Battle Mage: Winds of Change (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 11)

by Donald Wigboldy

  Grinning, Sebastian countered, "All I need to do is take you up to the highest tower I can find to do that. I just don't want to make you sick doing so."

  "Ha ha," she mocked his thought. They had tested how Ashleen's power worked and had found that her tie to the earth was behind much of her wilder power. Even with stone beneath her feet, Ashleen had grown ill from her disconnect with the earth after climbing a tall tower in Falcon's Keep. Separating her from the ground was likely to kill the girl, so the second floor room of the Black Smith inn was about as high as he would recommend for the wilder.

  In spite of her hatred of waking up for the morning walk, Ashleen finished breakfast almost as quickly as Sebastian. He took the basket made for them by Hilda and thanked her again before the two walked to the fire wizards' guild building outside the inner city walls.

  "How did I get roped into this again?" Olan complained making Ashleen giggle as she knew the feeling.

  Wizards Serrena and Liam were joined by Mecklin and Frell also. The remaining members of his team, he had called on them to give him a hand moving the parts of the metal frame he was building.

  "Stop whining, Olan," Serrena admonished the falcon while she moved a four foot iron bar end to end with another. Making them as straight as possible, the fire wizard mumbled a spell placing her right hand directly over the two ends.

  The wizard's hand began to glow red. After a moment the color changed to orange then yellow and finally nearly white. Beneath her hand the two bars began to melt together. Like a welder, the fire wizard created a bond between the two rods until they were as strong as one.

  Finishing her spell, the little wizard stood brushing back her auburn hair to wipe at the sweat beading on her forehead. Serrena aimed her green eyes at the falcon and added, "It isn't like you have to do anything other than help hold the frame once it's finished. If you were bonding the bars or imbuing the runes like Bas, then I might offer you my sympathy."

  Olan winced, though they all knew that it was exaggerated. The falcon took the admonishment in stride knowing that the wizard was only picking on him to pass the time. Walking the next iron rod over to Serrena, he replied, "But my boredom alone should buy some sympathy. Just standing around watching you bend over to cast your magic isn't easy you know."

  As her eyes narrowed slightly, the woman retorted, "I've been told that I have a nice rear end. I'm pretty sure watching me bend or squat isn't that much torture for you. By the way, does Yaroma know that you watch other women bending over all day?"

  The other two mages were laughing behind their hands as Olan turned red with the wizard's cutting words. He had to wipe sweat from his forehead and scrubbed at his neck trying to throw off the embarrassment.

  Sebastian rolled his eyes at the two from where he and Ashleen were working on another length of frame. The lightning wilder was working the magic welds while the mage held the metal together. Having the sole duty of imbuing the runes into the metal once the frame was finished; Sebastian was trying to conserve his energy for the process. Without using the power of the earth with a staff, the only other way Bas could supplement his strength to do it all would be to borrow power from a wizard.

  Ashleen could do the welds by herself with less energy wasted than combining their efforts, so the mage sat back and just helped as much as he could for the moment.

  "Done if it meets with your approval," the wilder stated moving from kneeling to sitting cross legged to ease her knees from the other position.

  Sebastian nodded. "It doesn't have to be perfectly in alignment as long as it is all connected enough for my magic to pull it together with the runes."

  "You're sure that you can do it without cheating?" Ashleen questioned insinuating the process of pulling from the earth. It was a secret and the girl knew how to evade giving away too much, since others beyond his team were nearby as well. Even his team had never been fully informed of how he managed to increase his power. They all knew he could, but Sebastian didn't think anyone had fully put it together yet.

  "Well, I may need to borrow your strength or one of the others. Until I actually try it, I can't really know."

  "Your power reserves seem to have grown, but can you do more powerful spells now?"

  Sebastian handed the wilder the third segment of the four segment base. The sides would be made from two full bars and another cut in half, since it was the shorter dimension.

  As Ashleen sighed and moved back to her knees to crawl the extra few feet to the spot of the next weld, he considered her question. Musing aloud, "I'm not really sure. Maybe I still use the staffs as a crutch instead of pushing myself further. If I don't need the extra draw, it would probably be wise to avoid the risk of pulling too much or in a harmful way."

  "Is killing yourself in a flare of magic the harmful way or are you considering something else?" the girl chuckled with a grin before turning to the next weld.

  "Well, that would be harmful, but I have told you what Darius said in warning. There were wizards using the same way of tapping the earth for power. Most used spells to kill and cause destruction.

  "Darius said that quite a few wizards died young from abusing the technique. He said that twenty year old men would die looking like they were ancient men several times their true age."

  Ashleen stretched her hand to touch his cheek and said, "Well, I wonder if that is why Yara decided to part from you? I don't know if I can see myself dating you if you look older than my grandfather though."

  With that she laughed at the mage and turned back to the metal before her.

  Sebastian knew better than that however. Ashleen might tease, but he thought even if such a thing should happen the girl would stand by him. He had been surprised at how attached they had become. It was the real reason that Yara had broken up with him, the man was pretty sure. Though he had always told her that he was just a friend to Ashleen; Yara must have seen more there than Sebastian had believed.

