“Captain, bring me Torin’s horse,” Abigail said, turning back to the Fellenden royal guard. “Take the rest of your men north along this road. When you overtake the two Sky Knights walking an injured wyvern back to the city, you will stop and offer them your assistance. Then you will accompany them, taking your orders from either of them. Is that understood?”
“Prince Torin is our charge; we’ll not abandon him.”
“And how well have you protected him so far?” Abigail asked, her temper slipping. “You can do no good against this witch … she’ll just charm you again and set you against everything you hold dear. Leave her to us and do as you’re told.”
The captain clenched his jaw but nodded while one of his men brought Torin’s horse forward, handing the reins to Abigail.
“Good man,” Abigail said, mounting the horse and offering Magda a hand up behind her. The crowd parted as she spurred the animal into a gallop. Once they reached the open range south of the village, Magda cast a simple spell that was answered by a roar in the distance.
“I’ll look from the air while you search for any sign on the ground,” she said, dismounting. “If you see anything, send up a whistler. I won’t be far.”
“Good hunting,” Abigail said, spurring her horse toward the thin forest running between the road and the foothills of a mountain range a league to the east.
The ground cover beneath the fir boughs was sparse and the few shrubs she saw were devoid of leaves. Under the shade, the air was cold but still and moist with the morning dew. Abigail guided her horse cautiously, searching for any sign of passage but finding none. The swath of forest was miles wide and crisscrossed with animal trails and a few hunting paths, none bearing any sign of recent traffic. As the morning wore on, she became convinced that finding them within the woods was nearly impossible given the sheer size of the area to be searched. On top of that, she had no idea how far the witch had carried Torin in her flight from the village, nor what other capabilities her enemy might possess.
Reluctantly, she guided her horse out of the forest and back to the road. She had just cleared the tree line when she heard Taharial roar in the distance. She spurred her horse into a gallop, racing south toward Magda, slowing when she crested a gentle rise.
Then she saw the enemy. The witch was standing in the open, atop a small hill beside the road. A goat was hogtied on the ground in front of her, and she was chanting while holding a dagger over the helpless animal. Torin stood behind her, seemingly oblivious to the events swirling around him.
Abigail surged forward, leaning into her horse’s neck and trying to coax more speed from him even as his strength waned. Magda released a bubble of liquid fire the size of a man’s head toward the witch, but the Sin’Rath ignored it, continuing to chant the words of her spell as the fire burst against a half-sphere shield covering the entire hilltop where she and Torin stood, dripping orange flames to the ground in a circle surrounding them.
Magda banked sharply, wheeling for another attack run when Peti shouted the final word of her spell and plunged her dagger into the goat, its bleating scream carrying on the wind until it exhausted its final breath. Moments later, sooty black streamers began seeping up from the ground, rising up over Peti’s head and coalescing into a whirling cloud of darkness. With a menacing cackle, she pointed at Magda, and the darkness shot forth with terrifying speed, lifting toward Taharial, striking the wyvern full in the chest and soaking into the beast like water into a sponge.
Abigail watched helplessly as Magda’s steed turned jet black, freezing solid as if he’d been turned to stone. A moment later, Taharial shrank out of sight, leaving Magda strapped to her plummeting saddle.
Unable to help her friend and mentor, Abigail turned her attention to the Sin’Rath, sending an arrow at her while still on the run, knowing full well that it wouldn’t penetrate the shield, but trying nonetheless. After her arrow shattered against the magical barrier, Abigail slung her bow and drew the Thinblade.
Magda pulled her release cord, the locking bolts popping free, allowing the saddle to fall away from her while she cast her featherlite spell and landed gently. Moments after reaching the ground, she unleashed a light-lance that was brighter than any Abigail had ever seen. The shield protecting Peti faltered, flickering out of existence a moment later.
Then Peti cast another spell. Abigail saw no visible effect until the ground around Magda started growing into a patch of barbed tangleweeds that wrapped around her, immobilizing her within seconds.
Abigail drew closer but the witch just cackled, beginning to cast yet another spell. Abigail was only a few dozen feet away when her horse stopped charging and started bucking, dancing and trying to throw her. She leapt clear in a desperate effort to control her fall but still hit hard, dropping the Thinblade and tumbling to the ground.
Shaking her head, she struggled to recover, unslinging her bow and nocking an arrow, but Torin was riding behind Peti, blocking her shot. She heard the witch laughing as they rode south. Still entangled, Magda loosed a spell at the Prince of Fellenden, a small sphere of translucent yellow light striking him squarely in the back but seeming to have no effect.
After retrieving the Thinblade, Abigail cut Magda free of the tangleweeds, each stalk turning to black smoke as it was severed. Magda was bleeding from a dozen places, but her eyes showed only rage.
“I’m going to kill that witch if it’s the last thing I do,” she said, stepping free of the thorny growth, “and then I’m going to find her sisters and rid the world of their taint once and for all.”
“I’m sorry about Taharial,” Abigail said.
