Out of the Frying Pan

It was a simple plan. One that kids throughout many worlds had employed many, many times over.

Rusty led the way as they walked out of the tent, their bellies full of the tasteless gruel and hard biscuits that they’d been given to eat, and found the nearest soldier to ask a very important question.

“Excuse me sir, where is the bathroom?”

To their surprise, he answered. And though his words weren’t English, weren’t anything he’d heard the wizards say, Rusty understood them.

“Piss over the side, into the swamp. Or look for one of the buckets that’s around if you need to shit.” The man gestured in a roughly leftward direction.

“Thank you sir,” Rusty said.

The man merely grunted, and watched them go.

It was the deep of the night now, and the swamp was dark, save for the torches positioned around the camp and on poles, out around the perimeter. Rusty did his business out into the darkness, then turned and looked around at the figures in the camp, marking every form with his memory.

And Ken peered out into the night. Ken, who had put a minor enchantment on himself earlier, to detect everything with about a human-sized waist within five hundred feet of him.

Alice simply focused on assensing. And the two boys turned while she did her business, into a bucket.

Once they were back in their tent, Rusty let out a breath. “There are about twenty people on watch among the platforms I can see. The largest group is at the front gate. The place we used as a bathroom has four guards.”

“This place has two-hundred and seventy-one people inside the camp. And there are three people out toward the direction we were looking. Probably elves, I’m guessing. They seem to do pretty good in the dark,” Ken said.

“The ward ends about ten feet beyond the wall,” Alice whispered. “And I think Balangor is still gone. He ain’t here and ‘less they hid it, the carpet isn’t either.”

Rusty nodded. “If we get sneaky the elves will be able to catch us pretty easy. So I think we need to try plan B.”

“You sure?” Ken asked. “That’s going to be one big spell. Two maybe.” He looked to Gunther. “Hey. What do you think?”

Gunther tried to sit up, gasped, and lay back down. “No. I am sorry. I… no.”

“This ain’t fair.” Alice said, her jaw trembling. “We can’t… we can’t just leave him.”

“You have to,” Gunther said. “I’ll be fine. I’ll say I was sleeping and didn’t see you go. They will not blame me.”

“It still don’t feel right,” Rusty agreed. “But we can’t let them send us up against that dark lord. They’re bad guys. We need to figure out the truth of it all. Find out what they’re hiding from us. And they won’t hurt Gunther. They’ll need him, when we’re gone.” He wondered if he was telling the truth with that, but it did seem to calm the others down, a little.

Ken finally growled, and tugged a familiar-looking small metal box out of his pocket.

Rusty blinked. “Terathon gave you one of those, too?”

“Yeah. Gunther, this is supposed to be a way to get home. I don’t know if I trust that, now. But if you get in a tight spot, and you’re gonna die, you might as well unwrap the little bundle that’s in here. It might help.”

“Oh my…” Alice’s eyes followed it, as Gunther took it. “Jadar didn’t give me nothing like that.”

Rusty burned with shame. He remembered throwing his own into the swamp, without even considering the possibility it could help one of the others.

But it would have been a strong temptation. And maybe it DID do what Terathon said it would. Terathon had been kinder than the others, calmer, more focused. He couldn’t remember any incidents where he’d heard the brown-clad wizard speaking of anything suspicious when he didn’t think they were listening. And he was Unbound, whatever that was. Maybe…

Rusty looked away from the box. There was no point in wondering. He had to focus on the now, and the two big spells he was going to have to cast. “Okay,” he said, and held out his hand. “Gunther. Y’all come find me if we get back home. I want to show you my farm, okay? And my Mom’ll feed you a good meal, every guest gets the best Colfax hospitality and beef dinner we can give’em.”

Gunther grinned, and shook Rusty’s hand. “Come to England if you can. We’ve got this thing called toad in the hole that sounds horrible but it’s great.”

Rusty’s eyes burned, and he just nodded, then looked at the tent wall while the other two said their goodbyes. This could go any number of ways, and so few of them ended happily.

Then it was out into the night, and on to the next step of the plan.

*****

It was both easier and harder than Rusty expected.

He looked outside for the soldier with the most elaborate uniform, then walked right up to them, and completed the words he was holding in his mind’s eye. It was a long string of words, but he had a full belly, plenty of rest, and a lot of time to put them together.

“Remember your commander’s orders to let us out when we ask.”

Create false memory in adult human!

