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

by Donald Wigboldy

  Chapter 7- Folded Strength

  Sebastian sat at the table tapping his lip with paper wrapped graphite. The common writing tool among wizards and scholars, if the work was likely to be temporary, the variation of pencil waited to write in the book of blank paper. He had started the book after he had figured out how to copy the runes from the merfolk.

  Placing the pencil on the table, the mage leafed through the pages of drawings. All copies of the runes drawn by hand, Sebastian looked at them looking for the common uniting factor as if there was a key to the strange writing from beneath the waves. He hadn't truly had a chance to do much more than write them down since copying those he could find onto his body.

  Ashleen sat in her chair with her bare right heel hooking enough of the seat to fold it tight against her rear as the wilder continued to look at him pondering something. They hadn't spoken much as they walked back from the guild hall, but she obviously had questions and Sebastian could assume what they were, though he had no answers.

  Feeling the tension between the couple, the remainder of his team had chosen another table where their conversation wouldn't interrupt the owl's study or Ashleen's stares. She nursed a mug of prapple juice as they waited for the restaurant staff to bring them their meals, but he wasn't sure that the girl had taken more than a sip from her drink.

  "How did you cast those spells and not need to eat or drink heavily at the very least?" the blonde haired Kardorian questioned finally.

  His eyes remained on the pages as he compared the runes to each other, but the owl answered without appearing too distracted, "I haven't truly pushed myself since we realized that something was beginning to happen in how I stored my magic. Since you and Serrena shouldered the bulk of the work, I decided to test myself a bit.

  "Of course, the portal spell has been getting easier for me with each use too. Harder spells, like the wind riding spell, were the same way when I first learned them." His eyes met her blue gaze as he spoke a little lower to avoid being heard beyond the table. Keeping talk of the staff and pulling from the earth between them, Sebastian hoped to keep the discussion between them. Ashleen and Yara knew of the power boost from using it, as did Darius; but the immortal had discovered the cheat long before he was born anyway. Few who had seen him use a staff had attributed the piece of wood to his increases in power as far as he knew, and that was for the best if Darius' spoke the truth. The high wizard had no reason to lie. Sebastian still used the trick on occasion and Darius knew it, so the warning had only limited the expansion of the idea. Since the mage had worried over the repercussions before meeting Darius, nothing had truly changed aside from being told that he was right to worry.

  "I didn't figure out how to ride the winds by myself until after meeting you and using a staff to draw the extra power into me. Just like the portal spell, until today; I needed either the earth or a wizard to give me the extra push.

  "After a time, I managed to use my magic more efficiently to use the spell with just my energy. I guess that I am to that point with the portal spell."

  "You bound this one in some way, didn't you?" Ashleen asked keeping her voice low as well. She knew that what Sebastian did required a certain amount of secrecy. Releasing spells before they were ready could harm those they were intended for, like his fellow battle mages.

  History was full of stories of wizards who had died using spells that they weren't ready for or which hadn't been tested enough. He was cautious, though Sebastian wondered at times if he kept things to himself out of a certain selfish part of his nature as well.

  It wasn't that the owl wasn't willing to share; but there were times where the lack of gratitude from his fellow mages and the unreasonable demand to continue finding new spells for them, when they did nothing to deserve his help, grew grating. Shaking his head to clear the thoughts, the mage replied, "I tied it off like my air shield. Once it is made, like the shield, you can create a loop for the magic to maintain itself with minimal effort from the wizard holding the spell."

  Her eyes grew wide. The air wilder knew the spell he meant and could do the same with it. After helping Sebastian cast the portal spell, however, she had yet to master the magic to create a doorway by herself. Like Darius and the students he had tried to teach, they were finding that helping with portal magic didn't necessarily mean a wizard could learn to cast the spell. The gestures and theory of thought required to make a gate were there for everyone, but actually achieving one was very hard and limited to a small amount of wizards.

  "Teaching the others who can create portals how to do that will make it so much easier then," Ashleen stated with appreciation. "If the caster can tie it off like that, then they won't need the extra power of an assistant beyond the initial casting of the doorway, right?"

  "Are you trying to get out of having to help me in the future?" he chuckled at her summation of his adjustment to the spell.

  Giving him a sigh of annoyance, the girl replied, "You already made a gate without me. I am already obsolete as your battery."

  They lapsed into quiet for a moment and Sebastian considered her comment of being a battery for the mage. Wizards could channel power into items like a corrinut to draw power from or use the power stored for a delayed action. He had even used the large nuts to hold magic making them into small percussion bombs. Charging dozens he had collapsed tunnels in the enemy fortress to create a distraction in one area while he had freed Rilena and a pair of wizards from a prison chamber.

  With thoughts of charging corrinuts and lodestones in mind, the mage wondered if there was a way of creating a rune that might be able to hold a charge for the caster to draw from in times of need. A reservoir of magic held in a rune could make a mage more powerful. It might even give them a chance to cast spells on a wizard's level, though that might be asking too much.

