The Archmage: Chapter Six

We dashed towards the entry, absorbing our familiars back into ourselves with streaks of power, and I let my divination spells spin. Again, I didn’t try to break the spell, just alter it. 

Creating a doorway sized hole in a dome was harder than shifting the wardlines, which had defined parameters I could tweak. This was just force, though, and as my abjuration prepared to rip a hole in it, I had a horrible realization. 

We wouldn’t all fit.

My cloak was impressive, even I could admit that. But it was also fending off attacks from two near-archmages, a half a dozen remaining guards, had shifted archmage level defenses on their maximum power, and would need to do it again. That drained even my cloak’s impressive reserves.

I had a split second to make a choice, and I did. As I finished the alterations, I unclasped my belt and slipped my hand up my shirt to undo the cloak. 

I tore the hole in the dome and Tara leapt through, but Osheen waited. I knew he would. 

He always would. If there had to be one of us who didn’t make it out, Osheen would pick himself every time. Though I only had a split second to process all of this, it filled me with warmth. I had a good partner. 

Which was why I used the last of my power to activate flight and force enhancement spells in my cloak. 

I flashed behind Osheen, shoving my cloak and belt into him as I kicked him through the swiftly-closing tear in the force dome.  Tara and Osheen landed on the outside as the supercharged defensive spell snapped into place, the power of my cloak totally bone dry and no longer able to hold open the hole.

I fell several feet to the ground, lying on my back as a ‘wumph’ of air shot from my lungs.

It stung, and I felt pain race through my body, but it wasn’t as bad as when Phillip had shot me. I didn’t think I’d broken any bones, just the wind knocked out of me, so I forced myself to sit up, even though my head was spinning a little bit from the fall.

The last thing I saw of them before I was surrounded by guards was Tara dragging Osheen away, forcing him to flee towards the town, and Draven’s hidden portal. Osheen was shouting, and released a burst of fire at the dome, but she slapped his hand and yanked him away. 

I just hoped that I’d bought them enough time for them to make it. The Elides would definitely be able to take down the dome and chase, but I doubted they could do it with the snap of their fingers. 

One soldier grabbed my back and yanked me to my feet, then cast a force binding spell around my hands, locking them in place All around me, the others held spells at the ready, and Edward strolled over. 

“Well, I admit, I wasn’t expecting guests,” he said with a smile, and a tone that was almost sickly sweet. “But what can I be, if not a host?”

“Ah, offering me guest rights? Very kind of you.” 

The words came out of my mouth before I could stop them, and the smile dropped off his face. His hand lashed out in a cupped palm slap that didn’t leave me injured, but stung hard. 

“I’m not some faerie,” he said shortly, the honey in his voice falling away to reveal the cold iron underneath. “Word games aren’t going to be enough for you.” 

 Edward turned to his guards then, nodding to two of them. 

“You, you. Put him in the holding cell. If he resists, remove one of his fingers. Do it slowly, bit by bit, so that he can feel each slice.” 

I tensed at his proclamation before forcing myself to take a slow breath and try to relax my body. That was… Beyond brutal. That was straight up tortuous. But if there was even a slim chance he was willing to go that far, I wasn’t willing to risk it. 

The pair guards marched around to the back of the house, then one of them unlocked the cellar before they shoved me down the stairs roughly. I did my best to keep my balance, but it wasn’t the easiest, as they were far from gentle. 

The cellar appeared to be an ordinary wine cellar, but to the left side of the room there was a blank space, which I was marched to. 

My third eye was still active, so I was able to see the light runes floating in the area. Probably an illusory wall, then. 

Sure enough, we passed through the wall and into a small central area that branched off into three rooms: a library, an equipment vault, and a cell. 

One guard pushed open the unlocked cell door, while the other patted me down for weapons, as well as anything incriminating, before shoving me inside and to the floor. I was for once glad I’d only taken my belt and cloak with me – having anything that a diviner could use to track down Osheen or Tara would have been a problem. 

The cell doors slammed shut, and as the door’s lock was engaged, blue light flared between the bars, a ward activating.

Then, to my surprise, the guards left, and I had a moment to take in what I could. 

