123 – Where are we going and what are we doing

  Caspian’s plan at this point was to get as good a map as he could through magic, then plan how to get in to where Diana was and back out. Rox’s job was to hide their presence for the moment, and shield Caspian’s magic from detection.

  Rox set up her shields as small and unobtrusive as she could, and set then to camouflage by blending in to the ambient energy. Caspian put his staff down, the light from the carved head at the top pointing into a spot on the floor. He tested her setup, and then cast a spell that began to map the area via the air currents. This fed into an image spell to form a visual map in front of him. First the chamber they were in was shown, then the five passages connected to it began to show. These quickly showed more chambers and passages, as the spell split at every intersection. As the map expanded, the scale of the overall image changed to keep the whole image about a cubic cubit. Caspian kept a sense of the expanding mapping spell, and whenever a passage seamed to be beyond the general boundaries of the community he would cease its expansion.

  After the spell completed, they had a floating map with several large blobby caverns as central structures connected by knots of smaller tunnels, with smaller caverns interspersed, and several arrays of satellite caverns like the ones they were currently in.

  “Can the magic of the map and of this tracker interact and tell us where in the place Diana is?” Rox held the tracker ready.

  “No,” Caspian answered, looking the map over. “The tracker’s spell is not designed to interact with any other magic.”

  Rox looked over the floating image, careful to keep her own magic going. “I see three main caverns.”

  She ran her hands across one long cavern that curved up and around like a long misshapen bean, a second above half of and rotated a bit from the first that looked like a splattered pancake, and a third that went away from the first two that also looked a bit bean shaped. This third one had a constellation of smaller caverns closely around it at assorted altitudes, connected by a series of orderly tunnels. The interconnecting tunnels between the main ones looked like roads connecting three towns, a few main roads through the shortest available intervening space, and longer ones at almost random. There were a handful of medium sized and dozens of smaller caverns along and among the tunnels. Several passages seamed to circle the whole community at assorted altitudes and angels with larger chambers strung along them like pearls. These were interconnected by more knots of smaller passages and chambers. The chamber that Rox and Caspian were currently in was on one of these external passages. Five separate larger roads led out of the community, each in a different direction, each starting from a medium sized cavern that had a myriad of smaller tunnels attached. The way they had come from was identifiable by three medium sized chambers along that road.

  Caspian just stared at the image. “Ideas?”

  Rox looked it over, beginning to spot a pattern. “We know the tracker runs on straight lines. You said it will not interact with this map. I expect she will be in one of the larger caverns, as those would be better for housing. They need space for growing food, this upper cavern almost looks like a mining operation, or at least that they are clearing the rock out to expand the available volume. They need a water source, but that could be anywhere. We have seen plenty of springs, and I suppose we are deep enough to be under the first layer of aquifer. We don’t want to spend long here, and avoid capture.”

  Rox traced a few peripheral tunnels to the main caverns. “With some disguise, we could scout a few of these, and see which way the tracker says she is. That will eliminate which of the rest we have to risk.”

  Rox paused. Her spells were still going, properly. “Can you recall the image of this map, once you dispel it, or is it dependent?”

  Caspian thought, then got a bit of paper from a pouch. He held the paper flat in his palm, sprinkled some dirt on the paper and cast another spell. The dirt started organizing on the paper, into lines and smears. The excess dirt ran off the side, leaving an image on the paper that looked like a scribble done by an enthusiastic child with a crayon.

  Rox could see that it was a two dimensional image of the three dimensional map. There was residual magic on the map, not just holding the dirt on.

  “I can now recall the map from this at need.” Caspian put the map aside. “In the mean time, I agree. We need to go along this tunnel here,” he ran his finger through the image. “It goes between the two larger areas, while pointing at the third. There the tracker should tell us which one. Then we can scout things further. I just hope these elves are not a militant as the last group of this race I encountered.”

  “What happened then?”

  “I got my crossbow, and a few scars. They got a cave in.”

  Rox almost asked how big a cave in but let it go, not really wanting to know. “I haven’t sensed any magic yet. But I can’t say that I would know for sure.” Rox rechecked her spells. They were humming along just fine.

  “I haven’t ether. You would have noticed. And you don’t need to keep checking yours so much, unless you set them wrong or deliberately unstable.” Caspian answered, then got an unfocused look. “There he is.”

  Caspian stayed that way for a moment.

  Rox waited, figuring correctly that Caspian was communicating with his familiar elsewhere in the complex.

  Caspian’s awareness returned to here. “Cyrril finds a standing field at the entrances to each of the main caverns. He is not sure what kind or how large the magic field is. Also the third cavern is being slowly enlarged, but there are people living in it as well. Near as I can figure from what Cyrril reports, they are between their lunch and dinner time.”

  Rox’s stomach growled. “So are we.”

  She was splitting her attention, tracing the floating image before her, maintaining her spells, and listening to Caspian. She traced the floating map.

  “Looking at this, we can get to the tunnel we want by going out this one, up at this node, and then along this one, and into this main tunnel. Then about what, halfway, and check things. Question is, how much traffic is there to avoid, and how.”

  “We won’t find out about the traffic, until we start moving. If I cast any magic to tell us more than I have, it will let every magic user in the area know where I am. The next question is whether they will pay attention.”

  Rox was at a bit of a loss, yet several ideas mostly out of fiction were floating around her head for how to sneak about and not be noticed. “How much traffic does Cyrril see, or have to dodge?”

  Caspian went unfocused again. “Some. They are not paying him attention just yet. That might be because of the time of day.”

