Twisted Legends: Twisted Magic Book 4

by Kaye, Rainy

  I swore, but the word never reached my mouth.

  My underhanded plan had failed. My backup surprise ambush had failed, too.

  I didn’t have anything else.

  My ship rocked as it touched shore.

  Below, thousands of yellow and orange clad soldiers stood, ready to defend their claim on this world.

  A battle cry beat against the stillness of the air. I spun partway as the smaller boats landed on shore. The occupants, my followers, clambered out of the vessels as they surged forward.

  “What are they doing?” I muttered, but I already knew the answer.

  This was not just a fight. It was the final one. They would not live in a world of fire and death anymore.

  The Fire Lords raised their hands, a perfect pose of their idol. It was then I noticed they did not carry any weapons or shields.

  Red and orange light danced around their palms.

  Magic.

  I charged forward and leapt off the bow of the ship. A gentle wind wrapped around me, easing the drop as I landed in a crouch.

  Above, the clouds flashed lavender before returning to the smoldering embers in their bellies.

  Several Fire Lords jerked their heads skyward, and palpable understanding rolled through the army.

  Someone else was using restricted magic.

  That someone would be—

  All eyes turned to me.

  Blue magic—ice, as Hava had said—unfurled from me before I even finished standing. I didn’t have to power up; I didn’t have to try. Ice blue magic swept along the army. They shot back with orange, but it never left their palms.

  The clouds pulsed blue, and then again.

  My magic never died, never wavered as blue crashed over them like a tide, one after another, drowning them out, and with each crash, their magic snuffed before it could build.

  Around me, the others charged forward. They barreled through the Fire Lords, knocking them aside, racing across the land toward their waiting idols.

  It was so effortless to hold the Fire Lords back. Their magic welled and extinguished over and over. I turned my attention to the clouds as I continued to pull the soldiers under with an element they could not control. The clouds rolled around in the sky, filled with blue that glistened like ice, and I could feel the growing power of a storm that had waited centuries. It just needed the blessing of the water idol.

  The ground trembled. I jerked to look at my feet. The black earth divided and cracked, the grout seams splitting apart. The rocking sloshed lava from deep in the ground, and I skittered out of the way before I lost a foot.

  I tried to identify, among the endless rows of soldiers, who had beaten back my onslaught enough to summon the lava. The Fire Lords cowered on the ground, huddled together, trying to shield themselves with their hands when their magic continued to fail them. Ice coated their skin.

  In the far distance, my people had made it to the steps of the platform with the idols. In moments, they would set their world right.

  As the ground continued to tremble, a line broke across the earth, headed for the tower.

  I snapped my magic back, releasing the Fire Lords. Without looking beside me, I grabbed at Randall’s arm.

  “Let’s go,” I said, breathless. “They got this.”

  We charged forward, straight for the tower. Up close, I could make out swirls and edges carved into the stone, a forgotten language and writing system, a story of this land no one would remember. The writing made me nauseated.

  At the base of the tower stood a set of double doors more than twenty feet tall. I rammed my palms into them, shoving, but they didn’t budge.

  Behind us, the Fire Lords found their feet. The ice crystals faded as the soldiers brimmed with their lava and death magic again. The clouds reflected their dominance.

  From the feet of the idols, crying rose up like an orchestra. Despite the distance, I caught the scent of blood.

  The statue next to the Fire King began to raise her hands from her lap, extending her palms out to face the lava lake. The clouds shifted and rolled, and sage colored lights vied with the embers.

  Across the hills in the distance, green rolled toward us, sweeping the ground as moss and small plants erupted from the dark earth.

  “Your magic,” Randall hissed, nudging me. “Blow open the doors, Saf.”

  I blinked away from the scene unfolding as the next idol raised his hands.

  A breeze swept across my skin.

  I turned my attention back to the doors to the tower. Randall had to be right.

  My magic was so easy here.

