Wolf in the Fold, page 10
“Emily,” Caleb said, sharply. “We have a problem.”
Emily looked up. A storm was advancing towards them, flickers of raw magic spiralling through the air and crashing into the ground. It wasn’t a thinking being, she thought, and yet she could sense a chilling malevolence as lightning sparkled through the air. It was utterly terrifying and it was zeroing in on them ...
“Get down,” she snapped, dropping to the ground and pulling the horses together. They looked uncomfortable as the storm neared, their eyes flickering wildly. “Help me!”
She rummaged through the saddlebags for the protective blankets, laying them down over the horses as quickly as she could. The beasts barely moved ... she hoped they’d stay still as the storm crackled over them. They’d be dead in a heartbeat if they panicked and galloped out of cover ... if they were lucky. If not, they’d wish they were dead. Caleb hastily set up the protective tent, shouting for Frieda to join him. Emily’s lips twitched in dark amusement as she finished covering the horses, then looking at the storm. It was a whirling cloud of bright and deadly light, stabbing knives of pain deep into her eyes ...
“Emily!”
Emily broke out of the trance and dived into the tent. Caleb closed the flap and sat back on the ground, face grim. Frieda looked pale beside him, their legs almost touching ... there simply wasn’t enough room for all three of them. Emily met Caleb’s eyes and they shared a smile as the storm raged outside. The last time she’d been trapped in a storm, it had been with Cat and the blankets had been almost painfully small. There was more room this time, thankfully. It still wasn’t enough. They would be trapped until the storm moved on.
Frieda looked up. “How long do we have to wait?”
“No way to know,” Emily said. She was sure she’d felt true malevolence in the storm. She hoped she was imagining it. “Get some sleep. You need it.”
“You too,” Caleb said. “I’ll take first watch.”
Frieda looked reluctant but laid down on the hard ground. Emily passed her a bedroll to put under her head, then rested her own on Caleb’s lap. He stroked her hair gently as she tried to close her eyes, although the air felt too heavy for her to sleep at all. Frieda would have it worse. Emily knew. She’d never been happy sharing a bedroom with anyone, let alone a bed, and the three of them were trapped in a tent that made her bedroom at school look large. The storm howled outside, flashes of lightning sometimes visible though the protective fabric ...
“The reports said the storms were fading away,” Caleb said, quietly. “I guess they were wrong.”
Emily shrugged. It wasn’t easy to predict the weather at the best of times and in the Blighted Lands it was impossible. The flickers of magic could create storms as easily as calm or worse ... she sucked in her breath as she shifted against him, trying to stay comfortable. There was no point in doing anything else. They were trapped until the storm had run its course ...
She must have drifted off, because the next thing she knew was that the flap was open and bright sunlight – a little too bright – was streaming into the tent. She felt grimy as she staggered outside to find Caleb boiling water for Kava, his face grim. He looked as though he’d been through the wars, his hair dank with crusted sweat and his eyes tired and worn. Emily guessed she didn’t look any better. Her body ached and her head was sore, making it hard to think clearly. She kicked herself, again, for not teleporting. It would have made things a great deal easier.
“You look like shit,” Frieda said. Emily had been so out of it she hadn’t noticed Frieda by the horses. “Are you alright?”
“I’ve felt better,” Emily said, swallowing several angry responses. “How are the horses?”
“They’re fine, I think,” Frieda said. She’d done a good job of giving them nosebags and wiping them down. “But we really should be on the move.”
Caleb poured three mugs of Kava and handed them out. They tasted strong, almost unpleasant, but the jolt woke her up. She sipped gratefully, nibbling at a ration bar that was better than nothing. In hindsight ... she shook her head as she finished her breakfast and then checked on the horses. They looked subdued, somehow. They were lucky they hadn’t tried to get out of their protective covers. Their trainers had done a very good job.
“We should be there later today,” Caleb said, once he’d packed away the stove. “Shall we?”
