Even those spells could be ignored to a point. The earth fed the sword and the magic of her cage. Being a wilder, the girl's power came from both within her and without; but Ashleen knew that allowing the earth too much control of her power would be deadly as well. She had heard Darius and Sebastian speaking of the dangers of drawing power from the earth. To do so directly usually meant an instant death. The power resting beneath their feet was like a roaring fire and she was just a lit match. The fire would consume the match without thought in an instant destroying it.
No wizard within Southwall's history had tried to tame the earth. Sebastian's use of a staff had been the first she had heard of from any land in the North, though wizards tended to guard their experiments. Maybe others had tried and died, but the battle mage had discovered that a staff could draw in the power for casting without killing him. Even a piece of wood would burn away if used like a lightning rod for too long. It was a good physical warning to stop.
Now Ashleen stood drawing in the power without a staff. The sword captured some of that power with each touch to the ground, but the wizard could feel the strain on the metal and runes holding the magic. The same strain was making itself known on the girl, but Sebastian had asked her to help hold the line until he returned.
"Are you able to keep going?" Xarnov asked over his shoulder. The tremors in her hands, the one touching his back and the one which struggled to charge the sword when it was empty, betrayed the struggle of the wizard.
She leaned on the man more and more, so her attempt to be strong was defiance in the face of weakness as Ashleen replied with a dry mouth, "I will be alright for a little longer."
It wasn't the most confident of sentences, but it was probably more optimistic than either of them believed. Ashleen had charged the Hollow Sword more times than she could remember, but each use continued to wear her down.
Even as Ashleen tried to be strong in the face of so many enemies, a dark fog began to roll in towards the front. Other wizards sent copies of the light spell into the fog pushing it back for a moment, but Ashleen could tell that the warlocks had pooled their magic for this spell. It wasn't the work of just one powerful man. This was magic of an epic level that came from a group of warlocks or wizards working together. Like using the power of the earth elevated her strength, this pooling of magic expands the bounds of spell casting for wizards.
The fog grasped for her lightning and Ashleen winced at the cold touch. Like she was tied to the lightning, the wilder could feel the power draining nature of the fog. This was meant to exhaust the wilder completely and, with her gone, the rest of the wizards fighting would fall shortly after her.
"Light," Ashleen called the power into the sword before letting Xarnov pick the next target. She added to the soldier, "We need to fall back. The cage won't last long and I don't think even the sword can stop this attack."
Giving an incoherent shout, the sergeant swung the sword as he closed his eyes to the blinding light. He had been warned early on by the girl that it was too much to look on without shielding his eyes. Even through closed lids, the horizontal arc of light could be seen. It was one of the most powerful blasts the sword had issued, but as the light disappeared, the fog began to advance once more.
"Light," the girl ordered the sword once more. Xarnov was able to exert control over the release of the sword's energy to a point, while Ashleen essentially left the circuit open between them in her exhaustion. That bolt had drained the Hollow Sword in a single strike, which wasn't the wilder's plan. "They are combining their power. Nurse the power in the sword or I won't last much longer."
"Then we'll be dead," the man nodded quickly understanding the nature of this new attack.
Xarnov felt Ashleen grip his shirt. He only had a metal plate across his front. The back plate had been tossed aside early on as the work of using the sword made his skin heat up. Magic worked on him, even though the soldier had no power of his own. Just wielding a sword for so long would have been exhausting normally, but this prolonged fight was torturous to them both.
She pulled gently guiding the soldier back towards the second line of embankments. The earth walls had breaks in them, more than when they had taken their position in the front.
"I'm out," Xarnov warned after only four uses of the sword. He was only using the magic to fend off the fog now as she had asked. Ashleen's lightning cage fell as they walked. The fog taxed it beyond the wilder's ability to maintain the shielding.
"Light," she called again as they touched the sword to the earth. Xarnov never let go of the sword as the wilder directed his hand for each recharge of the runes. Her fingers found the hilt and his hand equally. Directing the sword and the power gently, the girl did her best to draw on the earth without killing herself. She had lied to him earlier. Ashleen was pushing towards collapse and didn't know how much longer she could maintain charging the Hollow Sword.
Her foot caught a stone as she tried to lift the boots on her feet over each little rise and fall of the ground. The battle had torn holes too deep to risk stepping into as she guided the man as he continued to face the enemy with the sword.
"Light," she gasped exhaustedly feeling his arm touch her free hand. He held the sword touching it to the earth without her guidance now. The wizard wasn't sure that she could walk much longer. It was taking too much of a toll on her and she just wanted to stop and sleep. Ashleen was so tired.
Magnus swept onto the field taking in the damage to the defenses and the fighting centered on a beacon of light. Crackling lightning flashed but it was nothing to the flashes of light. As the wizard advanced he watched as a wall of fog seemed to grow like a wave. It swallowed up the lesser lights of the wizards as they attempted to disrupt this new attack.
Without glancing to Embrell and Wellas, the wizard warned, "We need to stop this attack now!"
