Inconvenient Magic 01 - Potatoes, Come Forth! Page 15

  Instantly, the magic arrested his fall and he seemed to hover, looking down at the landscape below. Then, after perhaps a dozen seconds, he plummeted again.

  “Take ye flight!”

  Again, he floated, free of the draw of the earth far below. Marking seconds, he sculled with his hands, trying to adjust his orientation. By the count of thirteen, his fall resumed, but he had managed to assume an upright position, feet downward. After one more cast, he made it to the ground, falling less than five feet into a plowed field. The loose dirt cushioned the impact somewhat, but still his knees banged into his chest as he collapsed. He lolled onto his back, staring up into the sky and grinned.

  He had survived!

  Wait a minute.

  He had survived?

  He thrust himself into a sitting position. This could not be mere coincidence nor the random fluctuation of a natural physical force. He had manifested exactly the right spell at exactly the right moment to preserve his life. Nothing in conventional magic theory could explain that.

  Come to think of it, his other recent manifestation, the strength spell, had been the same. That spell had allowed him to overcome the gendarme and had come to him just in the nick of time.

  Three more extremely suspicious oddities immediately presented themselves as evidence of the unnatural state of the world: the failure of the Alarsarian magician’s spell to detect his magic, the deviant adaptability of his and Sarah’s spells in the Eriis prison, and the failure of the pistol cartridges of Edwin’s cohorts. There seemed little doubt that these occurrences also must be the results of magic, though magic bereft of spell, manifestation, enunciation, or actuation. Such passive magical effects were entirely unheard of and until this moment he would have said that such a thing was impossible.

  There could be only one explanation for these undeniably beneficial alterations in the natural order. Somehow, somewhere, something – someone – had manipulated the forces of nature in order to protect him.

  No human wizard had ever been known to possess a spell that would permit a fundamental change to natural law, a change to magic itself. That devious villain Edwin had spoken of a Mystical Spirit. Could that preposterous idea have merit? Was there some disembodied being with intelligence, motive, and purpose that had determined to interfere directly and positively in his life?

  If so, what reason could there be for such interference? Not until he had met Sarah had –

  “For Magic’s sake! Beautiful Woman, come forth!”

  The young woman appeared in his arms, unresponsive and unmoving, her eyes closed.

  His heart froze as he feared her dead, poisoned by the bizarrely transformed Edwin and his minions. Then he saw the slight rise and fall of her chest and realized that she must simply be locked in a deep sleep, overcome by some potion mixed in the tea. Likely, the same was true of Bennett and the others on the air carriage.

  Save poor Aldo, of course.

  Thinking of the craft, he looked up, scanned the sky, and found its tiny dark shape against high clouds some distance off to the north. It was still headed towards Zheria. To what fate it flew, he could only speculate. The revelation of Edwin, Suzette, and Mitchell – and perhaps others – as traitorous, heartless killers with some still unknown agenda had thoroughly annihilated all of his previous presumptions and assumptions.

  He looked back down at Sarah. The soft lines of her face lay in peaceful repose and she seemed none the worse for the imposed slumber. Clearly, she was not in distress at the moment.

  I need a spell to awaken her!, he shouted in his mind to the unnamed, unidentified, possibly non-existent disembodied being.

  He held his breath in anticipation, but no magical inspiration burst into his consciousness.

  After waiting a further futile ten minutes, he gathered Sarah in his arms and with some difficulty stood. Struggling with her limp form, he juggled her about until her head lolled against his shoulder. Knowing that they could not remain here in the open till she awoke, he took stock of his surroundings.

  Huge and rolling, the field seemed to go on for a mile or more in every direction. He had often read the vast wheat lands of Alarsaria described thus and took it for granted that he had landed in the Kingdom. For whatever reason, it looked as if the early wheat had been already harvested and a second crop not yet sewn. Silos and buildings lay off to the west, so he started walking in that direction. He had to resort to his strength spell after about a hundred yards to ease the fatigue in his arms, but covered ground quickly and reached the buildings within half an hour.

