As soon as Cat was alone with the prisoner, he had done something to make the shackles corrode away and drop off. Then he pulled the claw weapon out of a pocket dimension. She didn’t think anybody else knew how to do that. She backed away and tried to throw her magic at him, but nothing would work. Her pocket dimension was closed to her. Even her shapeshifting abilities were gone. She searched for an anti-magic field, but there wasn’t one. That’s when she’d first noticed that nature had ceased. The birds in the trees, the animals, even the breeze. The air wasn’t just still; it was stopped. Everything was stopped. Time was frozen.
“Hello, you!” the wizard greeted her with a voice that seemed entirely wrong for his body.
“How are you doing this?” she gasped.
“Ah well, that’s the thing,” he replied. “You’ll never know now. Not this time.”
He advanced on her with a wicked grin, slashing the air with his claws. She tried to run, but she couldn’t move. She called out, but within just a few yards, the sound abruptly stopped.
His laugh chilled her to the bone, but that was as nothing to her reaction when he told her what he was planning to do to her. She was going to die a horrible, painful, pointless death, but that wasn’t the half of it. There was more. What he had told her next, she could not comprehend. She refused to tell her friends what it was.
“I can’t,” she insisted. “I’m sorry, I just can’t. It doesn’t matter, anyway – he’s not going to get the chance to do it, thanks to her.” She indicated the white aura.
The white figure had materialised and charged at the wizard. There was a brief struggle until the entity did something that broke the wizard’s weapon, which fell uselessly to the ground. Then Time had restarted.
“Your agency and powers are returned to you,” the entity had told her with a distant feminine voice.
*****
Back in the present, Cat called out to her girlfriend. “Hey, Dreya, you might be interested in this. You know you’ve got your power words, well, I’ve created one of my own.”
She reminded Dreya of the time a group of clerics used their congregation to attack her because they believed replicating Holy Water was blasphemy. When she finally tracked down the clerics themselves, she had used her magic to reflect their hatred of her back on themselves. Her power distorted their beliefs so that they would obey her instructions as if they were commands from their gods. She did it, not because they tried to kill her, but because they had violated innocent people and placed them in harm’s way to do it. Even children. She’d told the clerics to drown themselves in their precious Holy Water, and they had; compelled by their devotion to her, fuelled by their hatred.
“I remember,” Dreya replied. Mandalee and Daelen also knew the story.
“Well, I didn’t think anything could sicken me more than what those clerics did, but this one has just found a whole new level to sink to. So, I’ve created a power word version of that same spell especially for the occasion.”
“What did you call it?” asked the sorceress.
“What else could I call a spell that takes unreasoning hate and changes it into unthinking devotion?” She turned her attention back to the renegade wizard, encouraging him to focus on all of his hatred for his ‘target’. Then, she cancelled all other magic, directed her will and her gaze upon the prisoner and said, “LOVE.”
Immediately, he dropped to his knees and begged. “Command me, Mistress! Let me please you! I’ll do anything!”
“First of all, without repeating what you were going to do, please confirm for me: was that your free will? Something you wanted to do?”
“Oh, yes, Mistress!” he affirmed. “I so much wanted to do it!”
“And is it true that you’ve killed other innocent people before?”
“Many times, Mistress.”
“And if given a chance, would you do the same to others?”
“Again and again and again, Mistress,” he grinned excitedly.
“Why?”
He looked puzzled for a moment, as if he’d never considered the question before, and then answered, simply, “For fun, Mistress.”
“Then there is only one thing you can do for me,” Cat commanded with a voice as hard as steel. “Walk away. Walk far away and keep walking. I don’t care where you go, as long as it’s away. You may stop to drink and rest as often as you need to, but you will be unable to eat. Your vile hunger would continue to cause the deaths of innocents. This way, the only death your hunger will lead to is your own. That will please me very much. Now go.”
The wizard leapt up and cried out in joy, “Yes, Mistress! I will go away and die as you command. Thank you for letting me do this for you, Mistress!”
Without another word, then, he simply walked away.
The white aura spoke to Catriona once more, “I have to go, too. Don’t worry – they won’t understand now, but they will one day. Take care, Catriona.”
The aura faded until she vanished altogether.
Cat ignored her friends’ horrified looks. Even Dreya had a puzzled frown on her face that told her even she couldn’t imagine what had driven such a response. The druidess didn’t want to deal with them at the moment, though, so she immediately shifted to owl form and flew away to see to her long-delayed scouting job.
*****
When Catriona found the barrier around Kullos’ hidden army, she probed it gently with her magical senses. It seemed safe enough. As she watched, other birds were flying through it without incident, so she tentatively lowered herself through it. It tingled a bit, possibly trying to identify what she was, so she concentrated on being as owl-like as possible. That way, any such detection magic should register her as a bird and remain unconcerned. As she breached the barrier, there appeared to be no call to arms, no sense that anyone thought anything out of the ordinary was happening. Encouraged, she began to fly around, taking in the scene below.
