Byrn concentrated on the ball pushing on its sides and pulling upward with his thoughts. It grew slimmer and longer for several seconds and Byrn tried to hold it in its shape. He began to sweat with exertion and his hand started to tremble. A moment later the trembling began to spread to his torso and Sane commanded him to stop.
“Take a break for a few minutes and regain your strength,” the sorcerer told him, “and we will try again.”
Chapter 19
The ranger followed the Black Brigands back to their camp careful not to step on the dry leaves or wayward branches that littered the forest as she stealthily kept pace with them. Her heart was racing giving the apprentice ranger a burst of nervous energy as she silently followed her targets from her vantage point on the hill above them. She was forced to remind herself that this was not one of Sari's games meant to test her skills or teach her an important lesson. This was for real and the stakes were life and death.
After a half hour traipsing through the forest the bandits led her to their camp. The Black Brigands consisted of six men all wearing motley leather armor that looked like it was pieced together from the spoils of previous raids. Their leader was an older, but still very muscular man with gray hair tied in a rogue's knot and a scar from his right shoulder down to the forearm. He would be the most difficult opponent and Marian Lightfoot decided that he should be the one eliminated first.
Once more she scanned the camp looking for her friend, but did not see the elf. There were three tents spaced evenly around the makings of a campfire and she was unable to see into two of them from her vantage point. Sari would most likely be held in the leader's tent away from the others. Not in an attempt to protect her, but to ensure that she remained unspoiled for the one Marian had decided to call “Scar,” for lack of a better name. She did not know why she liked to name things. It got her into trouble as a child more than once when Marian began to name the family's livestock and refused to let her father slaughter or sell them. Now here she was giving names to things that she would have to be the one to put an end to.
Marian observed them from a safe hiding place in a thicket of tall grass for several hours more until the sun had set and the moon and stars began to claim the sky. The moon was waxing and overcast providing enough light for the ranger to see by, but still feel relatively secure that the Black Brigands could not see her from her vantage point. The ranger silently thanked the gods for this small favor.
The brigands lit a fire to stay warm and began the night’s drinking. A middle-aged man with a fat gut and bald spot laughed loudly at a joke one of the others had made. The rest of the brigands soon settled around the fire and joined in the merriment blissfully unaware that not far away sat a woman planning to kill the lot of them.
Eventually their boisterous behavior began to settle down as the night wore on. The captain motioned to his tent and two of his men went in. A minute later they emerged with their captive, the elf ranger, Sari. Her hands were tied behind her back, but her feet were free although the bandits had removed her boots. Marian guessed they thought that would prevent her from running away. Unbeknownst to the brigands, elves were as comfortable running in bare feet as they were in boots only wearing them for protection in battle or hunting aggressive animals.
For hours Sari was alone in that tent. With her feet unbound she could have slipped out unseen or bolted and outran any of her captors at any time. Marian briefly wondered what was keeping her companion there. Surely the elf was not still too drunk to escape.
One of the men pushed her to her knees in front of the fire. Scar knelt down in front of Sari and took her face roughly in his hand squeezing her cheeks. Sensing that the situation was about to get much worse Marian readied her bow and notched an arrow. She carefully took aim at the leader's head inhaling as she drew the bowstring back. Exhaling she loosed the arrow and watched it fly towards her target until it took root in his head an instant later.
Marian pulled another arrow from her quiver as the dead bandit collapsed. His comrades began to rise and draw their swords ignoring their captive. “Grab a shield!” ordered one of the men and Marian rewarded his quick thinking with an arrow in the forehead.
Sari took off at a sprint into the forest opposite Marian with her hands still tied behind her back. Two of the men who decided to take their chances with an unarmed, bound elf instead of facing an unknown attacker who was flying arrows in their direction, ran after their swift footed captive. The other two grabbed shields from their tents. They moved cautiously toward Marian's general position using the trees for cover as best they could.
