Wayfarer (The Empyrean Chronicle)

by Siana, Patrick

  He disappeared and it didn’t take much imagination on Danica’s part to guess his tactic. She threw herself into a somersault. As she rolled to her feet she swung her whip in a wide arc overhead hoping to catch the time mage as he teleported into a flanking position. She gritted her teeth, bracing herself for impact, but her wild swing did not find purchase. Footsteps alighted behind her.

  She spun about and then realized her miscalculation, as she heard his footfalls at her heels. Her clever adversary had teleported not behind her, but above her, hoping to drop down upon her unawares. Fortunately for Danica, he hadn’t expected her to charge forward and he had misjudged his landing. Still, he was close and took advantage of his proximity, which rendered the superior range of her whip useless, and slashed down at her.

  Danica caught his blade on the long haft of her whip, while she took up the chain in her other hand. She snapped a quick kick from her knee to purchase precious time. He doubled over with a grunt of surprise as the blade of her foot bit into his abdomen. Her left hand found the short half-hilt that affixed the blade of the whip-dagger to the chain, and with a cry of triumph she darted a rising stab into his throat.

  The sudden change in direction snapped the elf’s head back with such force that Danica was certain she had broken his neck. He rocked back onto his heels and looked stupidly at her with glassy eyes before he fell onto his back. His legs swung up and over his supine body and he rolled over onto his face and then slid to stop. Danica’s first impulse was to run for the chamber that contained the Infinity Chest, but she knew that the time mage was clever and resilient, and if he lived he would pursue her.

  Danica danced back a step and swung her whip up, arcing it over her head to gain momentum for a coup de grace. The stunned elf heard the hiss of the whip and pressed himself onto a knee even as the whip descended toward his skull. With inhuman alacrity, which Danica attributed to some secret time mage Arcanum, he raised an arm to intercept the strike. The whip wrapped around his forearm and he gripped it tightly in his hand. His delicate features contorted into a bestial mien by the supreme effort he exerted.

  He leaned back and with all of his strength pulled Danica toward him, his black dagger propped to impale her. Danica slowly lost ground to his superior strength, but she dare not abandon her hold on her whip and face him weaponless.

  “It is too bad for you,” he rasped, “that you didn’t have the time to take the sheath off your whip-dagger. Otherwise you surely would have killed me, even if you did miss my windpipe.”

  “It is an error I will remedy shortly,” spat Danica, who pulled back against him, her fury lending her strength.

  As she inched closer to him he said, “This is a soul-knife. It will trap your soul once I stab you with it. Now, think on this: there are many timelines, but do you have many souls? If I imprison your spirit, will you drop in all other timelines? Will you fail to pave the way for your brother’s return across all infinity and not just in my own personal timestream? This philosophical question has plagued me for some time, but, fortunately, it is one that will be answered presently.”

  Danica felt her magic well up inside her. The world darkened around the edges as she channeled more energy than she had ever even conceived of harnessing through the deep gateway in the center of her consciousness. All she could see was the smug elf and the bright and black corona of his aura. She funneled her power into her hand, as if performing a healing, but she had something else in mind entirely. “I want to say, sorry to disappoint you, but my father taught me not to tell a lie.”

  “Burn,” Danica said, and then sent her magic ripping through the enchanted ore of the whip.

  Arcs of blue lightning snapped along the whip-dagger from haft to sheathed blade. The elf went stiff at once and spat a charm, but it died on his lips. His mouth opened in a silent scream as every muscle in his body contracted in convulsions. Liquid light danced up his arm and then rippled through his body.

  At once exhausted from the ordeal and the sudden expulsion of her power, Danica pulled back. The elf continued to writhe on his back, blood and spittle pouring from his mouth in equal measure. Danica was unsure if she had killed him or not, but she knew that she had already wasted too much time on him. She had to get into the chamber with the Infinity Chest and be ready before the containment field went down. Now, more than ever, she realized how essential it was that she complete her task.

