The Archimage's Fourth Daughter

by Lyndon Hardy

  Jake came out of his momentary shock and interposed his own blade to block Angus’ thrust, and the blade skidded harmlessly over Fig’s shoulder.

  Angus grunted and disengaged. He retreated, swinging his dagger back and forth between his two assailants.

  Fig instinctively moved a step to the right. Jake watched what he was doing and paced an equal amount to the left. If they could come at the exile from two different directions, they might have a chance.

  Fig took a tentative breath and immediately gasped. His lungs seared as if they were on fire. The air of the room was hot, unbelievably hot. He remembered a trip to the Arabian Peninsula when he was a boy — 131 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade. But as will sapping as that was, it was nothing compared to this. He had to withdraw, back to the large main floor before it was too late.

  Fig glanced at Jake. There was panic in the other man’s eyes. Together, they hastily beat a retreat back through the open door. Angus followed them to the doorway, fangs bared and waiving his dagger. He through his head back and growled.

  As the pair watched, the Heretic reversed the grip on his dagger. He raised it past his ear and focused on Fig’s chest. Involuntarily, Fig took another step backward, but then stopped. No matter what the cost, this was not the behavior of one who had pledged his sword to his queen.

  Angus’ eyed narrowed. Fig imagined the calculation going on in the exile’s mind, or at least what he hoped was. If the dagger were thrown, it would give Jake an opening to strike. And to venture into the cooler warehouse floor to retrieve the blade, the air temperature would shift the advantage to his remaining foe. No, the dagger was going to remain in the alien’s hand.

  Fig thought furiously. Two to one. The exile was outnumbered, exactly as Ashley said he would be. He and Jake should be able to subdue him. But the first encounter, as brief as it had been, made clear their opponent was a skilled fighter. One swift movement and his own weapon had been completely neutralized. He and Jake had never even handled a sword until Briana gave them a few brief instructions earlier in the day.

  Disregard the pounding heart, Fig told himself. It was the kiln. The kiln was the key. He surveyed the expanse of the warehouse and saw what he had hoped for on the far wall near the loading dock door.

  “Jake, stay where you are. Keep him occupied.” He started backpedaling as rapidly as he could, sword still drawn.

  “Wait!” Jake called out. “Where are you going? I can’t take on this guy only on my own.”

  “I’ll be back in a second. Keep menacing him. It’s a standoff.”

  Fig reached the warehouse wall. He studied the boxes mounted there and then jerked on the biggest switch. Instantly the warehouse plunged into a deep gloom. The encrusted windows let in only the smallest glimmer of light. But more importantly, the spark igniting the fire in the kiln went out. The fan blowing hot air silenced. It might take a while, but the air inside the back office would start to cool. Fig reached up and flicked on his miner’s lamp. Across the warehouse floor, Jake did the same.

  Angus looked over his shoulder to see what had happened. Fig moved until he was on a line perpendicular to the doors opening. Jake did the same on its other side. Together they converged on the exile step by step.

  The pair closed within a few feet of their opponent, who then had to look rapidly from side to side to see who might dare strike first. Other than that, no one moved.

  Fig heard footsteps behind him and glanced to see Briana enter from the front office.

  “So that is what they look like!” she exclaimed. As she approached, she positioned her own dagger alert. There was a big smile on her face.

  “From what Maurice phoned to us, there was only a single exile who did not use the portal,” she continued. He was not left by Oscar’s hut. He is here!”

  Angus’ eyes widened. “What kind of being uses females for fighting,” he spat. “A disgrace. It is well you should all die.”

  “You speak English!” Briana marveled. “How? How did you learn?”

  “A thousand of your years is a long time to study and prepare,” Angus said. “But no matter. Surrender to me, and I will arrange that the three of you can be spared.” He waved back at the silent kiln. “Just as I can heat the air to comfort, I can cool it as well. We have many structures of cold where I am from.”

