Chapter 14

  Strange Sands

  The trio crashed into pale sand. The gate shut behind them with a wavering moan, the freshly sealed veil shuddered as the Titan railed against the barrier between it and its prey. Hannah jumped to her feet, staff raised, ready to strike down anything that forced its way through. The air wavered, once, twice, thrice, and then blessedly stilled. She exhaled, her body shaking with leftover adrenaline.

  Ari lay curled in the sand, still clutching her right arm to her chest. Boreal settled by her side and nuzzled her shoulder. “Breath. This pain will pass.”

  The girl drew a hissing breath through clenched teeth and pushed herself into a sitting position. The bear shifted closer so she could lean against his side.

  “Let me see your arm,” Hannah said, kneeling beside her.

  Wincing, Ari extended her right arm. Glowing fissures, jagged and raw, blazed from hand to elbow. No blood seeped from the wound, instead, flickering motes of light peeled away from it, dissipating into the air with soft hisses.

  “This your first mana burn, huh?” Hannah asked.

  Ari nodded wordlessly.

  “Thought so. Don’t worry, I know how to deal with these,” Hannah said as she took Ari’s arm in her hands, careful to avoid touching the injury. Closing her eyes, Hannah let her mind peel back the layers of the physical world. Ari’s body was a dark silhouette rimmed by a fiery golden aura. Magic flowed through her in a tangle of interconnected nodes and lines not dissimilar to the human nervous system, radiating out from a flickering star seated in the girl’s chest. Hannah followed the lines of magic down Ari’s right arm, where they became frayed past her elbow.

  “Alright. Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to pull the excess magic from your arm. It’s gonna feel a little weird and it’s gonna make you really tired, but we’ve got Boreal to carry you, so we’ll be fine to keep going for a little bit.”

  “Can’t we just rest here?” Ari asked.

  “This close to a gate? Hell no. We need to put some distance in just in case someone follows us through. It's hard to pick up a trail through the Realm Sea but not impossible. At least you get a ride, I’m walking.”

  “What happened to your duck? Did the Titan get him?” Ari asked.

  “Ah, yeah, no, he broke. He wasn’t a real duck, just a simulacrum. I’ll make another one when we have time,” Hannah said.

  Ari considered asking more about what a simulacrum was, but a fresh bolt of pain from her wound dulled all interest in anything other than relief. She groaned and Hannah refocused on her arm. Carefully, she pulled magic from the glowing veins beneath Ari's skin. The motes of light that poured from the injury increased, crackling into the air like little dots of fire. In a matter of moments the lines dimmed. Ari breathed, her pain lessening. Just as Hannah warned, an odd draining sensation, almost like she was losing blood, followed the relief. She leaned her head back against Boreal’s fuzzy shoulder, her limbs growing heavier and heavier as Hannah worked.

  “How’d this happen?” Ari asked. “One second I was fine and then my arm exploded.”

  “Magic flows through a physical body like blood, pumped from the core through veins called channels,” Hannah said, tracing what remained of the glowing fissure with her index finger. “Each channel can only handle so much magic flowing through it at a time. Force too much through and it’ll burst. They get stronger, but yours are brand new.”

  “Ah,” Ari said, recalling the strain she’d felt before the channel in her arm burst. She’d known she was pushing herself, that there would be some sort of payback, but she’d had no clue how bad it would be. Every fiber of her being was raw. Her muscles ached. Even with Hannah draining away some of her magic, she still felt overloaded. Her channels throbbing, making her dizzy.

  “Seems most of the magic was in your arm, probably fueling that sword. Speaking of--when did you learn that spell? I thought you were new to all this,” Hannah asked.

  “I’m not sure, right before we were attacked I had this dream or . . . vision, I guess? I was standing on the Realm Sea and a dragon came down from the stars. He called himself Hazeon, said he was going to help me get to Taitamar.”

  Hannah nodded slowly. “Huh. I mean, it makes sense he’d visit you. You’re part dragon after all.”

  “So you believe me? It wasn’t just a dream?” Ari asked, unsure why she needed the confirmation. Maybe it was just how wild it all sounded when she said it out loud.

  “The random power up is pretty convincing. Did Hazeon say anything else to you?” Hannah asked.

  “Yeah, he said he had gifts for me and then he . . . I don’t know, put a star in my chest or something. At least it feels like a star or . . . maybe a ball of fire. All I know is it's pumping out magic like crazy. It kinda hurts.”

  “Sounds like your core. Everyone with magic has one. It’s the heart of our power,” Hannah explained. She could see the core when she closed her eyes and viewed Ari’s aura. To her it resembled a sun on the verge of going supernova. No surprise she was having a hard time siphoning off Ari’s excess magic. “And you’ve got a dragon’s worth of magic stuffed inside a human body. No wonder you’re hurting.”

