Archon's Hope: Book III of 'The Magician's Brother' Series

by HDA Roberts

  And it wasn't even really necessary.

  The Elemental already had Cathy wrapped in a coil of shadow. He had her safely in the playing fields, having left a massive hole in the side of Cathy's boarding house when he'd extracted her.

  Which would make sense. The Elemental was bloody huge!

  He was about half a kilometre long and looked like a cross between a colossal black snake and a whale, with flippers at intervals and a great set of sharp spines along its back. Actually, more like a dragon than a snake...

  It was coiled like a cobra, a great circle of body where Cathy was being kept safe, the massive head high above, poised for a strike; the mouth full of sharp teeth and coiling shadows.

  Cathy was holding onto him for dear life, unafraid of him, recognising shadows as me, hopefully. The dragon was glaring at the hole, where Maria Hellstrom was standing, her hands flickering with Earth Magic.

  She kept drawing power and stepped out of the hole in the building, lowering herself gently to the ground.

  "You think that's going to scare me, Graves? An Illusion of a dragon? How stupid do you think I am?"

  "Pretty stupid!" I shouted from high above her, launching a series of dispels that tore her shields away. I saw that she was already bleeding from her face, four long gashes in the meat of her cheek, my large friend had been efficient.

  The Dragon's mouth opened and a tide of shadows vomited out, enveloping Hellstrom, squeezing and smothering. I hadn't even asked him to do that, what a useful fellow...

  Don't kill her, I sent along my link to the shadows, knowing somehow that my thoughts would find their way to the creature.

  The One doesn't kill, so we don't kill, he whispered by way of an exasperated explanation.

  Maria fell to the ground, and I started to relax a little. But then I felt it. I tensed and so did the dragon.

  The Black, closing fast.

  I should have known that the other one wouldn't be far away.

  Take her away! I commanded, Somewhere safe!

  His emotions were full of protest, he didn't want to leave me alone, but at the same time I felt his fear of the Black, and his desire for it. The feelings were a mirror of my own. He darted down and I heard Cathy squeak as he took her gently into his mouth.

  What can only be described as a gateway opened, and the Dragon dove into it. I wasn't even a little worried; I knew instinctively that she'd be safe. The creature was of the shadows, and in a very real way, they were of me...

  Whoa, where did that thought come from? That was happening a lot lately...

  Before I had a chance to explore that, a beam of Black-Magic impregnated shadow slashed into my cocoon, and I had to release my own constructs before they could get contaminated. I covered myself in Will, casting shields and readying attacks even as I descended.

  Fireballs exploded against my shields from behind, the incidental light freeing Maria, who darted to her feet and readied her own attacks. I spotted the other Shadowborn coming from doors and even a window, dropping to the ground and advancing; the bodyguards were coming too (it was one of them who'd thrown the fireballs.

  And I saw someone else, too. I saw Prewett.

  She was armed and fired her pistol at my shields.

  That was a shock, but I didn't let it affect my casting. I set up a Light generator as they advanced from all sides, hemming me in. Tiny balls of condensed light started to appear around my head. I dared not use shadows as long as Darius was up and about, which tied my hands a little.

  I was getting over my shock at the initial situation, the emotion vanishing as I focussed and built my defences. I found that now I had a moment to think that I was rapidly becoming more angry than I'd ever been in my life.

  Because no matter what else was going on, no matter what trap they'd intended to set for me, they'd come after my Cathy.

  I decided that they were going to bleed for that.

  The fact that they'd set a trap for me was fairly obvious. They didn't need that many heavy-hitters to abduct one eighteen year old girl. That was obviously blown, so I probably could have diffused the situation. I could have tried to talk them down; hell, I should have done any number of things that might have mitigated what happened next.

  But I was too furious, and Hellstrom was there with his poisonous Magic.

  "Surrender now, and maybe we'll leave you with one or two working limb-" Maria started.

  I sent a Force Lance straight at her.