  Relationships weren't easy, the young man thought, and relationships between wizards and battle mages had their own built in problems. Yara was a healer and though he could heal as well, Sebastian was in fact a soldier too. The differences eventually came to the fore and Yara's mind built upon her jealousy and fears of Ashleen, who was a much closer match from that stand point. A wilder with Ashleen's abilities was similar in that she could fight enemies and even kill. A healer, like Yara, couldn't usually use magic to harm or destroy at all.

  Sebastian had been the first anomaly to the wizard view that said that one could either heal or destroy, but could not be a balance of both. Since he became the first battle mage healer, more had been found, though they were quite rare. He wasn't alone and the wizards had to question if their beliefs were correct on the matter. It was just one more issue the mage had caused for the wizards as the owl proceeded to break down the barriers between battle mage and wizard.

  "Ok, last one," Ashleen stated moving to the end of the three joined bars and extended her hand to the battle mage for the next length of iron.

  A rumble, as one of the earth wizards working in the courtyard created a wall from a cart of stone hauled in to build the trapping walls, drew his attention away from the girl as she used her magic for the last weld for the lower bar. Half a dozen men and women in brown clothing had been working on fortifying the walls and making new ones while building a pair of towers all morning. The amount of work they had finished by the time he and Ashleen had arrived made the mage think that they had been at it for hours.

  Fire wizards dotted the surrounding yard watching both the earth wizards and Sebastian's team. While it was known as the fire wizard's guild building, he doubted that it had been created with the idea of just one class of wizard holding the structure for its own. A fortress with towers surrounding the courtyard and walls running to the inner wall joining them together, it was one of three wizard fortresses within the city. The air wizards had one in the southeast corner and used the towers of the inner and outer wall overlookin
g the vertical drop of the cliffs, while another jointly used by the earth and nature wizards was south of the fire wizards near the middle of the inner wall.

  Even the healer wizards had a center just for them, though their hospital was inside the inner city unlike the rest. Only the water wizards had chosen a building outside the city. At the base of the cliff, a harbor and town servicing it had the water guild's fortress to protect them in times of danger.

  The remainder of his mages stayed in the corps garrison, a fortress like the others, it fell between the air wizards and earth guild. The fortresses were further proof of a city designed to be held even should the enemy find a way within its walls. Now they were building defenses for a gate that led nearly to the heart of the city and created a potential weak point when the rest of Hala was designed to avoid any weakness.

  As his mind returned to the fire wizards, he wondered if they hoped to learn something or were more worried about the intrusion into their fortress. The gate had been placed within their courtyard, but that wasn't the invasion they found most annoying. Other wizards and mages traipsing about their grounds was probably the greater offense.

  The side supports were fused together and attached to the top part of the frame. Foot long pins were attached every couple feet perpendicular to the top and sides. Even the base had a few, but the corners were fastened differently than the top. While the metal was attached directly to the side frames for the top, two stones had to be built into the base.

  Darius' lodestones had to be part of the gate to continue using it. Though Sebastian could have used his magic to bind the portal points instead, the other cities and schools had been trained to look for this magic to open the gate. Making it slightly more difficult, he could have asked Darius to be there to infuse his magic into the frame also; but the wizard was already quite busy and the mage was sure he could make use of the stones to do it in a different way.

  Laying the frame on the ground with the stones touching the metal of the base and sides, the duty of finishing the gate frame was now on the mage. Ashleen knelt behind him as he placed his hands on the metal near the center of the frame's side. The wizard would back him up should his power falter. She could supply what he needed for the major work that involved the smithing he had learned, rune magic, portal magic and a spell that had no name.

  He had once taken a piece of wood and drawn iron through the veins of the once living branch making it a combination of the two. Iron had its pores and channels, especially while in a more basic form, and the owl hoped to take advantage of this property of the metal.

  Taking a deep breath the mage used a new word to focus his spell. "Bind."

  His magic moved into the iron and began to try to encompass all that he could feel. The frame was large, yet the thickness of the metal wasn't great. Still it felt massive to his mind as the mage closed his eyes concentrating on what he must do.

  Like a straw drawing in liquid, the two lodestones began to join with both the base and upper frame suffusing the metal with Darius' magic imprint. The metal began to feel like the spell which the high wizard had placed on the lodestones, even while the iron used the two stones to create a bridge. The base and sides flowed together creating an attachment that required no heat like the welds of the wizards.

  For those watching the process, they could see the metal shifting at the corners and as magic began to form glowing runes, the welds disappeared into smooth metal. The flow of the magic needed the metal to become one piece as if even the clean welds would have prevented the circuit he needed to create.

  Several minutes passed as the owl exerted control over the entire frame at once. Ashleen waited for his nod to add energy to the mage, but the request never came. Those watching could feel the magic within the gate. It was powerful and mysterious. No one who was in the courtyard could say that they could have recreated the spell even after watching the mage as closely as they could. The onlookers could feel the magic and see the results, but how Sebastian had actually made the new gate, they had no idea.

  Opening his eyes, the mage let out a sigh feeling contentment that it was finished.

