Soul Gem Collector 5 Chapter 6

“We have only ever come here on entirely legitimate--” Cad fumed as he stepped forward, but Otso flung out a muscular arm against Cad’s chest. The blonde wizard stopped in his tracks, but his glower didn’t leave his mustachioed face.

“I think it would be best for you to accept,” Otso rumbled to his friend.

“Why?” Cad whined. “It’s a ridiculous wager. We can go to the Dean if we really need to.”

“Because we are Battle Mages and we are teammates.” Otso moved his hairy mitt to grip Cad’s shoulder. “That means we don’t go running to the Dean to settle every little disagreement. We respect our teammates enough to settle our problems between ourselves like gentlemen.”

“Fine.” Cad scowled at me. “Zayre, if you win, you’ll never see us around the laboratory again. I will promise you that.”

“Good.” I checked in the back of my mind to see if Ferox had calmed down at all, but the little chamrosh was still growling and bristling at his former owner. I wasn’t surprised that Cad was the one who meant me the most harm. “So do you want to set up the poppets right here, or do you want to call another crowd to watch you get your ass kicked?”

“We are far past the time for a poppet duel,” Cad sneered. “If you’re really ready to keep up with the Battle Magic team, you should be able to duel without a safety net. I propose a dual duel, just me and Otso against you and your fox-bitch.”

“What, to the death?” Taslyn snarled, and she dropped her basket and twirled her iron knife in her fingers. “Is a broken hammer worth it?”

“Not to the death, or nobody would survive to graduation.” Otso shook his head and patted the handle of his war hammer. “We fight until one team can’t cast anymore. Either your weapon breaks, your hands break, or you pass out.”

“Uh, you’re not going to be able to use your hammer anyway,” I pointed out. “You said it was broken, so you might as well just not use it.”

“Fair enough.” Otso leaned his hammer back against the side of the laboratory, made fists of his paws, then started to stretch and wave his arms above his head. “I can cast without a focus. But one of you will have to jettison yours as well, to make it fair.”

“Otso, have you ever seen me cast with a focus?” I spread my hands out. “It’s always from the hands. We’re at an equal advantage here.”

“My knife is not a focus.” Taslyn showed her teeth and the blade of her knife. “It’s just a weapon.”

“If Taslyn gets her knife, Otso should be able to use his fists,” Cad interjected, and he reached out, clasped his hand over Otso’s fist, and held it up for a moment. “He’s a physical adept, you know.”

“Isn’t this a fight of magic, not of fists?” Noura interjected. “We are getting away from the point of this duel. I propose that the gentleman with the rapier be allowed to use it, but I’m also happy to be Zayre’s second instead of Taslyn.”

“Why?” Cad looked from Noura to me, and then back again. “You’re new on campus, aren’t you? Don’t tell me this human has already entranced you as well.”

“I do have some Battle Magic training.” Noura raised an eyebrow.

“And I’ve been tutoring Zayre in his Battle Magic for some time now.” Taslyn turned to look Noura fully in the face, then winked at her. “I don’t mean to malign your skills, Noura, but--”

“This is not your fight.” I patted Noura on the shoulder, then looked over at Cad and Otso. “How about Cad gets his rapier and Taslyn gets a potion of her own choosing? That’s kind of her specialty, just like waving around the world’s skinniest little sword is Cad’s.”

“Very well,” Cad sniffed. He held up one hand with his fingers splayed out. “Shall we say five minutes?”

“Five minutes should be enough.” Taslyn glanced toward the laboratory. “Noura, would you mind entertaining these gentlemen while Zayre and I fetch my potion?”

“I am nothing if not entertaining.” Noura clapped her hands and bowed to us.

“No need to break out the whole routine.” I lowered my voice so that Cad and Otso couldn’t hear us. “Just chat with them and make sure they don’t do anything shady.”

“Aye aye.” Noura winked at me, then turned and strode over to Cad and Otso. “So, gentlemen, how long have you been in training as Battle Mages?”