  Her shields went down immediately, and the beam tore past the side of her head, taking a solid chunk of cheek and her left ear away with it. She fell screaming, and the night exploded in chaos and magic.

  The Shadowborn started throwing tiny threads of darkness at me. I called the light I'd been generating and threw out a photoburst which made them step back, dazed. Darius was the first to recover and hurled another beam of Black Magic at me, screaming his hatred as he drained himself nearly dry. I saw the skin on his face start to turn black around the eyes as the evil of the magic he was using began to consume his Well. The more he used, the worse it would get, and if the transformation was beginning, that meant he'd used a lot already.

  I didn't care. I just wanted them all to hurt. I called more light and focussed it down into a beam. I pointed my finger at Darius and let it rip. One of his bodyguards got in the way, just as Hellstrom was casting another Black spell. My attack hit Hellstrom's shoulder instead of his face and seared his arm off.

  Hellstrom's attack hit his bodyguard.

  The bodyguard changed before my eyes. Whatever Darius had intended for me, I don't think it was this. The poor man had taken the hit on his head, and the air around him warped hard as his Magic recoiled at the attack. His head doubled in size over two or three seconds, sprouting horns and bony protrusions as one of his eyes enlarged and split into ten more, covering the engorged forehead. His mouth opened, enlarging right to his chest, becoming one gaping maw out of which a horrible scream poured.

  I nearly threw up.

  The new Grotesque glared at me with all of those terrible red eyes... and then leapt right at me. He bounced off my shields, and I threw force that sent him spinning head over heels to smash into Prewett, who he then proceeded to bite with that horrible mouth of his, tearing a great strip of flesh away from her face.

  Blood sprayed over the ground, coating the monster and two nearby Shadowborn, one of whom screamed and simply bolted (sensible girl). The Grotesque turned towards the second Shadowborn, but I called light and cleaved the monster's forearms off, leaving gently smoking stumps as I grabbed him with my Will, wrenching him away from the boy.

  The last bodyguard hit me with Fire and Air from behind before I could get the monster away, and my weaker rear shields buckled and failed before I could turn and defend properly.

  This is why you shouldn't duel angry, by the way; you make mistakes.

  I took hits to my shoulder, back and hip before my shields could regenerate and cover me. In that time, I'd dropped the Grotesque, and he'd rallied to leap at me again, Magic pouring off him. He tore at my shields, and I started to panic, terror finally shoving its way past my anger, alerting me to the fact that I was now thoroughly in over my head.

  I was burned and bleeding. I thought that one of the Air-blades had nicked something important in my chest, as I was having trouble breathing. My Light generator was still up and running, so I pulled in a few of the globes and put a beam through the monster's remaining human eye. It fell back and over, twitching spasmodically. I hoped it was still alive, not that there was a very great deal of person left, any more.

  I called Will, desperately trying to ignore the pain in my back as I shovelled more power into my shields. I bought myself enough time to cast my numbing spell. The agony vanished, and I stood to face the man who'd nearly killed me. He looked scared as I called my shadows.

  Something in me enjoyed that.

  Without Darius up and casting there was absolutely no reason I couldn't use my shadows
to swat the bodyguard like a horse fly. I felt the Shadowborn come back into the fight as my darkness slammed into the Air-bodyguard, buckling his shields before sending him flying, cut and broken.

  I was tired, lightheaded and losing concentration, but there were still enemies all around me. Maria was standing up again, her hand to her mangled face, Earth Magic gathering. Into all this returned the Shadow Dragon. The gateway opened just as Maria hurled a massive ball of concentrated gravity at me.

  The Dragon skimmed a few feet off the ground, and took the hit on his massive flank, shrugging it off like it was nothing, before a twitch of his tail flung two of the three remaining Shadowborn away with broken bones. The last one standing, the kid I'd saved, turned and ran, screaming and crying, not that I could blame him.