  Ashleen whispered, "You managed to do it all by yourself."

  Half question and half statement, the girl was in awe of what the mage had done alone. She could feel the power of his magic still appearing strong within the battle mage even though he had used a large amount of power in the undertaking.

  Sebastian stood nodding to Ashleen. He didn't say anything at that time to avoid anyone else noticing what he had actually achieved. Knowing that the spell should have exhausted him, the mage felt fine though he was beginning to feel thirsty. His throat felt a bit raw like he had been giving a speech for an hour, but Sebastian knew that once he had drunk something and had a bite to eat he would be fine.

  "Well, that's it. All we need to do is lift it into position and have the earth wizards secure it into the stone walls."

  Given their cue to lift the frame, the team worked to lift and then set the base. The earth wizards made the earth open beneath the anchoring rods letting the team settle the metal frame. Stone walls lifted along the new towers to hold the sides of the gate also as the side pins were held in place.

  "We will finish anchoring the frame once we have built the wall across the top," Wizard Zeben stated for the assembled earth wizards who were looking tired after all their work. "I think we need to break for lunch first, but can you show me how this will work?"

  The wizard was one of the portal wizards as well as an earth wizard. His duty would be to make sure the gate was used properly.

  "Place your hand there," Sebastian stated pointing to an exact point on the right side of the frame as they faced it from what would be the outside of a portal. "Can you feel the rune? It should feel loose to you compared to the rest of the frame."

  The wizard felt with his magic. Earth wizards were close to metal as well. If it came from within the ground, they could usually relate to it and use the material.

  Nodding, Zeben replied, "It's strange. The metal feels solid, but it's like a gap in the magic. Well, not a gap exactly, but a weak point maybe?"

  "Let's give it a try then," Sebastian stated. "Door."

  The magic came to him without Ashleen's assistance and felt easy. Only creating a small window, the owl watched as the much larger frame came alive with his portal. They looked at the cloudy back of the gateway.

  "Fireball," Serrena called out like a battle mage and hurled her magic at the surface of the portal. The flames scattered along its facade running down the rear of the gate like it was solid stone.

  When she noticed all the eyes on her, the young woman shrugged and replied with a grin, "It was just begging to be tested."

  Shaking his head at Serrena, Sebastian tried something with his portal window. He created a loop within the magic. As the owl secured the spell, he found the pressure of maintaining the portal drop to almost nothing. Like using a pulley to reduce the power needed to move a load, the magic was also akin to his air shield spell. The mage could maintain that spell all day with minimal effort letting it essentially feed off itself. A little of his magic was needed to keep the spell active, but he could regenerate as much energy as was lost even without eating or drinking to keep his strength up throughout the day.

  Sebastian stepped towards the larger gate leaving the smaller window active in the air. He could feel eyes on him as the owl managed to remove himself from holding the gate close by, which few had managed so far.

  Motioning Zeben to follow, the mage informed the wizard, "Use your magic to make the lock rotate. You can make it go up or down within the frame to flip the portal to this side. When you finish, you simply flip it back to secure the gate against intruders."

  Zeben frowned at the explanation, but moved to the portal touching the frame where he had felt the difference in the magic. Channeling his power into the lock, the wizard lifted his hand as if he could physically turn the lock. In just a moment, the portal ch
anged from the dull pearl appearance of the back to the golden glow of the open side of the magical doorway.

  There were gasps from the assembled wizards and mages. Most hadn't seen his scaled down demonstration of the locks and gates before. To see something so large just switch its nature was astonishing to anyone who had been exposed to portal magic previously. It had been tested by others, especially in the last few days since Sebastian had pointed out the difference of the rear and front of the gates. They were solid constructs except the entry, which was limited by its size.

  A gate was set and immovable, or so they had thought before seeing the giant gate turn on a magical axis.

  "Impressive," the wizard stated seeing what his magic combined with the lock could do.

  "Rotate it again to seal the area off," the mage reminded the wizard.

  Zeben did as he was told and flipped the portal so they were looking at the solid back of the gate once more.

  Releasing the magic holding the window, Sebastian let the gate disappear into nothingness. His appetite was beginning to increase revealing that the combination of spells was starting to affect him now; but he had achieved more than he would have believed was possible before trying them both.

  "I will leave it to you to show the other portal wizards how to use it. Leave it set this way until someone needs to use it, then use the lock to make the gate turn. When it is put back, the enemy will find that they either have to retreat through the portal or fight through our defenses designed to hold them there."

  "Once we are finished, no enemy will have time to escape unless they retreat," the earth wizard nodded as he knew how formidable the defenses were planned to become by the time construction was finished.

  With no tools to gather, the battle mage looked up at the sun shining down on them and said, "Well, I guess that it is a good time to go have lunch. Unless there are any other questions, Zeben, I leave the gate to you."

  Giving a nod to the man, Sebastian picked up the barely touched work basket before offering Ashleen an arm like a gentleman. He led the rest of his team figuring that they could eat lunch at the Black Smith Inn. There were other restaurants that they had visited throughout the city, but it was as close as most to the guild and the mage needed to evaluate what had been done before moving on to the next city and its gate.