  After a tense pause, Ari asked, “is that a bad thing?”

  “Well . . . a human body can only handle so much magic before it either breaks or . . . changes,” Hannah said.

  “What happens when magic changes a person?”

  “Depends. Magic is change incarnate, everything it touches is affected. It's kind of like radiation in some ways. How much you're exposed to and for how long can have different effects. It can be fatal but often it just forces mortal flesh to change so it can properly contain the magic it's absorbing. Mutations usually happen after long periods of exposure to dense magical fields. Those who undergo significant and permanent changes are called Weird. As a mage, I’m still human, but my core protects me to an extent. Even magi have to be careful to not let our power get away from us though. We can be warped by it.”

  Ari nodded, pondering the new information while Hannah finished her work. Using just a scrap of her own magic into the limb, she sealed off the broken channels and encouraged them to repair themselves. When she let go of her arm, Ari examined what remained of the wound, a thin jagged line, pale, glowing so faintly it could barely be seen.

  “Thank you,” she said with honest relief. She flexed her wrist and shook her hand. It felt like it had fallen asleep.

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  “The tingling will go away in a few hours. Come on. We’ll find a place to set up camp around here somewhere,” Hannah said as she helped Ari onto Boreal’s back.

  Finally free from pain, Ari was able to take in their surroundings. They were in a forest of wind-carved sandstone. A cool evening breeze sighed through narrow, twisting canyons, beckoning them into the shade of the natural labyrinth. The setting sun still illuminated part of the canyon’s walls, highlighting the colorful striations that flowed across their surface. Shades of red, pink, amber, and terracotta. Ari ran her fingers over the smooth surface as they walked, wondering just how old this place was. How many millennia had wind, sand, and long-gone rivers taken to carve these pillars and pathways? Probably millions of years.

  “Where are we?” she asked.

  Hannah shook her head, dark curls bouncing with the movement.

  “Never been here before. Might be a settlement nearby though. Looks like people have come this way recently,” she explained, pointing to the remnants of tire tracks and footprints left in the shifting sand. “Whether its a guild-realm I can’t say yet.”

  “Sleeping in a bed would be nice,” Ari said with a yawn.

  “Right? Probably won’t get one tonight, though,” Hannah said. As the light waned, she summoned her staff again, the luminous weapon and the soft glow of Boreal’s fur pushing back the deepening shadows. Thick, succulent-like plants retracted their night-blooming flowers as the group passed, shying away from the halo of light. Small rodents and lizards took advantage of the growing dark to feed on the bulbous foliage that thrived in the sandstone corridors. Ari hoped the rest of the realm’s wildlife would be just as harmless, but where there was small prey, there would be predators. All they could do was keep an eye out and hope they were too big to bother. The last thing they needed was another fight.

  They made camp in a craggy recess a little ways off the main path. Too tired to bother cooking, the girls ate a quick dinner of jerky, dried fruit, and some granola before settling into their sleeping bags. Boreal kept silent watch as they slept, his presence deterring the nocturnal fauna from testing their edibility.

  Morning sunlight brought with it dry heat and silence. Ari was the first to wake. Immediately she found the lack of birdsong unsettling, especially after so many days spent wandering through forests. She rubbed her right arm. The line left by her injury was pale as an old scar. She frowned, noting the budding golden scales that traced it. Reaching up to touch the horns swaddled in her tangled dark hair, she found they had grown, not by much, but enough that they’d clearly stand out.

  Whatever Hazeon did to her, it was speeding up her transformation. The star he’d ignited within her blazed white hot. Magic surged through her, every channel in her body straining with the sheer amount of it. Ari breathed deeply, trying to calm the storm inside with little success. The dragon writhed under her skin, desperate to escape, but she wasn’t ready to let go. She wasn’t ready to release her humanity, no matter how small and weak it made her. The dragon could wait, would wait, until she was ready.

  Hannah woke with a yawn, the sound shaking Ari free of her thoughts. She gladly turned her attention to scrounging up something for breakfast. Digging around her pack, she frowned. Her trail rations were getting low. She had some dried rice, but without a burner and pot there was little she could do with it. Luckily, Hannah was able to provide what she lacked. She loosened the drawstrings of her belt pouch, widening the opening so she could pull out a pot, a bottle of milk, dried oats, and some honey discs. Ari watched each item appear in silent amazement. Looking in the pouch she could see nothing, just the leather walls of the bag. How limitless was the space within? How did Hannah find what she was searching for?

  I definitely need one of those, Ari thought, glancing over at her bulky pack.

  Hannah prepared the oatmeal with practiced efficiency, ladling it into two bowls she’d produced from her pouch. Ari took her bowl with a nod of gratitude, humming with pleasure as she took her first bite of the sweet oats. It was a welcome change from dry granola and chewy jerky. She was tasked with the clean up once they’d finished. Hannah tapped away on what looked like a cellphone while Ari scrubbed the sticky pans with a mix of water and sand.