  Rox nodded. “Then let’s go. Tell Cyrril to keep watch for traffic in this main passage., and we will try to meet him there.”

  “Right. That dampening spell I taught you? Now is the time to use it.”

  Caspian let his spells go, and cast a quick spell around himself and his equipment.

  Rox relaxed and dispelled her shielding and camouflage spells. Then she followed Caspian’s example and cast a spell over herself and her equipment. The most noticeable result was that Caspian’s staff stopped buzzing in Rox’s senses and instead only continued to visibly put off light from the dragon’s head.

  Caspian had been teaching and helping Rox practice this spell since Shalaia. It essentially blended the presence of whatever object or group it was cast on into the background, insofar as magical sense went, regardless of the actual magical presence of the object or being.

  As Rox took time to look the rest of the garden room over, she noticed could see that the living things put off a heat sufficient to navigate around. The leafless trees or wooden roots or whatever hanging from the ceiling were arranged almost random, but actually in general rows. The plants on the floor of the chamber were also in rows. Rox could neither see nor hear anybody else in this chamber. Remembering from the map, she started toward the exit she had proposed.

  “I though you wanted to eat.”

  Rox paused. “I do, but . . .”

  Caspian understood. “You are focused on the task at hand. Eat first. Then we will go look. It will be easier to deal with things if you are not hungry.”

  Caspian got out his own food, from his bag as Rox turned to her pack and got hers. They ate quietly and quickly. Rox knew she was eating a sandwich, but was not aware of what it consisted of or tasted like, her mind working over what she would do if and when she encountered anyone between her and Diana.

  Caspian finished first, and contemplated his staff for a moment. “I can’t just walk around with this light going, If I do I may as well walk around with a big banner saying ‘shoot me’ on it.”

  Rox watched as he prepared another spell. He cast it on himself, and then extinguished the light from his staff.

  “Now you can see in the dark?” Rox asked.

  “Yeah. Unlike your visual gifts, this is only seeing in grays; it’s really uncomfortable, and prone to flash-blindness. That’s why I haven’t done it before now. Once we are clear of this place I will shut it off.”

  Once the food was consumed and trash packed away, they stood, put their gear back in order and on, and started out. Rox led to the passage, carefully looking around, and not seeing anybody. They also listened, and did not hear anybody. The slight breeze that flowed through the caverns they were in gave everything a barely perceptible whistle. The passage went into was typical of the previous ones they had followed to get here, being carved from the natural rock, and wide enough for a several people to pass along it. This passage went generally straight and emptied into a crossroad/chamber with a larger passage going to either side. The air could be felt passing from their right to their left. Just past the edge of the side passages, a shaft ascended and descended to other levels. Rox wanted to go up. She could see the bracing that had been constructed to support the sides of the shaft, tracks for a lift built onto the braces, and a second set on the left side as she faced it for the counterweight. Cables of some kind ran down in the middle of the counterweight’s frame. A ramp spiraled in a right-hand spiral around the outside of the shaft that would allow the defender to stand above and swing right handed with the wall to his left. She looked down and up the shaft briefly, then back to Caspian.

  “No traffic, and if there is a lift, it is above us.”

  Caspian looked around quickly, then back to Rox. “Do you know what you are doing?”

  “Yeah. I’m sneaking around potentially hostile territory to find and retrieve my kidnapped daughter.”

124 – Blending in, walking around

  Rox started up the ramp, going quickly. A slight breeze went down the shaft. They spiraled around several times before getting to the next level up. There was some noise above but it drifted by, and was muffled by the lift platform sitting at rest at this top level. Several creatures were hanging on the bottom of the platform, and occasionally on rocks on the wall and ceiling of the passages. Rox presumed these to be some variant on bats, and partly why Cyrril had so far been unnoticed, at least as reported by Caspian.

  Rox and Caspian listened as they waited, there was noise but it was not apparently threatening. From what Rox remembered of the map, this was still more or less a side tunnel so there would not be lots of traffic just passing by, it would be directly at them. The passage directly into the elevator was short and sided directly onto another more or less flat passage that went to either side. Rox and Caspian crept carefully, looking both ways for anybody. Following the plan, they would travel this passage to the main tunnel that circled most of the area, going at about the level of the largest cavern, partly under and partly between the second largest as it circled around. The unknown was how much traffic anywhere, and how to deal with it.

  Rox led to the next intersection. It was all she could do to keep from crouching and sneaking along. Caspian strolled along behind, waiting for someone to make some notice and noise to their presence. Surprising to both of them, there was no one in this tunnel at this time.

  Looking in either direction, this larger passage looked to Rox like the concourse of a mall, with a large wide road, side passages at intervals, some passages at different elevations with ramps or stairs to get both up and down, and the main concourse tiled with pieces of the same crystals as in the first three chambers they had passed through.

  Rox saw that there were several locals in clusters moving purposefully in all directions.

  “Do you sense any magic?”

  Rox looked back as Caspian who stood looking almost bored. She looked back, and put her attention to those senses. She could not sense Caspian’s staff, and nothing along the passage in either direction, so far as her visual range extended.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Then quit hiding,” Caspian chided. “Start looking like you belong here, and are not giving anyone any more notice than any other local.”

  “I’m a head taller than you, and head and shoulders taller than they are. Somebody will notice.”

  Caspian scoffed. “About time you noticed. Come back here and let’s do a bit more magic.”

  Rox followed him a few steps back into the passage. “Will anyone notice this?”

