Renegade mage paranoid m.., p.11
Renegade Mage (Paranoid Mage Book 2), page 11
He could guess right away that it normally took multiple mages to clear such a thing. First of all, there was an appropriately large nest of stirges, living in the stone walls of the well. There were too many to count, and they made the idea of getting anywhere near the well a non-starter. While Callum had plenty of tricks, he didn’t fancy his chances against a swarm of oversized wasps.
That wasn’t even accounting for what was in the waters, or whatever the cenote was actually filled with. There were fleshy pods clinging to the walls with long, spiked tentacles. Whenever one of the wasps drifted down to drink from the water surface, the nearest tentacle-pod would try and grapple it, churning up the surface of the water.
There were also smaller shapes in the water, arrowpoints of some kind of fish, and round lumpen things at the very bottom. While neither of them seemed particularly offensive to his senses, he was entirely certain that, considering every other form of life he’d seen in the Night Lands, they were quite nasty.
Even with all that, he was sure that it wasn’t too dangerous for competent mages to clear out. True, he didn’t know how magic-resistant the life might be, since it was very clearly more energized than anything on Earth, but they were still animals. Group tactics and probably some flamethrowers would account for the stirges, while the tentacle things could be taken care of with old-fashioned dynamite.
Hopefully actual mages would have better tools than those.
At the very bottom of the cenote, scattered among the lumpy things, were small spheres resting on the rock that had the weird, dense feel of the vampire seal or, to a lesser extent, the bullets and enchanting materials. It was immediately obvious that was the mordite he’d come for, but so far as he could tell there wasn’t anything overly special about it other than the amount of mana inside it.
Carefully, ever so carefully, he stretched out a thread of vis to wrap a teleport construct around the spheres. So far, he’d seen it was very possible for people to notice and react to his magic, and there was no reason that animals couldn’t do the same. This time, he didn’t even have any handy walls and portals to hide behind, but if he was slow and subtle about it, he might be able to grab the stuff without disturbing anything.
He’d half-expected it to be hard to handle the mordite, given the energy density, rather like Clara or the pixie, but there was no resistance at all when he teleported it away. The sphere, about the size of a grape, appeared in the compartment in his luggage he’d reserved for enchanting stuff. At the same time, a ripple ran through the not-water, something slightly different from the splashing and thrashing of the tentacled limpets.
That wasn’t good.
Either his magic was more noticeable than he’d liked or removing the mordite spheres was more disruptive than he’d hoped. There was a little bit of a stir from the fish and the lumps, but nothing major. Yet.
Callum took a moment to consider, then made himself a little action plan. First, he wrapped his teleport framework around some of the not-water and teleported it into one of the empty water bottles in his luggage. Even if he had no idea what it was, or what it was good for, it was magical and worth having some to fiddle around with. Then he reached out and got ready to take as many mordite spheres as he could in one go.
Eight seemed to be his limit, but that was fine. That’d still be quite a bit of raw enchanting material, at a quality far higher than anything he’d seen. It was certainly a far cry from the powdered stuff, and possibly even purer than what he’d seen in the teleportation network or the homebond. It was hard to tell with those, because they were just thin wires, which raised the question of how people with larger native vis threads enchanted them.
He made a mental note to write down that question later and yanked on the teleports. The eight spheres of mordite dropped into his luggage, and the cenote went wild. The not-water started to fizzle and bubble, the lumps at the bottom of the cenote unfolded into long, snakelike things that shot toward the surface, and the stirges exploded into the air.
Callum teleported directly away from the mess, and quickly, with an involuntary shiver. It was the first time there was actual noise in the Night Lands, a combination of hissing and buzzing, and it sounded incredibly angry. He didn’t know whether the cenote inhabitants would be able to track him down, but even if they didn’t, that might well draw other creatures or even vampires or mages. The latter would be a problem, since he had no time to clean up after himself, but there wasn’t much he could do about it.
Several miles later, he stopped and waited, listening and straining his perceptions for anything that might be following him. There was silence and stillness, so far as he could tell, and he let out a long breath and sat down to take a look at his loot. He didn’t want to touch any of it, because for all he knew it was toxic, so he just got out his lantern and shone it into the luggage container briefly.
The nine mordite spheres he had looked like tiny versions of the moon overhead, slowly rippling surfaces and all. In his perceptions they were solid, so the visual effect wasn’t entirely real, but since he couldn’t see mana visually, glamours and all, it wasn’t that either. He’d need better light to study it more, and that wasn’t going to happen in the Night Lands.
For once things seemed to be going fairly well, so he zipped up the container again and started back toward the gate. Since he hadn’t been ambushed between the portals, the fae might have lost the trail by now, and if they hadn’t, hanging around in a portal world wouldn’t help. While he would have liked to think that stowing away on an intercontinental flight was enough, he wasn’t sure about that. He did know that there were limitations, else he’d have been found far earlier.
All he needed to do was get back through the gate and he could settle down to make some serious items and do some serious practice. His notebook held a number of half-coherent thoughts for foci that he could work on, and ways he could protect himself or others. He still was determined not to be a mercenary, but he could at least be more considered in his responses.
