The Flaw in All Magic (Magebreakers Book 1)

by Ben S. Dobson

  “Good.” A pause, and then, “You Astra-riven idiot. What were you thinking?”

  “That we were taking too long to get aboard. Looks like I was right.”

  “Of course. Getting yourself locked in a stolen airship with the most powerful mage in Thaless was obviously the right decision.” If she’d been there with him, she’d have been glaring in that way only she could. He could almost see it—like she meant to flay the skin from his bones with her eyes alone. “Have you heard from Nieris? Was it him blocking my sending before?”

  “He has Lady Abena. I’m supposed to come to him on the bridge.” He reached the stairs and started up, taking great care with each step. His hands never left the rail.

  “You have to stall him. We’re still trying to find a way to board.”

  He didn’t have high hopes. Mages could levitate, but not at speed, and a portal into a moving target was dangerous and impractical. “I’ll try,” he said. “What about the heating glyphs? Whatever Nieris did, it might be reversible. If you can get the altered plans from the shipyard—”

  “Already done. Dean Brassforge is looking over the glyphs now.”

  “Tell me as soon as he finds something.” Tane crested the stairway to find another four-way junction in the hall. “I think… I think I see the bridge.” Ahead, straight through the junction, the hall ended in a large steel hatch with a round window. In the room beyond, a huge half-circle of glass panes looked out onto the deck. A panel of levers and glyphed instruments sat below, with a large ship’s wheel at its center.

  He couldn’t see anyone, but Nieris had to be inside somewhere. Tane reached into his pocket and wrapped his fingers around the ancryst pistol’s grip.

  “Just keep him talking while we figure out how to get to you, Tane,” Indree sent, and in that moment he was all too aware of just how far away and below she was. “Don’t make him angry. As much frustration as it might save me, I don’t want you getting yourself killed.”

  “I’ll try not to—” He neared the hatch, and the sending-pressure abated before he could finish. Indree wouldn’t have cut him off like that—this was something else. He’d come within range of Nieris’ masking spell.

  The handle on the hatch turned itself, and the door opened. Nieris’ voice came from over the threshold. “Mister Carver. I’m so glad you’ve decided to join us. Please, come in.”

  Tane stepped through the hatch. The tingle of a ward raised the hair on his arms.

  Talain Nieris stood in front of the instrument panel a few feet to the right of the wheel. Through the half-circle of windows behind him, the lights of Thaless shone against the dark. He held his head high, his shoulders square, his hands clasped at his back—the picture of elven refinement and poise. A perfectly pressed indigo topcoat with black lapels draped perfectly over his shoulders, with trousers to match, and a deep violet cravat at the neck, impeccably tied and ruffled. His short black hair was neatly parted, not a strand out of place; the hint of grey above his pointed ears only made him look more distinguished. He might have been a gentleman receiving an honored guest, rather than the dangerous criminal he was.

  The Lady Protector wasn’t with him.

  “Nieris. Where—”

  Without moving or even unclasping his hands, Nieris uttered a single word in the lingua. Before Tane could react, a band of silver-blue force wrapped around his midsection, binding his arms to his sides and lifting him from his feet. The spell pushed him hard against the back wall, and pinned him there, a foot above the floor. He struggled, but the Astral energy held him fast. This was too complex a spell for so few words—it must have been spoken in advance and held for completion. One of the most difficult tricks of magecraft, especially while concentrating on other spells. Nieris looked like a bit of a dandy, but he had three hundred years of magical experience, and that made him exceptionally dangerous.

  And now Tane saw Lady Abena pinned to the same wall just to his right, her arms likewise constrained with silver-blue magic. Her ceremony attire was considerably less neat than Nieris’, a rumpled white coat-dress accented with Audish blue, rucked up at the sleeves where the band of force held her arms.

  She offered him a wan smile. “Mister Carver. I don’t suppose you brought any friends?” Capture, it seemed, hadn’t diminished her composure.

  “It’s just me, I’m afraid,” said Tane. His fingers were still wrapped tight around the pistol in his pocket, but it wasn’t going to do him much good with his arms bound below the elbow.

