The Changespell Saga

by Doranna Durgin

  Jess led the way to an empty table, choosing her spot when the woman would have taken a table closer to the food bar—a more conspicuous table.

  Jess did not want to be conspicuous.

  Maybe taking this run hadn’t been the best decision. She’d needed it—needed to force herself past that spot in the road—but now lingering here, with its constant reminders of this strange and dangerous time, had only made her as tense as everyone else.

  Friedan didn’t improve things, her false-edged voice and forced conversation reminding Jess of how different she was, how her almond—dun—skin and two-toned hair made her stand out even in a populace of varying of shades and forms. Jess just hoped Ander was willing to—

  Quick movement rushing up from behind danger!

  She threw her head up, shifting her weight, her leg free and chambering to kick—

  Ander caught her shoulders, a casual movement that nonetheless trapped her—she twisted to free herself, panic edging her thoughts, phantom ears flat to her skull. He pulled her back against his chest, his low voice in her ear. “Easy.”

  It was as much of a command as anything he’d ever said to her, and a deliberate invocation of one of her Words. She stopped pulling against him, still trembling against his grip, the need to strike out and run still strong within her.

  Ander turned so she could see the young woman who’d first greeted them, her face chagrined as she tugged her uniform back into place and straightened her shoulders, catching her breath.

  “That was quite an entrance,” said Jep, brows raised above his narrow eyes.

  “Especially when you consider how tense things are.” Ander kept his voice light-hearted, but Jess heard his irritation and knew it was for her sake. She took a deep breath and relaxed against him so he would know she had calmed.

  Karle frowned decisively. “I believe we’ll assign some extra classes on awareness skills, Lydda—until you know to think twice before running up behind someone who spends as much time in the field as I do.”

  No one saw.

  Jess let out a sigh of relief. Ander’s quick thinking had hidden her reaction, and she wouldn’t have to explain. Or apologize. Or talk about it at all. She took another deep breath as Ander released her, rubbing her shoulders in a quick apology for his bruising grip.

  “But the shift wizard—” Lydda said, persistent—and then her eyes widened in dismay at Karle’s darkening expression. “I’m sorry. I’ll sign up for extra classes. But—” The urgency returned to her voice—“Falcin lost contact with one of the companies at the stalking games!”

  “When?” snapped Jep.

  “Which company?” Friedan asked. “Did he try to reach its second dispatcher?”

  “Gestan’s,” Lydda said. “And no, he can’t reach the second, either! He can’t reach any of them.”

  Jep’s expression turned grim; he dismissed the girl, and sent Ander and Jess a distracted glance of regret. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I have to see to this.” He put a command tone in his voice when he turned to Friedan and Karle. “Eat. I’ll need you later, and I don’t want you hungry.”

  Neither of the two looked happy, but they nodded in sharp unison. Lunch turned into a quiet and distracted affair with no more intrusive curiosity; they proceeded to Jess’s chosen table and ate quickly, and Jess and Ander slipped directly outside from the dining area, and found their horses readily enough.

  Ander retightened his girth and looked at her over his horse’s back. “She would have startled anyone, Jess. Don’t worry about it.”

  “She was stupid,” Jess said immediately, making sure her saddlebags and their contents were secure. “She would have deserved it.” And then she stopped, and blinked, and said, “I don’t know why I said that.”

  “She was stupid, to go pelting up on someone like that.” But Ander looked a little startled, too.

  “Yes. But... it was a only mistake.” She frowned down at her fingers as they rebuckled her saddlebag. There was no point in being so angry at someone for a mistake. Jess made enough of those herself.

  “I don’t think she’ll make it again. Karle and Jep didn’t like it any more than you did,” Ander said with assurance, leading his horse away from the rail and mounting up.

  Foot in the stirrup, Jess hesitated at the hint of unusual sound. “Do you hear... ?” she said, but then it was gone, and she mounted up. Just a breeze knocking branches together, or an approaching rider. Or... several of them? “Do you—?”

