by Cory Herndon
When she turned back, Slobad was gone.
“Slobad?” the elf girl hissed into the darkened woods. “Slobad, this isn’t fu—hey, back off!” One wasp had gotten close enough that Glissa had to swat at it with her sword, but the creature sluggishly avoided the blade. “Slobad, where are you?”
Another wasp moved in too close and Glissa whirled, slashing backward furiously and feeling the sword tip connect with a thin metal exoskeleton. The wasp shrieked—Glissa was surprised to hear the voice of an insect, she hadn’t realized they had them—and turned in mid-air, crashing back the way it had come like a drunken goblin. Half of a translucent silver wing fluttered to the forest floor. There, it joined a severed stinger six inches long that twitched as it pumped wasp venom into the ground.
The other wasps swarmed on their fleeing cousin, stinging the defenseless insect repeatedly. The savaged creature dropped onto its back, kicking spasmodically as its kin tore it to pieces with powerful mandibles. One of the wasps, the smallest, couldn’t get to the cannibal feast—twice, the other wasps batted the runt away with legs and wings—so it turned and continued to chase Glissa, followed closely by the rat, which gave the insect feeding frenzy a wide berth.
“Up here!” came Slobad’s voice up ahead, about twenty feet in the air if her ears weren’t lying. Glissa kept running and craned her neck to see where Slobad had found refuge.
He stood upside down on the bottom of a tree branch, his arms crossed and the worn satchel hanging awkwardly from his armpit.
“How—?”
“Just run up that tree! Trust me! Straight up! Meet you there, huh?” And with that, Slobad turned—still upside down—and ran toward a wide Tangle tree trunk directly in Glissa’s path. The tree was ancient, and had no low-hanging spikes for leverage. Her claws would be useless in the bark of a tree that age, hardened and weathered by centuries of moonlight.
But she trusted Slobad and her eyes. Claws would not be needed.
Glissa reached the tree in seconds, swatting blindly with her sword but never feeling contact with the giant beasts she knew were right on her tail. She kicked out with a flying leap, extended one foot parallel to the tree trunk, and hoped she hadn’t been hallucinating.
Her foot found solid purchase and gave no resistance as she pulled it loose, brought up her other foot, made firm contact with the tree trunk, lifted that foot …
If she hadn’t been running for her life, Glissa would have slapped her own forehead. She was using a climbing spell. Or rather, one was affecting both of them. Glissa looked over her shoulder and saw the ground like a wall receding in the distance. Her horizontal had gone vertical.
The wasps finished off their cousin’s corpse, and now four of them buzzed lazily around the base of the tree, but their wings couldn’t lift them clear of the ground. One still dive-bombed the rat, which had been forced to slow its pace and fight back.
All giant creatures. All obviously subjected to growth magic. Glissa had seen no mage, and the creatures had materialized seemingly out of nowhere. And now she was running easily along narrow, spiky limbs and boughs that should never have supported her weight. Stranger still, so was Slobad. Suddenly, it all clicked.
“Slobad, wait up! I think I know what’s happening!”
The goblin skidded to a halt when he saw Glissa had lost their pursuers. “Yeah?” he asked as Glissa bounced off a springy tree spike, somersaulted, and landed in a crouch on a small, flat terrace. “Slobad thinks it’s all that elf-magic floating around back there.”
“It’s all the magic floating around after the—” Glissa stopped. “What did you just say?”
“Elf-magic. So thick back there Slobad could smell it, huh?” the goblin continued. “Was going to tell you, but didn’t want to slow down.”
“Right,” Glissa nodded, casting her eyes about the forest canopy lest a giant beetle or wall of spiky thorns pop up out of nowhere and take them by surprise. “You can, uh, smell magic, Slobad? I didn’t think you and magic got along.”
“Know how elf magic smells, huh?” Slobad said, wrinkling his nose with distaste.
“How does it smell?” Glissa asked.
“Like rotten moss mixed with rat dung,” he said. “Sorry, but true.”
“Huh,” Glissa said. “Never noticed that. Do you know anything about mana? The elemental forces that give magic its energy?”
“Like blast powder and a fire tube?” Slobad asked, arching a spiky eyebrow.
