The Dragons of Dorcastle

Chapter Nine

Alain had watched from a distance as the Mechanic left the trolley and entered the very large building which served as the center of Ringhmon government. Already the subject of curious and worried glances from passerby, the Mage began walking around the outside of the area bounded by the great building. As he had expected, there were numerous small and large restaurants dedicated to feeding those who labored inside the building. He also located a store which sold written items, and found a large volume dedicated to the history of Ringhmon. The bookseller he selected reacted to Alain’s presence in his store with ill-concealed unease, but Alain gave no sign that he noticed.

He carried the book out of the store, past the payment desk where the clerk pretended not to see Alain. Commons paid elders for the services of Mages, but Mages did not “pay” for anything, Alain had been told. They took what they wanted or needed from whichever common had those things, and the commons, who did not matter anyway because they did not even exist, should be grateful that the Mage had not chosen to take more. If a Mage needed shelter, he walked into a room and any commons there left. If he needed food, he took it from a roadside stall or entered a place where commons ate and was fed. No one would dare deny a Mage.

Except a Mechanic. He had been warned that Mechanics would resist, and so should be ignored. Do not walk into a room with them or take their food. Just realize that the Mechanics do not exist and are not worthy of your attention.

Unless they threaten you, and then you must kill them, Mage Alain. Mechanics are as merciless as they are mercenary. If any appear dangerous, kill them.

“How can I ever repay you?” Master Mechanic Mari had asked him.

Alain stood on the street for a moment, looking at the book he had taken. He could not do what commons did even if he chose to. “Pay” had something to do with money. He knew that much, but he had no money. Why would a Mage carry money when he or she never needed it?

Unless they threaten you, and then you must kill them.

What if he had remembered that advice during the bandit attack, when the Mechanic had pointed her weapon at his face? He could have killed her then. He could have tried, at least. Then, when she was dead, the bandits would have found Alain and killed him, too.

Clearly the advice of his elders was lacking in some respects.

On his journey from Ihris to the Imperial port of Landfall, Alain had taken rooms and food just as he had been told to do, but not without noticing the fear and resentment on the faces of the commons who provided those things. They tried their best to hide it, worried that he would do something terrible to them, but it was always apparent to a Mage.

It had bothered him. Despite all of his training within the Mage Guild Hall, once out among the commons again, whenever he saw a man and a woman he thought of his parents. When around Mages, Alain had acted as they had, oblivious to the cowering commons. Now, alone among commons, he could choose how to act.

Perhaps he would take back the book when he was done with it.

He had to eat, however. Alain chose a restaurant with a window seat which gave a good view of the entrance to the government building and settled down to watch for the Mechanic’s reappearance. He still had no clear idea of what he was doing or what he would do next. If this course of action was a road, he should reach a point where it offered a choice, to go onward or back, or to turn off onto another road.

A trembling server came to stand near him, afraid to speak. Alain gave her a dispassionate glance, then pointed to another table where a common was eating and drinking. The server went to grab the food and drink from the common, paused as if realizing that might not be the best course of action, and looked back at Alain, who shook his head and pointed to the kitchen.

Within a very short time Alain had his own meal set before him, after which the commons pretended he wasn’t there while they discreetly watched for any sign that he wanted anything.

Yes. It did bother him. He wasn’t certain why the faded memories of his parents came at such times.

It did not seem like the sort of question that he should ask an elder, though.

He ate without tasting, in the Mage way. Food was another illusion, of course, and while it was necessary, too much focus on it would distract a Mage. Or so he had been taught, and acolytes did not vary from or question the wisdom they were told. Finishing, Alain settled into meditation, outwardly unmoving, barely aware of the commons avoiding coming near him, the book showing the alleged, officially approved history of Ringhmon open before him but unread.

The sun sank through the sky until darkness began creeping across the courtyard, and large numbers of citizens who either worked in the city hall or had business there filed out and dispersed into the city. Alain blinked his way back to alertness, certain that the Mechanic had not yet left the building. How much time had passed? He had reached here before noon, and now sunset was passing. He was hungry again.

