The War of Embers

by James Duvall

  “It's settled then,” Weslin said.

  “Speaking of Solomon's Watch, will they be here today?” Joshua asked.

  Weslin shook her head. “No, they're stretched thin I'm afraid, keeping an eye on the boundaries and preparing the expedition to Ryvarra.”

  Brian hopped out of his chair, brightening visibly. A grin spread across his face from ear to ear. “So there is an expedition then?”

  Mayor Weslin let out an exhausted sigh, massaging her temples. “Yes, there is. Please try not to seem so excited about it, Mr. Ketch.”

  “Oh come now, you can't keep me from having a little fun now,” Brian said. “I was planning to join the Adventurer's Guild back home you know. Before... before things changed.”

  Joshua presented one of his father's coins to Tarus. The sadean panther studied both sides of it, then held it under a lamp on the mayor's desk to get a closer look.

  “The inscription reads Keep Us and Guide Us,” Joshua said.

  “This is what you wanted me to look at?” Tarus asked, looking to Mayor Weslin for an answer. The mayor broke off her conversation with Brian and looked at the proffered coin.

  “That's the coin I took to the power shed,” Joshua said.

  “Keep Us and Guide Us,” Weslin said, reading the inscription aloud. “What do you make of it Tarus? Some sort of prayer coin?”

  “It is a traditional prayer of the Ilsadorian church, but I don't think I've ever heard of 'prayer coins'” he said, making quotation marks in the air. He took the coin back from her and held it up in an open palm, then tapped it with two fingers glowing with a subtle aura of white light. Afterward, the dragon's image shone brightly, as though it were carved from light and not metal.

  For a moment the room was silent, all eyes on Tarus, whom tugged and pushed at the coin with the faint magic that earth afforded him. It happened so gradually that at first Joshua did not notice the room had grown a bit dimmer, as though a cloud had passed overhead. It was dark out by then, and the room took on a colder cast, a puff of frosty mist escaping Joshua's open mouth as he watched the aura twist and curl around his father's coin. The aura stretched and grew, the coin soon hardly visible within an intense globe of brilliant sapphire light. Tarus strained under the effort, beads of sweat popping out on his forehead despite the growing chill. Had the heater stopped working? Joshua drew his coat a little tighter about him.

  The light retreated back into the coin as Tarus released it. Shadows crept up all around as though drawn in. In the aura's absence the electric lights seemed pale and yellow, weak as a candle's flame by comparison. Warmth returned soon after.

  “I think this coin might be the top of an anchor stone,” Tarus announced. This earned Joshua's full attention, the strange sense of cold falling into a distant second priority. “There's probably a dozen of them arrayed beneath the weather station.”

  “It's not one of ours...?” Weslin asked, her face growing pale at the very thought.

  Tarus shook his head. “I don't know of anyone on our side of the portal that could make something like this. Plus... the prayer... I'd say this is from Ryvarra. Strange that it should be in your hands, Joshua, where did you find such a thing?”

  Joshua bit his lip. “I found it in my father's things.”

  “Never mind where it came from,” Weslin said. “What does it mean? Can we use this to figure out what is going wrong with the power shed?”

  Tarus mulled it over, hands on his hybrid hips as he gazed up at the ceiling. “It's possible... Obviously Joshua's anchor stone fragments react to the presence of the power shed. Perhaps the weather station is drawing power off and leaking it into the portal?”

  “The portal has been shut down for the past month,” Weslin countered.

  “Ah, not so. It simply hasn't been used. The crystals haven't discharged but they still draw power. Much like an unused remote control still eventually results in a dead battery.”

  In demonstration he plucked an old remote control from the corner of the mayor's desk and pointed it at the old CRT television mounted in the office's southwest corner. The local weather report flickered to life amidst a haze of faint static. More snow in the forecast from Colorado Springs, up through Denver, Rocky Mountain National Park, and on up into Wyoming.

  “Well, it didn't work last time.”

  Weslin took the remote from him. The television flashed and went dark. “I changed the batteries.”

