The Scofflaw Magician (The Artifactor Book 3) (27 page)

“In
booby-trapped tunnels. Yes, that makes worlds of sense.” Snarling, she whirled
and dove into her room, snapping up two wands, one for shielding and the other
to deactivate any traps as she went. Hopefully she remembered exactly where all
of them were.

As she moved at
a half-jog, her mind whirled. How had they come to the harebrained conclusion
to do anything back there? Whatever Big thought, she highly doubted that they
were ‘playing tag.’ She had just finished telling them NOT to go into that
tunnel! Had they somehow gotten confused while in there?

It took
disabling two traps and avoiding a third, but finally she found Aran. He had
camouflaged himself very well so that he was blending right into the rock, but
he wasn’t bothering to hide his magical signature. And why should he? His
opponent was not a magician and wouldn’t be able to pick up on it. Stomping
right up to him, she reached out and grabbed a handful. Blind luck let her
latch onto a pointy ear, and she pulled it ruthlessly upwards.

“
Owowowowowoww
!”
Aran yipped, squirming in protest.

“KIP! GET OUT
HERE NOW!” Sevana yelled at the top of her lungs.

It took more
than a minute but eventually her childhood friend slinked into view. “Um, Sev,
why are you back here—”

“Because you’re
in the wrong tunnel, you nitwit,” she snapped. “This is insanity. In-san-i-ty.
I told you specifically to stay out of this tunnel! These traps aren’t
something that will spray paint on you, they are meant to defeat AN EVIL
MAGICIAN.”

Aran had at
this point dropped his camouflage and was giving her a woeful look. He likely
wasn’t sorry about being caught, it was more the fact that she had a firm grip
on his ear. Morgan had the same hangdog look, but then he knew from experience
that Sevana would get revenge on him later for this. Aran didn’t have the same
history with her to know that he was in for it later.

“It might be
all well and fine for you to waltz back in here,” she informed the Fae tracker
crossly, “but it is not for Kip. He doesn’t have the reflexes or magical
ability to survive back here if he makes a wrong move. It’s stupid for you to
be here. It’s suicidal for him to follow you. I don’t believe for one minute
that you got in here by accident, as you clearly knew the route last time as
you exited out of the correct tunnel. So whatever game you were playing? It
ends right now. And gentlemen? I had to deactivate three traps to get to you
and you
will
make that up to me later as it’s going to take several
hours to replace them.”

They both
winced at that.

Holstering her
wands, she reached out, grabbed Morgan’s ear and proceeded to drag them both
out of the dangerous area.

There were
yelps of pain and pleas to be released and she ignored all of it. Overriding
everything they were saying, she growled, “I don’t know what’s gotten into you
two, but if you must compete with each other, do it in the safe areas and
don’t
create more work for me in the process. Clear?”

“Crystal,” Morgan
assured her around a pained breath.

“Perfectly,”
Aran said with a wince. “Um, Sevana, my ears are particularly sensitive…”

“Good,” she
snarled and didn’t let go of either of them until they were level with her
bedroom door. Only then did she give them one last, warning look, before
letting go. Satisfied they were cowed, she swept into her bedroom and slammed
the door behind her.

Idiots.

~ ~ ~

After that,
they showed more sense. She saw several chess games, checkers, and one card
game that involved penalty flicks to the forehead. The competitions had started
out with much testosterone but it eventually steadied out into a friendlier
vibe of two men killing time by ribbing each other. How and why this happened,
she had no idea, but Sevana was grateful for it. She hated to think that some
rash stupidity would lead them to being killed.

For a straight
two weeks, they were in a good routine of working, eating, sleeping, and
finding ways to entertain each other. Sevana thought that the routine would
hold right up until she came into the kitchen mid-afternoon, looking for a
light snack. There, in front of her incredulous eyes, were all three men
sitting around the table playing what had to be a drinking game. There were
eight cups, all of them filled nearly to the brim, and the men had a song going
that held a distinct rhythm. None of them were particularly good singers, but
that wasn’t the point of the song. On a certain down beat, they’d pass the cup
in their hand to the right and quickly reach for another one.

As she watched
with open mouth, Morgan missed the beat and the whole thing stopped.

“Drink, drink!”
Aran and Master encouraged, laughing.

Making a face, Morgan
tossed back the glass in his hand and drained the whole thing in three long
gulps.