  The site might once have belonged to a farm. There were half a dozen grain silos, two larger buildings that had the shapes of barns, another that once had been a two-storey dwelling. Now, though, the place was obviously a fortress, with timber revetments occupying the porches and windows of the house, a palisade of logs and sandbags linking all the structures, and blockhouses of freshly lain brown brick covering every approach. A wide, deep ditch ran along the exterior, pierced only by a hard-packed road leading to the south. Soldiers were partially visible through firing slits and gun ports, and Everett soon identified the maroon field jackets of the Royal Infantry of Alarsaria.

  He felt a moment’s hesitation at that, but there was nothing to be done for it. He could not assume that the events in Eriis had not already been made known here, but hopefully he would be able to conceal his and Sarah’s identities and avoid any unpleasantness

  When he was only about three steps from the plank-shored edge of the defensive ditch and casting about for someone to hail, a four striper popped from a hatch in the top of a blockhouse that abutted a cut-stone silo on the opposite side. With the hardened look of a professional soldier, he was probably fifteen years older than Everett. The close cut stubble under his slouch cap was mostly gray.

  The sergeant had the oddest expression on his face as he proclaimed, “You have to be the luckiest man alive!”

  The Alarsarian was better than ten yards away but his strong baritone and innate friendliness carried easily.

  Everett was somewhat taken aback. He had expected a more belligerent challenge. “What? Why do you say that?”

  “Because you have just walked down the center o’ a beebeefield.”

  “A what?”

  “A beebeefield. That whole area is sown with beebees.”

  Everett shook his head in incomprehension. “What in the world are beebees?”

  The man grinned. “Don’t get to town much, I expect? I thought everybody knew about beebees. That’s ‘B-B.’ Stands for ‘Buried Bombs.’ It’s a mechanism filled with gun powder.”

  “And they explode when stepped upon?”

  “Yeah, they surely do. A sow got loose when we were emplacing them. There wasn’t enough left for a good stew.”

  “Oh.” Whatever effect had preserved him from the pistols apparently also –fortunately! -- worked on any other similar mechanism.

  “Like I said, you have to be the luckiest man alive. None o’ my mates back at the barracks will ever believe this.”

  “Probably not.”

  “Well, I guess I had better tell you that you both are under arrest.”

  “Right.”

  “What’s with the girl? Drunk?”

  “Right, something like that.”

  “Well, stay right where you are and we’ll lower the footbridge across. Then the Lieutenant will need to see you.”

  At a field desk in a small room in the former farmhouse, the young officer, J. Jenkins according to a patch sewn onto the breast of her field jacket, accused the sergeant of pulling her leg.

  “The fellows at the academy warned me about such pranks. The young woman is a nice touch. Excellent try.”

  “Honest, Lieutenant!” the underofficer swore. “He walked right out o’ the eastern beebeefield.”

  “Balderdash! I should put you on report for bringing civilians up here, Sergeant Mallory. I’ll overlook it this time, but let’s not have it happen again, read
me?”

  The sergeant snapped to attention. “Yes, mam.”

  “Now, send them back to the rear where they belong.” She waved a flimsy at Mallory. “This morning’s dispatch warns that we should expect action by the Zherians at any moment. I want you to issue every infantryman quadruple ammunition and check on the sentries on top of the silos on every quarter hour. I don’t want to catch anyone up there sleeping like I did yesterday.”

  “Yes, mam.”

  Outside the lieutenant’s door, Mallory shrugged. “Best crazy story that I’ve ever had and everybody’ll just think that I’m a bad liar. Well, come on. We’ll get you headed back to Bayou Dorking, like she said.”

  Whispering his spell again to ease the strain of carrying Sarah, Everett followed the sergeant out of the farmhouse. Several curious guards watched without speaking as they exited through a timbered overhang covered in sandbags.

  “Bayou Dorking?” he questioned. “That’s the nearest town?”

  “That’s right. Not from around here, are you?”

  “No, we’re from …” Everett thought quickly, but his knowledge of western geography was severely limited and only one place name in the vicinity sprang to mind. “Bindleberg.”

