An Ocean of Light

by Kit Fortier

  “She can’t get to us here,” Fox said. “Not with the salt lines keeping her magic out.”

  “The problem is she, or her partner—we’ll just say both for now. They seem like they’re really good at muddling people’s senses. For the victim, for those in the immediate area.”

  “What do we do then?” Anger made Ben’s hands tremble. “We can’t just sit here waiting for her!”

  “Can you track her down?” Fox asked.

  “I’d thought about that, but I honestly wouldn’t know where to look. Don’t want to arouse suspicion with the Las Vegas P.D. by poking around in their official investigation. And I wouldn’t want to risk a private eye getting caught up in her—their magic.”

  The four sat in horribly uncomfortable silence. A solution wasn’t forthcoming. At least, one that didn’t involve barricading themselves inside indefinitely.

  “She’s after me,” Eric said softly. “I can leave—she’ll leave you alone.”

  Ben pulled Eric into his arms.

  “No.”

  “I didn’t mean to give you any trouble, Ben. All this? This time with you… It’s more than I could ask for, but trouble always finds me. Always.”

  It was a horrible reminder that Eric’s life was mostly pain and betrayal. Ben couldn’t stop himself. He couldn’t stop the anger, the tears.

  “It doesn’t have to be like that this time.” His face was in Eric’s hair, but his shuddering sobs told everyone what was happening.

  “Fox and I aren’t fans of self-sacrificing, buddy,” Dad all but whispered. “Maybe we can make use of you ‘walking out on us’,” he said, adding air quotations around the last part of his statement.

  Ben turned his bleary eyes to his father. “What do you mean?”

  “We’ll make it look like Eric started walking. Make it look like he left us. Give him one of our packs,” the older Hughes man indicated himself and his husband. “We three can watch him—follow him with the spark sight. Since he’s tethered to your light, we know where he’ll be at all times, right?”

  Ben looked at himself, then at Eric. “I think so.”

  “You two can communicate to each other. If she tries to use any glamours or suggestions on him, maybe you can talk him out of it. Meanwhile, he can tell you everything he sees, so we can be right there to take her out and get Eric to safety.”

  Fox shook his head. “I don’t like that he’d be going there unarmed.”

  “He won’t be,” Dad said.

  Ben wiped his eyes. Eric slid his arms around his waist when Ben asked, “Why?”

  *** Jake

  The conversation ended with a brief explanation. Jake prepared a great deal of salt and silver and borrowed Ben’s newly bought SUV. While he had no access to the inside of the property they were buying, Jake could still affect the outside and perimeter.

  It didn’t take him long to set up a circle a foot thick around the house. It would take a great deal of silver and salt, but those were replenishable. As an added layer of protection, Jake put a line in front of every door that opened to the outside, as well as every window. Even the rims of the chimney and the vents around the house were treated, permenantly set with a blink of an eye. As a further precaution, Jake ran a line along the edges of the whole house, both stories. There wasn’t a side of the home, the garage, the perimeter of the property in general, that wasn’t triply protected and forever sealed.

  After one last setup on the beach, Jake laid down a permanent marker. Night fell, and with the new moon near, the only light would come from the houses dotting the beach a hundred yards or so inland. He trekked back to the SUV and drove back to the hotel.

  When Jake arrived, Fox sat in the darkened living room, waiting for him. His face was illuminated by the tablet he held.

  “They found an abandoned LVPD cruiser outside San Gabriel.”

  Jake sat down across from his husband. “She’s definitely on her way here, then.”

  “How is she tracking us?”

  “I… I don’t know. There are a lot of things about magic that I don’t understand. It could be they have a kind of sight or sense of alchemists—like we do of them. It stands to reason they could. Or they’re using magic, which could just as easily explain how they knew Eric had lost his lycanthropy.”

  Fox sighed with an uneasy breath. “I don’t like it.”

  “You’re not the only one.”

  Silence filled the space between them.

  “What did you do out there?”

