It wasn’t just the dead boy that had worried him. After all, he was a healer who showed no emotion at death.
No, it was the runemark buried under the snow that was now melting. A rune that surrounded the boy.
Later, when we arrived back at the camp, Siddel was so exhausted that he had to grip the spine of a chair just to stay upright. I know the feeling, buddy, I thought, sympathetic for him.
He was standing inside Red’s tent, at the entrance. He had cast a spell of light, revealing a hollow map display of the surrounding area, there for us all to see.
“Hunters find four more runes,” he said. “Here. Here. Here. There.”
Listening from across the tent were Pendras, Red, two more old mages, and me. If I was honest, I didn’t deserve to be there. Not if you took hierarchy into account. But Pendras explained that I had found the boy and moved the boulder, and this had bought me a stake in learning about it.
“Runenmer,” said Red. “A circle. See?”
“Sorry, no, elder,” said Siddel.
Red looked like he was going to get out of his chair. Given he seemed old enough to snap in half when taking a step, I was surprised.
But rather than get up, he performed a series of micro movements with his hand. A flash of light later, and a small twig floated from the floor and over to the map.
Wow. That was telekinesis from a double-circle mage, one who didn’t need to – and couldn’t – perform a series of stances to cast his magic.
Come to think of it, that was something to make note of. The older a mage, the less supple his or her body. Did mages lose spells as they got older simply because they couldn’t hold their stances?
Anyway, it was not the case here. Red could cast a telekinesis spell using his fingers. And he was such a powerful mage that maybe he could control a boulder from far away…
No. No motive.
And there was the rune, too. I didn’t want to get rid of my suspicious instincts, since suspicion can be healthy, but I was off the mark suspecting Red.
“Circle,” said Red, pointing at each rune mark on the map.
“Ah,” said Siddel, nodding.
I hadn’t seen it at first, but I understood now. After finding the first rune, Pendras had ordered that the search for food to be ended, and that instead we look for more runes. This was done at the behest of Red, who suspected something sinister.
We had searched all that day, rested at night, and continued all the next. Eventually, we had found four more runes drawn on the ground in light, each one dozens of miles apart.
Now, seeing them represented on the map, I could see what Red was saying; they did look like they were the beginnings of a circle.
My memory strayed back to a few nights ago now. To the portal opening in the sky, to the skinny creature that came from it, the one who made a circle with runes and summoned demons from them.
Was he doing the same thing now, but on a grander scale? Spreading his runes for miles so that he could make them form a giant circle, into which he would summon his eviscerating demons?
Red made the twig float over the map, to a place where no runes had been found yet. “Next,” he said. “Then, circle. Then…”
He didn’t finish the sentence. Let’s be honest; he didn’t need to. Siddel and I had told everyone what happened that night when the portal opened, but Pendras and Red hadn’t been surprised as I had imagined.
I mean, if you told me that a long-legged freak fell from the sky, summoned a bunch of demons, and killed four people in barely a blink, I’d be a little shocked. Hell, I had been there, and I still couldn’t fully comprehend it.
No, there was something else here. Pendras and Red already knew about this thing.
Pendras got out of his seat and approach the map now. “Bigger?” he said.
Siddel held his hand above his head. He made a simple stance, just by bending his middle and ring fingers.
Amazing. Could he cast spells using his fingers, instead of having to torture his body into martial art-like stances?
Whatever he did, the map grew until it showed more of the terrain around the camp. Maybe ten miles in each direction.
“Move camp,” said Pendras. “Da fleck nam is tai. Time to go, Red. Must move.”
“East?” said Siddel.
“Na. Ogres. Na east, un na west.”
“Na west?”
“Humans.”
“Ah. Yap.”
Well, that certainly got my attention. There was a camp of humans to the west?
Part of me wanted to get up right there and then, and go find them. That would be stupid right now. The mere fact they were humans didn’t make those people friendly; plenty of humans were bastards.
“South,” said Pendras. “We must go south.”
Red shook his head. “Six runes completes circle. Aber, na neccesessar perfect circle. Can lay anywhere, and when sixth rune placed…finita.”
I thought I understood. I didn’t want to, but I knew his meaning.
The Runenmer only had to place six runes, and once the sixth was placed, they would join together, forming a sort of catchment area. It didn’t have to be in a perfect circle.
And what happened when the runes joined up?
Well, I knew that already.
Shit.
What this mean, I guessed, was that the Runenmer could lay his runes in a wide area, and once they joined up, anything within them would be eviscerated by the demons they spawned.
It meant it was useless to just move camp; all the Runenmer had to do was wait for us to settle, then place runes nearby. When he placed the sixth, they would all join up. It was a trap. A net that he could extend as far as he needed, and he’d trap us.
Things didn’t look great.
“Still early,” said Red. “Runenmer still new. Aga na da furmento. Diswigle ee an moment.”
“Huh?” I said.
Pendras ignored me, he was so wrapped up in looking at the map. Red didn’t care to repeat himself.
