Chasing Bloodlines (Book 4) (2 page)

“And they have come a long way to ask for your assistance.”

“
And
?”

“And his wife is missing.”

“
AND
?”

“
And
they fished me out of the river when I tried to ford it. They got to me right before I froze to death.”

Gabriel stared at her as Mikelle laughed. “What are
you
doing today?” he asked his Councilwoman.

“Collaborating with Robyn. Do you know he doesn’t know what chocolate is?”

“Gabriel, honestly.” Robyn sighed.

“Fine. What is chocolate, and what do you do with it? Do you wear it?”

“Some people do.” Mikelle said, “Some people
should
.”

Robyn laughed. “It’s a food.”

“Yes, you put it in cookies, or mix it in breads, and it makes everything sweet.”

“What are cookies?”

Mikelle slammed her hand on the table. “Have I ever told you how much I
hate
this place?”

Gabriel turned his head to the door. “Lael, I need help!”

“Go to the Irukanji Markets and find me chocolate there.”

Lael strode in swiftly. “You called, Head Mage? Oh, Queen Robyn! What a delight to see you here!”

“Take one of these women off my hands. They’re carrying on about things I don’t understand.”

Lael nodded knowingly. “As do all women. Mage Malain will be here shortly. Shall I have tea brought up?”

“
Wine
.”

“Lael,” Mikelle said with a soft voice, “tell Gabriel he looks pretty.”

“No wine for Mikelle.” Gabriel said.

Lael nodded, trying to hide his grin, and left them.

Gabriel finished the rest of his meal and waited in the sitting room for Malain. He could hear Mikelle and Robyn laughing down the hall, and it made him smile.

“Head Mage,” Lael announced sometime after, “Mage Malain,”

“Mage Malain, you look very well,” Gabriel said as he stood.

“Nothing a healthy diet and sunshine couldn’ fix.” He said with a bowed head, “Thank you for seeing me so quickly.”

“It is I who should be doing the thanking. I understand you pulled Queen Robyn out of the river.”

“Oh, I only helped. My boy Demi carried her out and set an impulsion-pattern t’ warm her up.”

“Then I must thank him as well. You all do me great service. But I understand you come here on important business.”

“I do, Head Mage. When I returned after my imprisonment, I discovered my wife Anabel had vanished. I know what you may think, husband missing for two years. It gives a wife every reason t’ leave, but I assure you, Anabel would not leave like tha’. She has three children and was devoted t’ them. I can only assume foul play. It happened about a month before I returned—righ’ about the time Ryker was released.”

Gabriel nodded, surprising Malain. “I have had thirty letters stating exactly what you said. I have no doubt Ryker is involved.”

“Do—do you think her dead?”

“I do not.”

“But…you will not say what you think.”

Gabriel bent forward and put his elbows on his knees. “I think Ryker is building an army. I know he has killed Mages to make them into specters. It could be that Ryker took her for other purposes. Is she beautiful?” Malain nodded. “I want to say she is alive.”

“Which could be worse than the alternative.”

“Do you have a piece of her? A hair or blood drop?”

Malain wrinkled his nose. “I do not.”

“For now, there is nothing I can do. But know that I am doing all I can to find Ryker.”

Malain nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you.”

“I am hoping I can spend time training with you later. As far as I know, you and I are the only Creators. I would like to learn what you can offer.”

“I would be happy t’, but I doubt I could teach you anything. Creating is instinctive. It simply happens. You feel the threads laid to form what you need, and it happens.”

Gabriel nodded. That much he knew, but Creating did not always happen when he wanted, only when he needed it.

“I plan on staying in Jaden indefinitely. Please let me know when you wish t’ spar. Perhaps we can create new patterns for you.”

Gabriel smiled. “Give yourself a few days to rest, and then we will spar. I understand your son is due for a Classing shortly?”

“He still has a few weeks.”