I watched Noura lean against the door to the laboratory, then headed around the other side of the lab toward the back door, and silently gestured for Taslyn to follow me. I wasn’t going to hide where I was going from Cad and Otso, but I didn’t need their eyes on me, either. I headed past the still where we’d buried even more of my gems, held the back door open for Taslyn, then slipped in and closed it behind us.

“I only have a few ingredients for my potions here,” Taslyn muttered as soon as the door was closed. “I use plants, Zayre. Not chymicals.”

“A lot of my chymicals are derived from plants.” I gestured to the many jars of chymicals and minerals that lined the shelves, then pointed at the humming machinery that took up much of the room. “And we always have my black powder in a pinch. Cad and Otso won’t know the difference between a powder bomb and, uh, an instant fire potion.”

“I’m not opposed to blowing those two up a little,” Taslyn conceded, “but we can’t just rely on that. We need to have a real strategy.”

“Absolutely.” I grabbed some round glass bottles, thought about getting some of my contact explosives, then decided that a wizard’s duel wasn’t going to be a stable enough environment to keep them from blowing up. I’d have to rely on firepower. I grabbed a small scoop and started to full up the bottles with black powder. “I have my gems, but what are you going to use in a battle besides these? We agreed on just one thing for you.”

“Perhaps we can share your magic through our psychic bond,” Taslyn suggested. Her ears flattened, her eyes grew bright, and she touched her shoulder where she’d carved her sigil. “Try it.”

“All right.” I imagined the sigil she’d carved on my ankle, and the patch of skin there started to itch. I could feel the warmth coursing through the still-healing scar, and my skin prickled as the magic began to activate. “How do you feel? Want to try it out?”

“I feel…” Taslyn blinked her bright amber eyes, then rubbed at the hair on the back of her neck. A low growl emanated from her throat. She clapped one hand to her mouth and blinked at me. “Well, that came on all of a sudden. I hope it answers your question.”

“That would be Ferox.” Even though I knew we were about to take part in one of the most dangerous fights of our lives so far, I couldn’t help but feel a spring of hope bubbling up in my heart. I grabbed Taslyn’s shoulders, grinned, and pressed a kiss to her petal-soft lips. “Tas, you can feel him! That means you can connect with my magic through our link!”

“Good.” Taslyn grinned back at me, and a gentle pink blush spread over her cheeks. One of her ears coked up and swiveled toward the window. “Do we have time to test it out?”

“Bad idea in the lab.” I corked the half-dozen bottles of black powder I’d filled, then started to tuck each of them into the little straw holders that Professor Meinke had occasionally used to transport samples of his work to other alchemists. “Almost all of my powers would wreck this place.”

“You have a point.” Taslyn tapped her lips and frowned. “It’s not as though I don’t know how to manipulate energy. I’ve spent several years learning reiki.”

“Then you have more experience than I do with this,” I said. I stuffed the straw-covered bottles into a netted bag and handed them to Taslyn. “The important thing is that you have to go with what the energy wants. If it wants up, it’s going to go up. It wants out, it’s going to go out. You just have to aim it and shape it.”

“Good.” Taslyn nodded. “So, our battle strategy? Should I just follow your lead?”

“Well, Cad is probably going to take the offense, since he has the rapier,” I observed. “Otso won’t have his hammer, so he’s more likely to play defense. The problem is that we’ll both be working with the same energy and the same dynamic at the same time, so we won’t be able to do that.”

“Then we’ll have to work one man each,” Taslyn shrugged. “And we’ll simply double up on defense. Would you prefer to take Cad or Otso?”

“We’ll need to attack one man at a time.” I shook my head. “If we take Otso out, Cad’s defense is shot. If we take Cad out, Otso may just end the duel.”

“Then we both focus on attacking Cad?” Taslyn nodded and secreted the netted bag of corked bottles into the folds of her skirt.

“Yeah, I think that’s our best option,” I agreed. I glanced over at the front door and took a deep breath. “All right. You’ve got your explodey potions, so throw them when there’s flame to light them. How’s your throwing arm?”

“Tolerable.” Taslyn pushed up her long black sleeve to show a pale, freckled, and thoroughly muscled right arm.