  "Great, you're thinking again. If I can't keep you grounded to here and now...," Ashleen let the thought fall away unfinished. She didn't look completely unhappy, but Sebastian smiled at the girl to ease her mind.

  "Sorry, when a thought or solution to a problem comes to mind, I guess that I do tend to drift away. I don't mean to, but sometimes I just can't help following a thread while it's fresh," he shrugged apologetically.

  Smiling back at him, Ashleen shifted her legs to dangle in front of the chair. Crossing her ankles, the girl had clearance from the floor to kick aimlessly at the air. "I know, but you seem to forget about what is around you when that happens."

  "I don't forget and I certainly don't mean for you to think that I could forget you," Sebastian answered with a nod to the girl.

  "Ah, now you use you want to use your smooth talking to win me back over. Maybe this time I won't be so easy," she giggled as her mood began to change.

  A moment later, Ashleen asked, "Well, as your apprentice or whatever we wish to call it, maybe you can include me in some of these thoughts. What has distracted you this time?"

  "I was wondering if there was a way to make a rune that could store extra power when I don't need it to create reserves to draw off when I need more power than I should have."

  "And do you understand rune magic enough to actually make that rune?" she inquired having her curiosity fueled by his information. Wizards and battle mages could both benefit from energy storage. It would be like having the energy of a meal or snack at the ready. Pure magic stored could be pulled directly into the system to be used immediately, which would certainly be more useful than waiting for their bodies to process the energy from a meal.

  "That is why I was looking at these sketches of the runes I know so far. If I could just figure out a commonality to them which would let me translate them to words I know, then maybe I could create brand new marks to do other things including a magic reservoir."

  The dark haired waitress, one of the few who weren't children of the inn keeper, came with a tray and an apologetic smile as she placed the two meals before them. "I am sorry that it took so long. We are having trouble in the kitchen t
oday apparently."

  She didn't elaborate, but placed the plates heaping with food. Both Ashleen and Sebastian were used to resupplying their energy from large meals after using their magic. Both had done enough that morning to warrant the extra food, but the mage was surprised when he began to eat that he wasn't starving. The magic he had used had been significant for a battle mage, but Sebastian was no hungrier for his lunch than because of the time of day.

  On the other hand, Ashleen's first few bites looked almost desperate. They hadn't snacked along the way, since Sebastian hadn't needed any nourishment beyond a drink. With a larger amount of power to draw from for the wilder, Ashleen hadn't been that much in need at first but she was beginning to feel a bit drained now.

  The mage ate casually making small talk as they worked through their meal and the idea of the magic storage rune continued to prick at the recesses of his mind. The remainder of the day was considered open for them now, since he hadn't known how long the gate would take to make. Finishing in a single morning, they had some spare time for themselves. Sebastian just wondered if that would last.

  The late summer sun was well into its descent to the western horizon when a messenger came to call Sebastian to the fire wizard's courtyard once more. Ashleen was with him as usual. More than just someone he cared about, the wilder had in effect truly become an assistant to the mage. They had worked with metal in the smithy to discover the best blend of iron and the additives to make steel. She had lent him strength when he needed it and Sebastian, as a mentor, in turn had tried to convey what he could to her. Ashleen had even managed to heal after all their work, which had most likely saved his life already.

  Serrena and Liam hadn't been pulled back to their respective guilds and had watched as Sebastian toyed with drawing and infusing runes with his magic. Neither had chosen to taken any of the runes onto their bodies yet. Most wizards considered the strange magic he had brought back as something just for battle mages and soldiers. At least the runes could help protect the men and women putting their lives on the line fighting monsters like trolls and armored viles.

  While Olan and the other mages had reported in with the mages corps garrison, the other four made their way to the portal courtyard to meet up with Darius and his collection of assistants. The high wizard looked up as they entered the yard and smiled as he gestured to the metal gate surrounded by thick stone.

  The earth wizards had continued to toil away after the group had left and had nearly finished creating a stone bridge between the two towers. With the stone supported with steel braces from within, it should allow defenders to fire down on enemy invaders in relative safety from about fourteen feet above the ground with three foot walls to protect their lower bodies or to duck behind.

  Having the stone bridge over the metal gate gave the portal its fourth set of anchor points making it strong and defended.

  "This is very impressive, Sebastian," the immortal wizard replied. Those with him nodded. Rilena and Elzen had followed the wizard again. Both being good friends of the owl; Bas was always glad to see them return. "I can sense my magic not only from here, but from afar where I made contact with this gate. My eyes can't even tell how you managed such a thing."

  "Well, I can hardly take credit for all the hard work," Sebastian replied humbly. "Serrena and Ashleen created the welds to make the gate and braces. The earth wizards have created an amazing set of defenses in a remarkably short time as well."

  Looking from the mage to the new towers and wall, the wizard nodded. Sebastian had seen half a dozen wizards working on the wall, but had been told that the other men and women had been rotating in and out for over twenty four hours. Each group of wizards needed to maintain their strength to continue work that would have taken large crews of normal artisans weeks or even months to build even working around the clock.

