The crackling in the air grows louder. The hairs on my arms and the back of my neck stand up. The air has an electrical charge so strong I can smell it, the sharp smell of ozone, like right after a lightning bolt, only lightning hasn’t struck yet.
“What’s happening?” I ask.
“I have a guess, but I hope I’m wrong,” Rent says. I’m at his side, pressing random pieces of clothing I found in a pack against the claw marks to try and stop the bleeding. It bleeds through another shirt. The claw marks are deep. I don’t understand why Rent’s not healing himself.
“Well? Even if it is wrong, tell us,” Jilli says. She holds her zweihander up, braced for whatever comes next.
“Have you ever heard of zolbats?” he asks.
“No, what are they?” Jilli’s voice is impatient.
“They’re created from excess magical energy after a large battle.” He sits up straighter, careful not to dislodge the white shirt I hold against his leg. It blossoms with red despite how hard I press. “I wouldn’t have thought our battle to be enough, but I can smell them, like lightning but more sulphury. I don’t dare pray for another spell until this dissipates.”
But it’s not dissipating. I can see the crackles licking along the red grass. They’re not white, but multi-colored, red static, green static, blue static. They each coalesce into concentrated balls.
Hax comes to stand beside his brother. “So we can’t fight them with magic?”
“Oh, we can, and we’ll have to.” Rent watches as shapes form. They’re vague, but the colored balls of electricity unfold like new butterfly wings opening and closing. “Just know that the more magic we use, the more of them we might summon.” His voice is calm, but it makes my pulse quicken. He’s only whispering when he says, “We have to be precise and conservative.”
“Well, that’s hardly my style,” Hax says with an emphatic sigh. “I’m more of a fire and forget. Let’s say we use lots of magic and hope for the best.” He conjures two ice daggers and grips them tightly. Mist curls up from both as the frigid bolts meet the warm evening air.
With a practiced flick of the wrists, Hax throws one, then the other.
They pass right through the unfurling mass of green electrical sparks, lodging into the silty dirt of the riverbank.
“That’s not inspiring my confidence,” Hax says, giving a pouty frown.
“What about me?” Blaize asks. She spins her knives in each hand, the blades dancing across her knuckles. “I’m supposed to stab electricity? At least you can blow on them or get them all wet.”
“If only you were a fire or earth elementalist,” Hax hisses sarcastically. “You know, a useful element.”
“Yah, exactly.” Blaize sheaths both of her knives in one smooth motion. Then she places one palm on the ground, and her eyes both glow green. The silt shivers and the red grass waves back and forth with vibrations from beneath.
Leafy tendrils burst from the silt. They wind around the sparking balls of magical energy but retreat when they touch the sparks.
Blaize’s hands flinch back. “Hax, wet the sand some more.”
Without comment, sarcastic or otherwise, Hax conjures a small gray cloud and coaxes a drizzle of rain. It makes the crackling louder. I can see the three balls flare larger and brighter.
The leafy tendrils act like fingers and form slit cocoons around the three balls of crackling energy. The staticy feeling leaves the air, and it grows quiet. The leafy tendrils wrap tight around the slit, closing them up and anchoring them to the ground.
“Wow, that was amazing,” I say. Just like a druid, I don’t say.
Blaize exhales and sits heavily on the ground.
Jilli is moving though. “We should get out of here. Rent, do you think you can walk?”
I’ve lost some pressure on his wound in my distraction. I switch to a new shirt. He’s still bleeding. I shake my head.
“I can manage,” Rent says. He gets his arms beneath him and tries to push himself up.
“I can’t hold this if you get up,” I tell him.
“I’ll be okay.” He goes to stand but crashes back down when his leg won’t support him. Or maybe it’s the dizziness from losing so much blood. A pained hiss escapes him.
He whispers a prayer, watching the prisons of slit and green vines.
I pull my hand away. Another shirt is soaked through, but now Rent heals the wound. His face tightens as the claw marks pull closed, and he’s paler and sweating when he’s done.
Hax helps me lift Rent to his feet. Jilli and Blaize have all the packs back on Gnuf, and even the ummuth seems ready to move, braying with impatience.
I feel electricity tingle along my arms before I hear it. I look over my shoulder and see colored crackles of energy seeping from the slit prisons.
“We have to go,” Jilli urges.
Luckily, she remembers the direction we’re heading and leads the way. I’m so disoriented after the knuei and Rent’s injury and the zolbats. I’ve forgotten we just crossed the river, even though my clothes are still damp and I reek of iron.
We don’t get far before the slit prisons explode into flying clumps of wet sand. The three zolbats shoot into the air like lightning bolts, stretching out and then taking form once more. Now I can see they are in fact bat-shaped. They flap their wings, all made of colored electricity, and come at us.
Rent pulls away from Hax and me, sets his feet wide to support himself, and begins a prayer. He forms a ball of searing white light in his hands and throws it at the approaching zolbats.
It misses.
It lands in the wet sand with a dull thunk, swirling and pulsing with divine light.
“Aw, crap,” Hax says. He raises his hands, but stops when the zolbats hesitate. They sense the magical source and are drawn to it like moths. Two of them attach to the ball of light, like they’re feeding on it, but one gets close and then turns back to us, and Rent the source of the magic. It moves fast, like a bolt, jaggedly zipping several feet at a time in spurts of movement.
Hax can’t form his spell fast enough, but the energy of it draws the fast-moving zolbat.
Rent shoves his brother out of the way. I scream as the zolbat slams into him, exploding into a fountain of blue sparks. Rent convulses for several seconds. Then he collapses without a noise. His unmoving form smokes.
The other two zolbats are drawn by the chaos and noise as Rent’s searing ball of light evaporates.
Hax rages with a pained cry. He leaps up and summons a whirlwind of air that spreads forward from him in a cone. It knocks the other two zolbats away, catching them up in its current and spinning them around.
They blow away like dead leaves.
I’m afraid to touch Rent. Is he still electrified? But Hax has no such thoughts. He drops to his knees beside his brother, and puts an ear to the older man’s chest. Hax doesn’t get zapped. So I kneel across from him.
“Is he alive?” I ask.
“His heart beats, thank the gods, but it’s weak.” Hax answers. He taps Rent’s cheek. “Brother. Brother? Can you hear me?”
Rent’s eyes remain closed.
“He needs a priest,” Jilli says.
“He is a priest!” Hax growls.
“But he can’t heal himself if he’s unconscious,” Jilli reasons. “Our only choice is to get him to the temple in Masebe. The gates are just ahead.” She comes over and lifts Rent into her arms. “Hax, bring Gnuf along, and I’ll get him there.”
Hax looks confused for a moment.
“Hax, please,” Jilli says.
He mumbles something that sounds like one of Rent’s prayers and takes the ummuth’s reins.
Jilli takes off at a jog, and the rest of us hurry to follow.
~ * ~
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