Alain looked toward a server, who jerked with fear at his glance. Pointing toward the kitchen once more, Alain soon had dinner before him. He ate it just as heedlessly as he had the earlier meal, paying no attention to the food, thinking that this road he had taken appeared to be leading nowhere. What did Mechanics do, anyway? It had never concerned him, but now Alain thought that whatever it was, it took awhile. Perhaps it took days. He almost got up to leave, but decided that if nothing mattered, then waiting here also did not matter. Besides, he had no wish to encounter the impassively hostile Mage elders of Ringhmon any sooner than he had to.

It was fully dark outside the restaurant when Alain’s road finally took a turn. A deeper darkness flashed before his eyes and sudden pain filled his head, before both vanished without a trace as quickly as they had come. What did that mean? Pain that was not my own? How could— ?

Alain looked down at his hands, trying to apply what he knew to what had happened. Foresight? Of something due to happen soon? Yes, very soon. Not a vision or something heard, but a physical sensation felt. I felt someone else’s pain. How is that possible? Others do not exist. Their pain is not real. How can I feel it even through foresight?

If only I knew more of foresight.

What he had experienced had felt real enough for that moment, though. I did share feelings once, with Master Mechanic Mari, when I knew that she too did not want to appear too young or too weak. That was very different, and yet… He tried to recall what he had just experienced, to recreate the moment of darkness and pain, in hopes of gaining more understanding. Instead, Alain felt something like a thread, thin and insubstantial. The thread wasn’t real, either, but it ran from him, going out into the night, toward the looming, silent bulk of the Ringhmon Hall of City Government. He studied the thread that wasn’t there, and somehow knew that it did not go somewhere, but to someone. He was linked to a shadow in some mysterious way.

As he examined the thread that wasn’t there, Alain realized that in an indefinable way it felt like the Mechanic.

This was worse than he had thought.

Was the thread the means by which she had kept his thoughts on her, and caused him to act in ways contrary to his training? But he could feel no power running through the thread. It simply was. Without power there could be no spells.

A strange road this offers, indeed. No elder ever spoke of such a thing as a thread between a Mage and another. Mages can feel each other’s presence at a distance. Not like this, not in any way like this, but perhaps the things are related. Alain hesitated, torn between his training, his curiosity, and that strange thread leading into the night. Up until this moment he could observe, seeing where the road led, putting off any decision. Now he saw two roads, one leading back to the Mage Hall and away from the thread, and the other following the thread. Would the thread break with increasing distance? How to judge the strength of something that was not there?

One road to safety, to the certainty of the wisdom his elders taught, and the other road into the dark, in every sense of the word.

The Mechanic was surely in trouble.

That did not matter at all. She did not matter at all.

If she died, would the thread break?

Alain felt a strange sensation as he thought about that. He had felt her pain. If she died, would he feel…?

His eyes stung in a strange way. Alain lowered his head and raised the cowl of his robes to shadow his face. He blinked several times, unable to understand why his eyes were watering. It had started when he thought of feeling the Mechanic die—

There it went again. The two things were somehow related.

Memory. Little girl Asha looking at little boy Alain on the first night after they had been brought to be acolytes. Her face streaked with…tears.

Crying. They had learned not to cry, to deny anything that might bring betraying tears and the punishments that came with them. They had striven to forget everything about tears.

The Mechanic had made him remember this, too.

He did not want her to die.

I could not save my parents. I could not save the commons with the caravan, the master or the commander of the guards or any of the others. I can save the Mechanic. I can try. Perhaps when I do so her spell on me will be lifted, the thread will break, and I can seek wisdom anew. If her uncanny influence has not already crippled my ability to work spells.

He should ask advice on this. Ask older and wiser Mages what the thread might mean, whether the Mechanic’s effects on him could be reversed. But it would take a long time to return to the Mage Guild Hall, ask of the elders, and return. What if the Mechanic died in that time?

What if the elders would not let him return? What if they were watching when he felt the Mechanic die?

I must act. I must do what I think should be done. My elders already believe me to be a fool, too young to be a Mage, too young to follow wisdom. Alain stood up, looking into the darkness where the thread ran invisibly. Perhaps they are right. The only way I will know, the only way I will learn, is by following this new road. I am young, but I know this.

She may be only a shadow, but I will not leave her to the dark. I will not feel her die if I can prevent that, even though I do not understand why I am so resolved.