“Great.” I leaned in, kissed her, and patted her on the arm. “Then I think we’re set. Just follow my lead and keep an eye out for Otso.”

“Do you really think he’ll attack?” Taslyn asked as we headed outside again.

“There’s no reason for him not to,” I reminded her. I made sure to lock the door behind me as we left. I wasn’t looking forward to the possibility of getting blasted by Cad and Otso’s magic, but I tried not to think about the feeling of being flayed by a water jet or scorched by a fire ball. I especially didn't want Taslyn to worry or to sense my own nervousness, so I just hoped that she would chalk any static she was getting on my end up to more anxiety on Ferox’s part.

“It’s been seven minutes,” Cad sneered as we approached the lab’s front door. The blonde Elvenborn sheathed his silvery rapier and clicked his heels together. “I trust you’re thoroughly prepared?”

“We’re good.” I clapped my hands together, then pointed to the pockmarked, moss-covered clearing where a decade of alchemical experiments had taken their toll. “Let’s fight over here so we don’t burn the lab down, yeah? Lots of flammable stuff in there.”

“I hope you’re ready to feel that burn.” Cad pushed his long blue sleeves up, strode over toward the clearing, and beckoned to Otso as he walked. He didn’t even look behind him, as though he were calling a servant. “Positions, Otso.”

“Don’t forget your hammer!” Noura pointed at Otso’s war hammer where it leaned against the wall.

“It’s worse than useless right now.” Otso shook his head as he loped behind Cad. “I’ll deal with it when we’re done.”

“Shall I referee, then?” Noura clasped her hands together and glanced between the two teams as we took our places on the field.

“You’re hardly a disinterested party, are you?” Cad cocked a groomed eyebrow at Noura.

“No, but I’d like to be useful,” Noura replied.

“Your task can be to run and fetch the campus healers if someone gets seriously hurt,” Taslyn called to Noura.

“Yeah, stay back and keep safe in case something really, uh, bad happens,” I called to Noura. I stopped, estimated that I was about fifteen feet away from Cad and Otso, and dug my heels into the ground. I just hoped that Noura would get my meaning and intervene if we actually looked like we were about to die. I didn’t care if I beat Cad and Otso on honorable terms, I just wanted them off my back. I spread out my hands, straightened my shoulders, and took a deep breath. “Let’s go.”

“I’m ready when you are.” Taslyn stopped about a yard away from me, and her bag of powder-filled bulbs wasn’t visible, so at least I knew that Cad and Otso couldn’t see what she had or how many. The fox-girl pushed back her black hood, held up one hand, and slid the other into the folds of her skirt.

“I’m--” I broke off and squinted as faint rainbow trails began to drift in front of my vision. I could see a halo of purple and orange flames flaring dimly around Taslyn’s body, and the longer I looked, the brighter they grew. When I looked over to Otso and Cad, I could see their auras as well. I knew I hadn’t used my magical sight yet, so I figured that I was looking through Taslyn’s seer eyes. I relaxed my eyes and let myself sink into the sight. “All right. I’m ready.”

Otso and Cad nodded to each other, then turned back to us. The bear-man held up his huge, hairy paws in a defensive position, just like I’d predicted, while Cad dropped into a gentle crouch and pulled his rapier from its gilded scabbard. Otso’s aura radiated a deep, calm blue, and a healthy reddish-brown, while Cad’s aura flared a urine-like amber color that melted into a bloody crimson.

“En garde!” Cad pointed the diamond-spark tip of his rapier at me as his free hand flew up behind him. The outline of his aura started to glow with yellowish-silver sparks, and the sparks quickly widened to a wide glittering ribbon.

“That’s magic,” I thought to Taslyn in the span of a split moment. “But he can’t be using his yellow light attack already--”

“Layer your magical sight on top of what I can see,” Taslyn thought back. “That way we can see what he’s about to do.”

It barely took us a second to have the conversation, and it took half that long for me to dip into the passive purple sight I’d inherited from Tanow Llwyd. It only took our combined intelligence to moment to understand what the snapshot of magical data in front of us meant.

