Lingering Haze (The Elusive Strain Book 1)

by James Berardinelli

  As the afternoon wore on, I became restless. My legs and feet were growing sore. Although I was in a lot better shape physically than I had been upon my arrival, six weeks (or however long it had been) wasn’t enough time to turn a pampered high school girl into a toned athlete. To keep my mind on something other than my aching muscles, I broached a subject with Samell that I had wanted to discuss with him: religion.

  Before coming to this world, I hadn’t been a believer in a higher power. Actually, that wasn’t strictly true. I hadn’t given it much thought. For me, the concept of an omnipotent deity who would engage in personal relationships with his creations seemed less realistic than Santa Claus. But could there have been something out there, something to have set all these things in motion, something to have seeded the universe…? Someone had once told me that children and adolescents never give god much consideration. They either accepted or didn’t accept what others told them. Questioning and pondering came later in life. Now it was time for me to start that questioning and pondering.

  Going through what I had endured, it was hard not to acknowledge that there might be a higher purpose. Although I had accepted the reality of my current situation, I didn’t understand where “here” was or why I had been chosen. Maybe it was all random. Or maybe I had died in my world so I could be reborn here in a purgatory I would escape only by finding salvation or redemption.

  Backus had taught me the basics about religion in this world. Beliefs were closer to what the Greeks and Romans had once accepted than what I was accustomed to. There were four gods: Sovereign, the sun; the two moons, Ire and Concord; and the blackness of the void, Vasto. These celestial objects weren’t merely representations of the gods, they were the gods. In the world I came from, faith demanded acceptance of the unseen. Here, the objects of worship weren’t invisible.

  “Do you believe in the gods?” I asked Samell, breaking the companionable silence as we walked side-by-side.

  “That’s a strange question,” he said. “They’re all around us. Sovereign’s eye watches even now.” He glanced skyward although the leaves and branches obscured direct sunlight. “How could I not believe in them?”

  Science had taught me that suns, like all stars, were superheated balls of gas. But no one in this world would understand what that meant. Was it possible that the astronomical truths of my world might not be the same here? How different were the fundamentals? And if I argued against them, would I become like Galileo?

  “I’ve never seen you praying or worshipping.” No churches, either, at least in Aeris. And, although Father Backus was a priest, I hadn’t observed him doing much ministering.

  “Do they do that a lot in your world?”

  When I was a little girl, it had felt strange being one of the few people in the neighborhood not to go to church on Sunday mornings. It was like a club I had been excluded from because my parents were “lapsed Christians” who preferred sleeping in. Then, as I got older, I discovered that I was envied by many of my church-going friends because I didn’t have to endure the boredom of a weekly service.

  “Yes,” I said. “At least some of them do.”

  “Things may be different in the cities,” said Samell. “But out here, living in the open, we just accept that the gods are watching and listening to us. And if we need something and have led lives they approve of, they may consider granting a request if we ask for it.”

  “Do you choose one god over the others?”

  Samell shook his head, amused by my ignorance. “How would that make sense? They are all there. What would be the point of ignoring one or preferring another? True, ‘prayers’ might be targeted depending on the request. You wouldn’t ask Vasto for a sunny day or Sovereign for a clear night. Each has their own domain and we venerate them equally. Apparently, Father Backus spent more time teaching you about magic than theology.”

  I couldn’t debate him about that.

  “Look, I don’t know what the gods are like where you come from or what kind of relationships your people have with them but if you have any questions about our gods, just ask. After all, they’re your gods as well, now. Whether you want to believe in them or not, they’re always there. You can’t hide from them. So, even though we don’t talk about them often, we’re aware of them.” He glanced skyward again. “It’s hard not to be.”

  I didn’t know what to think. The sun was just a ball of gas, wasn’t it? And those two moons at night, they were just rocks in space, orbiting the planet? When did astronomy become so complicated?