Something very large seemed to be trying to beat its way out of Mari’s head. She clenched her eyes tightly against the pain, slowly becoming aware that she was lying on something rough. Forcing herself to open her eyes, Mari waited until they could focus on her surroundings, gradually making out stone walls decorated only by strong metal rings set into them at various heights, and a ceiling made of heavy wooden beams. Weak light which flickered like that from an oil lamp filtered into the room through a small grating in a hefty wooden door which was reinforced by metal bands and bore an impressively large lock mechanism.

Wincing at the pounding in her head, Mari used one elbow to lever herself carefully to a sitting position. She had been lying on a wooden cot covered only by a thin mattress made of coarse fabric that had apparently been stuffed with straw a long time ago and never refreshed. She was still wearing everything she had before, including her Mechanics jacket and her empty shoulder holster under it, but her tool kit was nowhere to be seen. Reaching up, Mari gingerly felt the back of her head, her fingers encountering a lump surrounded by hair matted with what she assumed was blood.

A fresh wave of agony in her head made Mari decide to lie down again, staring at the heavy door across from her. She didn’t see any sense in trying the door, since it was surely locked. As far as she could tell, that door marked the only entrance or exit from the room.

She rubbed one hand across the front of her Mechanics jacket. I thought this jacket was the sort of armor no sane common would dare try to challenge. That’s what the Guild always told me. “The Guild is your family. We’ll always protect you.” But here I am. At least I’m not dead. Why not?

Think it through, Professor S’san always said. They still need me. If that Model Six breaks again they want me handy to fix it. What makes them think I’d help?

Mari thought of the torture methods she had heard about, things that rulers inflicted on commons, things she had never expected to worry about being done to her. Maybe she would be able to hold out. Hold out until they killed her, anyway. I’m still supposed to be planning everything I’ll do in my life, not trying to imagine how soon it’ll come to an ugly end.

Would Stimon bring the resources of the Mechanics Guild to bear on her behalf? If he did, she would be free before morning. But would he? What if Polder and his allies swore that Mari had left? A too-young Master Mechanic, wandering alone through a strange city after dark—and never mind that Stimon had set that up—he would accept that her disappearance was her fault.

No one here would want to rock the boat for Mari. Ringhmon was clearly spending a lot of money on Mechanic devices, everything from rifles to what must be a huge contract for that secret Model Six. How much profit would the Guild Hall here in Ringhmon, and the Guild as a whole, sacrifice in the name of questioning a perfectly reasonable story told by the oh-so-respectable rulers of Ringhmon?

Why hadn’t any other Mechanics already noticed how Ringhmon was using that Model Six? If they had, why hadn’t Mari been told? Why hadn’t something been done? Commons couldn’t do the work of Mechanics, but still it was forbidden for them to try.

As she lay there, Mari remembered whispers in the dark. She, Alli and Calu, sneaking out of the apprentice barracks in the middle of the night and climbing up onto the roof to share a few moments of pretend freedom from the oversight of older apprentices, Mechanics, and most of all Senior Mechanics. Calu, frowning up at the stars as he spoke in a voice so low only Mari and Alli could possibly hear. If commons can’t do Mechanic work, why is Mechanic work secret? It’s like forbidding horses to learn algebra. What’s the point? They can’t. You only need to keep secrets from someone who can use those secrets. So why do we have to prevent commons from learning Mechanic secrets?

Alli had punched him in the side. Shut up, you idiot! Are you planning on asking some Senior Mechanic that question?

No! But what do you think the answer is?

And, as Mari had already become used to, both Ali and Calu looked at her for an answer. She had pretended indifference. I bet the answer is that if you ask the question you end up catching blazes and getting demoted back to entry-level apprentice. You guys want to bet on another answer?

They hadn’t, going on to other topics, like who was the stupidest Senior Mechanic, or who Mari should try dating because you really are hopeless with boys, Mari. But she had remembered Calu’s question. It had nagged at her, even as she accepted what the Mechanics Guild told her about commons.