  “The house is protected. All the doors to the outside, upstairs and down, as well as all the windows. There’s even a circle around the whole house. I also set up the area on the beach that we talked about. We can see it clearly from the sun deck on the roof of the house.”

  “And you think she’ll only come at night?”

  “She’s a witch, first and foremost. She has to use what cover is available to her. Her escape from the jail was bold. The police department is stunned, but all they can say is that no one was paying attention according to the surveillance videos. Out there, she can’t cast a spell on the houses up and down the beach—they’re too far away. She can only affect her immediate area.”

  “So, anyone looking in the direction of the action won’t see anything out of the ordinary,” Fox murmured.

  “That’s what I’m thinking. I believe that’s how Sully managed to disguise what was happening at Fault Line Park all those years ago.”

  “And when do we send Eric out there?”

  “Tomorrow night. It’ll be a new moon, so outside of the campfire I’ve set up for him, it’s going to be pretty dark. We’ll follow him with spark sight. All three of us, right Ben?”

  A deep sigh hissed from around the corner as Ben came into the common area, closing the door behind him. He hadn’t changed out of his clothes from earlier that day.

  “Didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” Ben said.

  “Do you see me getting mad or blaming you, son?” Jake indicated the single armchair, inviting his boy to sit.

  “There’s something you both should know about this level of alchemy we’re all at. Ben, it’s new to you, but it’s no less accessible,” Jake said. “Fox knows, and I think you have a sense of it, but we can transmute or transform things at will. Fox has seen me raise walls of earth, even slam creatures on the ground with it. Fox has thrown a punch with the force of a lightning bolt behind it.”

  Ben looked at Fox in awe.

  “It was… It was an accident, but it helped me figure out my alchemy in a big way,” Fox said, barely above a whisper. Jake reached out to Fox, taking his hand. He pulled it to his mouth for a soft kiss before gently releasing it back to his husband.

  “Ben—we don’t know what you can do yet. I haven’t been encouraging it, because I had hoped you’d never need it. But it is a tool, just as it is a weapon, or even a shield. I’d be stupid, stupid and foolish, not to train you.”

  “Can you train me now?” Ben stood up. “With the night as dark as it is, and the time as late as it is, I think we can go out there and no one would know.”

  Jake looked at his husband.

  “He’s got a point, papa bear. You two go. I’ll stay and wait up, keep watch.”

  Jake crossed over to Fox, kissing him on the forehead.

  “Follow me,” Jake motioned to his son as he walked out to the balcony. They stepped out into the night.

  “We’re four stories up, Dad.”

  “Lesson one: Understanding composition. What is most sand made of?”

  “In places like this?”

  “Yep.”

  “Silica,” Ben replied simply.

  “What first comes to your mind when you think of what silica is used in?”

  “Glass.”

  “Correct. Much of alchemy is understanding the composition of the things you create, like this.” Jake put out his hand over the rail. A thick, wide rail slide made of semi-transparent glass blossomed upward from the ground to the edge
of the balcony. Jake hopped up on the rail and slid down. With a wave, he invited Ben to follow. Once his son did, the slide burst into a cloud of sand that fell to the ground in a soft, lengthy hiss.

  Ben’s eyes were wide with comprehension and awe.

  “Let’s go to the water.”

  The Hughes men made their way to the ever-shifting shoreline.

  “What is seawater made of?” Jake asked.

  “Well, water for one,” Ben replied. “But there’s chloride, sodium, magnesium—”

  “All good. And sodium chloride is…”

  “Salt.”

  “Remember that. Think back to the powder I had you set when you made lines around the hotel room. What was that mixture?”

  “Silver and salt.”

  “So, here’s the deal with silver. It keeps out altered beasts that are affected by the Aether. Not all altered beasts are touched by Aether. There are a few, in fact, that are bright with the spark in ways normal humans can’t be.”

  “And salt?”

  “It’s one of the base elements. It provides stability and protection against the Aether. It’s said that the Aether’s composition is constantly in flux. When it collides with salt, its effects are nullified.”