A jagged violet line squiggled its way down from the sky and culminated in a kind of sunburst glow around Cad’s form. The violet light continued down the entire length of Cad’s outstretched arm, brightened to a kind of brilliant lavender, and zigzagged toward me from the tip of the rapier.

I kept my hair cropped close to my head so that I wouldn’t catch it on fire during an experiment, but now every single short hair on my head stood up straight. My scalp, palms, and the tips of my fingers started to tingle, and a faint smell of burning metal and snow wafted under my nose.

“Lightning!” I thought at Taslyn as I launched myself sideways toward her. I wrapped my arms around her waist, reached into the black and white static that was the portal magic of a skelk trapped in a diamond, and imagined us both about two yards to the left. I saw the trees move past me and then jump, and I knew that I’d teleported us both out of the way.

An intensity white bolt of lightning struck Cad on his golden crown with a blinding flash, and was followed immediately by a booming crack that rattled the teeth in my skull and the ground beneath my feet. The second flash followed a mere moment after, and this time a yellow-white bolt of lightning sizzled past us just a couple of yards away. The lightning arced from the tip of Cad’s rapier to the patch of moss where I’d been standing, and I could smell the acrid stench of burnt plants as the air thunder echoed away. Once the lightning stopped, a blackened patch of about a foot across with a six-inch radius of scorched earth remained where I’d stood.

“Look at the mighty warrior, running away from the blow,” Cad sneered. The blonde Elvenborn didn’t look any worse the wear for having just channeled a bolt of lightning toward me. “Or are you scared because you’re powerless to control it? Little monkeys, running from what you don’t understand.”

“Oh, we’ve mastered some things.” I winked at Taslyn, held my hand up with my palm out, then reached inside of myself and summoned the fire jet that had once been Valerys’s soul.

Valerys’s orange fire swirled in my stomach and licked up through my lungs like the aftermath of an Inkatian blue curry. The flame sparked through my veins, lit up my heart, and roared down my arms, even though none of it was visible to anyone except for myself and Taslyn. The stream of flame would normally have become visible as it shot out of the center of my palms or the tips of my fingers, but I’d learned the trick to holding it back, and I just hoped that the action would transfer over to Taslyn. The flame that built up slowly in my cupped fingers felt hot like bath water, but the only visible sign of its presence was a faint shimmer of heat in the air.

Taslyn’s ears pricked up, and her head jutted forward for a moment as though she was about to cough something up. She regained her balance, shoved a hand into the folds of her skirt, and grabbed one of the bottles of black powder. The fox-girl wound up, let the shining sphere loose into the air toward Cad, and thrust her hand palm-first after her projectile.

I mentally opened the block I’d set between my fingers and let the floodgates of fire open onto Cad. I could feel the heat on my face as the fire that had been building up in my hands blossomed out into a huge orange and yellow fireball the size of a watermelon, but I tightened my hands to keep the ensuring stream of fire to a pencil-thin wand after the flaming ball left my hands. I knew that even if Cad managed to escape the fireball, the resulting explosion from the black powder ought to deal him and Cad some damage.

Cad craned his neck up as the glass bottle arced into the air, but once the flame appeared in my hands, he twisted his neck around with a downward-drooping frown. The blue-eyed half-elf lifted himself up on his toes, jumped to the side, and slammed into Otso’s broad, furry arms.

Taslyn cupped her hands together the same way that I had, then aimed her fingers about a yard to Otso’s other side, Her arms and then her hands glowed brighter and brighter with orange energy until she pulled her fingers away from each other abruptly. Her strong fingers seemed to cradle the fireball as she pushed it outwards.

The bottle had a head start, but my fireball flew faster. By the time the powder-filled bulb had reached its obsolete mark, the widening ball of flame had enlarged to engulf the area from the top of a man’s head to the ground. The enormous ball of flame seemed to hover in the air for a moment, and then the light coming from the yellow cracks in its orange blooms got much brighter. The fireball expanded very rapidly from there.