Dragon wings formed at their command and the three wizards launched forward. They reached the front aiming for the faltering beacon at the center of the darkness. The light had nearly gone out as it retreated from the fog.
The three wizards used fire and wind trying to drive the fog back, but it wasn't an ordinary fog. This was the power of a night spell and it was designed to destroy wizards like them.
"Fireball," the fire wizard said experimenting with the power of the Hollow Sword. Releasing the power within the blade with a flick of his hand, the sword sent a torrent of flame splashing into the fog. For all the power of the magnified spell, the fire might as well have been trying to burn the ocean.
He led the other two to land before the fog. The white light wasn't far now and Magnus wondered who had the power to stand even this long in the face of such a powerful spell.
"This is a joint spell," Embrell cautioned though all three had guessed as much by now. The black fog covered the entire front and no matter how many wizards challenged it with their individual light spells, the fog continued to press forward. Able to consume magic, it was hard to tell where the warlocks were who controlled the spell. Normally so many wizards working together would be easy to find. Disrupt or kill the wizards in the chain and you could break the spell.
Magnus tried to sense the warlocks behind the night fog, but without luck he said to the others, "We need to create a break in this fog and find them quickly."
"How?" Wellas asked from his left, while the other fire wizard held his right side.
"Maybe this sword can do what Bas said it can?" Magnus stated and lifted it before him. A normally impatient man, the fire wizard fought his nature and lowered the sword to the ground. "Light!"
Outside of the fog, the light of the sun still tried to illuminate the village and defenses; but the Hollow Sword took the power of the earth making the light spell shine like a second sun. In a world with three moons, a second sun was less surprising, but no one would mistake the power of magic creating this light.
Magnus could feel the metal straining in his hand. "Release," he ordered swinging the sword towards the fog.
Like releasing the sun into the sky, the light of the sword shone bringing cheers from the weary men defending the village. Magnus could sense the lesser strength of the dozens of wizards struggling against the fog. The power of the sword made everything else disappear for a moment and the wizard knew that even the combined might of a dozen warlocks would have to fear this weapon.
He placed the sword against the ground and felt the strength of the earth leap into the blade as Magnus recharged his sword. The wizard said to his comrades, "I think I understand how Sebastian keeps building his strength now. We can beat those warlocks together."
Embrell and Wellas looked at their leader and didn't question his belief. Both could still see the purple light in their vision. The fire wizard, Embrell asked, "What do you need us to do?"
"Join your power with mine. We'll use the sword to create a light spell that will break this fog with a single strike. Then we'll hit their warlocks with a spell that will defeat them."
The two wizards joined their power to the man by touching their hands to his shoulders. Magnus touched the sword to the ground, but didn't lift it this time. "Light!" he ordered feeling the power of the earth cross from the sword into the three wizards. His friends gasped as he used their joined power with that of the earth.
Light left the fire wizard's hand shaming even the power of the Hollow Sword. The sea of fog separated cut through the heart by their spell. Magnus sensed the power behind the fog and summoned his most powerful fire spell. Called the inferno, he had never witnessed the strength of such a spell augmented by two other wizards and yet he added the power of the earth itself making the powerful spell epically more deadly.
As the fog started to drop like rain into the hundred foot wide gap created by the light, fire rose for over a hundred feet above the wizards. Magnus made it jump the wilder and the soldier before them. Ashleen fell to her knees looking at the three men and the growing torrent of fire. Like a tidal wave of flame, the inferno jumped through the opening in the fog burning the men and monsters in their armor beyond it.
The black armor could absorb the magic, but the air burned their lungs killing everything before it. The fog fell as the warlocks dropped the spell to try to save their lives. Black shields combined from their joined power covered them in domes, but the intensity of the flame cracked the shields in places. Warlocks died and some lived, but the inferno overwhelmed the men and women behind it.
As the fire dissolved, Magnus felt the strength go out of his legs. The power creeping through the sword was the only thing holding the man up now, but he could see the fight had gone out of their enemies. Black armored warriors retreated in fear. Warlocks that had survived were helped from the field.
As the enemy retreated, cheering from the soldiers of Sileoth rose up at this victory. Magnus could barely hear them over the rush of blood thrumming in his ears.
He released the power of the earth and knelt with the sword before him. His hand reached to his waist finding a canteen tied there. Taking a drink of water, Magnus looked at his two friends. They looked shaky as well, but the brunt of the spell had been taken by Magnus alone.
From the wizard and the earth, the man corrected in his mind, and with just a few spells he was left exhausted; but the fire wizard contemplated the rush of power he had felt through the sword. Was this how Sebastian had managed to continue growing in power when a mage was supposed to be weaker than a wizard? Magnus wondered.
A figure dropped from the sky to land beside Ashleen and some soldier the wizard didn't know. He thought the man was from Sileoth in fact, but his armor was filthy with dirt and black marks from fire. The wilder had been the source of light which had brought him like a moth to the flame.
His eyes spotted another of the Hollow Swords in the soldier's hand and wondered at the power of these weapons. The mage had created these as well.