“Sort of. Mana’s more like the ingredients for a good stew. You can make a stew out of almost anything, but to make something good, you’ve got to use the right vegetables and meat.”
“So different magic needs different meat, huh?” Slobad said. He began to turn his foot on one toe like a nervous student.
“And I’m attuned to Tangle magic because this is my home. And that moon, it’s made of pure green mana.”
“So why don’t all the monsters go there?” Slobad asked, jerking a thumb upward in the general direction of the dazzling emerald orb.
“The lacuna,” Glissa said. “The moon had to burn right through the surface to get out.” She gazed back down through the thick trees and saw the slow-moving wasps and the shambling rat buzzing around below them, unable to resist their instincts but equally unable to actually reach their prey.
“So the magic burned into the ground, huh?” Slobad said.
“To put it simply. That much energy floating loose, it’s trying to coalesce. To take shape before it dissipates.” Glissa began pacing, and took two steps up the side of the tree, deep in thought. “But there’s no intelligence behind it, so the spells aren’t entirely taking sha—oooOOF!” Glissa’s feet slipped as though on ice, and she dropped three feet back to the terrace, landing on her rear. She shook her head to clear the ringing.
“See what I mean?” Glissa muttered. She hung her head between her knees and rubbed either side of her temple. “Its centered on that big hole in the ground.”
No one answered.
“Slobad?” Glissa asked, head still between her knees. “What do you think? Does that make sense?”
“Oh yes,” a gruff voice said calmly, “That makes perfect sense. You’ll have to tell us all about it.”
That wasn’t Slobad.
Glissa placed one hand on her sword hilt and drew her blade as she leaped to her feet, ready to strike in the direction of the voice. At least, that was the plan, but her attack was over before it started. Glissa only made it into a crouch, and her sword never cleared its sheath. The elf girl was eye-to-blade-tip with three swords, all pointed at her throat. Glissa followed one silver blade up its three-foot length, where it ended in a familiar golden-filigreed hilt. The hilt was in the hand of a tall elf. Slobad was scooting backward, apparently hoping the warriors had not yet seen him, which the elf girl could already tell was pointless. Glissa couldn’t hold back a smile as she raised her hands.
“Where have you been?” Glissa asked.
“Thought these guys on our si—ow!” Slobad whispered, then yelped as a the point of a sword poked him between the shoulder blades. The goblin risked a look back over one shoulder and said irritably, “Cut it out, huh? Know who this is?” he asked, cocking his head in Glissa’s direction. “Huh? Greatest warrior in the Tangle, here! You not know. Asking for trouble. Crazier than she is.”
“Quiet!” the gruff voice behind him barked. “She’s a criminal, and if you’re with her, you are too. But I only have orders to bring one of you in alive. Guess which one, goblin?”
“Banryk, this is ridiculous,” Glissa managed as she narrowly missed tripping over a newly exposed tree root that had melted around the edges. “I’m not a criminal, and neither is he. This is foolish. Something amazing had happened. I have to talk to the elders.”
“I said, quiet!” the growling elf hissed in return and gave Glissa a shove that nearly sent her sprawling face-first into the thick, wiry undergrowth. She managed to keep her balance, no thanks to the enchante
d leather straps that the Tel-Jilad warriors had used to tie her hands behind her back. The bindings blocked the natural currents of mana that should have been at the tips of her claws here in her home range. Even though she’d tried to convince the trio of Chosen that Slobad couldn’t even use magic, they’d tied him up the same way.
The Tel-Jilad warriors had easily subdued the exhausted pair. Glissa cursed her luck. She still hadn’t been able to rest, and now she had neither the emotional or physical strength to fight her own people. Even if that included fighting an ambitious blockhead like Banryk.
The other two were unfamiliar—they’d probably been inducted into the Chosen after Glissa’s family had been killed and she left the Tangle. Neither had said a word since the capture.
Despite the situation—arrested on her home turf after helping stop a madman from destroying the world—she couldn’t fight back a stab of melancholy at seeing the distinctive, rune-inscribed armor the Tel-Jilad Chosen wore proudly on their chests. It reminded her of Kane. For all she knew, one of the newcomers was his replacement.
