Finally he just decided to go out on his own and see if there was anything for him to do. He wasn't tired yet. Not too tired anyway. Not for floating around like a ghost.
It wasn't until he found the three girls surrounding Judith that he remembered her. They'd kind of packed up and left her all alone. The bullies hadn't forgotten her though and it seemed, that in about twelve seconds, that state would become permanent, because the giant girl was about to lay waste to them all. Hard.
“Freak!” The smaller royal girl in the center of the clutch called out, holding her right arm already. “I'm telling, have fun in prison bitch!”
The other girls made sympathetic noises, but the larger girl just shook her head.
“I'm not going to prison. I'm swinging on the gallows. For your death.” She smiled grimly and pulled something from the pouch on her right hip. It was probably a cutter or force lance.
“Bitch.” Then she hit a sigil and moved in.
Tor chuckled softly, getting everyone’s attention. When they turned around Judith looked at him, not seeming to see him at all at first. The other girls all looked away after a second, except the one on the right hand side, a kind of round faced girl that was tall, and kind of cute, with hair that was black and curly, like what Trice really looked like, but with a tiny nose and funny eyes. He'd seen the look before… In Austra.
“Go away. This is a private matter.” She sounded Austran too. A clipped sound to the voice. Hidden but still there. So, a spy most likely. Hard to tell. If so she wasn't very good, but then how hard would it be to blend in at Lairdgren? People had a lot of different accents there.
Tor just shrugged.
“Is it? Seems an oddly public place for it then. Why don't you all just come with me to the Dean’s office and we'll let you settle it there.” Tor stared at the girl that had spoken, holding her gaze for a second. She finally looked down and away.
“Screw you. We don't have to answer to some little peasant boy. I'm a… Baronetta… and above people like you.” She actually paused before saying it even. It was nearly cute or would have been if Judith wasn't about to cut her and her friends down where they stood.
Of course they'd be fine if they had shields on, and they should all have them. Tor didn't check, that wasn't something that was doable at the moment after all. Instead he just shrugged.
“Oh? A Baronetta? What's your name then?” Tor took a breath, having a sudden, very deep urge to run away. He couldn't though, not really. Instead he moved to Judith's side and tapped the sigil on his chest and made sure all the devices the other girls had were turned off. Then, slowly, casually, he pulled the glossy white weapon in his own right hand pouch and got ready to trigger it.
The first girl answered for the Austran after about fifteen seconds of silence, baffled by her friend’s lack of speaking. Royals were most often very proud of their titles and families after all.
“She's Baronetta Coltress. Ginger Coltress if you must know. Who are you?” The tone was snotty. But then, an entitled noble, who knew, yeah? Tor smiled.
Judith spoke before he could, “He's Master Tor, Y'all never heard of him?” Her accent was thick again, probably due to nerves. The Austran's hand tried to pull something from her left front pocket, so Tor hit the first sigil, a force lance, that picked her up off the ground and slammed her into the soil. The other girls…
Screamed and started trying to run away.
“Judith, subdue them. We need them alive.” Was all he had time for, because the girl on the ground instead of laying very still, a normal reaction to being hit that hard, rolled to the side and sprang to her feet. He took her down again, even as she fought for whatever was in her pocket. Tor was too busy trying to stop the potential spy, who looked about sixteen, from doing anything else to really look at what was happening around him. He did hear the sounds of a fight though. After about a half minute that stopped and someone ran up to him, yelling.
“Stop that right this instant young man!” The voice was dark and filled with lemons still.
Proctor Campbell.
Good.
“Campbell, get this girls hands, don't let her touch her pockets. I can't prove it yet, but she may be an Austran agent.” Tor smiled then. “Or she may just be a girl faking her way into a good school using the name of a dead girl. If it's the later we don't want her hurt, but if it's the first…”
“What?” The man balked for a few seconds.
“Just do it! I don't have time to explain! Hands. Keep them out of her pockets.” The whole time Tor had to keep her pinned down, which stopped the second the black clad bald man stepped in the way. Freaking hell.
Whatever the girl had in her pocket, it wasn't a weapon. At least she seemed to be trying to swallow it. Grand. There was an obvious biting down and about ten seconds later as Campbell stood looking shocked the girl’s mouth started to foam, white first, then pink. Some kind of poison? That or Nanos. That last was confirmed a second later when his shield started sparking with small purple lights, then it turned into a storm of them.
Then the man just fell down, face to the stones of the commons.
“Shields on, get your shields on!” Tor yelled. Judith's already was, but one of the girls on the ground the one that wasn't the ring leader, started to shake and foam too. The hurt girl screamed and tried to run, but had enough presence of mind to turn the shield on herself. The nanos didn't trigger it? Not good. They must have slipped under the girls idea of what was a threat. They'd never encountered them before, so their deep minds didn't know to get the shield in place. A gap in it he'd never even though about.
The people standing around to watch caught on, except a few, who hadn't bothered to wear theirs apparently. The rest lived. Those others died and the healing amulet didn't save them. It just made them nearly die over and over again, until, after several healings, they just died anyway, bodies unable to heal fast enough, even with help. Crap.
Tor didn't know what to do. Not at all. For a few seconds he just sat, but then he shook himself a bit. Right. They had to warn… everyone. Plus there could be another attack.
“Shields on! Spread the word. If you don't have a shield, lock yourself in a room and don't come out until you have the all clear. Go! Tell everyone! There's an Austran attack, shields on!” Damn, his voice was too soft. Judith tried to call it out, and she got volume, but her accent was too heavy for most of the people listening to understand at all.
Except Guide. His accent was much, much clearer, luckily he came running up and after one repetition from Tor started yelling.
“Shields on! Go, tell everyone! Austran attack! Shields on!” He didn't stop screaming it either, bless him. Tor just hoped it worked. After nearly a minute, someone else started repeating it. Then dozens of voices rang out. Thank god.
Tor reached into his pouch and hit the sigil for the palace on his communications device, just floating where he was. Really, he just couldn't think of anything else to do.
“Hello? Tor?” Connie's voice was warm and sounded gentle. Kind even. Happy.
“There's been a nano attack on Lairdgren. Three, no four dead here. I'm standing at the point of attack. I believe it was an Austran agent, but I don't have that confirmed yet. She had the accent and she gave her name as one of the dead girls in the murder investigation going on there. Ginger Coltress. We need to get all the… cargo, pulled from here now. Can you get that done?”
A gasp came from the device, “Is it-”
“None of ours so far. Shields stop it. It was like death dust I think, but different. I don't know how far it will spread, but if they hurry…” He just hoped she got who he meant by “they”. He didn't want to spell it out in case there was more than one agent in place.
“Oh, thank goodness. Yes. It will be done immediately. Take care of yourself too.” The device went silent.
“Right, Judith, Guide? With me. We need to get with the school officials, especially Kolb and his people. Jude, got your flying gear?”
She held up her left hand and showed him the winged glowing design on focus stone.
“Sleep with it.”
“Good, get with Kolb and let him know exactly what happened. We may have more spies or whatever the hell she was. We need to make sure that all the new people are interviewed. Can you do that?”
She didn't wait to say yes, just tapping her hand and flying off without hesitation. Guide watched her for a second.
