The magitech chronicles.., p.126
The Magitech Chronicles- Complete Series Box Set, page 126
part #1 of The Magitech Chronicles Series
“We should do something flashy.” Shaya snapped her fingers and her smile returned. “I’ve got just the thing. Want to see what the Spellship was really designed for?”
“Show me.” Voria turned her attention to the ship where, theoretically at least, her mortal body still lay. It was long and slender, so unlike the sleek Talon. Given her current size it would probably fit in the palm of her hand.
“Go ahead, then,” Shaya prompted. “Take it in your hand and see what happens. Trust me, you’re going to love this.”
Voria stretched out an arm, and willed the Spellship to come to her. The vessel obediently appeared across the palm of her hand, roughly the size and shape of a sword hilt. It vibrated suddenly, in greeting she realized. It was…alive. No less so than Ikadra, and like Ikadra it had been crafted to be wielded by a goddess.
Vast, brilliant light appeared at either end of the Spellship as her hand closed around it. The magic lanced outwards into long, thin blades of pure life magic, the antithesis of spirit, and void, and dream. It was a double-bladed staff, she realized. “My goddess.”
“Me, you mean?” Shaya gave an amused snort. “Pretty cool, right? You can melee gods with that thing. You’ve had training, right?”
“Not much,” Voria admitted. She gave the staff an experimental twirl that ended with her opposite fist thrust outward. Her eyes darted down to the Spellship in sudden alarm. “There are tens of thousands of people in that ship. Are they…okay?”
“They’re fine.” Shaya waved dismissively at the ship. “It was designed for this. Your followers provide the power, and trust me, not even a god likes getting hit by that thing.”
Nebiat had finally noticed the new weapon, and broke off her attacks on the beleaguered shield. She rose into the sky over Shaya, and flexed all four of her arms. “There’s some fight in you, then. Good. I’m going to enjoy this, Voria. I’ve foreseen your death, many times, at my hands. I’ve tasted it so many times. Now I will make it real.”
A cosmic fist sailed toward Voria, and she clumsily raised her staff to block. She narrowly deflected the blow, then backpedaled toward the sun to gain room. Nebiat followed up with another blow, and another. Voria desperately fell back, narrowly deflecting attack after attack.
Shaya’s frowning face drifted into her field of view. “You’re thinking two dimensionally. This isn’t a school yard brawl. You. Are. A. God.”
“Think like a goddess,” she murmured to herself.
Voria teleported behind Nebiat, and rammed her staff into the elder god’s midsection. The tip blazed where it touched her cosmic skin, and easily pierced her back. She brought the weapon up, and pulled Nebiat away from Shaya, flinging her toward the sun. A river of white spirit energy flowed from the wound, clustering in the air like droplets of divine blood, which maybe they were.
Nebiat gave a cry of wordless rage, twisting in the sky over the shield. She brought all four limbs to bear, each hand balled into a fist. Tremendous power built around each, then expanded toward her in four waves of green flame. She brought up the Spellship, and desperately parried one of the beams.
The other three slammed into her body, one in the leg, another in her chest, and the third her shoulder directly above. She couldn’t precisely call what happened pain. Something more like utter mind-breakingly powerful terror, the knowledge that a part of her existence had just unraveled, and that if it happened again she would cease to be.
Her right arm, the one holding the Spellship, hung limply, unable to make use of the weapon. Voria desperately willed magic into it, forcing her body to return to its previous state. It came quickly, and easily, but not quickly enough.
To her shock Nebiat hadn’t followed up on her attack. Instead, she’d turned her attention on the undefended world where Voria’s previous followers desperately huddled.
51
Atma
Nebiat had witnessed countless variations of this moment. It was a moment that Kem’Hedj players called ‘atma’, which meant death, or endless darkness, depending on your favorite translation. You left your opponent no viable choices, and they either gracefully conceded, or were systematically dismembered.
