The little Trust tugged on her dress, and when she looked down, he scrunched up his face and stuck out his tongue. Bridgett smiled at his silly antics, thinking fondly of Pebble and his childish ways, and the small boy grinned. She could sense that he wanted to cheer her up, but her smile was fleeting in the shadow of the darkness in her thoughts. She grasped his hand in hers, squeezing it gently to thank him for his concern.
As she stood holding his small hand, she wondered what she should do now. She needed to contact Osric to let him know what had happened. She needed him to understand why she had done what she had, but she feared hearing anything but approval in his voice. She looked around for a quiet space where she could contact him with her wand, but there seemed to be irua in every corner and crevice of the stone tunnels and chambers. She wanted to ask her young companion, but he could not understand her words, nor she his. He followed along beside her as she walked across the large, round room where she had nearly been murdered. Thankfully, her herbs had dulled the pain from her wounds, and she was able to move easily with only a minor limp.
Suddenly, chaos erupted around them as irua guards dashed through the chamber in full armor shouting at everyone before disappearing down a distant tunnel. Bridgett and the Trust pressed up against a wall as the irua scattered in all directions. The little boy tugged on her hand and chattered at her urgently, but she could not understand him. With waves of emotion washing over her, Bridgett could not discern his feelings from those of the surrounding crowd. He turned away without letting go, and Bridgett allowed him to pull her through the throng of frightened irua toward a narrow tunnel that led off the back of the chamber.
Just before they could slip from the room, Bridgett heard a sharp scream. She turned back to see three gruesome creatures burst into the crowd. They were as large as horses, though not nearly so graceful. They lumbered around, bracing their weight on muscular arms that terminated in large claws. The leathery skin that encased their bodies was darker than the stone that surrounded them. Bridgett watched in horror, frozen in place, as one of the massive things took down two irua bystanders with one swipe of its arm, splaying them open as the sharp claws tore through their torsos. Armed guards were rushing in with drawn swords as archers attempted to find large enough gaps in the crowd to loose arrows without harming the irua.
Bridgett pulled her wand from its pouch, trembling with fear. Her Empath ability was overwhelming her. The room was so thick with terror and confusion that she felt as if she were swimming through mud as she attempted to flee the chamber. Shrill screams and the sound of battle chased them down the narrow tunnel. The Trust ran ahead of her, gripping her hand tightly, and Bridgett could only hope that he knew where he was going. She had no idea where he was leading her, but she felt a strong desire to stay with him.
They rushed through the tunnel, twisting and turning, passing multiple doorways and branches but never veering from the tunnel he had first pulled her into. As they ran, the floor became less even and the ceiling grew closer. Eventually, she stopped seeing any doors or intersecting tunnels. The glowing stones that had lined the walls through the tunnel ended, and Bridgett lit her wand to give them light. The small boy ran on, seeming to be undaunted by the lack of light before him. The floor began to slope downward, and small rivulets of water smelling of sulfur trickled along near the walls. The passageway narrowed until Bridgett had to focus as she ran to prevent her shoulders from grazing the rough stone walls. She strained her ears, listening for the sound of anything or anyone following them, but all she could hear was their footfalls on the rough stone floor. They slowed to a walk when Bridgett had to crouch slightly to keep from grazing the ceiling with her head.
A short distance further, the tunnel curved sharply to the right. As they rounded the corner, Bridgett stopped suddenly and looked at the young irua questioningly. The tunnel ended abruptly in a small chamber that was not much larger than the cell she had been held in. Barrels and crates of varying sizes stood stacked in the center of the little room. Bridgett’s head swam and she had to brace herself against the wall as she thought about retracing their steps back to the carnage they had left behind. She would just use the traveling spell and take them both out of the tunnels, but she had no way of knowing where the enemy forces were. Without a safe location in mind, it would be too dangerous to travel away. Bridgett turned and started back the way they had come, holding her wand out before her. She felt a tug on her skirts, and as she stopped, the boy took her hand again and tried to pull her back into the storeroom.
