The Book of Deacon: Book 03 - The Battle of Verril (2 page)

With a tumultuous crash, the light suddenly
vanished. Myranda opened her eyes. Before her, in a heap, was a
young man with unkempt brown hair and a gray tunic. Beneath him was
the twitching remains of a now destroyed creature. The inexplicable
newcomer groaned in pain, and slowly recognition forced its way
through shock, fear, and confusion. She knew this man. He was a
young wizard she’d met in a place called Entwell. It was a place of
learning, tucked away on the other side of a treacherous cave.
She’d spent time there, what seemed like a lifetime ago, learning
the ways of magic. He had been her teacher, her mentor, and above
all her friend, but she’d had to leave him behind in that paradise.
His name was Deacon. She’d reflected upon their time together more
times than she could count in the eternity since she’d left. Now,
with no explanation, he had returned, and his appearance had
crushed the beast that had been threatening her.

A thousand questions and a dozen emotions
fought for Myranda's attention, but one pressing matter defeated
them all. The other creature. Before she could draw breath to shout
a warning, a second gash in the sky opened and a small white bag
came tumbling out. It landed with a force far too great for its
size, and directly atop the beast that was only steps away from
bringing the unexpected reunion to an all too swift end. Thus, in
the most unlikely of ways, the crisis was ended.

Myranda looked down upon her ailing friend.
The fall, and more so what he had fallen upon, had taken a rather
severe toll on him. He groaned again and rolled to the ground,
rising to his hands and knees, then finally unsteadily to his feet.
Suddenly his clenched eyes shot open.

“Myranda!” he cried, as though he had just
remembered the name.

The wizard's eyes darted around, finally he
found Myranda. He rushed to her.

“Myranda! Heaven and Gods above. It is a
miracle! Are you well?” he asked, crouching at her side, his own
injuries instantly forgotten. “No, no, you are not well at all! My
crystal! Where is it?”

“Deacon . . . Deacon. DEACON!” Myranda
called, finally with enough of her wits about her to appreciate the
appearance of her old friend.

“Here, yes,” Deacon said, scooping up his
crystal and rushing to her side. “What requires healing most
urgently?!”

His voice was insistent and desperate.

“Please, Deacon calm down. Thanks to you the
danger is gone. Now, where did you come from? How did you get
here?” Myranda asked.

“From Entwell, directly,” he said, calling to
mind his long neglected white magic teachings and beginning to
restore Myranda's ailing legs.

“But how? It is so far. When did you leave?
How did you find me?” she asked.

“I left a few moments ago. I've been watching
you as best I could. It has been . . . well, part of a recent
change in focus for me,” he said.

“A few moments ago?” Myranda said,
confused.

“Yes. Instantaneous travel. Transportation.
It flirts with a number of techniques we have forbidden, but the
principles were there. It just took some digging. Some innovation.
A few weeks,” he said, finishing up on the injuries he could see
before beginning on his own.

In Entwell, Deacon had been the resident
master of a field of the mystic arts known as gray magic. It was a
catchall, dealing with anything that did not explicitly heal or
hurt, and was not based on the elements. He’d devoted the whole of
his life, since before he could speak, to mastering these arts, and
thus they were second nature to him, an afterthought that he
understood so thoroughly he often forgot that there were others who
did not.

“How could you have been watching me?” she
asked, trying to stand on her restored legs.

“Well, distance seeing is actually rather low
magic. Penetrating the obscuring effect of the mountains required
that you be exerting yourself mystically, but that was hardly a
rarity for you. It took a bit of diligence, but I was able to
pinpoint you rather frequently,” he answered, his voice beginning
to waver as he began trembling.

“Is something the matter?” she asked.

“Nothing at all . . . I am just . . . Is it
always this cold?” he said.

Myranda realized that he was in no way
dressed for the northern weather. The same light gray tunic he had
worn in Entwell was all he wore now. It was scarcely enough to ward
off the freezing wind.

“Good heavens! Why didn't you wear something
warmer?” she asked.

“I-I haven't been thinking very clearly of
late. Not s-since . . . Never mind. I have some things in my
b-b-bag which might h-h-help,” he said.