Committed chakra: 14/44

Cost: 4 chakra

Magic resistance detected... bypass?

This was the first time that had come up, the first time it had asked, and Rusty saw the man’s head snap around as he searched, his mouth opening…

“Yes!” Rusty thought, then willed the letters into being.

Additional cost – 10 chakra

Remaining free chakra: 16/44

Oh, that was uncomfy. It was like every organ in his body shivered on the inside. But a pressure he hadn’t even known was there eased. And to Rusty’s surprise, he saw a glittering bead on the man’s necklace flare with a browny-orangy light, then dissolve into powder. The officer shook his head, and looked around, with a lot less panic. Then he saw Rusty, and nodded to him. “Boy. Are they ready?”

He was a stern, skinny looking man with a scar that went across his forehead like a crooked strap, and missing teeth. And he certainly wasn’t smiling, but there was none of the malice that Rusty had felt with Jand. Rusty got closer, pointed up at the platform above. “Almost. We have to check out of the ward. We’re not coming back.”

“Check out of the ward?” The man squinted. “First I’ve heard of that.”

“It’s Balangor’s orders.” Rusty put on a really wide smile. “We’re going home after we beat up the Dark Lord! So there’s no need to leave a hole in your protections!” Truthfully he had no idea if that’s how any of it worked, but he was willing to bet that the officer didn’t know all the details, either.

And judging by the man’s expression, he had no desire to disagree with a wizard. “All right, but make it quick. I have my orders.”

Rusty nodded, and ran back to the tent. He was aware of eyes turning on him as he went, but that was fine. They had what they needed, even if it had been expensive.

And now he knew how magic resistance worked. Though it hadn’t worked that way for Ran. Maybe because it cost so little to overcome her resistance?

There was a lot the wizards hadn’t told them about magic. Or charms. Or a lot of other things. But now wasn’t the time to dwell on it. He poked his head inside the tent. “We’re on. Come on.”

“Good luck Gunther.” Ken shook the big kid’s hand.

“Shut up. I’m pretending to be asleep,” Gunther hissed.

Rusty just stared at his outline in the darkness. There was a lot he wanted to say. And he still felt bad about leaving him behind, knew that there was a chance he’d regret this his whole life.

But he just turned, as Alice and Ken fell in behind him, and walked back up to the officer. The man just grunted, and turned and led the way up to the tent where the wards were kept.

The guards up there looked a little funny at their escort, but let the kids through. And once there, Rusty nodded to the others. “Works better if you touch it. Hopefully.”

And when he had his hand on there with the others, he cast and hoped.

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“Create a hole in any wards that would cause alarms if we left.”

Bypass selective wards!

Committed chakra: 15/44

Cost: 15 chakra.

Remaining free chakra: 1/44

Rusty staggered as his vision blurred, and Ken caught him, held him stand while his limbs felt like they’d been turned to floppy rubber. “Easy, easy,” Ken whispered. “You all right?”

After a few seconds, Rusty managed to blink the after-images away. “Yeah. Yeah, let go. I’m good. It’s done. Let’s go.”

He managed to get himself moving with the others as they turned and left the tent. He felt the guards’ eyes on his back, could almost taste their suspicion, but it didn’t matter. So long as they didn’t act on it immediately, they could make this work.

It still felt like an eternity, as they made their way down the platforms. It couldn’t have been more than a couple of minutes, though. But as every soldier they passed threw their officer a chest-thump salute, and got out of the way, he felt a little of his tension ease.

The guards at the gate didn’t even look their way, as they left. He did hear them asking questions of the officer, but it didn’t matter. And they walked out beyond the ring of torchlight, and out into the swamp.

At least it was a relatively clear night. There was no moon, and come to think of it, Rusty couldn’t remember seeing a moon any other night, but there were enough stars to get by.

That ended, the farther they got into the swamp. They had to slow down in the darkness, and pick their way through. And as they went, Rusty couldn’t help but think back to Terathon’s lessons on the many, many dangers of the beasts and plants out in the wilds.

Thankfully, nothing jumped them along the way. Rusty had been hoping for this; he’d expected that the small army nearby would have cleared out or chased off any significant predators.

The bugs, content to keep away from the inedible forms of their alien bodies, were still loud. So it was a bit of a shock when Ken brushed up against him, and muttered into his ear. “Hey. There’s one thing with a waist following us.”

“How long has it been there?” Rusty asked.

“Been getting flashes of it off and on since we broke the treeline. Just one.”

