Tathan was back in the area where he had sensed an ambush during their last visit. Just because he had walked away without figuring out who had been following him didn’t mean he wasn’t dying of curiosity about it. His senses were right more often than not and survival was a more useful instinct than curiosity.
At the moment, he was standing at the corner of an alley across from the building he had chosen not to enter. He could see the alley entrance from where he stood. Beyond that were the lakeside wall and the street he had walked down last time.
There had been no movement for the last two hours since he arrived. Heat didn’t bother him too often and it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as a summer in Dralin, but sweat was starting to trickle down his back and he didn’t feel like dealing with it. A part of him felt guilty for staring at what appeared to be a vacant house rather than getting information about the princess, but wanted to see what the rest of them would discover. At least that’s the excuse he gave himself.
Tathan moved to the corner of the building he had been casing and quickly climbed up to a small, foot-width ledge where the floor of the second level was joined with the walls. He was able to use that to get to the nearest window. After a quick check to make certain no one was watching from below, he maneuvered his knife to unlatch it. Then he pushed the window open and slipped in quietly, moving immediately to the side of the room.
Tathan crouched low with knife in hand, remaining where he was until his vision adjusted to the darker room. There was a good deal of light coming in from the window, so it didn’t take long. Even though this house was vacant, a bed was up against the wall that looked as if it had been used recently. There was also trash around the room. Most of the empty houses in Puujan had no furniture. Warehouses in the city contained basic furnishings, which could be purchased with a home. The concept had floored Tathan when he heard about it. Nobody had ever taken care of citizens in such a way to Tathan’s knowledge.
He sniffed the air. An inhabited room normally smelled of bodies, food and that sort of thing. There were lingering odors, but nothing fresh. He guessed that whoever inhabited it had been gone for at least a couple of days. Mixed with that was another odor that seemed more animal than human. There were also scratches on the wall whose origins he couldn’t distinguish. Whoever lived here had some sort of creature with them.
The door to the rest of the house was ajar. Tathan moved to the edge of the opening and listened. He stayed there for a good ten minutes. It was boring, but patience had saved his life many times and he had all day if needed. The house was quiet with the exception of a few flies and other insects going about their business.
Tathan slid through the doorway and into a short hall. To his left were a couple of rooms and to the right was a stairway leading down. He checked the rooms, finding no signs of habitation. Light shone from a window at the top of the stairs that Tathan was sneaking toward. He paused just out of sight to see if he could discern sound coming from below.
After hearing nothing, he moved to the stairs and began heading down. They were made of stone like most of the house. Tathan was grateful as stone rarely betrayed footsteps the way an old wooden board would. He checked the stairs for wire or loose stone on each step. Anyone who would set up an ambush would likely set traps as well.
The bottom level was darker than the upper. Dust motes drifted through dim light from the upstairs window while the windows below were shuttered. To the left of the stairs was a good-sized living room. On the far side of the room was a doorway to what would most likely be the kitchen. Beyond that would be the door to the alley where the ambush would have been.
The living room had a table with two chairs. There were no carpets or wall hangings of any sort, but litter was strewn across the floor. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, Tathan realized that something was alive in the far corner, something bigger than average.
The creature was facing the wall, curled up in sleep from what Tathan could tell. It had dark black fur and looked to be roughly the size of a small bear, though it had a large, furry tail covering it like a blanket. There were scraps of food around it along with pinecones, nuts, twigs and other items from the forest and around the city.
Tathan stood there against the wall, wondering what to do. He didn’t want to wake the creature, though he was certain he could handle whatever it was. The problem was that he had never seen a bear that looked quite like that.
The door to the kitchen opened and a woman stepped through. She removed the hood of a black cloak from her head, exposing ebony hair. “Steve? I sense someone here.” Her beautiful voice resonated within the room, having an edge to it that surprised Tathan. The woman was stunning. Dim light made it hard to see her eyes, but he thought they might be green. Tathan was intrigued.