“I look forward to seeing him on the Fire grounds.” Gabriel stood. “Thank you again for saving her Grace. We will see you are rewarded.”

“No need, Head Mage. I am happy t’ be behind safe walls.”

Malain paid him a bow and left, letting Gabriel get back to his studies. Robyn and Mikelle still gossiped over tea and grew silent as he walked in. He sighed heavily.

“I’m returning to Kilkiny to set more wards around your quarters,” he said and shifted out.

He slipped a searchers pattern through the amber link with Aisling’s hair and located her in the Map Room. He appeared behind her, finding the room filled with Generals. He was just about to shift out when a man stood and exclaimed “Head Mage!”

Aisling spun out of her seat. “Shalaban has broken through our army—I have not heard word from Balien. Go!”

Gabriel shot out of there as fast as he could manage. He did not have one of Balien’s hairs to search with, but he could skim the camp in a circle. He backtracked miles from the last known location until he saw pale smoke drifting in the distance.

The battleground was strewn with broken things. Men, horses, tents and carriages. He could not tell which side was which, so he cut his shift and dropped himself in the center. The air was quiet and filled with the stench of death. People milled in the distance carrying bodies while great fires cremated others.

“Maggin! Shoklar Maggin!” someone shouted, and Gabriel turned to see a soldier running at him with a weapon raised. Gabriel seized Void and shifted west into an Anatolian field. Soldiers dug graves to one side while others carried the bodies of their fallen. With a few simple patterns Gabriel lifted the earth for the diggers and kept walking. A few tents set up behind a rock fortification marked the camp’s center. Gabriel surveyed the damage with a pinched expression.

“Star—Star Breaker,” someone called faintly. Gabriel stopped and looked around for the source of the voice, finding a man bleeding into the rocks. “I thought no one would find me.”

His legs were broken and rest of him did not look much better. Gabriel set his bones and replaced burns with renewed skin. “Stars bless you, m’lord,” the man whispered as Gabriel worked. “We lost our Spirit Mages early on. I thought I’d lose me legs at best.”

Gabriel hefted the man up in his arms and walked towards the tents.

“What happened here?” he asked.

“Shalabane Mages attacked by night. We took a goodly number of them, but they overwhelmed us before the sun rose.”

“War Code states battles end by sundown and begin at sunrise. What makes them think they could attack at night?” Gabriel hissed.

“Can’t say, m’lord.”

“When did this happen?”

“Two days ago.” The soldier was beginning to wane.

“Don’t speak. We’ll get you to a tent.”

Soldiers saw him before he made it to the camp. They rushed to meet him and take his burden. “Where is Prince Balien?” Gabriel stated.

“Quickly,” a man replied and cut a path through the debris. The cries of dying men filled his ears, but he could not stop for them. The soldier brushed through a flap into a quiet tent.

“Oh, stars,” Gabriel gasped and rushed to Balien’s unconscious body set on a cot. “Oh, stars, Balien. What happened?”

His friend’s body looked misshapen. His torso was oddly compressed. Black bruises littered his skin, but there was not a tremendous quantity of blood.

“An Earth Mage dropped a boulder on him.”

Gabriel set a dozen delve-patterns into the bloody figure and felt numerous breaks. “How is he still alive?”

“His sword broke its fall—protected his head.”

“I…I can’t work here. I’m taking him to Jaden.”

The soldier grabbed Gabriel’s arm. “There are a lot of wounded men here.”

“I will be back with Battle Mages before nightfall,” Gabriel nodded and seized Void. He grabbed the cot in one hand and Balien’s arm in the other. They shot towards Jaden, making for the infirmary. Balien’s rasping breath filled the quiet space between worlds as black and white images blurred past.

He cut the pattern in the infirmary, a clean, bright floor in a block of apartments. “Spirit Mage!” Gabriel shouted, delving Balien’s neck for damage, “Quickly!”

A Mage in a yellow mantle ran in and gasped. “Head Mage! Stars above, what happened?”