Otso grabbed Cad around the waist with one arm, held out the other meaty paw, and lugged his friend away from the explosion as quickly as he could. He stumbled when the shock wave from the explosion caught him, and the way he shook his shaggy head suggested that he’d felt the wave in his ears, but somehow the huge hulk of hairy muscle kept himself upright. The large bear-man started to leap toward Taslyn’s ball of flame, but turned on his heel as he caught sight of the fiery trap. He whirled backward, held a few fingers up, and uttered a low, piercing whistle even as the licking flames cast orange light on his hairy face. The outside of his aura began to glimmer with white sparkles.

The air roared past my ears, the ground shook under my feet, and a great meaty palm of air slapped me in the chest. I could feel an even hotter wind on my face now, and I let my fire powers drop as I braced myself against the impact of the explosion. I knew I didn’t have any magic power that could protect me or Taslyn from its concussive force, so I just had to hope that my calculations about distance and dosage were accurate. I winced as the loud crack from the explosion reached my ears, but I sighed in relief when I realized that the slowing fireball wouldn't reach us.

A burst of hot air like a dog’s breath drifted in front of my face. A bubble of faintly glowing air grew from the tips of Otso’s black claws and pushed back against the orange flame of Taslyn’s fireball like a yolk carving its space out inside an egg. A cooler breeze whipped past my face and stole the heat from the flame. The air blew little runnels in the slowing explosion and truncated the flow of my fire as it poured from my palms.

“He’s keeping the fire away with wind,” Taslyn thought to me. “Will stronger fire help?”

Cad blinked up at Otso with unfocused eyes, shook his head, then staggered to his feet. He still clutched his rapier in his right hand, but his grip described wobbly circles in the air.

“Otso’s a pretty strong dude,” I thought back. I could feel the now-stiff breeze on my close-cropped scalp and against my face, and my fire was barely more than a stub now. I decided to keep the fire going just to keep Otso busy while I traded thoughts with Taslyn. “And they’re already fighting fire. Now is the time to surprise them.”

Cad dropped to one knee and pressed the blunt end of his sword to the ground, then planted his left palm onto the moss. His pale amber and muddy crimson auras began to blend into a ruddy orange in the center. Whatever he was doing with his energy wasn’t anything I was used to, but I had to interrupt whatever he was doing.

“Let’s knock them off their feet,” I thought to Taslyn. “I’ll push up their daisies, and you build us a shield. Just imagine the stone coming up from the ground and the magic will do the rest.”

I mentally reached down into the ground and imagined a giant jagged stalagmite right under Cad and Otso’s feet. I gave the huge stone spear a mental tug upward and felt it shoot upward through the ground with blinding speed in a way that had nothing to do with vibrations in the earth beneath my feet. I could even feel Taslyn using the magic to pull up a wall in front of us, and it just spurred me to force my stalagmite up faster. I wanted to see Cad and Otso fall off of the rising ground before Taslyn’s defensive formation went all the way up.

The earth beneath Cad began to dome up just as brilliant blue and white sparks started to form around the Elvenborn’s aura, and Otso cocked his ear to the ground. The jagged point of pale green and beige stone broke through the moss and sprayed dark brown dirt everywhere as blue and white sparks shot down the blade Cad’s rapier, and Otso gripped Cad’s sword arm. The stalagmite burst upward, and Cad screamed a full-throated, wordless cry as the bear-man dragged him away from danger once again. Striped beige and white rock slabs shot up in front of Taslyn and me just as a blueish-white burst of light left the end of Cad’s rapier.

“Rock blocks lightning,” I thought at Taslyn with more than a hint of pride. I couldn’t see what Cad and Otso were doing over the tops of the wall, but we’d undoubtedly blocked their attack. “Nice job on the wall.”

“That didn’t feel like lightning,” Taslyn thought back, and her hand dipped into the folds of her skirt.

Cracks started to zigzag over rock slabs. The cracks filled with translucent blue material almost as soon as they appeared, and more cracks quickly spider-webbed across the face of our shield.

“Ice crumbles rock,” I thought, held up my hands, and then summoned Valerys’s raging fire again. “Let’s melt them. Get ready to throw flame.”

