by Blink, Bob
There were still a few Hoplani. He saw more than a hundred of the beasts wandering randomly around the outskirts of the village. More were being made in the small section of the tunnel that had been left intact. They looked lost and uncertain, hardly the same fearsome beasts that had threatened the kingdoms. Rigo almost felt sorry for them. They had been left alone because it was thought the Duneriders might need them, but given the current situation, Rigo wondered if the remaining creatures should be eliminated, or at least the factory be destroyed so no more were created. These seemed to serve no purpose.
He’d wandered down into the tunnels that had once produced thousands of the creatures. They were bare as the day he’d checked after they had destroyed the production cells. The one disturbing thing he carried away with him was the feel of the walls. After they had triggered the foil directed Bypass, the walls had been smooth and slick. They had almost felt oiled, with no sensation as he’d run his hands over the glasslike surface. Now the walls were slightly textured. He’d looked closely, but couldn’t see anything that would explain the change in sensation, yet his fingers could feel a slight unevenness. He intended to go back with Ash’urn and Daim at some point and see what they thought. Now, however, he had a more important matter on his mind.
“You wish to hold it at Lord Chaten’s estate?” Queen Rosul asked. Rigo and Mitty were talking with her about a proposed Binding ceremony. “It is to be held during the first weeks of spring?”
Mitty nodded, her eyes alight. She and Rigo had lived together for many months now, and the pairing was well received by everyone. They had decided to make the Binding official.
“Lord Chaten feels it would be appropriate,” Rigo explained “It is all but certain we are relatives, and his gardens would be the perfect place for the event.”
They discussed the advantages and disadvantages of a ceremony in the open gardens as opposed to the more formal and common indoor custom. There would be no formal announcement. A private ceremony attended by a small group of close friends was what they wished. They would pass the word personally to those who would attend. A separate ceremony would be held a couple of weeks later in the Three Kingdoms to eliminate the necessity of people traveling across the Ruins.
“The word will still leak out,” Queen Rosul promised. “There is no way for something like this to remain a complete secret. Just the preparations will be noticed.”
“Lord Chaten is already arranging most of the items that will be needed,” Mitty explained. “It will be done slowly so as not to attract undue attention. We will tell the others only as the date approaches.”
Three months later, the day arrived. The guests had either arrived the previous evening and had rooms in Lord Chaten’s extensive estate, or had come early in the day. Covered tables and tents were set up in the far corner of the garden, and the flowered platform where the ceremony would be held could be seen opposite the largest of the tents where the feast was being prepared. Rigo, Mitty, and Queen Rosul had walked away from the others to speak alone for a few moments. They were approaching a shaded enclosure some distance from the center of activities, when three figures suddenly materialized in front of them.
Carif was almost unrecognizable. She had aged decades since the day of the attack. Her skin was sallow and wrinkled, and hung loosely from her face. Her hair was white, stringy, and thin. In places it had all but fallen out. Her arms were skinny with twisted bony fingers. She was hunched as if she were in pain. With her were Ensay, looking almost unchanged, and another Caster none of them recognized. Each of them carried a staff with the power crystal aglow.
Almost the instant the three figures appeared, Carif said in a raspy voice, “As fast as you are young wizard, there are three of us and one of you. You can kill me, perhaps not a bad thing, but before you could do any more, Ensay would kill you, and Mande here will kill your beautiful consort. Then they will kill Queen Rosul, before they disappear. You were stupid to come out here alone. I know you have wizards among the guests, but they are too far away to be of any help. By the time they realize something is amiss, this will be decided.” Carif addressed herself to Rigo, since he was the only one of the three with any power that could threaten them.
“What do you want?” Mitty demanded sharply.
“Why, revenge dear girl,” Carif rasped. “I owe Rosul and this wizard repayment for what they have done to me and my grand plans. It is very simple. You can see I hold the upper hand. And I’ve got nothing to lose. Whatever was on the arrow your friend shot into me, has ended my life. Mande here has been able to delay the effects, but not halt them. For months I was bed ridden, in horrible pain. Slowly, because of her magic, I have recovered to the point I can move around and still function. Function well enough to do what must be done. I’m still dying, so I lose nothing however this turns out. At best I have a couple of months left to live, all in pain. The choice here is simple. Rosul and Rigo come with me. Have no doubts. They will not return. If you resist, then all of you will die. I will too, but I do not care so long as I take you with me. Following my orders is the only way you can save your love, wizard. What do you say?”
Rigo stared at the ravaged Carif for a long moment. Mitty held onto his arm tightly. Rigo looked to Rosul, who nodded her acceptance. Slowly he nodded at Carif.
The former Saltique almost cackled in delight. “I knew it.”
She raised her hand in a gesture that had once been so familiar as she prepared to open the Doorway that would take them away, when someone stepped out of nowhere and clamped a blocking band on her wrist. Even as that happened, Queen Rosul unleashed a flash of intense magic that simply wiped Ensay from existence. A less spectacular release of more common Brightfire from the figure next to Mitty burned a killing cavity through the chest of Mande, who crumpled and dropped to the ground.
