As we got closer, I could hear Sifuso calling out, “Can someone help? The ground’s trying to eat me.”
The noise had attracted some curious students, and they were clustered around the entrance, peering through the earth room’s sideways doorway. “Don’t worry. Carnavon is here,” one of them shouted.
They were relieved I’d arrived. If rank ten Gaul Haddar had left me in charge, surely that meant I was somewhat competent.
Boy, I had them fooled!
The other students got out of the way, revealing that, across the room, our lacertian student had climbed up the wall to escape the three-foot-tall, four-foot-wide blob of awakened earth magic that was rolling about beneath him. The thing appeared to be a pile of dirt and small rocks, but it was moving about like it was disturbingly alive.
Azarin had been so nonchalant when she’d fetched me, I’d been expecting a little creature like last time. Not this massive thing.
“You could have warned me it was nearly the size of a wagon.”
“It’s grown. It was only about as big as a bucket when I left to get you.” Azarin, who came from a people known for their adventurous storm-chasing, giant eagle-riding ways was by nature an over confident sort, yet she took one look at the menacing thing and grimaced. “Want me to evacuate the place?”
“Maybe? How should I know?” Then I shouted at Sifuso, who was about fifteen yards away, “What the hell did you unleash this time?”
“I don’t know, Carnavon. It was an accident. I was attemptingShape Earth.”
That was a spell I’d had no success with myself. So far, I’d learned some fire, air, and a bit of death, but earth, water, and life eluded me.Shape Earthwas supposed to be a simpler spell,directing minor Elemental spirits to move dirt into different useful forms, but this was certainly not that.
I’d not known lacertians could climb so well, and poor Sifuso was doing everything he could to remain stuck to the wall. In their home kingdoms, lacertians were known as vicious hunters—honestly, I found him a little frightening to look at, not that I would ever admit such a thing—but there wasn’t much his claws or fangs were going to accomplish against this thing.
The blob was currently occupied eating a wooden bench we’d salvaged from the dump. It had formed a hole for a mouth and was gnawing on the boards with rows of teeth made of gravel. Another mouth formed on the opposite side, and it began eating a shelf. I didn’t know much about the beings of the Elemental Plane of Earth, but something about this thing reminded me of the gurglers of my home realm, a dumb—but hungry—bit of the plane come to life.
If this was anything like a gurgler, we were all in terrible danger.
“If you survive, you’re banned from doing that spell in the Tube again. Got it?”
“Never again. I swear!” Sifuso’s yellow eyes were wide with fear as the earth monster effortlessly snapped big planks in half beneath him. “What do we do?”
That was a really good question. Lacertians had thick, scaly skin, that could supposedly even stop a knife thrust, but this thing was contentedly grinding boards into splinters, so I doubted that natural armor would make much difference if it got hold of him. I looked back toward the students clustered around the door. “Who’s got some offensive spells handy?”
A couple hands reluctantly went up.
“Great. You two get in here. If it tries to eat Sifuso, we’ll blast it. Morton, go fetch Krachma. He’ll know what to do.”
Krachma was a lob from the Elemental Plane of Earth. He was by far the strongest among us at this type of magic, and also the source of this particular spell. Unfortunately, Krachma was also a lousy teacher who barely spoke any of the trade language everyone else spoke in the Core, and none of us were fluent in Lobbish. I suspected if Krachma was better at explaining how earth spells worked, then our gang of morons probably wouldn’t keep unleashing monsters to eat our basement.
“On it, Mr. Carnavon, sir,” Morton the gnome shouted as he sped off on his short little legs. I probably should’ve sent somebody faster, but it was already too late.
I yelled after him, “And send Trax Bloodtrail if you see him!”
“Trax is a monk, not a wizard. What’s Trax going to do to a living dirt pile?” Azarin asked. “Punch it?”
“I don’t know. He’s handy, though.”
“True,” Azarin agreed. Because say what you will about our Squalo friend, the toothy fellow was comforting to have at your side in a fight. Though he was a lot more useful when the enemy was something edible.
Instead of the lethally efficient Trax, we’d have to make do with two of our newer students: Rufus the dwarf from Bergwald, and Danny, a local human. Neither had exactly impressed me with their magical aptitude so far, even though both had papers from a tester declaring they’d been born more gifted than I’d been.
Danny was so scared, he looked like he was about to piss his pants. Rufus’ mood was inscrutable, but I’d found that to be true with most of the dwarves I’d met so far. It was probably because their beards covered up so much of their faces. He caught me eyeballing him and puffed up his chest. “Never fear, hotlander. This pathetic brute is nothing to a mighty war mage of Clan Rudnik.”
Rufus’ tester papers marked him as a rank two, butwar magesounded like it should be a lot more impressive an office than a mere two. Rank ten Gaul Haddar didn’t even have a title like that, and I’d seen him shrug off getting hit by buildings.
“That’s great.”
“Aye. I am great,” Rufus said.