There was not a single possibility where Voria conceded, gracefully or otherwise, but Nebiat wouldn’t have it any other way. She wanted to savor this, her rival’s futile struggle. No matter what path Voria chose, she was about to die. Not a single possibility in the trillions Nebiat had perused offered her any chance of survival.
Nebiat thrust a hand toward the world below. A final rush of acidic, green fire rippled through the last vestiges of the shield, and her followers, Wyrms and Ifrit both, flooded through the gaps and began to assault the world below.
Her other three arms shot down, and seized the great tree itself in different locations. She willed her mass to increase, and slowly tore the wretched tree from the world that had birthed it. Tens of thousands died as branches snapped away and fell upon the settlements around the roots, along with mountains of soil and the remains of their structures.
As the tree tore free from the world, her nails dug into the wood, shattering it everywhere she held. Under the wood she felt something cold and alien. A life form, but one that lacked anything recognizable as a consciousness.
You have done it. Krox’s voice held awe. What you feel is Worldender, the oldest object in existence, so far as we know.
Nebiat yanked the spear free from the remnants of the tree, laughing as countless fragments of wood rained down into the atmosphere, dooming the farming villages in the fields around the gaping hole where the tree had stood.
Behind her Voria had begun to rise, and had summoned her magic to heal herself, as she had in every possibility. And, as she had in every possibility, Voria went to the aid of her world. She summoned life, and water, and somehow undid nearly all the damage that Nebiat had inflicted.
Countless tendrils burst from Voria’s hand like strands of blue hair, and the water magic twisted down around the city below. Cool water fell upon the Ifrit, burning them as surely as acid might a human. Spikes of ice pieced the Wyrms, jabbing through hearts, and skulls, and lungs. Hundreds of her minions died, just as she’d seen in countless possibilities.
Voria’s crowning moment, the one that truly earned Nebiat’s respect and admiration, came when she gathered the thousands of fragments of the wood raining down into the atmosphere. Life touched every last one, the tendrils as numerous as the water had been. They carried the fragments back toward the position where the tree had stood, and began welding them back together.
The gaps were filled in with magic, and it all happened in the space of seconds. Many citizens hadn’t even had time to fall to their deaths, and Voria managed to save them, depositing those who’d survived the initial impact back onto safe perches on her newly created tree. It lessened the catastrophic loss of life, but only slightly.
Finally, a new shield began to ripple outward from the tip of the tree, once more shielding the survivors from Nebiat’s surviving forces.
It was all so very impressive, a fitting last act for her rival. Many citizens had died, but Voria had somehow saved a few. Only a god with the computational power she possessed could truly understand how great a miracle that was.
Her power is rooted in creation. This is where she excels. Slay her, and take that strength for our own. It will prove useful in many situations.
Nebiat could have countered Voria’s magic. She could have prevented her rival from restoring the blasted tree, and even from restoring the shield. Instead, she chose a far, far more terrible fate for the people of Shaya.
She raised Worldender in two of her hands, steadying the weapon as she aimed at Voria’s chest. In every possibility the ancient weapon ended Voria. There was no hope for her enemy’s survival. Voria was exposed, a conscious choice on her part that had been necessary to save her world.
After her death Nebiat would take that world for her own.
She would make these people love her and worship her. She would teach them to revile Voria, and turn this into the first colony in her new empire. She would mold them into rabid warriors, and then unleash them to destroy everything the Shayans once loved.
Her revenge would be glorious.
Nebiat cocked the great spear back to throw it, and Krox’s elation surged with him. He too craved the death she was about to inflict.
Sudden agony roiled through her, a multi-layered wrongness as vital parts of her body ceased to function. Were she a mortal, she would have wagered that someone had just slid a dagger into her kidney. The pain, if it could be called pain, was acute.
“What—is happening?” She gasped as she sought a way to peer inside herself and find the cause of the disturbance.
In forging the body you have, you have rendered yourself vulnerable. You cannot perceive inside the confines of your own vessel. Not as we could using my previous form. I do not know what is causing the damage, but the weapon was either created by Inura or Nefarius. Either way, I can feel it pillaging our magic, growing stronger as it tears us apart.