  Maria seemed to understand that the dragon wasn't an illusion, and started calling light. I sent my shadows for her, and they met Darius' half way there; I felt the Black and had to retreat A quick look showed that his powers had rebuilt his arm, but had left him almost starvation-thin. He was shaky, but standing, his power flaring unstably. I called more light, and the dragon leapt up and away from the tainted Shadowborn, thrashing his tail in agitation before he vanished back through the same gate he'd come through.

  I was slowing down. I coughed and tasted something metallic, which couldn't be good.

  There was just the Hellstroms left now. Three Shadowborn were down for the count, one bleeding and screaming, one still running for his tiny life. One bodyguard was still unconscious, but not seriously hurt (I hoped), and the other was a slightly-lobotomised monstrous heap, still twitching.

  The siblings came closer to each other, approaching cautiously. I reinforced my shields and took a moment to cast a stimulant spell that cleared my mind and sped my thinking. While they were gathering strength, I cast a basic triage spell on my back that would stop me from keeling over, assuming I didn't pick up any more injuries.

  Darius struck first, and I put up a Will shield that caught his attack. I started calling more force, and wasn't even half way done when my shields took a massive hit from Maria, all but three of them shattered by the sheer force of her spell. I made my energy-gathering enchantments self sustaining and started working on my dispel cannon. It was time to start doing things properly.

  My rational brain was coming back into gear at long last. I had been reacting, wounded and outnumbered. I started to work smarter; I knew that I was stronger than the pair of them combined, but if I didn't start fighting with my big brain instead of my little one, then that wasn't going to matter. Darius would drain my Well with the Black, and Maria would finish off what was left.

  They both managed to get off another attack before I cast the cannon, and it started spitting out dispels. I directed it to start hitting their shields as well, and it drove them onto the back foot enough for me to pull together the light and force my generator spells had been creating for me.

  Darius was retreating frantically, trying to restore his defences. Maria was just putting more power into hers. I hit Darius first. I pointed and my fingers glowed with flickering blue and gold light as I threw the lance that stripped the last of his shields away. I threw the prepared coma hex and he dropped like a bag of wet spinach, down for the count, his powers falling away.

  Maria screamed out her frustration. I turned my attention back to her and called my shadows. She called light, even using the energy in her shields to try and shred the incoming attack. I wasn't having it this time. My shadows landed on her like a runaway passenger jet. Her shields held for a second, and then another, but then they failed and my shadows came right for her. The impact was so all-encompassing and heavy that she passed out on the spot. It took all I had to keep my shadows from perforating her.

  When I was sure she was out, and that there were no other threats, I pulled my shadows back to me, where they slithered around me protectively, holding me up as I walked over and dropped a coma-hex into Maria.

  I started breathing normally, relaxing ever so slightly, I lowered my shields.

  And nearly jumped out of my skin when the cheering started.

  I looked over at Curie House and saw every window full of faces. The arch underneath was full of students and teachers in dressing gowns. Everyone was shouting, bellowing in some cases. Some were shouting my name, others just showing their approval.

  I saw expressions of exultation and triumph turn to fear, and turned.

  Too late.

  The Grotesque was coming right for me, hands outstretched, straight at my face.

  I darted back and fell over. I tried to scramble away; it didn't help. The creature stood over me, posed for an instant between running and killing. It seemed to be moving in slow motion, but there was nothing I could do to stop it.

  And just like that, he disappeared down the dragon's gullet.

  I looked on in surprise as the Elemental swallowed once and disappeared back through another gateway.

  I didn't really know what to think about that, so I simply sent 'Thank you' into the shadows.

  Unity, honour, duty. Life for the One, he replied.

  You killed him? I asked.

  Essence already moved on. Only ate the shell.

  And then he was gone again.

  I think he was saying that the bodyguard was already dead...

  I suppose I could live with that.

  "What the hell was that thing?!" Belle shouted, making her way out of a nearby window.

  "Don't worry, I think he works for me," I said, taking a step before my legs went and I keeled over.

