So much magic.
That was the real problem.Nothing was harder to read through, and it was everywhere down here.I’d even sensed it in small amounts in the human encampments near the surface, sputtering off amulets or humming contentedly around natural sources: a medicine stone worn on a thong, natural tobacco in a greasy leather pouch, a small cedar chest tucked into a backpack.
But here, it was like a bomb going off.
The most bothersome was the trapped magic, the kind woven with a spell attached, to bend it to a wizard’s will.That kind translated through my senses more like noise than scent, screaming at me from warded doorways, reverberating up and down the scaffolding that kept these caverns from imploding, and murmuring from potion bottles littered across vendors’ stalls.I paused by one such in confusion, the thin thread I was following swallowed up in the overwhelming cacophony, and tried to find it again.
It was elusive.Maybe because ofthat,I thought, scowling at the wooden bar over the stall, holding a line of amulets lightlyswinging, swinging, swingingon their thongs despite there being no breeze down here.And singing a hundred different notes as they did so, in a clash of sound.
It blended with the clamor from a hundred similar stalls, like the nearby tattoo shop, where an artist was etching a song onto a man’s back.The spell had not been fully bonded to the ink so that it would meld with the buyer’s own power and draw strength from it, but that caused bits to dust off into the air, settling on everything in the vicinity like the gunpowder in my counterpart’s weapons.Only far more potent.
Some of it flew into a potion a witch was cooking in a pot, changing its color, and causing her to curse the artist; others sparked along a line of small lights around a stall, making them flare and then pop, one after the other; and still more landed on a stray cat’s back, which hissed and scampered off.And that was only one item among thousands, among tens of thousands, of magical signatures spilling and frothing and clamoring for attention.It felt like the whole room was screeching at me.
I stumbled forward, not caring where I went as long as it wasn’t here.My soul longed for wide open spaces, room to run, and the wind carrying thin wisps of scent to my nose from miles away.Instead, I had this, confusing, mystifying, suffocating!
It was impossible to make out anything in here.
I burst into a corridor, one of dozens snaking away from the market, and hoped for respite I didn’t find.It was quieter here, but far from silent.Even the walls were saturated with power, being covered in symbols.
Some were mere scribbles, with just enough magic to make the often lewd pictures move.Others were stronger, thrumming through the walls and floor as if I were inside a drum.They were the plaques containing the market’s rules, or direction signs, or markers for the specialty shops that clustered close to the main bazaar, each yelling its information in a thunderous chorus.
I decided to concentrate on the people and try to sift out the rest.That wasn’t easy, as many of them wore the same trapped magic in jewelry, woven through spelled clothing, or bound to weapons, including the dagger on one man’s belt that screeched so loudly as he passed that I staggered back.But he strode quickly on, the cloud of his scent thinning behind him, and what remained...
There was a trail here, but not the one I’d been following.It had been swallowed up in the magic-laden soup behind me, lost for good, but this...This was unexpected.
Following the new trail turned out to be easier than I’d thought, as many of the people brushing past me didn’t bathe as often as those in the world above.Their natural musk was easy to read, and told stories that kept wanting to take me on trips back through their lives, for weeks in some cases.I shook them off and stayed on the hunt, although this place seemed determined to confuse me.
A vampire swept past, stinking of his last meal; a couple of witches eyed him from a doorway, his bones worth a fortune in the right market; and a couple of war mages on patrol following recent events shivered as I went by.One continued walking, but the other pulled a gun and spun, and the magic suddenly pouring off him whited out my senses for a moment, leaving me flailing and helpless.Until his friend pulled him on, and I heard something above the clash of all that power.
Voices.
Ones I knew.
“—have your hide!”That was the tall, brown-haired boy called Andy, speaking from somewhere far ahead, his voice fading in and out as people passed between us.“Slipping away, not telling anybody—”
“What?I forget the hall pass?”the one they called Chayton asked.
Andy must have grabbed his arm, because they both stopped, making it easier to find them in the labyrinth of branching tunnels.“You can’t just leave!It’s not safe!”
“You know what’s not safe?Taking a break in the middle of a crisis.But Lia could be out of it for days, maybe weeks, and Cyrus isn’t gonna leave her alone.Meaning nothing is getting done—”
“He’s got a point,” another voice, the one called Lee, said.
“Don’t help him!”Andy snapped.
“And anyway, you gotta make up your mind,” Chayton added.
“About what?”
“Last time, I was yelled at for not doing enough and letting Jace slip away.Now, I’m doing too much—”
“Don’t be an ass—”
“That was my fault,” the boy named Jace said, the sweetness of his voice carrying clearly past the crowd.“I already told them—”
“So why is everyone still giving me crap about it?”Chayton demanded.“I just want to know the rules here.‘Cause it’s starting to sound like you don’t have any.It’s just shit on Chayton all day every day—”
“So that’s what this is?Trying to prove yourself?”Andy demanded.
