Millennial Mage

Tala continued cursing herself as she was whipped backwards.

She did, however, pause her inner tirade for an instant chuckle. Ha, ‘whipped backwards.’ Because I’m being pulled by a whip.

She jerked to a stop, and back to the matter at hand, and immediately began moving forward after Terry, her anchor preventing her from getting any further from her partner’s collar and the dimensional anchor affixed there.

The strain was too great on the juggernaut’s weapon, and the woven length of vines frayed and shattered behind her, just leaving the length wrapped around her waist.

Tala, once again, slammed into the ground face first, her mind overcome with nausea.

Terry trilled, and Tala’s enhanced hearing heard him slide to a halt and juke back her way.

Because of that, her dimensional sliding came to a quick end.

That was…unideal.

Even so, she still had enemies bearing down upon her from behind. She needed to keep moving.

With a great effort of will, she pushed herself back up to stand on her own two feet, or at least, she tried.

The portion of the vine-whip that had wrapped around her was now anchored deeply into the ground, seemingly growing roots, even as it spread across her. Even with her enhanced strength, she was stuck fast.

Trapped as she was, Tala still wasn’t helpless against the Leshkin who were almost upon her.

Her sphere slammed into a lesser’s chest, knocking it back, as her rod tripped up a warrior only a handful of feet from her.

With Flow in the form of a knife, Tala sliced across herself with almost frenzied abandon, feeling her ending power drain to defend from each cut, followed by the distinct magical signature of the elk leathers expending power to pull back together.

The vines, also, continued to grow, even as the cuts tried to pull back together. Thankfully, the heat of Flow’s blade, even in knife form, had somewhat cauterized the vegetation, making it much more difficult for the plant to regenerate.

Get… Cut, slash, flail. FREE!

She was finally able to jerk herself out of the suffocating vines, and she stumbled upright.

Terry almost tackled her from behind, knocking her onto his back once again.

She barely caught his collar and righted herself as the avian veered to the side, and away from the jagged wave of oncoming enemies.

Blessedly, Terry was able to steer back northward, circumnavigating the screaming mini hoard.

Now on the lookout for it, Tala was able to intercept, or otherwise thwart, a myriad of thrown, or otherwise long range, attacks.

Terry outright dodged any thrown Leshkin while barely slowing.

In a couple of instances, Tala felt dimensional energies build within her friend, but they always faded without him flickering away to leave her to her fate.

His instincts are telling him to abandon me, but he’s not leaving.

She suppressed the wetness in her eyes. Now was hardly the time for sentiment, and blurry vision could well get them both killed. Still, she could do nothing about the grin tugging at her face.

Despite everything, she was still keeping a tight rein on her aura, only letting it extend in specific places to allow for the manipulation of her bloodstars.

Something deep within her made her feel that it was utterly imperative to keep her aura restrained and under her control. Wisdom prevailed as she continued to listen to that deep something. If help is coming from Rane or the caravan, they’ll have to find another way to find me than tracking my aura.

They were making a lot of noise, between them and their pursuers, as Tala and Terry continued their skirmishing retreat, circling north as much as possible. They can probably hear this ruckus from miles off…

She really hoped that nothing else would follow that sound and find them, adding to the complexity of the situation.

Finally, when the inside edge of the tree line was in sight and the gloriously brilliant, snow-covered grasslands were before them, their progress hit a snag of monstrous proportions.

Two juggernauts slammed into the ground directly in their way, blocking the narrow path between two trees just a hundred yards in front of them.

Not seeming fazed in the slightest by their ballistic impacts, the two vaulted to their feet, weapons at the ready. Each held a tower shield that was actually on the small side for them, while still being just taller than Tala, while she rode on Terry.

The one to Tala’s right wielded a greathammer one-handed that was large enough that it would easily have required Rane to use two hands. The other pointed at her with a flanged mace of dark, dense wood, clearly a gesture of violent intent.

Her first thought? I want those weapons for Flow. It was an odd, disjointed thought, as she’d not focused on that when surrounded by juggernaut weapons. It was probably because she was nearing the end of her mental endurance, and her thoughts were becoming less directed.

Her second thought? I really want to survive this… The significance of that thought didn’t register in the slightest as she immediately began mentally scrambling for a way out.

Terry could change direction and take them away, once again. After that, they could try to circle around once more, but she had no idea if it would work, or if they were being shunted towards more Leshkin or some other threat to the east.

The avian couldn’t fight a juggernaut safely, and Tala certainly couldn’t bypass them on her own. He’s not dying for me, not if I can help it.

She could throw her anchor once again, but given the level of intelligence the Leshkin were demonstrating this time around, they might just snatch the empowered item from the air, and she’d be well and truly trapped.

She had a brief mental tableau of a juggernaut holding her anchor in one hand, while the other slammed it’s massive weapon into her again and again in an endless cycle until her magic ran out, and she was pulverized for the last time. I wonder how many that would actually be? Twice? Three full body heals? It probably wouldn’t be more than that. I suppose it depends on the exact nature of the damage.

