The Sac'a'rith

by Vincent Trigili

  “I should have enough to outfit us all three times, unless I make a lot of mistakes.”

  “Amazing! How much did you buy?”

  “Everything the store had. I did not know how long it would be until I had another chance. It took almost every cent I had, so I guess I will need to work for you a while longer,” I said with a grin.

  “My brother, I would not dream of leaving you penniless. I will transfer three years’ pay into your account before we jump, and I hope you stay with me regardless,” he said.

  ‘But … ” I started.

  “No buts! I told you that I would cover everything you need while you’re with me. You need this armor to fight the wraiths, so I will cover it.”

  “Are you saying this will stop their attacks?” I asked.

  “Exactly!” he said. “Now, tidy this up and let’s go to the bridge. We have a contract to complete. After that we will take a break to give you time to make more armor, and for me to train the new recruits,” he said.

  He left and headed to the bridge, and it occurred to me that he had started referring to me as his “brother.” I had noticed it before, but until then it had not really struck me. As a slave, I had no family, I had no past and no idea if I had any living relatives. For this man, whatever he was, to call me his brother was a completely new experience for me.

  As I tidied up, I wondered about the entire experience. My armor felt softer, more flexible, and I could feel the power in it. Somehow I understood its strength was much greater than before, and it would hold up to far more than mere wraiths.

  I had felt so driven to make the leather tunic that I could not avoid it. I never spent any time analyzing why I was making it; I just had to. It was as if something inside me knew that this would happen. Before making the tunic I had no frame of reference for magical armor, but somehow I knew this would be the result; I knew if I pressed on, I could make something really great.

  I was born to be a warrior, and have always trusted my instincts in battle. I could look over an arena and size up opponents without conscious thought. Narcion called me an enchanter; to be one must require the same instinctive knowledge that a warrior has. Somehow I needed to learn to tap it more reliably, just as I did in combat.

  When I joined Narcion on the bridge he said, “When we come out of jump, start a full sweep of the area.”

  “Sure. Where are the others?” I asked.

  “They are down in Engineering. You know, it occurs to me that we have almost a full crew now. We just need a doctor,” he said.

  Soon we were in the pleasant azure of jump space. There was something about that place which always felt comforting to me. It felt like jump space was where I really belonged, which made no sense whatsoever. Jump space was a strange place into which ships could force themselves through the use of gravity bubbles. I did not really understand how the whole thing worked, but somehow using these gravity bubbles allowed ships to get around the limitations of the speed of light by briefly leaving the flow of time. The larger the gravity bubble a ship could produce, the further it could travel in one jump.

  As my head cleared from the post-jump hangover I began the sweep as he asked and noticed right away that something was wrong with the station. “Do you see that? One entire docking arm is missing.” In its place was a large, gaping hole in the side of the station, a hole big enough to fly our cruiser into.

  “Yes. Are you getting anything else on your scans?” he asked.

  “Nothing. The station is completely dead. There’s not even any residual radiation,” I said.

  “Odd,” he said. He was silent for a time, and I assumed he was considering the situation. After a while he said, “Back us into that hole. Stop around fifty meters before entering and set the controls to station-keeping.” Then over the intercom he said, “Crivreen, do you have any idea what could cause that kind of damage to the station?”

  “It is hard to tell from out here, but it looks like the blast originated from inside the station. Hold on a second,” he responded. After some indistinct discussion with Felix he said, “We found the docking arm. It looks like it was blown off.”

  “You said the blast came from within the station?” asked Narcion.

  “Yes, but I cannot explain how. Based on the station maps we were given, I don’t see anything in that area that could have caused such an explosion.”

  “Take a shot at solving it,” said Narcion. “What could have done this, and why?”

  “Well, we are being sent here to fight wraiths, right?” asked Crivreen.

  “Yes,” said Narcion.

  “What would happen if you dropped an energy field across the opening to the docking arm while the wraiths were inside? Would that trap them?” asked Crivreen.

  “No; they could merely fly through any unshielded side wall out into space, and back into the station at another point,” said Narcion.

  “Well, maybe not, then,” said Crivreen. “I was thinking that they might have tried to trap the wraiths in the docking arm and then blown it up.”

  “Interesting idea. I can see how they might have thought of that idea. Unfortunately the explosion would not hurt the wraiths, and they would just fly back to the station,” responded Narcion.

  “But it is a viable theory to explain the damage that we see,” commented Felix.

  “I agree. Everyone, get your armor and weapons, and make sure they are fully recharged. Then meet in Airlock 3.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Narcion sent Zah’rak and Crivreen off to Engineering to try to restore power on the station; meanwhile, we went to the central command center to see if we could find any record of the attack.

  “This way, Felix,” Narcion said to me as we left his cruiser and drifted towards what appeared to be the remains of an airlock. The metal frame around the hole was twisted and scorched. Whatever they had used to blow up this section must have been powerful, as the docking arms were designed to withstand impacts from out-of-control spacecraft.

