Kadka glanced back at Vladak and grinned wider still. This was more like it. He nodded at her and stood up straight from the wall, ready to move. Neither of them spoke—there was a chance they might be heard now.
Hobbier walked, and Kadka and Vladak followed. It was easy enough to stay out of sight. The woman looked behind her only occasionally, and any detection spells she might cast wouldn’t pick anything up—orcs were hard enough to find Astrally, and Kadka was near-invisible.
They tracked Hobbier through the Stooketon streets for a quarter hour, in the general direction of Greenstone. The houses and markets of Stooketon gave way to artifice manufactories and industrial buildings, and there were fewer and fewer mage-lamps brightening the way. Eventually Hobbier stopped on a dark street in front of a brick facade, featureless save for a heavy-looking brass door—not even windows, though other buildings nearby merely covered theirs with iron bars. She fumbled a key from her pocket, unlocked the door, and disappeared inside.
Kadka and Vladak had been following at a distance, but now Kadka loped to the door Hobbier had entered, closing the distance quickly and quietly. Vladak was close behind her.
“What do you think she’sh up to in there?” Vladak asked in a soft voice.
“Only one way to know.” Kadka reached out to grip the door handle.
He grabbed her shoulder. “Could be anything waiting inshide. Might be better to get word to the othersh, go in together.”
“No time,” said Kadka. “Maybe she goes out other door somewhere, we lose her. Endo’s plan happens tomorrow. If we know nothing by then, he wins.” She didn’t wait for an answer, just turned the handle and pushed open the door, slow and steady. It was heavy, but swung easily on oiled hinges, and made no noise.
It was dark inside, but that was no obstacle to Kadka’s eyes. She’d entered a large, open room, apparently empty. No furniture, no sign of anyone. No Oola Hobbier. There was a hallway on the far side, but nothing else of note. Except for one strange fact: the entire room, and what she could see of the hall beyond, were lined with brass, just like the door. Completely encased, from floor to ceiling. Sealed against outside magic.
No one built a room like this without reason, but this one was empty of any purpose that Kadka could see.
The hair rose on the back of her neck and hands. Something was wrong.
She reached to her neck, squeezed the sending locket that Indree had given her in case of need. No response, no tell-tale tingle. Even with all the brass, it should have worked through the open door. The room was warded. She turned to Vladak, already knew what she’d see. He was trying to get in, pressing against what looked like nothing, but when he pounded his fist against it, there was a slight silver-blue shimmer. The doorway was warded too. He couldn’t get in.
Kadka put her hand against the ward, felt solid magic block her way. “Take this. Tell Indree.” She unfastened the locket from her neck and tossed it through the ward; Vladak caught it in one huge furred hand.
“It doesn’t matter. Help isn’t going to get here in time.” A woman’s voice from behind, in the hallway at the other end of the brass-sealed room. Though the words were fluent Audish, they were spoken with a strong Rhienni accent.
Kadka whirled. Her orcish vision picked out the small form in the darkness just beyond the mouth of the hall. An auburn-haired gnomish woman, short enough that the top of her head wouldn’t even reach Kadka’s waist.
“Oola Hobbier,” Kadka said. “How long do you know we are following you?” She was impressed—there weren’t many in Thaless who could spot her when she didn’t want to be spotted.
“Endo suspected you’d be watching me,” Hobbier said, and the admiration in her voice bordered on awe. “He told me to come here, draw you out.” So she hadn’t actually seen anything—she hadn’t been the one to set the trap. “You are in over your heads. You can’t beat him.”
Vladak pounded against the wards from outside to no avail. “We have to get you out!”
He was right, though Kadka hadn’t needed help reaching the obvious conclusion. Whatever Endo had planned for her, it wasn’t good. But the only other possible escape was the hallway behind Hobbier, and there would almost certainly be a ward on that side, too.
Still, she didn’t gain anything by not trying. She didn’t mean to die here.
