45. BATTLE BEGINS

  After Ruath looked away, Greer and Keven quickly climbed ropes leading down the cliff face and with some help from our mages, reached the valley floor undetected.

  In just a few moments, they were two simple soldiers moving through the ranks of Uof’s army.

  We watched them shuffle toward The Factory building deliberately, and they looked like two Vale-born soldiers who’d been sent on a mission by their commander. They moved around toward the back of The Factory heading for the side entrance we’d identified as the most logical place to sneak inside.

  I looked back to Ruath, who stood stock-still a dozen yards in front of The Factory walls, and I realized with a shock that he was staring up at us again. He scanned the ridge slowly and stopped at one point, staring directly at Bend.

  Inexplicable, I thought. What spell has he cast to give him such senses?

  Somehow, I guessed, Ruath seemed to have sensed the source of the blanket spell that lit up all of the Mage Beacons. If he’d been able to manage that, he was a stronger mage that I’d originally suspected.

  Phase two of our attack required us to scale the cliffs to get to the valley floor, but in the moment, and seeing Ruath's bloodhound-like abilities, I decided on an alternate course. The distraction was such that nearly every soldier of Vale was over at the front gates watching the approach of our phantom army. However, with Ruath onto us, we needed to move into the valley fast.

  “Stand back, everyone,” I said quickly to men behind me and we moved back a dozen feet or so. Then I signaled to all of our men to duck and cover. Standing out of sight of the valley floor, I moved my arms in a practiced spell I knew but hadn’t intended to cast today.

  Dropping all hundred of our soldiers and mages down ropes to scale the cliff while Ruath watched, wasn’t an ideal scenario. This new plan may not be any better, but I had to be decisive in the moment. After weaving the spell’s pattern and drawing on a significant amount of matter, I triggered the spell and stood back behind a stand of dead trees.

  Then, a small explosion collapsed the entire cliff wall ahead of us. I had woven a quick detonation midway down the cliff itself and in an instant, the top off the cliff face turned into a landslide, land and earth moving downward toward the valley floor in a collapsing plume.

  While before we’d each have to scale the cliff face on ropes to get to the valley floor, now we had a makeshift ramp or dirt and rock that led down into the valley.

  Once the landslide calmed, I looked down at the valley. No one had noticed this change due to the loud noise of our phantom army; no one except for Ruath himself.

  Unsurprisingly, Ruath started to move toward our position.

  “Gird up, each of you,” I said the men near me. “We’re about to face an attack.”

  Uof stood at the gate now, perched on one of the outposts watching the phantom army approach, while his voice boomed over the valley, shouting taunts at the ghosts of our distraction. Uof had no magic in him whatsoever—and his power, while physically imposing, seemed that of a loud, intimidating puppet governed by his own emotions and whims.

  The danger would come from his body man, his general, and the legendary sword master. Ruath did not recruit a dozen other men to come with him, so confident was he that he simply locked eyes on our position, and started to move toward the collapsed cliff face.

  I looked over and saw Bend’s eyes start to widen as he saw Ruath moving toward us. Bend had been terrorized by the man, and had reason to fear.

  “Mage,” Bend said to me, looking like a deer caught in a hunter’s sights. “What do we do now?”

  I made another quick decision. Again, this wasn’t the next phase in our plan, but it was close enough. I stepped out of the cover of the bushes, out of the trees, and stood up tall and in the open, my Staff of Matter held out in my right hand. I moved to the edge of the ridge, now visible to anyone looking this direction. I'd worn my cloak’s hood up until this point, and now I moved the hood off my head, letting my long graying hair fall down my back.

  Ruath’s eyes moved to me, and his steps adjusted course slightly.

  “Men, Ruath is the strongest mage any of us have ever faced,” I said to the mages without looking at where they took cover. I could hear them all creeping into position, ready to spring an attack. “When I give my signal, concentrate all of your spells on binding his arms, so he cannot weave his own spells.”