She lay there, her head pounding with pain, thoughts bleak, for how long she didn’t know. The pain gradually lessened, and a stubborn flame of determination grew. I am a Master Mechanic. I’m Master Mechanic Mari of Caer Lyn. I’m the youngest person ever to qualify as a Mechanic and the youngest ever to qualify as a Master Mechanic. I won’t let anyone do this to me. Not Stimon and not Polder. Not anyone. I won’t just lie here helpless until somebody comes for me. Im going to get out of here and get some answers.

She managed to sit up again, finding the hammering in her head stayed manageable this time. Moving very cautiously, Mari stood up, her feet a bit unsteady. Taking each step carefully, she crossed to the door, confirming that it was indeed locked. She knelt to examine the lock, discovering that it was tightly sealed behind a heavy armor plate so she couldn’t have accessed its workings even if she had possessed her tools. Odd. Why so much trouble when commons couldn’t crack a lock? Am I not the first Mechanic who’s disappeared in Ringhmon? But how could they hope to get away with having more than one Mechanic vanish after coming to the city hall? Surely they would have been smart enough to plan on a kidnapping that couldn’t possibly be tied to them.

That ambush. Mari, you idiot! The so called bandits equipped with lots of expensive rifles. The same type of rifles that Ringhmon has bought for its army. You fool. Why did it take you so long to figure out that connection? Who else even knew a Mechanic would be coming in on that caravan? They planned to kill everyone but me and probably bring me into the city with a hood over my head and a gag in my mouth, just one more anonymous prisoner. My Guild would’ve searched the Waste in vain for any trace of me. No wonder I saw some of those ‘bandits’ in the city. They were probably soldiers of Ringhmon, back from trying to find me, and once I made it to the city I bet they had orders to let Polder’s guards handle it.

She had figured it out too late, though Mari suspected that even if she had realized the truth sooner no one would have listened to her. Just a nervous girl, promoted too quickly, not really ready to do her job, and finding excuses to avoid it. Right. Well, water under the bridge. Now the problem is how to get out of here. She stood up again, going over the door and walls in search of any feature that might offer something she could use.

There was nothing. Just that extremely solid door and walls made of closely fitted blocks of extremely solid stone. Mari looked upward, staring at the ceiling. The beams of wood offered no signs of help, either. Hardwood, thick and massive. Even an axe would have trouble biting into them, and she didn’t have an axe.

Mari squinted, spotting what seemed to be a large knothole in one beam. Something about it didn’t look right. Grabbing the cot, she pulled it under the knothole, cautiously stood on the cot, and raised her hand to probe inside.

Something metal rested in the hole, concealed from sight in its shadow. Mari got her fingers around it, blessing the fact that her hands were small enough to allow that purchase, and twisted the object free. She started to pull it out, finding it resisting like something attached to wires. Yanking viciously, Mari pulled the object out, hearing and feeling wires snap. Then she stared down at what she had found.

A far-listener. Someone had installed a device in this cell that would detect any sounds made and send them along the wires to a place where someone else would hear them. She knew Mechanics produced such things. She had never imagined a common cell apparently designed to hold a Mechanic would include such a device.

Mari examined the far-listener closely, seeking clues to where it had been made. To her bafflement, she couldn’t find any of the telltale makers’ signs that should have provided a guide to which workshop in which city had crafted the thing. It’s as if this were made by Mechanics who aren’t in the Guild. But that’s impossible. All Mechanics are in the Guild. All Mechanics are trained by the Guild. No one is allowed to work outside the Guild. Someone trained by the Guild who tried freelancing would face death, and those who hired them would be banned from receiving Mechanic services.

The far-listener couldn’t exist. But it did.

Mari stuffed the broken far-listener into a pocket and sat down on the cot, staring at the stones of the wall. First she’d seen a Mage do things which Mages weren’t supposed to be able to really do, then commons attacked her and imprisoned her, and now she had evidence that unauthorized Mechanic work was being done. Three “impossible” things. My education wasn’t nearly as thorough as I thought it was. I can’t be the first Mechanic to experience this stuff. What the blazes is going on? If Professor S’san suspected enough to insist on giving me a pistol as a graduation gift, why didn’t she tell me more?

What else haven’t I been told?

The light changed slightly. Mari looked up and over at one wall. There was now a narrow, roughly door-shaped hole in it. Standing in that hole was Mage Alain.

