As Arcnus took a step back and released the hands that had been about her waist, Sara felt hope rise above all other emotions.
Even when the line mage had gripped her tightly, she had known it had been in fear rather than anger. She didn’t sense deception about him. She also didn’t sense manipulation, just an honest desire to do the work involved. So she re-sheathed her sword and looked over at the rest of the group.
In a voice loud enough for them all to hear, Sara said, “Let him do what needs to be done.”
Faces all down the line looked anywhere from relieved to curious to offended, but none questioned the order. Sara looked away from them and back to the young woman who had tried to “save” her.
“Thank you for your aid. Did you find what we needed? A path home?”
Reben nodded solemnly. “I can be off like a rabbit and down a back set of paths to Sandrin before anyone notices…on your orders.”
Sara shook her head. “I may not be there to give them. You’ll have to use your best judgment. Assess the situation and prepare to run like hell the minute that you see us overrun. It won’t be long before they target you as well.”
Reben stiffened for a moment—not enough to challenge the orders, but definitely enough that Sara saw turmoil within. For a moment, she wondered what it was that Reben had found on the other side of the shield, where they were already flanked by the opposition.
Panic shot through Sara’s mind. “What happened out there? Did you see a patrol?”
Reben flinched at her tone, but Sara was just waiting for the answer. This was life and death for them all.
“No, of course not,” Reben said. “All I saw was deep fog and abandoned areas—just as before.”
Gentling her voice, even as her body stood unmoving and vulnerable, Sara asked, “Then what is it?”
Reben looked down and off to the side, ashamed. “I don’t want to leave you all when you need me most,” she finally replied.
Sara cleared her throat, commanding the mercenary in front of her to look up, because she couldn’t crouch down herself, not without disturbing the line mage’s careful placement.
Reben did look up, and Sara said, “The empire will need you more. Remember that. We may not know what is coming, but we should always be prepared, and the information we’ve learned tonight and the details on the people we’ve fought will be invaluable to the empress’ strategy team.”
Lip quivering, Reben said, “Long may she live.”
“Long may she reign,” Sara replied by rote. She had never met the empress and never would, but she knew that she owed their ruler her fealty and her life. They all did. This battle against the Kades was bigger than just them, and Sara would do whatever was possible to ensure the empress had what she needed to defeat them.
Before her loyalist emotions could overwhelm her, Sara snapped at Reben, “Now go get in line. We’ll need some of your power for this, though I’ve already instructed Arcnus to keep you out of the main target lock. We can’t have you caught up in the meld.”
Reben nodded and prepared to run off to do as ordered. But not before she gently touched Sara’s cheek and came away with a single teardrop on her fingertip. Sara was speechless as Reben curled her finger solemnly and gripped the drop as if was precious. Then she raced away.
Not knowing what else to say, knowing she couldn’t move, and helpless for the first time in her life, Sara watched and waited for their lead mage to finish.
By the time Arcnus was done, they were all frozen in a line, Sara by choice, which arced around the edge of the inside of the shield dome.
Sara was just ready to get this over with, so she watched anxiously—as much as she could—as he helped the final person take their place.
“Each of you place your left hand on the waist of the individual to the right of you,” Arcnus instructed.
Everyone did as he asked. Then he walked back to the tail end of the line, on the far left of everyone else.
“Hold still if it helps find the quiet inside you. Let nothing bother you. Nothing else matters but this connection. Isabelle will link each one of you individually, but it must be done in a chain, and I will come behind to target. By the end, our forces shall be united, and for a time, we shall be one.”
There was contemplative silence as he began gathering his magic. Sara took the moment to look at her compatriots.
Four full mages and two natural mages with the skills to divert the attention of the Kade cohorts. They stood in a line on the edge of the shield.
In a half-circle around them, not unlike an honor guard, stood the fourteen other warriors, including Ezekiel and the captive Kade leader, who would serve as their line of defense should they need it. And Sara had the bad feeling they would indeed need defending as they worked their magic—after all, there were equal odds of a nasty surprise waiting for them on the side of that shield wall. And as soon as they hit their target and it came down, they would be vulnerable to anything standing in their way.
Reben had already peeked out to survey the perimeter and declared it void of any presence, but it couldn’t hurt to be as prepared as they could be. Sara wished she could leave the half-kith out of their mage network in order to keep scouting, but they needed all the power and magical backup they could get. Reben would serve as an extra boost at the beginning of their casting—therefore, she went in with them.
While they were gone, Karn was in charge—may the gods help them—and Sara just hoped he could keep the group together for everyone’s sake. They didn’t need a mutiny while they were vulnerable inside a magical reinforcement net that they were trying to break down with half a hope and a wish.
Sighing deeply, she closed her eyes and raised her right hand as Arcnus gave his instructions in a trance-like tone.
As her palm hovered just in front of the edge of the shield wall, Sara felt the crackle of the repelling energy that was already fighting her presence. This wasn’t an ordinary sight-and-sound shield. Sara didn’t need to get within five feet of it to tell that. Now, standing inches away, it felt more like a high noble’s perimeter fence that had been lit up by the lightning fire of the sun and magnetized to fry anyone who touched it.