  Nieris raised an eyebrow. “Not even that… thing that has been following you all over the city?” His lip twisted with distaste. “There is no purpose in lying, Mister Carver. I may not be able to detect her, but she cannot pass through the ward I’ve cast on this room. She won’t be coming to help you.”

  “I don’t know where Kadka is. We… parted ways.” Tane tried, without much success, to focus on Nieris rather than the nighttime glow of the city glimmering through the half-circle of the bridge windows. The lights were too small, too far below.

  “An act of surprising good taste, if true,” said Nieris. “I don’t know how you could stand to be near such an unnatural creature. It is one thing to be magicless, another to be absent from the Astra. I've never seen the like, and I have dealt with full-blooded orcs more than once. But I suppose as a non-magical yourself, you are blind to such things. I admit, it was a great relief when you supplied me with a reason to remove her from the Guard.”

  “So you owe me a favor,” said Tane. “Let us go and set down the airship, and we’ll call it even.” The airship shuddered, and a long groan sounded from somewhere above. He swallowed, and his fingers twitched instinctively toward his waist pocket, but he couldn’t reach.

  Nieris chuckled. “Even now you insist upon your little jests. I must say, Mister Carver, you have impressed me. When I allowed you to work on the investigation, I believed that a man without magic could only get in the way of the constabulary. But you persevered, and here we are. Perhaps I should even thank you. You see, it occurred to me after you dealt with poor Randolf that I would need a new scapegoat. And you offered yourself up so nicely.”

  “It’s too late to put the blame on me, Nieris. I’ve already told the constabulary everything.”

  “I’m sure you’ve told them quite a tale,” said Nieris. “A pity that in a short while you will not be available to argue your case.” He smiled, a menacing glint in his sapphire-blue eyes. “You see, Mister Carver, this airship is about to fall out of the sky. With you on board.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  _____

  KADKA CLUNG TO the side of the rapidly ascending airship, clutching the tether-line tight in her fist as the ground dropped away beneath her. She had to be hundreds of feet up already, and still rising. The air was growing colder, and a rising wind whipped through the hair on her head and the backs of her hands, threatening to tug her away into open sky if she loosened her grip for even a moment.

  It was incredible.

  She could see all of Thaless spread across the coast below, a city mapped in landmarks of light and dark. Yellow-orange oil lamps at the outer edges transitioned to silver-blue magelight in the wealthier central districts. There in the middle of it all was the great dome of the Brass Citadel, the seat of the Protectorate’s government, divided into pie-slice segments by a framework of silver lights embedded from tip to base. Just south of that was the great expanse of Rosepetal Park, a broad swath of untouched natural darkness. Further north, the illuminated face of the clock tower above Thalen’s Hall marked the University campus. Craning her neck back, she could still see a dense collection of magelights at the edge of the harbor behind her—the ceremony grounds, getting further and further away as the airship drifted inland over the city.

  She climbed hand over hand up the rope, stopping to anchor herself on the sill of a porthole whenever the wind gusted too strong or the ship swayed too heavily. Now and again, a strange, straining groan came from the shimmering s
ilver envelope overhead. It didn’t sound very good, but then, she didn’t know what sound an airship was supposed to make. It might have been the result of some kind of sabotage; it might have been nothing at all.

  Either way, it was enough to make her climb faster.

  The tether-line was tied off to a heavy iron ring a few feet below the deck—just far enough that she couldn’t reach the edge to pull herself up. There were no handholds across that final gap, just the sealed wood of the hull.

  But she wasn’t about to stop here. There was still one way up.

  Kadka took a final look down at the beautiful lightscape below, gripped the ring with both hands, tensed her arms, and hurled herself upward.

  For a moment, she was suspended in open air, a thousand feet above the ground, at the mercy of wind and gravity. Flying, almost. She laughed aloud, terrified and exhilarated at once. With straining fingers she reached for the edge of the deck. The fingertips of her right hand grazed the edge, caught…

  And slipped away.