She estimated that Kullos’ army must number into the thousands, about half of which were demons. Mostly Lesser ones, but there were several dozen Greater Demons, from the deeper planes. The other half of his army was mostly comprised of humans and Faery, but there were other creatures, too, that Cat did not recognise. They didn’t seem to be demons – they didn’t have the right magical signature for that. Catriona puzzled over the issue for a moment. If they were neither from Tempestria nor from the higher or lower planes, what did that leave? She quickly reached the only logical conclusion: aliens. They had to be. It made sense – if Daelen could create portals to other worlds, then so could Kullos.
She didn’t know whether they were here willingly or whether they had been coerced. Come to that, she didn’t know how many Tempestrians were here because they supported Kullos and how many were here against their will. She didn’t want to be a party to killing innocent people, no matter what world they were from, but this was war. She and her friends were heavily outnumbered, so there was no fighting this war defensively. Cat could see plenty of opportunities for crowd control: wells provided water, campfires burned for warmth and cooking, and despite being in the middle of the desert, a few hardy plants still grew. All could serve the needs of her druid magic, but it wasn’t enough. They had to do what Mandalee had done when she’d been forced to fight more than fifty alone: attack. Hit hard, hit fast, make every strike kill, no hesitation, no mercy. If only there were some non-lethal way to take the mortals out of the fighting, and let justice sort the willing from the unwilling later. She had no qualms about slaughtering demons. Mandalee had been doing it for years, and with no innocents getting in the way, Dreya could unleash mass devastation with blood magic, power words and beam cannon blasts. If their allies grouped around Michael, it would be simple enough to avoid targeting that area. But to facilitate that, Cat needed more information.
Gradually, night gave way to day, as it always does, and Cat was beginning to think a nocturnal owl might start to look suspicious, so she found a secluded spot to quickly shift to falcon form, instead. Taking to the sky once more, the falcon, with her super sharp eyesight spotted the solution: a single Red robe sorceress. She’d met her only once, years ago, but she’d made an impression. She was the reason Cat had embarked on this quest in the first place: Justaria, the missing Triumvirate representative. At last, she’d found her. But how to talk to her without arousing suspicion?
Keeping an eye on her position, Cat stopped worrying about the people and demons, and instead focussed on nature. People tended to think of deserts as barren, lifeless places, but it was still home to many varieties of animal and plant life. There were palm trees, willows, and cacti, as well as flowering plants, including yellow marigolds and white lilies. Once again, Blessed Alycia, Mother of Nature had provided all a skilled druid needed. It was time to plagiarise one of Justaria’s ideas.
Remaining in bird form, she subtly used her magic to encourage more lilies and marigolds to grow together near a palm tree on the edge of Kullos’ territory, close to the barrier, not far from where Justaria was sitting. Then she bent all the lilies so that they were pointing towards the tree. Just one final component to add. She didn’t know how to do it with magic, so that meant the hands-on approach. Trouble was, she knew Kullos and his forces were on the lookout for her, and she couldn’t afford to be spotted. But there was another option. She hadn’t used it for years – Cat had promised she never would – but under the circumstances, she could see no other way. Being careful not to be seen, Catriona landed behind the tree and shifted into the shape of someone she used to know well: Jacob. Maybe she’d look him up when this was over, she considered. That might be nice. She wasn’t sure of the accuracy of the image in her mind, but it didn’t have to be perfect. Compartmentalising one part of her mind to keep concentrating on holding this unfamiliar shape, she reached out with her sympathic communication, trying to project something into Justaria’s mind: ‘Friendship, tree, quiet, care’.
It wasn’t easy trying to get through the mental defences of a sorceress as skilled as Justaria, but she knew she could do it. The key was subtlety. The gentler she was, the less of a threat she seemed. As a side-effect, this meant Justaria was less likely to be startled by the impressions in her mind. It took patience, but after a few moments, Justaria’s body language began to change, as if she were getting an idea and trying to make it take shape.
As Cat projected, ‘flowers, tree,’ Justaria’s expression was one of curiosity, not suspicion. She wasn’t sure why she wanted to look at these yellow and white flowers so much but could see no harm in the idea. She was a nature lover, after all, and missed her garden. That thought was the trigger. Suddenly, she could see how the white lilies were bent, even though their yellow marigold neighbours were standing straight. This was just like what she had done with the white daisies and yellow buttercups around that old oak tree at home, back when Kullos came for her. Her hopes elevated, but she was conscious of the need to not draw attention. Rather than approach the tree directly, then, she spent the next five minutes casually wandering around, even calling out greetings to people along the way as she usually would. Her stroll appeared random but was, in fact, a carefully calculated route to take her naturally back to that palm tree.
Waiting for her, was a young lad, probably no more than eighteen, wearing the red robes of a wizard. She thought she knew all the wizards in Kullos’ camp, but she didn’t recognise this one. She had believed Kullos had stopped ‘recruiting’ as he was expecting an imminent attack.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“A friend,” the wizard answered, pointing to a carving in the tree that read ‘CAT’. “Think back a few years to a particular Conclave for a certain young druid girl, facing charges brought by old Renjaf.”
