35. CONFRONTATION

  I stepped through the gates of Vale for the first time in well over a week. Smoke hung heavy over the city like a fog, and I saw fires burning here and there right on the city streets. No steam-powered cycles or wagons moved down the streets as one might see on a normal day in Vale.

  Also, today wasn't a day for sneaking or hiding, so I wore my oiled black leather duster, black hood on my head, with my many-pocketed mage’s cloak visible underneath. My pockets bulged, full of with enough matter to divert an army. I carried my Staff of Matter and the Spellcasters walked with me, the first true army of mages of The Way of the Mark to walk the world for generations. There were more than twenty of us, including Greer, Bend, Ehren, and Shade, each outfitted similarly with many-pocketed cloaks and a variety of leather dusters, marking them apart from the citizens of Vale and our own rebel fighters.

  Several of our mages had stayed behind to care for the other exhausted mages from the Factory, back at the outpost.

  When they saw us, the citizens of Vale stopped for a moment, staring openly at the sight of mages walking on the streets of Vale, and then ran, though one or two simply watched. They all knew something was coming, but mages walking openly on the streets of Vale—this was a sight not seen before in Vale's long history.

  We walked purposely from the gates up the main street that led from the city gates to the central market in the center of Vale.

  In my planning and thinking, I’d thought through many scenarios for facing Uof directly, in person, with many of those scenarios revolving around setting up a trap of some kind. Perhaps we could set up a carefully planned ambush, so we could relieve him of his Motorized army and Valeguard forces.

  But now, despite my many misgivings, I thought we needed to draw him out in the open with a bold attempt to face him head-on so we could try to disable his mechanized body. This could be a mistake, but I knew that this kind of direct confrontation would need to happen eventually.

  After we walked straight up the main road for several blocks, Dirk and twenty or thirty more of his resistance fighters slipped out from various side streets to join our procession. I clapped Dirk on the back as his men fell in step with us. He wouldn’t be able to open his shop again until after this war had finished, whichever way it went in the end.

  A few streets away from the central market square, we started to hear the voice of Uof moving our way, calling me out. “Mage, come out! Face me!” We heard his artificially projected voice echoing above the usual clamor of the city, calling through the streets.

  Crowds began to gather along storefronts, on rooftops, following us as we moved toward Uof’s voice. People weren’t cheering, but many whispered or talked excitedly. The tide of watchers swelled as we walked up toward the central market square, throngs of people filling up the side streets to watch the silly mages face the great Uof. Even children ran alongside us as we walked, and I hoped that they would scatter before what was to come could hurt them.

  We entered the market square, and even though it was midday, all the shops and stalls had already been shuttered. Word had spread fast ahead of us, and instead of market sellers hawking their wares, it was quiet as people lined the square.

  We heard the clanging and grinding of the steam-powered body of Uof—he was nearby, and the sounds slowly grew louder.

  Then Uof appeared, stomping into the square from a side street, a towering monster bringing the sounds of the Motorized with him in his very body. Behind him, dozens of solemn, red-clothed Valeguard moved into the square around and beside him. My men, in reaction, fell in behind me, leaving me at the tip of our triangle-shaped formation.

  I stepped toward Uof, looking toward him, and meeting his eyes.

  Uof wore a cloak and cape, both emblazoned with the red symbol of Vale. His arms and legs pumped as they moved, pistons cranking, gears turnings, steaming, oily discharge leaking from various exhaust ports on his mechanized body and dripping all over the ground. It was an imposing picture and the swelling crowd hushed, people pulling back as if they knew an explosion waited to detonate.

  “Mage!” Uof growled at me, seemingly out of breath from stomping around the city. Sweat beaded on his brow, and he had to spit out the words, as he took deep, gasping breaths. “You finally appear, you coward!”

  I didn’t acknowledge him, not right away.

  On the walk to Vale and up to this market square, I began draining matter, pouring it all into the metallic eagle on the head of my staff, which now gently pulsed with power. Even now I continued what I’d begun earlier, draining the matter from another piece of steel from a destroyed Motorized weapon and sending it into the eagle, which pulsed brightly for a moment.

  Even as our entire force filled in behind me, soldiers and Valeguard kept moving into the market square behind Uof, comprising a force now some two hundred men strong, including some of the fiercest fighters in the world. I spied the tall mysterious man, the one Keven called Ruath The Grinder, moving about on the periphery with his face difficult to discern inside a dark cowl, though obviously still commanding the soldiers.

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  Finally, I drained another piece of metal, performing the draining spell carefully, slowly. The crowd hushed completely and Uof seemed to wait for my reply as I vanished the piece of metal with a wave of my hands, pouring its matter into my staff.

  The crowd gasped lightly at the sight of the vanishing piece of metal and then it seemed to hold its collective breath. I looked up at Uof then.