  “Ah. Anyway, the analogy holds.”

  “Are you saying we just need to replace the power shed's batteries?” Weslin asked, daring to sound just a bit optimistic for the first time that evening.

  “It's possible that they've simply worn out faster than we expected due to proximity to the weather station.”

  “Could it be that simple?” Brian asked, sounding quite skeptical. “Is Solomon's Watch sleeping on the job? I find that hard to believe.”

  “No, I don't think that's it, but it is not as though we have resident mages with expertise in managing a portal. Solomon's Watch does what it can, but we must rely on... outside assistance... where technical matters of the portal are concerned.”

  “So that's why there's an expedition to Ryvarra? To get help with the portal?” Joshua asked.

  Weslin nodded somberly. “We're using this week's charge to send a team from Solomon's Watch into Ryvarra to seek help from the mages there. Tarus, is there any way we can be more sure of this theory? I don't want to put all our eggs in one basket here.”

  “I was just thinking about that actually... I think it would be best to take Joshua's coin to the weather station and see if it still reacts there.”

  “It only reacts if I'm pretty close to the power shed,” Joshua interjected. “So won't that mean that it won't work at the weather station?”

  “A good question! Lets assume that there is a substantial draw of power from the power shed to the weather station. If so, and, as I'm hoping is true, the weather station is still working...?” He trailed off, looking to Weslin for feedback. She nodded and he continued.

  “Then there's like a tendril of power reaching from the power shed to the weather station. If we are on that vector, the aura flux should still invoke a sympathetic reaction in the crystal at the heart of the anchor stone!”

  Tarus looked around excitedly, then got that 'what went wrong' look on his face. Brian stepped over and slapped him on the back.

  “You might have run off on the technical terms there,” Brian advised. Joshua nodded his vehement agreement.

  “Ah...” Tarus rubbed his chin. “Well the short version is if there's power going to the weather station from the power shed, the coin should light up so long as we're between where that power starts and ends. So we go to the weather station, walk toward the power shed, and if the coin lights up before we get right on top of it as you usually must do, we can assume some extra power has been siphoned away. Ehm... sort of like a magnet? It should still be reaching toward the vacuum.”

  “Okay, I think I got the gist of it. We can use the coin to see if there's a leak that's draining the batteries too fast. When were they last replaced?” he asked. The question slipped out faster than he realized he hadn't even the vaguest sense of how long a magical battery should last.

  “We're not due for a refit for another 5 years,” Weslin answered. “and these are the original charging focuses.”

  Tarus frowned. “Even so, they should have lasted a lot longer...”

  “Please see that the test is done as soon as possible,”Weslin said. “The sooner we can resolve this the better.”

  ***

  The following morning Joshua got up early and readied himself for a long day hiking up to the weather station and back. Well before dawn he found Tarus on a darkened street waiting beneath the corner lamppost. Snowflakes became visible as they drifted into the small splash of light. Tarus gave a friendly wave as he spotted Joshua coming down the sidewalk.

  “Morning,” Joshua said, stifling a yawn. H
is apartment had been much too warm and the lethargy clung to him like heavy chains as he trudged through the fresh-fallen snow and rendezvoused with Tarus.

  “Good morning, Joshua,” Tarus said, he sounded much more alert than Joshua felt was reasonable. Tarus unscrewed his thermos and took a sip of steaming coffee. “Want a swig?”

  Joshua shook his head. “I just need a few minutes... Long hike, wish we could take a snowmobile.”

  The reason for this was Tarus himself. The human form leading the way to Brian's house was only an illusion, a fact illuminated by the inhuman paw prints following behind in the snow. It was Brian's idea that a snowmobile could likely be modified to suit the panthers, but so far no one had found ample need to do so.

  “Ah, I'm afraid we're all on foot today,” Tarus said. He offered an apologetic smile.

  “Not your fault,” Joshua grumbled.