  “Deshka!” she swore, and grasped wildly with her left hand. Two fingers hooked over the side, no further than the second joint. Not enough to support her weight, but in that brief moment of stability, she gathered her feet under her and kicked blindly for the iron ring below. Her right foot found purchase. She pushed off, just high enough to get her elbow over the edge above. With her right hand, she reached up again and gripped a brass support of the deck rail. A moment later she was pulling herself over to safety.

  She collapsed on the deck, her heart pounding, and rolled onto her back. For a moment she just looked up at the great silver oval shining above and tried to catch her breath.

  And then that groan came again, louder and longer. Something wasn’t right.

  Kadka pushed herself up and looked along the deck. Just ahead, near the front of the ship, a half-circle of windows framed a room that had to be important. There were lights inside, casting moving shadows over the deck.

  Someone was there.

  She crept closer, staying low, until she was crouched beneath the nearest window. Showing as little of herself as she could manage, she peeked in the bottom corner.

  She’d been right about Carver—he’d gotten himself in trouble. He was pinned against the wall by some kind of spell, a band of silver-blue force around his torso and arms. Lady Abena was beside him, likewise trapped. And though the mage holding them in place had his back to her, Kadka knew him. Pointed elven ears, greying temples, expensive clothing with frills at the sleeve and neck—he was hard to mistake.

  Chancellor Nieris.

  Kadka was less surprised than she should have been. For all his forced politeness, she’d seen the ugliness beneath when the chancellor had looked at her, the glint of pleasure in his eyes when he’d stripped her of her badge. He wasn’t the first to look at her that way, and probably not the last, but she always noticed. She hadn’t suspected him of worse only because he’d seemed too much the fancy bookish sort to get his hands dirty.

  Apparently she’d misjudged him, there. But nowhere else.

  And now he had Carver, and the Protector of the Realm. She had to help them, but how? There was a door just to her right, but it was thick steel, and turning the wheel to open it would draw too much attention. Breaking a window would be no better. If Nieris heard her coming, she’d have to cross the room faster than he could cast a spell, and he had three hundred years of experience doing just that. And even if she could get in quietly, he might well already have wards in place to stop her. She’d learned some about magic over the last few days, but not enough to find the flaws the way Carver could.

  So Carver would have to do it for her. If she was going to save him, he’d have to help her do it.

  She just had to get his attention first.

  _____

  “What did you do, Nieris?” Tane demanded. His only chance now was to keep Nieris talking until help came—if help was coming. “It’s the heating glyphs, isn’t it?”

  “Astute, Mister Carver,” Nieris said with a condescending smirk. “A shame such a mind was wasted on a non-magical. Yes, I altered Miss Hesliar’s work on the glyphs. A minor change to the limits on their power consumption. Or rather, a complete removal. But the engravers had no means to catch such a mistake, as you well know. And now the envelope is overheating above us, expanding beyond its capacity. The higher we go, the further it stretches. You’ve already heard it groaning under the strain, I expect. Very soon…” Nieris clasped his hands together and then parted them suddenly, pantomiming an explosion.

  “This is madness, Talain!” said Lady Abena, pulling against her magical bonds. “If we crash over the city… there are people down there asleep in their homes! They’ll be killed!”

  “Yes,” Nieris said. “And then your airship will be nothing but a failed experiment. How could the project go on, after such tragedy?”

  Lady Abena ceased her struggles, and looked, aghast, to the chancellor. “You’ll die just as surely as anyone!”

  “You think so little of me, Your Ladyship?” Nieris affected a tone of mild indignation. “I assure you, I will survive. You forget: I am the most accomplished portal mage alive.”

  “You’re going to portal out of a moving ship?” Tane’s incredulity was only partly feigned to keep Nieris talking. “That is insane. There’s no way to anchor it!” A portal linked two fixed points in space—it wouldn’t be able to move with the ship.

  “Ah, the limited vision of the magicless.” The chancellor preened a bit, grasping his lapel with one hand. “I only need to anchor this end at the moment of entry, Mister Carver. The casting can be done in motion, and the position fixed only at the last instant. Then I simply need to step through before the ship moves away. Perilous for the untrained, but for a master of the craft? Easily done.”