  “Your plan will not come to pass,” Briana said. “We know about the SF6 and the volcanoes.”

  “The microphone and computer in the front office,” Fig said. “That is how you planned to do it, right? Broadcast the incantation that starts the catalytic reaction. Speakers on the slopes. The rest of the seven hundred are not involved at all. You are a one-man show.”

  Angus did not reply. He clasped both arms to his sides and shivered slightly. He lifted his head and growled again, although this time not as ferociously as before.

  “He’s weakening,” Jake said. “All we have to do is wait a little longer, and then he probably will not even be able to lift his weapon. All we have to do is wait and then — ”

  “And then slash his throat,” Fig cut in. “It is too dangerous for him to live.”

  “What about the others?” Briana asked. “Maurice said they were using the portal to go somewhere else.”

  “Well, then torture him first,” Fig said. “Find out what the rest are up to so they can be stopped, too.”

  Angus interrupted with a laugh. “The others? I think not. They are all happy rotting in their holes.”

  “You’re lying, Jake said. “We can’t believe anything you’re saying.”

  “What do we do with him then?” Fig asked.

  Decisions

  BRIANA PACED in a small circle again. The standoff continued for what must have been two hours, but finally the exile collapsed in a shivering heap. Jake and Fig looked at her for what to do next, but she had no ready answer. She needed to think.

  To buy more time, she directed the pair to clothe the alien in the hoodie and other garments containing the strange inserts. A high degree of thermal isolation, Fig had explained. They bound and gagged him and let him wiggle on the floor as his body heat began to warm his numbness. The lights were turned back on, but not the power to the kiln.

  The paper on the floor was covered in a strange script. The only other place she had seen such symbols were on the inside of the portal. The length was about would be expected for an incantation, however. It did look like this single exile was acting alone.

  Ashley had arrived with the warning the thuglings sooner or later would give up the chase and return. Whatever their own little group was going to do with Angus, they had to do it soon.

  “Ursula will keep quiet at her desk,” Briana had said.

  “And we can leave a note on the small door leading to the loading dock, telling the thuglings to go away until they are called back,” Ashley had said. “They will probably want to go to a bar somewhere and release their frustrations after losing me on highway nineteen.”

  Briana frowned as she saw the other three were watching her as she paced. No one offered any more opinions. Not even Ashley. It was irritating, if nothing else. When a big decision had to be made, one of immediate life or death, they had shied away. And Maurice was not even here. Somehow, he was the moral compass of the group. His absence could not have happened at a worse time. But it was her quest they had reminded her. She was the one who had to decide and she alone.

  The easy answer was to dispatch the exile. He clearly was evil. Merely escaping from imprisonment was not enough for him. Every living soul, every living animal and plant on the Earth was to be destroyed so he and his kind — a mere seven hundred or so, could be free.

  But to do so was murder, pure and simple. There was no way around that. Yes, there was bloodshed recorded repeatedly in the sagas. But those were the tales of others. Decisions they faced, not her. Could she do it? Plunge a dagger into the heart of someone bound and gagged?

  Or torture first in order to learn more? On M
urdina, only barbarians engaged in the hideous practice. More than one sorcerer said such a thing did not work. Victims would agree to anything suggested to them in order to stop the pain. Only by the craft could one look without error into someone else’s mind.

  She looked at each of her companions, one at a time. They did not refuse to look back. No, they entrusted her to make the decision, whatever it may be. She recalled a quote she had read when she had surfed the internet what now seemed like so long ago.

  ‘Leadership is not dictated. It is granted by those willing to be led.’

  Briana smiled at that. It did give her a small degree of comfort. She was not sure how it had happened, but even with Ashley taking over the task of detailed planning, Jake and Fig — and probably Maurice as well have given her that grant. When she returned to Murdina, perhaps that would be sufficient for the story — the grand story she would be able to tell.

  She looked at ‘Mr. Angus’ as Ursula called him, straining at his bounds, struggling to be free. Was ‘Angus’ an alias? Maurice had phoned that only ‘Dinton’ remained.