“We can’t stay here, little one. Hiding will not save us.” She pulled on his hand, hoping they could make it to an intersecting tunnel before the battle trapped them in the dead-end passage. He shook his head at her and repeated a phrase in the irua language over and over. Though she could not understand his words, she did recognize that his tone was not fearful but insistent. Whatever he was saying, he was certain of it. It was not the tone of a terrified child who wanted to hide from a fight behind a stack of barrels. Bridgett allowed him to lead her toward the back wall of the small room.
As they wormed their way around the barrels to the back of the chamber, the smell of sulfur grew stronger. When they reached the far wall, Bridgett realized the thin streams of water that had flowed along the walls were escaping through a small opening. The irua boy kneeled down and squeezed his head and shoulders into the narrow crack. Bridgett was about to stop him, wondering if he expected her to be able to pass through the tiny opening, when he backed out on his own. Bridgett watched him curiously. He held out his hand, showing her a thin, round rod about the length of his palm. Quickly, he turned back to the wall and slowly and meticulously used the rod to draw seven strange symbols on the stone in an arc above the gap.
The images were barely visible at first, but as he continued working, the interconnected lines, curves, swirls, and shapes that he drew contrasted more and more with the surrounding stone. They lightened to a pale yellow, then white, then gradually began to glow until the symbols emitted so much light that Bridgett no longer needed her lit wand to see their surroundings. When he had completed the seventh symbol, the boy again crawled forward until his shoulders were swallowed by the narrow crack and he returned empty-handed. Then he stood up, taking Bridgett’s hand and backing against the nearest stack of crates.
The symbols were glowing so bright that Bridgett had to shield her eyes. Then there was darkness. She held up her wand, lighting the tip hesitantly, afraid of what she might see. To her surprise, where there had been only a tiny opening and seven unfamiliar symbols, there was now a clean archway, large enough for Bridgett to crawl through on her knees. The edge of the small doorway was smooth and even, as if it had been carved using expert tools or well-practiced magic. Bridgett looked at the young irua with new eyes, impressed with his knowledge of magic and fearful of what else he may know. She wanted to think he was an innocent child who needed her protection, but it seemed that she was the dependent one. She would follow where he led, and she could only hope it was not to another chamber of death.
The boy crawled through the opening easily, waving to her to follow from the other side. She got to her knees, still more afraid of retreating and encountering those leathery, clawed creatures than she was of continuing forward into the unknown. She kept her wand lit and grasped it tightly in her hand as she crawled through the opening.
Emerging on the other side, she found herself on a wide ledge. The boy sat just to her right, leaning against the wall with a broad grin on his fine-boned face. To their left, the stone ledge was continuous with a steep staircase that clung to the side of the wall. Bridgett crawled to the edge of the ledge in front of her and peered down into a black chasm. She could just make out the wall across from them in the dim light of her wand, and the staircase followed the wall down in a dizzying spiral as far as she could see. Below them was what seemed an eternity of nothingness—a pool of shadow so deep that her vision could not detect the bottom no matter
how hard she strained her eyes. She backed away from the edge cautiously. The boy giggled and rose to his feet, skipping off toward the staircase with a fearless stride. Bridgett followed with less enthusiasm.
The stairs seemed solid and well constructed, but Bridgett was ever aware of the precarious drop-off close at hand. She trailed her fingertips along the wall to reassure herself of her position as they descended. Even when the rough stone had worn her fingers raw, she needed the tangible anchor to keep her focused on placing each foot securely on the next step. She felt as if they had been slowly falling, on step at a time, into the very center of Archana. She had no way to measure time within the circular vault of stone, and she desperately wished to see the sun.