Emily nodded curtly, helping to fold the tent and put it back in the saddlebags before they left. The horse seemed relieved to be on the move. Emily knew how he felt as she scrambled into the saddle, breathing a sigh of relief as they started to trot away from the campsite. The air was a little too bright, heavy with the sense of trouble brewing in the distance ... she kept her eyes open, watching for the first signs of something bad heading their way. If it was something really dangerous ...
The landscape changed slowly as the hours wore on, taking on a more natural appearance as the ashy ground gave way to soil. She breathed a sigh of relief as she saw Kuching Castle slowly coming into view, surrounded by the remnants of what had once been a great city and dozens of small family farms. The air was clearer here – she smiled as she saw pieces of magitech at the edge of the community, draining or deflecting the tainted magic – and the people looked friendly. Cat had invited hundreds of people who wanted to settle a new country, getting in on the ground floor ... Emily hoped, prayed, it worked. The Blighted Lands needed to be settled as quickly as possible, before the kingdoms started land-grabbing in earnest. If they could build something new, a set of communities that could drain the older kingdoms of troublemakers, it might prevent more civil wars. Or perhaps it was already too late.
A guard stepped out to block their way, wearing a simple brown tunic and carrying a rifle slung over one shoulder. “We don’t get many riders out here,” he said, stiffly. “Can I ask for your names?”
“Millie, Caleb and Frieda,” Emily said. She was the only adult Emily in the Nameless World, as far as she knew, but Millie was a fairly common name. Cat would know she’d used it as a cover before, and the fact she was using it now meant she was travelling incognito. “Please inform Lord Cat of our arrival.”
“Of course, My Lady.” The guard scratched a note on a piece of chat parchment and waited. “May I take your horses?”
“Yes.” Emily was relieved to be out of the saddle. “Please take care of them.”
The guard checked his parchment. “You’re invited up to the castle,” he said. “I’m sure you can find the way.”
Emily had to smile. The castle was perched on top of a mountain, glaring over the town. It was impossible to miss. The winding road leading up to it was designed to make it impossible for someone to get to the walls without being spotted and blasted, if the castle’s defenders didn’t want them around. A shiver ran down her spine as she recalled a necromancer raining overpowered fireballs on the town below, before she’d killed him. She hoped it had hurt. The bastard had treated humans like farm animals, a horror she had considered beyond imagination until she’d seen it.
“We can,” she said. “And thank you for your time.”
She rubbed her forehead as they started to walk. No matter what happened, the coming discussion wasn’t going to be pleasant. Cat and Caleb and Frieda in the same room ... and Penny, of course. Perhaps she could speak to Cat alone ... no, that wasn’t going to happen. Not now that she was engaged.
“Heart’s Eye has gone further faster,” Caleb said. “And we had a war on our hands.”
“So did they,” Emily reminded him. “So did they.”
Chapter Ten
“Millie,” Cat said, with heavy sarcasm. He perched on a wooden chair that seemed designed to serve as a mockery of a throne. “I’ve never heard of you in my entire life.”
Emily saw Penny, standing beside her master, roll her eyes. “That’s no way to welcome a guest,” she said, sternly. “You should be more welcoming.”
Cat gave her a sidelong look. “Which of us is supposed to be the master and which the apprentice again?”
“I’m the master,” Penny said, cheerfully. “And you’re the apprentice.”
“Hah.” Cat made a face. “Is it too late to rule by fear?”
He smiled, then stood. “It’s good to see you again, all of you,” he said. “And I hear you’re getting married.”
“We are, yes,” Emily said. She took Caleb’s hand. “That’s not what we came for.”
“I guessed as much,” Cat said. He was a very direct person, often blunt to the point of rudeness, but he was very far from stupid. No one who qualified as a combat sorcerer could possibly be considered an idiot. “You wouldn’t ride through the Blighted Lands unless you had some reason to keep everything as secret as possible.”