  “Only the few magic users around, if they are paying attention.” Caspian concentrated a moment, then spoke a phrase in a language Rox was not familiar with.

  She felt it settle in with the magic already active on her, like an ingredient in a mix.

  “That should keep you from being noticed by anyone not directly looking for you. Problem is it will also keep your daughter from understanding you’re you. So you will have to dispel these spells before identifying to her.” Caspian finished, then strolled past Rox.

  She followed him into the larger passage and simply took up a purposeful walk in the direction they wanted to go. To Rox’s initial surprise, the sparse regular traffic of the locals took no more notice of her or Caspian than they did of each other. As she walked Rox noticed that the crystal tiling of the passage soon alternated in patterns, and included other stones for cobbles. The walls were carved and occasionally had wooden or stone carved arches arched buttressing the ceiling.

  They traveled a bit farther than they wanted, having missed the scale of things a little. The passage turned counterclockwise and started to descend some as they went. Rox had noticed a pattern in the arches that buttressed the ceiling. Every third one was carved stone with the intermediate two being plain wood. Then she came to one that was crystal. It was carved blocks shaped to make the arch, and had a slight aura of magic to it. It did not have a strong field to it, but it did register. Rox almost stopped before going through it.

  Caspian gently took her arm and kept her pace up. “The magic is just for ventilation. It keeps the air moving.”

  They walked on under the arch and past it without much incident. Rox did notice that the breeze had picked up a bit, and was fresher.

  After a few more archways, Caspian pulled Rox aside against the wall. He kept his demeanor as business-like as he could, as if just a local conversing with another over whatever business du-jour.

  “We should be far enough that the second chamber is above and behind us, while the third is ahead of us. Check the tracker.”

  Rox got the tracker from the neck of her shirt and held it out. She had her back to the column and the wall on her right. The dot was nearly to the top, on the side away from her, and bit to her left. Both looked at it, and visualized the map and the actual caverns around them.

  Caspian spoke first. “I think she is in the main one, and a bit to this end of it. So, do I continue with you, or do we split up? If we split up now, that is less chance for us to be both caught before we can start any diversion. Also I can go back and scout the other end of this main cavern, for somewhere to make that diversion. That will leave you on your own, to finalize Diana’s general location, and get there.”

  “I think it is time to split up,” Rox said, as she took the tracker from around her neck and wrapped it around her left wrist, where it would not interfere with using her bow. “I’m no longer jittery about moving through here. I think I got a handle on the tools at hand. I will meet you in this same passage on the other side.”

  Caspian nodded. “Right. Go quickly, but pick your targets carefully. We aren’t here to kill or destroy, just distract.”

  Rox looked at him, pausing before moving away. “That is a surprise, considering what you did to the last locals who crossed out paths.”

  “They weren’t Urnvtai, or from this community.” Caspian turned and strolled away as Rox considered, a moment, then started again in the direction she had been going along this passage.

  Rox passed several openings on either side of the passage, and the traffic was such that she was not alone. She strolled along and kept her self looking as purposeful as she could to any locals she encountered. The locals were head and shoulders shorter than Rox, but appeared not to pay her any attention, her magic cloaking still working. Rox briefly looked at their variety of clothing, but none of it stood out as remarkable; rather it fit for the rolls each played in their community, tradesmen, domestics, the odd constable or militia man, and so forth. The passage soon began descending gently and turning to her left. It leveled off before it finished its turn. Shortly after the turn, Rox paused and checked the tracker. Again oriented with the passage wall to her right, the dot on the tracker was to her left. Rox walked to the next passage on the left side of the passage and into the entry tunnel to the main cavern, where about half of the community was located.

  Fortunately she was alone in this passage. It was the same general size and design as the passage she had been traveling. The gateway arch into the cavern was another crystal one. Rox had passed several more of these and could tell that this one had a different spell on it than the ones in the passage; more so an additional one. But she could not tell what just yet. Rox did not want to risk breaching any magical barriers yet, neither did she want to risk testing one and setting off any alarm, yet.

  She looked across through the archway directly into a residential area. The roads continued to be cobbled and tiled, and there were pillars of shaped crystal on the corners of the houses. The roof looked to be more of the crystals, cur to uneven depths several dozen meters above. Having seen what she could, Rox turned and strode back the way she had come and continued on her way around the ring-passage as she had come to think of it.

  She turned to go in and check the passages into the cavern at every other one. Past the residential area was a market place, then a few open areas that were just open areas. On her right she passed a significant construction area, where stone was being removed from between several passages to create more open space. At one part they were harvesting crystal blocks the size of the workers.

  By the time Rox met up with Caspian coming the other way, she figured she had circled this ring-passage about three fifths of its total distance. The cavern that it ringed had more industrial stuff at this end she was approaching and that Caspian was supposed to check.

  They turned to their right down a side passage into a storage area. The room they entered smelled of food storage.

  Caspian started first. “I found the water works, and I think a barracks and guard house.”

  “I found residential area, some markets, and some open areas that I have no idea of their use. Do you have any idea what the second spell on the arches into the cavern is? Near as I could tell, they alternate which way they move air into or out of the cavern. But they all have that second spell that I don’t recognize, and did not want to risk testing.” Rox leaned against a wall as stretched as she reported.

  Caspian likewise stretched as he listened. Cyrril hopped off his shoulder onto a stacked pile of grain bags. “I think it is related to firefighting. I got the sense that it had to do with moving heat and smoke. But that was not the barrier Cyrril noticed. That one is just beyond the archway, in the main cavern. I don’t think is it a military barrier either. I think it is a varmint barrier. We should be able to walk right in. So how do we do this?”

