Tattered Pawns - (Endmage, Book 1)
Chapter 4
It was almost dusk by the time I neared the manor grounds. Perfect. I killed time by scouting what I could from outside the Count’s walls. The bastard had always insisted on meeting me as far away from his pristine estate as possible, but now I managed to get a decent idea how the place was laid out. Enough to know where to start, at least.
I approached a few minutes after the sun dipped below the horizon. Post-dusk light plays hell on your night vision, and I figured it would give me an edge on any particularly vigilant guardsmen.
The outer wall was fairly low, though judging by the faint glyphs etched into the stonework it was heavily enchanted to keep out intruders. Not a problem for me. I was over in a few seconds.
I was surprised by the lack of foot patrols on the lawn or around the wall, but it made sense after the Count’s heavy losses in the battle against the Magus. His house guard would be further thinned if he wasn’t home, as he customarily traveled with at least a dozen lackeys to wipe his ass whenever he needed.
The grounds were unmanned. I crept up to the grandiose, white-marble behemoth of a main house, and around the side. That’s where I saw the first guard. He stood there, idle and bored, indifferently scanning the grounds in front of him. I crept past when he glanced off in the other direction, my footsteps muffled in the wet grass.
I found an unwatched servant’s door tucked into an alcove around the corner from the lone sentry. It was a simple lock, and simple locks had stopped being an obstacle for me early in life. I slipped inside.
I’d give myself minutes, tops, to snatch what I could carry and be off the premises. My firm opinions on contractual obligations aside, there was only so much risk I was willing to tolerate for a grudge. I never would have attempted anything this elaborate with some of my clientele, but I’d seen the Count’s crew at work, and I was…comfortable indulging in a brief vendetta. The scant few professionals among them were retired sell-swords long past their modest prime, and the rest were the disfavored nephews and cousins of local lords, given a shiny breastplate and a job in the ruling house to keep them out of the way. Ten on one, they were happy to push around a peasant, or throw a pariah out into the rain—but I didn’t think they could slow me down for a second if I came across them in ones and twos. Especially now that the Magus had vaporized the “best” of them.
I pulled an empty burlap sack from my back and stalked through the manor, stuffing any trinket that looked to be of decent value inside as I went. I wasn’t concerned about the monetary worth; the fifty gold rods the Count had "generously" paid me would be more than enough for me to survive off of for some time. But we’d agreed on two-fifty, gods dammit. If I wasn’t going to get it, the Count was at least going to know he’d paid for something involuntarily.
Once or twice, I had to duck into an alcove or side room to avoid being spotted, but on the whole it was smooth sailing. I decided to use the servant’s halls to head deeper into the compound, where I suspected the good stuff would be. A random servant was less likely to question a stranger than a guard or family member, or so I hoped. The route took me out of the house proper, through the stables and kennels.
I heard shouting and thought for an instant that I’d been discovered, but there was no one within view. The racket was coming from an intersection up ahead, between rows of empty horse stalls.
Curious, I peeked around the corner to see what the commotion was about. A bulbous man in dirty clothes and a leather apron was shouting angry commands, snapping a riding crop at something I couldn’t see. I leaned out further.
That bastard. He was cracking the crop into a dog that had apparently committed some minor offense. The poor thing flinched as each stinging snap ripped into its sleek coat, bringing tiny rivulets of blood to the surface, but the dog never once whimpered or made a noise. Bright, brown eyes stared defiantly back at his tormentor.
Rage boiled up in my chest. I’d seen that scenario played out in a thousand parallels throughout my own life. The dog’s perseverance was infuriating his handler as much as any actual transgression; at this point he was being punished simply because the previous punishment hadn’t been harsh enough.
The naked, one-sided unfairness of the confrontation struck a nerve. The bully and the literal underdog—call it projecting, but in that moment, I was feeling invested.
I stepped from my hiding place and walked right up behind the man. "Excuse me," I tapped his shoulder as he raised his arm for another swing.
Startled, he wheeled about. "Who are—"
A savage right hook silenced whatever he had been about to say next. He reeled back, gasping, then tried to lunge at me. I snapped my fingers and sent my aura washing over him. He staggered as the alien sensation ran though him, cutting him off from the permeating background presence of the Ether, and missed his swipe. I cracked an elbow into his face.
He had the misfortune to remain coherent after he hit the floor, so I kicked him until that situation resolved itself. Feeling satisfied and more than a little self-righteous, I turned to the hound.