“Yes.” Emily took a breath. “Has anything odd or unusual happened here recently?”
Cat and Penny exchanged glances. “Very little,” Cat said. “Unless you count the missing orcs.”
“Missing orcs?” Emily leaned forward. “You lost your servants?”
“No.” Cat scowled. “After the necromancers were broken, a great many orc bands started wandering the countryside and terrorising the locals. There was never any rhyme or reason to the attacks and we had to remain on guard at all times ... then the attacks just stopped.”
Frieda frowned. “You killed them all?”
“No.” Penny shook her head. “They just ... stopped. And they can’t have just dropped dead.”
Emily nodded, slowly. Orcs were tough, far stronger than the average human, but they were so dumb they bent the knee to anyone who beat the crap out of them and kept following their new master, mindlessly, until he died or was beaten himself, at which point the orcs swapped sides without hesitation. The necromancers had never had any problems keeping the orcs in line, but now ... without the necromancers, who was taking command? Penny was right. The orcs couldn’t have starved to death. They could eat practically anything, including each other. And humans.
She met Cat’s eyes. “So who’s taken control of them?”
“I wish I knew,” Cat said. “If there’s a necromancer still out there ...”
Emily doubted it. Her battery-powered disruption spells were a minor irritant to regular magicians, no matter how powerful, but lethal to a necromancer. Any lucky enough to survive the war would have to know the risks of getting too close to a magician who might have a battery and know how to use it. And yet, who else could command so many orcs? It was hard enough for Cat to keep a small number under control.
Penny glanced at her. “Why are you here?”
“It’s a long story,” Emily said. She explained briefly what had happened in Celeste, ending with Boswell’s cryptic message. “But the Hierarchist insisted they would be here. In Kuching.”
“Assuming he wasn’t lying to you,” Cat pointed out.
“The thought crossed my mind, but ... I need to examine the nexus point,” Emily said. “That’s about the only thing they could want here, if they really are here.”
“If.” Cat and Penny exchanged glances again. Emily felt a twinge of amusement mingled with envy. They were more like a couple than a master and apprentice ... it crossed her mind to wonder if they were a couple. It wasn’t impossible, just severely frowned upon. Except Penny was a lesbian ... “And ...”
Cat stood, brushing down his tunic. He didn’t look much like a king – he styled himself First Citizen – but everyone knew who he was. His outfit didn’t hide his muscles either.
“Emily, I’ll take you to the nexus point,” he said. “Penny will show the rest of your team to their bedrooms.”
“I’ll give them the best quarters,” Penny agreed. “I’m sorry about the dust.”
Frieda glanced at Emily. “Emily ...?”
“Go with Penny,” Emily said. “I’ll be back shortly.”
She felt the urge to cringe as Cat led her through a hidden door and down a flight of stairs. It wasn't the first time she’d been alone with him after they’d broken up, but ... she was engaged now. And Cat had never seemed quite willing to leave her alone after she’d regained her powers and confidence. It was galling to realise he’d only loved her because he considered her an equal, yet ... the hell of it, she reflected, was that such an attitude was better than being considered grossly inferior. Cat was more progressive than ninety percent of local men.
“It’s been a while,” Cat said. He shifted slightly as they reached a barren antechamber. “Remind me ... where do I have an embarrassing mole?”
Emily felt her cheeks burn. “Between your testicles and your anus,” she said, not bothering to hide her anger. “What does that have to do with anything?”
Cat didn’t seem impressed. “And what were we doing, the night before we started the march on Alexis?”
“Something that came right out of a blue book,” Emily snapped. The writers had to be male virgins who knew little of female anatomy, but hid their ignorance behind an endless series of sexual acts that could only be performed by contortionists. Or partners who didn’t mind the risk of being crippled. “And then you suggested doing something unspeakable.”
“It is you.” Cat relaxed, slightly. “I feared the worst.”
