The girl sighed helplessly. "I can't make a portal or tap into that magic to try and find him either."
"I don't have the power required," Elzen said bringing his attention back to the wilder beside him.
Looking a bit hopeful, Ashleen offered, "I could loan you power to boost your skill, if you think that would help?"
He shook his head. "Maybe if they can't find anything, but Treya has more of a handle on the magic than I do. If she can't find him, then I don't know what a novice like me could hope to accomplish."
Ashleen looked at the wizards and mages around them. Leaning closer to Elzen, she said quietly, "Maybe we can find him together. We know him better than any of these people. They're strangers. Only Serrena knows his magic the way we do. If you think that you can use portal magic at all, I could help you."
Not wanting to get the girl's hopes up, which Elzen could tell required her grasping at straws; he replied, "We'll let them try first. If they can't get a trace on him, then it can't hurt for us to try something later."
A smile crossed Ashleen's lips for the first time since she woke to the worry that she had for Sebastian.
Dorgred walked out of the fortune teller's little hole in the wall business that probably doubled as her home. Really more of a palm reader, the wizard was quite certain that she was a fake. He had held back that he was a wizard. Someone that had the gift would certainly have called him on it easily enough, but this woman had tried telling him that he had the hands of a blacksmith. Working with fire made them rougher than some wizards and Dorgred was strong enough to enjoy doing real work as well. Few of his contemporaries seemed to like doing anything that their magic could do for them. Manual labor was for soldiers or mages not wizards, he had been told in various ways; but that was just an excuse to be lazy.
Being built of sterner, stronger stuff than most wizards, Dorgred still felt fine physically after walking the streets of the city for a few hours. He had looked for obvious signs for these seers or visionaries Palose was pushing him to find. If he could find one and send them on their way to the dark mage, then the wizard could be through with the kid. While he did appreciate the second lease on life, Dorgred didn't like being beholden to him ether.
He and Wendle had killed some maniac warlock for the mage, so that was supposed to make them even and instead they remained in the cave city for months afterwards. Like some prison with wide boundaries, he and Wendle had found that they couldn't leave through the main gates of Ensolus. The emperor's guards at the gates looked for spies. They had perhaps magical ways of discovering people who didn't belong there.
An old story told that the emperor had imbued a bit of his magic into every minion and soldier that served him in the old world. Cast into the void, everything he owned was pulled into the rift with the Dark One where he created a small world for them to live until he could escape once more. Palose said that those ties had been severed with his change of bodies, a piece of information that few knew; but they could never get through the gates even so.
Maybe that had just been fear or paranoia, but Wendle had been unable to leave any more than he had through those gates which kept the emperor's enemies out and his people inside.
Now he was free... mostly, but he had this one task to take care of before he was rid of the one who had brought him back. There would be no other strings apparently, though Dorgred wasn't sure that there could ever be true freedom being what he was.
"Now you look like someone who could use a guide," a boy's voice said startling him out of his reverie.
A boy, who appeared to be in his early teens sat on a crate off to the side, looked at the wizard with a smile that annoyed the burly man. With light brown hair and eyes that seemed to be more gray than blue, the teenager looked to be a bit short, though he was still seated. More obvious was that he looked a bit thin to Dorgred. A muscular man with a black beard, the wizard looked at the lithe boy with his hairless chin and assumed that he was just one of the annoying children that ran around the markets looking to pick a pocket. His right hand rested on the bulge of his small coin pouch, while his left rested on a sheathed short sword. Both were gifts from the one who had brought him back from death, but Dorgred refused to feel obligated for what had been given to him from the dead warlock's bank account.
"And I suppose that you will tell me that you can help me find anything that I am looking for in this city for a few coins now?" the wizard questioned suspiciously.
The boy shrugged pushing off of the crate, but he didn't look to be trying to intimidate the much larger, older man in front of him. He rubbed the back of his neck making the wizard wonder if the kid simply didn't enjoy looking up at him from his seated position; though he could also be readying to run if he was a thief.
"I know this city as well as the back and palm of my hand," was the reply from the slender teen. Standing now, Dorgred realized that his guess of him being a bit short was correct. The boy might not be full grown depending on his true age as well, the man thought.
"I thought that the saying was 'like the back of my hand', not the palm," Dorgred countered the odd expression given him.
Holding out his right hand back side up, the teen shrugged and said, "Knowing the back of your hand isn't that impressive." He flipped it palm upward and added, "Now knowing one's palm is more interesting. Fortune tellers don't read the back of your hand. There's nothing to tell them there, except maybe a few marks on a worker's hands.
"The real charlatans can guess your business from the look of your hands, but the palm reveals lines that tell much more."
Frowning at the boy, Dorgred replied in annoyance, "So you saw me leaving the fortune teller and think that means I believe in them?"
"Why else would a man go into a fortune teller's house, but to have his fortune read? If you just need directions or a map, there are certainly better places to go," the teenager countered with a smirk.