  By the time the late afternoon sky started deepening into twilight, we had covered about a quarter of the distance from Aeris to NewTown, which put us on target since the plan was for us to arrive before nightfall on the fourth day if the weather held and we were able to maintain a strong pace. We set up camp a short distance off the road under the trees. My mind-sight confirmed there were no dangers in the immediate vicinity. No nothing, in fact. Except for the thriving vegetation, we were the only living creatures nearby.

  Gabriel decided not to light a fire. When I asked him about it, he said, “Don’t really need it, do we? It’s a warm night. Even in the coldest hours, we won’t need more than a light blanket. And there ain’t a worry about things sneaking up on us in the dark, what with you being a Summoner and all. Besides, I don’t like burning Blight wood. If the trees are poisonous, I’d rather not inhale the smoke.”

  I guess the toxicity of Blight wood could be an issue, although I had been under the impression that most of the wood burned in Aeris for cook fires was taken from trees that grew in or near the Blight. It was strange to think that something that wouldn’t affect me could be fatal to my companions. But that wasn’t unique to this world. I remembered an incident in elementary school where one of my classmates went into anaphylactic shock after eating a brownie with bits of peanuts in it. If not for the quick actions of our teacher, she might have died. Dangerous to her but not to me. The brownie, as I recall, had been delicious.

  The night passed without incident although I didn’t sleep well. Lying on the hard ground didn’t agree with my back or sore muscles any more than it had during my first couple of nights after being Summoned. And the rich, pungent smells of the forest were difficult to ignore. Some, like the top layer of loam, were comforting. Others reeked of decay and disuse. Although I was left out of the watch rotation, I was probably awake longer than anyone else. When the crisp, clear dawn arrived, I greeted it sandy-eyed and tired. During the morning’s walk, I was uncommunicative. Samell made several overtures but my monosyllabic responses convinced him to find another conversation partner.

  Around mid-day, the road emerged from the forest. According to Gabriel, the Blight hadn’t yet overtaken the southernmost reaches of the great woods. A quick check with my mind-sense confirmed the presence of insect and animal life. “Ten years ago, the Blight was just a small part of the forest, far to the north and west. An oddity for most, a place to visit for the curious, and certainly not a danger. We used to call this part ‘Greenswood.’ A year from now, there won’t be anything left of Greenswood. Sad. The great fear in NewTown is that the Blight will spread all the way south to The Long Orchard. Seems unlikely but no one ever thought the Blight would eat up Greenswood the way it has.”

  Travel was monotonous. During nearly two days on the road, we had encountered no other souls. Apparently, no one was heading north toward Aeris. Gabriel asserted this was normal for the time of year, that there was little congress between villages during the warmer months. The forest receded from the road, giving way to the vast plains that represented so much of the local geography. We had stopped for an afternoon break, with my calves urging that this would be a good place to rest for the night, when our guide announced, “It happened around here. I’ve been looking for signs of the wreckage of my wagon and the bodies of the horses but I haven’t seen anything. Someone or something must have cleared it away.”

  A cursory probe of the surroundings revealed nothi
ng unusual but I decided to search more deeply. Sitting cross-legged, I closed my eyes and let my mind roam. Then, almost instinctively, I reached for my magic.

  Immediately, my mind’s vision sharpened and expanded. Things that had been blurred snapped into focus. I became aware of every bug, every creature crawling through the tall grass or burrowing beneath the ground, every bird in the air. I was like a child whose poor vision was suddenly corrected by putting on a pair of glasses. I almost gasped aloud at the clarity.

  And there it was, well beyond the range of my unaugmented senses. Somewhere to the east, perhaps as far away as fifty miles, it was meandering. Even at this distance, its magical nature called out to me like a beacon. An eerie calm accompanied a chilling realization: if I could sense the air reaver, the reverse would also be true. And if it detected my gaze being directed at it, there seemed little doubt it would turn its attention toward our small band. As Backus had said, it was the iron and I was the lodestone.