Shakily, he made his way to the crater that
contained his bag and the remains of the second creature. When he
spotted it, he jumped back.

“W-w-what is th-this?” he said, clearly
having just noticed the beasts he had saved Myranda from.

“I don't know, they just came out from the
walls. Something Demont dreamed up, I'm sure,” Myranda
answered.

“Demont . . . “ he mused, as though somehow
he knew the name. “F-fascinating. I've not seen something crafted
in s-s-such a way.”

“You can study it later. You need to warm
up,” Myranda reminded him.

“Indeed,” he said.

Deacon grasped the cinched closed end of the
bag and tugged at it, but it barely moved.

“B-b-b-blast it. I was afraid something like
this would happen. The transportation damaged the enchantments,” he
said. “Won't t-t-t-take a moment to fix.”

He held his crystal unsteadily over the bag.
A pulse of light and a flex of will later and the bag seemed to
rise up, as though it was no longer heavy enough to compress the
broken creature beneath it. Sure enough, Deacon grasped the bag
once more, this time lifting it as though it were empty, which it
indeed seemed to be. He began to paw through it clumsily. As he
did, the sound of much clinking and jostling could be heard from
within.

“Sh-sh-sh-should have organized this better,”
he said, suddenly beginning to cough a dry hollow cough as the bite
of the cold finally got the better of his lungs. When the fit
subsided, he cast a harried eye to the door behind them. “Is it
warmer inside, p-p-perhaps?”

“I wouldn't risk it. There was some spell on
the door that released those creatures,” she said.

“If it was placed there, it can be removed,”
he said, gathering the bag closed and rushing to the door.

Myranda watched anxiously as he inspected the
door. He looked it over, even without his crystal at work, seeming
to follow lines and patterns that weren't there, until his eyes
settled upon the door sill.

“Here. R-r-runes. I don't recognize them . .
. but . . . it would seem they are spent. If we can manage to
p-p-p-pry the door, the spell will not activate again,” he stated
with certainty.

With that he heaved a shoulder at the door,
bouncing painfully off. He then raised his crystal. Another pulse
of light and the door burst open so forcefully that it was nearly
torn from its hinges. He rushed inside. When the door did not slam
shut again, and no more creatures appeared, Myranda followed,
shutting the door behind her. Deacon was beating his arms and
looking desperately for some source of heat. Finding none, he
raised his crystal once more and released it. The immaculately
clear, egg-shaped focus stone took on a warm orange glow and almost
immediately the room's temperature rose to a comfortable one. He
settled against the wall, sighed with relief, and slid to the
floor.

“We need to move on from here as quickly as
possible. This is Demont's workshop, I believe. I do not wish to be
here if he returns,” Myranda warned, nervously scanning the room
once more.

“Duly noted. A wise decision,” he agreed as
he rummaged through his bag once more.

The satchel was by no means large. Stuffed to
capacity it looked as though it might be able to hold a tightly
balled blanket, and it was hanging quite loose. Yet he pulled a
full length white cloak, then another from it. Dropping the bag on
the ground, he hurriedly put the cloak on. It was not ideally
suited for the northern cold either, but perhaps in addition to the
tunic he wore it would be enough. He then presented the other cloak
to Myranda and helped her to put it on.

“How did you fit those inside that small
bag?” she asked.

“It is quite large inside. A little trick
traveling wizards use. I could make one for you if you like, but it
would take a bit of time,” he said, showing her the bag.

When he opened the top of the bag wide, the
inside looked to be mounded with vials, books, tools, indeed, the
entire contents of Deacon's hut. They had not become any smaller,
either. It was as though looking into the bag was staring into the
mouth of a deep pit.

“That is quite alright. Deacon . . . I . . .
“ Myranda began, fumbling for the right words. “How long will you
be out of Entwell?”

She wanted desperately to tell him how often
her thoughts had turned to him, to tell him how much she valued
their time together, but the words wouldn't come. It was as though
it had been so long since she'd had someone like him in her life
that she had simply lost her ability to express herself
adequately.