“I don’t think he’s dead, but I can’t be sure.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The witch used a transformation spell,” she said, looking about and walking quickly to a small object on the road. She picked it up with a humorless smile. It was a perfect replica of a wyvern, cast in black metal. “If I can figure out how to reverse the spell, I think I can bring him back. Unfortunately, that will take some time and research to accomplish.”
“At least he’s not dead.”
“No, but he won’t be helping us for a while,” Magda said, wiping blood from one of the scratches on her arm.
“You take care of your injuries while I get our packs from your saddle,” Abigail said. “My horse was exhausted before they stole it, so they won’t get too far before they have to start walking. If we hurry, we might be able to catch up with them, provided they don’t vanish into the forest again.”
“That won’t be a problem,” Magda said. “I hit Torin with a tracking spell. I’ll be able to determine his direction and distance with a simple incantation anytime I like.”
“How long will it last?”
“Several weeks, certainly long enough.”
“Well, that’s the best thing I’ve heard all day.”
Chapter 16
The horse’s tracks followed the road and it looked like he was being run ragged. Confirmation came when they found the animal, collapsed and left to die where he fell. Abigail shook her head sadly, kneeling next to him. His body was still warm.
“They’re not far, maybe an hour or so ahead of us.”
Magda nodded, muttering a few words under her breath. “About a league south,” she said, looking up at the steel-grey sky. “Only a few hours of light left.”
They moved quickly, pushing themselves to cover greater distance, but as fast as they were, Magda reported that Torin remained a league out of reach.
“Why didn’t she bite Torin’s guards?” Abigail asked while they walked.
“That’s hard to say. It could be that her venom is limited and she used so much of it to turn so many soldiers back in the city that she didn’t have enough left. Or it could be that those charmed by venom lose some essential aspect of their free will, making them less useful to her in a fight. The truth is, we don’t really know for sure how their venom works.”
“Do you think she’s bitten Torin
?”
“I doubt it. Over the years we’ve done what we could to gather information about the Sin’Rath without violating our truce. It seems that they don’t bite those in positions of power whom they wish to influence. Instead, they reserve their venom for those that they deem expendable. I suspect that the influence of the venom diminishes one’s ability to think rationally and thereby diminishes one’s usefulness.”
“I hope you’re right,” Abigail said. “She should be dead. I put an arrow right through her head. If that won’t kill her, what will?”
“As I said, she survived your arrow because of a very powerful constructed spell. One that I’m quite sure she hasn’t had the time to replicate. Another such well-placed arrow would be the end of her.”
“I’ve seen a lot of things over the past year, but that swarm of locusts made my skin crawl.”
“It was disturbing.”
They walked on in silence, the forest to their left thickening and eventually overtaking the rangeland that had bordered the road on their right, creating the effect of a tunnel with a ceiling of fir boughs. Magda stopped a dozen feet before entering the gloaming pathway before them, her eyes narrowing.
“What is it?” Abigail asked, unslinging her bow and looking around warily.
“I’m not sure. Something’s not right here.”
“It just looks like a forest road to me.”
“Yes, but …”
An arrow whizzed past Abigail, grazing Magda on the shoulder, her riding armor deflecting the shaft but not before it managed to cut a shallow gash across her outer arm. She cursed, then began casting a spell.
Abigail nocked an arrow, searching the woods for any sign of movement. A rustling in the bushes caught her attention. She fired blindly into the foliage, eliciting a cry of pain. Three men emerged from the woods, two charging toward them while the third walked around in a circle, trying to reach the arrow sticking out of the back of his shoulder, yelling in pain with each attempt.
Abigail dropped her bow and drew the Thinblade, swinging it wildly to ward off the man charging at her, cutting him in half from the ribcage to the shoulder with one stroke. His torso fell into her and nearly knocked her over, staining her armor with blood.
The other man ran headlong into Magda’s newly erected shield, bouncing off it in stunned amazement, then turning toward Abigail with almost desperate urgency. She pointed the Thinblade at him and shouted, “Stop!” but he charged right into it, impaling himself on the blade while still trying to stab her with his dagger. She spun away, drawing the Thinblade through half of his torso and narrowly avoiding the blade plunging toward her.
The third man had fallen to the ground and rolled onto his back, breaking the arrow off with a horrific scream before staggering to his feet and advancing toward Abigail with a knife. Magda knocked him over with a force-push. His landing stunned him for just a moment, but then he scrambled to his feet and charged again, wild-eyed and driven by something unnatural.
Abigail clenched her teeth and set herself to meet the attack, sidestepping to her right and spinning, lashing out with the Thinblade. A foot of the magical blade passed through the man’s upper arm and his chest, cutting through his heart and lung. He fell in a heap, bright red blood gushing from his wound in decreasing surges until the ground beneath him was soaked red.
Abigail’s heart was pounding in her head from the sudden violence. She searched the darkening forest for more threats, but the calm of the late winter day settled over the battlefield in stark contrast to the carnage scattered across the road.
“How did you know?”
“I cast a number of spells every morning as a matter of course,” Magda said. “One such spell warns me when danger is near … at least most of the time. As with everything else in life, spells sometimes fail.”
“Well, I’m glad it worked today.”
Magda knelt next to one of the dead men, pulling his collar down and nodding to herself. “He was bitten.”