It was a handsome animal, if I was any judge. I recognized it as some kind of hunting breed, similar to others I’d seen among the local nobility. Damned expensive, of course. I’d once heard a salesman claim that they had some magic stock way back in the pedigree, but I think he was just trying to turn puppies into copper.
The dog had a slick brown and white coat, built deep and strong in the chest but thin and lean toward the hips. He—yes, definitely male, I saw—was a big fellow, coming up to my waist even while he sat. And judging by how out of proportion his paws looked, he wasn’t done growing yet.
He stared at me intently. After a second, he glanced down to the unconscious man, then back up to me. I’d have sworn I could see him taking stock of the situation and processing new information. His tail twitched.
I crouched down and offered the back of my hand for him to sniff. He obliged me for a second before lunging forward to plant a big old slobbery doggie lick on my face.
"Bah! Ugh. You’re welcome," I grumbled, trying to wipe the slobber off. I took a look at the damage the asshole had inflicted. "Doesn’t look too serious," I told the pooch. "Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve had worse around here."
The dog cocked his head to the side, listening if not understanding.
I leaned down and untied the leash and leather collar around his neck. "Look buddy," I told him, “it’s your call, but if it was me? I’d get out of here."
The dog licked my hand and padded off, giving my leg a shoulder-check that made me stumble as he went. Tail wagging, he disappeared around the corner and down the hall, out toward the great barn doors that led out of the stables.
I had no idea what the pup would do next, but I had my own set of problems to worry about. I resumed my hunt.
The servant’s corridors wound all throughout the estate, and I poked my head out regularly to get my bearings. I was downright giddy when I spied a set of ostentatious, gold-inlaid double doors. Based on my rough guess as to where I was, I felt sure that I’d found the Count’s private chambers.
Excellent.
Not seeing anyone around, I strode right up to the doors. Some of the filigree camouflaged the distinctive shapes of glyphs, similar in function to the perimeter wall outside—not that I cared. Being an endmage can be a real bitch sometimes, but it does have its perks. I turned the handle and went inside without incident.
The room was exactly the treasure trove I’d been hoping for. I stuffed my loot bag as full as I dared with jewelry and currency bars someone had left lying around. The confidence born of having an impenetrable magical door, I suppose.
My payday secured, I engaged in petty vandalism. I started by carving "Don’t fuck with an endmage" into a very expensive-looking ebony armoire, and went from there.
I was midway through the process of sketching an artful mustache onto an oil painting of the Count’s mother, balancing atop a vanity to reach it, when I heard a commotion at the door. I whirled, jumping down and doing my damnedest not to wince as I landed awkwardly on my foot. A lone guard stood in the doorway, sword drawn.
I snapped my fingers and sent my aura rushing over him. He staggered, but recovered much quicker than I appreciated, flashing me a wicked grin.
Not good at all. I took a second look at him, watching with mounting alarm as he twirled his broadsword in an intricate and menacing display. Belatedly, I spotted the distinctive red sash looped around his waist.
I groaned inwardly. That sash denoted a Man-At-Arms of the first order, probably a recent addition to replenish the Count’s losses. The Men-At-Arms order spent years pursuing mastery of their chosen weapons with a borderline religious fervor, and their skills did not come cheap—but the count could afford it. Worst of all, the bulk of their training was conducted without the use of any magic. Negating his eldritch abilities would not faze this fellow, and I doubted I was his equal in fair combat.
No reason to fight fair, then.
I’m not unskilled myself, with the profession I’m in. I whipped my sword out of its scabbard and launched into a big, flashy, swirly display. It was fluff—tactically worthless, but it set me up for the big trick. I leapt into a spin, arcing my blade around me—and hurling it across the room. It tumbled through the air toward the swordsman.
The Man-At-Arms sidestepped it easily, and my trusty sword buried its tip in the ensorcelled wood of the bedroom door. He cast me a contemptuous look and began to stride toward me, intent on mayhem.
I pulled my aura back in as close as I could.
The door exploded in a blinding discharge of energies. The swordsman was shocked, battered, and launched through the air by the blast. He hit the wall and crumpled. Those same violent energies washed over me with no effect.
"Ha!" I barked, snatching up the plunder and making my escape, pausing only for a moment to recover my sword. It was slightly warped, and glowing orange in a number of places. I cursed; it would take the attention of a half decent blacksmith to get it back into serviceable condition, and I didn’t anticipate that happening anytime soon.
I decided I had overstayed my welcome and began making my way back through the manor. I chuckled in spite of myself. Poor guy was going to be hurting tomorrow. Nobody ever sees the glyph thing coming.