  Rox took her shoulder bag off. She had been wearing her cape to this point, as it helped to diffuse her shape in the light and hear conditions. She folded and rolled it into a bundle and secured it to her bag. Rox left her bag on the pile Cyrril was crouched on, and added her water bag to it. She did not want to carry anything extra that might get in the way. This left her with her equipment and weapons. She reached into another part of the bag and pulled her chains, and a small box out. She hand not worn these yet for stealth reasons; now she put them on, securing them to her equipment harness, arms and legs.

  Caspian likewise put his own shoulder bags aside. “Leaving these here means either coming back this way, abandoning them, or risking using magic to retrieve them.”

125 – Planning and Causing Trouble

  Rox nodded. “Let me see the map.”

  Caspian pulled out the sheet, and energized it. The glowing image of the map sprang from the paper. Rox looked it over. She touched a set of rooms off the side of the ring.

  “I believe we are here. This passage leads to this chamber, which leads to this exit tunnel.” Rox traced the passages as she spoke.

  “Problem: that is not the way we came from.” Caspian pointed at the passage they had come from it was a third of the way around the map from where Rox was pointing.

  Rox looked at the passages. “Okay. My scouting says Diana is in this section of the main cavern.” She pointed at the end closest to the third, expanding cavern. “We are here right now.” She pointed at the series of rooms on the side away from the second cavern. “If we cause enough distraction, we can get back here, and around and out the way we came.”

  Caspian looked at the map. “The area I am looking to make my distraction in is over here, on the far end from where you will be. I can take our bags and leave them there, then we pick them back up on out way out.”

  He ran his finger out of the cavern, back onto the ring, and around the way they had initially traveled.

  Rox looked at it. She was flummoxed. If there was more time . . . but there was no more time.

  “Okay. Let’s do that. I will come over to here, fire a few of my gimmick arrows toward the center of things. You will hear them land. Then you start your distraction. I follow the tracker to exactly where Diana is, and get her. I fire a few more arrows as needed, and we go out and around, meet at the elevator, and go down and out that way.”

  Caspian nodded and put the map away. “Sounds good. Don’t start without me. Give me a bit to get back into position.”

  He picked his bags and hers, and then went out of the room, Cyrril leaping onto his shoulder as he left.

  Rox took a deep breath, and sent the Astronaut’s Prayer to heaven for good fortune. Then she pulled her bow from the low carry she had slung it at on her belt. She pulled the sling’s slack out and wrapped the excess around itself to its shorter position. Next she opened the small box from earlier. Eight crystal bread-head arrow heads rested in felt padding. One at a time, Rox drew eight of the local made wooden arrows from her quiver and slotted the crystal broad head over the metal arrow head, and slid it to the shaft until it stopped. With all eight ready, Rox put her hands on either side of the lined up arrows; she put the magic safeties in order, and then activated the spells on the arrowheads. Each began to glow in her magical senses. The activation finished, she scooped up the arrows and put them back into the upper box of her quiver with the other wood arrows, her other aluminum ones on the lower box. Rox opened the draw string on the cloth closer of both boxes, to quickly draw as she needed. Satisfied she slung her bow on her shoulder, and tested her disguise spell. The spell was still working. Rox squared her shoulders and stepped out.

  Rox did not see Caspian ahead of her. She looked both ways in the ring cavern, and caught sight of him making his way to his start point, off to her right. She turned left and went back in the direction she came from. Rox passed a town constable or militia man as she went this time. This unnerved her a bit, but she held her discipline and kept going. She was certain that was what or who he was as he wore armor and carried a sword. No one else did.

  Thinking of the ring-passage like a race track, she was going the wrong way on the back straight away, toward the turn from the short passage, though in this part of the ring it was more just a gentle curve all around. Rox checked the tracker. The dot subtly shifted as Rox walked. Now it was on her right side, and as she turned the corner, it slid slowly around to more in front of her, but still to her right, in the cavern.

  Rox waited to be past the open areas before turning into the cavern. Three other chattering locals followed her into the cavern. She stuttered her steps briefly then stepped boldly through the fields that filled the archway into the cavern. Nothing happened that Rox sensed. The three behind her likewise went through without incident and walked into the main cavern of the Urnvtai village of Chigoria.

  This cavern looked like part of this end had been carved from the inside of a huge geode. Most of the crystals had been cut and cleared for space, but a few had been left to support buildings. The crystal tiling and cobbles on the road continued, sometimes up the side of a building. The road was wide enough for two wagons to pass, with sidewalks. Every so often a water pump and trough intruded on the sidewalk, leaving the road clear. In the first intersection Rox came to, a large crystal had been carved into a statue. Rox turned to her left and looked for the first alley she could. But the buildings were built continuously. So she looked for a non-busy side road.

  The roads were generally gridded, but wandered a little; the buildings were single story with the floor at road level, or double story with a step down and a step up. Finally Rox turned right onto a smaller road, and found what she wanted. Stepping away from the traffic, she checked either side, borrowed a spell idea from Caspian, and leapt up and onto the top of the wall of the building. The roof was joists with some kind of thatching lay across, almost flat. Rox scrambled across the top of the wall to an intersection, keeping as quiet as she could. The tracker said Diana was off to her left, almost directly, and the dot almost centered.

  Rox looked across the village. She could smell smoke up here, but it was of cooking fires, rather than anything else, yet.  Rox got her bow from her shoulder and drew one of her magic tipped arrows from her quiver. She knocked the arrow and held it in place as she surveyed the village looking for a good target over the roof tops.