  With a flick of her wrist she recalled her whip-dagger and raced down the hall to the sixth door on the right. She hazarded a glance at the fallen elf, who remained inert, twitching occasionally. With a shaking hand she input the correct code into the tumblers and cast open the door, careful to see that it sealed behind her. She wanted no more surprises this day.

  She approached the containment field and checked her watch. She had minutes to spare before the field went down. She had made it. Tears of relief poured down her cheeks. Even though no one was present to see her, she felt the bitter sting of shame as she sobbed openly.

  After she returned the spellbook to the chest, Danica took some time to gather herself. She didn’t want her comrades to see her ruffled, and she wanted to be prepared if any more surprises awaited her upon exiting the chamber. Once she mastered herself she opened the door and reentered the central corridor of the vault. Her heart sank into her guts.

  The elf was gone.

  Danica brandished her whip, and reached out with her senses, seeing if she could feel anything. Though not yet fully developed, the secret lessons her father had inured in her and Elias remained with her, buried beneath her surface thoughts, and she had come to trust her fledgling extrasensory perceptions. Satisfied that no imminent threat loomed, she crept toward the exit of the vault on cautious toes.

  She pressed the ponderous vault door open a crack and spoke into the open space. “It’s just me, hold your fire.”

  She slowly opened the door and stepped through. As she had guessed, her companions lay in wait. Leoman and Bryn were perched at the top of the stairwell. The former held iridescent globes of yellow-white energy in each hand, while Bryn held a throwing dagger in one hand and a teardrop of orange flame hovered above the other. Lar lay in wait with his back pressed against the outer wall of the vault, his blade held at the ready to impale whoever stepped through the doorway.

  Danica closed the door behind her. “It is done. I made it.”

  Bryn and Leoman raced down the staircase as Lar took Danica by a shoulder. “You defeated him?” Leoman asked, glancing furtively behind his shoulder and around the room.

  Danica managed only to nod and crumpled against Lar, as her legs seemed to have lost their strength.

  “How, Danni?” asked Bryn. “How did you do it?”

  “Let’s get back to the palace first. I feel too exposed out here. Leoman, I think you should get together any wizards you can trust and close the outer seal.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” said the Librarian. “Let’s get you out of here, dear. You’ve been through quite enough for one day.”

  “For a lifetime,” Danica said and then passed out.

  Chapter 52

  The Return

  Seven Winters traced an idle finger along the wall of the great hallway. He had recently been taken on as a palace page. Eckard, the master of pages, had taken notice of him. Seven thought it was probably because of his friendship with Elias. He had worked in the stables since he could remember, and he missed the horses and the open air even though he had seen wondrous things in the palace, but he figured working in the palace would bring him one step closer to becoming a Marshal one day.

  Though he missed the horses, he missed Elias more.

  He didn’t think that he was the only one either. He had talked about it with Lady Danica yesterday. She had looked tired, or drawn, as his mother would have said, before she died. Like Elias and Danica, he too was an orphan now. Lady Danica had said that everyone was talking about Elias so much because the memory of what happened last fall was sti
ll fresh in their minds, and people were afraid. The coup against the crown, temporary though it was, showed how quickly life could change, and not for the better.

  In a way, Lady Danica had said, Elias wasn’t just a Marshal, he was a symbol, just as a Marshal’s badge was a symbol of what he stood for. He reminded folk that they had a chance to prevail against forces that seemed so much bigger than them. They had a reason to be afraid and confused again, and now that the man that had personified their emergence from a dark time in their lives was gone, people had lost heart.

  Seven supposed that one man could make a difference, though that’s not what he was taught when he was young, but really he just missed his friend.

  Seven couldn’t afford a watch, but he knew that he had already wasted too much time and should report back to the page’s wing on the ground floor. He turned to leave the royal wing and make his way back when a large commotion erupted down the hallway. Men were calling out as if raising an alarm but something was different about it then the other alarms he had heard raised.