Magic, at its most basic level, works by the will of the caster; raw power is pulled out of the Ether and shaped to some desired goal. For a one-off spell, the caster can use themselves as the conduit, employing various techniques or tools depending on how they learned the craft. That’s where we get magic wands and wizard staves and the boiling blood of your enemy’s firstborn sons and all that fun stuff.
But in order to set up a permanent effect—like, say, a magically sealed doorway—the most common method is to inscribe glyphs or runes, enchanting them with a perpetuating force that keeps reiterating the caster’s original intent.
This makes a glyph a direct channel into the Ether, constantly pulling in energy for its task. Catastrophically damaging one under normal circumstances is hard, straddling the line between the material world and the Ether like they are. Maybe you’ll manage to ding it up, and it’ll just peter out; sputtering energy until the spell is unraveled and useless.
It’s like poking a hole in a bucket—water goes where its not supposed to, but eventually it’ll drain and the bucket won’t fill up even if you keep pouring water in. But if your local Endmage is the one doing it—well. Imagine you could snap your fingers, take all the water out of the bucket, and then smash the bucket to pieces. Then you put all the water back, at once. Everybody gets wet.
That metaphor got away from me.
Putting the glyphs on Count Pompous’ bedroom door inside my aura cut them off from the Ether, rendering the doors no more spectacular or resilient than any normal hunk of wood. Smashing a blade into them disrupted the careful, intricately laid out patterns—but since they were already inert, there was no natural falloff in energy flow. When I pulled my aura back, I released the flood, and the Ether dumped power into a shattered vessel, with aversive consequences for my red-sashed friend.
My luck held out for the next few minutes. The commotion sent a lot of people rushing about and created a handy distraction for someone intent on slipping off in the opposite direction. I made it to the entrance unmolested. The guards stationed there had been drawn away by the alarms behind me, and I took advantage, bolting for the door.
I slipped through and found myself in a grand courtyard, complete with a gaudy fountain set in the center of a circular cobblestone drive that ran right up to the doors. The fountain was a siren call to mischief, but I’d pressed my luck enough for one evening. I slipped into the shrubbery and shadows along the perimeter and crept forward. Once I got to the edge of the building, it would be a quick dash to the outer wall…
I hit the dirt when I spied a coach bouncing up the drive. It rattled past me, faster than seemed safe. I recognized the banners streaming above it—the Count had come home.
Well. That was sub-optimal.
I weighed my options. A mad dash off the grounds had even chances of succeeding, but I’d almost certainly be spotted. Ample moonlight wasn’t working in my favor. A heated pursuit through the city didn’t sound appealing; I wanted to be at a safe distance before anyone sorted out the confusion.
That in mind, it seemed a better bet to lie low for a few moments while everyone in the Count’s contingent went inside to investigate the clamor. If I was lucky, even the coach’s teamsters would peek in, and I’d have a moment free from wandering eyes.
The coach just sat, doors closed.
"Come on," I mouthed. "What are you even doing, you bastard? Go inside."
A supernatural chill washed over me, all frozen guts and pure, primal fear. I snapped my gaze around and saw a second coach careening toward the house at an even more reckless speed.
It was the black coach from the night before, with its mad, hunched driver howling at his team of frothing, frenzied horses.
Dread burrowed into the core of my being as I remembered the deathly gaze of the hooded occupants, and I had hoped to avoid a repeat encounter, ever.
I steeled myself, forcing calm. Wait. Let them do their business, then slip away. Simple.
The black coach rattled to a halt behind the Count’s, the horses snarling more than they whinnied or snorted. The Count’s team, by contrast, was tranquil beyond what I’d expect even from trained animals.
Finally, the doors of Grendesian’s coach opened. Several bodyguards stepped out, followed by the pompous, cheating blowhard himself.
Peering up through the bushes, I had trouble making out much, but their body language seemed…detached. They milled about for a moment, then went still.
I couldn’t stop myself. I risked inching to the side to get a better view.
I spied the Count’s face. His expression was slack, and his skin seemed pallid even in the moonlight. His eyes were milky. Dead.
Gods and furies.
The black coach opened. Out stepped the same pair I’d seen outside the tavern; one childlike, one tall, both robed and hooded beyond all further recognition.
The Count, and the poor bastards who had served him, all acted on an unspoken command in unison, and they began shambling as one. A few made their listless way into the manor. The rest began to spread out, looking like they intended to comb the grounds for something.
For me.
Perhaps that was an egocentric conclusion to jump to, but it seemed prudent at the time. Regardless as to whether I was the object of their search, I did not want to be found.
