So it’s a chase, but I like my odds a lot better when I can throw fireballs.
And throw fireballs I do, and god, how I missed that.
On the knife-edge in a life-or-death battle and flinging power like confetti, I want to cackle like a supervillain, it’s such a rush.
I content myself with going toe-to-toe with Destien as giant stones whirl and slap around us, as we throw fire and lightning, and anything that hits the barrier sizzles out like it’s being eaten by the void.
Until a spell very nearly catches me underfoot, and I sense it only at the last second and manage to change my step into it into a dive over it, cushioning my roll with another spell rather than landing on the ground directly, where another spell lay.
Destien before me.
And I turn to find Evram behind me, finally willing to get his own hands dirty.
This is also satisfying but much less good for me.
The grand magus looks absolutely outraged.
“I took you in and trained you,” he spits. “And for this?”
He gestures around us.
I am pretty confident he does not mean the havoc I have wrought on Stonehenge, because a grand magus of High Earth wouldn’t care one iota for the sanctity of a power spot on Low Earth.
He has, unfortunately, taken the time while I’ve been occupied with Destien to look at the spell I didn’t quite finish.
That being, the first anchor that would draw magic back to Low Earth.
And Evram, also unfortunately, is one of the few High Earth mages who can absolutely undo it if I give him the opportunity. The only reason he hasn’t is because as soon as I get rid of him and Destien, there will be no one to stop me from finishing it.
Which means his priorities have abruptly shifted, and he absolutely has to finish me first or risk losing his own access to all the power stolen from Low Earth.
If I’d had any doubt the grand magus knows full well Low Earth can hold its own power, this would resolve it.
Evram hasn’t fought his own battles in a long time, but with Destien still in the fight, let’s say I do not like my odds.
I really needed to have finished Destien before Evram figured this out. But Destien is too good, and Evram was too quick. Damn.
Nothing for it.
I take a breath, ground my stance, and get ready to dig the fuck in.
I try to reactivate my spell to limit power in the dome first, but Evram anticipates that and unworks it in the same breath. In the next, Destien has sent a wall of magical force like one of the stone slabs—can’t fault his inspiration—and I’m on the defense.
Damn, damn, damn.
I have gone from totally in control of the ground to on the defense too fast. It’s a testament to how goddamn fast I still am that I hold on for thirty seconds, a minute, two, but unless I have a brilliant idea fast—and I don’t havespacefor that, as fast as I’m fending off attacks—I’m not sure I’ll make it to a third minute.
My grand debut on the stage of the universe is going up in smoke before my eyes.
Then something invisible plows into Destien at high speed and I don’t even stop to question what the fuck just happened.
With a surge of power, I shoot a beam of magic straight at the grand magus.
The old man isn’t used to dueling anymore, and he’s not used to his wand, but he manages to get a shield around him just in time.
If he had been my target, that would matter, but my target was his wand.
This wand isn’t powerful enough, with generations of careful defenses, to take that. Evram never planned to get his hands dirty, or he’d have prepared for this.