  On impulse Seven raced through the royal wing toward the cries. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Something had happened. Something big had happened. When Seven rounded a corner and saw what it was he nearly fell right over, but he quickly regained control over his legs and turned at once and ran the other way.

  He knew of at least one person in the palace that would want to know about what had just happened even more than him.

  †

  “What’s all the fuss about?” asked Danica as she peeked out of the door of the room she shared with Bryn.

  She had spent the weeks since her encounter with the dark elf pouring over the ciphers and diagrams she had been able to copy from the time mage’s spellbook in the short time she had possessed it. She cross referenced the ornate spellforms with any similar spells she could find in Arcalum’s exhaustive supply of books and asked just about anyone who would listen for further clues or suggestions. It was a trying endeavor, but it was the only way she could think of to help reach her brother, or else stop the elf should he return, or, as was more likely, when he would return. She knew in her heart that the elf was not dead, that she had injured him and he was off licking his wounds, but the question remained, for how long?

  She had left express instructions with the Whiteshields guarding the royal suites that she not be disturbed.

  One of the Whiteshields stepped into the queen’s breakfast room and said, “Apologies, Lady Duana. There is a page here who says he knows you. He says it’s urgent. We tried to turn him away, but the lad is in a state.”

  “What’s this page’s name?”

  “Seven Winters,” said the Whiteshield with an apologetic expression.

  Danica’s fatigue melted away under the warm light of a smile that she felt down to her core. Elias had a special place in his heart for the precocious stable hand turned page, as did she. “Please do send him in.”

  Having been within earshot and presumably held back by the other Whiteshield, Seven burst into the room, spots of color high on his cheeks. The boy had been running. Wasting no time on pleasantries Seven said at once, “Lady Danica, you must come at once! Something has happened in Lady Bryn’s old rooms!”

  Danica went cold. “Raise the alarm, then fetch Ogden, Bryn—everyone.”

  “Aye, milady!” said the Whiteshield, but Danica had already turned to go fetch her weapons. She didn’t take the time to don her leather armor, but she strapped on her short-sword and buckled her whip-dagger to her belt. When she came back into the breakfast room she found Seven still awaiting her and they took off down the hall at a sprint.

  She heard excited voices as she rounded the corner to Bryn’s former rooms, but she didn’t take the time to register their tone. She skidded before the open door and drew her sword and whip simultaneously, as Blackwell had taught her.

  Far from the bloody scene she had expected, Danica found at least twenty Red and Whiteshields and Marshals had squeezed into Bryn’s sitting rooms. At an utter loss, she marched past the throng, who went silent to a man as they noticed her, and made her way toward the bedroom. Blackwell stood before the containment field that housed the rift with his back to her. He stood next to a man who wore a rich hunter-green cloak hemmed in silver filigree. Danica reached out with her senses to probe the stranger and her weapons clattered to the floor.

  Elias turned. “You’ve done a good job with the containment field.”

  Tears pooled in Danica’s eyes. “I suppose you think you’d have done better?”

  Elias shrugged. “I’ve had more practice, so I can’t fault you. But without the containment field to stabilize the rift, I never would have been able to return, so I suppose I ought to thank you.”

  The siblings rushed together and fell into each others’ arms. If anyone present, who watched them embrace in silence, ever thought it unseemly that the Duana siblings wept openly in public, they never said a word about it until the end of their days.

  The throng of spectators parted for the second time in as many minutes as the Lucerne Sentinels, led by Lar and including even the queen, burst into the bedroom. In mere seconds panic turned to shock turned to tears of joy.

  Bryn stepped into the room feeling disoriented. She had the strangest feeling that this had happened before, though she knew that to be impossible. A witching memory her father had called it. Was Elias truly returned, or was this another of her bizarre and painfully realistic dreams? Her thoughts turned to Danica, who had become her closest friend and confidant, and who had suffered the hallucinogenic night terrors brought on by the demonic Slade. Bryn believed she understood Danica better now.