Mari stood up, realizing that her mouth was hanging open. That wall was solid. I felt it. There wasn’t any opening. She watched as the Mage took two shaky steps into the cell, then paused, some of the strain leaving his face. She blinked, wondering what she had just seen, as the hole in the wall vanished as if it had never been. One moment it was there, the next it was gone.

Mari walked rapidly past the Mage and slammed her hand against the wall where the hole had been. The stone stung her palm, as hard and unyielding as it had been when she had checked it earlier.

Mari whirled back to face the Mage, the sudden motion making her still- throbbing head dizzy. “How did you do that?” she demanded, pointing at the wall, shocked by how ragged and hoarse her voice sounded.

The Mage looked at her with that unrevealing face. “I have come to…help,” he said in an impassive voice tinged with weariness.

“Help? You’ve come to help me?” Mari felt a wave of weakness and leaned back against the solid stone for support. “A Mage has walked through a wall into my cell to help a Mechanic.” She couldn’t suppress a shudder. “My head. They hit me and now I’m seeing and hearing things.”

The Mage came closer, peering at her. “You are hurt, Mechanic Mari?”

“Master Mechanic Mari,” she muttered automatically, then reached out and grabbed his arm. “I’m not imagining this. You’re real.”

“Nothing is real. All is illusion. But I stand here,” the Mage agreed.

“Don’t confuse me. I can’t handle it right now.” Mari worked to control her breathing and to calm her nerves. Realizing she was still holding Mage Alain’s arm in a tight grip, she let go. “Never touch a Mage.” “Why would I want to?” “How did you get in here?”

“I learned that something ill had befallen you,” he explained without apparent feeling. “I felt your pain.”

“You felt my pain? You’re not talking empathy, are you?”

“Empathy?” Mage Alain shook his head. “I do not know that word. No. It hurt. In this place.” He reached up to touch the back of his head.

Mari staggered back to the cot and sat down. All right. Stop and think. A Mage felt me get hit on the head. Then he walked through a wallto find me. But either I’m crazy, or it happened. If it happened, then I can analyze it, figure it out. “Let’s take this one step at a time. How did you know where I was?”

“I could sense your location,” the Mage said dispassionately. “A thread connects us.”

She looked down at herself. “A thread?”

“That is…a metaphor. I sense it as a thread. It is not real, but it is. I do not know why it exists, or its purpose.” Something about the way the Mage said that made it sound…accusing? She must be imagining that.

I don’t think I’m ready to examine the question of why there’s a metaphorical thread connecting me to this Mage. Or why he thinks there’s some thread. “I’m sorry, but I know nothing about Mage stuff.”

“The thread is not the work of a Mage,” Alain said.

“Then who—?” Her head pounded again. “Never mind. Next topic. Where are we? Still in the city hall?”

“Yes,” Alain confirmed. “A city hall with a dungeon. It is what would be expected in Ringhmon.”

“You’ve noticed that about them, too, huh?” Mari swallowed and pointed to the wall. “How did you do that?”

“I cannot tell you.”

“Mage secret?”

“Yes.”

Mari took a long, slow breath. “They use smoke and mirrors and other ‘magic’ to make commons think they can create temporary holes in walls and things like that. It’s all nonsense.” “Mages actually can make real holes in walls.”

“No.”

Her head hurting with increased intensity, Mari glowered at the Mage. “You didn’t make a hole in the wall?”

“I made the illusion of a hole in the illusion of the wall.”

Mari looked at Mage Alain for what felt like a long time, trying to detect any sign of mockery or lying. But he seemed perfectly sincere. And unless she had completely lost her mind, he had just walked through that solid wall. “If the wall is an illusion, why can’t anybody walk through it?”

“It is a very powerful illusion,” Alain explained.

“But you made it go away, so you must be more powerful than that illusion.”

“No,” Mage Alain said, shaking his head. “Even a Mage cannot negate the illusions we see. What a Mage does is overlay another illusion on top of the illusion everyone sees.”

In a very strange way, what he was saying seemed to make sense, or at least seemed to sustain a consistent logic, if logic was the right term for something that involved walking through walls. “We can get out the same way that you got in?” Mari asked. “Through imaginary holes in the imaginary wall?” She wondered how her Guild would feel about seeing that in her report. Actually, she didn’t have to wonder, but she also wasn’t about to turn down a chance to escape.