Only Siddel took pity on my lack of understanding. “Elder says Runenmer still young this world. Still new. Can not place runes. Not power, yet. Grows.”
“He isn’t strong enough to lay his runes? But we already saw him do that.”
“Na, Isaac. Na strong over great distance, yet. But soon.”
“Ah. So we need to go take care of him before he is strong enough to place his runes over a great distance.”
“Was? Was is take care?”
“Beat his stupid brains in, I mean. Kill him.”
“Ah. Mord. Ya.”
They didn’t waste time. That afternoon, Siddel, Pendras, and a few more mages left camp and split into three groups, each heading in a different direction. They had gone to scout for Runenmer, to try and find him.
If they could kill him while he was still new to the world, before he was strong enough to lay his runes at a distance that would entrap the clan, they might have a chance.
Here was the thing, though. I had seen the portal when it first opened. I knew the Runenmer had only just come to the world, yet they already seemed to understand a hell of a lot about him.
What did this mean? Well, only one thing, as far as I could see. He had been here before. Either him, or one like him.
If it was one like him, that meant there were more of these bastards. But if he was the only one and he had returned to the world, it meant something else.
There were cycles. Things died, or left, and they came back.
Either way, I had no part in it. Pendras seemingly didn’t trust me enough to let me join a group, no matter how much I asked. I told him I wanted to help. I told him I wasn’t scared. I mean, I was scared alright, but I refused to show it. He still refused.
This left me back in camp with the kids, the teenagers, the elderly, and the injured, as well as those mages whose spells were no use in this.
But I wasn’t going to sit on my ass.
The morning that Pendras and co departed, I
headed north, to the forests. I found the first rune, where the poor kid’s blood still stained the snow. Without fresh snowfall the stains of his death were on show, and I felt sorry for him.
I thought about how we’d found the first rune, and I could only guess one thing; the Runenmer had pinned the boy under the boulder, right on top of the rune. He’d wanted us to find it. He wanted us to know.
A mistake. He’d showed his hand too early.
There, alone in the forest except for Roddie, I got to work. I’d borrowed a shovel from the camp supplies, and now I started digging around the rune. I lifted the shovel and smashed it into the frozen ground as hard as I could. The metal clanged, and vibrations shocked under my arm.
Again and again I brought it down. And though I succeeded in smashing some of the ground, I realized this was useless.
I’d hoped I could dig the rune up, and maybe that would break it and destroy Runenmer’s chain, but it didn’t work. After an hour of work I had dug five inches into the ground around the rune, and I saw that the rune itself went deep into the ground. God knew how deep it went, but I wouldn’t be able to get it loose. So much for that.
There wasn’t much else I could do to help, but it was killing me to just walk around camp doing one chore after another. So, completing an afternoon of chopping wood for that night’s fire, I left camp again.
I headed beyond the tents and to where I practiced my spells. This time, I studied the second book Pendras had given me; Hrr-Barrer: Un gata fur Novicien.
Now, I didn’t know what this spell did, and I didn’t even know what its spell discipline was. Odds were that I didn’t have the elementals in order to cast it. I checked what I had now.
Elementals:
[Fire] x5
[Human] x4
Reading the word human still made me feel weird. I’d gained the fire elementals from killing the hell kittens, and I could use those to cast hrr-chare.
So what kind of spells could a mage cast from elementals that came from humans?
And did that mean some of the Lonehill mages looked at me enviously, wondering if it was worth killing me to get the elementals that must be inside me?
Going further, did the Lonehill mages also have elementals inside them? I guessed they must have. I hadn’t seen the healer take elementals from the boy he’d mercy-killed, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t.
So maybe I didn’t have the elementals for hrr-Barrer, but at least I could practice the stances. Then, I’d have to go hunting, I guessed. Start killing stuff, gain their elementals, and see if any fit with the spell.
Pendras and the rest of them were gone for days. Pretty simple to explain how I spent that time.
Chores.
Quick meals by the fire.
Walks with Roddie.
And stances. Lots and lots of stances.
It seemed that my painstaking training for the hrr-Levita spell had conditioned my body a little. I was more agile, and my calves were stronger, and I could both learn and hold new stances much better. I guessed my Lonehill robes had a little to do with that, too.
By the fourth evening (god knows how many nights I had spent in camp in total by now) I had it.
Backward C, followed by a strange, almost standing-lotus stance. Arching my back, twisting my leg and stretching my arm way above my head.
Interpretive dancers had nothing on me.
Stance after stance after stance. Hearing the voice speak in my head, feeling energy build up inside me.
The energy of the hrr-barrer spell worked up in me, stronger and stronger with each cycle of the stances.
If only I had the elementals to cast it.
But then, something strange happened.
I completed eight slow cycles of the hrr-barrer spell until the energy was so strong inside me that it was like a tide, and I could hear the voice screaming in my ear, and I knew I had it down, and then…
…and then light shot from my palms, casting out in front of me and forming a blue shield.
It was eight feet tall, four feet wide. When I moved in a direction, the light moved with me. I reached out and touched it, and it was solid. It made a dink sound when I hit it.