  “What?” Ander asked.

  She shook her head, but before they reached the gatehouse, she stopped again. Then Ander heard it too—the sound of many dozens of little hoofbeats. Light steps, ticking and pattering against the hard road in enough numbers to create a minor alto rumble.

  The man in the gatehouse stepped out into the middle of the road, where his view was much better than theirs—and just as fast, he ducked back into the gatehouse, shouting something incomprehensible into his little black square.

  At least, Jess thought it was incomprehensible. She couldn’t really have heard him yelling about sheep, could she?

  “Maybe we’d better move,” Ander suggested, his blue eyes changing from puzzled to alarmed.

  But it was too late, and the sheep were upon them—there was nothing to do but hold their horses and wait it out as a large herd hit the entrance, bottlenecked briefly, and poured through.

  They ran into the yard without slacking speed, filling it... milling around with a cacophony of angry bleats. There were rams and ewes in equal numbers—and the rams were willing to go head-on with anything in their way—each other, a tree, part of the fence...

  A surprised ewe came out of the gatehouse at the pointed end of the peacekeepers’ boot; Jess saw his mouth moving, but couldn’t hear his voice any longer—nor did she have attention to spare, for her horse, tail clamped and back humped, quickly had his fill of the woolly creatures and ducked his head to buck his displeasure.

  Jess held her seat and pushed him up into the bridle, keeping him to a few bogging leaps—and as he settled, was relieved to see his little temper tantrum had at least earned them some space.

  But Ander’s expression didn’t reflect any relief at all—in fact, it was downright grim. She put her face into a question and when he caught her eye, he shook his head and pointed.