“For quite a while . . . quite a while,” he
said. “My actions prior to my escape have soured attitudes toward
me. I'm not certain I would be welcome.”

“What did you do?” she asked.

“It doesn't matter,” he said, his eyes
beginning to wander to the contents of the workshop. “The important
thing is that I managed to reach you in time. You say that this
workshop belongs to Demont. He is . . . one of the generals,
yes?”

“He is,” Myranda said.

“Then . . . I think anything we might do to
delay him is useful to the cause,” Deacon remarked
distractedly.

“I suppose,” the hero replied.

“To that end . . . I think it prudent that I
take samples . . . remove pieces of his puzzle, as it were,” he
said, beginning to pour over the shelves and tables.

“If you must, but do it quickly. We need to
rejoin the others. And be careful,” she relented.

Like a child given permission to raid the
shelves of a candy store, Deacon began greedily plucking up
artifacts, sheets, and vials. After a cursory glance that somehow
assured him that it was safe to do so, each was dropped into his
seemingly bottomless bag. There was a case filled with crystals
that he dropped in its entirety inside, and book after book
followed it. Finally he pulled a large map that had been affixed to
one wall, folded it and tucked it inside. When he was done, the
shelves were virtually bare, and the bag did not even bulge.
Myranda smiled at the utter enthusiasm in Deacon's face as he
shuffled the things inside his bag, reaching down nearly to his
shoulder into it to pull up things he was interested in looking at
first and positioning them at the top. When he was satisfied, he
cinched the bag shut and hung it effortlessly from the tie of the
tunic beneath the robe.

“Well, I suppose that I am prepared to brave
the weather again. Are you certain you are well? It has been some
time since I last practiced the healer's art. I may have missed an
injury,” he said, suddenly realizing he had been ignoring her.

“I am well enough. Let us go, quickly. There
is no telling how far the others have gone,” she said.

“Then by all means,” he said, bracing himself
for the cold before opening the door.

The instant that the harsh wind touched him
he knew that the thin cloak was not nearly enough. After briefly
considering coping with the cold, he decided that further action
was required.

“Just a moment more,” he said, shedding the
cloak and clutching it in one hand as he held his crystal in the
other.

He closed his eyes briefly, as if
remembering, and then cast a spell. In addition to the swift, clean
pulse of light from the crystal that signified his spells, a wave
of light swept up the cloak from bottom to top. A glow trailed
behind it, lingering briefly before fading. He stepped into the
wind again, this time seemingly unaffected by it.

“What did you do?” Myranda asked.

“I imbued the fabric of the cloak with an
enchantment that counteracts the cold by preventing any of my own
heat from . . . “ he began.

“An enchantment against the cold. That was
answer enough for me,” she said.

“Of course,” he replied, clearly a bit
disappointed at his explanation being cut short.

“Is it really so simple to cast an
enchantment?” she asked as she stepped out into the cold, her
layers of protection and years of experience making a similar
treatment unnecessary.

“Well, normally no. The strength and
complexity of an enchantment that a garment or other object will
hold is . . . We make our cloaks specifically to ease enchantment,”
he said, catching himself.

“Thank you,” Myranda said with a chuckle.

The pair stepped outside. The terror of
Myranda's previous venture through the doors had been so
overwhelming she'd scarcely noticed where the door had led her.
They were on the edge of a steep, icy slope. The weak glow of the
morning sky cast light on a sparsely treed countryside. The memory
of their trip was faded by her ordeal, but she was certain that she
was nowhere near where she had entered the fort with the other
Chosen. Nothing her eyes told her gave her any indication of where
she might be. After a few moments of straining her eyes, trying to
find something unique about the countryside, all she knew for
certain was that the fort was somewhere to the southwest. An
endless column of black smoke stretching high into the gray sky
betrayed that.

“Where do we go?” Deacon asked, marveling at
the sheer size of the countryside. He had no memories of any place
but Entwell. Tiny and perfect as it was, it was his world. The
rolling hills and mountains of white, the scattered, snow capped
trees, the tiny flickering hints of far off fires, it all had a
scope that was dizzying and disorienting to him.