But she was getting distracted in a moment where she couldn’t afford distraction. She did have one idea. It was out there, but it meshed with her understanding of her own magics too well not to try.

Well, let’s do this, then.

“Straight on, Terry. I need to try something. I think it will help get us out.”

Terry trilled, deep and rumbling, almost a war-cry.

Tala’s grin returned as she extended her right hand, first two fingers pointing up, second two curled downward. All fingers, and her thumb, were tucked in tight as she oriented her palm towards the juggernauts.

She locked onto both. That had been expected to work. Even without rings to burn, the targeting inscriptions should still function. Still, she felt a thrill at the first success, no matter how expected.

Now, the hard part.

She had modified her inscriptions on the fly before. Holly had helped her enact Crush upon herself, while suppressing the recursive portion of that inscription, and it had worked exactly as she’d hoped. Totally useless in the end, but it had worked.

That had been suppressing and diverting power away from a portion of inscribing. What she was doing now was quite a bit more convoluted and would require her jumping power through her flesh. She wouldn’t need to mold that power into true spell-lines, thankfully. She wasn’t adding functionality, she was just hot-wiring two bits of spell-logic together in a sequence they hadn’t been inscribed to fire. Should work though, they are compatible, and my mental model is rock-solid.

Indicating the first targeted enemy, she ordered. Restraining, followed immediately by a command towards the second, Crush.

Her power rushed through the spell-forms, but there were no rings to work with.

Tala grabbed the Restrain functionality and guided it, stealing all kinetic energy from the Leshkin on her left, and channeling that energy into the Crush spell-form, trying to enact upon the second juggernaut.

She screamed in agony as the inscriptions embedded in her right breast were burned away in their entirety to fuel a twisted hybrid of their original purpose, forced as they were to work in a way out of sync with their design.

But it worked.

The hammer wielding foe froze in place, clearly struggling, and at every thwarted twitch from the colossal beast, the mace wielding enemy was driven towards the ground.

The kinetic energy wasn’t doing the crushing. No, that would never have worked. That stolen energy was powering the multiplication of the gravitational constant on the second.

It only worked because of the immense power of the hammer wielder, jacking up the gravity on the second Leshkin so fast that it couldn’t divide into knights to escape.

Incidentally, it was also burning out the flesh of Tala’s chest as she acted as a catalyst. The gold of the inscription was long since gone, but the spell-form was stable, and would continue until it couldn’t any longer.

I may have made a terrible mistake. She couldn’t scream, she couldn’t even draw breath. Only four barely scraped together void-channels kept her body from being sucked dry of power.

As the mace wielder was crushed into oblivion, there was no longer any where for the kinetic energy to go, allowing the spell-form dissolved into nothing, freeing the first beast from kinetic thievery and Tala from her self-created agony.

Tala slumped forward left hand pressed to the right side of her chest as she gasped in a breath for the first time in what felt like hours.

Rusting rust! It had worked, but there was a reason that using uninscribed spells was inadvisable.

Terry continued his sprint towards the one remaining juggernaut, a host of smaller Leshkin still close behind Tala and her avian transportation.

This is it. She looked up, seeing the foe that she’d been unable to contain. I have no tricks left.

In retrospect, she could have waited until they were closer, and that might have allowed them to bypass the ambush before the hammer wielder could move again, but as it was an untested spell-working, she hadn’t been willing to commit them to the extent that that would have required.

“I’m sorry, Terry, but-”

Tala’s eyes widened as she watched Force take the giant’s head from its shoulders. Rane rode past the still upright body, precariously standing on his horse’s saddle to get the height needed for such a blow.

Over the body of the first juggernaut, a hail of bolts shot, dropping part of the wave behind Tala and Terry.

Rane had arrived with two full units of Guards and none too soon.

His voice was crisp and filled with an air of command. “Come on!” He dropped down into a more stable seat, hooking his feet back into the stirrups and grabbing the reins to wheel around and charge back towards the plains. As he drew close to the Leshkin again, he freed one foot from its stirrup, leaning out of his saddle and opening his harvest back to scoop up one of the shields and the mace.

Tala laughed with barely contained glee. We’re going to live? We’re going to live!

The Guards continued their steady rain of bolts, softening up and slowing the Leshkin in pursuit.

Tala, for her part, threw anchor darts at the remaining shield and massive hammer. It only took her eight attempts with her left hand to sink a dart into each as she and Terry drew closer and swept passed. Her right arm was not working as she desired, due to the pain in her chest.

I’m glad the ones I missed with will be dragged along just the same.

And then, she was out, the full light of day unobstructed before her, despite the canopy extending overhead.

The guards were in full retreat atop their own mounts, twisting in their saddles to fire backward as they rode.

Terry overtook the horses and passed them by, head tucked low, utterly focused on the line of daylight ahead.

They burst into full, beautifully blinding light, and Tala felt tears fill her eyes.