***
Bartholomew Janry’s Shift Survey was going well. They’d already found and cleared five wells in the controlled lands around Weltentor, which was near the limit for the normal appearance rate. The only issue had been the update by scry-com to be on the lookout for a lone, possibly rogue mage wandering the Night Lands, but they hadn’t seen anything like that. Even if they had, Bart’s team could have handled it.
“There’s some noise to our eight o’clock,” Garan’s voice came over the scry-com, the wind mage being their dedicated listener as well as their transportation.
“Combat ready, everyone,” Bart instructed. “Take us there, Garan.”
They readied their shields, pulling up their active combat forms. Shards of force whirled around Bart, air congealed in front of Garan, and Christopher crystallized shards of ice. Edgar formed four sets of portals, the logistical support meaning there was no chance of any of them being flanked, let alone surrounded.
Most mages didn’t actually fight with a spatial talent on their side, given how rare they were, but Shift Surveys always needed one. Not only was their absolute sense of direction necessary to keep from getting lost, especially if a Shift happened outside the bounds of an illuminated area, but they could energize a large enough portal to siphon the moonwater off to Weltentor. Bart had found that even without any offensive abilities, the flexibility of instant movement was very helpful.
A few minutes of flight brought them within range of a cenote that seemed to have already been disturbed, the stirges swarming and the moonwater thrashing with barbed limpets and the guardian kraken. He flexed his vis through the flight focus and took point, with Garan and Christopher flanking. Edgar, of course, stayed back, but his portals darted ahead.
The stirges swarmed up at them, and Bat sent his force darts arcing through them. Like most animals in the portal worlds, they had some resistance to magic, but not enough to stop the spell form of a competent mage. Their torsos exploded in a shower of gore, and Edgar caught the falling corpses in one of this portals.
They were used to fighting together, ice and force projectiles wreaking havoc on the stirge swarm while wind broke up groups or smashed the creatures together. Portals let them reposition at will, bouncing back and forth and utterly ignoring the stirge’s attempts to surround them. Not that the creatures were all that dangerous, but those harpoon stingers actually could punch through a mage’s shield, and none of them wanted to take the risk.
In a few minutes they’d eradicated the swarm, with the carcasses piled up in a gory heap, while the limpets and kraken snapped and strained madly from their places in the cenote. Edgar came closer and took the paired focus from his backpack, setting it on the ground as he focused his vis through it. The portal manifested in front of him, and he sent it flying off over the cenote and down to start taking in the moonwater.
The aquatic beasts flailed at the portal but Edgar held it together, draining the moonwater into the immense cistern in Weltentor. The net there would catch the fish and other things floating in the water, and without the moon-water to float in and absorb, the kraken and limpets would be easy enough to dispatch. For Christopher to dispatch, anyway; they were tough, and had to practically be frozen solid to die.
Neither he nor Garan were going to get near those flailing, razored tentacles.
“So, why was this already active?” Bart asked aloud.
“Another well nearby? Maybe they fought?”
“I’d give you five to one odds it was that lone mage we’re suppose to be watching for,” Edgar said, concentrating on holding the portal intact against the flailing tendrils.
“Could be, but it would be pretty stupid to rile up a cenote like this by yourself,” Bart replied.
“You wouldn’t get much out of it,” Edgar agreed, using a smaller portal to get a better perspective on the cenote as he lowered the drain. The reflection of the moon in the glowing water was dead and dry rather than shimmering and liquid, a reminder of how different the intrinsic magic of the Night Lands was from the familiar spell forms of human magery.
Christopher approached and started to freeze the bits of flesh that were revealed by the dropping water, staying well out of range as frost coated the inside of the well. For his part, Bart stayed back by Edgar, watching through the perspective portal and holding several force magic constructs ready just in case. While it seemed routine, every single creature in the Night Lands could kill an unprepared mage in a single blow, so nothing could be left to chance.
As the drain portal reached the bottom of the cenote, the moon-water reduced to a few inches, the lumps of mordite came into view. Only, most of them were gone. Bart stared at the empty depressions where the bane-metal should have been, and then lifted his scry-com to report in. No matter how their lone mage had done it, they had definitely been there.
Chapter 7 – Pursuit
“We’ve got a potential hit at Weltentor Landing.” Zarin said. “Everyone, sound off.”
It only took a few seconds. They had their armor on, their foci primed, and auxiliary charges at their waist if necessary. Sen had been given an air mage’s standard loadout, which was essentially what he had worked with during his service, though of higher quality. The armor had built-in flying foci, with subordinate resonators to link up with his teammates, and the gauntlets had heat projectors for both the standard bolt spell and a few variations.
The built-in glamour was potent, probably strong enough to render them invisible to most mages at a distance, or at least those not using active sensing. Even Sen found it difficult to focus on the team when the glamour was active. The earpieces, though, were fairly standard, even if such things were a relatively new development. At some point in the distant past they would have needed dedicated far-speaking foci, rather than automated relays, but that sort of thing was irrelevant now.