  “So magic users can’t cross the line?”

  “Not without great pain, or even death, depending on how much the Aether has taken over.”

  Ben looked out on the water.

  “I want you to think of simple weapons. Rocks, bricks, even spikes.”

  “Why not a staff?”

  “I like your thinking, but even if you compacted salt enough, a staff made of salt would be easy to break.”

  “So, go bigger.”

  “Yep.”

  “Alright.”

  “Now, imagine yourself drawing that weapon out of the materials in the water.”

  Ben’s eyes focused on the ebb and flow of the waves. Jake followed his son’s line of sight and saw what his son had created. Three columns of salt dozens of yards out in the water shot upward. They collided with the sand like missiles from an offshore submarine. The elder Hughes whistled.

  “Impressive, buddy.”

  Ben wasn’t done yet. A synthesis of information he had gleaned from the primer over the past few days collided with the immediacy of the impromptu training grounds he and his father stood on. He remembered the walls, the weapons, the many uses of water—and much like the element he would supposedly flourish with, Ben took hold of the waters before him and flowed with inspired ease. With a sweeping motion, arcs of water sailed upward into the air. They hovered off the ground, flowing in a circle over and around them in a tightly spiraling coil. Jake stood absolutely still, staring wide eyed at his son’s work. Ben made another motion which dissolved the pillars of salt into large fragments. He pulled the fragments into the hovering spiral of water. With an outward pushing motion, the coil exploded outward, ejecting chunks of salt and pressurized water. It left a dry, circular patch of ground only where the two stood. Everything else from sand to beach debris was blown outwards in a frenzied explosion of salt and water.

  Ben made more motions, like he was violently lifting many somethings up. Columns of sand burst from the ground and fell over in a crisscrossing pattern. They stretched out in front of them across the shoreline. He punched at the air—and dozens of shards of dirt and glass flew out of the ground and out into the water. Jake watched in wonder. His son’s abilities were definitely the product of an active imagination and rapid acquisition of the skills necessary to wield the elements so freely.

  In a short span of time, Ben had created projectiles, walls, columns, slabs out of everything from sand , salt, and seawater. One offense flowed into another, and defensive actions merged seamlessly into the fold of the young man’s actions.

  “I should have had you train me,” Jake said, patting his son on the back.

  “It feels like as long as the materials are there, I can make pretty much anything in my imagination, right?”

  “Correct. Everything except life,” Jake said. “We can’t create life from nothing, and for the most part, we can’t revive the dead.”

  “We revived you,” Ben said.

  “That’s why I said, ‘for the most part’,” Jake replied. “That’s something I don’t quite understand myself. It had to do with the fact that my own spark hadn’t faded away, so Fox had something to work with.”

  Ben nodded.

  “This thing we do, you, me, and Fox—It’s the end result of my work for the past seven years. I wanted a better way to combat magic, should it ever come down to it—because for me, it’s happened one time too many, being caught off guard. Before this, we would have to have actual circles drawn in sand or on stone, elements, litanies, an understanding of the gates of transmutation. We were behind the curve, always playing catch-up to the speed at which mages could access their powers. Now, it’s at will, with none of those other things in the way outside of understanding composition.”

  Gates. The Gates of Transmutation. The codex in Ben's laptop bag clicked into place with everything he learned just moments ago.

  “I get it, Dad.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I won’t abuse this,” Ben looked at his hands.

  Jake put a hand in each of his son’s hands. “No, buddy. That’s not it. I know you’ll be responsible no matter how you use this. I just wanted you to know that I missed so many years of your life trying to give this to you.”

  Jake gasped in surprise when Ben pulled him in for an embrace.

  “We’re good, Dad. Thank you.”

  Jake could only nod.

  *** Eric

  There was a dream of a forest. It seemed familiar—nebulous mist settled near the ground, obscuring the forest floor. It reminded Eric of the wolf.

