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“Happy to be the idiot you require.”
She didn’t retort as they’d reached the end of the long hall.The door was sealed, as reported.Nic was aware of Alise and Asa watching closely as Gabriel manifested a new silver key out of moonlight.He was getting faster and more efficient, barely drawing on her magic.She suspected he wouldn’t have used her magic at all if he weren’t concerned about what they’d find within—and what he’d have to do to stop it.
“Brace yourselves,” he told them brusquely.
As soon as the door opened, noise flooded out, along with a wave of algae-smelling water.Their small group of rescuers shouted and shrieked in surprise—all except for Gabriel, who stood splay-legged and strong, supporting her against the current.He’d no doubt felt the water on the other side of the door.They would have to discuss how implementing greater detail into his warnings would be more useful.
She wondered why Gabriel hadn’t used his magic to contain the water, but it quickly became clear that the waves were periodic, with a new one rushing toward them from the pit.This one Gabriel stopped, parting the wave with a raised hand and sending it curving back to the pit.With the recession of the flood, several people within the room flopped to the stone floor like so many stranded fish, gasping and scrabbling to get up.One man seemed to be bleeding copiously from multiple… bite wounds?If so, from very large teeth.Jadren stood atop a tall workbench, not dry, but apparently uninjured, employing some sort of artifact that looked to be a shield with moving spikes.
Another woman faced the pit, summoning some kind of magic to deal with an immense tentacle waving from the pit.Another tentacle shot out of the water, slamming down where she’d been a moment before she rolled away.Fanglike spikes screeched as they dragged against the stone floor.Nic grabbed Gabriel’s upper arm with her free hand, digging in.“Don’t kill it,” she urged.
His wizard-black eyes glittered like knife-edged obsidian as he glanced at her.“I don’t plan to.You!Get back from the pit.”
The woman flashed a pale, startled look at them but obeyed, scrabbling back.As soon as she did, the water all around rose in a column, creating a clear pillar all the way to the dim ceiling towering overhead, the tentacles flailing within but unable to penetrate, as if walled in by thick glass.Nic had seen this trick of Gabriel’s before, but the others gasped in wonder.It was truly a sight to behold, the creature rising within as if captured for their observation.
“I have it contained,” Gabriel informed them unnecessarily, “and can hold it for a while.”Nic figured it would be much longer than “a while,” as Gabriel was barely drawing on her magic, but he was smart to preserve the sense of urgency.“We have time to develop a solution.”
“Lord Phel, the injured?”Asa asked urgently.
“Go.”Gabriel jerked his head at Jadren.“Get down and protect them, just in case.”
Jadren snarled something incomprehensible but also obeyed, leaping to the floor and taking up position with his shield.
“Can you make use of Iliana’s Ariel magic?”Gabriel asked Alise, who nodded, holding out a hand to the redhead.“Good.Guard them,” he told Han.The blond man nodded grimly, face clear and set as he raised his sword, stepping between the women and the creature.
“I’m looking for ideas,” Gabriel said to the lot of them.“Ideally I’d like to communicate with the creature.Calm it down and assure it we mean no harm.Can Ariel magic do that?”
“An Ariel wizard could,” Iliana replied doubtfully.“But we’d need someone skilled in working with monsters.Very different minds.It’s a niche expertise.”
“I think it’s awfully judgmental of you to call our new friend a monster,” Han teased her.
“I may not be a wizard,” she retorted tartly, “but I have enough magic to know our new friend is no natural creature.It was created.”
Gabriel looked at her curiously.“How can you tell?”
She shrugged, blushing lightly.“I know animals.”
“Hmm.”Gabriel’s gaze wandered to Nic, speculation in it, and she suspected he was thinking of the hunters and how to use this skill of Iliana’s.“Ultimately, I was hoping to relocate the creature once we discovered its natural habitat, but…”
“You thought to slip it into the Dubglass River and send it swimming off to Sammael to plague our neighbors?”Nic asked with raised brows.
“The fantasy may have occurred to me,” Gabriel murmured.Beyond him, the fanged tentacles thrashed soundlessly.“Regardless of next steps,” he said to everyone, “we need to calm the beast.Ideas?”
“I can send a spirit infused with Ariel magic, maybe,” Alise said.“I’ve never done anything like it before, though.”
“Your MP scores in psychic magic are high,” Nic reminded her sister.“Han’s Hanneil magic could be useful there, for psychic communication, depending on the creature’s intelligence.”
“You’re welcome to it,” Han said, staring at the tentacles flailing in the column with such a bleak and bitter expression that Nic nearly reached out to him.He was still in the early days of reconciling himself to his inability to use his own, powerful magic.
Alise was shaking her head.“I’ve never trained in Hanneil techniques.Only in Elal-licensed wizardry.”
“Long bows and crossbows,” Gabriel muttered.
Nic was frankly taken aback by Alise’s revelation.Of course, once wizards had contracted with a house, they were bound to that house’s license and forbidden from using other kinds of magic for profit.But profit was the key concept there.Most wizards dabbled in other magics as a hobby—and as insurance against the future.One never knew when a wizard might be fired from their contract.Wizards could have uncertain tempers and, as Alise had noted, the heads of houses the most temperamental of all.Also, houses occasionally lost their status, their licenses reclaimed by the Convocation or redistributed.The Convocation could be savage to those who didn’t come out on top.
The wise always had backup proficiencies.
“You didn’t take any other electives?”Nic asked, aghast.