  I rammed my palms into the door and unleashed everything I had as the world around us continued to reshape and reform.

  The ground under me shook and trembled. The splits grew wider. A crack reverberated and from my peripheral, I saw as the side of the valley shifted. The rock wall shuddered until a piece slid loose. The first boulder tumbled down the slope with clattering sounds that filled the air. It slammed into homes, flattening them into little more than dust.

  Under my palms, the doors shuddered. I put more effort into it.

  The earthquakes grew. The ground shifted and cracked open around us with booming sounds. One by one, the boulders of the valley wall began to shake loose and rolled down to the city.

  The doors rattled harder. As I siphoned more magic to shove open the doors, my heart squeezed in fear.

  The ground shook more violently. To my left, a ravine split open.

  It was me.

  I was causing the earth to tremble, the world to fall apart.

  But we had to open the doors.

  Another rock crashed into the homes in the valley, and dust welled up as screams filled the air. Not everyone had come to the battle; not even close. There were more Fire Lords down there. Those who had not come to defend their claim on the world.

  And children. Ones like Hava. Stuck in this gruesome world, under an abhorrent regime, just on a different side. They did not deserve to die, no matter what their leaders were doing to everyone else.

  But the doors.

  The keys.

  The vault.

  The doors vibrated until they seemed ready to explode into shrapnel. I powered more magic into them.

  An enormous boulder slid forward, ready to break free from the valley wall. Within minutes, the earthquake would knock this piece loose—and this one would decimate the city, and everyone left in it.

  This isn’t my battle, my people, my world.

  I squeezed my eyes shut, but I was still there. Just me. I couldn’t escape me.

  I would never be able to escape me.

  With a garbled growl, I yanked my palms away from the door.

  The trembling and shuddering of the earth ceased.

  I turned to Randall, defeated. “I—”

  “I know,” he said, solemn.

  A screech filled the air. We spun around to face the idols. Three of four had raised their hands. At the feet of the fourth slain bodies strewn about, fallen in their step moments before appeasing their idols. The Fire Lords had taken the platform, and lava welled up in a lake that had opened around the stage. They were going to rid of the rebels and feed the fire plants all at the same time.

  Gusts of wind swept around, blowing my hair across my face. The wind kicked around the platform, beating back the lava, but it could only do so much.

  Rock beats scissors. Lava beats air.

  I froze, my brain stuck on one thought: I couldn’t help them, not without inducing another tremor. I had caused several with my magic since I’d arrived but only now realized it.

  The rock wall would not last another round of my magic, indirectly. One good shake of the earth, and that rock wall was coming down entirely and taking everything in its path. Namely, the city of the Fire Lords.

  The Fire Lords were pretty awful, majority wise.

  And I needed the keys, so badly. Everyone in my world relied on me bringing the keys home.

 
“No,” I said, though it was to myself. “No.”

  It was that simple. There was no argument. No convincing myself I could break a few eggs. That it was reasonable to be put in a situation to choose.

  That whoever had made the rules to this game shouldn’t be held accountable for said rules in the first damn place.

  “No,” I repeated.

  The ground shook, but in the same instance, I realized it wasn’t me this time and it wasn’t the ground.

  The tower swayed like a tall tree in a tornado.

  “What the actual…” I began.

  Randall yanked me back, but it didn’t make much difference. The tower leaned forward and back and if it decided to fall in our direction, we simply could not outrun it. The top nearly disappeared in the clouds.

  At the idol platform, the lava sank back into the earth as everyone’s attention swung to the tower.

  The command, “Run!” filled the air, though it was impossible to say who initiated it. As one, Fire Lords and their subjects picked up and ran. There was no longer Fire and Air and Water and Earth. They grabbed up the fallen, the injured and took off across the fire and moss strewn ground in a world that had yet to find its balance again.

  The tower tottered drunkenly. With Randall, I took a step back and another. The lava lake sloshed behind us. In every direction, people fled.