He grinned, mischievously. “Have you and Caleb done ...?”
“It’s none of your business,” Emily said. She knew he was trying to get under her skin, to irritate her just a little. It was working. “We are friends now, not lovers.”
“Of course.” Cat managed to sound sincere in a manner that grated. “I do understand. And I hope it works out for you.”
He paused. “He did help you escape from Jacqui, I suppose. It speaks well of him.”
“And you never said what happened to her,” Emily reminded him. “What did ...?”
“Long story.” Cat turned away, hiding his face. “Long and embarrassing story.”
“I hope you didn’t sleep with her,” Emily teased, getting a little of her own back. “That would be bad.”
“Worse than that,” Cat said. “Way worse.”
He pushed open the door to the nexus chamber and stepped through, wards crackling around his bare skin. Emily gritted her teeth as she felt the wards sweeping over her too, poking and prodding to be sure she was who she claimed to be. Cat had modified the charms a little, in the months since her last visit, and it took longer than she’d expected to make her way through the defences. Cat didn’t look back as the door closed behind them. The nexus point dominated the chamber.
Emily stared, feeling her head starting to pound again. The nexus point was a tiny flicker of flame, dancing in the centre of the chamber, but the flame was just the tip of an iceberg, an iceberg of roaring power that grew more and more prominent the longer she looked. She could feel strata of raw power running to infinity, layer upon layer of magic just waiting to be tapped and put to use. It was a timeless source of power, a distortion that existed at every moment since she’d brought the flame back to life two years ago. She thought she felt a hint of her own presence at the dawn of time – no, the moment the nexus point was reignited – but the sensation was gone before she could focus on it. Probably for the best, she noted absently. There was no way to know what would happen if she accidentally pulled her past self out of time.
It could be my future self, she reminded herself. All times are one in the nexus point.
Cat cleared his throat. “Any luck?”
“Not yet.” Emily took a long breath. “Give me a few moments.”
She braced herself, then reached out with her senses. The spells she’d used to tame the nexus point were surprisingly organic, designed to grow as more and more power was funnelled into them until the entire point was brought under control. It was the only way to do it, she knew from experience. Trying to impose any other kind of order would lead to a colossal explosion when the nexus point broke free. The land that had become the Desert of Death had been killed by a nexus point explosion. Or so she’d been told.
Her spells glinted in front of her, sharp-edged charms linked directly to her magical signature – and Cat’s. She didn’t relax as she started to look for unwanted surprises, intrusion charms used to hack the network and bend it to someone else’s will. The network was big enough to allow someone to get in, if they knew what they were doing, perhaps even to hide their fiddling from someone who didn’t know how the network should look. She felt her eyes narrow as she parsed through the charms, inspecting everywhere a dangerous piece of spellware might hide. There was nothing. She wondered, suddenly, if she’d been tricked into access the network so the hacker could follow her in, but there was no sign of it either. The network remained untouched.
“Nothing,” she said, finally. Her heart sank as she stepped back from the brink. “If they did something to the nexus point, I can’t find it.”
“You created it,” Cat pointed out. “You know what to look for.”
Emily scowled. She wasn’t a slouch when it came to creating wards, or converting a nexus point into a power source, but she knew there were better wardcrafters out there. One could have hacked the network in a manner she couldn’t find, at least until the spellware went active and started subverting the rest of the network, yet there was just no way to be sure. There was no way to take the network apart and start again either, not without causing a hell of a lot of problems for Kuching. The Hierarchy might have counted on it.
She shook her head. “Nothing,” she repeated. “If they tricked us, or if ...”
Her mind raced. If the Hierarchy had wanted her to head south ... why? What was she missing? Had they intended to get her out of the Allied Lands? Did they intend to seize Heart’s Eye or Whitehall or... or where? Or ... or what? There was simply no way to know what they were doing. It was like fighting smoke and mirrors. Had they come all this way for nothing?”