  “I think if you examine the facts you'll find that it is,” Tarus said brightly, his tone matter-of-fact and carefree. He was like that a lot, simply interested in the logical truth of a scenario regardless of how the outcome impacted him.

  “Ehm, not that there is anything I can do about it,” he added.

  “Of course,” Joshua said, waving him off. “I just meant its going to be a long day.”

  “God willing, a productive day.”

  Tarus was still smiling when they knocked on Brian's door. Joshua tried not to dampen the sadean panther's mood, thinking that perhaps his good humor was because he thought this would bring back Casual Fridays.

  Knowing how something broke is a long way from fixing it...

  Brian emerged in his heavy winter jacket and a deerstalker, the flaps tied down over his ears. Joshua simply stared at it, searching for words.

  “Really?”

  “Well we're off to solve a mystery, aren't we?” Brian asked, then winked at him.

  “Isn't Stacy coming?” Joshua asked.

  Brian produced a radio. “She's manning the radio's today. In case we need someone to come fetch us.”

  “Can you hear me, dear?” Brian pressed the button and asked.

  Stacy's voice responded, made tinny by the old radio. “Loud and clear!”

  The trail to the weather station began at a little parking lot that doubled as trailhead and parking for a small picnic area with a set of swings and a slide. A hundred feet up the trail a sign had been erected in the middle of the trail declaring “Trail Closed due to Hazardous Conditions” in red letters on white. The same sign had been there since the first time Joshua had tried to make the climb to the weather station.

  “Have you ever been up here?” Tarus asked, setting the sign aside.

  “I haven't,” Joshua admitted. Brian shook his head.

  “I've been once,” Tarus said, grimacing at the memory. “Since my arrival, I mean. It was not a pleasant experience. Three weeks in lockup.”

  “They threatened to haul me up there for a week once,” Brian said. “Turned out they didn't have anything solid and hoped it'd make me cough up some personal items I'd brought from back home.”

  “And did you?” Tarus asked, looking back at him.

  “Heavens no, that would've got me a month for sure!”

  “What about you, Joshua?” Brian asked, grinning. “Ever been threatened with the weather station?”

  “Haven't we all?” Joshua mused. “Yeah I nearly earned a trip once, tried to climb up here looking for my dad. I had it in my head that if I could get into the weather station maybe I could find him... I got caught halfway up by a Solomon's Watch crew coming down. If I hadn't been so young I think they might have followed through with it. I hear it's awful work.”

  “Depends on how much you like digging,” Tarus grumbled.

  “How much further up do you want to go?” Brian asked.

  Tarus stopped and looked around the snowy woods, then consulted his watch. “Here is as good a place as any.”

  Joshua produced the coin. Tarus placed it in a small box and waited for a gauge on the side to settle.

  “0 candela,” Tarus announced, handing the box to Joshua. “Not surprising. We're well out of the path right now.”

  “Mm hmm,” Brian mumbled in agreement, recording their findings in a notebook.

  Tarus called for another halt every quarter hour until finally Joshua looked down and noticed the needle had moved off of the 0 peg.

  “Tarus? The needle moved.”

  “It has to settle. It'll bounce from you walking around.”

  “No, I mean, it's up just sitting on 10.”

  Tarus hurried back down the hill to inspect the readout. “Interesting. Brian? Whereabouts are we?”

  Brian unfurled his map and measured out the GPS coordinates.

  “Yes, this is about what I expected. We're starting to move into the direct line between the weather station and the power shed. Maybe another quarter mile and we'll see the apex. From there we'll see how far up we have to go before it drops off.”

  At the next stop the needle had risen to 20 candela. Brian's map showed they had come closer to the direct path between the weather station and the power shed.

  “How high do you think it will get?” Joshua asked, studying the needle as he followed Tarus's careful steps up the winding trail. The path never became exceptionally steep, wandering along the contours of the mountainside.

  “40 or 50 I'd imagine, based on the rate of growth,” Tarus answered. “I'm a little surprised we're seeing that much even, considering how far we are from the power shed.”