Pulling three arrows from her quiver she notched one in the center and put one above and one below as Sari had taught her. The apprentice aimed for one of the bandits with the middle arrow and loosed all three. The middle arrow hit his shield while one hit the tree he was hiding behind and the last hit the dirt a little way off on the opposite side. The intention was not to kill the approaching bandits, but to make them think they were outnumbered. It was a trick Sari taught her some time ago and tended to be effective, as not many humans knew of the ruse.
The pair of bandits decided the wiser course of action was to flee with their shields held in a way to haphazardly cover their heads and backs.
Marian reveled in her victory for a moment. For the first time in her life she felt strong and capable, like she did not need someone else to protect her. Now all she needed to do was find the runaway elf before her pursuers did.
The ranger hurried down the slope circling around the camp to avoid the light of the campfire that was still burning brightly. The camp was now deserted, but the apprentice knew not to take unnecessary risks. Her ears were strained listening for any signs of Sari. The woman would be as silent as a ghost even as she deftly avoided her pursuers, but the bandits chasing her showed no such caution.
Sparse rays of moonlight pierced the trees illuminating the forest in a mixture of faint light and deep shadows. A small broken tree branch snapped under Marian's boot and she chastised herself for not being more cautious just before stepping on another one with a dry crack that to her ears sounded as loud as a firecracker at the winter festival of Locklinigand.
“Waicosson, guide my steps,” she whispered hoping the god of the forest would heed her prayer and help her to avoid the noisy underbrush.
The wind shifted and blew the faint scent of sweat in Marian's face. The last pair of the Black Brigands were to her west and they had to be nearby if her dull human nose could smell them. Marian cautiously but quickly hurried in their direction until she caught a glimpse of one of the bandits running. A moment later she saw the silhouette of the second pursuer. They were moving too quickly and the forest was too thick with trees for the bow to be effective in the dim moonlight.
“Look at those boys trampling through the forest like a pair of blind boars searching for food,” whispered a voice softly in Marian's ear.
The apprentice ranger involuntarily yelped in surprise before she realized that the voice belonged to Sarianna of the Red Tree Clan who sneaked up behind her. The elf had managed to circle behind the bandits and her apprentice without any of them being aware.
“It looks like they heard you,” Sari added nodding at the pair who had turned and were now heading their way.
Now that the bandits were approaching instead of moving away they suddenly became much more reliable targets. Readying her bow and arrow Marian took aim at the nearer of the two shadow forms and loosed the arrow. An instant later his body jerked and fell backward as the arrow pierced his light armor and then his flesh.
The last bandit was almost upon her by the time Marian readied another arrow. There was no time to aim before she loosed the arrow and, thankfully, hit the brigand in the middle of his neck when he was less than two meters away.
Using her hunting knife Marian cut Sari's bonds freeing her wrists. The elf massaged her wrists revealing red bruises where the rope had rubbed against her skin.
“Did they harm you?�
�� asked Marian.
“Not as much as they would have like although I was starting to get concerned when they hauled me out of the tent.” Sari approached the downed bandit with an arrow protruding from his belly at a leisurely place. His breathing was shallow and in no condition to put up any resistance. “This one is still alive, but mortally wounded. You should put him out of his misery,” the elf said plainly bearing neither malice nor compassion for her former captor.
The man gurgled blood and spit as Marian approached him. She drew her dagger- a longer and sharper version of her utilitarian hunting knife. When she stood over the Black Brigand, Marian stopped for a moment staring at him. It was the fat one who had been laughing at his friend’s joke earlier. A minute before she killed another man almost without thought. Before that she killed two others at the camp. However, those kills had been different. They were not up close. When those men died she did not have to look them in the eye.
“It is harder when you are face to face. It is much more personal like this than it is with a bow,” said Sari. “It is also easier to take a life in the middle of a fight than it is when the fighting is done and your foe is at your mercy... at least the first few times.”