  She was about a third of the way across this end of the cavern, with about a third of it to her right and two thirds to her left. She was closer to the wall behind her than to either side. Also the cavern height would require a fairly flat trajectory, unless she wanted to hit the roof.

  Off to her right there were several large structures that seamed to be where the open areas she had seen were. Further away were more residential and market areas. At the far end she could begin to make out the industrial area, but it was too far to see in detail and make sense of just now. Rox looked back to the big structures, and decided they would do.

  Roxanne moved quietly across the tops of the walls to where she could stand and shoot. Standing carefully she found her balance, and drew the bow back. She took aim, adjusted her elevation, and let fly, then reached for the second arrow.

  Caspian stood, back to the rock wall, absently petting Cyrril. His part of the plan called for creating a diversion to give Roxanne an easier time on her side of this village. But he had to wait for her shot to go first. He didn’t wait long. A muffled boom echoed out of the cavern.

  At that first explosion, he began his part. He calmly started walking, concentrating on the archway he faced. The locals who had been walking in the area were nervous, wanting to go help, but not sure how or where yet. Caspian relieved them of their tedious wait, letting loose with the spell he had formulated. The keystone of the archway between the ring passage and this entry passage disintegrated, and the arch swiftly collapsed.

  After using half of her crystal tipped arrows, Roxanne had hit four targets on her side of the cavern. At that she slung the bow across her back, and retrieved her staff from its position on her quiver. She moved quickly across this block on the tops of its walls and at its end dropped back to street level, then trotted through the confusion she had just created. People were running every which way. Caspian’s attack on the other side of the village was now drawing much of the attention. Several larger structures blew up, the damage spreading in the confines of the cavern. Roxanne ignored it, and mostly ignored anybody she went past, her purposeful movement enough of a disguise at the moment for most of them, her magic doing the rest. Then a Constable put his hand on her shoulder.

  Rox turned into him leading with her staff into his face. He went down quickly, and she fled before much could be made of it.

  Caspian moved stealthily through the rubble he was causing. His task that of diversion and nuisance. He sent Cyrril to find the fuel oil storage and light it on fire. This took a few moments. But once done the results were spectacular. Next he went to the armory. He took a moment to examine the swords and then started the bows and arrows on fire.

  Rox picked her way quickly through the confusion and rubble, moving as fast as she dared, following the tracker. She thought briefly as she went that she would never have thought herself capable of something like this a few short months ago. She then cleared her thoughts and moved on. The few fires were casting strange shadows across the whole cavern and creating lots of smoke that would take a while to clear out. She could feel the magic on the passages had jumped in activation to ventilate the cavern.

  As she went, she felt relief that she had probably only injured men and a few women, and no children. Roxanne followed the tracker, watching it to see how close her daughter was, and where. She turned down a road into a square. The buildings before her were the last before an open area and the other cavern wall. Rox came to a stop, dispelled all the cloaking magic on her, and put up her magic shields. She was not anxious to enter a local house.

  More of the village burst into flames, the thatched roofs spreading embers quickly, the cavern beginning to smell of smoke. Caspian continued to cause trouble. He had blow a water wheel apart to its constituent boards. Cyrril was out looking for oils to burn. He paused at a smithy, and decided not to do anything here. He moved on, trotting around the confusion. He paused and hopped up onto the tops of the walls. He could not see any particular pursuit, and decided that the smashed water works, the caved in passage, the fuel oil storage, and what ever Rox had blown up were sufficient.

  Caspian called Cyrril to go check on Rox, and then felt her shields energize.

126 – Mom to the Rescue

  Rox stood for a moment, catching her breath, and focusing her mind on the magic pattern she had been taught. Then she yelled/cast her daughters name at the house, in English.

  “Diana Margaret Caplan, come her now.”

  She took her staff to a ready position, not sure what to expect. She could sense some commotion inside, and then her little girl came cannonballing out of one of the windows. She tumbled to her feet, looked around, and ran most of the way to Rox, yelling what Rox had ached to hear.

  “Mom!”

  But Diana stopped a few feet short, not quite recognizing her mother. This was understandable, as there was little about Rox that was quite the same as it had been before this all started. As well there was almost no light and Diana was seeing Rox with her expanded senses for the first time.

  Rox had prepared for this.

  As her daughter stopped, the door to the house opened, and a local elf woman came out calling for Diana to come back into the house where it would be safer.

  Rox moved a step closer. “Diana Margaret Caplan. You come here now. We are leaving.” Roxanne had rarely used that tone of voice, but Diana instinctively knew it and that to hesitate to obey it meant tears before bedtime. She moved, doubts put aside for a moment.

  The strange costume that her mother was wearing was new, but fitting. She ran to her mother and wrapped her arms around her mother’s waist.

  Rox cradled Diana’s head a moment, then batted the incoming magic aside with her staff. Diana shied away from this around behind her mother, as Rox turned to face the Urnvtai elf witch.

  “Give me that little girl.” The witch took a few steps out away from the house, mainly to avoid damaging it in the conflict that was about to happen.

  Right then, Rox saw Cyrril, who was looking for her. “Cyrril!” Rox was still using her command voice. The little dragon arrowed right for Rox and her outstretched hand. Diana had not let go of Rox’s belt, since latching on to it. The witch was busy formulating a spell. Rox had to clear the field before getting into this fight.

  “Cyrril, take my daughter aside. Protect her.”