The vedalken murdered Kane only a few weeks ago, but they were weeks that felt like a lifetime. A few weeks ago, she would have given anything just to have her old life back the way it was. A few weeks ago, she was an idealistic hunter with no conception of the wider world or her place in it. Now, knowing the things she knew, the Tangle suddenly felt very … small. She wondered if the pang of sadness was truly over the loss of Kane, or her own loss of innocence.
The three guards poked and prodded their prisoners down a narrow game path that cut through the foliage. Glissa recognized it as one that led directly back to her village.
Banryk had never been the most enlightened of the Tel-Jilad Chosen. She’d been forced to repel his clumsy romantic advances on numerous occasions. Glissa got the disturbing feeling that Banryk was taking more than the usual pleasure in his duties as one of the Chosen, and silently promised he would regret his thuggish behavior when she got out of this.
After a three-hour hike through the Tangle, the forest finally began to thin out a little and the guards prodded their captives off the game trail and onto the wide forest thoroughfare that led to Viridia. Through the glittering leaves, Glissa finally saw the distant glow of hanging gelfruit and open terraces in her home village. The green moon cast a dim jade light that gave the warm hearth glow a sickly pallor. Here and there, a sickly looking corrosion grew on the spiky limbs. The rough, rusty spots consumed the green.
As they drew closer, Glissa began to wonder where the people were. Even in early evening, even after an event like the ascension of a new moon, there should have been dozens of elves going about their business in the village. From her vantage point, Glissa could only see two more Tel-Jilad who stepped silently onto the road ahead, near the old Tangle tree stump inscribed with the village’s name and protective runes that served as a marker for this entrance to Viridia. The warrior on the left had a familiar stance Glissa couldn’t quite place, and a hand resting on his sword hilt. The other’s face was obscured by a drawn bow and an arrow pointed at Glissa’s heart.
“Halt!” Called the familiar-looking elf. His companion kept an arrow trained on Glissa. “Approach slowly, and no one will get hurt.”
“Yulyn, we’ve got the situation under control,” Banryk objected. “She’s not going to get away so easily again.”
Yulyn. That was a name she knew well, but hadn’t expected to hear. Before Glissa came along, Yulyn had been the greatest hunter in the Tangle, but he’d disappeared several months ago while tracking a pack of migratory ferroclaws. Viridians, Glissa included, had assumed the predatory creatures had finally beat Yulyn at his own game. Despite his long absence, the old warrior didn’t look any worse for his experience, whatever had happened to him.
But Yulyn had never worn the armor of the Chosen. What was going on?
“Banryk, you idiot, I sent you to fetch one prisoner. You’ve got one and a half,” Yulyn said. Glissa could tell from his tone that the older elf held Banryk in a much lower regard than the “half prisoner.”
“Half!” Slobad exploded.
“Slobad, not now,” Glissa whispered.
“Listen to your confederate, goblin,” Banryk said. The thuggish guard gave Slobad a shove, and the little man pitched forward onto the road face first.
That did it. Nobody shoved Slobad while Glissa had anything to say about it. The goblin continued to scream and curse about stupid elves as he rolled on the ground like an overturned insect, creating the perfect distraction. She hoped Yulyn’s friend with the bow would be unwilling to fire into a group that included three of his own allies.
Glissa bent her knees slightly and hunched forward then flung her head backward with all her might and let out an invigorating yell. She felt her skull connect with the face of one of her unknown captors, and warmth flowed over the back of her head—whether the blood was her own or the guard’s, she didn’t know and didn’t care. The important thing was that her move caused the guard to release her in surprise.
With her foe still off-balance, Glissa had to act fast, and without the use of her bound hands. She bent at the waist and spun around, leading with one shoulder and trying to knock her captor over. In the process, she hoped to dodge the arrow she knew would be coming. But the guard was ready for her move, and danced back out of the way—then stumbled backward over a twisting, rolling goblin shouting a stream of epithets that could melt tree bark. One down. Glissa turned again and charged headfirst at Banryk, whose jaw was still hanging open in shock.