“It’s probably an elf.” Rusty chewed on his lip. “I was hoping that since we left peacefully they’d just figure it was all part of the plan. Shoot. Uh…”

“I could snip them off at the waist. I don’t want to, but…”

Rusty could almost hear the terror under Ken’s words. And he knew he couldn’t ask Ken to kill again, knew his friend had nightmares enough, already. “No,” he decided. “We need to keep going, for now. Once I get some chakra back, I’ll make them forget. So long as it’s only one, it’s okay.”

“Yeah, okay,” Ken nodded, slipped away, and by the oh-so-quiet murmuring to his left, he knew that Ken was talking with Alice.

That murmuring stopped, all of a sudden, as Ken yelped. “Rusty? Nine people ahead, coming fast!”

“Shoot!” Rusty said, and hurried behind a tree. The others joined him, fast, and Rusty took a breath as the bugs grew quiet ahead, falling silent as heavy bodies moved through the watery parts of the swamp.

He knew those sounds intimately from his time out in the wilds.

Grach.

“We have to keep quiet and hide,” he whispered. He’d been prepared to do this. He’d been prepared to give himself memories of learning the Grach language when they ran into them. But it was too soon! He knew the cost, knew that he didn’t have enough chakra. Even if he stripped his enchantments, he’d run himself out. And then he’d be useless if it came to a fight, or drained, like Terathon had told them it would.

“Should we ambush them?” Alice asked. “If it gets bad, I mean?”

“Are you nuts?” Ken whispered back. “There are nine of them!”

“Ten, actually,” said an unfamiliar voice.

Someone put a hand on his shoulder. Rusty turned his head…

…and looked right into a wooden mask, with eyes glittering through it, staring into his own. Something sharp pressed into his throat, and Rusty froze, his mouth open.

“You are all my prisoners,” said a woman— no, a girl’s voice. “Even if you try to kill me, he dies. Then the grach kill you. Do you all understand? Comprende, amigos y amiga?”

Alice shrieked. Ken jumped up. Rusty simply stared into those eyes. “Who are you?” he asked, and tried to shrink back as the blade dug a little more into his throat.

“My name is Carmina De Rojas, and you have some choices to make, very, very quickly.”

Rusty stared into her eyes, tried to make them out in the darkness, but couldn’t. All he could feel was the knife at his throat, and the grip on his shoulder. He opened his mouth, but no words came.

“We surrender,” Ken said. “Also there’s someone that’s been trailing us, so please get us out of here fast. It’s probably an elf, and we don’t know how to handle that.”

Rusty saw the vague outline of her eyes widen, as she looked around, wildly. “Elf? Damn!” The knife withdrew. “If this is a trick, you—”

“We die, we get it,” Alice burst out. “Just come on and show us the way out of here, please!”

“We don’t want to kill Ringaldr. We don’t want to kill anyone,” Rusty said, his words coming in a rush. “We found out the wizards were lying to us about a whole lot of stuff and we want to know what’s really… going… on…”

Rusty’s words trailed off as she turned and ran before he could finish her sentence.

“Um…” Ken started. “Was it something we said?”

“ELF! RUN! FOLLOW ME!” Carmina shrieked.

The kids looked at each other—

—and a flash from behind them was all the warning they had. They ducked, instinctively, and the bolt of light that would have seared Ken’s flesh from his skull holed into the tree, instead.

“Run!” Rusty agreed, and ran.

The first step was to put the very solid, very big tree behind him as he went.

“Want me to look over your memories on that elf versus treestrider blasty fight while you keep us alive?” Roz whispered in his ear.

“Yes, please!” Rusty gasped, as water sprayed around him.

Grach hooted as he approached, and he heard Carmina’s voice off to the side, hooting back. The dim shapes of the grach reacted immediately, sinking below the swamp’s surface. They’re running too. But there’s nine of them! Can’t they handle one elf? How are they giving the soldiers such trouble?

Then light flashed at his back again and he dove underwater as a beam speared overhead, this time from the back-right. That’s a different angle! He realized. This was bad. Either the elf had been fast enough to relocate several hundred feet in the space of a few seconds, or there was at least one more elf out there. He wasn’t sure which possibility was worse.

There was no time to do anything, but burst out of the water and run into the darkness. He heard splashing to his left, not far. Alice and Ken? Probably. He didn’t dare turn his head to check, couldn’t do anything but face forward to try and see obstacles before he ran into them head on.