  There, caught around the neck of one of the ewes, was the remnants of a red and white peacekeeper uniform.

  ~~~~~~~~~~

  Chapter Fifteen

  Dayna sat down on a feed sack just inside the barn doorway, leaving the changespell team in the farmhouse. Not that they’d miss her.

  From here, she could see it all. She could watch the empty crates at the far end of the old building, and imagine them full of animals—pacing, snarling, angry. The stalls stood to her right—two of them, both filthy. One had a broken door—Jess’s stall. To her left lay a jumble of items—broken cages, trash, and generous piles of droppings.

  All in all, a thoroughly disgusting place.

  And inspiring. Far more inspiring than the comfortable old farmhouse, a multi-family dwelling that easily housed the changespell team.

  They’d settled in quickly enough, even if Teriyah wasn’t feeling well. But they had young Rorke for the mundane chores—magically ensuring the presence of hot water, preserved food, and lighting—so there was little to distract the team from their job of creating the checkspell.

  They had, in fact, settled on a version they now fine-tuned to exclude Jess, but Dayna didn’t think it would work. It was too broad in scope.

  They did the fine-tuning without her, which was as it should be. She’d joined the team, after all, for her ability to take her desires and distill them into action through raw magic. The more experienced team members followed along the process, separating what they’d observed into the component parts.

  Raw magic. That was her strength.

  And now, for the first time since she’d set foot on this world, it seemed
to be failing her. Using it did nothing but set up a discord in not only her own efforts, but those of the entire team—and Hastin, not of the most generous nature in the first place, was quick to let her know about it.

  Suddenly Dayna understood just how often she cheated, making raw shortcuts within legitimate spells.

  And so here she was, in the barn. Being frustrated and embarrassed.

  Usually she came for inspiration. All she had to do was think of Jess in that stall, or picture the tiny dead woman they’d found as the gentle and finely furred rabbit she’d once been. Probably died from fright, Shandy had said. Rabbits did that, sometimes. And those thoughts generally made her tuck away the tired, whining voice in the back of her head, and get back to work.

  Today, when her raw magic caused such discord, she’d only come to practice. She started with a handful of training spells—and quickly stunned herself with discovery—for when she studiously eliminated all traces of raw magic, they came to her more easily than ever before.

  She called water up from the underground well, and shaped it into a perfect sphere instead of her usual lumpy blob. She lit the barn in a handful of colors, and then blocked out all light to make it darker than night. Disgusted with the smell that seemed so much stronger in that darkness, she cleaned every inch of the barn without lifting a finger—and without a mistake she commonly made, which was to take a thin layer of the original material along with the dirt.

  And after all that, she wasn’t tired at all. She stared, baffled, at her hands—her nimble, obliging fingers, which had happily gestured out the elements of the spells as she’d been taught.

  Was it this easy? Had this been the answer all along, that her raw magic was confusing the structured spells? Did she merely have to make the effort to separate the two?

  Cautiously, Dayna reached for the raw magic, shaping her will to spin a breeze down the center of the barn. Instantly, a grating noise filled the inside of her head—and almost as quickly, Shandy, the small, elderly lady whose patience with Dayna had been extraordinary during this tense project, snapped a silent, direct, “That’s enough of that, young lady!” into her head, just barely cutting through the noise.

  Which was odd enough, considering Shandy’s easy proficiency with personal messages. Dayna released the gathered raw magic in a careful trickle, no happier about the result than Shandy.

  Then something chimed.

  It was a pleasant, melodic chime and yet disturbing for all of that; it came from nowhere and everywhere at once. At the top of the newly pristine barn, a flutter of something drifted downward.

  A watery, distorted voice said, “Fouuund youu. Daaaaayyna.”

  Dayna jumped to her feet, fear making her movement jerky; she threw a shield around herself. But as the object dropped steadily but serenely towards the floor, she had time to get mad. She dropped the shield and threw her magic—structured magic—out at the lingering traces of the message.

  She caught it, latching on to the whisper of distorted laughter, racing along the lines of its origin, perceiving a blur of forests and fields—and then, suddenly and painfully, crashing headlong into a sturdy, impenetrable shield.

  She opened her eyes to find herself on the ground.

  Groaning, she pushed herself up—finding herself so stiff that she must have been there for some time. At least she’d cleaned the place up before she’d smeared herself on the floor.

  In the center of the spotless barn lay a bit of... something. Dayna dragged herself over to it, wary despite the utter lack of magic around her. Black and green, feather and metal... it was identical to the darts that had taken out Jess.

  Willand. Dayna’s breath caught in her throat. Willand found me.

  And she had found Willand.

  Hadn’t she?

  She’d traced that spooky message right back to its source, or as close as she could get. Hadn’t she? Dayna smeared her hand across her eyes, suddenly unsure. There was no way that she, neophyte wizard, could have traced a message that far, that fast... especially not the message of a wizard as powerful as Willand—who no doubt would have taken precautions against just such activity.

  Maybe she’d led Dayna along, spreading bread crumbs to keep the less accomplished wizard on her trail. Maybe she’d wanted to be found. And if that was the case, there was nothing but trouble in it—especially if she told the others.

  Carefully, Dayna got to her feet. And carefully, she aimed a small spell of incineration at the dart.

  In a moment, it was nothing more than a bad odor lingering in a clean barn.

  ~~~~~~~

  Jaime stood in the hold garden and frowned at the stranger in the road, the crunchy sweet peas she’d just stolen—harvested—on the way to her mouth.

  The stranger frowned right back.

  Trust that she would be the one out by the gardens, assessing the dried pastures, when the woman walked by. And then when she demanded to see Arlen.

  As if just anyone got close enough to see Arlen these days.

  She was Jaime’s age and heavy, carrying most of it in her hips. Her plain face held small eyes and thick, doughy features. Her hair, pulled tightly back into a thin braid, did nothing to improve her demeanor. Neither did her attitude, of which Jaime was rapidly tiring.