As her legs were growing numb from the monotonous movements, Bridgett began to become aware of a thrumming in the air. Though she could not sense it physically, it was as if the stone all around them were vibrating silently. Her feet tingled, and she had a strange longing to remove her boots and bring her skin into contact with the stone. When she could no longer resist the urge, she paused and slipped her feet free, and carrying her boots in her hand she continued down the staircase. Remarkably, the further they descended from that point, the less fatigued she felt. The stone seemed to rejuvenate her senses and energize her movements. When they reached the last step, she felt as if she had awoken from a restful dream.
The Trust pulled a wand from a pocket of his sand-colored robes and touched it to the joint where the wall met the circular floor. A burst of light appeared low on the wall, mellowing as it spread in an intricate pattern along the pale stone. Slowly, it worked its way around the wall just above the floor until it formed a ring of illuminated lace around the entire room. The light dimmed as it climbed higher and disappeared completely at the level of Bridgett’s chest, but it cast a warm glow through the chamber, allowing her to clearly see the space. The floor where they stood was the same pale stone she had seen everywhere in the irua tunnels, but it gradually darkened toward the middle. At the very center, a circle with a diameter easily five times Bridgett’s height was cut out from the floor. Hesitantly, Bridgett moved closer to the edge to see what it held.
When she peered over, she was almost disappointed to see that it was just a hollowed out bowl consisting of the same stone that surrounded her. She looked back at the boy, wondering why he had brought her there. He just smiled, his eyes hinting of knowledge far beyond his youth. Bridgett sat near the edge of the bowl, her bare feet resting on the warm stone. She thought it odd that it wasn’t cold to the touch, but she let the warmth seep into her and ease the ache of her wounds.
She gazed at the stone, wishing there were some way to speak to the child and hoping she would think of a way to help Osric stop the war. Realizing she still hadn’t contacted him to inform him that the attack had begun, Bridgett held her wand in front of her and prepared to initiate the spell that would link her wand to Osric’s. As her focus shifted from the distant stone to the wand before her, her vision blurred as it had in the cell.
Suddenly, an incredible array of swirling colors danced before her eyes, twisting and tumbling in a myriad of dazzling light and interwoven strands. She was startled by the vision, but she held her gaze steady and attempted to make sense of it. At the very center of the bowl, the light was so bright that she could not discern individual strands or even separate colors. As she looked deeper, the light snaked and coiled into a thick rope of twisted strands of magic that delved deep into Archana. Just above the surface of the stone bowl, the strands sprayed upward like a fountain, showering down around her and washing over the stone floor. The strands spiraled together in intricate tangles in some places and splayed out in bursts of color in others. The amazing display penetrated all of the stone around her, creeping up the walls and climbing the stairs like beautiful serpents.
The light pulsed, waxing and waning in a constant rhythm like a heart beating. Bridgett felt a small hand rest on her shoulder, and she looked over at the boy with overwhelming gratefulness. She knew that he had trusted her enough to save her life when his superiors would have slain her, but she could not imagine what had caused him to trust her with such a gift as the vision she was experiencing. She wondered if any human had ever seen it.
The sight of the strands mesmerized Bridgett, giving her a new appreciation for how Osric could manipulate such power. His ability tied him directly to Archana in a way she had never before imagined. With great willpower, she pulled herself away from the bowl and refocused her vision so that she could again see the familiar world. She sat on the bottom step, still unwilling to put on her boots and shield her body from the wonder of Archana’s magic. She raised her wand and focused intently on linking hers to Osric’s with the communication spell. She grew worried when he did not respond to her call immediately, but relief washed over her when his diaphanous image appeared above the tip of her wand. She had to swallow past the lump in her throat, and she feared her voice would fail her. Emotions threatened to drown her when she saw his face for the first time in months.
“Bridgett…” His voice was weak and unsure, yet he wore an expression of attentive surprise. “I… I don’t know.” He harrumphed. “Look, you can come home anytime. I know why you left. But if you need something, just say it and it is yours.”
