Wind-Scarred (The Will of the Elements, Book 1) (34 page)

“
About fifteen minutes till we get close enough to worry about
being seen,” Sarah said. Evidence of the fire had started showing
around them, black fingers of charred earth and devastated foliage
reaching out into the woodlands. “Another five before Mat and I
hoof it in. You're our spotter for this Ezra.” She handed Ezra a
data pad with a series of topological maps pulled up. “You may want
to review the region surrounding the town for good places to camp
out. ”

Ezra blinked at the tablet in his hands,
“Camp out?”

Sarah nodded. “You should also familiarize
yourself with the operation of the railgun. Wouldn't want you
pointing it the wrong way and vaporizing yourself when you pull the
trigger.”

He looked at the bulky weapon in dismay.
“But... but I don't know the first thing about spotting! I mean,
you can't-”

“
Just ask if you need help,” Mat said, scowling at Sarah in
sharp reprimand. She raised her hands in surrender, smiling
mischievously. “And we practiced with the railgun back at the
virtual range in Sanctuary. Remember, the one that I told you to
lick for good luck?”

Ezra gave him a flat look, then turned back
to the maps as memories of his tongue going numb and staying that
way for the rest of the day heated his cheeks.

“
There, see? He remembers, no problem,” Mat
chuckled.

The rest of the trip passed in relative
silence, Ezra picking out a few places on the map to hide the skiff
that should give him a clear view of the town. He ran them by Mat
and Sarah, and they helped him narrow his choices down to three: a
primary and two secondary locations, in case he had to change
position or adjust to field conditions. Ezra took over control of
the skiff and bid his teammates farewell about half a klick from
the road leading into town. Everything was gray with ash as far as
the eye could see. The air was uncomfortably warm, and Ezra found
himself beginning to sweat as he activated the skiff's holographic
camouflage, cresting the hill he had chosen as a lookout point.
Even the town of Helena was drab and colorless as the day drifted
into twilight.

Ezra pulled up the railgun
and sighted down the scope, bringing the town into sharp focus. He
was surprised to see that the town itself was actually quite a bit
bigger than it had appeared from a distance, a small city, at
least.
Well
, he
thought grimly,
it had been before
today
. Roughly three quarters of Helena had
been burned practically to the ground. In fact, upon closer
inspection, the fire seemed to have touched nothing within a circle
that encompassed the remaining section of town. A clean line was
drawn between devastation and normalcy, sometimes passing straight
through buildings, denoting where the fire's ravages had
stopped.

“
We're just outside the town now, Hawkins,” Sarah's voice came
over the communicator softly. “And it's blighted hot. Anything we
should know?”

“
Oh, sorry.” Ezra quickly swept his view over the town. Not
many people were moving around. An old lady carried a bundle of
something across the intact village square. She tripped on a raised
stone and fell, spilling sticks across the ground. A young man,
probably in his late teens, hurried to help her to her feet,
stooping to gather the fallen sticks in the process. He shouldered
the bundle and seemed to chat amiably with her as he escorted her
home. A local vendor was closing up his shop and tossed the kid an
apple. He blushed and bowed deeply just as a burly man carrying a
large wooden beam walked past and tousled his hair
playfully.

“
Nothing much to report,” Ezra began. “Seems like a tight-knit
place, nothing obviously out of place.” He frowned. Back in
Southedge, just suspecting that there was a wind-scarred around
causing trouble had put everyone on edge. Even in Arborlen, where
no-one had actually been killed, the tension was so thick they had
practically been swimming through it. Out here, however, there was
nothing like the quiet, helpless terror that had been so present
previously. “Something's not right, though,” he continued. “The
people down there... they're sad maybe, but they don't look
afraid...”

