“No movement,” Ilmarin said.
“He’s there,” Anne said. She pointed through the doorway towards the shadows to the right. “And he knows we’re here.”
I walked into the room. In the light of the spells, I could see a table in one corner, chairs overturned and papers scattered on the floor. Variam and Ilmarin followed me through. Something made a soft scrape as I stepped on it, and I paused and crouched down. It was an empty cartridge.
“Sarge,” one of the security men said quietly from behind me.
“I see it,” Little said. “Verus?”
I looked at where Little was pointing. Ilmarin had moved one of his floating lights over next to the right wall, and in the greyish glow I could see bullet marks. “Interesting,” Ilmarin said. “So those would have been made by . . . who? Facility security?”
“Which raises the question of what they were firing at,” I said.
“I’m going to take a wild guess and say it’s got something to do with the thing that may or may not be human,” Variam said.
Anne spoke. “He’s moving.”
Our eyes turned to the darkness at the top of the right staircase. A figure appeared, still hidden in the shadows. We could make out its shape, but no more.
From behind I heard quiet movements as the security men readied their weapons. They weren’t pointing them at the figure . . . yet. I raised my voice, speaking clearly and loudly. “I am Mage Alex Verus of the Junior Council. If you are an enemy of Mage Drakh, Mage Crystal, or the other Dark mages who operated this facility, we will assist you. If you side with them and against the Council, you will not be harmed should you come peacefully. Step into the light and make yourself known.”
Silence. Seconds ticked away. Then the figure stepped forward.
It was a boy in his twenties, as Anne said. He looked quite ordinary, but my hackles rose the instant I saw him. There was an aura around his form; it was faint and hard to see, but the shadows were clinging to him a little more than they should, hinting at something larger and darker behind. I recognised that pattern and I knew what it meant, and all of a sudden I wasn’t interested in talking anymore. “All units,” I said quietly into my communicator. “Defensive formation. Prepare for enemy summons.”
The boy swept his gaze over us, looking down from the top of the stairs. Futures flickered as he made his decision, but I didn’t need to scan them to know what was going to happen. “Why do you all keep coming?” he said to no one in particular. His voice sounded wrong, older than it should have been.
“Fire,” I said into the communicator.
Variam didn’t hesitate. A pillar of flame erupted on top of the gantry, casting the room in hellish light. From behind, the submachine guns stuttered out three-round bursts.
The fire receded to reveal the boy standing unharmed. A translucent black shield was flickering around him: bullets were still hitting it, their impacts marked by flashes of black. He spread his arms wide.
“Hold fire, hold fire!” I called. “Cease fire on the primary target, watch the sides, we have summons. Four on the left, two on the right.”
The darkness at the sides of the room seemed to writhe, figures stepping out of the shadows. They were man-sized, thin and spindly with arms too long for their bodies, and they darted forward along the walls. They were hard to see, the eye wanting to shift away, but unlike the boy, they didn’t have shields. The nearest one fell as bullets tore into it; the one behind staggered into cover.
From past experience I knew that the things killed with their claws: as long as the men could hold them at range, they should be safe. Little was already directing his men into a defensive box, overlapping fields of fire holding the creatures at arm’s length. Two were down, and the remainder were pinned, unable to advance. Something new showed itself in the futures and I turned.
The boy was still holding off Variam’s attacks, but he was focusing on Little’s men. He raised one hand and a dark sphere soared high into the air, arcing down towards us.
A shield of air appeared just as the spell was starting its descent, and it detonated in a silent black flash, wind ruffling my hair. Variam growled. Another pillar of flame exploded around the boy; this time Variam followed it up with a bolt of fire that flew out like a rocket. The black shield soaked it up without a ripple. “Fuck!” Variam shouted. “How is he stopping these?”
“Okay.” I’d been carrying a shortsword sheathed at my hip; it came out with the sound of metal on leather. “Let’s try it up close and personal.”
Variam glanced at me, then nodded. He took a step, his hand coming down to stretch out behind him, but before he could cast his spell, I sensed something new. Without pause, I spun and dashed back towards the security men. “Little!” I shouted. “Behind!”
I saw Sergeant Little look up, startled; as he did the shadows behind his squad moved and one of the creatures stepped out of the wall and ripped a man open in a spray of blood. He went down with a scream and the security men whirled, their formation breaking.
Then Anne was there, running through their ranks. The shadow creature raised its claws and hesitated. Anne didn’t. Her fingers brushed its body and it collapsed, the life seeming to go out of it. Anne was already kneeling by the injured man, working to staunch the flow of blood.
I didn’t have time to watch; that creature hadn’t been the only one to come out of nowhere. Another materialised out of the darkness right next to where I was standing. Or where I’d chosen to stand. I rammed my shortsword through its torso, twisted the blade, ripped it out. The weapon was a low-level focus imbued with a dispelling effect, designed to penetrate shields. The thing staggered and fell. One of the security men ran up next to me and emptied his magazine into it.
Looking around, I could see that the battle had turned messy fast. The formation of Little’s men was disorganised; now instead of keeping the things pinned down, they were backing towards each other, guns sweeping from left to right as they tried to figure out if one would appear behind them. Anne, I called through the dreamstone. Keep the men alive. I’m going to take out the summoner.
Got it.
Ilmarin and Variam had pushed the boy back to the far side of the room. He was standing at the end of the gantry, face set in an expression of concentration, fighting with needle-thin wires of black energy that stabbed and struck. Variam was pressing him, fire blazing from one hand and a flaming sword in the other, trying to get close enough for a killing strike, while Ilmarin hovered in the air.
I sprinted around towards the gantry. It was about ten feet off the floor, and there was no stairway from the angle I was approaching. “Ilmarin,” I called through the communicator. “Need a lift!”
Ilmarin didn’t need to be asked twice. A roaring wind picked me up as I ran, throwing me into the air in an arc aimed precisely down and behind where the boy was standing.
The boy sensed me, turned. Whip-like strands of energy lashed out, trying to cut me in half. In the instant before they struck, I found the futures I needed and twisted; one strand brushed my hair, the other glanced off my leg armour. The impact threw me off-balance and I landed awkwardly, my shortsword bouncing off the boy’s shield.
The boy stared at me from only a few feet away. I was taller than he was, but somehow it felt the other way around; there was a presence behind him, like a shadow looming over his shoulders. There was a strange detached look to his eyes, as though something else was looking through them. Black energy snapped at his fingers, but he didn’t attack. “You will serve.” His voice was normal, weirdly out of place in these surroundings. “Both of you—”