  Magic could accomplish great things that normal men couldn't even conceive of to try.

  "It is an impressive set of defenses, but your work on the gate itself is astounding. I couldn't have come up with this, even with my hundreds of years working with magic." The wizard returned his gaze to Sebastian and asked, "Have you come to understand runes so well that you can create other new uses for them yet? Surely the wizards who bestowed them on you weren't using them for portals?"

  Shaking his head, the mage replied, "No, they weren't thinking of gates and portals when they gave me the basic runes. Without Gerid's added guardsmen, I would only have had access to a few runes; but they let me copy the others from their bodies. Still, I only have a little more than twenty to try and make sense of the language behind them."

  "And yet, you did this," the wizard stated extending his hand towards the metal frame once more.

  "The rune lock is the only thing I truly made, but it is really just a simple arrow made to turn and point the direction the portal should take. Coming up with an arrow is hardly ground breaking," he finished with a laugh.

  "What about the other runes built into the metal and how you managed to use the lodestones to imbue my magic into the frame as well? Surely those aren't something you had access to before making them."

  "The runes in the gate are just manifested from the magic used to make a portal. When I create a gate, I can see the movements in the spell's creation. A portal naturally wants to form in a certain direction and mirror a size. The size gets pulled to match our gate because the individual points are set by runes that are made by our other portals.

  "Pulling your magic from the lodestones had nothing to do with runes though. I have pulled iron through the veins in wood and basically did the same with the stone. The iron shifted to allow the stone to join with it through the areas impurities once held," the young man shrugged as if the concept should be easily understood by the other wizards, though most looked at him with open mouths as they tried to comprehend what he had actually said.

  That Sebastian was a mage only made the concepts he was throwing around so casually more baffling to wizards used to dealing with complex forms of magic.

  Darius appeared less confused, but shook his head saying, "I will stay with my people here over night. Tomorrow, we will have a gathering of minds from Hala for you to try to convey this knowledge which you think is so simple. You may as well clear your whole day. I don't think you will find it as simple as you say."

  The wizard chuckled and Sebastian noted the others nodding at Darius' judgment.

  Darius gestured the young man to come closer to the gate and began asking questions in a lower tone. "So the ladies welded the metal of the frame and attached the bracing pins, but who helped with the rest? I only sense your magic on this aside from mine which you infused into the iron.

  "Even the magic from the welds is obscured when I try to read the metal," the wizard finished.

  Sebastian had noted the wizard's eyes glowing with power as he continued to scrutinize the work done on the rune gate.

  Ashleen spoke up on that point and the mage could tell that what he had done was still worrying her, "Bas worked the runes and lock making any defects smooth away all by himself. He didn't even take power from a wizard to do all this."

  Her voice told the high wizard that the work involved had used a great amount of power. Pooling magic with Ashleen or one of his other wizards would make such a challenge manageable; but she was trying to get Darius' attention to convey her worries over the changes occurring in the mage.

  Eyes still glowing, the high wizard continued to see beyond the physical exterior of human eyesight. He could see a confusing aura in the mage. Placing his hand on his shoulder as if to congratulate Sebastian on his accomplishment, was just a hidden use of his magic to try and look even deeper. Like a healer, Darius could feel the changes that would only confuse his eyes.

  His forehead wrinkled at the strangeness of Sebastian's magic. Most wizards and battle mages had an echoing flow of magic nearly bonded to their blood stream. Veins and capillaries which moved blood so efficiently to bring nutrients to a
human body mirrored the lines of magic. It was why food and drink could resupply a wizard's energy so fast. The flow of magic could draw from not only the stomach but anywhere within the body that was tied to the system.

  Unlike most wizards and mages, Sebastian's magic almost seemed to be like a core of steel folded over and over like the metal of a worked blade. There was magic within the folds that masked his true strength. To the high wizard's mind, it meant extra reserves of power had begun to find ways to overlap and strengthen the man's base magic.

  He withdrew his hand and nodded at the gate. "Well, if he manipulated the final magic of the gate, then that explains why I only feel our two signatures built into the metal. I wonder if other wizards can join their power in it as well.

  "The enemy has portals that are generic in nature as you know, since you discovered them with your map. Although, I suppose as long as a portal wizard knows what to look for and where they wish to go, whether it is my magic they use or yours makes little difference so long as they can find it, right?"

  Sebastian could tell that the wizard was avoiding saying what he had felt within the battle mage. Since Ashleen had described what she felt, he had a basic understanding but neither of them could truly explain it. If Darius was just talking about the construction of the gate, either the high wizard was as confused as the young couple or he didn't wish to discuss it out in the open. The immortal was good at keeping secrets locked away after all.

  "We opened the gate to here from Windmeer without issue, though my entry was much smaller than this. It is kind of amazing to see how large this one is and how it forces the nature of another portal to become this size in spite of how we start the transport."