster! Zdenka had no choice but to re-twin Neda with others who were at her level, for Danika was going far too fast for Neda to keep up with her, no matter how hard she wanted to keep up. However, Neda still remained Danika’s hand for many other things and still shared a bedroom with her adopted mother.
In February, the seventeen finally encountered their first spell that slowed them all down, primarily because of their inexperience with magic in general. It was the spell that identified the magical properties of a magic item. “Just explain what it seems to be able to do,” Zdenka coached woman after woman. They were frustrated because they had not the vocabulary and knowledge to be more precise about what they were detecting in the items.
“Well that slowed them down,” Lida commented as the four met on Sunday while the many students took the day off.
Laughing, Rayna added, “Sure did. They took a whole week at it. Damn, I remember when I was dealing with that spell for the first time. I took nearly three weeks to get it all sorted out.”
“Yes, but we had a crappy teacher, sis,” Lida pointed out.
“At this rate, they are going to be into the second level of spells long before spring comes,” Verushka pointed out.
“I told you they are an incredible batch of students,” Zdenka teased them all.
“Hey, I heard that one of them went ice skating. Is that true?” asked Rayna.
“Yes, Blanka watched over her a couple Sundays ago. Danika was a bit nervous about it and had some very awkward moments, but by the end of the afternoon, she was skating very well indeed. I think that she used to skate a lot when she was younger,” Zdenka pointed out.
“That is encouraging. They are adapting well, I’d say, far better than I ever imagined that they could when I first heard about them,” Lida admitted.
Due to the weather, Zdenka rearranged her usual order of covering the second level spells. For safety’s sake, some of these really needed to be cast while outside. Thus, she moved other spells, such as ESP, up sooner than she normally taught them. By early April, the seventeen fully mastered this most interesting spell.
Danika decided to put this spell to good use. Every Sunday afternoon, Rafael came by and took her out for the afternoon. More and more, she began to look forward to these times, but she was also pragmatic. What was his real motivation for seeing her? She could see that some around the fortress area pitied her and the other women. Was he doing all this out of pity? If so, she wanted nothing more to do with him. Maybe he really liked her, she thought, but quickly abandoned that notion. After all, if she really took a good look at herself, she was nothing more than a helpless cripple now, wholly dependent on others for most things. She hated the fact that someone had to feed her like she was a baby. It was embarrassing for her to have to have someone help her use the chamber pot. The list went on and on. Only when she was doing or studying her magic did these feelings vanish entirely. She resolved to find out this Sunday.
As Rafael came to the door to pick her up, Danika cast her ESP spell upon him. Danika was totally surprised to discover that it was not pity for her that he felt. Instead, he was in love with her. He not only admired her but also had a tremendous respect for her. She flushed when she picked up his worried thoughts about whether or not he should kiss her. Will she be offended if I did? Will it embarrass her? She is a magic user now. God, I don’t want her to suddenly dislike me because I am so forward. Maybe I best play it safe a while longer. She is so beautiful and so powerful. She picked up some further thoughts and then silently canceled her spell. She decided to make the first move. She leaned over and gave him a passionate kiss. After that, their bond of love grew stronger with each passing week. Danika also knew that she was making good use of her magic skills. Without her spying on Rafael’s thoughts, she would always have had doubts about him and his true intentions towards her. Now she had none. During their afternoon strolls, she opened up and shared more about herself and her feelings than ever before. The two found that they shared many the same future desires. Both wanted to have children and a home, for example.
Chapter 14 Elsewhere, Winter Turns Bad
For Adapazan, the long winter dragged onwards but it took a turn for the worst on several other worlds. On the 10th of February, Zoran received a panic message and summons from Baron Arcangelo Mondo of Cosma, the agrarian planet. Help! An entire village of ours has just been destroyed by dragons! Please, can you come at once and lend us a hand? Please.
Zoran agreed and sent for Jarka, Bernard, and his son Tomas. Everyone else was really extremely busy with all of the teaching, underground construction projects, and guard duties. He left orders to be Messaged at once if any dragon attacks came while he was off-world. “Bring a stash of healing potions, Jarka, but I suspect we will be too late, as usual.”