  “Elias, is it you?” Bryn asked in a tremulous voice.

  Elias broke away from Danica and went to her. Bryn pressed a hand against his chest gingerly as if she were afraid he would dematerialize right before her.

  Elias took her shaking hands in his own. “Yes, it’s me. Thanks to you and Danica I found a way back.

  “Timelines are crossing and overlapping, and with each collision it becomes worse, and that is why you feel so strange. You’re at the epicenter of a temporal paradox, as am I, but it’s my fault that it’s come to this. I failed you once, but I mean to see that history doesn’t repeat itself.”

  Elias looked up. “I’m never leaving you, any of you, ever again. Peidra is my home now, and I cannot tell you how happy I am to be back. I thought that I might not see any of you ever again.”

  “You’re wrong about one thing,” said the queen.

  “What’s that, Your Grace?” asked Elias with a wry smile.

  “Lucerne, not just Peidra is your home,” said Eithne. “You belong here at the heart of our realm as much as any man. We built you barracks for your men in your absence, and don’t you think Oberon would have let me spent all that coin for naught.”

  Moved to emotion beyond propriety, Elias took each of his companions in arm and hugged them tightly, excepting not even little Seven Winters.

  After he had greeted all of his friends, Ogden asked, “Elias, what do you mean when you said that timelines were colliding?”

  “I traveled through time and then into another timeline,” Elias said, hazarding another furtive glance to the containment field. “There is another rogue time mage who has been opposing me and corrupting the timelines further. He is in possession of a powerful artifact, a Grimoire that contains all of the secrets of time travel. We must get it back. Next to sealing the rift permanently, that must be our prime goal.”

  Ogden shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

  “We haven’t the time to discuss it further right now,” said Elias. “We have to move. Mordum has been monitoring the rift. He will have sensed my return by now. He will try to stop us.”

  Ogden swallowed his questions. “What must we do?”

  “For starters,” said Elias, “I’ll need my sword.”

  Chapter 53

  The Battle for Time


  Elias paced before the containment field. “He’ll come when I take it down. Be prepared for anything. He may have allies or he may be alone.” Elias looked each of his companions hard in the eyes: Ogden, Danica, Bryn, Phinneas, Blackwell, Lar, Ronald Oberon, and even the queen.

  They had begged Eithne to stay behind but she had refused. The task of safeguarding Galacia had been given to House Denar, she said, and she vowed not to shirk that task, or ever be left in the dark again. A cohort of Whiteshields and Marshals, measuring the finest swords in Galacia, stood at the ready to ward their monarch, and their realm.

  “If he is alone, he is not to be underestimated,” Elias continued. “He has had unknown years with the Grimoire, and has grasped what may be the most dangerous Arcanum ever known. He is the strongest wizard I have ever encountered. With the power of the Grimoire he can breach not only time, but space.”

  Ogden rolled up his sleeves, his expression grave. “What exactly does that mean, Elias?”

  Elias made an expansive gesture. “He can disappear before your eyes, only to step out of a dimensional distortion behind you and impale you with his favored weapon—a soul-knife. I trust your imagination can supply you with the function of this weapon.”

  “All right,” said Danica, “this fellow makes Sarad Mirengi look like a puppy dog. What’s the plan?”

  “Everyone put their backs to a wall so that he can’t flit around the room flanking us. I will be at center stage when the field comes down, and will engage him at once. You all do your best to take shots at him or engage his flank as you’re able. If I know Mordum he has some contingency plan, so stay on guard.

  “He may try to escape if the tide of the battle turns against him. This we cannot allow. Reclaiming the Grimoire is our main goal. When he gates here he will leave his portal ajar, though you will only be able to see it with your arcane sight. Still, it will take him time to gather his power to reactivate his gate fully.”