I planted my left foot forward and my right foot back as I felt the fire roar through my veins again. I could feel Taslyn’s movements in my own muscles, now. I only had to flick my eyes over to see that she was mirroring my stance perfectly, right down to the individual twitches of our fingers, but I didn’t need to do that. I could feel her ears pricking and her tail fluffing as the fire sparked at the tips of her fur, and I could feel the rush of euphoria as power poured from her fingertips.

Our twin flames became two more and reunited with each other once again as blasts of fire against the rapidly freezing stone wall. The flames burned red-orange against the limestone, and tendrils of steam gouted out in frantic curls as the ice melted away. As the fire burned, the rock cracked even more, and soon chips of stone began to fall away from the wall.

“We’re making progress,” I thought at Taslyn. “Get ready to throw the bottle--”

The wall exploded toward me in a burst of cold water. Stone chips that were any size from darts to dinner plates flew at my head with a glowing rush of white behind them, and I could feel the first freezing drops strike my face along with the first shards of stone.

I shut off the fire power, grabbed Taslyn, and turned my back toward the oncoming jet. I squeezed my eyes shut and gripped my girlfriend as bits of stone broke against my back.

“Brace yourself!” I thought at Taslyn as a cannon of icy water pounded against my back.

I’d been expecting pieces of stone to hammer my back and legs until I was bruised and broken, but after a second I realized that the freezing water pounding my back with icy needles hurt a lot more than the sensation of breaking stone. I understood the situation when I saw a piece of limestone fly past and shatter into tiny pieces on the soft moss. I’d told Taslyn to raise a wall, but she’d ended up with the thinnest wall possible. I realized that I wasn’t enabling Taslyn to draw from the stone along with me, I was just splitting the power output between us, and I must have been using a pretty big percentage of the magic at that moment without leaving much for Taslyn. I would have to pay closer attention to that if we were going to win this fight.

“Had enough?” Cad taunted from behind me. “Or do you need a bath, you dirty ape? Protecting your smelly, slutty fox… she’ll never get clean like that, Zayre!”

“Let’s blow the shit out of him,” Taslyn thought to me. “Fuck fair play.”

“Great idea, but one problem: The powder won’t light if it’s wet,” I thought back. “What about the water?”

“Blast him with fire with your left hand,” Taslyn thought. “I’ll throw the bottles overhand with my right and keep Otso off with my left.”

“Perfect.” I thrust my left hand behind me and pulled up another gout of Valerys’s fire to throw at his buddies. I had to admit that I enjoyed using his power right under their noses, and I smiled wide when I felt a gush of warm steam puff over my back. “Go.”

Taslyn grabbed the bag of bottles from the folds of her skirt, wound her arm back, and threw the bag overhand with her right hand. She held up her left hand as a stream of fire shot from her palm, and in the light of the fire her lips curved up in a smile.

“Cheater!” Cad’s voice shrilled through the roar of the fire.

I felt the sudden cessation of pounding water from my back, and turned around just in time to see Cad’s water cannon arc through the air toward the netted bag of black bottles.

The bottles tinkled ridiculously, like sleigh bells ringing out in the night instead of explosive devices being smashed to pieces. The shining bits of glass mixed in with the wet clumps of black powder as they fell to the ground.

“Enough.” Taslyn’s voice was resolute in my mind as she raised her copper head. Her eyes were a brilliant, sparkling yellow, and they glowered brighter by the second. “This fight is beneath us, and we’re holding back for the sake of sportsmanship. Let’s finish him.”

I reached into the brilliance of the sun, of the cleaning light of fire, of Taslyn’s beautiful eyes that could see magic all on their own. Where I usually felt my muscles straightening and my cells aligning under the glare of my inner sun, now I felt like a vehicle for Taslyn’s gaze. I turned and aimed my hands and my eyes at Cad.

The blonde half-elf dropped his rapier and then dropped to his knees. He doubled over and put his hands on his stomach like one gripped with nausea, but his watery blue gaze never wavered from my sight.