“Osric, listen to me. I am sorry that I haven’t contacted you. It was cruel of me. But there is no time to discuss my needs. The Well of Strands is real.” Bridgett fought back the tears that threatened to fall at the pain in his voice. “I’m in the Irua Realm, and the war is beginning. I saw the first deaths with my own eyes.” Though she stuttered and choked, she needed to put her own feelings aside and do what she had come here for.
“Wait, what? The Well of Strands is real? How do you know the war is beginning?” His eyes darted back and forth in confusion, as waves of the emotion flowed through the wand.
“I came to the Irua Realm to inform them that an army is on its way to invade, but they already knew. The Nagish has agreed to coordinate his defenses of the realm with your soldiers.” Bridgett could not bear to tell him what had occurred leading up to the alliance. “I saw these big creatures break into the heart of Angmar. They were killing indiscriminately, but I was able to escape the area. I was led away from the danger, and now I am sitting mere strides from the Well of Strands. I don’t understand how it is possible, but I can see them. I can’t control it, but I seem to have acquired the Wand-Maker’s vision.”
“Uh, wow. All right. We can discuss everything else when we are together again. Are you safe?”
“For the moment, I don’t believe anyone can get to us. But I can’t stay here. I will have to make my way back to the surface somehow.”
“Okay.” Osric took a deep, calming breath and a crease formed at the center of his forehead as he thought. He looked back up and gazed through the wand into Bridgett’s eyes. “Listen to me. You need to stay safe. Remember everything we have learned. Remember spoken spells and dual wielding. You may not be as fluent as I am, but look for any edge you can get if you meet resistance. Remember…” His voice broke as he looked down. “Stay safe and remember that I love you. We are not the feeble organization you once knew, and I am bringing help.”
“I won’t forget.” Bridgett could no longer restrain the tears; they slid freely down her cheeks as she whispered, “I love you.”
19 –Saddle up
“Aranthians! Wand and sword! Battle calls!” Osric burst out of the barracks, projecting his voice into the air with his wand. “The battle for Angmar has begun, and much sooner than we had thought. Bring your battle hearts and ready yourself for a fight to save the unknown land!”
Battle training had just begun on the cultured greens, and every face turned to hear his voice. Machai held two student’s heads under his arms while he fended off a third attack with his wand, but the battle ceased with his shout. Even the spell that protected the Aranthians wavered with the force of Osric’s voice. It took mere mome
nts for his commands to settle into their minds. Controlled chaos then erupted as men and women scattered for their supplies. Machai and the other arms instructors retrieved weapons and gear from the armory. They began passing out the enchanted Dwarven swords that Osric had recovered from the Braya Volcano.
“Instructors, to me!” Osric ordered. Ten men gathered with haste around him. “Have any of you been to Angmar?”
“Can’t say for these, but I been to Barda on northern shore. Not to Angmar.” The half giant Irgon spoke with his thick accent from the eastern hills, beyond the border of Helewys. The other men shook their heads.
“Okay, I need all of us to know the travel destination. Join hands.” Machai nodded in agreement with the decision as he stowed his axe away behind his back. He had recovered quickly from his wounds after the battle with the earth elemental. Since then, rather than sending him back out on patrol, Osric had kept him on the grounds to train the Aranthians in swordsmanship and dual wielding with weapon and wand. If another elemental showed up, Osric wanted him on hand. Once they were all in position, Osric ordered, “Irgon, take us there now.”
“Eo ire itum.”
Osric could feel his own anticipation urging him to hurry, but rushing would do him no favors this day. With every moment that passed, he felt the danger to Bridgett’s life growing in intensity. It wasn’t the Portentist gift that urged him to rush but his own instinct to protect the one he loved.
Dry air and high winds greeted them when the spell had brought them to their location. Osric quickly surveyed the bright sky and his surroundings before asking, “Which way to Angmar?”
The Well of Strands (Osric's Wand, Book Three) Page 24