The Fates, as is so often the case, failed to consider my desires. I was discovered immediately.
One of the former guards shuffled right past where I lay. How he found me was a mystery, because he reacted to my presence before his dead gaze swept down. I had no time nor inclination to figure it out. He emitted a gargling, tortured groan, and lunged straight at me. The noise attracted the attention of everything in the courtyard.
The hells with that. I kicked out as he advanced, hooking one foot around the back of his knee, and driving my other heel into his hip. Shambling undead corpse-thing or not, leverage is a bitch. He fell backwards, not even trying to catch himself. That horrific groan never missed a beat.
I scrambled to my feet, acutely aware of the fact that my trusty sword had been reduced to little more than slag with a handle.
Well. Use what you’ve got.
I snapped my fingers, dumping as much will and panic into my aura as I could. It’s an almost physical force when I’m feeling motivated, and the situation was certainly inspiring. A few of the zombie guardsman were knocked off their feet; whether from the force of the aura or the severing of whatever spellcraft was controlling them, I couldn’t say.
The lumbering corpses, standing or not, lost direction. A few still shuffled aimlessly, but most just stopped where they were. Small victories.
The hooded nightmares, however, weren’t nearly as incapacitated as I’d have hoped. They muttered to each other in some dark, foreign tongue. The short one seemed to be giving orders.
I blinked, and then the taller one was inches away. I jumped despite myself. Nothing should be allowed to move that fast. A hand shot toward me, looking for a hold.
Luck saved me as much as reflex. The figure missed the grab, and I launched a wild punch in response. It was sloppy form, but it connected solidly where the figure’s chin should have been.
It barely flinched. I felt like I’d punched a wall.
"Shit-storms and blighted furies!" I cursed, dancing back out of reach, before lunging in to throw a kick at the figure’s kneecaps. I don’t care how tough you are, it doesn’t take much to ruin those.
Evidently, my logic was flawed. My opponent didn’t even try to evade, just watched in bemusement as my foot bounced off. I was baffled. No protective spell could’ve been in play, not against me. Armor, maybe? But that should have been obvious.
A thunderous roar sounded behind me, and I damn near soiled myself. A blur of brown and white rushed past, slamming into my attacker’s chest. I heard enraged snarls and saw flashing teeth.
Again, I don’t care who you are—leverage is a bitch.
My opponent went down under a hundred pounds of pissed-off canine. The same pooch I’d bailed out earlier had come back to settle his account.
I was thankful for the interruption, but I knew the situation was hopeless. Already, the hooded menace was recovering and trying to force the dog off, and there was no telling what unpleasantness its shorter companion might yet bring to bear.
Time to leave.
I turned tail and sprinted. I left my bag of plunder—not worth the weight. Behind me I heard commotion and furious, threatening bellows from the dog, louder than they had any right to be.
I felt a presence hot on my heels, and a sidelong glance revealed—to my immense relief—that it was my fuzzy new companion, keeping pace and periodically doubling back to visit his bitey wrath on any pursuit.
Somehow, we reached the wall. Panic and adrenaline put me over it without as much as a thought. I landed hard on the other side, wincing in pain, but I could worry about my ankles when I wasn’t about to be dead. Live now. Sort the details out later.
I ripped my ruined sword from its scabbard and turned on the wall. I hacked and chopped with a vengeance, disrupting the lines of power in every rune and glyph I could reach.
The hound cleared the wall with a mighty leap as I finished. I tackled him, pulling him as close as I could. I drew my aura in.
The warding spells on the Count’s wall were an order of magnitude above those that had sealed the doors to his chambers, and I’d ruined as many as I could reach. Power slammed back into them as I withdrew my will, erratically bursting into the physical realm where the careful spell lines had been wrecked.
The wall detonated.
Light and fury washed over us, blinding and deafening. My aura shielded the pooch and I from the worst, though the heat was still noticeable.
It was over in a second, but the damage was devastating. Everything within thirty yards of the wall, on either side, was scorched beyond recognition. There must have been some sort of chain reaction, because as far as I could see, the carnage seemed to extend around the whole perimeter of the property, not just the part I’d damaged.
"Blackened furies…" I breathed, choking on the soot. The dog had frozen in my embrace, eyes wide, weight leaning into me. He let out a worried, interrogative whine.
Most of the buildings closest to the Count’s estate were on fire. Alarmed shouts were coming from all directions.
I heard panicked screams and sounds of terror even over the rising din, drifting on the wind from the direction of the Count’s compound.