  “Bindleberg? Isn’t that the technological monastery way up in the High Shadowed Hills?”

  “Exactly.”

  “So what are you doing way down here?”

  “We’re on a, uhm, holy pilgrimage.”

  “To where?”

  “Kleinsvench.”

  “What, so the two o’ you practice the doctrines o’ the Old Style Dho Sect?”

  “Yes,” Everett agreed quickly.

  Mallory laughed kindly. “Sorry, son, I just made that up. How about telling me the truth?”

  Everett shrugged. What could it hurt? Even if they were imprisoned again, he had total confidence that sooner or later the two of them could use magic to escape. As Sarah had said -- whether she meant it in the same sense or not -- in some weird way Magic – or at least someone -- was on their side. As they walked toward the rear of the compound across a yard scuffed to bare dirt, Everett told the Alarsarian every detail from his initial transportation of Sarah to his blind leap from the air carriage, reserving only the self-incriminating encounter in Eriis with Captain Van Ghest.

  “I was wrong,” the sergeant admitted as Everett finished, stopping in front of the heavily fortified rear gate, a double switchback of sandbagged bunkers. “This is the craziest story that I’ve ever heard. Did I hear that right? Potatoes, come forth?”

  Everett sighed wearily. “Right.”

  Mallory quirked his lips in amusement. “Amazing.”

  Everett grimaced. “What are you going to do with us now?”

  “Send you on to town. If I went in and tried to tell the Lieutenant this whopper, she’d have my hide. Best to just get you and your problems out o’ my hair. I’ll have to send a couple of infantrymen with you, though, and turn you over to the Provost.”

  Mallory led him through the gate to a small area bounded on one side by a horse corral and on the other by a line of parked freight wagons. As two stablemen hitched a pair of gray draft horses to one of the heavy wagons, the sergeant called another man over to him.

  “Percy, go get Privates Clay and Serheighmon. I’m sending these two to town under guard.”

  Percy scratched his bald pate. “She won’t like that, Sergeant. You know she thinks you’re just been trying to put her out of harm’s way.”

  “In the King’s Army, soldiers obey orders. You just go tell them to report on the double.”

  Percy shrugged, grinning, and went into the compound.

  “Clay and Serheighmon will take you to the Provost in Bayou Dorking,” the sergeant told Everett quietly. “I’ll leave it up to you to explain what you were doing out here. My advice would be to come up with a better story before you get to town.”

  “At least we don’t have to walk,” Everett replied optimistically. While one of the stablemen held the horses, the other fetched blankets for a pallet in the bed of the wagon. Everett laid Sarah on the pallet with care, arranging her limbs in as comfortable a position as he could. He sank down beside her, stretching out his legs and leaning back against the driver’s seat, happy for the opportunity to get off his feet. He was thoroughly tired and, having missed lunch, hungry.

  “Sergeant, I don’t suppose there is any chance of getting something to eat?”

  “Cook’s shut down the mess already. I might have a field ration on me, though.” The Alarsarian patted his pockets in sequence and then grinned, shoving a hand down in a long outside thigh trouser pocket. He brought out a sealed wax paper covered rectangle about the size of a student’s copybook and passed it over. “These are kind o’ dry, but there are canteens under the seat.”

  Everett accepted the ration with an appreciative smile and tore the end off. The thin, grain, nut, and dried fruit cake inside was further protected by a wrapping of baker’s parchment. Taking care not to drop any crumbs, he broke the cake along an incised line and then re-wrapped Sarah’s half in the parchment and slid it back into the wax paper envelope. He only got four good bites out of his half and finished quickly, but the small snack took the edge off his hunger.

  “Thanks again, sergeant. I appreciate it.”

  “No problem. I always keep a couple on me. I’ve missed a few meals in my time.”