The Mage took a deep breath and swayed on his feet. “No.”

“No?”

“Unfortunately—” Alain collapsed into a seated position on the cot next to her—“the effort of finding you has exhausted me. There were several walls to get through. I can do no more for some time. I am probably incapable of any major effort until morning.” He shook his head. “I did not plan this well. Maybe the elders are right and seventeen is simply too young to be a Mage.”

Mari stared at him. “Are you telling me that you came to rescue me, following a metaphorical thread through imaginary holes, but now that you’re in the same cell with me you can’t get us out?”

“Yes, that is correct. This one erred.”

“That one sure did. Now instead of one of us being stuck in here, we’re both stuck in here.”

The Mage gave her a look which actually betrayed a trace of irritation. He must have really been exhausted for such a feeling to show. “I do not have much experience with rescues. Are you always so difficult?”

Mari felt a sudden urge to laugh, but cut it off when the laughter made her head throb painfully. “To be perfectly honest, yes. You’re not the first guy to ask me that, by the way. Thank you for coming. Thank you for getting this far. At least I have company. Unless I’m insane or drugged and imagining all of this, of course. Maybe you’re not real.”

“I am real,” Mage Alain said. “You are not.”

“You know, that’s really not helping.” Mari spread her hands. “I have no way of getting out of here. You don’t have any more tricks?”

“Tricks?”

“Sorry. What do you call…?”

“Spells.” Alain shook his head, his weariness again obvious to Mari. “Small ones. I cannot open a hole large enough for either of us to pass through. Not for some time. The effort required grows rapidly as the size of the opening increases.”

“Well, sure, that makes sense. Does it increase by the square like an area measurement or a cube for volume or is it some exponential progression?”

It was his turn to look at her, saying nothing, for a long moment. “I do not know,” Alain finally answered. “Do those words have meaning?”

“Yeah. I guess Mages don’t spend much time on math, huh?”

“Math?”

“Never mind.” It was as if she and Mage Alain occupied two entirely different worlds even though they were sitting side by side on the cot in this cell.

“Do you have any Mechanic…tricks?” Alain asked her.

“I haven’t come up with any yet that can get us out of here.” Mari looked glumly toward the door of the cell, then her eyes fixed on the lock. “You can’t make another big imaginary hole for a while, you said. Can you make a little imaginary hole right now?”

He followed her gaze. “Yes. It will be very tiring, but I feel certain I can do that. Where do you need it?”

She stood up carefully to prevent another bout of dizziness, then walked over to the door and pointed at the armor plate protecting the lock. “Right here. About this big,” Mari added, outlining an area with her cupped fingers. She didn’t stop to think about how much sense any of this made. As long as it worked, it could be pure crazy. If she could get at the back of the lock, maybe she would be able to jimmy it open before the Mage’s imaginary hole disappeared.

“If you believe this to be important, I shall do so.” Mari watched nervously as the Mage narrowed his eyes and seemed to concentrate, then opened his eyes wide. “Hurry with what you wish to do. I cannot hold it long.”

She turned back to the door, and stopped, aghast. There was a hole there, a little bigger than she had asked for. But there wasn’t simply a hole in the armor plate. There was a hole right through the plate and the back of the lock and the lock itself and out the other side of the door. She could look through into the passageway.

Mari just gazed blankly for a second, unable to accept what she was seeing, then abruptly remembered that she needed to do something. Reaching into the hole with a fear that it would vanish and leave her hand embedded in steel, Mari fumbled for the lock bolt, which now hung in the door jamb unsupported by anything where the lock mechanism had been. She pulled out the heavy bolt, hastily looked for anything else protruding into the frame from the door, then yanked her hand free and dropped the bolt as if it were on fire. “Done.”

The Mage sighed and relaxed. The hole vanished at the same moment the sheared off bolt hit the floor inside the cell with a muffled thud. Mari studied the door, which once again looked and felt completely solid. But the end of the bolt still lay on the floor where Mari had dropped it. She pushed against the door and felt it begin to swing open. I am insane. I have to be. This can’t be happening. She pushed at the door again and it scraped open a little more. But if I’m going to imagine I’m escaping, I might as well go through with it.

