Chapter 17

Regina leaned against the wall and watched as Lance dispatched the soldier. He made it look easy. He killed the man with a couple efficient movements. He then stepped back and cleaned his sword with an annoyed air, like wiping mud spattered on nice clothes.

She stared at Lance, wincing at a sharp pain when she drew breath. The man in front of her had done magic. He was a trained thaumaturge and a master swordsman. Those two things meant he was palace trained. The king possessed the only school that trained thaumaturges. And that was secret. Rumor was, anyone with wild magic was killed. Regina had never seen anyone with wild magic, except Tythos.

“You’re part of King’s Shadow then?” Regina said.

“Oh,” Lance said, “My-my, but how your thick accent is much improved.”

“Bastardo.”

“Don’t curse at me you ill-bread strumpet.”

Regina laughed, which sent a flash of pain through her ribs,

“Strumpet? This is not one I’ve heard.”

Lance looked her up and down, “Yes, typically strumpets are more frilly. You’re more of a gutter-snipe.”

“You are full of sour grapes for someone I saved interrogation.”

Lance laughed, a full bellied, round laugh, full of genuine mirth.

“Who saved whom just now?” He put his sword away and waggled a finger at her. “I had everything under control, until you came in like a whirling dervish.”

“What is dervish?”

“A wild dancer from an extinct culture, let’s stay on topic.”

“You brought up.”

“I can’t help it you’re uneducated, just save your questions until after the lecture.” His tone hardened, “Why are you here? Do you have a contract for one of the party?”

Regina saw a dangerous light in his eyes. She realized she didn’t have a chance if he saw her coming. She shook her head.

“No. I’ll make deal with you.”

Lance raised an eyebrow, “Oh? And what would that be?”

“Equal exchange, I keep your secret, you keep mine.”

Lance smirked, “Okay, give me your secret first, and I’ll say if the exchange is equal.”

Regina scowled, “Contract came in to be shadow to Tythos Tyrannous Rex. I believed he dead. I want contract very badly, so I push hard to get. Now I’ve accept job to disappear anyone who recognizes Tythos as we travel across country.”

Lance considered this for a moment. Finally he nodded.

“Okay, but I catch a sniff you’ve told anyone about me, I’ll squash you like a bug.”

Regina glanced at the blood-spray on the wall where the commander had hit. When she glanced back at Lance he was smiling.

“Yes,” he said. “Like that.”

“You could have done this to all five?”

“I can do it again,” Lance said, his voice light, but his eyes hard.

“I don’t ask for threat, only curious.” She shook her head. “Peony is only thaumaturge I meet. And you know how he is— no good to ask him question.”

Lance cursed, “I forgot about the kid! We need to get to the horses before he sets them on fire!”

He took several steps toward the door, then looked down at his feet in disgust. He began checking the feet of the dead soldiers.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” he muttered. “I’m gonna kill him.”

“Who is it you are going to kill?”

“That churlish, hell-hated, long-bearded bastard!” Lance held up a socked foot. “When he did… whatever he did to me, I came back without my boots!”

Regina blinked at him.

“This is what has your balls in twist?”

Lance made a face at her, “Refrain from speaking of my anatomy. Do you have any idea how much those boots cost?” He looked at her for a moment. “Put on some normal person clothes. If Peony sees you in that getup, everyone he meets is going to hear about it.”

Lance resumed his search of the dead soldiers and Regina went to put on her gear.

“Never seen a man so love his boots,” she said under her breath.

“That’s because you’ve never seen boots that were actually made to fit the feet of the man.”

She glanced over at him, he was tugging a pair of good looking boots on with a look of disgust on his face. He had sharp hearing. She shook her head and quickly resumed putting on her layers.

“I want to something,” she said, as she worked. “Why you no do that to Tythos?” She pointed at the ruin of the commander with her chin.

Lance growled an answer, “I tried. Gods know why, but they wouldn’t cooperate when I called. It was like they were afraid of him.”

“They?”

“Never-mind, my judgment is being clouded by this shoddy footwear.”

Bird burst in through the still open front door, panting and looked around the room with a horrified expression.

“You unbelievable assholes,” he said, looking at the bodies, then shot Lance and Regina a reprimanding look.

Lance looked up at him, nonplussed,

“What?”

“Dragon,” Bird said. “Run!”

He turned and disappeared out the door. Lance and Regina exchanged a look and sprinted after him.

***

As Peony entered the stable at a run one of the horses startled. It let out a rising prolonged note. He stopped and looked at the horse.

“That’s it!” He pointed at the horse, “You’re a genius! Why didn’t I think of that?”

He walked over to pet the horse on the nose. It let out a grumbling nicker and tried to bite his hand. Peony jerked his hand back and shrugged.

“Grumpy,” he waggled his finger at the animal. “Even so, you’re still a genius!”

Peony cleared a wide space on the floor, lit a lantern and began to draw. The note the horse uttered matched one of the vocalizations of the incantation for fire. The horse had given Peony an idea.