I locked gazes with the pooch. "We need to leave. Now."
He seemed to agree.
We didn’t stop running for a long time.
I approached a few minutes after the sun dipped below the horizon. Post-dusk light plays hell on your night vision, and I figured it would give me an edge on any particularly vigilant guardsmen.
The outer wall was fairly low, though judging by the faint glyphs etched into the stonework it was heavily enchanted to keep out intruders. Not a problem for me. I was over in a few seconds.
I was surprised by the lack of foot patrols on the lawn or around the wall, but it made sense after the Count’s heavy losses in the battle against the Magus. His house guard would be further thinned if he wasn’t home, as he customarily traveled with at least a dozen lackeys to wipe his ass whenever he needed.
The grounds were unmanned. I crept up to the grandiose, white-marble behemoth of a main house, and around the side. That’s where I saw the first guard. He stood there, idle and bored, indifferently scanning the grounds in front of him. I crept past when he glanced off in the other direction, my footsteps muffled in the wet grass.
I found an unwatched servant’s door tucked into an alcove around the corner from the lone sentry. It was a simple lock, and simple locks had stopped being an obstacle for me early in life. I slipped inside.
I’d give myself minutes, tops, to snatch what I could carry and be off the premises. My firm opinions on contractual obligations aside, there was only so much risk I was willing to tolerate for a grudge. I never would have attempted anything this elaborate with some of my clientele, but I’d seen the Count’s crew at work, and I was…comfortable indulging in a brief vendetta. The scant few professionals among them were retired sell-swords long past their modest prime, and the rest were the disfavored nephews and cousins of local lords, given a shiny breastplate and a job in the ruling house to keep them out of the way. Ten on one, they were happy to push around a peasant, or throw a pariah out into the rain—but I didn’t think they could slow me down for a second if I came across them in ones and twos. Especially now that the Magus had vaporized the “best” of them.
I pulled an empty burlap sack from my back and stalked through the manor, stuffing any trinket that looked to be of decent value inside as I went. I wasn’t concerned about the monetary worth; the fifty gold rods the Count had "generously" paid me would be more than enough for me to survive off of for some time. But we’d agreed on two-fifty, gods dammit. If I wasn’t going to get it, the Count was at least going to know he’d paid for something involuntarily.
Once or twice, I had to duck into an alcove or side room to avoid being spotted, but on the whole it was smooth sailing. I decided to use the servant’s halls to head deeper into the compound, where I suspected the good stuff would be. A random servant was less likely to question a stranger than a guard or family member, or so I hoped. The route took me out of the house proper, through the stables and kennels.
I heard shouting and thought for an instant that I’d been discovered, but there was no one within view. The racket was coming from an intersection up ahead, between rows of empty horse stalls.
Curious, I peeked around the corner to see what the commotion was about. A bulbous man in dirty clothes and a leather apron was shouting angry commands, snapping a riding crop at something I couldn’t see. I leaned out further.
That bastard. He was cracking the crop into a dog that had apparently committed some minor offense. The poor thing flinched as each stinging snap ripped into its sleek coat, bringing tiny rivulets of blood to the surface, but the dog never once whimpered or made a noise. Bright, brown eyes stared defiantly back at his tormentor.
Rage boiled up in my chest. I’d seen that scenario played out in a thousand parallels throughout my own life. The dog’s perseverance was infuriating his handler as much as any actual transgression; at this point he was being punished simply because the previous punishment hadn’t been harsh enough.
The naked, one-sided unfairness of the confrontation struck a nerve. The bully and the literal underdog—call it projecting, but in that moment, I was feeling invested.
I stepped from my hiding place and walked right up behind the man. "Excuse me," I tapped his shoulder as he raised his arm for another swing.
Startled, he wheeled about. "Who are—"
A savage right hook silenced whatever he had been about to say next. He reeled back, gasping, then tried to lunge at me. I snapped my fingers and sent my aura washing over him. He staggered as the alien sensation ran though him, cutting him off from the permeating background presence of the Ether, and missed his swipe. I cracked an elbow into his face.
He had the misfortune to remain coherent after he hit the floor, so I kicked him until that situation resolved itself. Feeling satisfied and more than a little self-righteous, I turned to the hound.
It was a handsome animal, if I was any judge. I recognized it as some kind of hunting breed, similar to others I’d seen among the local nobility. Damned expensive, of course. I’d once heard a salesman claim that they had some magic stock way back in the pedigree, but I think he was just trying to turn puppies into copper.