  Ruath now walked through the outskirts of their camp, and soon enough he’d be climbing the plume of earth, heading right toward us. A few other soldiers of Vale had now noticed the collapsed cliff face, and the plume of dirt and rock leading up, and were following Ruath’s lead, moving toward our position.

  Out of an army of a thousand men, a few soldiers heading our way wasn't bad—this could have been much worse,.

  I held off my own attack for now. I didn’t want to draw the attention of Uof and the rest of their soldiers and thugs. In my mind, the further away from the camp Ruath was, the longer we’d get to fight him without him having the benefit of backup.

  However, at the same time I was astounded. Was he that over-confident? Did he truly think he could take all of us on by himself?

  I darted my eyes toward where Greer and Keven had been earlier and followed their likely trail. I spotted them another hundred paces closer to The Factory, just now entering the high stone walls and moving into the inner camp. Much of the inner camp lay deserted now though the soldiers manning the cannons remained in place.

  Greer and Keven faced no opposition to getting inside The Factory itself. They’d be inside in a matter of moments and then, and only then, could we risk attacking Ruath.

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  I took a deep breath. We were right where we wanted to be. This was the inevitable end of all the hard work we’d been doing for months. This was the final act of the rebellion, but would it all end here, or would we accomplish our goals in taking down this system of perverse magic and technology?

  I didn’t know how this would go, and I wouldn’t admit it to the men, but I felt scared. My old, tired knees shook a little. My side hurt and throbbed in pain as if it had only been wounded for the first time yesterday.

  “Men, prepare for a barrage attack,” I said, my voice low and as steady as I could make it. “When he gets close, his focus will be on me. Hit him fast and hit him hard. Then, I will take him on. Push back any other soldiers who move to come our way.”

  Ruath stepped up the newly formed slope toward me, on slow step at a time—holding his sword out in front of him—and so I began to weave. I drew matter from the head of my staff, and I wove instinctively, feeling for the right spell for this moment. It wasn’t sheer power or an explosion spell that I put together in that moment. It wasn’t a spell of binding, nor a spell that would hurt him bodily.

  Instead, I wanted to feel out his true abilities before I threw everything I had at him, this way I could try to better gauge his talent. Ruath was still one of the biggest mysteries of Vale that remained.

  He got closer to the ridgeline, moving steadily up the landslide.

  First, I triggered a simple spell—and suddenly the ground dropped away from Ruath’s feet, as a deep, gaping pit appeared beneath him. Ruath fell into it, falling fast, but stopped in midair, before he hit the bottom of the newly-formed pit. He floated himself back to the ground above the hole in the ground.

  Impressive.

  His spellcasting was fluid and lightning quick.

  I felt another spell launch toward him from one of the mages nearby, a binding spell seeking to pin his arms against his sides. Ruath flicked it away like it was an insect and it was gone.

  I cast another simple spell, taking very little matter or power, just to test him. Just to annoy him.

  This time I wove a small pocket of air below us. The “bubble” appeared, a translucent shining ball in the air, and it moved down the slope toward the man known as The Grinder. The bubble hit Ruath like nothing—though he certainly felt it pass over him—then it closed around him and suddenly he was trapped inside it—unable to move forward.

  Ruath stopped walking, and for a moment, he touched the surface of the bubble curiously with his sword, unable to penetrate it, his face scrunched up in concentration. He took a swing with his sword and it bounced off taking no damage. This bubble spell could contain most mages for hours, or even days, unless they were let into the secret behind the spell, simple though it was.

  Ruath then pulled a necklace from inside his shirt, at the apex of which was a small metallic-looking charm. Then he muttered some words and touched the bubble with the charm. The bubble disappeared with a simple "pop," and he kept walking toward us as if nothing had happened, unhurried and completely without worry.

  He was close enough now that I could better see his face.