Were they
seriously drinking in the middle of the day? With an impending visit from a
crafty, evil magician?!

Master caught
sight of her in the doorway and greeted, “Ah, sweetling! Come join us, it’s
marvelous fun.”

“You—you—argh!”
She couldn’t think of a word strong enough to describe their idiocy in that
moment. Turning sharply about, she stomped out of the room.

“It’s not
alcoholic!” Master called after her. “Don’t worry, we’re not getting drunk! I
just mixed up some juices!”

“Penalty
juices,” Morgan gasped, sounding like he was almost choking. “What’s
in
here?”

“Vinegar, lime,
and pomegranates,” Master responded cheerfully. “Has a kick to it.”

Sevana rolled
her eyes heavenwards. Really, it would be safer for them to be drinking
alcohol, in a way. Master’s concoctions had been known to kill lesser beings.
She didn’t even trust the man to mix up juices or make tea without messing it
up foully. Every man in that room was going to be sick as a dog later. Even
Aran, with his Fae blood, would not be saved.

The only sane
place left in this mountain was her workroom. Perhaps she could talk with Milly
again. The woman had become something of a confidant in this place filled with
men. Entering the room, she found the mirror semi-lit, which meant that Milly
was nearby. If she were off visiting her children, it would be dark enough to
be almost reflective. “Milly?”

The matron
popped into being as if she were a ghost coming out of a wall. “Yes, dear.”

“Why are men
stupid?”

“It’s in their
genes,” Milly commiserated with a long face. “Just put up with them, it’s the
only thing to do.”

“If they poison
themselves, I swear I will have no sympathy. They’ll have to crawl in here and
find their own medicine.” Baby, of course, had followed her in and waited for
her to sit before flopping down on top of her feet. Enjoying her foot warmer,
she asked, “How is that new spell working out?”

“Oh, this?”
Milly held up a necklace she was wearing, a simple chain with unicorn hair
weaved in with it. “It’s marvelous. I can see through anything that reflects.”

Sevana blinked.
“
Anything
anything?”

“Anything,”
Milly said firmly. “I’ve seen through ponds, glass windows, even a sword blade
this morning from a guardsman. I don’t always know how to control where I’m
looking so it sometimes takes me a while to figure out where I must be.”

“That’s…strange.”
Sevana’s head cocked, mind whirling with power levels and numbers. “That
necklace Master made is only supposed to enable you to look through mirrors.
Any mirror, granted, but it should be limited to mirrors.”

“Things don’t
follow quite the same rules here on this plane,” Milly explained with an
indulgent smile. “I was pleasantly surprised that it did more, but at the same
time, it wasn’t much of a surprise at all.”

Fascinated,
Sevana put her elbows on her knees and leaned in. “Really. I think I always
assumed that the other planes were a reflection of this place and there wasn’t
a lot of difference. Tell me more about this.”

“Well, to
start, gravity doesn’t really exist here. There’s not much of a pull. It was
disconcerting at first, but now I can fly about at high speeds like I was bird
or the like.” Milly’s expression lit up. “It’s marvelous, really. I can flit
between my children’s houses all in a day, which I was never able to do before.
In fact, it took me a full month to visit them all before!”

Sevana was
privately relieved that the woman was adjusting to her new state so well. “No
gravity? I wonder why…but that’s interesting. What else?”

“The colors of
everything are different. Their shapes are the same, but the colors are more
vibrant, almost as if—”

In that moment,
a horrendous cracking noise rocked the mountain. Baby lurched to his feet, back
arched, hair standing on end as he snarled in warning. Startled, Sevana
instinctively snatched up sword and the nearest wand to her. “Big, what was
that?!”

There was a
loud groan of pain and then the mountain pleaded,
RUN.

It took only a
moment for the realization to hit. Their prey had arrived and he had made quite
the entrance doing so. Had he blown apart her front door? But if he’d come in
that way, then odds were against him going into the tunnels and that would ruin
their whole plan. She made a snap decision and grabbed the fake artifact that
she and Master had made, then sprinted out the door.

Which way had
he gone? Which way should she go? From the kitchen, she could hear the men
frantically scrambling her direction. Right, that would be best, she should
regroup with them first and then try to figure it out. No way did she want to
face this man on her own.

The thought
wasn’t even completed when she heard rough, ragged breathing off to her left.
Baby snarled, tail lashing. Wand snapping up in a guard position, she whirled
and found that her quarry had managed to corner her.