Free, I’m blessedly free of that cursed forest.

* * *

Tala took long, slow breaths as she laid on her back, looking up at the cloud speckled sky.

She had collapsed, arms thrown wide, on the cool white snow, close to a quarter mile to the north of the forest. She flexed her hands open and closed, picking up snow and casting it aside, uncaring of the melting snow that slowly seeped into her leathers. They’ll be fine.

She sent a pulse of power their way to top them off, just in case.

Terry was asleep curled up on her stomach. A mound of snow was piled atop the right side of her chest, but it didn’t really relieve the burning sensation still coming from the burned-out flesh in her right breast.

The Guards had headed back to the caravan, which was resting close to two miles to the west.

Rane was waiting with her, as she stared at the beautifully tree-branch free sky. It’s been too long.

The Leshkin had turned back a few hundred yards past the tree line. So, they had escaped from their erstwhile pursuers.

The Leshkin withdrawal hadn’t been a hard stop. Instead, one by one, they’d slowed down and eventually turned around to return to the forest, until the few that were still following were taken out by the Guards’ precise shooting.

But that was past now.

Tala was free of that ghastly forest. I’m not going back. Not for a long, long time.

She’d be sad to miss out on seeing Jevin. But he’ll come out in… 60? Yeah, sixty years or so. I can see him then.

It would definitely be better for everyone if she stayed out of that forest. At least until I can deal with Leshkin much more efficiently.

“Are you ok?” Rane’s voice was soft but reached her easily from where he sat, cross legged, a few feet away.

Tala grunted. “I think I will be. How’s the caravan?”

“All the Leshkin followed you. We sustained a few injuries as they departed, but not too many.”

“Carl?”

“He was mostly unharmed, but he was just trying to sit up as one of the last knights ran past. It’s foot clipped the side of his head just wrong and…”

Tala’s eyes widened. “Carl’s dead?”

Rane’s own eyes widened in turn. “Oh! No, it just caught on his skin and…damaged it.”

She frowned then. “Will he be ok?”

“He should be, a couple of the other guards were able to grab him, then, and get him in the chuckwagon. They got the flap back in place and applied cold pressure. It should be alright until Mistress Odera wakes up. She should be able to sort him with ease.”

Having your face ripped off. Tala shuddered. It put her own pain in perspective.

…still didn’t make it hurt less, though.

She tentatively poked at her chest, wincing at the pain.

She’d burned through her ending berry power without even realizing it, and though her inscriptions were actively working to break down the destroyed flesh and replace it with new, healthy tissue, burn wounds were notoriously hard to heal no matter the means, magical or mundane.

Rane cleared his throat and asked again. “Are you sure you’re going to be alright? I’ve never seen you take this long to recover from something.”

She grimaced. “Seems that fire wins again.” Stupid element. It hadn’t even been fire, not really.

“Fire?”

“Fine, fire’s proxy, heat.”

“Does it have something to do with what you did to the two juggernauts? I don’t think I’ve seen you use that working before.”

She sighed and gave him a brief explanation.

“Huh. Well, I’m not surprised that it worked.”

She cocked her head. “Really? Not going to chastise me for doing something ‘incredibly foolish’ or the like?”

“Hmm? No. Guides patching together spell-forms is a time-honored tradition in the heat of battle. The more experienced Mages can pull it off with little in the way of side-effects, but your consequences are in the vein of what a first attempt should produce.”

She grunted. Well, I’m finally average at something. She huffed a laugh.

“What’s so funny?”

“Of all the things for me to be average at.” She shook her head.

He grinned back. “Well, you’re alive.” His smile took on more of a mischievous glint. “And I have quite a few harvests for us to work with.” He patted the large canvas sack on the ground beside him. “I think there are a couple greatswords in here, that I can meld with Force for a bit of added magical weight. If we split the loot, I’m happy to give you the other part of my share-” he seemed to stumble over what he was going to say before catching himself and continuing, “for a reasonable price.”

She nodded. That’s right you won’t just give it to me. “That sounds reasonable. I think I might have a use for the armor, too.” She hesitated, then laughed. “I can probably use most of it, unfortunately. I’d love to sell it, to get a better payout.”

“Don’t be too sad, the Protection payout should be close to what it was for each of us, last time. Fewer injuries, no deaths, but overall fewer beasts beaten back.”

She shook her head. “Hard to believe that that was fewer.”

“More concentrated. That makes it seem worse.” After a moment, he shrugged. “I suppose the next two days could bring anything, though.”

Tala sighed and pushed herself upright.

Terry flickered to her shoulder without otherwise seeming to move.

She scratched his head and whispered to him. “Thank you, my friend. You really saved me, today.”

He trilled softly and nuzzled her in return, without opening his eyes.

Louder, she addressed Rane. “We should get back to the caravan.”

Rane stood, offering her a hand. “That’s probably a good idea.”

Tala let him assist her in standing. She was exhausted. “Lead the way, Master Rane.”