  The dragon’s thoughts were indecipherable to any but Caspian, but Rox could briefly see the mental conflict and resolve in the little beast. It wanted to report to Caspian, but also recognized the primal tone of a mother protecting its young, and the unstated consequence of failure in that charge.

  Cyrril chirped, and climbed from Rox’s hand to Diana’s shoulder, wrapping his tail around her throat as a protective necklace. Diana tried to look at him as he moved, while also maintaining a hold on her mother. But with her distracted, Rox had herself free from her daughter.

  Right then a blinding flash and rush of air crashed through them, as the witch fired her opening salvo.

  Diana had cowered to cover as Rox covered her, hoping her shields would hold.

  They did.

  Leaving her child with the little dragon, Rox turned and activated both ends of her staff. Something about filling a giant with terrible resolve slipped through her mind as she charged at the witch.

  The witch had thought this to be a quick route and then clean up. That Rox was relatively untouched was a surprise. That she was charging took a moment to register, and that the gold chains and attached jewelry were alive with energy never got a chance to get on any mental list. Instead the witch stopped her next spell, and activated a ring on her finger, pushing out a wall of force.

  Rox could sense the wall coming. An expanding ring of energy emanating from the ring in the witches hand. Rox countered with her staff again, swinging it so that both ends struck the wall, one that stopped its expansion, and the other shattered the spell with the energy evaporating.

  The witch completed her spell, and tossed a small sphere of energy at Roxanne.

  Rox had never played any game like lacrosse, softball, or golf, mostly from lack of interest. But she swung the staff, connecting with the ball of energy and batting it away hissing and spitting to land where it would harmlessly fizzle with out actually going off.

  Rox was now in striking range of the witch, and let her have it with both ends of the staff. She connected with each of the witch’s arms shattering the bones in them, and finished jabbing the witch in the sternum. The witch fell over backward, gasping for breath that would not come.

  Rox stood ready for the fight to continue, but she had already won.

  Rox watched as panic spread across a face that appeared not that far different from her own in age. Before the panic could reach full bloom the life behind it began to noticeably fade, already slipping into unconsciousness. Death would soon follow.

  Rox had not thought about killing this elf. And as she watched the features relax they reverted to their natural beauty. Rox moved again, as she had since starting, with thoughtful urgency. She deactivated her staff, and knelt beside the elf woman, no more a witch. Rox reached out with her magic sense, looking for healing magic. There; on the amulet in the woman’s purse at her side.

  Rox dumped the purse out, and picked up the small piece of black marble set in a holder of metal. Rox took this, and then drew a blank. She tried to remember the phrase for a generic activation, but couldn’t.

  Two someone’s stepped up behind her, surprising Rox. Caspian and Diana stood there; Cyrril still on Diana’s shoulder.

  “Caspian, what was the General Activation?”

  Caspian knelt, took the necklace. “Let me.” He spoke a phrase that crackled with power, and the amulet unlocked and started emanating organizing power. Caspian quickly put it around the elf woman’s neck. He looked at her a moment and then took the arm closest to him, and holding on the elbow and wrist he spoke another sharp set of words and pulled the arm straight. He then spoke a softer set of words, these wrapping around the arm to splint it. He then moved around and did the same on the other side.

  “She won’t be able to do anything with her arms for several days, but they will heal.”

  Roxanne and Caspian stood, Diana moving to her mother’s side and taking her hand.

  Caspian looked around. “Time to go. They are already getting the fires under control. Then they will be looking for us.” He turned to head back the way he had came, Rox following with Diana, when Diana tugged her mother in another direction.

  “This way, Mom.”

  The adults followed the child between a few houses, into another open area. Diana looked quickly and raced across it to a child’s playhouse, and crawled in. Parties of locals could be heard nearby. Rox and Caspian looked briefly at each other, and around. Rox quickly followed Diana inside. She briefly thought of Lewis Carroll, then pushed that aside.

  Inside the playhouse was a hole in the floor. Diana was already climbing down a rope ladder. Rox tested it, then followed her daughter, holding her staff in one hand as she went down. Caspian followed after.

  The shaft went down into a maze under the town. Diana led them through several tunnels and into the first chamber. There was phosphor on the walls, but not very bright; the air a bit staler. Caspian called them to a stop here.

  “Roxanne, I realize we need to get out of here, but Diana reeks of magic. We need to diminish that now.”

  Roxanne knew what he meant, they having talked about it on the way here. The magic had been in her senses, but she had been focused on other things. She turned to her daughter. “Diana, come here.”

  Rox knelt to look Diana in the eye, as Caspian commenced drawing on the ground with his staff. Cyrril was still on Diana’s shoulder. Rox looked at him.

  “Cyrril. Thank you. Go help Caspian.”

  Cyrril blinked, turned and leapt off, Diana turned to watch him go.

  “Mom, he’s a dragon, isn’t he.”

  “Yes.” Rox took her daughters shoulders in hand and turned Diana to face her. Some uncomfortable memories were in the back of her mind, but she had to put her daughter through the same things she had been through.

  “Now listen to me. Caspian and I need to remove some magic from you. To do this you need to be brave, get undressed, and do exactly as you are told and nothing else. This is going to be uncomfortable but it won’t hurt. All right?”

  Diana looked dubious for a moment, but nodded her agreement. She then looked at Caspian as he finished his first circle, still muttering. Suddenly Diana felt very warm, and began removing the clothes she wore.

  Rox felt the temperature shift as well. As Caspian completed the Warding Barrier he also removed the chill from the air to help Diana be more comfortable on the cold stone.