The dog had a slick brown and white coat, built deep and strong in the chest but thin and lean toward the hips. He—yes, definitely male, I saw—was a big fellow, coming up to my waist even while he sat. And judging by how out of proportion his paws looked, he wasn’t done growing yet.
He stared at me intently. After a second, he glanced down to the unconscious man, then back up to me. I’d have sworn I could see him taking stock of the situation and processing new information. His tail twitched.
I crouched down and offered the back of my hand for him to sniff. He obliged me for a second before lunging forward to plant a big old slobbery doggie lick on my face.
"Bah! Ugh. You’re welcome," I grumbled, trying to wipe the slobber off. I took a look at the damage the asshole had inflicted. "Doesn’t look too serious," I told the pooch. "Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve had worse around here."
The dog cocked his head to the side, listening if not understanding.
I leaned down and untied the leash and leather collar around his neck. "Look buddy," I told him, “it’s your call, but if it was me? I’d get out of here."
The dog licked my hand and padded off, giving my leg a shoulder-check that made me stumble as he went. Tail wagging, he disappeared around the corner and down the hall, out toward the great barn doors that led out of the stables.
I had no idea what the pup would do next, but I had my own set of problems to worry about. I resumed my hunt.
The servant’s corridors wound all throughout the estate, and I poked my head out regularly to get my bearings. I was downright giddy when I spied a set of ostentatious, gold-inlaid double doors. Based on my rough guess as to where I was, I felt sure that I’d found the Count’s private chambers.
Excellent.
Not seeing anyone around, I strode right up to the doors. Some of the filigree camouflaged the distinctive shapes of glyphs, similar in function to the perimeter wall outside—not that I cared. Being an endmage can be a real bitch sometimes, but it does have its perks. I turned the handle and went inside without incident.
The room was exactly the treasure trove I’d been hoping for. I stuffed my loot bag as full as I dared with jewelry and currency bars someone had left lying around. The confidence born of having an impenetrable magical door, I suppose.
My payday secured, I engaged in petty vandalism. I started by carving "Don’t fuck with an endmage" into a very expensive-looking ebony armoire, and went from there.
I was midway through the process of sketching an artful mustache onto an oil painting of the Count’s mother, balancing atop a vanity to reach it, when I heard a commotion at the door. I whirled, jumping down and doing my damnedest not to wince as I landed awkwardly on my foot. A lone guard stood in the doorway, sword drawn.
I snapped my fingers and sent my aura rushing over him. He staggered, but recovered much quicker than I appreciated, flashing me a wicked grin.
Not good at all. I took a second look at him, watching with mounting alarm as he twirled his broadsword in an intricate and menacing display. Belatedly, I spotted the distinctive red sash looped around his waist.
I groaned inwardly. That sash denoted a Man-At-Arms of the first order, probably a recent addition to replenish the Count’s losses. The Men-At-Arms order spent years pursuing mastery of their chosen weapons with a borderline religious fervor, and their skills did not come cheap—but the count could afford it. Worst of all, the bulk of their training was conducted without the use of any magic. Negating his eldritch abilities would not faze this fellow, and I doubted I was his equal in fair combat.
No reason to fight fair, then.
I’m not unskilled myself, with the profession I’m in. I whipped my sword out of its scabbard and launched into a big, flashy, swirly display. It was fluff—tactically worthless, but it set me up for the big trick. I leapt into a spin, arcing my blade around me—and hurling it across the room. It tumbled through the air toward the swordsman.
The Man-At-Arms sidestepped it easily, and my trusty sword buried its tip in the ensorcelled wood of the bedroom door. He cast me a contemptuous look and began to stride toward me, intent on mayhem.
I pulled my aura back in as close as I could.
The door exploded in a blinding discharge of energies. The swordsman was shocked, battered, and launched through the air by the blast. He hit the wall and crumpled. Those same violent energies washed over me with no effect.
"Ha!" I barked, snatching up the plunder and making my escape, pausing only for a moment to recover my sword. It was slightly warped, and glowing orange in a number of places. I cursed; it would take the attention of a half decent blacksmith to get it back into serviceable condition, and I didn’t anticipate that happening anytime soon.
I decided I had overstayed my welcome and began making my way back through the manor. I chuckled in spite of myself. Poor guy was going to be hurting tomorrow. Nobody ever sees the glyph thing coming.
Magic, at its most basic level, works by the will of the caster; raw power is pulled out of the Ether and shaped to some desired goal. For a one-off spell, the caster can use themselves as the conduit, employing various techniques or tools depending on how they learned the craft. That’s where we get magic wands and wizard staves and the boiling blood of your enemy’s firstborn sons and all that fun stuff.