  Chapter Fifteen: Ill Wind

  “It’s coming.” No sense hiding the inevitable. “It’s coming because it knows I’m here and I’m its target.” In effect, that answered the question about the earth reavers and Aeris. They had attacked because I had been there. I may have saved the town but I had also put it in danger. They were better off now that I was gone but my companions were in danger.

  What I said next, I didn’t want to say. It terrified me. But if these six people stayed with me through the inevitable confrontation and any of them died because of that, I knew I wouldn’t get another restful night for the remainder of my life. “I think it would be best if we split up. I can stay here, wait for it. The rest of you can head directly for NewTown and wait there for me. I’ll follow when I’m able.”

  “I can tell you ain’t no tactician,” said Gabriel. “That’s probably the dumbest plan I’ve ever heard. It’s more likely to get us all killed than save even one.”

  I didn’t know whether to be embarrassed, relieved, or angry. “If we split up, it will come for me and leave the rest of you alone. And I should be strong enough to beat it.” I didn’t know that, of course. The air reaver was likely to be a bigger challenge than the earth reavers. Victory wasn’t a given.

  “Hogwash,” said Gabriel. “You’ve got no idea whether we’d be safe if we left you. You weren’t anywhere near here when I was traveling north and that didn’t save me or my horses. It might come for us first - easy prey - then move on to you. Or, if it killed you, we might be next. The way I see it, we fight it together. Maybe in the end, you’re the one who kills it, but we stand a better chance seven-against-one with a Summoner than in any other configuration.”

  “She thinks it will be her fault if one of us dies,” said Esme, making an accurate estimation of my concerns.

  “And she’ll be right.” Gabriel’s tone was harsh. “But that’s the nature of leadership. Deciding who lives and who dies. It’s a lesson she’s got to learn. Like it or not, she’s a Summoner and that makes her a leader. If she lives long enough, people around her are going to die. The objective here is to kill that thing and that means coming up with the best battle plan. You don’t retreat before the enemy has been engaged, especially when you’ve got a numbers advantage.”

  I stared shamefacedly at the ground, feeling like a little girl who had just been scolded by a teacher for a wrong answer. He was right, of course, and that made it all the more galling. Splitting up was a stupid plan. I’m sure they all knew it. Only Gabriel, the outsider, had exhibited the forthrightness to openly object, to call it what it was.

  “You’re going to need our help, Janelle,” said Samell, his voice gentle but no less insistent. “If not during the fight then after it. We’ve seen what happens to you after you use magic.”

  Wordlessly, I nodded. Of course the headache would come. I had no idea whether the exercises I had done with Backus would make it bearable but it would be there, lying in wait. It was notable, however, that I had felt no pain after using magic to amplify my mind-sense. Maybe there was a clue in that to avoiding the headaches. I wished Backus was around to discuss it with.

  The plan was that there was no plan. We would continue our southward journey as a single group with me monitoring the air reaver’s approach. Gabriel was hopeful we might outpace it but I harbored no such illusion. My use of magic had acted like a beacon and it would come for me. Based on the tinker’s description, it would take more than arrows and blades to stop the creature. However, without seeing it, it was difficult to assess what kind of magic would be useful. In addition to my affinity for procrastination, I had always been drawn to improvisation. I could only hope that skill would be an asset.

  The sense of being hunted lent an eerie aura of déjà vu to this segment of the trip. If I relied on my unamplified sense, there was nothing to cause concern but when I used a magical filter, I could see the entity moving toward us at a pace that not even a galloping horse would outrun. “It will reach us within a cycle after sunset regardless of whether we stop for the night or keep going. I don’t think we’ll be able to evade it.”

  “Can’t run, can’t hide, so we fight. Unfortunately, I’m not going to be much help with only one hand,” remarked Gabriel. “Best I can do is stab at it with a knife and, against that thing, that ain’t going to do much.” He looked mournfully at his bandaged appendage.