“A boulder fell on him. Brace his feet, and help me get him up.”

“There may be rock debris left. Let me send for an Earth Mage,” the man said and carefully grabbed Balien’s feet. Another Mage rushed in and helped lift.

“I’ll handle earthen material,” Gabriel replied. They set Balien on a smooth steel table and cut his clothes away.

“Who is it, Head Mage?”

“Prince Balien Bolt.”

“He stopped breathing. I need an Air Mage!” The Spirit Mage rushed out.

Gabriel climbed up on the table and put Balien’s head between his knees. He immediately set patterns in Balien’s chest to inflate the broken ribs. They snapped together with sickening cracks as two Mages rushed in, one wielding an Air pattern he set in Balien’s chest. It rose and fell slowly.

“You, hold his wrist and tell me if his heart stops. You, I need water,” Gabriel ordered, pointing bloodied fingers.

The boulder had fallen on Balien’s torso and left leg. It broke more bones than Gabriel had suffered under Nolen’s control. There was great cause for alarm with breaks, for unwelcome material could get inside the bone. With the amount of open wounds, there was great chance for infection—the one thing Gabriel had no control over.

The pelvis cracked together in a dozen places, lifting the abnormally flat hip. The femur had two snaps, making the Mages pale. More had gathered to aid, but they stood speechless in the doorway watching. The back was broken, the spine severed just above the pelvis, but with a dozen patterns, Gabriel slid it back into place and repaired the nerves, veins and muscles.

“Should someone get his sister?”

“No, she doesn’t need to know yet,” Gabriel replied, twining his fingers around a compound fracture in the arm. “Plug your ears if you have weak stomachs.” He yanked the arm at the wrist and snapped the bone back in its place. The sound made several people gag, and in truth Gabriel’s stomach rolled.

“Head Mage, my stars, what happened?” Councilman Lewis asked as he rushed in. “Where can I help?”

“Start with the abrasions on the head and work your way down.”

Blood pooled on the table. Gabriel took water from a pail and sank it into Balien’s parched veins, flushing the wounds. He pulled rocks, grass, and dirt from the abrasions while signaling the Air Mage to pause his pattern.

“Still not breathing, Head Mage.”

“How is the heartbeat?” Gabriel demanded.

“Very faint, Head Mage.”

Gabriel delved into the chest, repairing tears and bruises to the lungs, closing his eyes to focus all his attention. The gut was horribly crushed and required several minutes of steady weaving to lift bruises and stitch lesions. “Missed one,” he whispered, and Balien’s back cracked as he realigned a vertebra.

“You may want this one,” Lewis said as he moved his hands over a leg wound.

Gabriel delved to make sure it had not let earthen material inside, and he slowly stitched it up, leaving a seamless line of new flesh amidst the blood. Together he and Lewis mended skin lesions until there was nothing left to fix. What felt like hours took no more than ten minutes.

Finally, Gabriel lifted his hands and put them over Balien’s head. “No one move. Step away from the table if you’re not helping.” He sank delve-patters into the brain and carefully felt a concussion. Closing his eyes, he mended the damage inflicted when Balien hit the ground. The back of the head bled and was mildly fractured. Gabriel stitched with great precision and broke the tiny clot forming, flushing it from the brain.

Gabriel hunched over his friend, exhausted. Someone brought him a mug of water, while several Mages washed the body and cut away the remaining clothes. Gabriel looked to the Air Mage, but he shook his head. The Spirit Mage did as well, checking Balien’s wrist. Gabriel laced a hand through his hair and gripped tightly, running over any healing pattern that would aid.

“Can anyone here handle the pattern to pump a heart?” Gabriel asked quietly. A few replied they could. He slid off the table, his legs and hands covered in blood. He instructed the Air Mage to keep Balien breathing while setting a female Spirit Mage on Balien’s wrist to monitor his heartbeats, and manually beat it if necessary.