  “Uof, we challenge you,” I said evenly, projecting my voice over the square, but speaking in a normal tone. “Not because we’re rebels, but because your hybrid weapons are killing the world—"

  Uof cut me off.

  “Who are you? Who are you to talk to me that way?” Uof spat, as he took a step toward me. “You dirty mages. Magecraft is illegal in Vale, don’t you know the law?”

  “Your spells are driving the world to drought, Uof!” I replied. “This is why we attacked your workshop and released your prisoners. They were mages, every one of them. You are a hypocrite—you use the Way to power your hybrid tools and weapons. ”

  “My workshop?” Uof laughed with a deep guttural cough. “My workshop is not destroyed. That was a mere outpost, you cannot stop me Mage. When we capture you, I will show you myself.”

  Laughs rang out around the square. Uof’s men laughed with wolfish grins, none of them upset about our destruction of the Factory. Could there be other factories?

  Suddenly, Uof’s left arm began to spin rapidly with a loud metallic whine. Where a moment before it was a crossbow of some kind, somehow, now he leveled a rifle at my head from across the square. At the same time, his right arm shifted to become a stout blade glinting in the sun. He smiled as he watched me study his weapons.

  “Yes mage, look at what you face,” he growled. “You cannot defeat Vale! I am Vale!”

  He fired the rifle from his left arm at my head. But I'd known this was coming.

  With the matter built up in the head of my staff, I quickly wove a shielding spell in front of our men. The rifle shot exploded, detonating against the shield and exploding back toward Uof himself, who stood at the head of his forces.

  A half-second later, my battle mages threw a dozen fireballs toward Uof’s soldiers. They weren't deterred. Even as some of them fell from the initial volley, the soldiers of Vale drew their varied crossbows, rifles, pistols, and other weapons firing them toward us. The shield wall held, blocking nearly every shot.

  Uof moved toward me and both of us stepped to the middle of the square, while his men peeled off to face my Spellcasters and Dirk’s fighters on either side of us.

  I drained the sizable matter from a small piece of blue topaz crystal, one of the rarest pieces of matter I had, pouring it into my staff while I kept my shield in position. Then, I wove a series of new spells drawing on the massive store of matter I’d built up.

  First, I fired a burst of light near Uof’s eyes, seeking to blind him. He walked through it, his eyes apparently unaffected. I wove again, sending a thick bolt of lightning at him, firing horizontally toward his metallic body, hoping it would shock him, his systems and somehow paralyze him. He stumbled for a half second, then shrugged it off. His grin only grew wider as he moved closer.

  Uof shifted his arms again, and his sword rotated out favoring a crossbow, which he fired once, then twice, burst after burst hitting my shield, which I could feel weakening shot by shot, explosion by explosion.

  His left arm switched now and a burst of fire leaped out throwing an explosion of flames my way. The explosion detonated on the shield in an explosion so large and powerful that it shattered the shield spell and sent me flying into the air. That was more power in that single explosion that I’d believed possible, I thought as I fell back, dropping my staff.

  The crowd around us gasped, “Oooohhhh!”

  I hit the ground, barely keeping my feet and my balance, while Uof took those precious seconds to close the gap between us, charging me. His machinery whirred and burped, gouts of steam jetting into the air as he ran.

  I knew a close-quarters battle would be over for me after only a few moments. One of his various arms could easily crush me.

  So, I dove to the side and rolled to my feet away from him while I drew from the store inside my Staff of Matter, even though it lay on the ground a couple feet away. This time I immediately wove an explosive spell that I directed to detonate at Uof’s feet.

  The concussion hit the metallic monster with a “BANG!” that rang throughout the square. The crowd cowered back, many people gasping or calling out in surprise—shocked at the blast.

  Leaping back, I regained my bearings and picked up my staff my the ground, watching the dust clear as I simultaneously drained the matter from two more pieces of limestone from my cloak—pouring that matter into the head of my staff.

  As the dust cleared, I heard Uof before I saw him. His ugly laugh rang around the square. As the small cloud of debris from the explosion faded, I saw that Uof hadn’t even moved—my small explosion hadn’t affected him in the least. I would need much more power to slow him down.

  Was he shielded somehow?

  Suddenly, the sword in his left hand drove toward me as he took quick clanking steps. I dodged his initial sword thrust and drove the butt of my staff into Uof’s chest. Instead of the staff knocking him off his feet as it would anyone else, my staff clanked into what felt like a metallic wall. He took advantage of that moment, hitting me with his left forearm, my face taking the brunt of the impact.

  I slammed hard into the ground.

  Uof stomped his right foot toward me, and I rolled, still dizzy and unsure of where he was. He missed stomping my head by mere inches. His left foot now drove into the ground and I scooted back, but one angular side of his metallic foot caught the original wound in my side.

  “Arrgh!” I screamed, unable to hold back.

  “So, the great mage is not invincible after all!” Uof called out theatrically to the square, laughing.