The Weaving of Wells (Osric's Wand, Book Four)

by Jack D. Albrecht Jr.

  Meanwhile, Machai was just as enveloped in the battle off to Pendres’s right. He wielded his axe with deadly efficiency, surprising the enemy with his deftness at fending off the blows of much longer blades from much taller foes. Machai used his stature to his advantage when he could, moving inside the enemy’s defenses, and he used his wand when he couldn’t to even the match.

  Many of Dredek’s soldiers were also dual wielding, attacking or defending with a wand while battling with swords. However, they had only been practicing for the short time since they had last battled the Aranthians, and Machai had been training in the technique for his entire life—all of the dwarves had. The floundering humans quickly realized how much harder it was to utilize the skill in a chaotic battle with experienced troops than it had been in training, and many of them dropped their wands or took fatal strikes from swift blades before they could get a spell off. Still, they were skilled with their swords, and the battle was far from decisive in the early moments of engagement in the open chamber.

  The Aranthians and dwarves were outnumbered, and even as they cut through the ranks of Dredek’s men before them, two more were waiting in the tunnels to the sides of the room to replace each one that fell. Pendres was hard at work trying to determine the best strategy to get the upper hand, and his mind raced as he considered how many men Dredek could have in the extensive network of tunnels and rooms beneath the desert floor. They needed to get to the Well of Strands as swiftly as possible, and then they could only hope that Osric’s plan would work. None of their men, including the old war hero, would be a match for Dredek if Osric couldn’t stop him from afar. Then, Pendres and Machai noticed their opening at the same time, and the two communicated with a quick nod to each other as they started calling out orders to shift their troops.

  A small group of Aranthians, the men and women who had remained in Angmar to aid the irua after the last battle there, had managed to fight their way up one of the tunnels to join their comrades in the main chamber. Having seen them arrive, Pendres and Machai shifted the drive of the battle toward that tunnel. It took several moments, but a unit of dwarves and Aranthians led by Ergon from Stanton broke through the last bunch of Dredek’s men who blocked the way, and suddenly Pendres and Machai were following the unit through the gap to meet their men.

  “Well met! Be there any chance this tunnel be leading to the Well of Strands?” Machai asked the man leading the group who wore the dirty but still recognizable uniform of a Stanton Vigile.

  “Not directly, but we should be able to come into the tunnel we need from both ends and clear it out. I will lead you there, but it would be best if we weren’t worried about being followed.”

  “Go now. I will make sure you have the men you need and you aren’t followed,” Pendres said, heading back into the large chamber where the battle was still raging. He barked out several orders, guttural syllables that would sound only like grunts or war cries to the enemy, and he was pleased to see his men falling into place according to his calls. One unit pressed forward, pushing back the enemy troops to widen the path to the tunnel. A second unit, still nearly intact with only a couple of losses, sifted quickly through the area, taking out all stray enemies that had been fighting behind the main line of combat. Pendres called out more orders. A line of troops funneled through the narrow opening created by the others, and Pendres waved them into the tunnel behind him. He fed just over one hundred men through the opening, and then he ordered the others to clear the immediate area and to press the attack harder. As the men melted away from the opening of the passage, Pendres stepped away from the arch and watched as the last of the men headed down the tunnel behind Machai. Pendres held his wand up before him and began a simple cooling spell. He widened the spell’s target area to span the stone several paces around the archway. The spell was quite basic, the sort of thing a child could use to cool his soup so he didn’t burn his tongue—but Pendres was no child.

  Pendres watched closely as frost formed on the stone all around the opening. He continued cooling it until the air before him caused his breath to fog out in a white cloud when he released a controlled and focused exhalation. When it was done, cold enough that any flesh brushing against the stone would be burned and blistered instantly, Pendres swung his sword in a great arc and struck the top of the arch. A loud crack echoed the chamber, startling men on both sides of the battle, followed by the crashing of large chunks of stone and the raining of crumbling rock. Pendres felt his head pounding from the extensive use of magic, but he pushed the pain down and ignored it. He looked at the space where the archway had been, and now there was only a wall of massive rocks, rubble, and sand. He still held his wand out before his body, and he took a deep breath before his final spell.