  Belle caught me and lowered me to the ground. The hand she had on my back came away red and glistening.

  "My God, Matty," she said, looking at the handful of my blood.

  "Don't worry," I said, my voice a little thick, "I can fix that."

  I focussed hard, until I could add power to my stimulant spell, which brought my brain back up to speed. I then cast Mage Sight and adjusted it to look inward. I hadn't done that very often; the perception can be very disorienting and also worrying because you see everything. From the tiny cold viruses floating around in your nose, ready to cause you a full-blown illness, to the tiny clutch of pre-cancerous cells living under a mole, every blemish, sore, boil, spot, bacterium, previous bone breaks- you see it all.

  I was in quite a bit of trouble. My triage spell hadn't worked properly, and I'd lost a fifth of my blood volume. Only the highly-charged stimulant spell was keeping me conscious at that point. I recast the triage spell, more carefully this time, and the leaking stopped.

  I had a patch of burned skin, worsening as it got closer to the centre, about the diameter of a football. There were two wounds from Air-blades, one in my shoulder, which was where the blood was coming from, and another in my abdomen, penetrating through to my left lung, which was only a few minutes away from collapsing at the current rate.

  I started there, draining my chest cavity of blood and air, right through the hole (it was the easiest way, and the noise Belle made was funny). I then stimulated my bone marrow to start replacing my blood volume while I prepared Flesh Magic lattices for the wounds and I drew water from the air to replace my lost fluids.

  It was a lengthy process, I wasn't a quarter done when about a hundred students surrounded me. Belle told them what I was about, and they backed off, watching. I think someone went for a matron, because one turned up and started looking at the various piles of mangled humanity I'd made.

  She panicked and called an ambulance, which turned up along with two others. Followed eventually by the police. The other bodyguard woke up around this time, just as the last wound on my back closed up properly.

  I opened up my eyes to see three police officers clustering around me, batons out and Spelleater amulets in hand.

  "Good evening officers," I said.

  "Turn around," the one in the middle said. He was an older man, with wrinkles around his bloodshot eyes.

  "Is there a problem?" I asked.
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  "This man has made some very serious accusations against you," he continued, "now turn around!"

  "What did he say I did?"

  "We'll sort this out down at the station, Sir. I won't ask you again, turn around."

  "Officer, if I was the antagonistic party here, would I be in my pyjamas while the others were fully dressed in dark clothes fit for sneaking and impolite behaviour? Think it through."

  The policeman took a look at me, and then back at the bodyguard.

  "The kid's got a point, Sarge," said a young man to his left.

  "We saw the whole thing," Belle said, "These guys all got in a big circle and started trying to kill him!"

  "After he attacked us!" the bodyguard snapped.

  "After your employer went into my girlfriend's room to do her harm," I said acidly, causing him to step back, the policemen, too. I really had to learn to moderate my scary tone. Cathy says it's sexy, Belle agreed at the time, but it wasn't helping me any with the police, who were getting twitchy with their batons again.

  I decided it would just be easier if I disappeared so I could go get Cathy.

  So, quick as a flash, I got up and bolted, easily outstripping the police, who followed only after a stunned moment's indecision, closely pursued by the remaining bodyguard.

  "I love it when you do that," Belle said as I reappeared right next to her.

  "How did you know?" I asked.

  "No way you run that fast," she said with a smirk.

  "Not nice," I said with a glare.

  "True though."

  The kids and teachers standing nearby looked on in bemusement as my illusion kept running across the Rugby pitches. I started to stand, and Belle helped.

  Mister Kenilworth came up to us.

  "What is going on?" he said, seemingly quite calm.

  "The unconscious people, along with that running person tried to kill me, I objected, I came out on top. The police think it's my fault, and I sent them on a wild goose chase so I can get some sleep before Miss Hopkins yells at me tomorrow, because there's no way she's going to be happy about this."

  "You don't bloody chuckle!" said a familiar voice that made me wince.