  Rox took her staff, and while Caspian drew the circle, she drew the pentagram with inscribed octagram. She finished this and noticed that Diana was hesitating to finish undressing. She went to her daughter.

  “Diana, what’s wrong?”

  “Him, being here.” Something about Caspian disturbed Diana.

  Rox guessed, correctly, that the local elves had already begun to try to indoctrinate Diana into dark magic, so she would already be adverse to a white wizard. But that wasn’t all of it. Then it came to her.

  “Oh. I see. In this case it’s all right. Like being at the doctor’s office. Remember?”

  That physical had not been a high point for Diana but she had survived it.

  Rox could sense her daughter’s reluctance, and something else, more than just being indoctrinated. Caspian would later explain that she was sensing some dark magic that had already been bound to Diana to turn her natural personality to a more malevolent bent. And that Diana was fighting it. But to win right here, she needed her mothers support.

  “Quickly now, the sooner you lay down, the sooner you can get dressed and lead us out of here.”

  Rox took the tunic her daughter was wearing and pulled it over Diana’s head and off.

  She tossed this aside and then noticed the little necklace Diana was wearing. A black piece of rock in silver setting; similar to the one that the witch had.

  Rox fingered it, and looked at Diana. “Where did you get this?”

  Diana’s features and aura shifted suddenly, and she tried to turn and flee, wearing only her breach cloth.

  Rox having had some practice at this game caught her daughter before she got one step.

  She quickly picked her daughter up, and holding her with one arm she pulled the breach cloth off with the other. Diana was kicking and starting to scream.

  Rox and Caspian had prepared for this, hoping they would not encounter it. Rox spoke the prepared spell. The crackling power of it shocked her as it wrapped Diana up and rendered her body limp, effectively severing the connection between Diana’s mind and her body. She then carried Diana to the center of the octagram and lay her down in it. Caspian had completed his part of the spell and had been waiting for this. He had felt the power of Rox’s spell and gave a slight shake of his head at its necessity.

127 – A Few Loose Ends

  Rox withdrew from the two symbols, and removed her equipment harness, and put down her bow. She then entered the pentagram opposite Caspian, and stopped at the edge of the octagram, at Diana’s feet. She then acted as a control valve as Caspian worked the magic.

  First he mapped all the magic around Diana. He threaded past Rox’s spell, and quickly dispelled the next three placed on Diana by the black elf. At that point, Cyrril darted in and grabbed the necklace. He bit through one side of the silver chain and took the whole thing away with him.

  Now it was Rox’s turn. She tested the pattern of the magic that she had put on Diana, at Diana’s birth. There was the key. She dispelled it, and the rest collapsed. There was a brief shimmer around Diana, as the spell dispersed. When it faded the most noticeable difference was that Diana’s hair quickly turned as white as Rox’s had turned. Rox then backed up to the spell she had put on Diana a few moments ago. This was released as fast as it was activated, but the effects took longer to manifest. That was just as well. It gave Rox a moment to be a mother. With the casting done, she stepped into the octagram, which was now no more than lines on the ground. She picked up Diana’s limp form and hugged her close. Slowly Diana came back to herself, crying and clutching at her mother as if to let go would be forever.

  Caspian watched this with a detached interest. Then turned back to practical matters. Cyrril was already making ribbons of the Urnvtai elf clothes that Diana had been wearing. Caspian moved him aside and incinerated the rest of it. Then sent Cyrril on another errand. To go get the packs that they would have picked up had they gone out the way they had planned.

  Cyrril was up and gone just that fast, passing through the ward and down one of the tunnels. Caspian could have teleported the things straight here, but that would have alerted every magic user in the area to their location. Instead he maintained the ward with its camouflage, and let Rox have the privacy with her daughter. For the same reason of alerting the magic users, he would not be teleporting them back to the surface. That left them walking the whole way back out.

  Diana did not settle down completely until Cyrril returned. The clever beast had the packs in tow, having levitated them, and then dragged then by their straps. He also reported to Caspian that the search parties were out in earnest.

  Caspian dug into his pack for some fresh spell components, and also some digging tools. He then set about collecting some of every substance in the cavern.

  Rox had taken her pack and dug out the clothes that the Nidaer Clan had given to clothe Diana in. She helped Diana put these on. Underwear, then some trousers, and an elfin silk blouse with a leather vest. A belt, a pair of socks and boots were the last. The clothes were adjusted to fit. Diana was feeling much better now. Rather like she had just got up from a night of bad dreams. Except this one was not yet finished.

  Diana looked herself over and was already showing the resilience of children. She would spend a while playing with her hair, until she got used to it being white and the mohawk stood up. At this point Caspian put his tools away and shouldering his bag, he looked at Diana, and spoke in English.

  “Diana, can you lead us out of here?”

  Rox put her harness back on and secured the girdle, settled the quiver, and put her staff back on the under side out of the quiver. Then she put her shoulder bag on and picked up her bow.

  Diana looked at Caspian and her mother and nodded. She turned around twice, looking the cavern over and getting her bearings, then started in a new direction, roughly perpendicular to the one she had been on when she came into this chamber. “The Urnvtai allowed me to play with the other children down here, and a few times I managed to find the way to the main tunnel to the surface. I think it was this way. They always stopped me from going very far into the main tunnel.”

  As they left the cavern, Caspian cast one last quick spell. He collapsed the ward, and had the barrier sweep the floor as it did, removing the symbols that had been drawn.

  Several turns along, they came into a larger carved passage. Diana led almost running. Rox followed and had her bow out and another of her crystal tipped arrows in battery, ready to draw and aim. Caspian and Cyrril brought up the rear alternating between a fast walk and jog to keep up.