First things first, I tried to light up my aura. A thin wisp of power drifted out of a single finger when I concentrated, but not enough to do anything. It wasn’t enough for glyphs, let alone for me to activate my Ligature Knot or call upon the Spring King. 

Of course, calling on the Spring King probably would have been a bad idea in general, which was why I hadn’t done it during the fight. This would be my last boon from him, and I didn’t trust him not to use it to screw me over or trick me. I’d only use it if I truly had no other options. 

Then I tried to contact Oracle, but the comforting sense of my familiar was muted, dampened by the power of the wards. There was only the faint impression that he existed, but there was no information or communicated mental images.

That left the room itself. It was sparse – a slot in the bars where a tray of food could be placed through, a mattress stuffed with hay that stunk, half-decomposed from the dark and dank, thin sheets atop the bed that had a bit of mildew. There was a small water pump in one corner, as well as a chamber pot, so that was some mercy, at the very least. 

I didn’t know when they’d be giving me food, though, so I forced myself to not pace around, despite my nervousness. Instead, I took a seat and started thinking. 

The ligature had at least a few people who worked here, so they may be able to smuggle me a few items, but I doubted it. They likely didn’t have access to this part of the facility. 

Osheen and Tara would try to come after me, but I didn’t know how long they’d need. There was no way they’d be able to sneak in easily, not with the defenses up and the guards increased. And both of those would happen, I was sure of it. They may not be able to afford the cost of running the wards on supercharged mode, or even on maximum power, long term, but they’d certainly be doing it for at least a week or two. 

A week… 

That was the other problem, but also potentially a solution. If I went full faerie, I wasn’t sure how the wards would react. It was meant to suppress a human aura, not a faerie one, after all. Not to mention, the power of the wards had dampened my familiar bond, not removed it, so there was a chance. 

But was the price worth it? 

Would I even have a choice? 

I sat there, stewing in my thoughts for a long time. I didn’t know how long – there wasn’t even a window to check for time, let alone something as fancy as a clock. 

Eventually, I started biting on my fingernails. It was an old habit, one I didn’t fall back on much, but with the stress I was under, I thought it was understandable. 

It didn’t help. 

After what felt like days, but was likely only a few hours, a guard appeared. I shot to my feet, and he grinned at me. 

“Don’t look so excited. You’re going to have questions to be answered in the morning. For now, though, dinner.” 

He shoved the plate of food through the slot, and I grabbed it quickly, then dug in. Salty cured ham that tasted terrible and old, alongside a half a loaf of old, stale bread. Not something I’d normally have eaten, but I needed to keep my strength up, and it wasn’t like salted ham or dry bread would be a particularly powerful or useful component, even if I was able to cast. 

As I ate, my mind drifted back to the tiny wisp of power I’d been able to produce. It wasn’t much, not really, but it was there. Tara was able to cast rituals with a similarly sized Aura… 

But what could I make the spell with? What spell could I create to crack the doors open? 

I came up blank on both counts. 

There wasn’t anything productive that could be done by moping, however, so I did my best to set those thoughts to the side for the moment, mixing denial and dissociation from myself. 

That left the little bit that was left not panicking, and it focused, calling up the wisp of aura I could conjure, then it – me – started folding it. 

The aura shaping and density improving techniques that Osheen had taught me weren’t much, but lighting up even a fragment of my aura was hard enough under the wards. Doing exercises was even harder, and it was a small, but productive, change that I could make now. If I became a fae, the denser power would give me a better starting base, and if I didn’t, it would give me more fuel for my fourth arch-star. Either way, it was a win-win. 

After I was completely exhausted from those exercises, I swaddled myself in blankets and lay atop the decomposing hay-stuffed mattress. Before I fell asleep, I closed my eyes and focused inward, trying to seek out my connection to Oracle. 

I’d used Oracle to send a message to the Silver Queen before, so there was a thin shot I’d be able to convince her to send a message to the ligature for me, or even do something to upgrade my knot, letting it work through the wards.

I pushed on the mental connection as hard as I could, but I was just unable to get past the barrier that the ward presented. It was like pushing against a sheet of rubber – there was enough give to it that it felt like it should, just maybe, be doable, but the rubber was too solid to be pushed aside so easily. 

When I’d exhausted myself trying to reach him, I finally let my mind relax – at least as much as I could in this situation – and went to sleep.