  “What is this child’s play?” he called out casually, still walking up toward the ridge. “Do you intend to defeat me by the simplest spells in the canon?I have seen all these spells before Mage!”

  I didn’t answer him. He was within a twenty yards of us now and I decided to try one more just to see what else he had up his sleeve.

  I sensed the mages readying themselves to deploy many spells at once, though all Ruath could see was me. Certainly, he would be expecting a bigger attack, but maybe we could catch him by surprise, just enough to knock him off his balance, and if we got lucky, trap him or wound him.

  Up until this point he had not sent even one spell in our direction, such was his confidence. I didn't want to give him the chance.

  I wove again, working up another simple spell, but this time I drew as much matter from my staff as I could manage, draining it significantly. I knew I had pockets full of rare matter all over my person—but would I have the time to drain and use it all later?

  Ruath’s beady eyes inside his dark hooded cloak watched my weaves, his face looked greedy to know the spell. I shuddered without meaning to—seeing that level of greed in his eyes for the first time made me realize how much this particular mage was driven to know spells, to gain knowledge. My knowledge. This niggled at something I'd been thinking about in the back of my mind, but I didn't have time to explore it further.

  Instead, I thought of the book of spells in my cloak. I knew now he would kill to have those spells, and to increase his own power. If he had a chance, I knew he would try to draw this knowledge from me without asking nicely. He had tortured other mages for this kind of information.

  I focused, drawing on every bit of matter from the staff, until it was gone, and now a massive amount of it swirled in the air in front of me and I felt a charge of static build and hit the air just as I finished my weave and triggered a truly massive lightning spell.

  This was the strongest lightning spell I’d ever cast.

  The spell dropped a massive charge on Ruath’s head in a stunning, groaning CLAP, like an explosion detonating with a commanding blast of light and fury. A flash of blinding white, a sharp crack split the air in front of us. I could barely see a thing amidst the bright flash.

  When I opened my eyes, Ruath lay on the ground.

  The mages around me had covered their ears instinctively, but for all of us, it was too late. I couldn’t hear a thing, my ears rang deaf from the blast. The light was so bright it stunned everyone—they had all scrunched their eyes up against the blast but most were also too late in this regard. At least I’d had some warning, so I’d closed my eyes in time.

  Sadly, this giant lightning spell had also mean the other spells that were being prepared by our mages, had been interrupted. So they had start work on casting their spells all over again.

  Down in the valley, this spell had finally gotten the attention of those at the gates, and a number of soldiers now looked up toward us. More of Vale's soldiers fell in together and started to move toward our position. It didn’t matter, soon they would have other things to worry about.

  I shot a look at The Factory below, but there was nothing happening there yet. Our phantom army continued to march, so perhaps we had a few more minutes.

  Ruath started to move, writhing on the ground. Many a man who’d felt the touch of this spell would not be moving at all, and wouldn’t even be conscious—or alive. In fact, this amount of powerful lightning could kill. Should kill. However, Ruath barely looked groggy as he crawled to his feet. I needed to incapacitate him fast, before he had a chance to retaliate—it occurred to me then that he hadn’t sent a single spell toward me yet.

  This scared the hell out of me.

  I took a necklace of gold out of my cloak and began to drain its matter, sending it into the head of my staff. I took few steps down the plume toward Ruath in order to weave another spell—what I had in mind would lock him to this spot for long minutes—a simple cast that would bind up his body as if it were made of stone.

  I walked toward him now, draining more matter, sending it into my staff, and weaving my spell, readying myself to trigger it. In a few steps, I stood over him as he crouched on all fours, still regaining his hearing and sight. However, before I could trigger my next spell, I saw a flash—his right arm sprang out and brushed my foot—and in a single instant, everything fell away.

  My world shifted.

  I blinked.

  Suddenly, I stood somewhere else. Now I looked around at an endless desert plain. I was in another place entirely. I was no longer standing on the rim of the valley overlooking The Factory far above Vale.

  Where was I?