Carif twisted to see who had appeared behind her and was shocked as Rigo stepped into view. He reached out and took the staff from her. She was powerless to resist any longer. Without the strength of her magic, it was all she could do to stand.
“How?” she started to ask, and then turned back to see the illusion drop away from Lyes who had pretended to be Rigo. Queen Rosul turned out to be Nycoh, who had managed to learn the illusion spell from Lyes some time ago.
Rigo handed the staff to Nycoh. They finally had acquired one undamaged. Perhaps she would be able to unravel the clues needed to create the green energy beam from it. With what they would find on the staff and the clues they would seek in the Reading, Nycoh had been certain the secret would be revealed.
“This was a trap,” Carif hissed, looking at the two people who had moments before seemed to be someone else. Both were people she hated, but now she was powerless to do anything with her hate.
“Indeed it was,” Rigo agreed. “I had a feeling you might still be out there, and if word somehow leaked of this ceremony, you would be unable to resist. It was a risk, but a small one.” Rigo pointed behind the former Guild leader, and she saw that several wizards were arranged, no longer hidden by magic spells. Climbing down out of a pair of trees some thirty paces away were Daria and Kaler, armed with the bows. They had been well hidden, but had a clear shot at the participants in the ruse. The exact location the group had stopped to talk had been carefully chosen.
“You did this to me,” Carif hissed, when Daria approached.
Daria met the dying woman’s eyes and said, “I’m glad you’ve been able to hang on and enjoy it as long as you have. I guess you have only a short time left. Just enough for a Reading to be performed so we can learn about who is left of your little group.”
Carif was led away to her fate. Rigo turned to Mitty. “Are you ready to do this for real?” he asked.
Mitty beamed at him. She had insisted she be part of the trap. Rigo had wanted it to be simply Lyes and Nycoh using illusions to pretend to be himself and Queen Rosul, but Mitty hadn’t believed it would look real. Given her strong will, Rigo had been forced to agree. Daria and Kale
r had been in place to ensure her safety. She nodded happily, and they walked back to tell the others. Moments later a Bypass was opened back into Nals where the Queen waited with the real ceremony that was planned for that evening. With Carif finally in their hands, it would be more of a celebration than ever.
The Reading performed on Carif revealed that three other Casters and Shym were still at large. All had elected to follow their own path, and had deserted Carif some weeks before. She had no idea where they had gone, and was willing to reveal their existence as revenge for their desertion. Shym had indicated it was over and wanted to die on her own terms. The other Casters had simply disappeared. None of them were as powerful as any of the Eight, and the Reading revealed none of them had one of the amulets that would allow them to cross the Ruins. Mande had been the source of those, and she and Ensay had worn the only ones that remained. They recovered the one that Daim had made and used as a pattern by the rebel Casters from around the neck of Carif.
Other matters Carif was less willing to reveal to them. Despite the ravages of the poison, she remained stubborn and determinedly resisted their efforts. Twice they had to use westerner healers to prevent her from dying. She fought giving up the secret trigger for the green beams, knowing they desperately wanted the knowledge. In the end, her stubbornness, and her weakened body, defeated their efforts. She died before the knowledge could be extracted from her.
At least it was over. The attacks and terror that the former head of the Guild had unleashed was now a thing of the past. They could all sleep peacefully now.
Chapter 88
Rigo was startled from his sound sleep by Mitty’s loud yell. He woke wondering where he was and what she had said. The fear was clear in his memory, but the word was lost. He glanced over at her and saw her staring with wide-open eyes toward the other end of the room. Quickly he looked in the same direction, expecting to see whatever had frightened her. Whatever she was seeing wasn’t in the room with them.
Mitty?” he asked worriedly. He reached to comfort her, assuming the dream had returned again.
“Baldari,” she whispered, the softness of her voice conflicting with the image the single word brought to mind.
“Baldari?” he asked. Everyone had been a little surprised that the Baldari had disappeared for so long. He wouldn’t be surprised that they would reappear one of these days. It was a bit of unfinished business that faced Sedfair. Then it dawned on him. Mitty was telling him what she was seeing. She was revealing one of her dreams. An attack by the Baldari was coming.
“When?” he asked. “Where? Somewhere along the southern border?” If Mitty could tell them where they would attack, the military could be in place and prepared to face them. That would significantly cut the losses.
Mitty shook her head violently back and forth. “You don’t understand. They are attacking right now. They are destroying a monastery, killing everyone.” She gasped as if something particularly horrible had just been witnessed.
Rigo wrapped his arms around her. He tried to soothe her as best he could. “Now?” he asked. Rigo believed Mitty was some kind of Seer, much like Queen Mos’pera. Seer’s didn’t see current events, but caught images of what was to be. Mitty must be mistaken.
“Has something changed?” he inquired, wanting at the moment only to distract her from her vision. They could discuss when and where this was to happen later. “Did something make you realize you can now share what you are seeing?”