Her head slammed into the loud-mouthed Tel-Jilad’s gut and Glissa heard a satisfying whoosh of expelled air as she made solid contact with Banryk’s solar plexus. He doubled over and collapsed on all fours, gasping.
Glissa heard an expletive-ridden goblin battle cry. Slobad had regained his footing, clutching a small, broken blade of Tangle-adapted razor grass in one bleeding hand. The goblin’s bindings lay in tatters on the ground. Slobad launched himself at their last standing captor, who let out a yelp of surprise as the goblin landed on his chest and began slashing at him with the sharp but flimsy plant. The stumbling guard, blinded by ninety pounds of goblin, accidentally kneed Banryk in the side and then went over backwards, struggling to keep Slobad from inflicting a mortal wound. Still fighting her own bonds, Glissa turned to face Yulyn and his bow-happy friend. They were nowhere in sight.
Glissa turned around very slowly. The gleaming silver tip of the arrow rested an inch from her right eye.
“I said, ‘Halt,’” Yulyn, whose sword had not left his belt, remarked calmly. With lightning speed, one strong arm flashed down and picked up Slobad by the scruff of the neck, heaving Glissa’s friend in the air with surprising strength. Slobad flailed in the air pitifully. “Both of you. You’ve been accused of crimes against Viridia. You will answer these charges, or attempt to flee again. I promise if you choose the latter, things will go very badly for you. Choose the former, and face those who accuse you of murder.”
“Murder?” Glissa spat incredulously. “What are you talking about? Look up! You see that thing in the sky? Did you see the giant wasps? The rat as big as a ferroclaw? You do know that the world almost ended this morning?”
“Don’t know anything about that,” Yulyn replied. “That’s something for mages to worry about. My job is enforcing the laws. What I know is, your parents are dead, and the elders think you had something to do with it.”
“Big elf crazier than Glissa!” Slobad bellowed, still wriggling a foot and a half in the air. “Barely escaped with her life, huh? Want murderers, head back down the big hole, huh?”
Slobad looked to Glissa, eyes pleading. Glissa didn’t see him. She hadn’t moved since she’d caught sight of the lithe figure standing on the terrace before her. The losses of the recent past suddenly didn’t seem to matter. Every bizarre accusation fell by the wayside.
Glissa leaned slightly on Yulyn, her knees weak. Finally, something had gone right for h
er. She opened her mouth to speak, but the figure above beat her to it.
“Hello, Glissa,” her sister said. “I’m going to enjoy watching you hang.”
“I was there, Yulyn,” Lyese called, her voice strong and cold. “She did it. She called the levelers, and killed our … my … mother, and my father.” Her little sister, not so little anymore, trained her one remaining eye on her older sibling, and Glissa saw hatred reflecting back. “She’s a danger to us all.”
Glissa was dumbfounded. She could see the pain of death etched on Lyese’s youthful face, marred by a silver eyepatch, the choppy golden hair now cut short and lying flat on her head, the graven Tel-Jilad armor on her breast and the wicked-looking spear she clutched in one hand telling the elf how the joyful girl she’d known and loved had changed in just a few short, painful weeks. Weeks Lyese had spent hating her.
Glissa fainted.
UP A TREE
Glissa dreamed she was walking through the strange, soft, brown forests she had seen in her flares. A world without metal, even the people. A tree tapped her on the shoulder. Twice.
No, not a tree. A small, clawed, goblin hand, tapping her on the shoulder. “Hey. Hey, elf. Craaazy elf. Wake up, huh? Making Slobad nervous.” Another shove, and the goblin’s voice grew more anxious. “Glissa? Glissa, come on, huh?”
She opened her eyes and the flare, or dream—it felt like a little of both—vanished in a flash of reality. Glissa blinked and called her surroundings into focus. The flare had made everything blurry, and she could make out only colors and shapes. One large round shape directly in front of her face was unmistakable and had breath that smelled slightly of sulphur and glimmer rat.
“Slobad? Is that you?”
“Who else, huh?” The goblin’s face split into a wide smile. “What, those eyes, they getting worse?”
She blinked, clearing her vision, and with it her real problems returned to sharp focus. She looked around the interior of the Prison Tree. “I can’t remember the last time someone was locked in here. If we are where I think we are.”