Marian knelt at the brigand's chest. She put her free hand on his chest to hold him still and hesitantly brought the dagger to his throat.
“No! No! Please, miss!” the man protested weakly, but Marian closed her eyes and slit his throat. When her eyes opened she saw the bandit's throat covered in crimson as blood gushed down his neck and seeped into the soil. The apprentice wanted to cry, but fought back the urge burying the feeling deep inside her.
An empathetic hand on her shoulder touched Marian. “It will get easier,” said the elf.
“Is that a good thing?” asked Marian not unkindly.
Her master was a blur before her as she tried to look through her watery eyes. She could not gauge her master's reaction, but noted that Sari had taken a more somber attitude instead of her typically playful persona.
After a few minutes as they walked towards the recently abandoned camp Sari asked, “How did things go with the rest of the Black Brigands?”
A more sedated Marian told her, “Two are dead. I scared off the other two so that I could get to you more quickly.”
She was reasonably certain that the master ranger would have been fine without her apprentice's assistance, but that was not something she was willing to risk. When she was at her lowest and had no idea where to turn it was Sari that showed up as if a gift from the gods giving her direction, friendship, and teaching her how to live for herself.
Since the great magician uprising a hundred and fifty years ago women began to take more independent roles in Aurelia, slowly at first, to the point where seeing women warriors or other more traditionally male roles is no longer an uncommon site, but many young women still took the more traditional role of wife and mother as Marian had. She still missed her husband and son greatly, but she no longer felt that deep emptiness anymore.
“Then we have two more to track down before we get paid,” Sari said with her usual smile. “There is a village nearby. Let us stop there and see if we can pick up the trail of the last of the Black Brigands. The first round is on me.”
Chapter 20
The flame took the form of a whip as Byrn envisioned it forming just beyond his hand. He watched it flick gently back and forth as he slowly twisted his wrist careful not to lose control of the fire or accidentally flick it against himself or Sane. It took nearly two weeks to get to this point, but master and apprentice were both very pleased with the result.
“Impressive,” said Sane eying the magical whip with a critical eye. “There are no breaks in the construct. No errant flames being released. The weapon is formed close enough for you to control it, but far enough away to protect yourself from burning...
“What is this shimmer?” Sane indicated a small area where the flames pushed away from his apprentice’s hand wielding the weapon.
“I am also casting a light protective shield between my hand and the whip to reduce the flame's heat coming back at me,” Byrn told him boasting.
Looking closer Sane regarded the gentle sheen of the small magical shield more intently. A small grin creased his lips and the old sorcerer nodded approvingly.
“Using two enduring spells at the same time is an impressive feat. It requires accessing two different aspects of your personality at the same time. There are powerful magicians in the world who are unable to effectively do that. How did you manage it?” Sane asked curiously.
Byrn shrugged. “The heat was making my hand too hot and made it harder to focus my thoughts. I thought if the heat was not bothering me then I could more easily focus on directing my emotions and maintaining control of the form.”
“So you tapped into the desire to alter the world around you and created the shield thinking that it would require less energy than would be wasted by trying to ignore the heat,” Sane interrupted. “That is really very smart. In time as a fire master you will have little reason to fear the flame, but for now it is a truly impressive feat although I doubt there would be many other magicians that would require the protection and have the natural talent to cast that combination of spells.
“Have you ever heard of a prodigy? It is someone- a young person or novice- that has an exceeding amount of skill despite very little experience. I think you are one,” the sorcerer said simply. “It's the only explanation I can think of for your rapid advancement.”
Byrn appreciated the praise, of course, but he thought there might be another explanation. The tutelage he was receiving from his friends in his cell cluster had helped him to think on more advanced techniques. Many spells were beyond his abilities, but the ideas got his mind working on ways to simplify them, so that he could wield them or at least a near enough approximation.
