Fimbulwinter (Daniel Black) (14 page)

“Oh, and we should both keep a close eye on her for a few days.

Sometimes when we figure out how to satisfy one of these cravings there are

side effects. Nothing dangerous, but she might get weird mood swings or start

stalking you looking for more or something.”

I chuckled. “I think I could handle that one. But yeah, I’ll keep an eye

out.”

We lay there in silence for a moment.

“Thank you,” she said softly. “For being so decent about all this. When I

called on the goddess I was afraid she’d end up tying me to some demon or

monster or something. But you’ve been really good to us both.”

“You make that pretty easy,” I pointed out.

“I guess. You know, Avilla’s really worried about convincing you to keep

protecting her. But you’ve already decided to do that, haven’t you?”

I nodded. “I like Avilla. I’m not going to let anything happen to her.”

“Good. It’s been really hard, being responsible for protecting her. Not

that she’s as helpless as she acts, but her magic isn’t much use in a fight. I’ve

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pushed myself pretty hard trying to get stronger. A lot harder than I should

have, really. But I was stuck being the man for her.”

She sighed, and hugged me again. “You have no idea how good it feels to

have someone to rely on.”

I brushed my fingers through her hair, and she rubbed her cheek against

my hand.

“I won’t let anything happen to you, either,” I told her. “You’re a little

nuts, but it’s a fun kind of crazy. I like having you watching my back.”

“Really? Most guys would be afraid I’d stab them.”

“Are you going to?” I asked her seriously.

She blinked. “I don’t want to,” she said hesitantly. “But some of the stuff

I’ve picked up… don’t trust me too much, Daniel. Not until we can figure out

how to get it back under control, anyway.”

“Fair enough. I’ll put ‘make Cerise’s secret dark side my bitch’ on the to-

do list.”

She gave me a wide-eyed stare, and then broke down into giggles.

“Make… your bitch… thank you, goddess! Fuck, nothing fazes you, does

it? You get a blowjob for that one.” She pushed the sheet down, her hand

fumbling for me.

Sadly, someone chose that moment to interrupt us. The heavy door shifted

slightly, and Beri peeked around the edge.

She got an eyeful, and blushed.

“Eep!” She ducked back around the door. “Sorry! I’m sorry! Miss Avilla

wanted me to tell you breakfast is ready, and the sergeant is waiting to speak

to you.”

Cerise sighed. “Maybe having servants isn’t such a good idea.”

“I don’t know, Miss Cerise. It sounded to me like you and Miss Avilla

need reinforcements, or soon you won’t be able to walk.”

I chuckled, and sat up. “Well, that’s one way to inflate my ego. Where’d

my clothes end up?”

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Breakfast was strips of wolf meat wrapped in hotcakes, with cheese and a

touch of butter. It was mouthwatering as usual, and I reflected that I was going

to get seriously spoiled if Avilla ever got a real kitchen to work with.

The snow had stopped some hours before, so once I was fed I headed

outside to work a little miracle. Cerise followed me curiously, and Thomas

detailed a couple of men to stand watch for me while I worked. I made my way

down the bank of the frozen river until I found a decent stretch of flat ground to

work on. There was now a good eight or ten inches of snow on the ground,

enough to be a noticeable impediment to travel on foot.

“So what are you going to do, master?” Cerise asked eagerly. “Bind a

troop of elementals to carry us all to Lanrest? Summon a dragon, and fly us

there?”

“You’ll see,” I answered. “Gronir, I remember someone mentioning that

Lanrest is on a river. Is this it?”

“No, milord,” the hunter answered. “But the Babbleflow runs into the

Summerfall a few miles down. I guess we could follow that to Lanrest, but the

way the river bends all around it’s a lot longer trip than the road.”

“Hmm. Let me check a few things.”

I called up my magic, blending three elements to create a simple stone

disk enchanted to hover a few feet off the ground. This was the same repulsion

effect I’d used to float a stone in my hand the day before, and it looked like it

had just the properties I needed. The repulsion fell off sharply with distance,

so the stone floated gently a few feet off the ground. Pushing down met with a

springy resistance, as the stone was forced closer to the ground and the

repulsion strengthened.

I let go, and it bobbed up and down for a few moments before coming to

rest at the same height as before. Push down an edge, and it tried to right itself.

Push sideways, and it glided silently across the ground like a hovercraft.

Perfect.

“So, you’re making floating disk things for the baggage?” Cerise frowned

thoughtfully.

“Nope. Wouldn’t be good enough,” I pointed out. “We’d still be walking,

and even if I made enough disks for all the old and wounded the rest of us

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would be slowed down pushing them. But you’re getting there.”

I concentrated, and the disk grew. This was a tricky bit of work, conjuring

more stone and extending the enchantment to cover it, but as long as I took it

slow I could do it. I made it self-powered so it wouldn’t be a drain on my

amulet’s energy, and slowly expanded the disk into a rectangular shape about

the size of a bus. Then I added a stone lip two feet high and a couple of inches

thick around the edges, just to make sure no one would fall off. The floor of the

thing was nearly four feet off the ground, so I shaped some dirt into an earth

ramp leading up to one side of it.

“Neat. Ok, I can see it’s big enough to hold everyone if we’re friendly,”

Cerise commented. “But how does it move?”

“Magic,” I replied. She rolled her eyes, and I grinned. Being mysterious

was turning out to be fun.

Looking around, I spotted Sergeant Thomas. I’d been working for about

an hour, and I suppose he was getting a little anxious.

“All ready, Sergeant,” I told him. “Get everyone organized, and bring

them over here. We’re going to ride into town in style.”