But in order to set up a permanent effect—like, say, a magically sealed doorway—the most common method is to inscribe glyphs or runes, enchanting them with a perpetuating force that keeps reiterating the caster’s original intent.
This makes a glyph a direct channel into the Ether, constantly pulling in energy for its task. Catastrophically damaging one under normal circumstances is hard, straddling the line between the material world and the Ether like they are. Maybe you’ll manage to ding it up, and it’ll just peter out; sputtering energy until the spell is unraveled and useless.
It’s like poking a hole in a bucket—water goes where its not supposed to, but eventually it’ll drain and the bucket won’t fill up even if you keep pouring water in. But if your local Endmage is the one doing it—well. Imagine you could snap your fingers, take all the water out of the bucket, and then smash the bucket to pieces. Then you put all the water back, at once. Everybody gets wet.
That metaphor got away from me.
Putting the glyphs on Count Pompous’ bedroom door inside my aura cut them off from the Ether, rendering the doors no more spectacular or resilient than any normal hunk of wood. Smashing a blade into them disrupted the careful, intricately laid out patterns—but since they were already inert, there was no natural falloff in energy flow. When I pulled my aura back, I released the flood, and the Ether dumped power into a shattered vessel, with aversive consequences for my red-sashed friend.
My luck held out for the next few minutes. The commotion sent a lot of people rushing about and created a handy distraction for someone intent on slipping off in the opposite direction. I made it to the entrance unmolested. The guards stationed there had been drawn away by the alarms behind me, and I took advantage, bolting for the door.
I slipped through and found myself in a grand courtyard, complete with a gaudy fountain set in the center of a circular cobblestone drive that ran right up to the doors. The fountain was a siren call to mischief, but I’d pressed my luck enough for one evening. I slipped into the shrubbery and shadows along the perimeter and crept forward. Once I got to the edge of the building, it would be a quick dash to the outer wall…
I hit the dirt when I spied a coach bouncing up the drive. It rattled past me, faster than seemed safe. I recognized the banners streaming above it—the Count had come home.
Well. That was sub-optimal.
I weighed my options. A mad dash off the grounds had even chances of succeeding, but I’d almost certainly be spotted. Ample moonlight wasn’t working in my favor. A heated pursuit through the city didn’t sound appealing; I wanted to be at a safe distance before anyone sorted out the confusion.
That in mind, it seemed a better bet to lie low for a few moments while everyone in the Count’s contingent went inside to investigate the clamor. If I was lucky, even the coach’s teamsters would peek in, and I’d have a moment free from wandering eyes.
The coach just sat, doors closed.
"Come on," I mouthed. "What are you even doing, you bastard? Go inside."
A supernatural chill washed over me, all frozen guts and pure, primal fear. I snapped my gaze around and saw a second coach careening toward the house at an even more reckless speed.
It was the black coach from the night before, with its mad, hunched driver howling at his team of frothing, frenzied horses.
Dread burrowed into the core of my being as I remembered the deathly gaze of the hooded occupants, and I had hoped to avoid a repeat encounter, ever.
I steeled myself, forcing calm. Wait. Let them do their business, then slip away. Simple.
The black coach rattled to a halt behind the Count’s, the horses snarling more than they whinnied or snorted. The Count’s team, by contrast, was tranquil beyond what I’d expect even from trained animals.
Finally, the doors of Grendesian’s coach opened. Several bodyguards stepped out, followed by the pompous, cheating blowhard himself.
Peering up through the bushes, I had trouble making out much, but their body language seemed…detached. They milled about for a moment, then went still.
I couldn’t stop myself. I risked inching to the side to get a better view.
I spied the Count’s face. His expression was slack, and his skin seemed pallid even in the moonlight. His eyes were milky. Dead.
Gods and furies.
The black coach opened. Out stepped the same pair I’d seen outside the tavern; one childlike, one tall, both robed and hooded beyond all further recognition.
The Count, and the poor bastards who had served him, all acted on an unspoken command in unison, and they began shambling as one. A few made their listless way into the manor. The rest began to spread out, looking like they intended to comb the grounds for something.
For me.
Perhaps that was an egocentric conclusion to jump to, but it seemed prudent at the time. Regardless as to whether I was the object of their search, I did not want to be found.
The Fates, as is so often the case, failed to consider my desires. I was discovered immediately.
One of the former guards shuffled right past where I lay. How he found me was a mystery, because he reacted to my presence before his dead gaze swept down. I had no time nor inclination to figure it out. He emitted a gargling, tortured groan, and lunged straight at me. The noise attracted the attention of everything in the courtyard.