It was strange to think of his cellmates as friends, but that is how Byrn had come to think of them. They were murderers, thieves, and malcontents. Tell was a rogue magician imprisoned for running away from his domain. Fredrik was a pirate captain who used his lightning to rob merchant ships. Ryonus was a bastard son who killed his father, a South Lands lord, after the man refused to acknowledge him. Xander led an infant rebellion against the kingdom that never quite got off the ground. Byrn even considered Mantellus who seemed half crazed most of the time and admitted to killing dozens of people before finally being caught a grudging friend.
In truth, Mantellus Firekin scared him a little. Not because he was a lunatic, but because in terms of magical affinity Byrn was most closely aligned with Mantellus and he feared one day becoming like him. In a fit of rage Byrn had taken nine lives. Maybe that is how it began with Mantellus too. It was easy enough to imagine being a rogue magician in the kingdom forced to kill to survive. Maybe Mantellus got used to the killing and eventually learned to enjoy it over time.
There were times late at night when Byrn would stare at the ceiling and wonder at what drove his fellow fire elementalist to become a killer as he was now, but Byrn dared not ask. He did not fear that his cellmate would refuse to answer. It was that the answer might strike too close to home for Byrn’s liking that gave him pause.
Of course the goddess Ashura's curse would end his life the first time he killed anyone even in self-defense, so there was some comfort in that even if the thought was grim.
“End the spell,” Sane told him and Byrn complied. Once the spell was released he instinctively relaxed his muscles and centered his mind so that he could be ready to cast a new spell at a moment's notice.
“Now cast it again,” his master ordered.
Byrn did as he was told focusing intently to create the small shield followed closely by the fireball carefully holding it in place; finally bending it into the shape of a whip. The entire process took about a minute.
“End the spell,” Sane commanded once more. Once again Byrn did as he was told although a little less willingly.
“Cast i
t.”
Byrn must have had a puzzled look on his face, because Sane told him, “You have achieved the end result of the spell effectively, but it is no good to you if it takes more than a few seconds to cast in a dangerous situation.”
They went on like that for several more cycles. Each time Sane's commands getting more frequent as Byrn completed it faster and faster until he could do it in just a few seconds.
“Great work. You should write it down in your grimoire. That spell may come in handy for some other prodigy one day.” Sane motioned him to the table where the book sat next to the sorcerer's bag. Byrn went to the book and felt a sudden rush of panic as he did his best to position his body between the bag and Sane who stood no more than five or six yards away.
“Have you spoken with the king about releasing me into your custody?” Byrn asked. He did not turn or look up from his writing.
“I have,” Sane answered. His sudden shift in tone betraying the bad news he brought, “His highness is resolute that you serve out your sentence, but I will speak with him again in another year or so when you have advanced even further. Perhaps then he will see the wisdom of my words.”
With that, Byrn made his decision. It was time he made his escape from Baj. The magician apprentice slipped his hand into the pouch containing the traveling runes and feeling several brush against his fingertips he lifted one out between his index and middle fingers as Fredrik had explained to him. Hoping that he did not take one that would be missed soon Byrn slipped it into his trouser's pocket and quickly began writing in his grimoire.
When he was finished Byrn turned to face his master. His practical mind told him to remain silent, but the young magician found he could not. Looking his master in the eye he said, “I want you to know that I appreciate everything you have done for me since I was locked up in here. I don’t think I ever told you, but I was adopted as a boy. Before that I grew up in the unfriendly confines of an orphanage where we were forced to beg for handouts and bring whatever we earned back to the housemaster. When the Lightfoots adopted me I was so happy and more than that- grateful… To lose them, the only people who had shown me any kindness for the first ten years of my life, was more than I could accept. At first I was angry and blamed you for the loss of my family, but since then you have done much to earn my trust and I wish that things could have been different.” Byrn trailed off for a minute. He was unsure what else to say so he simply added, “Thank you... for everything you have done to help me.”
Rogue Magician (The Magician Rebellion) Page 11