“I’ve not flown in forever. Now this is living.” At least Azarin was having a fine time. She was in her element. In fact, this was how her people found their magical element, chasing storms across the Plane of Air, on creatures not so different than this. “Not that I don’t enjoy the snuggling, but could you loosen the death grip just a bit? You’re going to break my ribs.”
I forced myself to relax.
She took a deep breath. “Much more comfortable, thank you. Alrighty, let me work with her for a little bit, get familiar with her quirks, and then we’ll get on with the mission.”
We spent the next twenty minutes swooping around the market. True to her word, whenever anyone looked up, curious to see what the massive shadow flashing past was, Azarin wouldshout at them to go to Smorp Brothers. It was unlikely anyone heard her. If the Smorps decided to keep this up, they’d probably need to invest in a banner.
After a few minutes, my stomach calmed and I’d run out of water to lose in a cold sweat. The view from up here truly was breathtaking. The Core City went on a great distance. The sheer inconceivable majesty of the place was awe-inspiring.
I might have found the point where beauty overcame fear.
Then Fairly banked hard to the side to avoid a flock of ocean birds, the saddle creaked, ropes pulled tight, down was to the side, and I was back to being terrified.
Azarin got our ride leveled out again. “I think I’ve got the hang of this. The way she moves, I imagine Fairly’s kind spend a lot of time circling, riding currents, and watching for prey. You can start doing your thing. Let’s find this magic bullet.”
That was easier said than done. The farthest I’d been able to sense my bowl was after I’d asked Trax to swim down the canal with it, which had been maybe two hundred and fifty or three hundred yards, tops. And that had taken all the concentration I could muster. Considering that was farther than I could reliably strike even a big target like a Fire Elemental with a trapper’s rifle, I would normally have taken pride in that accomplishment, but right now, my range was insufficient for our needs. We were higher off the ground than that, and it was hard to concentrate on sensing magic while getting tossed around and praying to not tumble to your death.
“We need to get lower.”
“Like how low?”
“Closer the better.” As soon as those words left my mouth, I regretted saying them.
Azarin had a gleeful laugh. “You hear that, Fairly? It’s time to skim some rooftops. I want to be able to reach out and touch theshingles. Let’s see how much control you’ve got. Try not to plow us snout-first into the ground.”
Azarin put us into a dive. Fairly shrieked in delight. I swore, held on tight, and squeezed my eyes shut. Not out of cowardice! I needed to concentrate on my magic. At least, that was the excuse I gave myself.
Finding the warming bowl required clearing my head and bringing the formula to mind. Magic’s done by feel, more art than science. When you get a spell to bind to an object, there’s a certain moment of connection between caster and element. When you’re invoking, you’re activating the element, giving that energy a direction, and then letting it go. Sort of like how Azarin was using the reins to point Fairly in the right direction, and then the kwetzel took that suggestion and did what it wanted. When you’re enchanting something, it’s more like you’re locking the element in with the power of your will, and that energy remains there, just waiting to release like a compressed spring. You can feel that built-up energy, sort of like Fairly’s back legs as she’d gone into the crouch, and setting off the enchantment was just like her leap. It wanted to go off.
Having created that enchantment, I was connected to it. I just had to listen for the call of compressed energy.
When I opened my eyes, we were only about thirty feet off the ground and moving so fast, the buildings were passing by like streaks. People were screaming and running from us. I closed my eyes again.
“Maybe I should coax her just a teensy bit higher.”
“Good idea!”
The flapping made me a bit more confident. Flapping meant climbing. I cleared my head and tried to relax. My grip must have loosened a bit, because Azarin asked, “You’re not taking another nap again.”
“No danger of that. I’m trying to concentrate.”
“Fairly and I will carry on, but if you start snoring, I’m going to have her do a flip.”
“Please don’t. Pass over the districts around the bay first.”
The reasoning for starting there was that once word got out to the various powerful factions around the city that there was a bit of Permanence on the loose, they’d all be looking for it. The wealthier districts would have more potential buyers, but they’d also have a lot more watch presence, and the Council automatically claimed the rights to any Permanence in the Core. Gerzog would surely prefer to sell it than have it confiscated.
With Carcalla looking for him, Gerzog wouldn’t go anywhere near the Slumps. He’d kept Dathka as a bartering chip against the Latros, but why risk running into them at all? The Cult of Tempus was another potential buyer, but if Gerzog went down into the remains of the ancient civilization from before the building of the Great Machine, the cult would just take it from him. Their goal was to open Time and kill us all, so it was reasonable to assume they weren’t exactly sane or honest in their dealings.
“Why there?”
“The watchmen would arrest him, the Latros would skin him alive, and the Cult would probably do whatever it was that insane mutants do to their victims. Gerzog can’t leave the Core, because he has to stay close enough to be able to show off the goods and make a trade. He’s likely in a district with enough people he won’t stand out, so probably among the laborers and tradesmen.”
“Wow. That’s smart.”
I took the compliment but didn’t tell her I’d gotten all that from Rade, because he’d worked for less than honest merchants before and picked up a few things and the movement of stolen goods.
We went over the bay first. From up here, a hundred ships were in view, and farther out in the waves, Korthican’s Warning and dozens of other islands. Out beyond that, the water went on and on. Since that ocean would eventually connect to the Elemental Plane of Water, it wasn’t infinite, but it sure was close.