A sudden burst of inspiration hit. “Hold on,
I have an idea.” Ezra switched the scope to thermal mode.
Immediately the ambient heat of the landscape all around him jumped
into view. The fires may have died hours ago, but the raw heat
still stained the place. Except down in the untouched portion of
town. Ezra carefully adjusted the scope, making out the heat
signatures of human bodies, many sleeping after what must have been
a trying day. Judging by the number of warm bodies crammed into
what must have been makeshift hostels, a significant portion of
Helena's population had made it through the fire. Ezra found
himself smiling as the scope flared with color, a huge heat source
coming into view. Ezra blinked, momentarily blinded. It could have
been an open flame, or maybe a hearth stoked to ward off night's
chill. Switching back to normal view, Ezra scanned the area of the
hot spot. Nothing was there, except for the kid who had helped the
old woman, and all he was doing was going around and lighting lamps
around the town square... with nothing but a gesture. “Oh no,” Ezra
whispered, heart sinking.

“
Oh no? What, what's going on?” Mat's voice was tense. “What
did you... hey, did it just get cooler?”

“
Mat, Sarah, abort, do not engage,” Ezra said urgently. “I
found the fire-kissed, but he's-”

“
You found him that fast?” Sarah demanded. “Are you sure it's
our guy?”

“
Well, he's got a heat signature that's off the charts, and
he's the only one still standing around in the square, but that's
not why-”

“
Ezra, if you've got a clean shot at this guy, with no
witnesses, strucking take it, man.” Mat sounded excited. “Easy
spotting on your first go, and after that typhoon I had to sit
through... thundering beginner's luck. We can do a little
fact-finding and be home in time for dinner. I bet-”

“
No, Mat, listen,” Ezra interrupted him. “The fire-kissed, the
one I spotted,” his voice dropped to a whisper. “I think he's on
our side.”

It took some doing, but Ezra managed to
convince Mat and Sarah to make the hike up to his position. He took
a few moments to explain what he'd seen, and was personally rather
proud of his calm and rational defense of the fire-kissed he'd
spotted.

“
How can you possibly be defending him?” Sarah asked in
exasperation, sweeping a hand out at the ruined land around them.
“Look at this! Fires like this don't just happen, Hawkins. We've
been doing this long enough to know that.”

“
Well then maybe... I don't know, there must be another
fire-kissed in the area or something. But I'm telling you, the one
down there didn't do it.”

Mat ran a hand through his short hair,
clearly frustrated. “How can you know that, Ezra? I mean, maybe he
did it, but people down there just don't know.” He brought his
right fist down into his left palm. “I've got it: the people you
saw were in cahoots with him, explains everything.”

“
Yeah, Mat,” Ezra said, rolling his eyes. “The merchant with a
third of his store cut away by what could have been a knife made of
fire was probably 'in on it'.”

“
The apple could have been like... protection money or
something.” Even Mat seemed to realize that it sounded
weak.

Sarah threw her hands into the air. “All
right Hawkins, fine. It's your show, what's the plan?”

Ezra drummed his fingers against the
railgun, thinking as he gazed down at the little town. “We need
more information,” he said slowly. “We have to find out exactly
what happened out here. We're too removed up on this hill, so we
can't get a beam on anything to listen in...” He sighed, scanning
the remains of the town. Lantern light illuminated it in the
growing darkness, the outside edges of the unburnt square swallowed
up by the night. A massive bell tower disappeared into the
nocturnal gloom. “That church,” Ezra exclaimed suddenly. “It's on
the edge of where the fire hit. I can't tell for sure from here,”
he squinted in the direction of the stone building, “but it almost
looks like the whole rear portion was sheared away. I didn't see
anyone inside when I scanned for heat sources. If we could sneak in
there tonight and set up a spotting point at the top of the tower,
we'd be able to do some serious reconnaissance in the morning.” He
looked back and forth from Mat to Sarah hopefully.

Mat's head was already shaking. “Not a good
idea, man. No way we're hiding the skiff right outside the town,
especially when people are bound to be rebuilding tomorrow. If we
get found out and have to leave in a hurry, we'd have to hoof it
back to wherever we left our ride.”

Sarah was staring intently at the abandoned
church. “Hawkins, can you do more than just make pictures with that
thing you're always carrying around?”