  It was theoretically possible, but it would make an already unstable spell even more unreliable. “If you get it wrong and miss your jump, the portal will tear the hull apart as the ship moves by,” Tane said. “We all die, and who knows what comes out of the Astra. Directly over Thaless.”

  “True,” Nieris said without apparent concern. “But I have no intention of making such an amateur mistake.” The arrogance of it was astounding, and Tane was no stranger to arrogance.

  “Why, Talain?” Lady Abena demanded. “Why are you doing this? You’ve served the Protectorate faithfully for centuries!”

  “Precisely,” said Nieris. “Centuries, watching the nation I have devoted my life to make the same mistake, again and again. I am a scion of House Nieris and the greatest mage of our time, and yet I am forced to suborn myself to an endless parade of magicless fools calling themselves Protectors of the Realm. And all because I was born with a power that makes me their better!” For a moment, his mannered veneer peeled aside; he spat the last word with a grimace of disgust. “And now you would ally with the people of the Continent. With these barbarians who fear everything that magic can do, who have sought to destroy us for centuries. Your peace will not last. They will take these airships you mean to give them, and turn them against us. I will not allow that to happen. The time has come to make the Mage Emperor’s dream a reality. Your demise with your airship will be a symbol: a new age is dawning, and the magical will rule!” He raised his fist with all the zeal of a preacher in the Halls of the Astra, and looked to his captives as if expecting applause.

  “You’re mad,” said Lady Abena. “The moment they see a new Mage Emperor rising to power, every nation on the Continent will move against us. We can’t fight them all, Talain. The Protectorate will be wiped from the map.”

  “Spoken like a non-magical. You haven’t the faintest idea what a mage is truly capable of.” Nieris looked at her for a long moment; his eyes clouded over slightly. “Let me show you.”

  And then Lady Abena screamed.

  She writhed wildly against her bonds, her eyes rolling back in her head, her neck cording with the strength of her screams. Nieris had to be sending h
er pain—or maybe that wasn’t strong enough. This was more like agony, and not just a short burst of it like Tane had gotten from Cranst. No one could suffer like that for very long.

  “Stop it!” Tane shouted. “You’ll kill her!”

  Lady Abena gave a final heave against her bonds, and slumped limply forward. Nieris’ eyes focused once more, and he released her, letting her fall to the ground.

  Tane stared at her, wide-eyed. “Is she…”

  “She lives,” said the chancellor, looking contemptuously at the Lady Protector. “For now.” His eyes moved to Tane, considering. Overhead, the envelope groaned once more, long and loud.

  Spellfire! If he’s willing to do that to the most powerful woman in the Protectorate, he isn’t going to balk at me. Tane blurted the first thing that came to mind as a distraction, hoping Nieris’ pride would demand he answer. “You must know you can’t get away with this! You’ve already made too many mistakes. You trusted Cranst, and he let himself be seen. This won’t look like an accident, now that everyone is looking for a crime.”

  Nieris took a long breath, visibly collecting his calm, and clasped his hands behind his back once more. “Yes, poor Randolf did make rather a mess of things, didn’t he? But don’t confuse his mistakes for mine. You know, he didn’t even tell me that you had taken the scrollcaster at first. I had to confront him after Dean Greymond told me about your ‘black market contacts’. He wanted to fix his failure himself, I suppose. He was so eager to make it up to me—how could I deny him the chance?”

  It wasn’t hard to find the meaning in that. “You told him to kill himself. He did it for you.”

  “I thought perhaps the investigation would end with him. And it might have, if not for you and that orcish aberration.”

  “But the bluecaps know about you now. Even if you portal away, they know you’re behind this!”

  “No,” said Nieris. “They only know that you claim I am. They cannot catch us in time to stop me now, and afterward, all the witnesses will be dead—who’s to say I was ever aboard? I will claim that I slipped away in the confusion of a madman taking the ship. I have powerful friends who will vouch for me. And the infamous Tane Carver was seen wandering about the University shortly after the murder, and boarding this airship just before it took flight. Seeking vengeance for his expulsion, I shouldn’t wonder. Given your reputation, who will believe your story against mine? Not many, I suspect, considering you will not be alive to argue the point.”