by Peri Akman
The fish bobbed up and down, not really indicating any one answer over the other.
Quinn narrowed his eyes, and banished the fish. It disappeared, and its demise made Quinn feel only slightly better.
The power trip vanished as quickly as it came, when he realized that Kole was still nowhere to be seen.
This was so frustrating! He had no way of doing anything down there! Why couldn’t humans just breathe underwat—
Wait.
Quinn summoned Ser Hero, but this time he reached out and prefaced it to the best of his abilities.
A gilled, aquatic, Ser Hero.
“Greetings Ha—AAACK!” Ser Hero gasped for air as they quickly ascertained they were not meant for the surface.
Ser Hero flopped onto the water, and floundered desperately.
Ser Hero now had webbed fingers, fins instead of hair, and while their eyes were pure white, they had bright blue eyelids. On their neck were gills, just as Quinn was aiming for.
“Greetings, Haldon’s Hero of Heroic Summoning!” Ser Hero bubbled. “I see you have gone almost natural for this encounter!”
“Go save Kole. I don’t know where she is, go find her. She’s underwater somewhere, check near the center.”
Ser Hero blinked with a second pair of eyelids that Quinn did not know they had.
Ser Hero dived underwater with only a salute and a promise of heroics.
Quinn took a deeper breath. It wouldn’t be long now.
He might even have time to go back to camp and find an extra shirt or something. If he was going to stay in this line of business, he was going to need a lot more clothing. Or better-enchanted clothing, but Quinn suspected that was probably expensive.
Quinn gathered up his clothing and began to head back, when suddenly he felt a snap.
Ser Hero had just been forcibly banished.
No. No no no.
He dropped his clothing in horror. Quinn had barely had time to process his fear and sinking sensation that he had directly led to the death of his master, when Kole came bursting out of the lake, propelled by air, energy, and what appeared to be several summoned objects.
She careened into the land, further away than the camp than Quinn was.
“Kole!” Quinn yelled, and started to run in her direction.
Unfortunately he forgot that he was lacking in the shoe department, and immediately slowed down from rocks jabbing at his heels.
“Ow! Ow—!” Quinn yelped and cursed as he stumbled over.
At least she was alive. Probably injured and bleeding to no end, but she had Cosime’s power at her disposal, which meant that she should be fine.
Quinn began to jam his shoes on, sans socks, when the wind began to blow a bit harder than before. It took on currents and angles that it really shouldn’t, and it didn’t seem like it was coming from Kole.
He didn’t dare look, but the noises were all too clear.
Asim and Dale had woken up. There was yelling and panicking and worry and orders being thrown around. Asim’s voice carried in ways that Quinn hadn’t realized was possible. It was like his very words were being conveyed in the wind.
This was going terribly wrong. He had been such an idiot! Why did he think this was a good idea? Why did Kole go along with it? He needed a shorter leash!
Well, Kole had definitely been right about one thing.
The secrets were going to bite him, hard.
Chapter Twenty-Five
There had been many times when Quinn had wished he could shrivel up and die.
For instance, his interview with the warlocks had been a nightmare. One time he didn’t do a project that he had to give a verbal presentation for. Another time he got a bloody nose and bled all over Mackie’s cloak.
Being soaking wet and nearly naked in the middle of the night while being confronted by two powerful warlocks was definitely topping that list.
Quinn grabbed his clothing and began to run; he had to do something before they saw him—
Wait, he had it!
He summoned a giant hollow rock around himself.
Darkness encompassed him.
At this moment it occurred to him that he had not specified if it was breathable. Was it breathable? Was he going to die of suffocation inside a hollow rock? He better hold his breath just to be sure.
He sucked in what air he could, and did just that.
He couldn’t hear anything outside of the rock, and as it turned out, holding one’s breath was harder than he anticipated when he was so damn nervous!
Quinn let out all the air he had been holding and heaved for breath.
This was stupid. He was being unequivocally stupid!