  This passage went more or less straight for a ways, then came to another intersection. Rox and Caspian both felt magic coming from somewhere up the passage to their right. Rox got a hold of Diana and slowed her down. Caspian got ready to put up a shield. As Diana and Rox crossed the passage, Caspian put a blocking shield across its opening. Rox surged forward, dragging Diana across the opening, and a blast of magic impacted on the shield Caspian had energized.

  Diana complained at Rox’s manhandling of her. Rox paused as she got clear of the opening on the far side of it. Caspian stepped around the corner and let lose with a lightening bolt into the cross passage. The concussion of this deafened everyone.

  “Diana, stay down.” Rox looked over the magic in action, and then brought her bow up. She aimed at the top of the side tunnel and let fly with her arrow. It passed through Caspian’s shield and down the passage several yards and hit the top of the tunnel. The magic on the crystal arrowhead hit the stone and sparked and shattered. The metal arrow head began to crumple against the stone, the wooden shaft to shatter. Then the spell on the crystal detonated. A wave of energy radiated out from the arrowhead, shattering the rock for three meters plus around it.

  The rock having lost integrity, it collapsed into the passage. The elves having been good engineers had avoided leaving seams as they had carved these tunnels, so there were no sympathetic fractures beyond this one. As it was, enough graveled rock obeyed gravity and collapsed into the tunnel blocking the way of the locals beyond it.

  The dust from the falling rock filled the cavern and obscured everything for a few moments. Then Caspian worked a spell that drew air from the direction they were headed and carried the dust the way they had come from.

  Once he could breathe clearly again, he dispelled his active shield and walked over to where Rox and Diana were getting up and brushing the dust off.

  “Can you hear me?” he spoke at normal level, he could barely hear himself.

  Rox did not even look over at him. Caspian cast a spell over himself, and Cyrril. This got Rox’s attention. Keeping the spell in process, he reached for Rox’s ears, and restored her hearing. Diana watched, and then let him do the same to her.

  “Can you hear me now?”

  “Yeah.” Rox answered in the northern language that she had most often spoke to Caspian in.

  “Mom, what are you saying?”

  Rox and Caspian looked down to her, and switched to English. “Caspian just asked if I can hear again, after all the big booms. What languages do you know from this world, besides English?”

  “The Urnvtai woman put their language into my head. I picked up some of the words that caravan spoke. Otherwise, I don’t know any other language from here.”

  Caspian continued in English. “We better get going. I put that group down, but there are sure to be others.” He turned to Rox. “Warn me next time you let one of those arrows fly at close range.”

  They moved on, following the passage.

*          *          *

  Steven woke up to find that Alex was sitting nearby on top of a low pillar looking around. The torch was cold. Steven could hardly see in the dark, while Alex could see just fine. By feel he carefully pulled out a lighter and found the right end of the torch. In moments the end was slowly burning, and Steven’s night vision had bright spots all over it. Steven put the lighter away, and pulled a strip of cloth out and wrapped it around the torch, almost smothering it before the oil caught and started burning.

  With the torch lit Steven called Alex over. Alex got down off the rock keeping his face away from the torch.

  “Alex, come here and let me show you something.” Steven pulled out the tracker out of his vest.

  Alex shaded his eyes as he walked over. “That hurts my eyes, Dad.”

  For a few moments, Steven did not understand. Then turned and set the torch on the ground upright against a nearby rock pillar, and walked back so it backlit him.

  “Is that better?”

  Alex put his hand down. He could see everything, and it was kind of strange to see the heat and light where the torch lit things.

  Steven knelt down and held out the tracker in his palm. “Alex, have a look at this.”

  Alex picked it up. It was a disk that filled most of his father’s palm, with a flat bubble of stuff on one side and a heavy metal back on the other. A swirl of light was right on the top. “Is this the tracker you talked about yesterday?”

  Steven smiled as Alex put is back in his palm. “Yes, it is. The top point is you.”

  Steven pulled the second one from his vest, and held it out. “This one is for Mom.”

  It had a swirl part way down the side of the bubble, not as bright as the other tracker.

  “I was told by the people who made it that it cannot read through thick rock very well. It does show the direction a person is, and how far away they are.”

  Alex looked and pointed back in the direction they had come past. “So Mom is that way, and not very far.”

  Steven had guessed that was about at the direction of the archway with the elf writing on it. This made him nervous, but it was expected. “That’s right. I figure we will wait for them here.”

  Steven’s tactical sense was telling him this would be a good place to squabble if need be. He only hoped he could do some good in the dark if it came to that.

  As it turned out, the need did not happen. Steven made breakfast for himself and Alex, using a small camp stove he had sparingly used to this point. He was glad for the warm breakfast, and had extinguished the torch in the mean time.

  Alex saw them first, which did not surprise Steven. They sat below the top of rock pillars near the wall. Steven could not see much beyond dark, but could hear lots. Alex said he could see everything, for a ways up, and in either direction along the rift. Then he saw a light in the elf’s tunnel.

  Steven turned and saw it, and finally had a rough clue on the distance. He gauged the bottom of the rift to vary between 75 and 150 meters across. The rock garden was about 400 meters from the archway. From Steven’s orientation the arch was to his right, and the way out was to his left, two days away.

  Cyrril startled Steven as he appeared out of the dark, having evidently flown under Alex’s sight line. He climbed up Steven’s boot and stood on his thigh as Steven crouched against the pillar.