Kadka strode across the room, reached out her hand. Hobbier flinched visibly—it didn’t take more than a glance to know that the woman had never done anything like this before. But as expected, the near-invisible force of a ward shimmered briefly across the mouth of the hall as Kadka’s palm made contact. No way out on either side, then. “What snare does Endo leave?” she asked. “Hurts me? Kills me? I can see you are no killer. Is not something you have to become.”
“If… If he says it must be done, it must be done.” Hobbier lifted her chin in frightened defiance. “He knows how to make the world better. No one else can. We are going to rule together. Side by side.” And now she stood a bit taller, prouder. “I will be his empress.”
Kadka raised an eyebrow. “Is interesting choice, to use his empress for bait.”
“He knows that I am not afraid to put myself at risk for him.” Not for the cause, not for magical superiority. For him. Oola Hobbier wasn’t one of the usual pro-magical fanatics. Her obsession wasn’t with magic, it was with Endo Stooke.
Which meant Kadka wasn’t going to talk her way out of this one. Maybe Carver would have been able to, but her gifts lay elsewhere. All she could do was buy time. “Is very romantic. But I wonder, does he care so much for you? He does not risk this, I see.”
Hobbier bristled at that. “He is the Emperor. I am not. But he took steps to make sure I would be safe. These wards are all his doing.”
“And if we take you before we come to this place?”
“You… he knew that you wouldn’t.” Hobbier only faltered for a moment. “He knows what you’ll do before you do it. And he trusts that my magic is sufficient to protect myself. Enough of this.” She reached behind her back, brought something out. Something familiar. A foot-long bronze spike in the shape of the Mage Emperor’s staff and crown. “He left a message.” She frowned slightly. “The other one was supposed to be with you, but… I suppose it can’t be helped.” With that, she jabbed the spike into the wall, and the sharp end penetrated several inches of brass with a silver flash.
Suddenly, a silver-blue illusion obscured the mouth of the hall, shielding Hobbier from sight. A huge, smooth mask with glowing slits for eyes. And between those eyes, an engraving of a staff standing upright through the center of an ornate crown. The Emperor’s Mask, the hulking automaton that Endo used as a stand-in to hide his true identity. Behind the image, Kadka heard receding footsteps. Hobbier fleeing the building, no doubt.
“Shpellfire,” Vladak cursed, still standing helplessly at the door. “I’m not getting in thish way. If she’sh got some other way out, maybe I can get in there. I’m going to look.” He darted away, disappeared from sight.
Vladak hadn’t been gone ten seconds before the image of the Mask began to speak. “Tane, my friend.” It was Endo’s voice; he hadn’t bothered to disguise it. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to see you off in person.”
Kadka rolled her eyes. Of course the message was directed at Carver. Endo had never spared much thought for her—in his world, a magicless half-orc couldn’t be a serious threat, no matter how many times she’d gotten in his way.
But more importantly, she was fairly sure that when the message ended, she’d be out of time. Endo Stooke would want the sound of his voice to be the last thing Carver heard. And he’d set his trap well. Brass all around, so no magic could get in. The room was probably warded against unauthorized spellcraft on the inside as well, not that it made any difference to Kadka. There was no way out. Which meant she’d have to find a way to deal head on with whatever spells Endo had left for her. Or rather, for Carver.
“It is a shame it had to end this way,” En
do’s illusion continued. “So… impersonal. In a perfect world, you would live to see me ascend to power. Why, you are partly responsible! You did kill poor Wilnam Urnt for me. I owe you my thanks for that.”
It would be spellfire, most likely, Kadka decided. Endo liked the stuff, and it would have galled him that they had stopped his spellfire attack on Thaless months before. Killing Carver with it now would be like proving a point. She couldn’t be sure, but guesses were all she had.
What did she know about spellfire that she could use? Carver had explained it to her before. It burned only what it was instructed to burn, but Endo wouldn’t have been so careless as to over-specify. He’d have scribed his spells to burn anything living in the room. So she needed a shield. Spellfire emanated from a fixed point, a caster or artifact—the safest place to be was behind something it couldn’t burn. She’d once protected Carver from it by standing in front of him and taking a blast that hadn’t been cast with her as a target.