He banished the rock with the intent to be a competent, respectable adult about this.
Asim was standing right in front of him, patiently.
“Hiya.” His dry voice was utterly devoid of amusement.
Quinn uttered a shrill yelp and promptly resummoned the rock over himself.
Asim kicked it over, as it was a hollow rock shell and not the sturdy structure Quinn was hoping for.
Quinn winced and stared at the older man. “Uh. Hi. Asim.”
“What exactly were you doing?” he asked.
Quinn looked down at his soaking wet underwear and shoes, and then he looked at the clothes scattered on the shore.
He looked back at Asim and felt his tongue fail him. He opened his mouth, but no words came out, only scared noises.
Asim stared at Quinn, his face grim. He took a step towards Quinn until they were practically an inch apart.
“I want something to be absolutely clear here,” Asim said in his impossibly smooth voice. Only instead of kindness it implied something much darker.
Quinn’s eyes darted momentarily to where Kole had landed. He couldn’t see anything over there, but he hadn’t expected to.
The wind whipped up around him, and he found himself flung against a nearby tree with just enough force for it to sting.
“I just got my best friend back, so forgive me if I’m slightly harsh, but if you ever endanger her again like that, I will tear your lungs apart and leave you for the buzzards and the monsters.” Asim spoke casually, just like he had back at the tavern, only now there was a carefully considered edge to every word.
Quinn felt his breathing stagger. His body began to freeze and his brain began to refuse to process things. His eyes locked into Asim’s pale and furious gaze. Quinn had no doubt in his mind that Asim would follow through with this threat. His magic shook and spurted randomly, as he tried to figure out what to do, if he could do anything, but it was no use, his mind was a blank.
Behind Asim, Ser Hero appeared, looking almost like Kole, only instead of her tightly wrapped bandages, they just had pure white skin, and no sigil on their eye. The eyes being pure white and that unmistakeable expression was what made him realize it was his own summon. Quinn widened his eyes. No. No! Go away!
Asim was saying something, but Quinn couldn’t hear it. He was far too distracted by Ser Hero.
Ser Hero’s face contorted with anger and hatred, and they drew their sword hand back, preparing to stab Asim in the back.
Quinn’s voice was failing him and his magic was on the fritz. He was panicking oh gods he was panicking.
“Asim!” a voice cried out, and the spiral of panic and terror stopped.
Asim dropped his magic, and the wind faded. Quinn fell to the ground, and with newfound relief, immediately banished Ser Hero. It was bad enough not being able to summon something because he was panicking, but as it turned out it was far worse being unable to unsummon something due to panicking.
From across the lake, Dale was moving with her disc. Kole, soaking wet and without a walking stick, was following suit. She was cupping her mouth, yelling in Asim’s direction.
Kole kicked off the disc, and propelled herself the rest of the way with the wind to push her.
She landed rather ungracefully on her good leg.
“It was my idea. This was my idea. Give the kid a break,” Kole said quickly.
Asim raised an eyebrow skeptically. “This was your idea? To wait until it was dark out to try and do gods know what? That’s apprentice-level stupid and you know it. Don’t try to protect him!”
“Yeah, well, I went along with it, so as the oldest person in this stupid scheme, I take responsibility. So get off your high horse and calm down,” Kole snapped.
Quinn really wished he had his clothes on now.
Dale finally made it over. “Hey, wasn’t there another guy here? It looked like there was someone else.”
Asim stared at Dale with confusion, and to Kole’s credit, she was able to mimic such a face astoundingly well. Quinn did not, but his face of shrinking blankness probably did the trick.
“No guy? I’m just seeing things? All right,” Dale said, without much convincing.
Thank the gods for small miracles, it would seem.
“It was my idea. So cool it,” Kole said, bringing the conversation back where it had been before. “I don’t want you threatening Quinn ever again.”
“Wait, you were threatening him?” Dale butted in, shocked. “How’d she know that? You were all the way across the damn lake!”