Mitty stared at him, her light brown eyes wide with the horrors she had been witnessing. She shook her head to indicate that hadn’t happened. “I don’t care,” she said. “This cannot be allowed to continue. People are dying, and many more will unless something is done to stop them. More than a thousand of the Baldari crossed the border on their strange mounts. They are headed for Roin.”
It took Rigo a moment for Mitty’s words to sink in. “Roin is in Kellmore,” he said finally. “It is their southern port city. The Baldari don’t attack the Three Kingdoms.”
Mitty nodded at his understanding of the situation. “They do now. They were moving along the southern border when they came upon the monastery.”
A chill ran up Rigo’s spine. The Baldari had never struck within the Three Kingdoms before. Somehow they had become aware of the existence of the western lands. Perhaps they saw it as an easier target than Sedfair which had resisted their attacks for years. Perhaps they had become aware of the difference in magic between the two lands, and hoped they could find what they sought in the west. He turned to Mitty. “Can you describe this monastery?”
She had only begun to describe the place before Rigo knew the truth of it. It was Ald-del. The monastery which he had visited so long ago and to which Kaler’s brother had once belonged.
“We’ll have to warn them,” Rigo said, preparing to get out of bed. “When will this happen? Do you have any idea?”
Mitty looked at him sadly. “There is no one to warn. It is too late. There is no one left alive there any longer.”
The look Mitty gave him made Rigo suddenly understand that it really was something she believed was happening now. “Get dressed,” he said. “We have to inform the Outpost. The Baldari will have to be found and stopped.”
* * * * *
They waited on top of the hills, watching as the riders approached from the east. Daim, Nycoh, Jeen, Ash’urn, Rigo, Burke, and more than thirty other wizards. No one had survived in Ald-del. They had gone and checked. Mitty’s vision had been true. No magic had been used, but that hadn’t saved the inhabitants of the order. They had been slaughtered to a man, and what could burn, had been burned. Even stone walls had been cracked and torn down in places. How the Baldari had managed it so quickly wasn’t known.
“How did they get here?” Daim asked. “Southern Lopal isn’t the most populated part of the kingdom, but with the Hoplani watch there are sufficient guardsmen that some sign of the Baldari should have been discovered before this.”
“They came up the Great Central River,” Mitty said.
“That’s impossible,” Ash’urn said. “The river is fast and deep at that point, and flows to the south with a current that one could not overcome. I studied it myself for years when I contemplated searching to the south of the great mountains.”
“That is how they came,” Mitty said with certainty. Something in her voice made the others understand she was right, even if they couldn’t envision a means by which they had come.
“Here they come,” Burke said, bringing the conversation to an end. The Baldari were almost to the point at which the attack would begin.
They had chosen the location for the bunching up of the invaders that would be inevitable. The hills provided protection against any counterattack, and the Baldari were in the open. Fields of fire had been established so that each could unleash his magic without fear of endangering another. The Baldari would be caught in a crossfire that would be impossible to escape.
Rigo held his breath as the Baldari moved closer to the point where the hidden wizards would begin the assault. They moved quickly, yet it seemed forever before the first of the small riders crossed the trigger point.
Immediately, the first beams of Brightfire lashed out. Five, then ten, then more than twenty. Sheets of swirling fire followed, and from across the way, Burke released dozens of balls of targeted and concentrated fire magic. Rigo had seen the Baldari before, and he knew that they were fearsome warriors, but they had no defense against magic. Ardra had shown him the burned bodies of the Baldari that had been mowed down in droves by the Casters in Sedfair. He was therefore completely unprepared when the magic of more than three dozen of the Outpost’s most accomplished wizards was totally ineffective against the advancing army. The beams lashed out and struck some kind of barrier that surrounded the Baldari. The energies flared and spread, following the protective band around the advancing horde, flashing in all colors of the spectrum. None of the energy broke through to strike the Baldari warriors. Not a sin
gle of the enemy was harmed.
“Link!” Rigo commanded, and he quickly joined with a dozen of the nearby wizards. Even the enhanced beam from the joined magic was insufficient to penetrate the barrier. The band around the Baldari glowed whitely, faint trails of energy dissipating into the sky above them, but none were harmed.
No counterattack was triggered. The Baldari continued to advance, almost as if the wizards hadn’t been there. No magic lashed out from within the protected barrier. Soon, the Baldari were moving past the position and were effectively out of range.
Nycoh looked at Daim. “Have you ever known of a means of deflecting magic as they have just done?”
Daim shook his head. “I have never known of the methods you use, and this is far more effective. How can we stop them if our magic cannot reach the warriors?”
“Take the squad,” Nycoh commanded. “Warn those ahead what is coming. Alert the Guard. Perhaps conventional weapons will not be affected by whatever is prohibiting our magic.”
“What about you?” Daim asked.
“I want to try something,” Nycoh said. Pointing to her friends, she made a Bypass and they disappeared into it.”