  “I’m not going to take you straight to Arlen,” Jaime said. She’d tried to handle this with polite diplomacy, but both those qualities were now exasperated out of her. “I’m not even going to take you into the hold until someone else clears you.”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” the woman snapped. “Every moment you stall increases the danger for the both of us, no matter how well-shielded you think you might be.” At Jaime’s surprise, she added, “Yes, I can certainly tell an augmented shieldstone when it’s in front of me. That probably means you’ve had trouble lately, which also probably means that Willand has a soft spot in her heart for you. Now stop playing games and get me into that hold!”

  Jaime snorted. “After what you just said? You’ll damned well wait outside until I get you cleared!”

  “My luck to have chosen an imbecile,” the woman snarled, more to herself than to Jaime. Readjusting the tight waistband of her trousers, she turned away from Jaime and headed for the hold, her steps fast and determined.

  Jaime laughed. “You’e kidding,” she said, easily catching up. “Which one of us do you think will get there first?”

  To her astonishment, she discovered tears in the woman’s eyes—and fear on her face. “I don’t care, as long as I get there,” she snapped, as though she wasn’t suddenly revealing all that emotion. “I need safety, and if that means Arlen’s personal peacekeepers wrestle me to the ground and slap null-magic bonds on me, then that’s what it means!”

  For the first time, Jaime hesitated. “The hold is half a mile away. Convince me, and I can have Arlen here in seconds.”

  The woman was already panting. She slowed, giving Jaime a look as suspicious as all the ones Jaime had bestowed upon her. “You cause me any extra trouble, and it won’t just be Willand you have to worry about.”

  “Threaten me, and those doors will never open for you,” Jaime shot back at her.

  They glared at one another a moment, and then the woman seemed to shrink into herself. She broke eye contact. “If Willand’s been after you, you probably do know as much about this sorry situation as anyone. My name is Renia, and I’m seeking sanctuary from Willand and... well, another wizard you won’t have heard of. Yet. Jenci.”

  She might have said more, but she interrupted herself at the sound of hoofbeats—the three-beat rhythm of two horses in a slow and easy canter.

  “Couriers,” Jaime said, without concern.

  But the woman darted off the road anyway, right into the garden and half-hidden within the corn. Jaime sent an incredulous look after her.

  By then the riders were upon them. Ander. And Jess, whom she couldn’t have been gladder to see. “Jess—”

  “You!” Jess said, her greeti
ng turned to fury in a heartbeat—and all the focus of that fury on the woman in the corn. Jaime gaped as Jess kicked her horse forward, aiming him straight at Renia.

  “Jess!” Jaime cried. “Not in the garden!”

  Renia screamed thinly and bolted—but Jess plowed through the corn and cut her off, her horse’s hooves digging up great clods of dirt and roots as he sat his haunches, responding like a cutting horse as Renia dodged through the garden.

  “Jess!” Ander’s puzzled cry echoed Jaime, but by then Jaime wasn’t frozen stupid any more. She darted into the garden to join the fray, cornstalks whipping in her face, her ears full of grunting horse and screaming Renia. A dodge, a duck, a leap—at last she snagged Renia’s sleeve, and in the next instant, got Jess’s reins with the other hand.

  Just pray they don’t take off in opposite directions, she told herself, stretched out between them and gasping with exertion.

  “She was there,” Jess said, and her face was full of thunder. “She was one of them!”

  “Burning Hells,” the woman gasped, astonished recognition on her face. “You—!”

  “Burning Hells, nothing,” Ander called from the road. “If you three don’t get your dainty little feet out of that garden, Arlen’ll roast you himself!”

  Jaime sent Renia and Jess equally stern glares. “Do I have to drag you out of here, or can I trust you to make it to the road without starting up all over again?”

  The woman shook herself free as Jaime slowly released the gelding’s reins. Neither said anything; Jess restricted herself to an expressive glare, and the woman strode through the loose, deep dirt of the garden with as much dignity as she could muster.

  Once they were out on the road again, Jaime stood between them and gave Jess a wary look. “Jess, what—? “

  Jess’s gelding flipped his head up and down, still coiled with excitement. She gave his shoulder a pat without easing her glare. “Her name is Renia. She held me prisoner.”