Vantra stared at the patch of gunk floating beyond the tail of the seastrake, a massive blight surrounded by churning cyan waters. They could have told her the humongous patch was as long and wide as the beach, could have told her it had a potency double what swam within the stuff at Selaserat. Poor Zeeya, holding it back at the same time she magicked the competition waves!
The formidable winds, which snagged their essences and played with their clothing, dwindled to nothing, courtesy of Weather. The lack of breezy sound no longer covered the shouts from the agitated group at the bottom of the slope. Her group had used a ziptrail to reach the base of the towering cliff overlooking the event beach and the ocean far beyond, then floated up to the paved, fenced viewing spot. Weather acolytes had already blocked the trail and calmly herded the viewpoint visitors behind the barrier. Their anger became full-blown rage as they bypassed the blockade, which she did not understand; if Weather’s followers told her no, she would assume they had a good reason for denying access and find something else to do.
“Are we looking at a new magic discipline?” Jare asked as he adjusted his headscarf to its original place. “There are a lot of destruction schools focused on wartime spells, and the damage the gunk does fits in with those, but I don’t recall one that uses these types of castings.”
“I think we are,” Lorgan said. “What we’ve encountered isn’t part of any modern school of magic repertoire, and these enchantments aren’t in the poison registries. We need to analyze more of the stuff to get a better idea which base elements they’re pulling from. Water, of course, but it’s a combination and I can’t get a sense of the others. What Adine’s doing is a start, but we need more information.”
Mica lifted his lip in a snarl. “So the footprints are Rezenarza’s, but another walks within them, twisting their feet to obliterate the original.”
“Twisting is right. He follows the nymph respect of water,” Jare said. “He’d never condone this.”
As a water-dwelling people, nymphs revered bodies of water. They held special ceremonies where they gave offerings to the syimlin of Water for clean, calm lakes and seas, and their reactions to pollution in their environment had led to several conflicts. Vantra had a hard time believing a nymph who, in myth, honored his peer in the same way non-syimlin would and terrified the masses into a similar respect, now harmed what he sought to protect for so long.
Maybe that was why he turned on his ex-allies; they fouled Greenglimmer’s waters. Of course, he should have realized they tampered with them, so perhaps he was not as much a fanatic as his stories claim.
A small boat zipped away from the larger one near the seastrake, heading for the mass. Cacarolisse motioned to the craft, her filmy, chartreuse sleeves fluttering despite the lack of wind. She resembled the illustrations Vantra had seen of ancient nymph religious leaders, with a circlet and decorative, jeweled net worn over her light, greenish-yellow curls, warm, coral pink cheeks playing against pale, yellowish-green skin, and larger, moss-brown eyes. Several clips dangled crystals from oversized ears, and they tinged together like chimes.
The wide eyes and larger ears hinted that the woman lived before those features in nymphs shrank to modern proportions; definitely an ancient ghost, then.
“Weather says the IBA will collect samples,” she said. “We’ve never seen the like of it in the isles, and they’re as concerned about this as they are about the floating red. All the fish near it are dead.” She eyed Mica. “I think you speak true. I’ve known Rezenarza for millennia, and he reveres the waters that created him. Another has warped his magic and his intent.” She folded her hands above her waist and returned to watching the smaller boat. “He will be displeased.”
“Not will-be,” Jare said. “He is displeased, enough so he’s aiding us.” Her head whipped around and her eyes bulged at the outlandish statement. “I know, him willingly working with Qira and Katta? It doesn’t seem possible, but it’s happening.”
“Then we ride storm waves,” she murmured.
“Things are that dire,” Lorgan agreed.
“I’ve existed long enough to see events swirl out of control and the terrible repercussions they bring, then watched as they settled into a new normal, sometimes hundreds of years later. The only times I have felt this uneasy were before the Banquet and when the Beast ruled.”
Before the Banquet? Vantra did not think she kept her shock hidden. She had thought Cacarolisse ancient as in twenty-thousand years of existence, not over one hundred-thousand!
Except for Sun, none of the modern syimlin of the greater pantheon were that old, and only a handful of the lesser had survived from that time. As far as she knew, she had not met a being older than, say, fifty-thousand. To exist all those years . . .
Had she attended the Banquet? What a horrible memory, if so. She could understand being frightened that only ten deities out of hundreds survived, and that the manipulators of the celebration, Sun and Death, reconstituted what it meant to be a deity right after the last dying gasp echoed through the hall.
Or had the priest only heard about the terrible events when Weather’s ancient predecessor returned to his temple?
Cacarolisse settled a hand on her chest. “Before the interstellar invasion, I would have assumed complacency in syimlin not to recognize a threat, but those events had a lasting effect on our divine ones. I think an enemy of plots realized this and has spent years planning attacks to circumvent syimlin notice. The hidden one is swimming their way to the surface, and I fear what they bring with them.”
“Weather’s experienced things?” Jare asked.
“Some oddities that, by themselves, might be mistaken for strange occurrences, but combined, create a picture not so easily washed away.” She cupped her nose and mouth in her hands, then bowed her head. “But that is a conversation for later. We must rid the sea of the corrupted magic.”
“We’ll talk,” he promised.
“We are blessed, the Daughter of the Sun walks among us and can eradicate it.”
Vantra blinked, shocked she used the title, while Jare wormed his mouth into a sour frown. “Have you been talking to Machella?” he accused.