  Rather than merely halting the cooling spell, Pendres channeled a great deal of magic into reversing the spell. The air in the huge chamber cooled rapidly, chilling the sweat on the skin of the fighters and sending a deep ache into their joints, but the air around Pendres grew so hot he had to shield his face with one arm. The many minerals in the stone liquefied as heat replaced cold, and the pile of rubble was sealed tightly. It wouldn’t just be a matter of moving the chunks of stone aside; the blockage of the passage was nearly as solid and strong as the stone surrounding it, and there would be no worry of the enemy soldiers following Machai into the tunnels. Pendres turned and waded his way back into battle, ignoring the pounding of his head and the burning of his skin, and his men cheered him as he swung his sword into the next enemy.

  * * *

  Introductions were brief. The leader of the Aranthian group in the tunnels was named Elidin. He had been with the Aranthians since the beginning, and he had served under Osric as a Vigile before the attack on the palace in Stanton. Machai had trained him to dual wield, although he did not hold it against the dwarf at all that he didn’t remember him.

  “I’m a head-down, work-hard, stay-out-of-trouble kinda guy. It’s served me well here in Angmar, and we have been able to get quite a few of the irua out to safety, not to mention the headaches we have caused Dredek’s men when the opportunity presented itself. Although, we never want to risk too much, so mostly we spend our time making sure the irua we can find are fed, sheltered, and out of sight of the soldiers who patrol the tunnels. Most of them have gone to other irua cities, but we send the ones who want to keep fighting back to Stanton to gain strength and training. I never realized how peaceful the irua are as a race; I guess I only met the ones who leave because they aren’t at home here.”

  “Thanks for yer commitment to be seeing this through to the end, Elidin. Ye be coming in just when we be needing ye.” Machai followed him through the tunnels at a jog, reassured by the sound of one hundred men moving steadily along with them.

  “We knew something was happening when all of the soldiers started mobilizing at once. They were all heading toward the main chamber at a run, fully armed and stinking of nervous sweat. We figured either the invasion had begun and the Aranthians were here or Dredek had done something horrible with his creepy magic and the tunnels were about to flood with fire, or poison, or worse. Either way, we wouldn’t have been safe or helpful hiding out in secret rooms deep in the tunnels. We were glad to see it was you when we finally got that tunnel cleared.”

  Elidin turned a corner, and they startled a group of five men running toward them. Dredek’s soldiers recovered quickly, but they hesitated when they saw how many people followed Elidin and Machai around the corner. The five heavily armed soldiers paused, raised their swords, then their eyes went wide and they spun around to run the direction they had come from. Likely, there were more men back that way, and Macha threw out his hand before they could get far. A wall of flames sprung up, blocking their escape, and they barely had time to spin around before the Aranthians cut them down. Machai waved his hand to quench the flames, and the column of troops continued down the tunnel with Elidin in the lead.

  “Let’s go find their reinforcements, shall we?”
Elidin asked.

  “Aye. Where be the tunnel we be needing for the well?”

  “Just ahead, we will send half our force down a side passage. Juri here will lead them, as she knows that section of tunnels better than any of us. This tunnel will dead-end at the intersection of the passage we want, and she will bring the rest around to the other end. It’s a main tunnel between the armory and the chamber we found you in, so it’s likely to be full of Dredek’s men headed up with fresh weapons to relieve the others. We will have to sandwich them in and clear it out in order to get to the only tunnel we know of that will lead where you want to go. Their troops are getting pretty good at fighting in these close quarters, so I doubt we could overtake them without making them fight on both fronts. Let’s just hope we brought enough men and their ranks are thin.”