“Because since he didn’t come to see if I was okay, he was most likely going after the person he blamed for it,” Kole said without missing a beat.
Asim said nothing.
“Wow… okay… so you’re both just… off-your-rocker insane. Good to know,” Dale stated.
“Neither of us are insane, you ignorant child,” Kole snapped. “So shut up and take your bigoted little nose out of where it doesn’t belong.”
Quinn could hear footsteps behind him. Kay and Cosime were most likely catching up.
“Can we have this argument later?” Quinn pleaded. “When Kole and I aren’t soaking wet?”
“Hmmmm,” Dale said, exaggeratedly mocking thought. “You know what? No.”
She whipped around and punched Kole across the jaw.
Kole staggered backwards, and landed on her bad leg. She gave a yelp of pain, and fell down.
“You gonna keep insulting me to my face, huh? Well guess what, you hag, some people aren’t willing to take that lying down!” Dale yelled.
Kole sat up, glaring at Dale. “Sure, punch a cripple. Bet you feel way better about yourself.”
“You’re not crippled on your jaw you—” Dale stopped talking suddenly.
She began to claw at her throat, and choke.
Asim idly twirled his fingers.
“No fighting,” he said simply, and flexed his hand.
Dale took a deep gasp of air. She whirled around to Asim. “You ass! You just tried to suffocate me!”
“You just assaulted Kole. Considering how much you were whining about how the lesser actions she committed were a huge problem, I think you’ll understand why I stopped you,” Asim replied dully. He clenched his hand in the form of a fist. Oh sure, Quinn got the threat of murder, Dale just got some stuffy half-threat.
“Oh, don’t give me that! She’s been trying to get a rise out of me since I got here! I can’t even look at her straight without her wanting to kill me! I defended myself!” Dale spat. Cosime rushed towards Dale now, and stood in front of her, almost defensively. Whether that was Dale’s orders or Cosime themself was a mystery to anyone.
Kay stood behind the rest of them, probably unsure of what to do. Quinn was definitely feeling that. He’d probably go over to her if it wasn’t for the fact that he didn’t have clothes on.
“Defend yourself, that’s rich,” Kole muttered. “So when you’re a jerk, you’re just defending yourself. When I do it, it’s only because I’m the big bad warlock here to ruin your day because I decided to hate you for no reason than, I don’t know, what do you think it is? Jealousy? Pride?”
Dale extended one arm and placed another on Cosime’s shoulder. “You see, now she’s acting like she’s innocent!”
Kole nearly spat in shock. “I’m acting like I’m innocent?! You hypocritical self-serving projecting—”
“—it will only be for a few more days,” Asim assured Dale, stopping Kole from continuing. “Surely you can handle that?”
“It won’t be,” Kole cut in. Her tone changed from confrontational to dully matter-of-fact.
Everyone turned to look at her.
“Quinn had some pretty good ideas on what to do with the orb. We tried them. I actually saw it work. And you know what? We haven’t been hurting it worth a dime. There is no wall we’re wearing down. We’re bouncing off of it because our powers are collectively worthless,” Kole explained somberly.
“Then… Quinn’s plan… why not just use that?” Kay broke in the conversation suddenly.
“Because by ‘work’ it didn’t actually do anything useful, oh no. It just hurt the orb so it got mad. It tried to throttle me, I nearly died,” Kole said irritably.
“How… how do you know that?” Dale asked, clearly suspicious. “That’s a rather convenient analysis.”
Kole rolled her eyes. “I summoned a pair of goggles, and then I amplified them. It let me see the outer layer properly, and, coupled with my own personal experience, it was a very easy deduction to make.”
Dale did not seem remotely convinced.
Kole rubbed her jaw, her fingers sparking with Cosime’s magic. “Disbelieve me all you want, but that’s what I saw. We could be here for months and not figure out how to take down that thing.”
“Seriously?” Kay spat out. “Then what’s even the point?”
“The point is that if we leave, then the demons go back to ruling the mountaintop,” Asim muttered. He went to go help Kole up.
