Battle Mage: Winds of Change (The High King: A Tale of Alus Book 11) (39 page)

The fire wizard was usually one of the first to try and discover something new. While Magnus was often an obstacle in his life, Sebastian did respect his ability and some of that came from the wizard's thirst for knowledge. He also wanted to be the best, which was also admirable, though it could come at the expense of others, which was a trait that too many men had shown in the past.

Sebastian gestured to the map while Magnus, Helmar and a couple of the fire wizard's hangers on paid attention to the lesson he had repeated with each group. The fire wizard passed his hand over the map with his eyes closed and said after finishing, "I can feel the familiarity of your magic and even that of Darius." He pointed to the secondary gate point in the emperor's capitol city. It was called Ensolus from what little Southwall's spies had discovered over the years. "This one feels familiar, even though it is under the Dark One's control."

Sebastian ran his fingers over the gates leading into the Garosh's fortress south of the great wall protecting Southwall first knowing the familiar magic signature better than the fire wizard. There was actually more than one gate attached to that one mark. He could feel them individually even though it looked like there was a jumble of colors. Darius and Palose had opened gates inside the fortress that hadn't been closed since the emperor's assault on the giant Garosh months ago.

"It should," Sebastian replied seeming a bit distracted as his thoughts of the originator of those gates came to mind. "You rode with him to Windmeer with me."

"That's the magic of the Betrayer, Palose?" Magnus asked showing surprise. Palose had been a friend to Sebastian, but a mission north of the wall had left his fellow cadet behind for dead. Days later he had returned only to open a portal into the guardian city's castle storage rooms deep inside the fortress.

No one knew what had happened to him, but Sebastian had fought him under Windmeer. Palose had become something more powerful than a battle mage by then and hidden it from him. He had felt like the warlocks Sebastian fought who were with him.

"Palose has snuck behind the wall to cause trouble several times since that first incident. He can open portals and found a way to set several gates around the country. Well, he could until I closed the ones I could find anyway," the mage stated with a grim nod to the wizard.

Magnus pointed to the one in the north where everyone believed the Dark One had his fortress city. A jumble of markings to the eye, there were multiple gates made in a general way, which Sebastian identified as general gates any warlock must be able to use. With their magical senses, both men could identify another magic separated from those marking it as another of Palose's gates.

"It feels weaker than the others, but Palose has his own in the city?"

Sebastian nodded in agreement. "That isn't to say that there aren't dozens more I can't feel. I know Darius and Palose's magic. There was also a general gate I found which I used as a guide to find the others as well. If other warlocks I don't know have portals for their use, I haven't discovered them; but there are three obvious ones there besides Palose's gateway."

Rubbing his chin in thought, Magnus stepped out of the way for the others to examine the map the same way. "If we could use his gate to enter the city, it might not be guarded. I wouldn't put it past the emperor to guard his gates, even if they didn't believe we could follow them there.

"Have you thought of a plan to infiltrate yet?"

"The ravens and white wizards are against me trying," Sebastian replied and forgot to hide his disappointment. Normally capable of hiding his feelings to the point of being stoic, the mage couldn't hide the way he felt about giving up this opportunity.

Magnus' silver eyes glanced to the battle mage looking surprised and that led to him saying, "They don't want to risk a more valuable asset like you. You could still send an assault team, if you had a plan."

Knowing that the man was correct, Sebastian tried to hide that he wished to go alone the first time. If there was a trap he couldn't avoid, the mage didn't want to risk more lives if he could help it. A certain amount of pride, or perhaps guilt in reference to Palose who he had lost as a friend, was probably behind his feelings as well; but Sebastian fought those feelings as best he could.

"I'm afraid that Palose disguised the gate or closed it. If we wait too long to test it, we could lose the chance forever," Sebastian confided to the man. It wasn't a true secret, but few knew that the original strength of the marking had been fading since he had originally discovered it using map magic to trace the portals.

"You should send someone then, or just go yourself if you feel that you can't trust anyone else to go in your place," Magnus said a little quieter and his eyes looked to those closest to them. No one seemed to take note of his comment aside from Ashleen and maybe Serrena or Elzen. Even Helmar had given up on the map and stepped away before the statement left the wizard's mouth.

"Are you volunteering, Magnus?" Ashleen questioned defensively. The wilder was as against his going as those in command. If Sebastian went, she knew that he would leave her behind to protect her. It was just the way the man was and part of why she loved him, even if it was as annoying as it was noble.

Placing his fingers of both hands on his chest, Magnus grinned at the girl trying to exert his charms on her once again fruitlessly. "Me? Oh, I am probably way too important to risk on such a mission.

"Maybe someone like Elzen or Arrimus, if he wasn't an apprentice, could be risked on such a mission; but not the champion of Winter's Edge," the wizard replied trying to appear innocent of being the one trying to instigate Sebastian's blatant disregard for orders.

Letting the matter go for a time, the wizards were led in trying to copy the runes given them on the first day of training. It was the runes of defense, since anyone could benefit from having the most commonly used rune. Those with magic could use it as a more effective shield than anything known to the wizards. Even the darkness shields had weaknesses, but the rune shields had yet to be defeated by something simple like a spell of light.

As he watched the men and women creating shields, the mage thought on his conversation with Magnus and turned to Elzen and asked, "Elzen, could you run to the supply master and pick up a dozen corrinuts for me?"

The younger falcon looked confused at the sudden request, but nodded his head as he countered, "Did you think of a new spell or something?"

"Or something," the owl agreed with a smile as he thought on the use of an old spell mixed with something new.