Then the creature stood on its hind legs, responding to the woman’s entrance. Tathan’s jaw dropped when he realized that it was a black squirrel a little taller than him. The woman and squirrel scanned the room. Tathan realized both their eyes were dark green and looked exactly the same. It was unnerving.
As a testament to his skill, the two didn’t see him immediately even though he was completely exposed at the bottom of the stairs. He watched as their eyes came to rest upon him at exactly the same time. There was something extremely unnatural about both of them. In the squirrel, it scared him. In the woman, it enticed him and he found himself oddly attracted to her.
In nature, Tathan had seen squirrels leap through trees and chatter at him if they thought he would steal their pinecones. It was sort of cute when they were small. It wasn’t quite as cute when a human-sized one chattered loudly in a booming voice before leaping straight at him.
If Tathan’s reaction had been just a little slower as he jumped toward the stairs, he would have been dead when the claws sliced through the air. The squirrel’s leap took it from one side of the room to the next in the blink of an eye. It hit the wall where Tathan had been standing. Even with Tathan’s reflexes, the claws ripped through skin and muscle on his right side.
The squirrel didn’t expect to hit the wall and shook its head. Tathan fell to his knees on the bottom step at the shock of being cut. Injury was something he hadn’t experienced in a long time. He could feel blood immediately begin to soak his shirt and looked down to see that the claws had even cut through his jacket. The jacket was not impenetrable but had been made with magical threads that made it resistant to cutting, yet it hadn’t even slowed the claws.
All of that became very unimportant when Tathan heard words of magic coming from the woman. He looked to see the magical wind blowing her hair and cloak back, revealing a burgundy dress with golden runes sewn throughout.
You could tell the power of a spell by how much of a draft was created upon the user. Tathan perceived that the spell the woman was casting would be overwhelming. To add to the fact, Steve the Black Squirrel leapt to safety in order to get away from the line of sight.
That was enough for Tathan to dash up the steps as fast as possible. The wound protested and released more blood into his shirt. The resonant voice that had graced his ear just a moment earlier became sinister with the hissing of magical phrases. Her voice was heavy with power ready to be unleashed.
Just as Tathan was about to reach the top of the stairs, the voice stopped and a split second of stillness filled the room. Fear gripped his heart as his foot touched the floor of the hall. He hurtled toward the bedroom door as fast as he could.
The roar of magic filled the air, traveling up the stairs behind him. Tathan took another hard step toward the room he had come from. Only one more would be needed to get to the door and safety.
The spell ricocheted off the wall next to the stairway, blasting the glass out of the window. Tathan could hear crumbling stone. There was an acrid tang hinting of death and weakness.
Another step, still thrusting toward the door. Sickly green and black tendrils of magic licked his hair and began moving ahead of him as the spell continued after him.
Tathan hit the door and burst into the room as the tendrils bit through clothing into his skin. He could feel them crawling through his hair and along his scalp. Weakness exploded within his body and he felt the urge to lose his breakfast from nausea.
With a strength born from years of surviving adversity in the streets and alleys of hard cities, Tathan pulled away from the wisps and leapt through the window. The magic had reached its limit and could not follow him.
Weakness nearly overwhelmed him, but Tathan managed to gather a last burst of strength to tumble as he hit the ground, breaking the worst of the impact. His breath was knocked out and dizziness threatened to overtake him. He reached out and activated the ring he had acquired in the Rojuun caverns.
The ring of invisibility worked instantly, obscuring him from the vision of anyone who should look in his direction. He knew it would last for about an hour, enough time for him to escape. There was a haziness to his body when he looked at it, so he knew the ring was working. To anyone else, he would be invisible.
What he didn’t know was if his dripping blood would reappear on the ground. He knew from testing the ring with Liselle and the others that he could still be heard. At some point, he would have to stop rolling around on the ground in pain, gasping for breath. At the moment, taking deep gulps of breath was the only thing he could do. Spots were floating through his vision from pain, loss of blood and the leftover effects of the spell.
Tathan had been shocked at the sight of a human-sized squirrel. Its eyes had looked just like the woman’s. She must have performed some sort of enchantment upon it. He heard chattering from the window and saw Steve the Squirrel and the woman looking down in the direction where he knelt. There were blood droplets that could still be seen leading up to where he was, but it looked like the fresh drops were invisible. Tathan didn’t know how long they would stay that way.