Endo’s message talked over her thoughts, making it difficult to concentrate. “But I’m afraid my thanks will be a poor one indeed. I thought you might manage to put together my connection with Oola, and I cannot allow you to interfere with her part in my plans.”
A shield spell was out of the question—there were almost certainly wards in place to stop it even if she could have cast one herself. The only thing in the room capable of stopping spellfire was the brass lining the walls; Endo wouldn’t have set his spells to destroy the building. It would have drawn too much attention. But the walls were seamless. Kadka wouldn’t find any purchase there.
Her eyes fell on the door behind her, still open to the street. The doorway was warded, but the door itself swung inward. The hinges looked solid and strong, crafted so the pins weren’t accessible, but they were all that held it to the wall.
She sprinted across the room, grabbed the door on either side, and yanked against it with all her might. Metal bowed slightly, but held. She was strong, but not strong enough. Not alone. “Vladak!” she shouted. “I need you here!” He was a full-blooded orc—the best muscle she was going to find outside an ogren, and she didn’t have one of those handy.
“It has been… interesting,” Endo’s voice droned on from behind. “I will say that. You challenged me more than I expected you would. Not enough to stop me, but more than I expected. Of course, without magic to match mine, it was hardly a fair fight.”
It was starting to sound very final. She was running out of time.
Vladak sprinted into her sightline once more. “There’sh another door in the—”
Kadka cut him off. “Hall is warded. No time. Need to break these hinges.” She pointed across the street, at a building with iron bars over small, street-level windows. “Iron will get through ward.” It was only set to stop living beings, she knew, or the sending locket wouldn’t have passed through.
Vladak didn’t ask questions, just moved. He was across the narrow street in seconds. With both hands, he pulled one of the iron bars over the building’s windows free, tearing through brick and mortar in a single yank. Just as quickly, he was back. He jammed the bar into the gap between door and hinge—Kadka’s efforts had widened it just enough. Vladak set his weight against the bar, and pushed.
At the same time, Kadka braced her feet firmly, cracked her knuckles, and pulled with every bit of strength in her body. The brass hinges squealed and popped, and she felt something give. The top hinge tore free from the wall.
It wasn’t enough. The bottom two still held.
And in the hallway, Endo was reaching the end of his insufferable speech. “I do hope the pain isn’t too much, old friend. It was never about that. I will remember you, when I am sitting on my new throne.”
As Endo spoke, Vladak jammed his makeshift crowbar into the gap between the last two hinges, and together he and Kadka heaved against the door one final time. With a great screech, the final two hinges burst away from their moorings.
“Goodbye, Tane,” Endo’s voice said from behind.
Kadka was already spinning, wrestling the awkward weight of the brass door around with her. She slammed it down between her and the image of the Mask, set her shoulder against it and gripped the door handle tight like she was holding it shut against an intruder.
From the direction of the spike Oola Hobbier had left in the wall, silver flame roared across the room, burning away Kadka’s vision with brilliant light.
An instant later the light faded. The flames were spent.
Kadka still stood, unburned, holding the brass door in front of her and blinking the spots from her eyes.
“Shishter!” Vladak must not have recovered his vision yet either, because he sounded panicked. “Are you hurt?”
Kadka looked over her shoulder at Vladak, still half-blind. “Is fine. Fire doesn’t touch me.” She grinned. “Maybe Endo is not as smart as he thinks.”
But Vladak didn’t look so satisfied. He was blinking his eyes clear just as she was, but now they focused on something past her, something she couldn’t see through the door that had been her shield. “I don’t think he’sh done jusht yet.”
Kadka leaned her head out around the door, still holding it in front of her—whatever Vladak had seen, a shield between her and it seemed a good idea.
There, in the hall, something was moving. She squeezed her eyes shut, tried to banish the afterimage of the light with a shake of her head, and then looked again.