A shield?
Of course. Hrr-barrer. Barrer must mean shield.
Discipline Unlocked: Shield
Spell learned: Barrer
[the base spell of the Shield discipline. Forms a shield of light effective against some melee and spell damage.]
[Shield] discipline improved by 2%!
Rank: Grey 2.00%
Spells:
Barrer [Cost: 1 kinesis elemental]
Another discipline! Another spell!
I mean, this was great, but I didn’t understand. I didn’t have any kind of shield elementals, so how had I been able to cast it?
Had I picked up shield elementals without realizing?
I checked my elemental list again.
Elementals:
[Fire] x5
[Human] x3
Nope, definitely no shield elementals there. Unless I’d picked up one, and I had just used it casting the spell. But surely I’d have remembered?
Wait a second.
I had picked up four elementals from the humans killed by the Runenmer’s demons. And now, unless my mind was playing arithmetic tricks on me, I only had three.
This could only mean one of two things.
One, human elementals powered shield spells. But that didn’t seem to make sense; from my limited understanding, only a creature who possessed a particular element would produce a relevant elemental. Hellcats had fire damage, so they left fire elementals behind. There was nothing shield-like about a human.
So, this might mean something else; maybe human elementals could be used on any kind of spell.
Ugh. That was worrying, because that meant something else.
To a mage, in this world, everything was worth killing. But if human elementals could power any spell, then humans were worth killing more. I was beginning to understand things.
CHAPTER 19 – Better the Devil
“Ogres! Ogres!”
The shout cut through the camp, ending conversations, stopping every mage in their tracks. Jugs of water were set down, bison reins dropped. One boy fled to his tent in such a hurry that he ran into the stew Mardak was preparing, spilling water, meat, and vegetables over the floor.
Mardak was too flustered to even rebuke him. Instead, he stared at the growing crowd, wanting to join them. I walked over and helped him lift the giant stew pot and we set it against his tent. Then, Mardak went to join the rest of the spectators.
Roddie and I followed him, and then I saw them.
Two great ogres, ten feet tall and taking steps that seemed to shake the ground. They each held chains, and on the end of those chains were people, naked and scampering like dogs, seemingly oblivious to how cold the ground was.
I felt a flinch of panic rip through me but I forced myself to stay calm, and that was when I noticed something else.
Behind the ogres were Lonehill mages. Pendras, with his wild beard blowing in the wind. Siddel taking lumbering steps. Other mages, six of them. This was only one of the three groups who had set out to look for the Runenmer.
The sight of ogres should have sent me into shock, but with my forced calm I could read the situation better. I saw that Pendras and Siddel didn’t seem worried about the ogres; in fact, they were walking without any fear at all.
They marched into camp, and some of the gathered mages moved out of the way of the ogres. Some lonehills were paralyzed by the shock of seeing these monsters stroll into their camp.
One ogre, the tallest and most battle-scarred with deep, long-healed wounds all over his body, didn’t even stop walking to let the scared mages get out of the way. He just walked on, jostling into one mage lady and sending her flying to the ground.
I rushed over and helped her up.
“Thankie, Isaac.”
The ogres both stood there in the c
enter of the camp, holding their chains firm. Their humans sniffed the air like dogs and looked around with expressions that were completely devoid of emotion.
Poor bastards. Whatever fight had been in them had left long ago. I felt a deep sense of pity, one so strong that I felt sick.
I wanted to hrr-chare the hell out of the ogres. Cast unrelenting balls of flame at their faces, break the chains, free those poor people.
But, in the time it would take me to perform my stupid stances, I sensed an ogre fist would have crushed my skull.
Pendras joined us now, followed by Siddel and the others. I looked around for Rosi, but I remembered that she had led a different group away to search in another direction. I hoped she was okay. Half of me hoped she’d found the Runenmer, half of me prayed she didn’t get anywhere near him. Or it. Whatever the creature was.
Pendras didn’t say a word to the mages gathered around, which was a shame. Given the presence of their enemies in their camp, they could have used a little reassurance.
Instead, he led the ogres to Red’s tent, which was the only one large enough to fit such giant creatures. He, the ogres, and Siddel went inside.
The camp was silent then. Mages looked at each other, unable to believe what they had seen.
I couldn’t, either.
Forget the chained humans for a second. Forget that the ogres could smash a mage to pulp with barely any effort.
What about the lake? About Kaleb? The ogres had attacked the Lonehills!
Not only that, but Rosi had explained to me that much of Red’s time was spent maintaining the spell he cast upon camp. One that hid it from view, so that an outsider approaching it would not see it unless the Lonehills willed it so.
He would spend eight hours each morning performing his ancient hand stances, using elementals that it was some of the teenage mages’ jobs to procure for him each day.
Why go to all that effort to hide camp, just to let the ogres find it?
The only answer was the Runenmer, and that worried me deeply. It meant that the creature was so terrible that Pendras had seen fit to let their enemy see their home.
Everything Is Worth Killing- Isaac's Tale Page 15