  “You get service out here?” she asked.

  “Everywhere. Nosis phones run on magic,” Hannah said. She finished whatever message she was typing and tucked the device into a pocket in her dress. “Texting my girlfriend to meet us here. We could use the muscle.”

  “She a warrior or something?”

  “Oh yeah, fighting’s her thing,” Hannah said with a grin. “Dumb as a rock but just as tough.”

  “How will she find us?”

  “She’ll track my aura. She's good at hunting,” Hannah said.

  Once all the cookware was cleaned and packed away, the trio continued their journey through the sandstone maze. As they traveled, more and more signs of human passage became apparent. Tracks and scraps of garbage such as cigarette butts littered the path. At a fork in the road two large arrows were painted onto the stone wall dividing the paths. To the left was the desert, the word painted under the arrow accompanied by a skull and crossbones. The arrow pointing right read Glass Citadel.

  “A citadel, huh?” Hannah said.

  “Good or bad?” Ari asked.

  “Depends on who managed carve out a living here. Few settlements unaffiliated the Guilds or Strongholds last long. The ones that do are usually small and the people were wary of strangers, especially non-humans,” Hannah explained.

  Ari crossed her arms over her chest as she considered their options.

  “Remember that dream I told you about yesterday? About Hazeon?” she asked.

  Hannah nodded. “Yeah, why?”

  “He told me to find a glass gate. Maybe it’s in the citadel?”

  “Huh, maybe. Let’s check it out. If nothing else we can get some supplies,” Hannah said. She popped open her belt pouch, rummaged around a moment, and then pulled out a purple beanie. Holding it in her left hand, she held her right over it and closed her eyes. Ari watched in silence, sensing the shifting magic around the girl as she performed a spell. A filmy layer passed over the hat, a grid that shifted in the periphery of Ari’s vision, silvery and strange. Satisfied, Hannah handed the beanie over. “Illusion’s aren’t my thing, but this should be enough to fool anyone without magic of their own.”

  Ari took the hat and put it on. The spell’s filmy grid passed over her like a cool breeze and clung to her skin. Looking down at her arms, she found the scales gone, her skin bare and brown as usual. “Awesome.”

  “We’ll have to leave Boreal behind. He could freak out the locals. Either that or he’ll have to reduce down to his core.”

  Ari looked to Boreal for an answer. The bear shook his big head. “I stay by your side.”

  “Then you’ll have to ride in my pocket again,” Ari said. The bear snorted in displeasure but nodded. In a flash he dissolved into a small ball of light and zipped into the right-hand pocket of her jeans.

  Bases covered, the girls started down the road to the citadel. The stone corridor expanded, obviously chipped away in some places to make room for larger vehicles to pass. Heat rose steadily as they walked on. The shade afforded some relief and it wasn’t until they exited the sandstone maze that the full brunt of the days heat hit them. The sun was angry, its light turning the pale sand into a mirror that reflected its rays back into the sky. Ari squinted at the white-washed vista, only bulky silhouettes standing out against the glare. Blinking, teary eyed, they waited at the mouth of the maze for their vision to adjust, shielding their eyes with their arms.

  “Damn that’s bright,” Hannah said, digging around her belt pouch with a look of consternation. “Of course I forgot to pack sunglasses. Damn.”

  “Can you conjure a cloud or something?” Ari asked.

  “With what moisture? Its dry as hell out here,” Hannah said.

  “What about an umbrella?” Ari suggested.

  Hannah checked her pouch. “That I can do.”

  She pulled out two small umbrellas, one solid purple, and the other blue with a repeating duck pattern.

  “You really like ducks, huh?” Ari asked as she took the purple umbrella and popped it open.

  “They’re cute,” Hannah said with a shrug.

  Ari grinned.

  With the aid of the umbrellas, they were able to see across the sands. In the distance a lolly cliff stood, ruddy stone a stark contrast to the white sands that surrounded it. A large cleft in its rippled face breathed telltale streams of smoke, the calling card of mankind. A few ramshackle buildings sat in the shade of the cleft. A natural stone spire was hollowed out into a watchtower, equipped with flood lights on the roof, and most assuredly occupied by guards, though they were too far away tell.

  There was no cover between the sandstone maze and the citadel. If the guards wanted to take them out at a distance they’d have a clear shot. Ari supposed they wouldn’t have painted an big arrow pointing their way if they were quite so isolationist. She couldn’t help but worry, Hazeon had warned her of great danger ahead after all, but the only other option was to wander the desert. She glanced at Hannah, wondering if she was thinking the same thing. The older girl met her gaze and nodded.

  “Let’s go,” she said, taking the first step into the line of fire and waving for Ari to follow. Ari trailed after her, eyes on the watchtower, silently preparing herself for another fight.