He was ugly.
Not physically so—he looked like an old man that had seen a rough life, but
wasn’t decrepit or anything. Balding head with wisps of white hair as a fringe,
bulbous nose, red skin, but a fit build to him and decent clothes on. He looked
like an aging tradesman. It was the magical core whirling up within him that
gave lie to his appearance. It looked like he had cobbled together several
magical cores, even from animals, and forced it to tie in with his own. It made
her stomach revolt just looking at him. How could a human being
live
like that?

Sevana had had
second thoughts about facing this man alone even before he’d arrived, but now
that she was looking at him she had absolutely no desire to fight him. She
literally would not be able to guess what spells he could throw at her. Even
her perfect plan now seemed highly flawed.

The immediate
trouble was, he was between her and the men, and that was not good. At all. It
only left her one avenue to retreat through and only one means to survive.

Raising her
voice, she called out, “Grydon! Lead the men!”

Baby stepped
toward the tunnels, clearly understanding that he needed to stay and guide her
without her having to spell it out for him. Bless the cat for being so quick on
the uptake. Clutching the artifact to her chest, she drew the magician’s eyes
to the blue carving in her hands, making it clear that she was the bait, and
then dove for the tunnel opening on her right.

He snarled and
chased after her, firing off a quick spell that splashed harmlessly against
Big’s walls.

Sevana focused
on Baby’s back, trusting in the tail that flickered against her stomach to lead
her. She knew the cat was slowing his pace so that she could keep up and
blessed her friend for not letting his hunting instincts kick in. She heard
their prey yelp behind her as he sprang a trap and his footsteps falter as he
slowed, becoming more cautious. Good, he was no longer breathing down her neck
at that speed. It gave her some breathing room.

Running ahead,
Sevana prayed that the men would catch up from behind before her prey turned
hunter and caught her instead.

There was no
lighting in the tunnels this far into Big. Part of that was because there was
no need for them—only storage rooms existed back in here, or empty caverns that
Sevana had never used. Besides, the main reason for the tunnels was to catch
thieves, and why would she light up areas and give the thieves an easier view
of the exit? Especially as they had been laying traps, any existing lighting
had been removed as they didn’t want their quarry to have an easy time of it
either.

The problem
was, Sevana hadn’t had the foresight to grab her night glasses before leaping
into the tunnel. She was just as blind as the man who was chasing her, and her
memory of where all the traps were became fuzzy at this point, as it was in a
section that Master had laid. If she used any sort of lighting spell, she would
become as bright as a beacon to the man behind her, and that would be beyond
stupid of her to do. She was left scrambling in pitch darkness, in a dank place
that smelled of mud and mold.

This was
becoming the definition of a Bad Day.  

The only guide
she had was Baby, who used his tail against her arm to lead her, or if she fell
behind, he would stop and look at her, letting her see his glowing eyes as a
beacon.

In this dark
place, and with her blood thundering in her ears, Sevana lost all track of
time. She heard someone catch up and engage the magician in a brief fight, but
he’d escaped somehow and gotten back on her trail. Sevana was deathly afraid
that the darkness was not as much of a deterrent to him as it was to her. With
all of those animals mixed in with his magical core, his night vision might be
much more superior to any human’s. As good as a Fae’s? Hopefully not, but she
couldn’t discount it. He was making far better headway than she was.

Sevana had to
bite her bottom lip to resist asking Big where he was. The mountain spoke in
sighs and whispers but, even so, you could hear him throughout the mountain.
Broadcasting the man’s position would reveal her own just as well. She dared
not ask Big anything.

Worse, the
traps were only semi working. Sevana had been counting every time she heard a
trap go off and he was avoiding half of them easily. They had not been half as
clever as they thought they were when she and Master had put the traps in.

How he was avoiding
Master and Aran, that was the real question. Both men were experienced in
tracking down troublemakers like this and a Fae’s sight was amazing. How did he
evade them and still stay on her trail?

Whispering
under her breath, she requested, “Big, give me a clear path. Where should I
go?”

The floor under
her feet shifted and smoothed out into a slightly downward slope. With a hand
on the wall to help her keep her balance, Sevana moved at a half-trot. Even
that was too fast for her—it felt highly uncomfortable—but she had no choice if
she were to stay ahead of the man.