But as he went, he realized that he had an edge. He’d been out in the swamp at night before, and his total recall let him take a good guess at the things he was running into, or around.

This saved his life.

He darted right to avoid what he was pretty certain was a pretty painful thorny bush that Terathon had warned was toxic, and there was a CRACK, and bark pattered off his face from a nearby tree. A tree that now had a quivering arrow sticking out of it. He’s switched to regular shots! “Regular arrows!” Rusty yelled, spending precious breath to get the words out. “No warning! Be careful!”

Something tugged at his pants as he went, and he almost stumbled, as another arrow skittered off into the bushes.

“Yeah, the light thing seems to take time to reload. These are as fast as the elf can string and fire!” Roz shouted in his ear.

“Down!” Rusty yelled, grabbing a quick breath, as he dove into the nearest pool of water he could find.

One second.

The water over him parted, as an arrow slid through.

Two seconds. No arrow.

Three seconds. He heard something body-sized splash in not far from him, followed by another splash. Alice and Ken? Had one of them been hit? Had they both been shot?

Then, he heard a lot of hooting and splashing, behind him.

Four seconds. Five. Six, and the noise kept going… along with some screaming that he hadn’t heard since Terathon had killed that first group of grach in front of him.

Seven. Eight… and Rusty yelped in surprise and pain as someone grabbed his hair and pulled him out. He inhaled a bit of water, coughed, as he looked up into Carmina’s mask. “They’re buying us time!” she yelled. “Get out and keep moving! Follow me!” She let go of his hair, turned, and fled.

Rusty glanced left, saw Ken and Alice peering out from behind a large tree route, and they followed him as he coughed and staggered and ran. Only for the first twenty feet or so, then his lungs were clear, and he put everything he had into keeping up with Carmina’s outline and the sounds of her retreat.

It was hard. She was fast, and the wizards had trained them in a lot of ways over the last two weeks, but jogging hadn’t been on the curriculum. But eventually the sounds died away behind them, lost to the jungle, and just as Rusty thought he was going to collapse, Carmina turned and waited for them to catch up to her.

“We’re past the watchposts,” she told them. “The elf won’t follow here, not alone. We should keep moving, though. They are really too good with those bows.”

“What about… your friends? You just… left them,” Alice said, winded and panting.

“I would have been no help, not against an elf,” Carmina said. “They’ll come back to one of the posts if they survive. Maybe they will. It depends on how close the elf got before they sprung the ambush. Elves have trouble seeing in the water at night, so… maybe.” She didn’t sound too hopeful. “Come on. And no questions. No more talking, not until we reach the gates.”

“He just tried to kill us,” Ken said, confusion in his voice. “The wizards wanted to keep us alive, at least, but that elf just…”

“It. It tried to kill you. The elves and the Stormers aren’t friends, just allies. Now no more talking, and come, or I’m going without you.”

She sounded tired. And for the first time, Rusty realized that she wasn’t much taller than he was. He couldn’t tell if she was younger or older, but she was a kid, just like him.

He remembered the dead kid in the hole again. The one from New York, the one whose parents would almost certainly never know how or where he’d gone, not unless Rusty made it home. And Rusty swallowed, hard. “Come on,” he said, and if the others noticed his voice was rough and scratchy, he’d blame it on the water he swallowed. But if they did, they made no sign of it and they followed Carmina further into the night.

It was a long walk, through alien trees. The ground did get less swampy as they went, and a few times the children found themselves following their guide down actual paths trampled through the vegetation. Light was dawning on the horizon, before she slowed her pace.

And then there were no trees at all before them, as the jungle gave way to a cliff, and a looming structure of mossy stone that gleamed in the morning’s green light. It was huge, sitting atop a dome-shaped hill like a nasty, swollen bee-sting on a giant’s knee. Two tusklike monoliths curved out of the ground at the base of the hill, and from them a fragmented but thick stone wall wound around the base. A manned wall, Rusty thought, as he saw movement on it, but at this distance he couldn’t make out who or what was up there.

“Those are the gates of Horn,” Carmina said, turning to them. “We’re almost… home… oh no.”

“What?” Ken asked. “What is it now?”

But Rusty and Alice saw that she was looking beyond them. To the south, to their backtrail.

And the pillars of smoke rising from the jungle, and the fast-incoming speck of what had to be Balangor’s flying platform, dropping balls of fire as it flew in their direction.