Battle Mage Visions (A Tale of Alus Book 12) (54 page)

That made the dark mage laugh. "If he is the same man that lived for eight hundred years or more, I think that Narissa would be way too young for him; but I don't think that is it anyway."

Slapping at his arm, Acheri replied, "Don't tease me. You know what I mean. Kolban is in a boy's body and she looks too... too... old," the girl settled on the word bluntly.

"You know your brother better than I do. You were once a part of him after all. Would he be interested in her?"

"She's pretty, too pretty to see the future, I think. The woman probably managed to fool you and now she will try to fool my brother. Perhaps I should make her disappear just to save him. You men are too easily swayed by a pretty girl's legs and face."

"You liked it when she called you pretty too," Palose said with a bit of a smile on his lips. It wasn't a look that Acheri appreciated, but the princess didn't hit him this time.

Giving an irritated sigh, the princess didn't correct him, but looked out over the city again.

"Palose?"

"Yes, princess," he answered curious to hear what she would say now.

"Do you miss walking south of the wall making your gates? I miss walking with you. Can we go for another walk in the sun some time?" the girl asked wistfully.

"Of course, you are the princess and I am just here to serve," Palose said thinking it would be what she wanted to hear.

"We are alone. Just call me Acheri like you used to. All this 'princess this' and 'princess that' isn't necessary between us and you know it."

Pausing a moment to consider it, the mage nodded and said, "Yes, Acheri, but I don't know when that time will be. I still need to return to the front regularly and recently we have found a wizard from Southwall in the city. We need to make sure that more can't find their way inside of our defenses and we need to finish breaking Sileoth and Southwall's armies on Litsarin.

"The emperor keeps me very busy I am afraid."

"Is that why Kolban wanted a seer, because a wizard snuck into the city?" Acheri asked looking at him with less concern than he would have expected after hearing that their defenses had been breached.

"He asked me to look for one before that happened actually. Maybe the emperor had something troubling his mind that made him want to find one. They say that Visionaries can see the future well enough to place their feet in front of your path, if they wish to. I wonder if Narissa didn't intentionally find us as much as we found her."

The thought made Acheri frown again. Perhaps she believed that Narissa had done so for a different reason than being able to answer the emperor's questions, but Palose figured that Kolban was an old enough soul that he could see through the woman if she was a fraud.

He felt a tremor of energy from beneath the castle and looked down. It felt familiar and that familiarity made him frown as he worried that it might be Sebastian. After a moment, the feeling subsided; but it didn't repeat strong enough for him to feel it again until the sensation of the mizard's magic was no longer beneath the castle.

A much larger spell drew his attention towards the south. It continued on longer than a mage would be expected to last; but, if it was Sebastian, the mage had figured out how to increase his power beyond that of a common battle mage. Palose stepped away from the rail and ordered, "Stay here. I think we have another intruder."

"But I can help," Acheri offered.

"You're the princess. I am not as important, so you must stay here or Kolban will kill me."

The threat was probably unlikely, but it made the princess pause in thought long enough for him to call up a portal and disappear from her sight. She didn't hold the gateway open to follow either. For once, Acheri listened making it easy for Palose.

Jumping through the doorway, the dark mage recovered almost instantly and spotted Sebastian in front of him. A wicked grin as he readied to attack the mizard spread across his face.

"Bas, I have you now!" he proclaimed starting to surge forward towards his rival and enemy.

His joy for another chance at defeating Sebastian made the dark mage a bit indecisive. Trying to decide which spell to begin with, he was stunned when Sebastian frowned and waved him away dismissively.

"Not now, Palose, gust... door," the battle mage chained two spells together in a row without a pause.

As the gust rushed forward throwing the dark mage back into the air, the glow of a doorway lit his back. In the path of the flailing man, Palose disappeared into the silver void only to topple through the other side. Rolling end over end, he crashed into solid metal bars.

His eyes didn't adjust the way he expected. It was dark and Palose realized that he had been cast away only to land in a cell.

Head and body hurting, the man recalled the moment he had spied the battle mage for the first time in months. Sebastian looked different. He had felt the mage's aura and thought him more powerful than he should be. His face had been both preoccupied and grim. There were other men there and someone lying on a table.

Had he found a nest of spies just to be cast out casually by the mizard? He couldn't be more powerful. Palose shared the power of five wizards and held the lion's share of Atrouseon' magic inside of him after the warlock's death; but Sebastian had dealt with him like he was a gnat. It couldn't be that the mage had evolved and grown more powerful again?

Sitting on the cell floor, the dark mage didn't jump up to attack again. He had been humiliated, but returning now without a plan was likely to end up the same way. If he was to attack his old friend, then Palose had to decide a better plan of attack.

Magic could make any man capable of throwing someone aside like that. The dark mage needed to remember that he had attacked blindly. Surely, it was just because Sebastian didn't need to recover from the disorientation of the portal spell that had turned his attack fully back on itself.

Palose sat in the dim light and contemplated what he should do. At least, Acheri wasn't there bugging him about why he was now sitting in a dungeon and not trying to leave already. The silence and dark were friendly companions as the dark mage remained where he was for a time in thought.

Chapter 29- Power Wells

Drayden stood looking at the portal as it faded from sight along with their attacker. He looked at Sebastian feeling the power of the man's magic playing around him and asked, "Wasn't that the warlock we ran into in New Harbor, the one who stranded you in limbo?"

Looking at the captain still holding onto the power coming from the staff, Sebastian replied, "It was Palose, you know, the Betrayer, and my old friend. By the way, it wasn't limbo exactly.