It didn't take his friend long to return with a small bag, which probably held more than double what he had asked for, but Elzen explained with a look of chagrin on his face, "When I told him they were for you, he gave me the whole bag. Apparently, you are quite popular here now."

Grunting dismissively, Sebastian said quietly to Elzen as one of his best friends as a cadet, "That's a switch. We were barely noticed except when you would pull one of your pranks anyway."

"Well, it's your fault now," Elzen said with a grin adding, "and no one's running after you threatening to turn you over to Falconi Garrett for punishment. Some people just don't have a sense of humor."

Pulling one of the corrinuts from the bag, the older mage acknowledged jokingly, "Well, when you scare the girls out of the bathhouse to the point of driving them into the hall naked, they tend to lose their sense of humor."

Moving his jaw back and forth with his hand, even as he heard a strange clicking from a blow to the face he had received for that prank, Elzen replied, "I don't think my jaw will ever be the same since Sylvie hit me that hard. The healers had to heal me after she pounded me that time."

"For a martial arts master, you sure let her beat you badly," Sebastian chuckled glancing from the nut to his friend thinking that Elzen was a nut of another kind as well.

Shrugging off the comment, the younger mage replied, "I didn't like hitting girls, or friends, especially when I kind of admit that I probably deserved it." He laughed looking back on that day, though the pain hadn't been funny at the time.

"So what do you plan to do with this?" he asked seeing the owl intently looking at the corrinut again. Ashleen and several others noticed his preoccupation with the large nut as well. Those practicing closest to him paused feeling that something was about to happen, which they might wish to learn.

"Spark," Sebastian said charging the corrinut with energy as he once had in the tunnels under the mountain fortress. Rilena had been one of those needing to be saved that day, and the woman watched beside Evie, who knew nothing of the ancient spell. It was said to predate the creation of Southwall and Darius had told him that he had even used something similar as an apprentice hundreds of years ago.

"Light," he added sending the second piece of magic into the nut. The mage had placed a smaller amount of energy into the corrinut than he had for the explosions he had needed as a diversion. The idea he had would use less force keeping the noise down. Unlike the diversion needed for the fortress, this time Sebastian wanted less noise.

"This should be bright," he stated and threw the charged corrinut away from those practicing. Once charged, the mage didn't even need to speak a word to ignite the magic held inside the nut. It was a trick of the nature wizards, so few in the courtyard had ever used the spell and no one had tried putting light into one since that was a relatively new spell.

Though Sebastian had a feeling that he might be blinded when it went off, which was the planned for use when the mage would use them; the man watched as he set off the nut's spell. Most assembled there had been looking, but Ashleen had looked at his face seeing something there that alerted the wilder to the impending test. It was the same look she had seen when the Hollow Sword had broken nearly killing him.

The sun had been brightly shining down, but the flash as the combined magic released was blinding. He closed his eyes automatically in the face of the bright light, while the others gathered did the same or raised their arms and hands to block for them a little too late. Those who hadn't been watching turned in surprise at the thud of the releasing magic and the bright light.

Some who turned late were still blinking at the purple light nearly blinding them. Those who had watched trustingly were rubbing their eyes. Some stumbled and fell to the ground as cries of shock came to the mage's ears. The owl opened his eyes seeing the purple of the flash emblazoned on his vision as if he had been staring into the sun.

"Idiot," Ashleen complained up at him from where the shorter girl stood beside him.

"Well, that should do the trick then," Sebastian noted blinking at the darkness still obscuring the light of the day.

Elzen asked, "What was that for?"

"I was thinking that it could disrupt the enemy if we ever set a portal in their midst."

As the younger mage swung his head to look at Sebastian incredulously, though he was suffering from the temporary trauma as well; Elzen asked, "Are you thinking of trying to open a portal into the Dark One's city?"

Placing his hand on his friend's shoulder, he ordered, "Heal." He fixed the blindness in a moment, though the mage was beginning to see more light already. How long the affect would last might be good to know and Sebastian refused Elzen's offer to do the same to him.

"It could be used to enter a city or a smaller window could be set in the midst of the creatures to drop the bombs in the middle of them to blind their monsters in battle. With our new ability to set portals, we could drop fully charged corrinuts in the middle of an army setting off explosions to disrupt and kill them before a battle even truly starts."

Elzen voiced the thoughts of those listening with his low whistle of appreciation. "That is an evil plan, Bas," the younger mage replied. "That is something I would expect one of his warlocks to try."

Knowing that the plan stated was indeed a cruel way to use the portals, Sebastian also believed that the light bombs were relatively humane if the mage used them as he was thinking. He took a second corrinut and charged it with the spark, but didn't place light inside this time.

"Door," the mage called on a gateway only about a foot squared. A second portal opened high above the courtyard and Sebastian tossed the nut through the window of golden light.

Looking up, the mage, whose vision had cleared by then, saw the dark dot high above them as planned and detonated the magic. It was in sight, but it was just the second experiment. He wasn't sure if an item could be sent through the gates and emerge on the other side without someone to deliver them.

The explosion drew those daring enough to look. There was no flash of light beyond the flash of fire. It wasn't a powerful charge this time and he hadn't used the second spell. Sebastian only wanted to know that it was possible to send the item through the gates.

A third nut was charged. This time it only held light and it was a strong charge. A new window opened and the secondary opening couldn't be seen, though many watching the experiment tried to find the exit gate. Sebastian sent the nut to a place beyond his sight and set off the charge of magic remotely.

Light flashed beyond the north wall drawing everyone's attention. He had sent it far enough away and behind the tall wall, but could still feel the magic inside of the nut. A verifiable success, Sebastian nodded having concluded that perhaps only a greater distance might prevent the spell from working as he had hoped.