"I'm not looking for someone that can tell me my future. I need someone with a wider view than that," the wizard admitted reluctantly. While he still guarded his pouch, Dorgred doubted that there was much to fear from the kid in front of him. The street urchin was surprisingly quick witted and that spurred the wizard to read his aura.
There was no sign of magic to him. If this boy was a wizard, or would become one, he had yet to manifest the powers of his kind. It was kind of a shame, Dorgred thought. Such a mind with magic at his command might become a great wizard.
Why his mind had led him to think about the teenager as a wizard was beyond him. Surely there were clever people that never held magic.
"A wider view? So you want to know the future, but not your own? That is a strange wish," the boy replied pressing a finger to his lips thoughtfully as if to shush the wizard.
Giving a dissatisfied grunt, Dorgred said, "That's the problem. I am looking for someone like that for a... friend. I knew that it was a quest that was likely to be fruitless.
"He only said that I should look and call him if I ever find someone like that."
Tilting his head to the side slightly as if appraising the answer and the man at once, the teen replied, "A friend sent you on a quest like that? Either you must owe him something important or you are just be doing it out of the kindness of your heart."
He stopped before giving a laugh and shook his head, "No, not out of the goodness of your heart. You are too cynical to be happy about it, so it is a favor being called in by this friend then."
Again Dorgred grunted at the boy in annoyance. "I could still be doing it because I want to," the wizard argued.
The boy laughed harder whipping his head back and forth with the laughter. "Nope, you don't want to do this. You are probably trying to get it over with as quickly as possible like pulling a bandage quickly figuring the pain will go away faster."
Giving a knowing grin, the urchin added, "Fast or slow, it still tends to hurt, doesn't it?"
Taking a deep breath before releasing it as a sigh, Dorgred asked
, "All right, know-it-all, if you're so smart and know this city so well; where can I find someone like that?"
His laughter died off and the boy crossed his arms before lifting his right hand to tap on his lips with his forefinger once more. "Well, that is a toughie. If you just wanted a palm reader or fortune teller for yourself; that would be easy enough to find.
"Perhaps you could tell me your question or what you want to know anyway. Then I would be more likely to know who could answer your question."
"But they're not my questions," the wizard groaned suddenly wishing that Palose had stuck around to deal with this kid. "I guess they deal with what is happening with Southwall, Sileoth and the Dark One; something like that anyway."
Making a sour face, the boy retorted, "Really, that is it? Couldn't you have a good question like the meaning of life or whether you would ever fall in love or something like that?"
"If I did, then that would be for me; which you said is very easy. I'm looking for someone more like a seer or... what did he call them... Visionaries?"
"Visionaries, that is a weird name."
He nodded and replied, "Well, I think that's what they called themselves before the Cataclysm, of course if they were so good at seeing the future, then they should have survived by seeing that coming."
The boy laughed at the wizard, though Dorgred hadn't really meant it to be funny. The wizard could see the humor in it, he supposed.
"Well, if something was going to happen to them directly, I thought seers couldn't see those events at all," the kid replied sounding like he was taking the question seriously again. "How could they avoid being killed in a Cataclysm, if no one came to them to see how it affected them as well?"
"I don't know!" Dorgred complained realizing that the kid was trying to turn it into some kind of philosophy lesson or something similar. "Can you help me find someone in the city that might be able to see the future... for real, not just someone good at guessing or trying to tell me what they think I want to know?"
"I suppose I could for a silver."
"A silver?" the wizard said of the amount that could pay for an entire meal in an expensive restaurant. "That seems like a bit much."
The boy raised his finger in the air and suggested, "How about this? If we finish and you think that I wasn't much help, I will take a copper for trying; but if I exceed your wishes then you should pay me a gold coin."
"A gold? Now that is ridiculous, kid," the wizard replied.
"My name's Evic and that is a good deal. It is up to you to decide if it is worth it or not," the boy replied. "If I do real well, you can still lie and give me less; but I think that you will pay me what I deserve even so."
"You're pretty trusting then, Evic," the wizard replied.
"Then it's a deal?" Evic asked putting out his hand to shake the thick heavy hand of the wizard.
"Fine, but expect a copper if you run me all over this town without any luck, kid."
Shaking hands Evic gave him a nod and smile that said he was having fun with the wizard.
Chapter 18- Power of the Mind
Ashleen sat at the table in the Black Smith Inn thinking over the information she had so far. The afternoon had lengthened as the wizards and mages continued to work on the problem of finding where Sebastian had gone. Treya had been thorough in her attempts to trace the mage's magic aura, but other than the strange sensation the woman got running her fingers over New Harbor nothing leaped out at her.
The wizard had tested on several maps. Red Hall even had maps that covered Taltan and Ch'thal the two closest continents as well as the rest of North Continent and the island chains known to them around each. Other than the nearest islands of Litsarin and Sileoth there were just two gates in the North Sea that had been discovered by Sebastian. One was the Grimnal's island and the other belonged to a small tribe that had once been merfolk also.