"There's a silver void that once held the Dark One inside of it. You've passed through it using the portals," Sebastian replied wearily. "Well, I guess that we need to move. He knows where the safe house is. We'd better leave before he brings more warlocks and wizard hunters after us."

Drayden looked at the others gathered around them. "I have had time to find alternate safe houses elsewhere in the city. We can go to one of them."

"I need to go to Hala," Sebastian stated. "I'm not sure that my healing of Jana will last. The healers will need to see her and I am not feeling like myself either.

"It is time to pull back before more of your people get caught. I can't guarantee that I can rescue them again. They know that we're here and that I can use portals into the city, or work with someone who can anyway. They'll be after us and on their guard."

Shaking his head, the captain replied, "Take the wounded and get them fixed up. If you're actually sick or something, by all means go. I'll stay here. I still have other assets in Ensolus that need to be taken care of."

"I can't be here to help you if they find you again," Sebastian warned once more.

"I can take care of myself and without you painting a welcome sign on my buildings, I'm sure that I'll be fine."

Wanting to ask him if he was sure, Sebastian knew that he was just fighting leaving the spy captain behind. Looking at Jana lying on the table looking pale, as well as at the three spies he had rescued; the mage stated, "I think everyone we rescued had better go get checked out as well. If you need them to come back after things settle down, I will try."

He pulled one of the talc stones from his pouch and handed it to Drayden.

"You can break this easily letting me know that you are in trouble. I will come if I can."

The captain nodded before making it disappear into a pouch on his belt.

Drayden looked at the other men and women mostly looking worn down. Both women were in need of healing and time to recover. They might never be ready to return to the life of spies, but that would be something to consider later. The men looked little better, though they had survived being outnumbered by orcs and trolls long enough for Sebastian to save them all. One hadn't made it back, but it was still a better result than they might have expected.

The owl mage just kept getting better, the captain thought to himself. "Take them back to the healers. Like you said, we can see about their return to this kind of life later; but they were discovered here, so I doubt that I will be able to use them in Ensolus any longer with their covers blown."

Knowing that Drayden was just helping him by preventing the others from thinking that they should stay, Sebastian ordered a new portal, "Door."

One of the men picked up Jana from the table, while the other one gently herded the other woman through the glowing doorway. Istrias had already escaped back to Hala with his own magic apparently, so Sebastian held the door only a moment longer before nodding to Drayden. He wasn't sure when or if he would see the captain again, but he had given the man what he could to protect him.

Disappearing through his gate, Sebastian found his room in the Black Smith Inn welcoming him back. The others all looked at him in confusion.

"Where are we now?" one of the men asked.

"Hala, inside the inner wall, I thought that it would be better to come here than using the wizard's gate. You can all borrow warmer clothes for the walk to the hospital. It isn't that far from here at least."

The mage didn't have a lot of extra clothes though it was easy enough to find something in Ashleen's closet for Jana and the other woman. She was able to sit on the bed, while Sebastian retrieved an extra blanket to wrap around her. Unlike the spies who had been taken to the dungeon, she still had her jacket and the clothes that she had on when entering the dungeon; but with her blood loss, even healing the woman meant that they needed to do their best to keep her body warm.

Gathering jackets and a spare dress for the female spy who still seemed to be in a bit of shock from her ordeal, the other three were ready quickly enough. He helped Jana down the stairs, while the men guided the other woman behind them.

Madame Hilda and the others watching over the remaining lunch crowd looked shocked by the sight of so many coming from the mage's room.

"Falcon Sebastian, what are these people doing here? You can't be taking so many people up to your room, at least without warning me," the inn keeper scolded him lightly. She was more confused than angry after their prolonged relationship at the inn.

"It was an unexpected trip, Hilda. We have injured to move. Would I be able to borrow a wagon to carry them to the hospital?" he asked infringing on their relationship a bit more. "I can pay you for the use of one."

"You don't need to pay me for the use of a wagon to the hospital, Sebastian; but where did you find someone needing a healer? Why were they up in your room?"

Smiling at the woman, the mage shook his head slightly as he replied, "It is probably best that you don't ask, Hilda. Just suffice it to say that it involves magic."

The woman shooed her son away with a wave of her hand. One of Hilda's daughters joined her brother to head out back to get Ivol to set up a wagon for the mage. Turning back to Sebastian, the woman stated, "For a man who is only supposed to be a battle mage, you sure seem to be the center of a lot of magic."

Grunting in agreement, he replied, "Tell me something that I don't know. I miss my days just leading a squad north of the wall driving off wolves sometimes," the man added settling Jana onto a chair for a moment. His head felt a little dizzy at times as well. The extra magic in the rune wells must be bleeding into his system, the owl thought. He would have to send word to Darius to join him at the hospital or back at the inn soon.

The high wizard had said that he would be visiting with King Alain and the queen today, since he was here. Other men like Leros and the high wizards were likely to infringe on the wizard's time as well, but unsure of what was going on with the new runes, Sebastian felt that Darius was likely to figure it out faster than one of Hala's healers.

Once the wagon was brought in front of the inn, they loaded up and let the pair of horses draw them to the healer's guild hospital. Magical healing went far beyond what someone without magic could do. They could pull a man from the brink of death and even reattach limbs, if they caught the injury fast enough. Hala was as much a center for healing as the three schools. Many advancements had been discovered by the wizards here, but Darius had centuries on even the most veteran of Southwall's wizards.