He used a stick to sketch the sigil in the dirt. It came out muddled and indistinct. He wiped it out and started over, drawing it bigger.

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He began vocalizing some warm ups as he drew. If his idea was going to have a chance of working, he needed to be able to sustain a single note while he drew the sigil in his mind. This should solve the timing issue. The tricky part would be holding the note without wavering. If he wasn’t pitch perfect, the underlying structure fell apart.

Peony held the lantern high, inspecting his work. He grinned. Drawing the sigil big was faster. Taking a deep breath, he picked up a piece of straw and sang the incantation. He held the last note, for what he guessed would be long enough. This note was short and he had never prolonged it before. His instructors were very rigid about incantations. Tone, timing and tempo. The faster the better. If he wanted to be a thaumaturge, he needed to cast at the speed of thought. He didn’t know if the incantation would work, with the timing all stretched out in one part. He would have been punished back in the tower if he was heard mangling it like this.

Peony formed both the piece of straw and the flame in his mind, and released the note. The bright flame Peony expected didn’t appear. Deflated, lowered his hand.

“The timing must be too far off.”

One of the horses blew and stamped.

“You’re right, just because this timing is off, doesn’t mean they all will be.”

Peony held up the piece of straw, ready to try again. He blinked. A soft glow emanated from the straw, illuminating his hand.

“What…”

He trailed off as the glow became brighter, turning orange. It continued to build, becoming a white Peony had to squint to see. The light snapped off, leaving spots in his vision. He blinked, trying to see what had become of the straw. His fingers began to scream at him. He yelped and stuck them in his mouth. He made a face and pulled them out, spitting ash onto the ground. He shook his fingers. They throbbed with the familiar pain of a burn. He snatched up another piece of straw, beginning the vocalization. What would happen if he held it longer?

“You’re a skinny waif, but you got a lovely voice,” said a gruff voice behind him.

Peony whirled, faltering the note he was singing. A pair of soldiers stood a couple feet away, big smiles on their faces.

“Oh, hello,” said Peony.

Both men’s smiles melted. One looked confused, the other angry.

“You’re not a girl!” Said the angry one.

“Umm, no,” said Peony.

He glanced back down at the piece of straw he held. He wanted to try varying more of the notes in the incantation. He’d never been allowed to experiment like this before.

“You sure it’s not a girl?” Said the confused one. “You know how these commons can go scarecrow like this one.”

“Hey, common! Look at us when we’re talking to you!” Said the angry one.

“Hmm?” Peony looked up. “Oh, I’m not a common.”

The angry one stepped forward and planted a fist in Peony’s gut. Peony doubled over. The explosion happening inside of him was worse than a burn.

“Shut up!” Said the man, standing over him. “I said look at us, I didn’t say speak!”

Peony discovered he couldn’t breathe. The soldiers were saying something else, but not being able to breath made it hard to focus on what they were saying. He felt lightheaded and put a hand on the ground to keep from tipping over. He’d never been hit this hard before. The pain was fantastic. It also seemed to have locked up his insides somehow. He noticed that the straw under his nose was almost laid out in a pattern.

‘Could a sigil be made out of straw?’ He wondered.

Something in his chest unlocked, which was a strange idea, and Peony gasped in a breath. When he gasped out, the straw moved.

‘Hmm,’ Peony thought. ‘Using straw to make a sigil could be problematic… unless… the connection points of the pieces of straw could be held together with wax. Then perhaps the sigil could even be made portable.’

Peony thought about drawing on the wood with charcoal. That charcoal had been made from wood, so perhaps there was a law of similarity at play.

‘Would a sigil work if drawn on wood with ink?’ Peony wondered. ‘Maybe not the best example. Some inks are made from plants. Perhaps I could draw a sigil with blood to test this out.’

Peony got to his feet, studying the straw on the floor.

‘If I made a sigil out of straw,’ he thought, ‘It wouldn’t really be connected to anything. What would it affect then? The air?’

Peony startled as a finger was snapped under his nose. He followed the arm and saw it was connected to a soldier.

‘Oh yeah!’ Peony thought. ‘I think he’s the one who hit me. Wait, he hit me! That’s not right, I’m a king’s thaumaturge.’

“Hey!” The soldier who’d snapped said. “We’re talking to you! You get kicked in the head as girl?”

Peony had opened his mouth to tell the soldiers he was a thaumaturge, he was simply out of uniform, when what the solder said caught up with him.

‘Kicked in the head as a girl?’ Peony thought. ‘That’s rather vague. How is a girl kicked, and how does it differ from anything else that can be kicked in the head? I can’t possibly answer that question without knowing more about how a girl is kicked.’

Peony blinked at the man and smiled,

“Can you be more specific?” He said.

The other soldier slapped the first solder on the arm, “I told you he was simple.”

“I still say it’s a she,” said the first.

Peony had no idea what they were talking about. He figured they must be continuing a conversation they’d already been having. His fingers ached with the burn. This reminded him. He looked down at the straw, wondering about how elongation of the last note had changed the effect. What would happen if he used it on steel?