  Before I could turn for our ship, a cracking crunching sound beat against my brain until I lost all other sensation. For a moment, I could not see.

  When reality came back, the tower had split at its base and fell like an enormous tree—away from us. It slammed into the idol platform with a crash. The platform gave, the ends tilting up as the middle collapsed. The idols crashed into each other with echoing clangs as they shattered into enormous pieces. One piece bounced towards us. I grabbed Randall’s arm, yanking him down as the fragment of statue flung over us and landed into the lava lake. In the same instance, blue swept across the lava as water reclaimed its rightful throne. Water splashed up and dropped down on us, plastering my clothes and hair to my skin. My body shuddered with the relief.

  Across the land, the lava streams shifted and changed to water. Fire plants on the banks wilted and sprang back to life in vibrant green.

  White balls of mist puffed from the water, sailing toward the sky, and joined with the shifting clouds.

  Marlowe came up next to me, staring at the changes unrolling around us.

  “The Fire Spirits are free,” she said, and then swept her hand as she spun in a small circle. “Look.”

  I followed her, turning slowly, as the world lit up with lights: blue, green, orange, and lavender. They danced and sparked in flashes, in the sky, in the air, in the ground. In the fiber of this world’s very being.

  The elements had not been appeased; they had been freed.

  As I took in the tower with its forgotten writing, laying across the valley like a bridge that led to the destroyed idol platform, I knew only one thing about this world: something terrible had happened here. Today, that horror had ended.

  “Safiya,” Randall said.

  The base of the tower, still rooted in the ground, formed a raised stone dais with carved corners and wide steps leading up to the top.

  “Never seen that before,” I said slowly, “but I’m wagering that will take us to the keys.”

  “It’s a passageway,” Marlowe said. She squeezed my hand. “We cannot cross through, but you can. Thank you, Safiya.”

  Praise all things holy, at least the prophetess nonsense was over.

  In a way, I kind of liked being just Safiya.

  I turned and wrapped Marlowe in a tight hug. “Please, be safe.”

  “We’ve never been safer,” she said barely above a whisper, hugging me back. “You freed us.”

  I stopped myself before I asked for clarification. All the questions and such…

  Somehow, I knew the answers would come, eventually. For today, we just needed to find the damn keys.

  She parted from me and stood on tiptoes to peck Randall on the cheek. He gently squeezed her, and I hadn’t realized how small Marlowe was until she basically disappeared in Randall’s hug.

  She stepped away and, linking hands, Randall and I approached the stone dais. We climbed the steps together. At the top, blue magic swirled up around us, emanating from the dais. Panic filled my chest, and I started to turn away. Everything darkened.

  A light scent trickled over me, and I identified it as perhaps fresh open water and vanilla.

  Then the Dark Lands disappeared and before us stretched a new pocket world.

  16

  The source of the scent of vanilla wasn't immediately obvious. The water, however, roared down in long parallel waterfalls close enough to where we stood, spray glistened along my arms and dampened my cheeks. For a moment, it was refreshing after so long among fire and soot. Then, it became annoying.

  Far up at the top of the waterfall, a red brick fortress perched on a rock ledge. One side had fallen in, collapsing the curtain wall.

  The entire structure seemed held up by good wishes and fairy dust.

  From the sides and back of the fortress, archways spanned out in long lines. It was impossible to tell what purpose they served from so far below.

  On the ground, where Randall and I stood, tall soft grass brushed my ankles and tufts of small purple flowers were tucked in corners and crevices of the rocks piled up around the pool where the waterfall crashed into fine mist.

  The faint sound of buzzing drifted to me and away before I could determine if it was real or my imagination.

  "I assume we need to get up there," I said, not bothering to gesture.

  There was pretty obvious in this case.

  Randall stared up at the fortress. "I'm not sure anything could safely be inside that."

  "Well, we could go adventuring, which sounds pretty much awful," I said. “I never thought I would agree with a hobbit, but we’ve been late for dinner more than once now.”