“Conclave records are public domain,” she scowled, suspiciously. “Anyone could know about the one you’re talking about. It doesn’t confirm who you are.”
“I know,” Cat agreed with a nod, “but I also know what happened after that – the private chat you had with that young druid girl.” She relayed the entire conversation, as close to word-for-word as she could recall. “In the end,” she continued, “you told me that you thought you were doing me a favour by kicking me out of college and letting me learn my own way.” She smiled. “You were right.”
“Catriona!” Justaria gasped, with a broad smile. Then with a mock frown, she took in how Cat looked and scolded her, “I thought we agreed you weren’t going to do this again.”
“What can I say? Old habits,” Cat quipped.
Justaria grinned. In reality, it wasn’t hard to guess why she was disguised this way. Taking the form of another person was illegal, but that law had never been formulated with this situation in mind.
“Still a handful of trouble, I see.”
“Oh, two handfuls by now, at least,” Cat returned.
“I see you got my message,” Justaria remarked, raising a hand to indicate the tree.
Cat nodded. “A whole team of wizards missed it before I got there,” she replied, asking nature to carefully remove all trace of her own handiwork. She briefly outlined the circumstances and apologised for making such a mess of her stable and garden, and then stealing her horse. She assured her that he was stabled at Kingsville Piers, where they would no doubt take good care of him.
More illegal actions. More crimes committed in the name of doing the right thing. Justaria promised that Cat would receive a full pardon and a commendation for her resourcefulness.
“Now, for my next trick,” Cat quipped, “it’s time to get you out of here.”
“How?” asked Justaria. “If escaping were that easy, don’t you think I would have done it by now?”
“That had occurred to me. I just look at things a bit differently. The barrier allows passage in only one direction, right?”
“You know about that?” Justaria asked raising a questioning eyebrow.
“Well, (a) it makes sense, and (b) I noticed the birds.” Specifically, she’d noticed the birds flying into Kullos’ zone, but none flying out.
“And you came in anyway?”
Cat shrugged. “I’ve been in way worse traps than this.”
Between her attempts to unlock Time Magic and the incident with the prisoner, she’d had a horrible night. Today was a new day and she was damned if a mere barrier of higher planar energy was going to stop her. Two failures were her limit.
Justaria explained that her investigations had begun to reveal a pattern to the abductions, favouring those who had publicly indicated mistrust in Daelen’s brand of ‘protection’. That made it easier for Kullos to persuade them of Daelen’s ill intent – his story fitted with what they already believed was true. To test her hypothesis, Justaria had begun to vocalise her own support for Kullos over Daelen. She assured Cat that that wasn’t the case.
“Quite honestly,” she admitted, “between Kullos, Daelen and that dark clone of his, I wasn’t sure which one to trust, if any. All I wanted was to gather independent information in hopes of sharing it at some crucial moment before any confrontation happened.”
“That’s why I’m getting you out of here,” Cat told her. “I’m on a mission, a quest with some powerful friends. I came here tonight to scout around, but finding you is even better. If you’ll come with me, you’ll finally get the chance to share your information.”
“But how do we get through the barrier?” Justaria asked. “I’ve never found a weakness.”
“Kullos is powerful, but not that smart,” Cat opined. “He’s done what you wizards do – created a dome shield instead of a bubble. Want to know how I know?” she asked.
Justaria nodded, so Cat pointed out the palm tree by which they stood. Some of the roots were slightly exposed near the trunk before disappearing under the sand. A few of them were heading towards the barrier. She’d seen similar roots on the other side of the shield, snaking out from the interior, still connected to their parent tree, still gathering water from deep underground.
“If the shield prevents living things from passing through from this side, how have those roots not been cut off and died? Conclusion: the barrier doesn’t extend that far down, which means a dome shield, not a bubble.”
Cat could get herself out at any time by burrowing in mole form, but Justaria was going to need something a bit larger. She could fuse sand into glass for her Nature’s Mirror, but for this, she was going to need to shape a tunnel at the same time. That required concentration and time.
“Mistress Justaria,” she addressed the Red leader, formally, “while I’m doing this, could you please collect some of those marigold flowers for me?”
“What for?” Justaria asked.
“My friends would call it a ridiculous radical plan because those little flowers are going to help me solve a problem and save a lot of lives.”
Asking no further questions, the high-ranking sorceress did as the druid asked until the tunnel was complete – an underpass with walls of glass. Justaria admitted she wouldn’t have the first idea how to do that.
“That’s OK,” Cat assured her, “we all have different strengths. Speaking of which, how are you with illusion magic?”
“Not bad, why?”
“Could you hide the entrance? We don’t want anyone to know there’s been a breach, and if my plan with the flowers works, I’m afraid you’re going to have to come back later.”