I climbed up the ramp and stepped into the floating vehicle. Considering

the thickness of the stone the thing had to weigh tons, and my own weight

barely affected it. Cerise ran lightly up after me, and eagerly jumped in.

“Are we going to fly?” She asked eagerly.

I chuckled. “No, this is as high as it goes. Free fight is way too tricky for

me to try it with this many people involved.”

Her eyes gleamed. “Does that mean you can do it by yourself? Or maybe,

with one person?”

“Yeah, if I ever get a few days to work on it I’m pretty sure I can build a

flight spell. Are you volunteering to try it out?”

She nodded, and leaned in to whisper in my ear. “A lot of demons can fly.

I have dreams about it sometimes, and it’s awesome. If you can give me that

kind of magic I’ll owe you some serious ‘thank you’ time.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Why don’t you see if Avilla needs any help?”

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The refugees were a bit dubious about boarding a floating rock with no

visible means of support, but a few brave souls crept up the ramp and

cautiously took seats. Then Avilla trooped up with the maids in tow, and a

couple of the soldiers followed her in, and we hit some sort of critical mass.

Ten minutes later I had a fully loaded hover-barge.

“Everyone, get settled in as best you can,” I directed. “You’re going to be

here awhile. This thing is more stable than a boat, but it’s still a good idea not

to move around too much. We’re going to be going pretty fast, and I don’t want

anyone to fall off. Gronir, I want you up near the front where you can help with

directions if we need it. Is everyone here?”

Nods, whispers and speculative looks. I glanced at Thomas, and he

nodded.

“Took a head count, sir. No one’s missing.”

“Good. Let’s see what kind of time we can make.”

I pushed off with a bit of force magic, and the floating barge drifted

slowly forward. I steered carefully, mindful of the substantial mass of the

vehicle. It was like guiding a boat, only worse. With no water to sink a rudder

into the only way to change direction was to shift the vector of the thrust I was

applying, and even with my new amulet pushing this many tons of vehicle and

refugees around took time. So I kept our speed down to a slow walk as I

maneuvered us down the river bank.

After the first couple of bends I was starting to get a feel for it, and eased

our pace up a little. Then we reached a spot where the ravine narrowed, and I

had to steer us over the frozen river.

The thin ice beneath us shattered almost instantly, producing an alarming

racket, and a spray of water sheeted out in all directions. The passengers

murmured uneasily as the vehicle sank a few inches, and began to bob slightly.

But the repulsion field worked on water as well as dirt, and the spray of

displaced water was all moving away from us. Good thing, since getting wet in

freezing temperatures is dangerous.

“We’re fine,” I announced loudly. “The noise is just the weight of the

barge crushing the ice under us.”

The passengers settled down in a few minutes, although the noise was

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still a bit unnerving. I pushed our speed up a little more, wanting to make sure

we wouldn’t be in one place long enough for anything to hear us and come

investigate. We were up to running speed now, which was fast enough that I

had to pay close attention to steer us around the tighter bends.

A thought struck me.

“Gronir, there aren’t any falls on this river, are there?”

“Waterfalls, milord? Ain’t heard of none. Don’t reckon there could be.

There’s boatmen on the river, in summer at least.”

“Good.” The thought of taking this thing over a sudden drop of any size

was enough to give me chills. If it flipped over anyone it landed on would be

crushed, and it certainly wasn’t going to float. I resolved to keep a close eye

on where we were going.

Avilla and Cerise were settled in just behind me, wrapped in their

warmth cloaks and chatting amiably. An occasional glance back revealed that

the rest of the group was huddled under blankets in clumps of two or three, but

they seemed to be holding up alright. The sky was still overcast, and I hoped

we could finish this run before it started snowing again.

Then we passed around another bend in the river, and found ourselves

face to face with a band of goblins who were camped out on the bank.

A hue and cry arose, but fortunately they were as surprised as we were. A

couple of goblins with bows to hand let fly in our general direction, but one hit

the parapet and the other somehow managed to miss us entirely. Several

wolves howled, and a troll scrambled to its feet and stared stupidly at us. I

threw up a force dome to protect us from further arrows, and gave the barge an

extra push.

“Ready spears!” Sergeant Thomas bellowed, and the men scrambled for

their weapons. A few more arrows bounced off my shield as we began to pass

the camp, and for a moment I thought that would be it.

Then the troll suddenly realized there were humans on the strange floating

object, and lumbered out over the ice to intercept us. Stupid thing. I attached an

invisible blade of force to the front of the barge just before we struck.

The troll actually tried to grab hold and stop us, but our momentum was

far too great for even its strength. The barge floated relentlessly forward,

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driving the force blade right through the monster’s body and cutting it in half. It

collapsed, and we passed over it with a thump.

Then the goblin camp was behind us, but the commotion of howling

wolves and blowing horns we’d left in our wake had to be audible for miles.

A dozen goblins scrambled to the backs of wolves and came bounding down

the riverbank after us, catching up quickly.

Thomas cursed.

“Our archers don’t have room to use their bows,” he complained.

“They’re liable to get pitched off this thing anyway if they stand up to try it.”

“I can keep their arrows from reaching us,” I told him. “But it’s

distracting. What we really need is… ah, finally, some good luck.”

The river we’d been following flowed into a larger water course, and this

one was both wider and less winding than the one we’d be trapped in.

“Hold on, everyone!” I called loudly, and gave the barge a harder push.

Our acceleration was worse than an overloaded semi lumbering up a

steep hill, but it was still more than my passengers were used to. A babble of