They were small, no more than a foot high, but there were a great many of them. They moved like spiders. Big metal spiders.
Endo’s crawlers.
Dozens of them, armed with spinning blades and unidentified copper-tipped wands at the ends of their legs. Come to clean up anything that somehow survived the spellfire.
And she was trapped inside with them.
_____
Tane sprinted down the street with Indree beside him. He could see Vladak ahead, standing outside the building that Indree’s divinations had led them to—she’d been able to find the spot by tracing the sending locket.
Vladak saw them coming and beckoned frantically. “Hurry! She’sh not going to lasht much longer!”
The door was open—or rather, it had been torn from its hinges. On the other side, Kadka was backed up against the ward, her every movement sending slight silver shimmers across the otherwise invisible surface. She was holding a huge brass door in both hands, swinging it back and forth to fend off some two dozen foot-high spider-like automatons. The crawlers—clearly Endo’s work—swarmed along the wall and floor and on top of the door, jabbing and slashing at her with blades and wands.
“Kadka!” Tane cried out. “How—no, that can wait. We need to get you out of there.”
“This is what people keep saying to me.” Kadka swept the door in a tight arc that sent a half-dozen crawlers flying across the room, and then brought it down hard, crushing another as it tried to sneak under. “But no one says how to—” Her voice cut off in a grunt of pain. One of the crawlers had darted around her makeshift shield; the spinning saw-blade at the end of its leg tore through her trousers and opened a long bloody gash before she kicked it away.
“Spellfire,” Tane swore. “If we don’t get those wards down soon…”
“I can try to unravel them Astrally,” Indree said. “But that’s not going to be fast. I don’t think we have time.”
“Try,” said Tane. “I’ll work on a quicker way. There has to be an external source for the wards, something you couldn’t reach while trapped in there.”
“There’sh another door in the back,” Vladak offered. “Leadsh to the hall on the other shide, I think.”
“Show me.”
Vladak sprinted around the side of the building, and Tane matched his pace, his lungs burning. Kadka couldn’t wait for him to catch his breath.
“Here,” said Vladak as they neared the back door—a heavy slab of brass, like the front. “Hobbier musht have come out thish way, but I washn’t fasht enough to sh
top her.”
“Hobbier was here?” Tane shook his head. “Later. Is it locked?”
“Not for long,” said Vladak. He backed up a few paces, and then launched a hard running kick at the door. It bent under the blow. One more and the latch gave way, sending the door slamming hard against the wall within.
Vladak barrelled straight through, moving to the end of the hall. He lowered his shoulder and charged, though there was nothing visible in his way. With a great silver flash he struck the ward, and it sent him stumbling back.
Tane followed him in. Down the hall and across the room on the other side, he could see Kadka—what parts of her were visible past the big brass door she was waving around, at least—still holding off the crawlers.
She saw them coming, started to shout. “Hurry, Carv—” And then, abruptly, her voice cut off. Tane heard her fall, saw arms and legs flop bonelessly to the floor behind her makeshift shield. And then it fell too. Absent anyone to hold it, the door teetered and toppled with a heavy crash, sending mechanical spiders leaping in all directions to avoid being crushed.
“Tane!” Indree shouted. “They got her with a daze wand!”
The crawlers were regrouping now, scuttling towards Kadka.
Vladak hurled himself against the ward again, with just as little result.
“You’re not getting in like that!” Tane barked. “This way!” He jabbed a finger at the open door halfway down the hall. “Now!” It was the only place the crawlers could have been waiting—and he was betting Endo had them serving more than one purpose. He spared one last glance at Kadka, saw the crawlers beginning to swarm at her, and then he was through the door.
He saw it as soon as they entered—he’d guessed correctly. A brass box, maybe a foot high, sat against the wall that adjoined the room Kadka was trapped in. The crawlers would have guarded it against any unwanted intrusion until the trap had been sprung.
Tane knelt before the box, tried the lid. It held fast. “Locked, probably warded. We don’t have time.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Vladak!”
The Mage War Page 7