  “We will need to seal this somehow if we turn the air back on,” I said.

  “I assume that the failsafe interior blast walls dropped when the section lost pressure, so that should not be a problem.”

  He was probably right, but of course that just meant we had a different problem. “Without power, how are we going to get past them?”

  “They usually have manual controls,” he said.

  As we entered the station, I felt cold. I checked my armor’s status indicators and nothing was wrong with the temperature, but there was a chill in the air somehow. I reminded myself that I was sealed in a full environmental suit, and there was no way there could be a chill in the air; I was drifting through the hard vacuum of space.

  “We probably won’t see much in the way of the walking dead until gravity is restored. The control the wraiths exert over animated corpses is clumsy in the best of conditions, and this is far from that,” said Narcion.

  We floated down the corridor past the airlock, and had travelled only a very short distance when our headlamps revealed that Narcion was right. The interior blast doors had shut.

  “We need to block off the airlock behind us before we try to open this door, just in case the station is still pressurized beyond that wall,” he said as he removed a panel from the wall to access what I assumed to be the manual controls.

  Blocking the corridor made good sense, otherwise we would be blown violently out into space when we opened the doors. “There is not enough of the door left to hold, but I can patch the gaps temporarily with my shields.” I assembled the best wall I could from the parts that were left and cast my shield spell over the rest. “Okay, I am ready.”

  “Once I open this door, how long can you keep the shield up?” he asked.

  “Quite a while, so long as I maintain line-of-sight with it,” I said.

  The door slowly lifted up as he turned a crank. As the door rose, a rush of wind under the do
or quickly filled our small section with air. My shield held in the rush of atmosphere as the room quickly became pressurized. Once the door was open enough, he slipped through and said, “All clear on this side.”

  I backed down the corridor, being careful not to break line-of-sight with my shield. “Without the gravity assist, how are you going to get the door to slam shut?”

  “These are failsafe blast doors that were intended to work in this very situation. There are powerful natural magnets that will pull it shut once I release the crank. Just let me know when you are ready.”

  I pulled myself down to the floor so that I could keep line-of-sight with the shields for the longest possible time. “Ready.”

  The door slammed shut so fast I never saw it move. It suddenly just closed, and I felt the loss of my connection to the shields. As I drifted back to an upright position I said, “How do we get back out?”

  “Hopefully the power will be back on and we can find a working airlock,” he said as he started down the hall.

  As we drifted towards the control room I asked, “Have you ever found a way for a mundane to fight these wraiths?”

  “Yes, but it requires the help of an enchanter, and until today I did not know of any that were still alive.”

  “Until today?” I asked.

  “Did you notice Zah’rak’s new armor?” he asked.

  I had noticed it, and noticed that it was wrapped in power. “Yeah, nice upgrade you got him.”

  “Not I. He crafted and enchanted it himself,” he said.

  We drifted along in silence a bit as I assimilated that, and then my mind made the connection. “Zah’rak is an enchanter? What is that?”

  “An enchanter can weave spells into clothing, jewelry, weapons, and just about anything made from materials that were once alive, or are at least completely natural,” said Narcion.

  “But his armor is a composite of alloys and other manufactured materials. It was never alive,” I said.

  “True, but all that leather he bought was,” he said. “He used the leather as an extra layer on the armor which allowed him to enchant the armor. He has only had time so far to make the two pieces he is wearing, but after this mission he is planning to make enough for all of us,” he said.

  “And if a mundane were to don this armor?” I asked.

  “It would protect them equally well,” he said.

  “But I thought only magi could use magical items?” I commented.

  “That is only true of some things,” he said, “wands, scrolls, and staves specifically. Most other enchanted items work well.”

  I thought about that while we continued our uneventful trip through the station. We could make a very nice profit selling the things that Zah’rak made. There would be no need to take on dangerous missions like this, or to be a mercenary at all. All I had to do was convince Zah’rak to come work for me instead of Narcion. That would probably be extremely difficult, however, as both he and Crivreen had an unhealthy attachment to Narcion.

  “Where are the wraiths?” I asked.

  “Not far off. They are watching us, waiting for us to lower our guard,” said Narcion.

  “How can you know that?” I asked.

  “It comes with being a Sac’a’rith. We can sense the unnatural creatures and sometimes read their feelings.”

  I wanted to question that statement, but as a magus I had to admit it was as good as any answer I could give about my own powers. In the past century the universe as we knew it had gone through such a dramatic change that supernatural powers had gone from being the stuff of children’s stories to becoming an integrated part of society. Answers like his would have offended the scientific elite of the previous era, but had become the best answers available.

  As we approached the control center of the station I noticed that all its blast doors were closed also. With the power off, there was no additional shield layer, but those doors were formidable enough on their own. “I presume that the manual release for those doors is only on the inside?” I asked.

  “Of course, otherwise they would not be very effective at securing the command center from attack,” he said.