  She pushed the speculation away. The label was not important, only the decision about what to do. Confinement is what prevented him from executing all the steps of his plan. Confinement. Perhaps that was the only answer needed.

  The caverns of the exiles were most likely empty now. The one on the floor before them was the last one left. And imprisonment there had worked for a thousand years. With proper barriers to influences from the outside, no access to the world above, especially to the internet, they probably could serve for additional millennia.

  Like the release of a crushing weight that had pinned her to the ground, Briana felt the burden roll aside. “We will travel to Oscar’s hut,” she said. “Travel there for three reasons. First, Maurice was last heard from there. We must find out what happened to him.

  “Second, the portal door may still be there.

  “Lastly, we can return this exile to the caverns. With no swathing or access to the internet, he will not be able to threaten this orb again.”

  “We just can’t carry him out of here bound and gagged for any passerby to see,” Fig said.

  “Easily solved,” Ashley joined in. “Put him in, I don’t know, a blanket or a rug. Haul him to the hut on a rented truck.” She tried to smooth a business suit that she no longer wore, and then looked at Briana. “Well done,” she said.

  “And I am hungry,” Jake complained. “The adrenaline rush from the swordplay must take a lot of energy. It has made me famished.”

  “Okay, one to go and rent the truck, one to get the blanket and cuffs, another to get take out, and one to stand guard until we return,” Briana agreed.

  “Um, the first rule of Dungeons and Dragons is not to split your party,” Fig said.

  “Can’t be helped,” Briana said. She was getting into her stride now. Once the hard decisions were made, the rest were easy. “Who wants to be the one to stand guard?”

  “I will,” Jake said. He flicked on his miner’s lamp. “Douse the lights on your way out. If any of the thugs do come back, they won’t be able to see where they are going and then surely leave.”

  “It will only be for an hour at most. He will not manage to get away.” Briana said. She smiled at Jake. “All of us, together. We have made great progress today.”

  She played with a curl for a moment. “About the takeout. Let’s pick a place serving desserts.” Being a leader did have some perks.

  The Loyal Minion

  ANGUS TRIED to push the thought away, but it stubbornly remained. If what the natives said were true, then, except for his stubborn elder brother, all the rest of his kind had gone away. To where? Back home to face again the wrath of those who opposed them? Or striking out to some new place where there was warmth, hot breezes, and the delicious air?

  And how was he even found out about, anyway? The natives should have shown complete shock when they encountered him. Instead, their words sounded as if the existence of the Heretics was common knowledge.

  Angus sighed, something he had not done in as long as he could remember. He had been close, oh so close, to achieving liberty not only for himself, but for everyone else. Freedom for almost a thousand bodies. He would be exalted even though he was the youngest, hailed as the new flock leader of them all!

  He glared up at the native with the light on his head. It was growing steadily dimmer. Perhaps soon it would go out altogether. He wriggled in his bounds. They were a tiny bit looser but not much. And even if he did manage to get free and speak the two incantations — the first to start the catalytic buildup of the SF6, and the second to break it, to blast the gas into the air, what then?

  Only he and Dinton were left. No mates, no concubines, no one to laud his feats. An entire planet to do with what he would… but to what purpose? Why climb a mountain if there were no one to shout to others how amazing was the assent. Why tell a joke if there were no one to laugh? Why feel lust running hot if there were no one to quench it in the warmth of their sweet bodies?

  Instead… he had heard what the young female had spoken. Returned to prison, the prison that had already confined him for a thousand years. Worse yet, his only company would be the overbearing pomposity of his brother.

  It was not right! Angus could not help himself from roaring in frustration, in sorrow, in despair.

  HOW LONG he roared and beat his head against the hard floor, Angus could not tell. The little room had plunged into darkness as the lamp battery drained, but his guard did not seem to care. Every time he made noise as he struggled against his bounds, he felt the prick of the sword tip on his chest.