  Randall grinned, taking my hand. We set off with the waterfalls to our left, following the edge of the pool. Ripples shimmered in a tight circle, and the head of a creature like a frog but with eyes on stalks emerged. I watched for what it would do. When the stalks shifted toward me, the frog-thing dropped back under the surface and disappeared.

  “Nothing has tried to kill us yet, so we’re already a step ahead of the Dark Lands,” I said as another frog emerged. Or maybe the same one. Across the pool, more frog-shrimp heads popped up to watch us, and then jerked back under the surface as we passed by.

  In both directions along the pond, the land remained flat, and it went on for miles. The only path up to the fortress appeared to be to wade across the pond and climb straight up the wet vertical rock walls.

  Ever might not have even attempted that one.

  The sounds of talking swept through the air, coming from the direction we were headed, and each word seemed closer than the last.

  Randall tugged me to the side. We stumbled over rocks, my ankles unsteady, and crouched among a pile of loose boulders and stones, several feet from the pool. I dared to peek between a gap of two tentatively balanced boulders, careful to keep my hands down and safe from any unfortunate crushing accidents.

  In front strode a man wearing a fluted metal breastplate and elaborate pauldrons, white with gold trim. The white robe underneath was much too thin and pleated to be a gambeson, and too pristine to have ever seen battle.

  The man probably didn’t have to engage in anything messy, not with the rows of soldiers marching behind him. They wore linen clothes with simpler breastplates, but didn’t have a weapon between them.

  “Magic,” I whispered, completing the thought aloud.

  Randall nodded, anyway. “I somehow don’t think they arrived on a tour bus.”

  The man in front came to an abrupt halt. His men fell back without faltering, as if they were prepared and ready for his sudden change.

  He turned and sniffed
the air, in the direction we were hiding, and I got a good look at his bony cheeks, sunken eyes, and nearly non-existent nose. He wasn’t a corpse, but he was practicing being one.

  “Someone is out there,” he said in a voice like he hadn’t used it in a few centuries.

  I dropped down, out of sight, and shot Randall a wild look. Perhaps we were on the same side as this man, but…I doubted it. That wasn’t the kind of luck we had brought along on this trip.

  The man inhaled deeply—I could hear it even without looking—and then said, “It’s not the key. Keep moving.”

  Their footsteps resumed.

  The key. What were the odds he was on a quest to put away the dark witches and mages himself?

  What were the odds he was the one who had freed them in the first place?

  Fifty-fifty. I still didn’t know anything, but I had sufficiently added one more problem to the growing list.

  Still, somewhere in this sure to be vast new world, lived the keys, if Otilia was to be believed. We had a long search ahead of us, and we had already wasted so much time in the Dark Lands, though wasted might have been a subjective word. The people of Drop in the Rock seemed to think it was time well spent.

  My world had a festering problem though, and desperately needed me to return with the keys. This guy—whoever freaky face was—seemed to also be looking for the keys. Chances were, his canine nose would pick up on the keys faster than Randall and I could root them out.

  There was only one logical, yet stupid, plan.

  “So, hear me out,” I said in a low voice, my mouth next to Randall’s ear. “Why don’t we push our luck and follow the crypt keeper up there, out of sight, of course, and see if he can’t lead us to the keys.”

  “And then…?”

  “Yeah, my plan ends there.” I tapped his arm. “Tag, you’re it.”

  “Then you use your overabundance of magic and level the army, steal the keys—wait, they’re people, right?—and then we do what we always do and narrowly escape.”

  “It’s as if Napoleon himself were here,” I muttered.

  We crept through the rocks, staying low, my thighs straining at the duck waddle as we picked our way without losing cover. The river rocks under us shifted with each step, and I got tired of holding my breath, afraid the army would hear us over the sounds of their footsteps. There were at least three dozen men. Our bigger worry was their fearless leader catching the scent of someone—us—following them.