Steel And Flame (Book 1) (67 page)

“Then come clean.  We’ve got plenty of time until
dusk.”  When Colbey did not immediately respond, the mage grew irritated. 
“Well?”

“Careful mage.  I’d hate to have to tell the captain
you tumbled from the tree and broke your neck.”

Marik remained silent.  He sat staring at him.

“What do you care, anyway?”

“I told you.”

Colbey sighed.  Why did outlanders always think they
were so damned clever?  But this annoying mage might cause him trouble, get him
expelled from the band before he located his quarry.  If the hoard appeared
with him outside the band and in a disadvantageous position, his already slim
options might reduce to nothing.  “Fine.  Don’t go telling anyone else. 
Understand?”

“If that’s how you want it.”

“It is.”  A quick glance around told him no one had
wandered close.  “It’s simple enough.  It’s a type of meditation that lets you
ignore your weariness or muscle aches.”  That stretched the facts but it should
be close enough to satisfy this busybody mage.

Or maybe not.  “Oh, really?  You just
thought
yourself past the need to breathe for half a mark?  And what about your aura?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Your aura,” the mage repeated.  He paused at Colbey’s
blank expression.  “You don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“No.”

“Everyone has one.  It’s sort of like the glow around
a candle flame.  Tollaf says it’s the natural bleed off of life energy from the
people that create it.”

“Uh-huh,” Colbey replied noncommittally, though his
mind picked through his training, matching the mage’s words to his lessons.

“The point I was about to make is that your thoughts
alone don’t make your aura do what yours did.”

“Is that a fact or is that your guess?”

The mage suddenly appeared uncertain.

“I thought so.  What exactly are you saying I did?”

“It changed shape.  Normally it’s like that candle
halo I mentioned.  Yours changed shape until it matched your body.  You were
wearing it, like a set of clothes.  I’ve never seen that before!”

Colbey pondered his possible responses carefully. 
“Mage, you say you never saw this before.”

“Right.”

“You are a mage yourself.  You have trained with other
mages?”

“Yes.”

“You think I am a magic user like you because you saw
this thing.  Yet you have never seen a magic user do this themselves.  How did
you arrive at the conclusion that I am a magic user because I did a thing no
other magic user does?”  Colbey hoped this would end the conversation.  It
wearied him, probably because it was the longest discussion he’d had with
anyone for nearly two years.

Once again, Colbey hoped in vain.  “Because there are
lots of different kinds of magic users, and my own experience is limited to the
mages in the band.”  He stopped and reconsidered.  “Well, there was one other,
but I never really saw him.”

“I told you I am no mage!  Not one of any stripe and I
tell you the truth, so leave me alone!”

“Then tell me the rest of it.  You didn’t tell me
everything, did you?  I want to know how a ‘meditation’ can do that to your
aura.”

“And how should I know?” he barked.  “It’s a simple
technique.  An exercise in concentration and control and…and visualization!”

“Visualization?”

“Yes!” Colbey admitted harshly before wishing he had
not.  The words sounded harmless enough except the mage became lost in thought,
as if they carried deeper meanings to him than Colbey thought they would.  “Are
you satisfied?”

“Hmm.”  He thought quietly, losing interest in the
conversation, which suited Colbey fine.  The irritations in dealing with these
outlanders far outstripped anything Colbey had ever endured at home in the
Euvea.  This one in particular persisted where others tucked their tail between
their legs.  Most left him alone after Colbey showed them his teeth.

He wondered, as he so frequently did, why he remained
in this strange land with its stranger inhabitants.  When the invasion broke
out on the Nolier border, Colbey had felt certain that
these
must be
ones he had waited so long for.

After an entire spring as an army scout, practically
walking in the Noliers’ footsteps before the grass could spring back up, he
knew it for another dead end.  These men were as foolish as the Galemarans and
the Tullainians, and the entire Nolier army could have invaded the forest, but
the Guardians would have held them at bay.  Certainly they never would have
been torn to shreds the way they had been.

Only if the Noliers were holding back could they turn
out to be his longed-for prey.  He’d heard the mage say the invasion seemed
less than serious despite the scale of the fighting, that the Noliers looked
ready to whirl and run at a moment’s notice.  The mage was wrong.

His assessment of their instant mobility had been
correct, but for the wrong reasons.  All spring Colbey watched their actions,
creeping close enough to overhear casual conversations, and knew what Captain
Trask knew.  From his own life, he knew the ins and outs of forest fighting. 
It would always be far easier, far more effective, to attack on the move than
to defend.  If the Noliers built earthworks like the Galemarans, they would
lose the edge the forest provided them.

Familiar with the surrounding land, they could blend
into the trees, could all but disappear if they needed to.  The particular
patch of land their camp inhabited meant nothing.  There were abundant
clearings in the Green Reaches.  From the trees, their archers could wreak
havoc and be gone by the time the Galemaran soldiers arrived to retaliate. 
Guerilla fighting at its most basic.

As for the creatures that had destroyed his home, he
had no word yet.  The fighting around the gold strike continued with no
immediate victory for either side.  Colbey listened to every story and rumor he
could, hoping for tales of strange beasts or strong magics.  Nothing.  If the
Noliers controlled such, they chose to hold them in abeyance.

“Where did you learn it?”  The mage’s sudden question
wrenched Colbey from his thoughts.

“What?”

“This technique of yours that lets you run like the
wind.  Who did you learn it from?”

“I don’t see as it is any business of yours, but I’ll
tell you if it will end your pestering.  A friend.”

The mage waited.  When additional words failed to
follow he asked, “That’s it?”

“That’s all you’re going to get.  I learned it from a
friend who is now dead.”  Memories surged; the dead…the dying...  It took a
moment for Colbey to choke them back down.