“Can it kill us?” Nebiat felt the first stab of real fear since she’d learned that Krox intended to absorb her.
Another wave of pain washed through her, this time closer to the chest.
Not if we flee.
Nebiat considered that. No, not yet. She would not abandon this battle, not while Voria lived. She would never have a better chance.
52
Hound of Xal
Aran had never experienced the level of power, and of control, he felt while flying Talon. He guided the ancient ship through a forest of miniature galaxies, winding through Krox’s body as he sought the pulsing void magic that had been stolen from Xal.
They flew in relative silence, with an exhausted Bord lounging against the wall, Rhea sleeping next to him. Neither was in any condition to fight, which meant they were screwed if they needed to defend themselves.
Kezia had stepped into Bord’s matrix, as asked. She might lack his defensive capabilities, but her water magic could still prove useful, even if she was inexperienced at piloting. It beat having an empty matrix.
“I wish Nara was here,” Kezia murmured under her breath. It was loud enough for Crewes, evidently.
“You know what?” The sergeant said quietly. “I do too. We’re in the shit, and no offense, sir, but you ain’t a true mage.”
“None taken. I miss her too.” Aran guided them around a nebula, and smiled when he saw what lay beyond. “There it is, Sergeant.”
A pulsing ball of liquid purple, darker than a heart wound and larger than any star, hovered in the black. Veins of dark energy flowed off the orb, and power pulsed away in a rhythmic heartbeat, snaking off into the vast distance that was the rest of Krox.
“That thing looks important.” Crewes gave a slow smile. “Would be a real shame if something bad were to happen to it. I bet Krox would just love having his appendix burst.”
“Yup, a real shame.” Aran answered the sergeant’s smile with one of his own. “Watch this.”
He tapped the void sigil on all three rings, then poured as much strength as he could into the matrix. Dark waves of magic disappeared into the deck, one after another, until the entire vessel began to shake.
Aran seized the arms of his command chair, and gritted his teeth as he channeled the spell. A tendril of negative energy shot from the Talon’s spellcannon, lancing into the pulsing ball. After a moment the pulsing stopped. The veins were suddenly sucked inward, as if subjected to tremendous gravity.
The entire orb shrank to a fraction of its size, all that void energy compressed into a tiny ball. Then it shot back towards the Talon at alarming speed.
“Uh, sir, is this part of the plan?” Crewes’s voice was tinged with panic as the orb slammed into the ship.
“Trust me, Sergeant.” Aran braced himself against the matrix’s command chair, grateful he no longer had to deal with a standard stabilizing ring.
The massive ball of void magic slammed into the Talon, and rippled through every part of the ship. Darkness shrouded everything as the entire vessel filled with liquid magic, the blood of Xal, the most potent concentration of void still in existence, so far as Aran knew.
Icy pain shot through every neuron as magic flooded into him, drawn by the strange ability he’d received from Xal. Aran found he could manage the flow, and even distribute it, but he had to do so quickly.
He couldn’t take it all. There was too much remaining, and he didn’t dare give any of his friends more of the magic. Even if they were okay with it, and Rhea at the very least wouldn’t be, it might kill them.
And then it occurred to him.
He sent a flow to Narlifex, which barely touched the reservoir still remaining. The rest, he gave to the Talon, fusing the vast void energy into the ship itself, empowering it just as he had his other weapons. The ship eagerly drank the energy, and he felt the Talon growing larger, and changing in shape and hue, as it absorbed the vast majority of the magic that had been stolen from Xal.
The ringing in his ears finally faded, and Crewes’s gravelly voice broke the silence. “Let’s never do that again, okay? I feel like someone just crammed their arm up my tailpipe, and left behind a bowling ball.”
Aran took several deep breaths, and overlaid the Talon’s senses over his own once more. The awareness he sensed was deeper now, but still seemed to lack the ability to speak directly to him.
The area around him hadn’t changed, other than the removal of Xal’s heart blood. No dragons came roaring after them. No flood of Ifrit came sailing in.