  “Aye, let’s be hoping,” Machai said.

  * * *

  Dredek watched as the last of the flesh grew on the caldereth. All of the months of experimenting on recently deceased animals had culminated in the picture-perfect forms that lay before him. Though he had been successful in reviving the dead once, with a deer in the forests of the Elven Realm, the upcoming spell to reattach gifts and life strands was the one thing he hadn’t yet perfected.

  He had, however, had decades of experience to tell him how to proceed and what would yield the results he sought. It was the lack of power that had kept him from establishing the connections needed in all previous attempts.

  His people lay naked on the bare stone floor inside The Well of Strands. Dredek looked down and could feel the surge in the flow that would bring him the power he needed. He had located his mate, Aeya, while her flesh was still growing. Now, he looked at her as tears began to fall. She was lifeless where she lay on the lower portion of ramp that led out of the well to his right, but soon she would be breathing again.

  He couldn’t help but stare at her where she lay. It wasn’t the lack of life that kept him from tearing his eyes away; it was that this was the first time he had laid his eyes on her since gathering her bones. If he didn’t know better, he would have sworn she was asleep.

  Her long black hair splayed out softly against the stone below her head. Her bare, pale flesh looked damp in the light of the well. Dredek longed to reach out, take her hand, and whisper the words he had held for so long. He rejoiced at seeing her body whole again. Seeing her broken and covered in dirt and blood was a memory that he would be happy to part with. Soon he would have the chance to bid farewell to all of the bad things that the last hundreds of years had forced upon him. Whatever cost the vast use of magic and the unspeakable crimes he was forced to perform to bring about this day would demand of him, Dredek was prepared to shoulder the burden so long as Aeya and the caldereth would live again.

  A chill ran up Dredek’s spine as he prepared himself to channel the power necessary to revive the caldereth scattered throughout the Well of Strands. He stilled himself for the task and the fatigue that would come from it, even though he was so close to the source that surged around him.

  Gooseflesh covered his body and his senses heightened. As his pupils constricted, he could feel portent pull him in the direction of the well’s opening far above. Even through his limited experience with the gift, he knew something bad was coming. He could hear fighting coming from the halls outside the well. How had they known to attack now?

  Dredek wished he had the ability to close the door to the well, but the irua girl was locked safely in her cell. He had no time to go and get her, to force her to lock them in and let him complete his task. It had come down to a race against the intruders, but as he looked down he knew they had come too late. The power of the well was increasing, ever so slightly, but it indicated that the time for his success was almost upon him. The surge in power that would allow him to bring back the caldereth was moments away. They could have him once he completed his task, but haste was a necessity now more than ever.

  * * *

  Osric stood thigh deep in a pool of magic, strands rushing around him like writhing snakes seeking an exit. The strands twisted and coiled around each other and around Osric’s legs, climbing up every surface they came in contact with. The walls of the well were alive with brightly colored strands, and Osric felt the magic lending him strength and feeding his power. It was exhilarating, and a bit terrifying, as he wasn’t sure he could control his abilities with so much source magic feeding them. Every part of his body was tingling, and he could feel his dozens of gifts all on the verge of activating due to the density of the strands around him. Rather than having to exert effort to use his abilities, it was as if he had to strain to keep them idle.

  Still, some of his abilities were too well developed and too passive for him to restrain. Osric could feel every emotion of his three companions assaulting him, and he struggled to dampen the Empath ability so he could focus on his own thoughts and feelings. His Portentist ability was in full flare, heightening his senses and drawing his attention toward the Irua Realm and to the streams of strands flowing into the well, but Osric was so familiar with his birth ability that he was able to ignore its urgings once he acknowledged them. Heatless flames sprang up along his fingers even as water condensed and dripped from the ceiling, slipping through the intangible strands and splashing up from the floor. The stone beneath Osric’s feet transmitted a mild vibration, and Osric put more effort into shutting down the Earth Elementalist ability until he needed it, fearing that if he couldn’t keep it under control the whole structure might crumble around them. Bridgett’s hair swirled around her face as air currents washed out from Osric’s position in the center of the well, and he could still sense her emotions like they were his own: fear that he would be harmed, pride that he was trying to save so many lives, awe at his power and the incredible display of magic before her, overwhelming love and desire for him, and many others.