  “How are we going to get in?” I asked.

  “The problem with the typical mundane, as you call them, is that they focus their protection on doors. I doubt my cutter could make it through that blast door, but the wall next to it should not be a problem. Keep an eye out for trouble while I work,” he said.

  I did my best to watch the area while I tried to make sense of Narcion. It was apparent at this point that he was some kind of magus, but he hardly ever used any power. He never tried to solve a problem with magical means, and barely even seemed to acknowledge the existence of power. Being a magus, he should have been able to train Zah’rak as well as I could, yet he did not seem to have tried before he met up with us. That did not make sense, as it would have been a major advantage for him to have telepathic communication with Zah’rak.

  I didn’t get to think much more about that, as I saw something drifting towards us in the darkness. “Narcion, alert!”

  He looked in the direction in which I was pointing and drew his knives. “Stay behind me and try to conserve your power. I do not know how many there are.”

  Soon there were three creatures moving towards us from three different directions. “They have us surrounded.”

  “True, but there are only three of them. Make sure your personal shield is ready.”

  He was calm and collected in the face of three of the deadliest creatures I had ever heard of. He seemed to have utterly no fear of anything. In a mercenary that was a good trait but, if not mixed with some realistic humility, a trait that could get you killed.

  As the creatures approached I felt an unnatural fear pass over and through me. It became hard to stop my hands from shaking, and I could not match the wraiths’ gaze. I was not confident I could even move, never mind help Narcion in this fight.

  Fortunately, I did not need the reminder about the shield, as I had cast that before leaving the ship. There was no way I was going to wander around a station that had an unknown number of wraiths without some protection. I knew from watching them fight that, as good as the armor was that Narcion had provided, it was no match for their claws.

  I am not sure what happened next, or in what order. It all happened too fast for me to process. Without any warning the three wraiths came flying down the hall towards us. Narcion seemed to move with even greater speed in response. The grace and fluidity of his movements as he sprang towards one of the wraiths seemed more befitting a cat than a man.

  I had barely had time to register the first fight when he was already moving to the second wraith. I turned to face the last wraith, which was moving towards me at great speed. I had a split moment of fear and indecision on how to proceed, and in that moment it closed the distance between us and swung one of its claws at me.

  Instinctively I threw up my arms to block its attack and its claws slammed into my shielding, sending me flying backwards into the wall. Stunned, it took me a moment to get my senses back, then it was on me again. This time I used the wall as a brace and kicked out with my shielded foot, hitting the creature square in its chest. As it went flying backwards I stood to cast, but Narcion must have finished with the second wraith, as he followed after the one I had kicked and quickly finished it off.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Yeah, but I suspect I will have a nasty bruise from that blow,” I said.

  He smiled. “A bruised arm beats being a corpse any day. There are yet more wraiths, so get yourself ready for when they come, and I will get back to cutting.”

  Once I was able to calm my nerves enough, I recast my personal shield spell. The two contacts with the wraith had weakened it, and I did not need it failing on me during the next fight.

  It was not much longer until we were into the command center. “Where are the bodies?”

 
; “Good question,” responded Narcion. “We need to disable any defensive systems or other lockouts before main power is restored.”

  “Okay,” I said, and we went to work searching the room for anything that might cause us problems when power was restored. I was still a bit shaken from the fight. I doubted I would sleep well later that night, if indeed ever again.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “Zah’rak, you and Criveen go to Main Engineering and see if you can get power restored. I’ll take Felix and head to Central Command,” said Narcion.

  “You sure it’s safe to split up?” I asked.

  “Zah’rak, you’re more than ready for this. Now go,” he said.

  “Sure.” I did not quite understand what he meant by that, but I knew better than to question it. “Crivreen, are you ready?”

  “Yes,” he responded.

  We left Narcion’s cruiser and drifted through the weightless vacuum of space through what was left of the docking arm attachment. It was an odd sensation to float through space like this. Everything seemed so peaceful; there was no sound in the vacuum of space around us, and the station had no lights. Behind us was Narcion’s cruiser sitting silently and almost completely blacked out. For those few moments, it was easy to believe that all was well everywhere. The knowledge that we were floating towards a station that was probably filled with dead people trying to kill us kept me from getting lost in the peace of the moment.

  “We should find an intact airlock,” said Crivreen.

  “But there is no power. None of them will be working,” I said.

  “We don’t need it to be working. For whatever reason, mundanes like to put windows in their doors, so we will be able to teleport in.”

  “Let me guess: if you designed it, you would leave out the windows?” I asked.

  “No, I would leave out the airlock completely. It’s a waste of space and resources for us,” he said.

  I thought about that as we drifted towards an airlock he had found. The only reason for an airlock was to keep atmosphere in when opening the door to the outside. If you never had any need to open a door, that did make an airlock a bit useless. This world of magecraft was different in so many subtle ways that it seemed as if I had crossed into a whole new reality.