  Private Clay, a tall woman who appeared to be not quite twenty, arrived at an agitated trot with her full kit and rifle and hauled herself up immediately onto the seat of the wagon, as if she already knew what the sergeant expected of her. She seemed none too happy with her assignment and, once seated, shot Mallory a hard look. This the underofficer blissfully ignored, pointing the other soldier towards the back end of the wagon.

  Serheighmon was a fresh faced lad with a rumpled but clean uniform and he offered Everett a friendly smile as he settled onto the tailgate, his rifle cradled haphazardly across his lap and pointing in no particular direction. With one hand holding his weapon, he tucked off his cap and used it to wipe sweat from his forehead and black stubbled scalp. He seemed to have no objections whatsoever to a casual jaunt into town.

  Mallory walked around to address the driver. “Clay, I want you to head over to Supply after you leave these two off and go through the requisitions. I think they shorted us ten cans of hash last month. Stay there until you find the discrepancy even if it takes a few days.”

  Clay’s disapproval intensified, but all she said was a chilly, “Yes, sergeant.” She snapped the reins angrily and the wagon took off.

  South of the outpost, the croplands to either side of the arrow-straight road had been recently harvested, but had not yet been plowed. The complete absence of trees made the expanse of tan stubble and straw seem to go on forever. Rising and falling like lazy waves, the terrain caused a gradual up and down movement of the wagon that gave Everett the impression that they traveled across a lethargic earth colored sea.

  “Is she sick?” Serheighmon, gesturing at Sarah, asked Everett after a few minutes along the rutted road. Clay had her eyes fixed on the path ahead of her and did not appear inclined to chat.

  “No,” Everett answered, then gave a very abbreviated and abridged version of the story he had told Mallory.

  “Air carriage, huh? I saw something high up pass over the border earlier but didn’t know what it was. I’ve always thought that technologists would figure a way to fly sooner or later. She’s your wife?”

  “No, just a stranded citizen of Kleinsvench. I’m helping her get home.”

  “You might want to reconsider going to Kleinsvench, given the war and all.”

  Suddenly alarmed, Everett asked quickly, “Has the fighting already started?”

  “No, but everybody knows it’ll be any day now. There’s been a lot of activity all along the frontier, but the officers seem convinced that the main attack will come along the Eiae Plain smack through the Grand Duchy of Filingham.
Kleinsvench, which is a close neighbor, is almost certain to be right in the thick of it.”

  Everett shrugged. “She’s determined to return home and I don’t think that anything will dissuade her.”

  “She’ll be better off in Kleinsvench,” Clay interjected without turning, apparently not able to ignore the conversation any longer. “The main thrust o’ the Republican attack’ll be either here in the east or through the Tghustan Forest in the far west.”

  The other private laughed. “Don’t start that again, Clay. If the Zheries moved an army in this direction, we would already know about it. The road dust could be seen for miles.”

  “Not necessarily,” Clay countered, turning her head to keep half an eye on the horses as she warmed to her argument. “If they broke it up into small units and moved them along separate routes far from the border, we’d not have any warning at all.”

  Serheighmon waved his free hand dismissively. “I suppose they could do that, but why in the world would they? Our main battle lines are too far from here to be flanked and if they moved too many troops this way, they would open up their center to a counterattack.”

  A distant sound, akin to thunder, came from the north.

  Everett, wondering about rain, asked. “Is there canvas for the wagon?”

  “No, but there’re slickers under the seat,” Clay replied, then looked back to the north curiously. “Not sure what that is, but this time o’ year the rains usually move up from the south-west.”

  Awarding Serheighmon a feisty stare, she opened her mouth to return to her rebuttal, but before she could speak, a horrendous torrent of sound erupted from the direction of the outpost.

  NINETEEN

  The tremendous explosions bolted the horses and the wagon bed began to bounce and swerve, tossing Serheighmon, arms and legs flailing and his rifle arcing away, off the rear end. Clay cursed a streak as she fought to bring the team under control.

  As the jouncing intensified, Sarah began to stir, moaning. Everett braced himself against the side of the wagon and took hold of her shoulders to keep the gyrations from throwing her about. Her eyes opened and blinked as she sought to focus on his face.