His inquisitor eased off.  He had either sensed
Colbey’s unwillingness to disclose further information or briefly felt Colbey’s
pain.  They sat silently in their tree.

The descending sun painted the sky with fiery oranges
and reds.  After nearly a candlemark of silence, the mage made one last
attempt, coming in from a different path this time.  “I’ve been trying to place
your accent since yesterday.  What part of Galemar are you from?”

Colbey remained silent.

“Or are you from outside?  A couple men in the Ninth
are from Tullainia and Vyajion.”

“It is dusk.  If you are going to do what you came
for, then get started.”

The mage shook his head.  “I’m only trying to be
friendly.”

“I don’t need friends.”

He finally gave up.  After drawing his legs up, the
mage sat cross-legged in the crotch.  “Make sure I don’t fall,” he told Colbey,
before becoming vacant eyed, as before when he had surveyed the camp.

Visions rose as fresh and as painful as if Colbey
still stood in the carnage, seeing it in truth, smelling the charnel smoke,
hearing his people moan.  He knew that his sole duty as a Guardian had been to
protect the village at all cost. 
I wasn’t there!  They all died, they all
were murdered, and I wasn’t there!

“No,” he murmured in a faint whisper to no one but
himself.  “The failed and the damned certainly have no need of friends.”

*        *        *        *        *

Keep the magician off the troops!  That’s easy enough
to say, Trask you bastard.

Since he knew what to look for this time, Marik found
the magician easily enough.  How he would prevent the magician from causing
trouble…well, that was the question of the day.  Marik only possessed the few
shields he’d learned from Tollaf and Caresse, and one attack the magician would
probably laugh at.  He discarded the attacking option.  The crude working would
probably never affect the enemy he now faced.

Shielding every man storming the clearing against
magical attack would be impossible.  His only option, as he saw it, was a
gamble.  He could reverse the shields.  Marik would enclose the magician inside
a shielded dome of etheric energy.  It might prevent spells from getting out,
except the weakest point of an arch is an attack from beneath.  Which is how
the magician, casting from inside the dome, would be hitting it.  He figured to
play it by ear and deal with problems when they manifested.  With his limited
training, what else could he do?

Marik had made that fact as clear as day to Trask when
he’d reported back last night.  He had given Trask the best description of the
magician he could, garnered through his detail-less magesight; average height,
not very muscular and short spiky hair that stood straight upward.  The captain
promised every fighting man would have the description and be on the lookout
for him.

Small help.

From his tree, Marik followed the man’s progress while
he spoke to other men Marik assumed were officers.  He gathered what scant
information on them he could.  Knowing them on sight might prove useful.  The
rest of the camp’s attention fixated on two wagons located to the south where
oversized pots and kettles steamed over cook fires.

The sun lowered further.  Marik watched while Trask’s
quartered company slowly crept through the forest toward the Noliers.  Trask
wanted to hit them from the four compass points simultaneously to prevent them
from fleeing.  Each element appeared in place and ready to strike fast.

Time for the shift change on the picket line.  As soon
as the new men were in place, Marik noticed several auras creep forward.  Many
of the new pickets were quickly put down.  Their thoughts on their full
bellies, all but three fell to the Galemaran front men.

The last three did not allow their after-meal lethargy
to hamper their alertness.  They shouted while they ran for the camp, then fell
with arrows sprouting from their backs.  In the evening silence, their cries
were enough to set the Noliers jumping.

As unprepared as they seemed to Marik, they moved with
a readiness that surprised him.  Trask’s southern and western forces erupted
from the trees, followed moments later by the eastern detachment.  Men turned
to flee, most heading north, in Marik’s direction.  It looked like an open
escape avenue so the Noliers dashed headlong for it until Trask led his men
into their path from the forest.  The Noliers halted as one to assess their
situation.  They drew their weapons.

Marik noted all this, but his primary focus centered
on the magician.  At first the man froze before he ran like a frightened
rabbit.  The apprentice mage almost laughed when he realized the magician
sprinted for his tent to retrieve his components.  He had been caught with his
pants down.

The urge to laugh quickly evaporated when the magician
strapped on his twin belts.

Time to earn my pay for the day.

Marik readied his personal shield and worked through
it with his mental hands.  The nearest line flowed too far away to reach,
restricting his draw to the ambient energy of the surrounding mass diffusion. 
He gathered as much as he could into himself.

Caresse had taught him a shield for astral
protections.  Marik had decided beforehand it would be the best bet.  He prayed
it would catch whatever part of the magician’s spells relied on astral forms. 
Normally, he wove the energy in a sphere around himself.  At first he had only formed
a half sphere to protect his front until Caresse had sent attacks to his rear,
rapidly teaching him to shield in all directions.

This time, rather than feeding the shield from within,
he would have to surround the magician and maintain it from the outside.  Marik
worked speedily, taking the fresh energy and forming the sphere around the
magician.

He proceeded warily despite the speed, expecting an
attack the moment the magician sensed the trap taking shape.  But the man acted
oblivious to Marik’s manipulation of the etheric substance around him.  The man
ran outside his tent, head turning to see what transpired.

Marik carefully moved the shield with him.  He felt it
too risky to tie it to the man’s core, which might explain why he’d sensed
nothing.

The magician studied the enemy forces.  Marik built
new shields, layering them atop the previous to form a thick sandwich.  All the
layered shields fed through the same channel once he linked them.  He could
continue building new ones as long as he had the energy to do so.  Since they
needed to be as strong as he could make them to avoid shattering at the first
casting against their weaker underbelly, he prayed he would be able to create
as many layers as would be needed.