Cad was tiny. He was a ridiculous little boy with lots of showy flourishes and no stamina for a real-life fight. His power was limited and pulled with great difficulty from his soul like teeth. He was an inveterate yes-man who needed a leader with vision and a stable friend and he had no leader now, so he would keep banging his head against the same thing until he wore himself out. He was to be pitied, like a mindless insect that had injured itself beyond function without knowing. To squash him now would be a mercy.

Otso had lowered himself to one knee, and he hunched over as well with his paws splayed flat on the ground. His big brown eyes gazed up at Taslyn through his shaggy brown bangs. What he was thinking was none of my concern. He was a mere accessory to this fight, incapable of stopping his weaker friend from engaging in these shenanigans.

“The duel is ended now, is it not?” When Taslyn opened her mouth, her voice echoed off the trees. Her hair shone like gold in the light of our magic. “One side is unable to cast. Do you agree?”

I crooked my index finger once, and Cad’s head bobbed up and down.

“Will a nod satisfy the terms of the duel?” Noura asked.

“Oh, I think they got the point.” I glanced over at Taslyn. “Don’t you, Tas?”

“It’s the new penalty for trespassing.” Taslyn crooked all of her fingers at once, and Otso’s arms squeezed tight around himself. “Remember it well.”

“Remember it well,” I echoed and then I squeezed my fingers and watched Cad’s fingers dig into his own skin. I didn’t feel the kind of satisfaction I might have felt once at the sight. I just knew that I had to show Cad how much pain I could inflict on him if he chose to disobey me again, or else he would keep on in his mechanical crusade until he bashed his insectile brains out. “Do you think they’ll remember it, Taslyn?”

“I think we can make it more memorable.” Taslyn made a complicated sign with her fingers.

Otso twisted toward Cad, reached his huge paws out toward his friend, and then slowed to a stop. The bear-man’s muscles bulged through his leathers as he fought the yellow enchantment, and a guttural whine started to stutter from his throat.

“I think perhaps it would be easier to allow them to walk out of here under their own power, instead of having to carry them to the healer’s.” Noura twisted her hands. Her dark eyes flitted back and forth from me and Taslyn to Cad and Otso. “Just so we can all get on with our day.”

“That makes sense.” I took a deep breath, lowered my hands, and let the yellow light go. But I couldn’t find the off switch today. My teeth slipped against each other and my stomach growled like I’d had too much beanbrew. I tried to steady my mind into that calm, detached bug-watcher state again, but I could feel the light getting warmer in my veins as I did. I felt fear slip through my stomach at the thought that I might never be able to turn off this power, then remembered that it would have to stop when the soul gems powering it ran out. I glanced over at Taslyn and realized that her hands were still up and her eyes still gleamed brighter than I’d ever seen them. “Doesn’t it, Taslyn?”

“I suppose.” Taslyn lowered her hands slightly, and the unnaturally yellow sunlight faded from the clearing.

I suddenly realized that I’d been clenching my stomach, my teeth, and my shoulder blades. I drooped as my conscious mind let go of the tension.

Otso sat back on his haunches, lowered his eyes, and placed his hands on his knees. He took a long, shaky breath.

Cad collapsed onto the ground, wrapped his arms around himself, and started to whine.

“Get your hammer and go,” I pointed to the hammer that Otso had left at the door. I could feel angry energy pounding through my veins, and I wasn’t sure that my hand was entirely steady because of it, but I didn’t care about being cooler than cool anymore. “And I don’t see either of you around here any more. Understood?”

“Understood.” Otso pushed himself to his knees, loped over to his hammer, and slung the weapon over his shoulder. He gestured to a gasping Cad, then headed toward the trees. “Come, Cadwallader.”

“Under-fucking-stood!” Cad spat out. He finally climbed to his feet, grabbed his rapier, and shoved the sword into its scabbard. The blonde Elvenborn lifted his hand to his forehead, fired off a limp-wristed salute, then clicked his heels and turned to go. “Bloody savages don’t understand the value of a good fight, do they?”

As I watched Cad stomp off into the trees, I had a feeling that I hadn’t really seen the last of Valerys’s friends.