Peony could work with fire. He had received a lot of attention in the tower because thaumaturges attuned to fire were rare. As a thaumaturge, you couldn’t control or change what you became attuned to. The fire attunement was rare enough that Peony was the only one living. The other two that had been discovered had accidentally killed themselves in training. Set themselves on fire.

Thaumaturgy, as a practice, had only been taught for the last ten years. So everyone in the tower called it new magic. Magic had been around before the school— of course— but never so well documented and studied. Peony had received the notes of the previous two fire attuned, and been instructed by the same instructors.

He was first, and rigorously, drilled in tone and pitch before he was taught about the mind structures that would allow him to use the incantations. He was then forbidden from any deviation from the three known safe incantations. They’d been named by the instructors, but Peony had his own names for the three. Ignite, engulf (which Peony thought of as a bigger version of ignite) and dragon’s breath. Peony had never seen a dragon, but the way fire leapt forward and washed over whatever was in its path when he used it, made him think of a dragon.

Dragon’s breath only worked if he had a fire stored, by using engulf backward. He could only store one. That reminded him, he’s stored one so big that he had passed out. He should be careful with the next dragon’s breath, it was bound to be bigger than ever.

Looking at the straw at his feet, remembering the way the piece of straw had heated up, just like being placed in the heart of a fire, Peony needed to know if he could do it again. This was something completely new.

A shove sent Peony stumbling back and he sat down hard. He blinked up at the man who’d shoved him.

‘The soldiers are still here,’ Peony thought. ‘Didn’t I tell them I’m a thaumaturge? I can’t remember.’

“I’m a thaumaturge,” Peony said.

Both men started laughing. Peony wasn’t sure what was funny. That was fine. Most of the time he didn’t understand what it was that other people found funny. He smiled up at the men, trying to be polite. Then he remembered they’d hit him and shoved him. That was ok. They’d thought he was a common. He shook his head and began to get up.

One of the soldiers drew his sword, stepped forward and swung it. Peony saw it coming. It was moving through the air toward his head in slow motion. This was curious. Peony tried to move out of the way, only to discover he was moving in slow motion too. He realized the sword was actually moving quickly, it was only his perception that made the movement look slow. The flat of the sword made contact with Peony’s head and everything sped up.

Peony crumpled to the straw. His head was ringing. He tried to move, but his arms and legs weren’t doing what he told them to. He made it to his hand and knees, and decided to stay there until things stopped spinning. This pain was also different than being burned. This one felt worse than the punch. He could still breathe though, which was nice. He watched a sting of drool escape his mouth.

‘I should close my mouth,’ Peony thought.

He found that his lips were being as uncooperative as his arms and legs. So he watched the string slowly creep toward the ground.

“Did you hear what the common said?” Said one of the soldiers.

“Sure did, Early,” said the other.

“Impersonatin a citizen and speaking of magic in the same breath.”

“Law says we put this one down for either one of those.”

“Should’ve aimed lower than thaumaturge.”

Peony’s head was jerked back

“In your next life, try picking something that isn’t imaginary.”

The man holding his head drew back the sword he was holding.

“Early, wait,” said the other man.

“What?” Said Early.

“I bet a copper this is a girl.”

“Yeah? I’ll take that action.”

Early drew back the sword again.

“Early?”

The sword was lowered and he dropped Peony’s head.

“What now?”

“Let’s settle the bet before we kill em.”

Early chuckled, “All right, but we gotta be quick about it. You know how commander Longmire gets.”

“That’s fine. As soon as we settle the bet— and have a little fun, maybe— I’ll bash her pretty little head in.”

“You mean his pretty little head. You’re about to lose money.”

Peony realized these men were going to kill him. This was a new and strange thought. King’s men had always been helpful and courteous. He had thought of them as protectors. Peony had some ability to move returning. He tried to get up, but he didn’t have that much control yet. His head was also clearing and the ability to think was returning. He literally had the senses knocked out of him. He thought that was only an expression. He wondered what other expressions were literally true. He would never find out now.

Peony realized he was looking at the marks of the sigil he had drawn in the dirt. Perhaps he could find out one more thing.

Peony sang the notes of ignite, he was so practiced with this one he could do it in less than a second, and he did that now. He held the last note, drawing the sigil in his mind, reached out his hand, and touched the line in the dirt. He released the note.

Blue light began to fill the lines in the dirt, flowing like a liquid from Peony’s hand.

“It worked!” Peony said.

He realized both of the soldiers were standing inside of the sigil he’d drawn. They were looking down at the light beneath their feet. Feet that were scuffing the marks Peony had drawn. His hair stood on end. His skin prickled.

Peony’s eyes grew wide and he rolled away from the glowing sigil. His whole world was consumed by the brightest light he’d ever seen. Something took hold of his body and made him go rigid. Then the air exploded. Peony was thrown forward into the wall and the light turned off.

***