Ezra blinked at her. “You
mean my remote wormhole controller? Of course. I mean, it's
a
wormhole controller
. But without a power supply and a receiving location, the
portal will last for about an attosecond. Not very
useful.”

Sarah opened her mouth as if to speak, then
stopped and grabbed the data pad with the area surveys. “Here,” she
said, pointing to a dark, oblong shape, “there's a cavern that
should pass right under that church and let out somewhere past
those hills over there.” Her head bobbed toward the faint, black
outlines in the distance, on the other side of Helena. “We drive
the skiff in, sync that wormhole doohickey up with the
gravitational stabilizers, and pop up right inside. We can just
port back down if things go bad, no harm no foul.”

“
What... you... you're actually on board with this?” Mat
stuttered, looking at Sarah like she'd just sprouted another head.
“Can his controller thing even do that? Ezra, can your thing even
do that?”

“
Yes, my 'thing' can do that,” Ezra bristled. “I mean, a single
port will drain the stabilizers pretty fast.” He shrugged. “Ten
seconds of active wormhole time, give or take. Then the skiff's
dead.”

Sarah raised her eyebrows at Mat,
questioning. “Gah, fine,” Mat grumbled. “Anything to get out of
this thundering heat. Move over, Ezra, I'm driving.”

==

“
Thought you said your thing was up to this,” Mat drawled. They
sat on the skiff, occasional dripping sounds echoing in the cavern
around them. “I mean, it's only like five or six meters. We
probably could have dug through it in this time.”

Ezra ground his teeth, biting back his first
remark. “Yes Mat, why don't you start working on that?” he snapped
instead, as he tried to adjust the power input tolerance of the
probability matrix. “I'll let you know when I'm done toying with
the fabric of reality.” Mat laughed, echos bouncing the sound
weirdly. “That should just about... do it.” Ezra sat back as the
controller hummed to life, linked to the skiff's generators via a
local net connection Mat had slapped together. “You sure we'll
still get power up there?”

Mat's laughter devolved into a derisive
snort. “Like a little rock would interfere with a power network
grid that I set up. This baby's good for about five klicks in every
direction.”

“
And now that you're both done stroking your egos, let's get
down to business,” Sarah cut in dryly. “Hawkins, here are the
coordinates to a spot just outside the church. I'd rather not waste
time getting portals stuck in walls, if it's all the same to
you.”

Ezra shrugged, smiling lopsidedly. “All the
same to me.” He keyed in the location. “Okay, everyone in tight, I
don't want to make this any bigger than it has to be. And make sure
you step off right away, if we drain too much power we'll be
walking home.” Mat and Sarah nodded their affirmatives, and he
activated the wormhole. The cavern was replaced with a clear night
sky, the church looming in front of them, dark and foreboding. The
instant they were all clear, Ezra killed the portal and checked his
power readings. “Energy for four, maybe five more of those.”

Mat grunted his acknowledgment as they crept
into the empty building, weapons drawn, and made it up to the bell
tower without incident.

“
This should be a good spot,” Mat murmured, indicating a view
that provided optimal cover while giving a clear shot of the whole
courtyard below. An open-air tavern was just visible at the edge of
a lantern's pool of flickering light. “Should get some good gossip
down there, especially if we're around to ask the right
questions.”

Sarah nodded, pulling out a small pouch of
coins. “You can be sure we'll ask them in the right way.” She
jingled the purse meaningfully, waggling her eyebrows. “Better get
some sleep, I'll take first watch.” Mat and Ezra each claimed a
corner of the little tower room, settling down for a night's
sleep.

The angel's eyes were huge, dark and
soulful, smoldering with a passionate heat. She frowned seriously,
as if trying to get the measure of him. “Will you accept this gift,
and with your passion shape the world?” Her lips were fascinating.
Ezra glanced around dreamily. There was the world, bright and
beautiful off in the distance. Off in the distance? That's right,
the shuttle had broken up. Oh, there it was, drifting around him in
little pieces.