She pushed open the door far enough to be able to stick her head out, searching quickly to confirm no guards were in sight, then looked back at the Mage, who was still sitting slumped on the cot. “Don’t you want to come along?”

The Mage eyed her. “You want me to accompany you.”

“Yes, I want you to accompany me! Do you think that I’d leave you in this cell? Blazes, Mage, I’m not that difficult! Come on!” He rose and walked after her as Mari slid out through the partially opened door. She paused, looking and listening for any sign of guards, but could detect nothing. “Shouldn’t they have someone watching the cells?”

Mage Alain stopped beside her. “Perhaps they do not want underlings in a position to hear things their prisoners may say. This is not a large dungeon, and seems to have had only you as a prisoner, so perhaps it is reserved for certain special needs.”

“That makes sense.” Mari took a couple of cautious steps, glancing through the grate in the door of the cell next to hers. She froze. No other prisoners were there, but carefully placed in the center of the cell floor was her tool kit. She pulled at the door, finding it locked securely, then looked around for a key. “I don’t believe it. We found my tools and we can’t get to them.”

“Your tools?” Mage Alain asked.

“They’re important! I need that tool kit.” She turned to the Mage, her hands upraised in a pleading position. “Those tools are…they’re my spells. And my…elders will give me a very hard time if I lose them. Please, Mage Alain, can you make a hole in that door’s lock as well? Just for a few seconds? Please?”

Mage Alain eyed her. “You need these things to cast your spells?”

“Yes!”

“And to undo spells?”

“Undo spells?” What did that mean? “Um, yes. I mean, unscrewing stuff and disassembly and disconnecting—”

“Disconnecting?” Mage Alain faced the door. “Then I must do this.” He stared at the lock, sweat appearing on his brow. “Quickly,” he whispered.

Mari tore her eyes from the Mage and saw a hole in the lock, though smaller than the one he had created before. Reaching in, she found enough of the lock mechanism remained to hold the bolt, but could turn the mechanism by hand to withdraw the bolt. Shoving the door to make sure it was unlocked, she pulled her hand free. “Done.”

The Mage nodded, the hole vanished without a trace, then he fell against the nearby wall, his body limp with exhaustion.

Mari grabbed him to keep him from falling to the floor, guilt surging within her. She had touched him before, but this was the first time she had held him, and his slimness made it all the more clear that the Mage was but a boy close to her in age. That was fortunate, because she might have had trouble holding up a bigger man, but it also drove home to her that she had been pushing him hard and somewhat selfishly. “Forgive me,” she said formally, “and thank you.”

Settling the Mage into a resting position, Mari darted into the cell, hoisting her tool kit with a feeling of joy. Most of what it held were just simple tools like screwdrivers, pliers, and wrenches, but with those tools she felt more confident and complete. She ripped open the compartment on the side, finding her pistol still there. Holding the weapon, she chambered a round and released the safety, then keeping the pistol in one hand and carrying her tool kit with the other she left the cell, shoving the door shut again with her hip.

Mage Alain struggled to his feet, fending off her offered help. “I should be stronger,” he mumbled. “I can walk.”

Mari stepped back, recognizing that in this at least the Mage was like any other young man. She had stung his pride by pushing him into revealing just how weak he was. “As you will, Mage Alain.”

She walked in the lead, keeping her place slow enough to accommodate his exhaustion even though Mari’s nerves were screaming for her to run, run, run, until they got out of here. For a brief time after leaving her cell she had been in an almost dreamlike state, half convinced this was all unreal, but now she had fully accepted it and was increasingly worried about some pack of guards showing up to overwhelm them. She could use her pistol if necessary, but as when they were watching the bandits, she knew that the sound of a single shot would bring an avalanche of enemies upon her.

Together they moved down the passageway, dimly lit by oil lamps set at wide intervals. After passing several more cells, all empty, the passage took a turn and ran past a few additional cells. At the end of the hall, a door blocked further progress. Mari approached the door, her weapon poised, then halted in mid step as Mage Alain hissed a warning. “Stop. No farther.”