Kole nodded.
Those demons are good at defenses. Tricky lot…
Quinn winced. Great, the voice was back. It had been absolutely quiet this entire time, and now it was back to bugging him. Just wonderful.
“Then we’re stuck here?” Kay asked. “I… camping is cool and all but… I don’t want to do this indefinitely.”
“Well, since you all clearly hate me, I’ll go and turn in the proper paperwork to the government,” Dale said coolly. “See if we can up this a few ranks in severity.”
“Thank you, Dale,” Asim stated, switching to a sincere voice almost instantaneously. Quinn doubted anyone was fooled by it at this point.
But Dale seemed to smirk just the same.
Right, as far as Dale knew, Asim was just some overly polite stiff. She’d never seen the other sides. Considering how often Asim took Dale’s side in the arguments, it would have taken a perceptive gaze to notice that Asim and Kole were close friends.
“Even then, we could be here for months. Years, even, if they’re feeling particularly obtuse,” Kole said. “And even if we do wait the entire time, I can guarantee you the demons will not be as patient. They’re doing what they always do. Waiting for a moment when they can enact their overly complicated plan.”
HAH! I must use that insult next time I see the wife. She’ll love it!
Again? So soon? Quinn shifted uncomfortably. He looked around, but no one else was acting like they heard a voice.
His stomach churned.
Asim groaned. “So we really are stuck in a problem. Wonderful.”
“Plus the ones who do stick around are probably just gonna get jumped in their sleep,” Dale said with a sigh. “I bet you that the plan they’re formulating is waiting for us to let our guards down so they can sneak in and infect us all with whatever that black cracked skin condition is.”
“That’s assuming these demons are still capable of spreading it. It’s possible only the initial demons could,” Asim said, shaking his head in disagreement. “It would make more sense that way, considering how long Kole and Quinn have been here.”
That’s just like them. Spreading the demonic nature to as many people as possible, and utterly failing at it. Wait until my wife hears about this…
Quinn shifted
. It was getting more common. Maybe he really was suffering from psychosis of some sort. There was no part of him that could comprehend having a “wife,” that much was for sure.
He would just have to ignore it. It probably was the demons just messing with him.
Although…
“Wait,” Quinn cut in. “Wait, I have an idea.”
“Another one?” Kole asked.
“Yeah. The demons are able to go through the orb no problem, right?” Quinn asked. A plan was formulating, and it was all because of the voice he heard in his head. This was going to get shot down very quickly, he knew it.
“Yeah, so?” Dale asked, narrowing her eyes.
“So why not get Tsalir?” Quinn asked, bracing himself for rejection.
Instead he was met with a round of confusion.
“Who?” Asim asked.
“Tsalir. That guy who is infected and bedridden?” Quinn elaborated.
“Ohhhhhhh,” Kole muttered. “That’s your plan.”
“What? What’s the plan?” Kay asked, curious.
“I’m just saying that if the orb only lets demons in, then, since the infection makes the people like demons, infected people might be let in,” Quinn explained, rising in confidence which was only marred by desperately wanting a shirt.
There was a silence, which Quinn wasn’t expecting. Dale and Asim stared at him like he had said something wrong.
“It’s an interesting idea, Quinn, but we have no proof that it’s true,” Asim said slowly.
“What do you mean?” Quinn asked, suddenly worried.
“We have no proof that the infection causes that. It seems a bit convenient if it did do that,” Asim explained.
He could have sworn someone had told him that—was it just the voice? Was he seriously taking advice from a voice in his head? This was terrible!
He was an idiot. A crazy idiot.
“I say we try it,” Dale broke in suddenly.
Well that was unexpected.
“We’re up a creek and without a paddle, why not give it a shot? It can’t hurt,” Dale continued.
Asim gave a shrug and a nod. “Fair point. Let’s go get… Tsalir, was it?”
Kole made a groaning noise. “Fine. I’ll go get him. Just give me my walking stick.”