In all, he was impressed by the quality of the equipment, and while some of it might be restricted to BSE he’d have to see how much of it could be gotten for House Fane. It was better than what he’d been issued for his service and, of course, better than his own personal foci. Similar, but crisper and more responsive.
He linked the mage’s mark on his wrist to the transporter pad and it resonated through his vis for a fraction of a moment, bringing them from the staging complex through to France. The moment they were through he keyed his flight focus to his partner’s subordinate focus, both of them lifting off the floor slightly. So long as they stayed near enough, the force mage could fly almost as well as an air mage thanks to Sen’s vis.
The others in their six-man squad joined him in a powered hover, darting out the door and crashing through the ward-line. The other two squads arrived just behind them, as soon as the transporter cycled, all of them spreading out into the air. They all ignored the alarms that set off, and Sen sent out his senses, taking in the surrounding miles and listening for any stray people. There were the ones inside Weltentor Landing, at their stations, but beyond it—
“South, two klicks!” Zarin snapped. “Go!”
Sen sent his partner and himself speeding south after Zarin, locating the target only belatedly. Down in the forest there was the sound of human breath and the radiant heat of a living person, and there was not supposed to be anyone in the exclusion zone. They had their glamours wrapped tight around them, and Zarin’s partner hefted a heavy arcane rifle. It was not a weapon that Sen wanted to be on the other end of, considering the massive spelled rounds the thing fired. He couldn’t imagine how expensive each round was, but it wasn’t like BSE needed to worry about the scarcity of good enchanting materials.
They were a good fifty meters up as they closed in on the target, the other teams moving to block off the escape routes. They did have an unconfirmed report of a homebond implant, which meant they needed to scramble the mage’s vis and incapacitate him as fast as possible. It was only if that failed that lethal force was authorized.
The moment they got within maybe half a kilometer, there was a subdued flare of magic and the target vanished. Obviously the mage was using active senses, but it had to be something subtle, considering that there was no clear sweep of vis to accompany it. Sen had a number of choice words spring to his lips but before he could actually say them, Zarin snapped more instructions.
“Teleport! Half click west! Two-Gimel, take the shot!” Even as he spoke they were altering course to head after the teleport, with Sen pumping vis into the flight focus to keep pace with Zarin. Somewhere ahead of them there was a bright flare as callsign Two-Gimel fired, a glowing ball of tight wards appearing among the trees.
“Miss,” came the terse statement. “West again.”
“We’ll go ahead, herd him toward us,” Zarin decided, and went faster. Their team zipped higher in the air, vis pulsing out into the surroundings as they scanned the terrain for their target. Sen knew they only had a limited time before the man used the homebond, assuming it existed, so they needed a clean hit.
Zarin hadn’t yet signaled they were in position when there was another blip of magic, just below them, and the sharpshooter jerked his arcanorifle around. Force magic launched the capture round, which smashed through the tree cover toward the target below. Sen winced as it impacted, the unleashed vis blazing.
It didn’t need to hit the target, and in fact, wasn’t designed to. What it did was deploy a sphere of interlinked wards and shielding, to keep the mage physically and magically isolated. Not to mention a burst of light and sound, coupled with the Special Target Access Bypass, meant to disable any renegade mage. STAB had a chance to permanently impair someone’s spellcasting, though, so it was rarely deployed. Even at that distance, he could feel it tingling through his mage mark.
“Target neutralized,” Zarin said, confirming that the wards were up. “Moving to— damn!” He spun, and Sen followed the motion to find that somehow, some way, the mage had gotten out of the capture area. He was almost half a klick westward, crouched down at the base of a tree.
“Goddamn,” Zarin swore. “How the hell—” He stopped himself. “Capture failed. Lethal force authorized.”
“Finally,” Sen said, and conjured flame into his hands.
***
Callum hoped that he hadn’t given himself away. There seemed to be more vampires out and about when he returned to the settlement, and he didn’t know if that activity meant he’d been spotted or if was just that local morning had arrived. No matter the reason, there were people walking the streets and the perimeter than when he had left.
That meant he had to be more careful, but it wasn’t an impenetrable surveillance. It did mean that he needed to get out of there quick, though, since he could only assume the trend would continue. Whether the vampires were waking up, were preparing for something, or suspected he was around, he wanted to slip out before it got worse.
The castle was essentially in the middle of the group of estates, so there wasn’t a significantly better approach from any direction, but he still circled around the town to make an entrance from a different angle than his departure. The actual estates were so very tempting, but there was no way that old and powerful mages didn’t have something impressive to protect their actual homes. Especially since he couldn’t see whatever glamours were in place, which no doubt spruced up the dark stone buildings and would signal to people where they ought to actually go. The mage equivalent of a welcome mat or a no trespassing sign.
Unfortunately, he wouldn’t find out anytime soon. Or maybe ever.
The added patrols meant that he had to take a slightly circuitous route into the keep, making sure to keep well away from any vampire that might possibly spot or sniff him. Once again, there were at least enough traces of mages about that his passage would blend in, but at the same time the increased patrols meant something was going on. It might be that his passage was far enough from normal traffic patterns to be suspicious in and of itself.