  “Ire and Concord kissed two nights ago, so they’ll be separating. Ire should be up before the sun sets so at least we won’t have to fight in full darkness. But we won’t see it until it’s nearly on us,” said Samell.

  The decision of how to proceed was mine. Like it or not, ready for it or not, I was the leader. “We’ll keep moving until dusk then we’ll stop and get ready.” I couldn’t think of anything else to do. We were too far from Aeris or NewTown to seek sanctuary or hope for aid. Whatever happened, it would be up to the seven of us and, if we perished, no one would know what had happened.

  The remainder of the daylight hours crawled by as we made our way southward, chased by an invisible presence that only I could detect. It was an unusually warm and humid day and we were all drenched in sweat by the time we decided to stop as the last of the sun’s rays bathed the world in their glow, creating impossibly long, distorted shadows. The air reaver was perhaps ten miles away, moving unerringly toward us at a speed that would bring it into contact in a half-cycle. We had that long to prepare ourselves.

  Low in the eastern sky, rising up to replace the sun’s glare with its fainter, silvery presence, was Ire. This battle would be fought under her pale gaze. By the time Concord rose, the end would be written. I didn’t know whether those orbs in the sky were asteroids caught in this planet’s orbit or the heavenly manifestations of some greater beings but, whatever the case, it wasn’t going to matter tonight.

  It was decided that the three Aeris men, all of whom were proficient in hand-to-hand combat, would be in the front. Esme and Alyssa, expert archers, would be behind them with me. Gabriel, who wasn’t physically able to fight except in dire circumstances, would be in the far back. Our concern was that a flying creature could make such a formation useless. This wasn’t like battling the earth reavers. It could come at us from any direction with such speed that we might not have time to adjust.

  By now, it was close enough that I could “see” it without magical amplification. It felt similar to the earth reavers, radiating the same malignancy and vitriol, but stronger. I wondered about its solo presence. Was it like the first earth reaver I had encountered, a scout sent out to seek its quarry, or was this something different? And to what degree did the reavers interact? Surely, it wasn’t a coincidence that earth reavers and air reavers had emerged from their reclusive existences at the same time. Was there coordination in their activities? More questions for an experienced Summoner.

  “Do you have your powder?” Samell’s voice startled me with its closeness. Despite the strength of his unique scent, I hadn’t realized he was standing immediately behind me.<
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  “In my satchel.” I gestured toward the sack I had been carrying, which was now in a pile with the rest of our non-combat items, ready to be retrieved when the fight was over. “You know what to do?”

  He nodded. “A pinch under your tongue and another in each nostril. Then, when you’re able to drink, a mixture of it in water.”

  “Be careful with it. It may help me but it could harm you.”

  He smiled. “I know, Janelle. I’ve lived here my entire life. I’m well aware of how dangerous Blight leaves are.”

  I held back a chuckle. Of course he knew. Only someone new to this world might have thought otherwise. It would have been like someone telling me to avoid shiny three-leaved plants.

  Through the long hour after sunset, I tracked the approach of the air reaver, which was coming directly toward us, showing no sign of deviation. As it closed to within 500 feet, my other senses began to note its approach. Although the light was too faint to see it at this distance, I could hear the distant buzz of a hornet’s nest and a stiff, foul-smelling breeze stirred the air. With every passing second, as it closed the distance, the sound grew louder and the wind stronger.

  “That’s it,” muttered Gabriel. “That’s the thing that attacked me and destroyed my wagon.”

  Then, in a literal whirlwind of chaos, it began.

  The air reaver plunged from the sky, its blackish shape blotting out the face of Ire as it dove toward us, a deadly silhouette. Esme and Alyssa, both possessed of incredible reflexes, were able to get off one arrow apiece before it was on us. One was tossed aside by the wild currents of air cocooning the creature. The other pierced its outer defenses only to clank harmlessly against a shell-like exoskeleton with a sound akin to stone striking metal. The two women ducked and rolled, tossing aside bows and drawing blades as the attacker slashed through the air where, only a second before, their heads had been.