Eyes narrowing with frustration, the fire wizard looked at the battle mage trying to decide whether he was angry with the young man or in complete awe. He had his tricks, but Sebastian continued to grow and surprise them all. Beyond the man's individual ability, he had created both spells and weapons the like of which no one had seen before.
"Do we press them further?" Wellas asked tiredly.
"No," Magnus' voice croaked from a parched throat though he had just drank from is canteen. The danger of being a fire wizard was the flame and smoke, the man thought as he answered the air wizard, "We broke their attack and killed enough of them to make them wait to try anything else."
As the three men stood or knelt on the ground, Sebastian approached carrying the blonde haired wilder. She was awake, but nestled her head against the man carrying her. Looking as exhausted as Magnus felt, the fire wizard had to admire the strength she had shown as well. How long Ashleen had fought with the Hollow Sword, he wasn't sure; but even charging the weapon was taxing. Ashleen had likely been fighting for over twenty minutes Magnus guessed.
Placing the girl gently on the ground to lean against the wall of one of the hastily erected defenses, Sebastian looked at the fire wizard nearby. Standing up to face his rival, Magnus leaned on the sword like it was a cane. He took another drink from his canteen. More than water would be needed to restore his strength, but Magnus didn't want to show any weakness in front of this man.
"This is a good weapon," the taller wizard stated with a nod of his head to the battle mage. There was no directed admiration towards Sebastian exactly, just the Hollow Sword. "Though I think I've figured out how you did so well at the tournament."
Sebastian faced the fire wizard and walked closer to the man. There were other soldiers and a few wizards nearby, so the owl didn't want what he was about to say to spread beyond the three men before him.
Magnus smirked at the mage as he continued to speak. "You figured out how to draw on the power of the earth without killing yourself. Telling me that the sword could be charged with more power than I could give it by myself made me realize how. Just using it as a buffer to fill the blade, I could feel all that untapped power.
"That you didn't kill yourself during the tournament means you figured out how to use the power safely. There have always been warnings to avoid tapping the earth. Now I see that those wizards were being selfish. So much power, I could have gone through the Winter's Edge blowing people away with a single spell. Even the night shields can't stop this kind of power."
Shaking his head, Sebastian stated, "I knew that I shouldn't have told you even as much as I did. You are smart enough to figure it out, so I'm not surprised that you did.
"Now that you know, I'd suggest that you never do it again. There is a reason that the knowledge of using a staff or sword to harness the power was covered up by the old wizards."
Magnus frowned and laughed with a single barked, "Ha!
"Why would I not use this power? If I use a staff instead of a sword, will it be more efficient? Come on, Bas; tell me what you have learned of this technique. With this power we can push the emperor's armies back to their caves. He can be destroyed once and for all," Magnus questioned the mage straightening with the energy of his words.
"It's too dangerous, especially for fire wizards like you," Sebastian retorted without raising his voice. He was calm and didn't sound like he cared as much as the young man truly did. While Magnus had never been his favorite person, letting the fire wizard die because of this knowledge wasn't his intention either.
"For a fire wizard like me? Didn't you see what I did? Only Wellas and Embrell added their power to mine and we harnessed the power we needed to destroy their warlocks. We destroyed the night fog and blew the rest away with an inferno that even their black shields couldn't stop!"
Sebastian had closed the distance and said quietly to the three men, "Continually using the power to destroy will age and kill you. High Wizard Darius has lived through a time where wizards used this power killing themselves in the process. He said young wizards aged to old men in a year or two by abusing the power."<
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Eyes narrowing in distrust, Magnus replied, "That sounds like a convenient notion, but you've been using the power since at least before the tournament and you don't look any worse for wear. You destroyed the wizards in the tournament and you are fine."
Leveling his finger at the wizard's chest, Sebastian's voice heated slightly but never became louder as he tried to keep the matter between the two of them. "I didn't abuse the power and I still nearly killed myself in that tournament. You're a fire wizard. All you know is how to destroy. That kind of magic needs a counter to balance the power being used in your body.
"I can heal and I rarely fight to kill with my magic. The tournament was a fight, but not a battle. Where I could restrain my use of the power, you will use it until you burn out."
Grunting in suspicion, it was easy to see that Magnus didn't believe the mage's warnings. When Sebastian raised his hand to the side of the wizard's face, Magus started to recoil; but it was too late. Pulling a hair from his head, Sebastian held it before the other man's face. It was white, though one might confuse it for very light blond in the sun's light.
Magnus was a blonde, but his hair was darker than bleached out blonde that would be required to have such a hair color.
"Your first gray hair," Sebastian stated before placing it in the wizard's hand. "Don't go down this path unless you want to have a lot more."
The fire wizard frowned at the mage first, but contemplated the hair in his hand. He wanted to rail at Sebastian for showing him something and then telling him that the magic wasn't for him. Like the battle mage, Magnus wanted to learn all that he could and use the power as he saw fit. Being told what to do, especially by a battle mage, was against what he had foreseen for his life.
Battle Mage: Winds of Change (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 11) Page 51