Even the maps showing Ensolus merely told the wizard that the owl mage had gates there. Perhaps the only truly bright side of the woman's research was that she was fairly confident that she could open Sebastian's gates into the Dark One's city to retrieve their spies and information.
The second source of information was both important and yet less helpful. Jeriah and Quylan had been like bloodhounds deciphering the scents inside the room. Beyond the abilities of a hound, the mages could put together more of a story than the wizards who merely knew that there had been a portal made in Sebastian's room.
Picking out the freshest scents, the falcons told them that the mage was just one of three recent scents there beyond those who had come with to try and find Sebastian. Magic had been used to confuse and change the lingering auras and smells; but they were able to both separate them out as well as follow the path that they had used before following Sebastian.
That was where their abilities brought less fortunate news. Following the strange trails obviously masked to prevent being found out by those of magical abilities like the falcons, they eventually came to a room full of cleaning supplies. The trail began from inside the supply room and went straight to Sebastian's guest room.
Those belonging to the trail had used the cleaning supply cubicle to enter the hall making their way to Sebastian to steal him away. They left only the single trail from one room to the other as they had used one portal to enter and the second to leave again with the mage.
Jeriah had pointed out only one other thing. Sebastian's pillow had an odd fragrance on it that didn't seem to fit any other, but the falcon had been able to follow the faint smell to the dining room. Even cleaning the tables there was just enough of the strange scent to lead him directly to Sebastian's table and from there to the kitchen.
It would take a research wizard familiar with the smell of chemicals to tell them what it truly was, however, and Gefflen was in charge of those in Red Hall. Since the man had also been involved with bringing Sebastian to the school, Ashleen could hardly trust Gefflen or his people.
They were forced to send word to White Hall in the hopes of figuring out what it was. The wizards there knew Sebastian so well, that they used a portal to their rival school as soon as they heard of his disappearance. She hadn't heard yet what they had discovered, but Ashleen and the others already guessed that it was something to make the mage fall asleep.
Drugged, the dangerous mage would be manageable for two wizards or warlocks; but that led once more to the belief that it was someone inside of Red Hall who was involved.
"Are you going to try to wait for the wizards from White Hall to tell us what they found out before going to bed?" Serrena asked her friend looking tired as well. Neither woman had done that much physically, but the emotional strain had wrung both of them out to the point of mental exhaustion.
"I don't think that I could sleep if I tried," the wilder replied quietly.
It was still early enough that the musicians for the night had yet to begin to play. Ashleen had no desire to remain in the room once the dancing began. Without Sebastian to dance with and not knowing currently if he was even alive, the pretty girl couldn't think of dancing with one of the men that might wish to have her on his arm.
Serrena noted the gathering crowd of people entering the hall that were removing coats in preparation for dancing.
"Well, I don't think I can take trying to dance right now," the fire wizard stated looking drained. Serrena rarely danced with Sebastian anymore. Ashleen had obviously claimed him and they seldom separated to allow anyone else to dance with them.
Brushing back her auburn hair with both hands a couple times in frustration, Serrena added, "I'm not sure that I will be able to sleep either though, especially with musicians playing down here. Maybe I should get a room at the fire wizards' guild? That would also put me by the portal gate when we're ready to go."
"Go where?" Ashleen complained more than truly asked the question. "We still don't know where Sebastian is, not even which city or town."
"I think Yenest plans to get permission to use Sebastian's port
al into New Harbor to begin a search there."
Letting out a deep breath as the wilder released some tension for a moment, she said, "It is just a guess that he might be there. Treya couldn't find anything beyond Sebastian's gates.
"I suppose that I shouldn't be surprised. Sebastian never tried to find Palose, just his gates or imbued stones. That girl's magic that they used to hide him was enough to keep Sebastian from tracking more of his portal points and he never found him on one of his maps as far as I know."
"So you don't think that the map magic will work that way?" Serrena questioned in surprise.
Throwing up her hands helplessly, the blonde haired wilder replied, "I don't know. I just know that Sebastian never found him that way."
Drumming her fingers on her lips as she blew out in frustration, Serrena took a moment to utter the disappointed words, "Well, that I didn't know. I had hoped that Treya could find him or at least we could find out that sign she felt might be some wizards trying to mask him.
"Still, I guess trying New Harbor with some tracking mages couldn't hurt."
"As long as it isn't a complete wild goose chase used to distract our people from where he really is, I guess that is true," Ashleen agreed without much enthusiasm.
Elzen hurried towards their table carrying a tray of drinks. The mage promptly placed a glass in front of each of them before sitting beside Serrena. "All right," the falcon said, "I can see no one is ready to sleep yet, so I got Hilda to let us have these."
Sniffing at the glass, Serrena pulled back shaking her head. "Wow, that is strong. What are you trying to do to us, Elzen?"
"A couple more of these and we'll sleep through anything," he said with a smile holding a glass with a medium brown liquor inside.
"What is it?" Ashleen asked putting the glass close to her lips while just breathing in the strong smell of the alcohol inside.
Battle Mage Visions (A Tale of Alus Book 12) Page 25