  In addition to the distraction of Bridgett’s intense feelings, Osric could also feel Gus and Aridis’s emotions so strongly that it was as if he could read their thoughts. The prairie dog’s excitement at seeing the well and watching as Osric’s gifts fluctuated and pulsed with the power of the strands was palpable, and Osric wasn’t surprised to see Gus’s ears twitching so fast he might have taken flight if they were bigger. Aridis was also awed by what he was witnessing, but his anxiety was not for Osric’s safety. The old Obcasior was worried what altering the terrain of Archana might do for magic use in the long run, as all magic required drawing on the strands that flow from the ground. Osric hadn’t allowed himself to worry much about the eventual side effects of his plan, other than his constant attempt to do as little damage to Archana as possible while still accomplishing the feat of weaving the wells, and now he tried to keep Aridis’s anxiety from feeding his own. Osric reasserted his focus on his gifts, striving to shut down the Empath ability, and he turned his attention outward to the overwhelmingly difficult task ahead.

  From the strong urging of his Portentist ability, Osric knew he only had moments to use the power of the well to interrupt Dredek’s spell at the Well of Strands. He had been formulating a plan for days, training and honing his various gifts in order to find a way to stop the caldereth wizard, but he had no idea if he would be able to pull it off. Bridgett and Gus had asked him a dozen times what he was planning, but he had deflected their questions for fear that they would try to stop him. What he was planning to do was risky at best, downright stupid at worst, and it would probably kill him. But he couldn’t think of any other way.

  He had actually come up with the idea before he orchestrated the reorganization of the flow of strands beneath Archana’s surface, inspired by the way he had separated Pendres from his Aranthian hostage, but he had let them think he was still trying to think of the best plan of attack. He had told them he had a few spells in mind, but he would need to test them on a smaller scale. In reality, he only had one idea, and in a way the reforming of the stone veins had been the small-scale test. Now, he had to do something simil
ar, but he had to do it much faster, and much more forcefully, and from a much greater distance. His hands were trembling and the flames flickered out as he finally gained control over his Elementalist abilities.

  Osric had been working hard to master the use of the Stone-Sight and Earth Elementalist abilities. He downplayed his role in the reconstruction project because he didn’t want Bridgett and Gus fretting over the amount of magic he had been using over the past few days. Really, he had done a great deal of the work himself trying to perfect his aim and his control of the gifts. Though the Enduro ability kept him from fatiguing quickly, and his vast amount of abilities made each use of magic tax him less than it would a normal man, he was still feeling the toll of everything he had done recently. His head pounded slightly, his stomach wouldn’t settle, and he couldn’t quite get his hands to stop shaking. Osric brushed his palms against his pants to dry the sweat and still the tremble, and then he cast out his gaze with the Stone-Sight in the direction of Angmar.

  Gus and Bridgett both gasped softly as they watched the strands react to Osric’s magical intent. Neither had ever seen anything like it, and Gus had been studying strands for his entire long life. They saw Osric’s eyes narrow and his brow furrow, but his expression was unreadable.

  Osric had been able to peer much further into the stone than any of the most skilled Stone-Sights in the world due to his multitude of gifts and their associated power linked to his life strand. Still, he had been terrified that he would not be able to amplify that power enough, even with the altered well, to be able to see as far as he must. As he pushed his sight further—across the span of water where the Darib Sea spilled out between the Irua and Elven Realms in treacherous currents, under the humid swamps near Catrain, and even further under the burning sands of the desert surrounding Angmar—Osric felt the strands from the pool surge toward him in response to his demand for more magic.