“Three dead … and all of them innocent.”
“We should proceed with caution,” Magda said. “These are probably not the only men she’ll send against us.”
“I wish we had time to bury them,” Abigail said.
“As do I, but every moment we delay …”
“I know. Let’s at least move them off the road into the woods.”
After the grisly task was done, they continued south, walking briskly into the growing darkness of late evening. When night fell, Magda conjured three softly glowing orbs of light that hovered over their heads, providing enough illumination to travel by without drawing undue attention. They walked well into the night until exhaustion overtook them both.
Morning came much sooner than Abigail would have liked. She was sore from walking so many leagues, but her sense of urgency overpowered any discomfort she felt. They ate a cold breakfast on the move, picking up their pace after their bodies warmed and limbered from exertion.
The forest remained thick and overgrown on both sides of the road as it meandered along a path cut to avoid the ups and downs in the terrain until it came to a stream where it turned and followed the water. Not an hour later, the road crossed the stream over a bridge that looked in need of repair, many of the timbers rotting from the constant moisture. A village was nestled against the far side of the river.
As they approached, a man on a platform in a tree overlooking the bridge blew a horn, and seemingly every able-bodied man in the little hamlet took up makeshift arms and came rushing to the bridge. Pitchforks, shovels, and axes were the most common, though a few had spears, and one, the biggest among them, carried a broadsword. He stepped through the crowd of men arrayed on the opposite side of the bridge and planted the point of his sword in the ground, resting his hands on its pommel.
“You shall not pass!” he shouted over the low roar of the water.
“This is getting old,” Abigail muttered, stopping a step short of the bridge.
“Indeed, yet it does pose a problem,” Magda said. “I count nearly thirty men.”
“And all of them are dupes; not a one deserves to die.”
“Agreed. Perhaps they would be open to reason.”
“I doubt it, but it’s worth a try,” Abigail said, holding her hands up and open in a gesture of peace, while walking to the middle of the bridge. Magda waited on the far side, softly casting her shield spell.
The big man’s eyes narrowed suspiciously but he approached after a brief internal struggle, stopping several paces from her.
“You shall not pass,” he said, planting his sword point in the bridge planks as if punctuating his statement.
“You said that already,” Abigail said. “I would ask you to hear me out.”
He frowned as if her request was unexpected. Then he nodded.
“Prince Torin is under the influence of a witch. We are trying to rescue him.”
“Nonsense! Lady Peti is his betrothed and he’s a lucky man to have her. She’ll make a fitting queen.”
“You’ve been duped-deceived by witchcraft. Peti is not a lady, she’s demon spawn and she has her claws in your prince.”
“He said that you would come and he said that you would lie, but I didn’t think your lies would be so obvious. You are fair by any man’s standards, but Lady Peti makes you look plain by comparison.”
“This is getting nowhere,” Abigail muttered, shaking her head. “Do you have a wife?”
“What’s that …”
“Answer my question,” Abigail interrupted.
“Yes,” he said, seeming somewhat taken aback by her demeanor.
“Did she see Lady Peti?”
His brow furrowed and he spat. “Yes, but she was jealous of her-kept going on about her not being human and such. Utter nonsense.”
“Perhaps she saw true.”
“I’ll believe my own eyes before I believe the addled ramblings of a woman.”
Abigail took a deep breath to steady her growing anger, lo
oking up and down stream for another place to cross.
“Don’t think to pass elsewhere,” he said, raising his sword point it at her. “I am the protector of this village and I will obey my prince.”
“You are a fool,” Abigail said, her temper finally slipping out of her control, “a dupe who betrays your prince and threatens the future of the very people you profess to protect.”
“I think you need a lesson in manners, woman,” he said, advancing toward her. “I command you to lay down arms and surrender.”
The rest of the men started forward onto the bridge while Abigail started backing away.
“Submit or die!” the village protector shouted, bringing his broadsword up over his head.
Abigail stopped, grasping the hilt of the Thinblade and standing her ground, anger flashing in her pale blue eyes.
“So be it,” he said, bringing the sword down.
Abigail drew, slipping to the side and cutting his broadsword off at the hilt, then bringing the flat of the Thinblade down on his shoulder. He froze in shock and disbelief, the men rushing in behind him stopping uncertainly.
“Your witch-blade will not prevail here,” he said, though with somewhat less certainty. “You may kill me, but …”
“Shut up! Back away! Right now!”
Confusion and relief danced in his eyes as he slowly stepped backward, out from under the threat of the Thinblade, still holding the useless hilt of his broken broadsword.
Abigail swept her blade through the timbers under her feet, then turned and ran. The bridge creaked and groaned for a moment before the timbers gave way and the bridge collapsed, spilling several of the men into the water. They flailed against the strong current even though the stream was only a few feet deep. The rest of the villagers scrambled to pull their friends out of the frigid water.
Abigail didn’t say a word, stalking past Magda, turning into the forest heading downstream and trying to master her temper but mostly taking it out on the brush in her way. A hundred feet from the edge of the village, she stopped and sliced through a tree with a single stroke. It wobbled for a moment before slowly crashing across the stream.
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