If she could
just
see
him without exposing herself completely, she’d fight back. Ah,
curse it, she shouldn’t have run. Right now, her odds would have been better if
she’d stood her ground and fought until the boys had caught up with them.

Behind her,
there was a terrible explosion, the whole mountain rocking and trembling around
her. Already feeling off-balance, this threw Sevana straight to the floor, and
she hit with hands and knees, the artifact spinning out of her grasp in the
process. Baby darted back to her, assuming a guard protection to protect her
back. She put a hand on the cat’s back, more for reassurance, as she demanded,
“Big, what was that?!”

The mountain
groaned and rolled again, shuddering in pain.
Hurts
.

A terrible, icy
sensation crawled up her spine. “Is he blasting new tunnels through you?”

Hurts,
the mountain whined pitifully.

Never, in her
wildest dreams, had she expected this. The man was bona fide insane. Who
blasted into a mountain while still inside?! Was he trying to cave the whole
mountain down on top of their heads? Big might be sentient, but even he had
limited control over his own body. There wasn’t anything he could do about
parts of him being broken and blasted away.

Another
explosion ripped through the mountain and Big gave another pained groan. Sevana
swore, pushed herself to her feet, and started running as fast as she could.
Forget finding the fake artifact, that wasn’t worth her trouble or time. She
had to get out before Big became her tomb.

Baby darted
around her, once again becoming her guide, and she latched onto the cat’s tail
to avoid losing him in this darkness. A blast ripped through the wall next to
her and she flinched, instinctively crouching and throwing her arms up over her
head in a shielding gesture. At least three large pieces of rock glanced off
her forearms, making them smart, but she knew better than to stay there for
more than a second. If he was blasting his way through, the man wasn’t far
behind. Scrambling, she tried to find her footing but it was hard with all the
debris littering the floor. 

“Baby?”

The cat gave a
petulant grumble, meaning he was bruised but not really hurt. Sevana put her
heart back in her chest and tried to think instead of just react.

Sevana yanked
out a wand and activated the strongest shield charm she could. Doing so lit the
area in a dull, yellow glow but there was no helping that. Sevana was convinced
by this point that he could see just fine in the dark so keeping herself
blinded like this wasn’t doing her any good anyway.

In a split
second, the charm took a direct hit, making her boots skid on the stone. Sevana
whirled to face her attacker, putting her back to the wall, drawing her sword
with her free hand. Baby stepped into the shadows and she let him go without
drawing attention to his presence. No doubt he was going to try to attack the
man from behind, or the side, and if he could pull it off it would make their
chances for survival go up.

From a man like
this, she expected a terrible voice, something raspy or dominating. But he
spoke in something like a rough whisper, as if his voice was rusty from disuse.
“Where’s the tool, girl?”

A slightly
hysterical thought popped into her mind. Her bait had worked a little too well.
“I dropped it back that way,” she responded honestly. 

He took two
steps forward, entering the faint lighting of her ward more fully. There was no
expression on his face. In fact, he made statues look emotive. He took no
pleasure in hunting her down, nor did he find it an aggravation, it was simply
a necessity he had to get through. The idea that her death might be nothing to
him more than a step in achieving a goal was bone-chilling. His eyes didn’t
leave hers but she had the sense that he was searching back the direction she
had come somehow. “Where?”

“I don’t know.”
She didn’t care, either. What she did care about was, where were her backups?
At this point, it would be safer for her to somehow get out of Big and into the
waiting arms of the Fae camping out back. They’d be able to handle this much
better than she could. “You can always go look for it yourself.”

With that
question and answer session out of the way, he wasn’t interested in asking
anything else. That became obvious when he lifted a second wand from an inside
holster and shot off a spell.

Sevana had been
around magic long enough to read the strength of a spell in a split second, at
least in general terms. She knew that what was coming her direction would be
able to overpower her shield. So she dropped to the ground like a marionette
with its strings cut, deactivating the spell as she did so, freeing it up so
that she could return the attack.

“
ISE NE FOLE
.”

Ice shot
forward, but he had expected an attack, and dodged. She barely grazed his chest
and shoulder with it and it took a bare second for him to wipe off the
vestiges. Sevana used that second to get behind a stack of rubble. It wouldn’t
shield her from much, but it was better than standing around in the open.

Baby chose that
moment to leap in, harrying the man. The magician acted as if he knew Baby was
somewhere nearby, as he was quick to dodge and counter, but even so his balance
was thrown off. The spell he uttered didn’t touch the cat, and Baby was able to
duck back into the blackness of the tunnel without even being grazed.