  Then, there was a tap on the door.

  “About time,” the native warrior called out. “What did you do, visit every restaurant in a mall?”

  The door swung open, but the blackness did not change.

  “Well?” the guard persisted. “What did you bri — ”

  Angus heard a dull thump against the metal helmet of the sentinel and then the crash of his body to the ground.

  “Mr. Angus, are you all right?” the soft voice came through the doorway. “I think the baseball bat I had stored besides my desk disabled the bad man who was here with you.” She paused. “He must have been bad, right?”

  It was Ursula, gentle, caring, na�ve Ursula Price. Could it be? Was she still here?

  A sudden burst of new energy surged through him.

  “A minute, Ms. Price. I mean Ursula. I first must collect my thoughts.”

  Even if he did away with his unpleasant brother, he would not have to be alone. Just as swathing protected from the cold, it also could from the heat if the immediate surroundings were somehow cooled. It would be a small flock to be sure, and one tainted with the traits of an inferior species. But at least someone to talk to, someone to carry out his orders, respond to his every wish.

  And who knows, his imagination began to race. Perhaps with the help of the crafts, maybe even interspecies breeding might be possible. And yes, for diversity, rather than eliminating his brother, he could share.

  Like a steam engine of the natives leaving a station, the momentum of his will began to grow. The microphone and the computer. They were less than two hundred paces away! There was no real need to wait for the confirmation from Bagana so that everything could be tightly synchronized. Speak the necessary words now, and the reactions at Etna and Kilauea would begin — begin now!

  Also send the go-ahead message to Bagana. It would take a few days, but the incantation would start there as well. The buildup would lag that of the other two volcanoes, but that would have to do.

  He was not thwarted after all! Except for this single chosen one, all of the inferior natives yet would perish. He would still transform this orb, reach the end of the road he had embarked upon so many orbits ago.

  “Do you have some sort of knife in your desk, Ursula?” he called out. “Something with a sharp blade?”

  “Yes, Mr
. Angus. A box cutter for opening packages when they arrive. But please, tell me. I do not understand what is happening?”

  “Excellent, Ursula. Go get the tool and then return to me. I… I am a little tied up at the moment, and you can help me get free. Then after I use the computer in the front office for a bit, we will take a… yes, take a vacation together. Somewhere special for a few days and then celebrate the beginning of the end.”

  “A vacation? A few days, Mr. Angus? How many?”

  “I am not yet sure, Ursula. It will take some measurements first to establish the rate of buildup. Then I will pick the correct moment. I will make sure the timing of the final words will be exactly right.”

  Now, with a clear path before him, Angus took the luxury of letting his thoughts wander. Thaling and the others, he mused. I wonder, where did they go?

  Return from Exile

  MAURICE PUSHED open the portal door and staggered out. The sun loomed high overhead, yellow green, painfully bright. It filled up too much of the sky, too bright to discern anything with unshaded eyes. The ground underfoot was featureless, flat, sandy, and coarse. Obviously the work of intelligent beings.

  Arrayed in front of him like a convention of festival revelers were the hundreds of exiles he had seen come here, one by one. They no longer wore any swathing. Most had on no clothing at all. Instead, they coupled with urgency, some standing face to face, others, tightly embraced, rolled in a frenzy over the ground. A few grouped in threes and fours, intertwined and growling lustily.

  Maurice blinked. They looked like… like great apes but covered with dark brown hair rather than gray. Noses protruding rather than flat. Fangs exposed on each side of the mouth. Not grotesque, but deeply disturbing all the same. The eyes. The eyes betrayed the intelligence behind and hinted at rage and cruelty.

  As he watched transfixed, two nearby pairs finished, and the males flopped on their backs, arms outspread in satisfaction. The females threw their heads back, and, to Maurice, appeared to laugh. They came bounding toward him, and he took a hasty step backwards, bumped into the portal door, and flinging up his arms in defense.