“I’ve got bad news, Sergeant.” Aran poured a little void into the ship, and spun it around as he scanned Krox’s interior, searching.
“What’s that, sir?” Crewes leaned over the edge of his command chair to look at Aran.
“We’re going to do it again, right now. I mean, since we’re here, might as well take some fire magic, right?”
Aran flew the Talon in a straight line, accelerating as he crossed the distance toward the largest star inside of Krox. It was a pulsing, red ball, fiery tendrils flowing out around it in long, slender neurons that snaked through much of Krox’s interior.
“All right, sir,” Crewes growled. “Let’s give this asshole a heart attack then. I’m all about getting more fire magic.”
Aran sucked in a deep breath and gritted his teeth. He tapped all three void sigils, and then duplicated the spell he’d used on Xal’s blood. A tendril of negative energy shot into the heart.
That area of the sun darkened perceptively, for a moment at least, then the heart returned to full strength, and a flaming orb shot from where the bolt had struck. The fire magic streaked into the Talon, a massive amount, and yet still a tiny sliver of what the heart could offer.
The flame crashed through the vessel, and it took everything Aran had to channel it so that it didn’t cook the interior of the ship. He struggled desperately to dump an equal slice into everyone, and then sent the rest into the Talon, which drank the fire as eagerly as it had the void.
Again the ship grew larger, inside and out. Aran didn’t know everything the magic had done, but their destroyer was looking a whole lot more like a full cruiser, almost a third the size of the Wyrm Hunter.
When the moment passed Aran was left panting, sweat dripping down his face. He looked around the bridge. “Everyone okay?”
“Peachy, sir,” Bord croaked from the couch along the side of the wall. “But if you could let me off before you do that again, that would be great.”
“Heads up, sir.” The sergeant’s urgency brought Aran back to the moment, and he observed the area using the Talon’s senses.
“Oh, crap.” Now a tide of Ifrit were surging toward them. The divine equivalent of white blood cells, maybe. “Looks like the locals finally found us.”
Thousands upon thousands of miniature stars rose from the heart, and began streaking in their direction. These ones were smaller than those attacking the shield outside, but that didn’t make them any less lethal.
“Let’s get the depths out of here,” Aran roared. “Hang on!”
He poured void into the ship, and they streaked through a nebula, then down between the spiral arms of another galaxy. Behind him came an endless line of Ifrit, all bent on their destruction. Thankfully, the newly enhanced Talon was quickly outdistancing their pursuers. Not quickly enough for his comfort, though.
Aran poured more void into the ship, “Come on, girl. Find us a way out of here.”
They wound further and further down into the body, but the number of stellar phenomena made it impossible to guess their location. Somewhere below the waist, maybe, but above the legs.
“Sir, why don’t we just make a hole?” Crewes suggested.
“Looks like we may have to. Everyone add a share of fire, please.” Aran tapped the fire sigil on each ring, and watched as Kezia and Crewes did the same. The Talon’s hull burst into nuclear flame, as hot as a star’s deepest internals. “Okay, time to make a new orifice.”
Aran poured still more void into the drive, increasing their mass and velocity as they rocketed toward Krox’s rear side. The Talon slammed into the membrane, Krox’s skin, but the enormous heat melted through it, and they burst through, back into open space.
Spirit magic sprayed into space from the wound they’d created, a tiny cut when considered against the whole of Krox. That was just fine. They’d gotten out.
Now it was time to finish this.
The Talon twisted through the battle with impossible speed, easily avoiding the few Ifrit who attempted to attack them. Aran brought the vessel around high, and took a good look at the Krox fleet. Judging from the damage around the tree, some of them must have made it inside, but there was no sign of them now. The shield was in place, and the world seemed safe.
The surviving Ternus fleet, twelve of the black ships, had gathered into a tight ball directly above the shield. A few Shayan vessels dotted their ranks. Were those really the only survivors? There wasn’t a single conventional warship, and Aran’s anxiety rose like bile when he realized there was no sign of the Hunter. Maybe she’d made it to safety under the shield.
