Wartorn Obliteration

He gushed with increasing promises of money he didn't actually have on his person at the moment. She gave him free rein, letting him wear himself out. His desperation mounted as each of his offers was met with silence. She still held the bitten-off piece of leaf in view. The soldier's eyes were fastened to it. He gave a last rasping sigh of frustration, then asked, 'What do you want, then?'

'Transport.'

'What?'

She again made to tuck the leaf away.

'No! Right. Right. Transport. What and where?'

'Myself. To someplace other than here.'

'That can't be done,' he breathed.

This time she reached into her pouch beneath her leather armor, extracted a full intact leaf. Turned it in the weak light.

'This is quality you dream about,' she said. 'This isn't weak marketplace rubbish. This is the real stuff. A full leaf of it? Of real quality? Imagine how long this would last you.'

He was doing the arithmetic as she watched, nervous eyes fixed intently. 'But—it isn't—I can't...' Heartbroken voice, forlorn gaze.

Radstac brought out a second leaf.

Something was strangling inside him. 'We... we transport out the wounded. After an engagement we're very busy. But right now, when it's quiet, we just receive supplies. There's very little going out.'

'Someone will be traveling with me,' she said as she took out a third leaf.

His gnawing aching need was almost palpable. But it took a fourth leaf to finalize the arrangements for her and Deo's escape.

* * *

It was a matter of clever official lies. But in the end, it was only a matter of that one Felk soldier's vulgar want.

The wizards paid them no mind, other than to perfunctorily instruct the two of them on the proper procedure while moving between the portals. Walk a straight line toward the far portal exit point. Do not deviate. Do not linger. Keep eyes focused ahead and ignore the disorienting surroundings.

Radstac couldn't remember if she'd visited the Isthmus city before. It was in the northern reaches, but it was entirely possible that at some stage in her mercenary past she had either fought for or against the city- state.

It wouldn't have been her first choice of destination. And it certainly wasn't Deo's. This magic-abetted excursion would put them deep inside Felk-held territory, far behind the southward advancing lines. But they didn't have the luxury of choosing where they went. Staying here meant risking, at every moment, being discovered as impostors. Or, much worse, as the ones responsible for Weisel's attempted assassination. Better then to go. Go anywhere.

Deo gave her a furtive assuring nod, as they stood side by side, waiting for the magicians to coordinate their efforts with their distant counterparts. Deo was affecting confidence and ease, for her benefit and probably for his own, a means of bolstering himself up for the unknown perils ahead, for whatever they would find when they reached the occupied city of Callah.

The watch was late. Night was heavy over the camp, overcast obstructing the stars. It was cool enough to bring out gooseflesh on Radstac's arms.

'Are you ready?' Deo asked her unnecessarily, his voice a whisper.

'I am.' She frowned. Then understood. Deo knew what this jaunt was costing her. She had paid in the only currency possible. Deo was accustomed to wealth, to access to vast resources. But coin wouldn't have bought them this passage. Only an addict's cravings could have persuaded a member of this Felk army to arrange for an illegal transport, all while a search was still in progress for whoever had tried to murder this same army's general.

Still, it was quite a fee she was paying. Those four full mansid leaves were her last. All she had now was that last pitiful little piece... and the effects from what she'd chewed earlier. The fantastic clarity of that was still with her, but it was lessening incrementally, wearing off.

She would be facing quite a challenge in the days ahead if she didn't manage to find more leaves in Callah, a Felk-controlled city.

Deo gave her another nod. There was warmth in his blue eyes, understanding, sympathy. Radstac had stood by him, her employer, when he'd gone off on this mad endeavor. Though she wasn't one to make such assumptions, she felt sure he would stay with her through whatever hardships were still to come.

The Far Speak mage had completed the necessary communications. The Far Movement mage, matching the efforts of his complement in Callah, now opened the portal. It was a wavering breach, a hole torn through the air, through the substance of what Radstac had always understood to be reality. She was from the Southern Continent, a far more civilized place than this Isthmus, where magic wasn't regarded with the same cultural fears. Even so, it was an act of unsteady faith to step inside that hole, into a world of milky uneasiness and chaotic perceptions.

PRAULTH (1)

There came a winking impression of speed and danger, a quick whisk of wind across her nose. Then a hard chunk sounded from the tree trunk on her left, just off the road, and a single leaf, brittle but still a spectral green in the autumn climate, detached itself from an overhanging limb and twirled to the ground.

Praulth, her reaction delayed and exaggerated and unproductive, seized her horse's reins violently and yanked with all her muscle. This succeeded only in causing the animal to make a frightened noise and rear, which consequently dumped Praulth off the saddle and onto the road.

Around her was a suddenly terrifying confusion of hooves. These were Xink and Merse's horses. Both men were still in their saddles. Praulth put her hand to her nose, quite certain she'd been struck there, by whatever that thing had been, whatever projectile...

She looked to the left and saw the arrow embedded in the tree. Her hand came away from her nose unbloodied. The feathers on that arrow must have brushed her. It had been that close.

Xink was hastily swinging down from his mount. 'Praulth, are you hurt? Are you—are...' His normally handsome face was a rictus of concern as he knelt over her.

She nearly shoved him away as he helped her sit upright. She gathered what breath she'd had knocked out of her by the fall.

'Tend the horses, you two!' Merse called angrily, reaching over to grab up the loose reins of Praulth's mount. Xink's horse was shuffling about skittishly.

Now Praulth did give Xink a shove. 'Get the beast before he tramples me to death.' She was more confident on horseback now than when they'd left the University at Febretree, bound for Petgrad, but she was never going to be an accomplished rider. Merse had set the punishing pace. It was urgent they get where they were going.

As Xink wrangled his horse to a standstill, Praulth realized for the first time the true peril of this situation. That arrow! It had nearly taken her nose off, yes. But who had fired it? Was their party being... being waylaid?

She scrambled to her feet, heart pounding. Merse was still atop his horse. He now had a knife in hand. He would surely laugh at her for her slow reflexes—if they had occasion later to reflect back on this incident. Merse was the Petgradite messenger who had fetched her from the University.

This stretch of road was abutted on either side by dense foliage. But the arrow was sticking in that tree on this side; so it had to have come from that side of the roadway. Praulth peered into the woods. The day was early—Merse had barely permitted a watch of sleep—and there was a maze of shadows amongst those trees.