He struggled to his feet and began stumbling away. Any minute they would come down the stairs and attempt to find him. When Tathan looked to see if they had gone back in, he saw Steve the Squirrel hanging half out the window. Squirrels could leap from tree to tree and apparently jumping from a second story building was not difficult for one as big as Steve. The animal hit the ground a short distance away from where Tathan had landed.
Tathan wondered why in the world the woman had named the squirrel, and why Steve? Not that it mattered. A freaky black squirrel was jumping out a window to crack him like a nut. Why the woman called it Steve really wasn’t important in the scheme of things.
It sniffed the ground where Tathan had landed. Tathan honestly had no idea whether or not squirrels had a good sense of smell. He staggered down the street as silently as he could while clutching his side. The wound was severe and loss of blood was making Tathan light headed. He would prefer to lie still and moan until someone took care of him, but that wasn’t going to happen.
The next time he glanced over his shoulder, he saw that the woman had jumped out of the window and was tumbling to her feet. Tathan wondered if anyone used stairs anymore. It wasn’t fair that a sorceress should be so athletic, but they had to stay fit in order to survive the magic that channeled through their bodies.
Tathan managed to get to the end of the street, looking back to see what they were doing. It seemed squirrels did have a good sense of smell, because it was looking in his direction and sniffing the air. The blood trail was beginning to show up on the ground, the invisibility effects wearing off much quicker than he had hoped.
The mysterious woman saw the blood re-appearing and smiled cruelly. When she began casting another spell, Tathan took off down the new street in the direction of the inn. His body ached from both the wound and from jumping out the window. A lingering effect from the first spell sapped strength out of him and breathing was still difficult. It wasn’t the first time his body had tried to drag him down before. Tathan knew a person’s spirit was much stronger than their body so he forced it to move faster, intending to push on until he was safe or dead.
A roar echoed behind him and he looked back over his shoulder again. More of the black and green tendrils shot from the other street, low to the ground. It was a shock when the tendrils turned in his direction and began swarming toward him. They were like ravenous worms crawling over each other in search of a soul to rend.
The spell had done something to him, because Tathan felt a sudden urge to fall down and give in. Fear welled up, bursting through the weakness to give him new energy. Tathan ignored his wound and began running as fast as he could. With each step, the weakness receded and by the time he passed the next intersection, he could see the tendrils withdrawing back to where they came from. He was very thankful that the spell had a limited range.
Tathan made it to another intersection, but was already gasping for breath again. He looked back just in time to see Steve burst onto the street. The squirrel’s muscles bunched and he closed half the distance with another leap before stopping to sniff Tathan’s blood trail.
Black fur glistened in the daylight as Steve stood on his hind legs, sniffing the air. Its tail quivered in anticipation and forepaws were held up against the chest as though begging. The claws were not like a normal squirrel’s though. These were razor sharp and gleamed dangerously.
If Tathan kept running, the squirrel would run him down from behind and kill him with those claws, so he stopped and drew his sword instead. Gasping for breath as quietly as he could, Tathan crouched in readiness. He held the blade in his right hand while clutching the wound in his left.
Steve lowered forepaws to the ground and began stalking him. It could hear its prey and kept turning its head in an attempt to see him too. Tathan readied to leap to the side and slash at the creature. If he could avoid the claws long enough, Tathan knew he could kill Steve the Squirrel.
“Steve! No, come back here!” The woman yelled from behind the squirrel with fear in her eyes. Steve turned to chatter at her in angry protest. It gave Tathan a clear shot at the neck. The problem was that he didn’t have any extra energy to run forward and lunge, so he just stayed still while holding his injured side.
“Stay!” she told the squirrel, running up the street rapidly. Tathan’s sword would be of little use against a spell. He tried desperately to think of a trick or way out of the predicament.