“Machella? No. Lokjac? Yes.” She raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think you realize how many religious functions he and Xaphane attend. I am well-acquainted with him and his assistant.” A small but amused smile alit her lips. “Yut-ta is in good company with the mini-Joyful, according to the stories those two tell of him.”
Mica snickered, which earned him a light rap on the arm from his friend. Vantra had no idea what to say, so kept quiet. Poor Yut-ta, his reputation preceding him in that manner. Had Weather heard these stories? She likely would now.
The sky darkened and lights blazed from the direction of the beach, flashing and moving as they would in a high-production concert.
The black gunk moved, engulfing the boat that had taken samples. Oh no! A Light-blessed shield rose around the boat, just in time. She threw Clear Rays at the hapless craft, adding extra heft to combat the stronger contamination; the beams struck, and while the stuff sizzled around the vessel, the breadth of it continued to creep towards the seastrake.
Sun’s Touch should have spread like lightning over it, cleansing it into non-existence. She poured more power into the spell for a second volley.
No holding back.
The rays hit, and water erupted skyward, carrying bits of the stuff with it. Another Light shield rose to keep the smallest drips from contaminating the seastrake. Brightness flared to her side; both Jare and Mica’s arms blazed with Light as they used the energy from the gemstones embedded in their flesh to power the defenses.
She clenched her hands, focusing, and felt something cold in her palm. She looked down; the Sun shard rested in her gasp.
That was not a good sign. How had it known she needed help? How had it even crossed the distance from her pack to this cliff?
No time to ponder it; she sucked in the energy from the shard and poured it into the rays. The gunk caught fire, even underwater, and blazed. The stuff latched onto the threads connecting her to the spell and raced up them, eating the energy so it thinned to the point of breaking. She coated the link in Retravigance, and the air around the nasty Touch caught fire, sending plumes of green-tinged grey smoke into the air.
What did that mean?
The flames zipped down the thread and hit the bulk of the nastiness; steam vented, hiding the gunk in thick white clouds.
“Vantra, pull back.”
Jare’s voice sounded faint, and hands clasped her shoulders. Lorgan’s Touch tapped against her, then shot down the still-viable threads. She followed it, through the hot fog and to the surface of the sea; the heat purified the gunk by boiling then evaporating it. A whirlpool developed, snagging the contamination from the edges of her spell and dragging it inward for eradication. The Rays brightened to the point her essence numbed and she could not perceive anything around her, and the flames roared into the sky.
She hadn’t meant to do that! She fought to control the spread, but the shard continued to dump power into the spells. They expanded like an explosion, struck the Light shields, and the protections wobbled. She sank her Touch into it, trying to absorb the excess, and everything churned into fuzzy white noise.
NO! What was happening?
Someone snipped the threads—PANIC!—no, it was Jare, not the enemy. The power dropped and she fled back to herself, able to once again sense the thread. The rays shimmered and disappeared in a sparkle of light. She bent over, tingling, and the shard, in a gentle, steady stream, sent energy to her to refill her reserves.
“That was incredible,” Cacarolisse whispered, staring at the now-pristine turquoise waters, no sign of the gunk, the remaining steam obliterated by the winds. Vantra did not think so; she lost control, and fear overrode her sense. Lorgan patted her back in comfort, though his attention remained on the broader sea beyond.
“I think she got all of it,” he said. “I wasn’t sure, after the initial attack failed. You should have destroyed the entire mass, but instead it swallowed the power and grew.” He half-laughed. “You didn’t let that happen a second time.”
“I never would have thought to evaporate the contamination,” Mica said, standing on the fence as he bent over to stare at the area. She had not either, it was a consequence of the spell, nothing more, and she felt low that an accident made her look inventive. “Some healing recipes rely on separating the good chemicals of plants from the bad, so I see the precedent. Unfortunately, I bet the enemy’s going to try to come up with a defense against it, so we probably can’t use a similar attack for much longer.”
“Maybe. It will take time to develop a counter, and they don’t have Vantra to test designs against,” Lorgan said.
“True. And even if they find one, we can come up with our own counters to those.” Jare looked towards the beach. “I don’t sense it anywhere, above or below the surface.”
“It’s gone,” Cacarolisse agreed. “Nem says neither she, Katta nor Zeeya can sense anything left of it but what’s aboard the boat. The Rays infused the clouds as well, so any remainder of the evil skyward Touch was eradicated. I’ll send priests to escort the vessel to safe harbor. No reason to take a chance with this enemy.”
“Agreed,” Jare said.
“You should return to Weather. We don’t want the curious councilors to wonder where half her guests have gone. They accepted her words that you went to check on Qira, but that will not hold.”
“How many of them might have aligned with the enemy?”
She shook her head with a minute shrug. “I don’t know. Bluewind Harbor has never had issues with anti-Weather sentiment before. A few discontents promoted local deities, but those divines are friendly with Nem, so nothing came of it. We’ll talk later. I need to speak with the harbormaster and Ozrik about this new threat.” She raised her hand, caught a wisp of greenish wind, and phased into it.
“Quite the way to not answer questions,” Lorgan said, exasperated.
Vantra watched until she disappeared, shocked a ghost could trigger Ether Touch and not have the gusts rip them to shreds.
“She is Weather’s high priest,” Jare reminded her with a knowing smile. “And Weather is known for her control of the wind.”
“We’ve tried for years to figure out how they do that,” Mica grumbled. “But it’s probably linked to her blessing, so . . .” He lifted his chin at the beach. “Let’s go and terrify some councilors.”
Hopefully he joked about that.