Including the six brave individuals who were about to risk their lives to break it down from the inside.
Steeling herself, Sara said to the five who would be going with her into another mage’s mind, “Ready?”
“We’d better be,” Isabelle muttered from beside her.
No one else said anything—Sara just felt them also raise their right palms through the mind link they had forged.
Sara smiled. “Let’s go, then,” she said, and they stepped into emptiness.
It was like breathing cold winter air. Sara sucked the chill in her mouth as she opened her eyes and found herself floating like a swimmer in a pool. She looked around to find that the other mages were floating with her.
She moved with difficultly until she saw them all—floating just like her in the weightless ether.
Isabelle was farthest off in the distance. She shone like a night star.
Sara turned. A few feet off to Isabelle’s right and down a bit floated Arcnus. His magic was closely aligned to his body, so smooth it was like a second skin.
In the northwest corner on the opposite end, Reben was darting around like a bunny rabbit that just couldn’t stay still. Though Sara didn’t think that was voluntary.
Below Reben and off to the left stood one of the mages from the imperial army—a weather warden, Sara believed, and judging by the sparks of lightning erupting around him, followed by bursts of rain, she was right. His name was Tomas.
Far up above them all floated Linus, the second mage of the original group of thirteen—and, unbeknownst to everyone but Sara previously, quite the powerful one. Now he sat with his legs crossed under him and his power echoing with the sounds of ringing bells throughout the ether. There was no mistaking the strength of the gifts he bore now.
And Sara, the final mage, floated as well, but she wasn’t alone anymore. Around and beside her, mirage images of Sara floated as well. All armed with different weapons. One carried a bow and arrow. Another a glaive. The third an axe. And the fourth, one of Sara’s personal favorites—the swallow, a double-bladed staff with beautiful symmetry.
As for the original Sara Fairchild, standing in the center of them all, she carried her two swords. Once done studying her copies, all of which stared forward with no emotion on their faces, Sara turned to Arcnus.
“Well, line mage,” Sara said, “this is a surprise.”
“These are your mental constructs,” he announced. “Representations of you and your magic in what is known as the Aether Realm.”
Tomas said, “I’ve never seen a visual representation of my powers in this realm before, and I’ve certainly never floated in the air like a bird.”
Reben laughed. “This is amazing.”
“It’s not intended to be fun,” Arcnus said, shaking his head. “I’d ask that you pay attention, Reben, as you will be leaving us soonest of all.”
She stopped darting back and forth faster than the eye could see, and waited as Arcnus floated so that he was more or less lined up in the center of all of their constructs.
Arcnus nodded in thanks to her then turned to the weather warden. “You are right in that you would normally not see your own constructs.”
“It’s more than that,” said Isabelle. “This is rather…unorthodox. The Aether Realm is a visual recreation of our own realm usually, used to travel between points of origin when necessary, and with great uses of power.”
Arcnus held up a hand, warding off more interruptions. “You’ve also never traveled through this realm with me. Line mages are taught to strip this realm of all distractions so that we can get our systems to the target faster. Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to do what we came here to do?”
It was almost as if Isabelle didn’t hear him, as she spouted out more information on the realm, and Sara had the feeling that she was more than just a practicing mage. Perhaps she held a certificate in instructing as well.
Arcnus tried to speak again, but he was cut off abruptly.
“Could this also be how the Kades are creating their portals past our own protective spells?” Linus asked Isabelle, and she practically gasped in excitement.
“It’s a good theory,” she said.
Arcnus was practically fuming now. “That is true, but we have a target to get to. Unless anyone else would like to hold a class on magical theorems?”
There was silence, and then Sara asked, “How long do you think this will take?”
Arcnus smiled. “A lot less than you think, once I begin.”
Sara nodded, and he began.
Arcnus raised his hands from within the center of the circle, and Sara felt a tug on the links Isabelle had forged to bind them all together. And then it was more than a tug—it was a pull, a pull that morphed into a yank on the metaphysical power that they all possessed. As he yanked, the representations of their power—their constructs—drifted over to him like puppets on a string. Reben’s speed and ability to phase through shields floated toward his head. Isabelle’s theoretical phasing powers and the ability to forge unions came down like a sheet. Sara’s manifestation of her fighting skills floated over docilely.
Every single one of them went, and the mages they represented watched anxiously.
When he had them all floating around him in a ring, Arcnus opened his eyes. “This is what I needed. The power to not only seek out the target, one mage upon dozens, but to reach him and reach past his own personal shields from such a great distance.”
“Are we ready?” asked Tomas.
“We’re ready,” Arcnus said before he turned to look at Reben. “You’ve given what you can. It’s time for you to go—inform the others that we’re moving ahead with our mission.”
Reben’s gaze flicked to Sara for permission.
She gave it.
And with a wave of the line mage’s hand, the young woman was gone. But her construct, her power, remained.
“We’re ready,” Arcnus said again as the remaining mages waited for him to begin.
He looked a little nervous to Sara’s eye and as six mages were down to five, she hoped that whatever sacrifice they were making to get to this lone mage was worth it. They needed this to work. They needed to win.