The hells with that. I kicked out as he advanced, hooking one foot around the back of his knee, and driving my other heel into his hip. Shambling undead corpse-thing or not, leverage is a bitch. He fell backwards, not even trying to catch himself. That horrific groan never missed a beat.
I scrambled to my feet, acutely aware of the fact that my trusty sword had been reduced to little more than slag with a handle.
Well. Use what you’ve got.
I snapped my fingers, dumping as much will and panic into my aura as I could. It’s an almost physical force when I’m feeling motivated, and the situation was certainly inspiring. A few of the zombie guardsman were knocked off their feet; whether from the force of the aura or the severing of whatever spellcraft was controlling them, I couldn’t say.
The lumbering corpses, standing or not, lost direction. A few still shuffled aimlessly, but most just stopped where they were. Small victories.
The hooded nightmares, however, weren’t nearly as incapacitated as I’d have hoped. They muttered to each other in some dark, foreign tongue. The short one seemed to be giving orders.
I blinked, and then the taller one was inches away. I jumped despite myself. Nothing should be allowed to move that fast. A hand shot toward me, looking for a hold.
Luck saved me as much as reflex. The figure missed the grab, and I launched a wild punch in response. It was sloppy form, but it connected solidly where the figure’s chin should have been.
It barely flinched. I felt like I’d punched a wall.
"Shit-storms and blighted furies!" I cursed, dancing back out of reach, before lunging in to throw a kick at the figure’s kneecaps. I don’t care how tough you are, it doesn’t take much to ruin those.
Evidently, my logic was flawed. My opponent didn’t even try to evade, just watched in bemusement as my foot bounced off. I was baffled. No protective spell could’ve been in play, not against me. Armor, maybe? But that should have been obvious.
A thunderous roar sounded behind me, and I damn near soiled myself. A blur of brown and white rushed past, slamming into my attacker’s chest. I heard enraged snarls and saw flashing teeth.
Again, I don’t care who you are—leverage is a bitch.
My opponent went down under a hundred pounds of pissed-off canine. The same pooch I’d bailed out earlier had come back to settle his account.
I was thankful for the interruption, but I knew the situation was hopeless. Already, the hooded menace was recovering and trying to force the dog off, and there was no telling what unpleasantness its shorter companion might yet bring to bear.
Time to leave.
I turned tail and sprinted. I left my bag of plunder—not worth the weight. Behind me I heard commotion and furious, threatening bellows from the dog, louder than they had any right to be.
I felt a presence hot on my heels, and a sidelong glance revealed—to my immense relief—that it was my fuzzy new companion, keeping pace and periodically doubling back to visit his bitey wrath on any pursuit.
Somehow, we reached the wall. Panic and adrenaline put me over it without as much as a thought. I landed hard on the other side, wincing in pain, but I could worry about my ankles when I wasn’t about to be dead. Live now. Sort the details out later.
I ripped my ruined sword from its scabbard and turned on the wall. I hacked and chopped with a vengeance, disrupting the lines of power in every rune and glyph I could reach.
The hound cleared the wall with a mighty leap as I finished. I tackled him, pulling him as close as I could. I drew my aura in.
The warding spells on the Count’s wall were an order of magnitude above those that had sealed the doors to his chambers, and I’d ruined as many as I could reach. Power slammed back into them as I withdrew my will, erratically bursting into the physical realm where the careful spell lines had been wrecked.
The wall detonated.
Light and fury washed over us, blinding and deafening. My aura shielded the pooch and I from the worst, though the heat was still noticeable.
It was over in a second, but the damage was devastating. Everything within thirty yards of the wall, on either side, was scorched beyond recognition. There must have been some sort of chain reaction, because as far as I could see, the carnage seemed to extend around the whole perimeter of the property, not just the part I’d damaged.
"Blackened furies…" I breathed, choking on the soot. The dog had frozen in my embrace, eyes wide, weight leaning into me. He let out a worried, interrogative whine.
Most of the buildings closest to the Count’s estate were on fire. Alarmed shouts were coming from all directions.
I heard panicked screams and sounds of terror even over the rising din, drifting on the wind from the direction of the Count’s compound.
I locked gazes with the pooch. "We need to leave. Now."
He seemed to agree.
We didn’t stop running for a long time.
Tattered Pawns releases Oct 1, 2022 and is available for pre-order RIGHT NOW!
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Copyright © 2022 Christopher D. Corrigan
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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.