She grimly nodded. To Bernard, she growled, “Here we go again. I hope to heaven they didn’t abduct women again!” A few minutes later, Zoran Shadow Walked the four to Arcangelo’s Circle of Ascension, where he found a very shaken baron waiting for them.
“So glad that you could drop everything and come. Honestly, I just can’t believe that this has happened here on Cosma. We’re farmers, for heaven’s sake. We grow food. Come on. I’ll take you there. Barons Bernardo and Vincens are there along with our three Archmages and fifty of my best soldiers.” He took hold of Zoran’s hand and teleported the five to the smoldering ruins of Pieta, a rural farming village of some two thousand people. The destruction instantly reminded the four of Petr Falls. Wooden structures had been burned to the ground, stone structures smashed by the might of the dragons. Burned, frozen, and acid eaten bodies lay everywhere. The soldiers were in the process of going through the rubble searching for more bodies and any survivors.
“It is quite similar to the raid on our village of Petr Falls, baron,” Zoran said softly. The three Archmages walked over to greet the four arrivals. Zoran recognized Archmage Bianca Babiana at once; she was a recent graduate of Zdenka’s, but he’d only seen the oldest Archmage once and had watched the other one when he was announced at the start of a High Council meeting some years back. Bianca looked greenish; the destruction had unnerved her.
“Archmages Biago Casimiro and Alfredo Amadeo,” Baron Arcangelo briefly introduced them. Both men nodded respectfully to Zoran and his companions. He nodded to Bianca and the two men.
The elder Archmage explained, “I got word from Mage Celia. She lives in the next hamlet. A farmer was hauling wood into the village when the dragons swooped in from out of nowhere. It happened about an hour ago. He hid and saw reds, greens, blacks, and whites. Worse, he saw them carry off thirty women and two dozen men as well. After the dragons left, the farmer headed to the next village for help and Celia notified me. We are still combing the ruins for possible survivors.”
“Ah ha. Then this attack, baron, is exactly the same as the one at Petr Falls,” Zoran said grimly. Jarka sighed and then cursed.
“What does it mean?” Baron Arcangelo asked, though he had a good idea.
“They intend to breed the women. In sixty days, the women will give birth to baby dragons, which will kill them as the baby dragons chew and claw their way into the world. Exactly what they are doing with the men we still don’t know as yet. If, however, we can find where they are keeping the women, we can rescue
them. We’ve worked out a way to save the women and destroy the foul creatures within them,” Zoran explained.
“Oh good god! You mean they are . . . Oh hell! They can cross-breed?” Baron Arcangelo exclaimed in a violent mixture of shock, surprise, and bitter anger bordering on rage.
“Yes, I am afraid so. If we cannot get to the abducted women before they give birth to these bastards, the women will die giving birth,” Jarka added, quite graphically.
“How — how can we possibly find them?” asked Archmage Biago, hanging his head. “I am getting too old for these things. I should have retired years ago.”
“You are just shocked as we all are,” Archmage Alfredo consoled his former teacher. “Come on; let’s put our heads together and see if we can locate the women. Baron, if we know the names of some of the women, then we can Message them and home in on them.”
“I’ll see what I can find out,” Baron Arcangelo said, the first faintest hope appearing in him. He headed off to talk with Mage Celia and the farmer.
“Baron Bernardo, if the Archmages are unable to Message the women, it is highly likely that they have been taken off-world. In that case, it will be you barons who will have to try to locate them by establishing a Duska Mind Link to them and then following the communication’s energy line to the person. Have you ever done anything like this? I know that Arcangelo can’t because he inherited your father’s Circle. You and Vincens are bonded to your two new Circles, like I am. We have a stronger bond with the Circles and our Duska senses than the others.”
“I’ve seen the energy line once, but that’s all,” Bernardo admitted. “All this is new to me, really, Baron Zoran.”
“I’ll stick around and help you both,” Zoran suggested to their great relief. “Also, we were only able to rescue eighteen of our abducted women. Alas, we never did find another ten women or the two dozen men who were taken. More than likely, the ten women are dead, but we’ve no idea about the men. The key is if you can find out the identity of those who were taken and make contact with them either by magic spell or Duska senses. If you can’t, then more than likely there will be nothing further that you can do for them.”