  He heard a soft yip. A creature emerged from the mist. Eric first thought it was the wolf again—but it was something else. Smaller. Strange. Glowing golden.

  It was a fox.

  It was small, as forest creatures go, but there was strength in its seemingly delicate stature. Its movements were the epitome of grace. As it neared the precipice that separated the forest from the rest of the shifting landscape in Eric’s mind, he noticed a peculiar thing:

  The golden, light-bearing creature had not one, but two tails.

  The luminescent fox stood in the midst of the mist, staring calmly at Eric. He stared back. It was an alien, beautiful creature. Its eyes reminded him of something. It was the color.

  They were the color of his own golden eyes.

  Reaching across the bed, Eric could feel no warmth. He sat up in the quiet of the darkened room, edging off the bed, and pulling a bathrobe on as he headed out into the common room.

  “Hey there, Eric,” Fox said. He had Jake’s tablet in front of him.

  “Hi, Fox. What are you doing up?”

  “Waiting on the guys. Jake’s training Ben out there.”

  Eric glanced out the window but could see nothing but yawning, dark blue night and highlights of rough, sparse surfaces in pale blue.

  “What about you?” Fox asked.

  “Couldn’t sleep. Not without Ben.”

  Fox smiled. “I know the feeling.”

  Eric sat down in the loveseat across from Fox. “How did things go at the house?”

  “Jake set up the perimeter, as well as all the doors and windows leading to the outside. He’s also prepped the area where we’ll have you wait for her while we watch.”

  The little guy drummed his fingertips on his knees. “And you’ll all be nearby?”

  “You can count on it.”

  The door to the balcony slid open, and both Jake and Ben stepped into the room, closing and locking the door behind them.

  “Hey baby,” Jake said to his husband as he knelt down and hugged him from behind the sofa.

  “Heya, E,” Ben sat next to Eric, pulling him close and kissing his head.

  “Just to let you know,” Jake b
egan as he sat next to Fox, “we got word that an abandoned Vegas police cruiser was found in San Gabriel.”

  Ben took Eric by the chin, looking him in the eye. “They think it’s likely the witch who had a knife to your back was the one who left the cruiser there.”

  Fox spoke up. “Since San Gabriel is only about two hours away, it’s likely she’s already here, waiting for an opening.”

  “And we’re gonna give her that opening tomorrow, right?” Eric asked.

  “That’s right,” Jake replied. “Everyone in this room—besides you, little guy—is trained in ways to beat back a mage. Those two probably won’t like the oceanside, because of all the salt in the air. But I think they’ll make an exception if they think it means getting to you.”

  “First thing after breakfast, we’ll set you up with a pack, okay? It won’t have much in it. But, on your person, we’ll put a zip-up bag of salt in all the pockets. If they get too close, throw it in their eyes, or in their general direction,” Fox said.

  “Hopefully, they won’t even be able to get that close—not with the circle of silver and salt I laid down for you,” Jake added. “It’s marked by a mound of sand I’ve made semi-permanent around a campfire I set up for you. When you get there, I’ll move the sand away and light the fire. As long as you’re within twenty feet of the fire, you’ll be protected.”

  “If he moves outside the circle?” Ben asked.

  “We’ll be there to stop them,” Fox said flatly. Jake nodded.

  “It’s likely they’ll try to use glamours on you. They won’t have any effect unless you leave the circle. They can also use a glamour to affect the area around you. You can see that from inside the circle—but any magic directed at you would be nullified.” Jake tapped his lips. “If you have to leave the circle, see if you can hit them with the salt before you walk away from it.”

  “Are we going to catch them or kill them?” Ben said, stone faced.

  “I think it’s safe to say we need to be prepared to do the latter,” Fox replied. “The witch has already killed three people—who knows what they’ll try to do to any of us.”

  “Hey, E? You’re trembling,” Ben rubbed his hands over Eric’s shoulders and upper arms.

  “Scared.”

  “We won’t let her get you, babe.”