Sevana used the
distraction to put a quick spell on her sword. Then she raised that up and
threw it at him.

The sword flew
with unerring accuracy, shining dully as it did so, cutting through the
darkness. With their only source of light the brief flashes of magic, it was
hard for him to see anything or keep his night vision. The sword found a target
in his right shoulder, striking deep. Snarling a curse, he reached for the hilt
and yanked it free before ducking behind a boulder so that he could no doubt
cast a few healing charms on himself.

Sevana took
advantage to move, trying to put some serious distance between them. Out. She
had to get out
now
. Whatever he had done had somehow blocked the others
from chasing after them and she couldn’t expect help from that quarter. But if
she could get out back, to where the Fae were waiting, then she’d be able to
come out of this relatively intact. Baby was right on her heels, still guarding
her back, making unhappy chuffing sounds even as he ran. Well, no doubt the
mountain lion would like to attack their prey head on, but this wasn’t the sort
of enemy you could face and come out alive.

His healing
took a bare minute, far too short of a time, and then he was chasing after her
in earnest. Sevana swore to herself in a near litany. Why was he chasing after
her, anyway? The artifact that he so wanted was the
other
direction. Or
had she so annoyed him that he now wanted her dead first? Curses, it might be
that. She had a talent for making people irate with her.

Big was still
trying to help her, bless him, by sloping the ground and leading her forward.
Sevana lit the tip of her wand in a dull glow, needing the light now no matter
what consequence it had. If she could just connect to one of the booby-trapped
tunnels—there! He was expecting them now, he’d be on the lookout and would
likely dodge them, but it wouldn’t save him any if
she
activated them.

It wasn’t
possible for her to rush headlong, after all the traps wouldn’t recognize
friend from foe, so she had to slow down to avoid bumbling into them herself.
“Baby, stick close.” The cat tightened their distance to where his cheek was
against her thigh. When she decreased her speed, the magician closed the
distance between them. Sevana rounded a corner as fast as she dared, spun like
a dancer, and shot a quick spark at the trap embedded into the wall.

The trap went
off perfectly, hitting him squarely in the side and making him falter. Sevana
saw him go down on one knee but curse it, he didn’t go down entirely. In three
seconds he was back up and stumbling into a jog, still coming after her.

Was this man a
machine?!

Panic
threatened to clog her throat as she ran forward, eyes frantically searching
for the next trap. Any other human being, hit with as many spells as he had
been, and with a
sword
striking him in the shoulder like that, would be
down and out. She certainly would have been! But here he was, not only still
conscious and moving, but flinging spells at her! The only thing that saved
Sevana was that it was beastly hard to aim spells properly at a moving target
while the caster was also moving. The odds of actually hitting something were
not unlike being hit by a meteorite.

“Baby, go get
the Fae!” she commanded. When the cat hesitated, she pleaded in near panic,
“Now, before he catches up with us!”

The cat didn’t
like it, not one bit, but he too must have realized they were out of their
league. With a bound, he shot ahead of her, disappearing completely into the
darkness beyond. Sevana sent a prayer after him that he would be able to get
help back to her before her luck ran out.

Frustrated, no
doubt running low on magic as she herself was, the man did the one thing that
he knew would work. He aimed ahead of her, toward the ceiling. “
KLAK NE FOLE
!”

The rock burst
apart, raining down on her, and Sevana was going too fast to be able to stop
and backpedal the other direction. Swearing aloud, she threw up a shield and
knew that even as she said the spell, she wouldn’t be able to react in time.

An avalanche of
rock hit her squarely. The first two boulders broke her arms, raised above her
head, and gave her a stinging blow to the forehead. A scream of pain burst from
her mouth as her nerves overloaded and she was crushed into the ground.

“
SEVANA
!”

She dimly
registered the twin howls of pain and anguish. Aran and Master? Ah, they must
have finally found a way to catch up. Figured they would come in too late to
help her fend the man off. It was that stupid drinking game that had done it,
she bet. Hard to run and fight with your stomach tied up in knots. Of course
she couldn’t tell them off because right now just breathing hurt like agony.
When the rocks fell, it had done so in a way that created a small cavity around
her head and torso, but she knew both arms were broken and she had a bad
feeling that her knee was also broken. It felt like her body was on fire with
pain.