“Halt!” a dual toned voice called from the right. Three Rojuun warriors came into the intersection with long-knives drawn. Two moved toward the squirrel and one female guard toward the woman. “An unauthorized use of powerful magic has been noticed from this location! Only benign magic may be used by humans in Puujan. Put your hands atop your head and shut your mouth, human!”
The speaker who moved toward the woman was short for a Rojuun, about six and a half feet instead of the customary seven to eight feet. All three wore leather armor made from the hides of a cattle-like creature deep in the Rojuun caverns. The tops were yellow and the leggings were a deep burgundy color similar to the dress worn by the sorceress. Tathan absently mused that even their armor had to be colorful and artistic.
Regardless of how pretty the armor was Tathan knew they were deadly with those knives. The mysterious woman knew it too. She stopped in her tracks and began casting a new spell. Steve leapt in Tathan’s direction, but instead of attacking him, the squirrel flew over in an attempt to get away. The two Rojuun who had been approaching the squirrel crouched defensively, watching in stunned surprise.
“Do not cast another spell, human!” the Rojuun speaker yelled at the mysterious woman. The squirrel was quickly forgotten as all three guards dropped a pair of knives and cast swift defensive spells. It was something Tathan hadn’t seen before, so he watched closely. He couldn’t figure out what they did specifically, but shimmering, translucent shields of energy large enough to cover their bodies appeared between them and the woman.
It was just in time to protect them from the blackish green wave that crashed against and around the shields, like poisoned water crashing against a beach. The shields protected the Rojuun for a moment, but the spell acted like a real wave and began moving back. The shields only protected the Rojuun from the front.
It knocked the guards off their feet. They screamed in agony, dual vocal cords piercing the air. Wherever the acrid green water touched, it burned armor and skin.
Tathan only saw part of this because he was at the edge of the wave. He had just enough time to leap onto the wall of the building he was next to and desperately grasp the ledge between the first and second floor. His right hand still held the magical sword he wasn’t willing to lose. The act wasn’t in time for him to avoid the wave completely and he felt liquid magic burn his right foot to just above the ankle. His scream was nowhere near as impressive as the ones made by the guards.
The wave washed back to the mysterious woman. She re-captured the energy then turned around to run back the way she had come. Tathan couldn’t hold on and fell to the ground, landing on his good foot. The pain he felt was overwhelming, threatening to overcome his senses.
Screams continued to come from the Rojuun guards who lay writhing in the street. Other guards were running toward them to help. Tathan noticed that cobblestones where the wave had washed through were etched by it.
Blackness was threatening to overcome Tathan, caused by pain and blood loss. The foot that had been touched by the wave was screaming at him with every nerve, while the cuts in his side had become a dull throbbing.
He reached into a small pouch in his shirt. Tathan had acquired an extremely dangerous, addicting, yet powerful drug in the form of a seed. When taken, it gave the user an astounding burst of energy. He had managed to avoid the addiction that normally came with it, but kept a few for times when his body just wouldn’t work without help.
The effect was almost instantaneous when he placed it under his tongue. A yell emitted from his throat as pain erupted even worse than before. Rojuun guards that had just arrived looked in the direction of the yell, but couldn’t see him. Then the pain washed away and adrenaline took over.
The injuries didn’t heal, nor did the bleeding stop, but Tathan was able to ignore them. That was good and bad. It was good because he was able to run away from where the Rojuun, and now human guards, were gathering and searching for whatever had yelled. It was bad because his heart was racing faster, which made blood flow more quickly from the wounds.
The seed made his vision sparkly. Wings upon the buildings of Puujan began to flutter and flap. Soon buildings were flying through the air. A few of them ran into Tathan as they flew by, causing him to slap at them and wave his arms around his head while yelling gibberish. Then there were people everywhere who talked and laughed at each other while buildings flew around on their pretty wings.
He ran into people who wondered aloud what had happened. The ring still made him invisible, but he forgot how to turn it off. “Liselle!” he yelled in desperation. People turned to look toward the voice, wondering where it came from. The buildings were flying further and further away. His vision was getting darker and less sparkly. He called out for Liselle again as he fell to the ground, wondering if he would ever see her again.