  Joshua squinted at the needle. It was bouncing around like a compass in a jogger's hand, but the average seemed to be considerably higher than 50. No, it wasn't even falling below 100. Joshua stopped and let the needle settle.

  “Tarus, it's over 300.”

  Tarus stopped. “What?”

  “The needle, it's on like... 320? 325? Somewhere in there? Brian, are you seeing this?” Joshua asked, holding up the box so that Brian could read the gauge as well. The needle crept up to 350.

  “That can't be right,” Tarus said. Joshua looked up to answer him, but the air around Tarus seemed distorted, much like it had with the sadean watchman at the power shed a few nights prior.

  “Tarus, your illusion is...”

  The spell faltered, crumbling away and revealing Tarus perched on the trail above them, his tail twitching with curiosity. He reached down and turned off the malfunctioning device.

  “Is that any better?” he asked, making his way back down to them.

  “No it's almost 400 now,” Joshua said. “Maybe it's broken?”

  Flipping over the latch he dumped the coin into his open palm, the dragons glowed bright as a spotlight. Tarus shouted something, but Joshua couldn't hear it properly over the crackle and hum of magic in the air. The coin flickered with intensity, pulsing a bright, blinding blue light. The pulses rapidly grew closer and closer together until all the world was washed out by its brilliance. Joshua closed his hand around the coin and averted his eyes, squeezing them tightly shut. Despite all this the final release of energy pounded against his eyes like a camera flash turned up to 11. A chill shot through him like lightning and cold metal through his veins.

  Chapter 5

  The Strength of Stone

  Naveria Forest, Arcamyn

  With this stone we held the storms captive; With this stone we sinned against our brothers; With this stone we wrought life into the lifeless, and with this stone we brought death unto the world.

  From a confession, carved into the wall of Halder's Tower. Author Unknown.

  Joshua fell through cold darkness and into blinding light. The ground raced toward him like a coming wall, striking him in the chest before he could properly orient himself. Coughing and gasping he tried to force himself up to shaking hands and knees. His arms trembled beneath the effort and gave out. For a moment he gasped for air, then dropped face-first back into the cold, wet mud. With a heave he rolled onto his back and lay there, staring up a
t a clear blue sky that was supposed to be gray and filled with grasping bare branches. A cool autumn wind caressed his face, gentle as the first decline of summer. It should have been edged with the hardness of a winter morning. The breeze rustled quietly through the needles of towering evergreens, framing a canopy of pale blue with sparse, thin clouds.

  What happened... “Tarus? Brian?”

  There had been at least a foot of snow on the ground. Now he could feel grass and crisp leaves beneath him. Moisture began to seep into his pants and sweatshirt, harrying him to his still-trembling legs. The energy of... whatever it was that had happened still tingled through him like electricity.

  Joshua looked up into the sky where he had fallen from but saw only empty air. Where he had landed the grass was torn up and muddy like the fairgrounds after a good rain. A metallic glint caught his eye, something sticking up out of the mud near where he'd landed. He picked it up and rubbed it clean, revealing the images of dragons circled by the old prayer, Keep Us and Guide Us.

  It was hot to the touch, like a quarter accidentally left in the dryer. He turned it slowly in his hand, regarding it with wonder. Had he passed through the Cold and into the forests of Ryvarra? Thoughts raced through his mind.

  If I am in Ryvarra, where in Ryvarra am I? How far is it from here to Camden? Andrlossen? If I am here, the weather station is discharged. It will be another week or more before they'll be able to open the portal again.

  That was enough to get him moving again. He could not stay in the middle of the woods for a week, hoping the portal might open of its own accord. For all he knew it might not open again, not if the power shed failed completely. If that were so, it would be all up to him. Ashcrest would have no other savior.

  The ground trembled.

  An earthquake?

  Another little shake. It didn't feel like an earthquake...

  The birds had stopped singing. Voices. People shouting. An authoritative voice barked commands, but Joshua could not make them out.

  Maybe something fell? Something big...