Chapter 20: 20. Destructive March

Excerpt from “The Rockbreaker’s Chant”, by unknown authors¹.

“Break, break, break! Shatter every stone!
Break, break, break! We work all day long!
Swing, swing, swing! Our hammers strike forever!
Swing, swing, swing! Let’s move and break another!”

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The next day, atop Chime’s back, Yenna spent some time filling in Captain Eone on what she had been working on. This necessitated sitting up the front, and without the protection of the supply boxes in front of her, Yenna found herself buffeted by the force of the wind as Chime sped onwards. Talking to Eone had been difficult too—the captain’s loud voice was easy to hear over the wind, but Yenna found her own voice drowned out. Feeling thankful for her newfound ability to control wind with greater efficiency, Yenna wove a spell to create a pocket of relatively still air around them.

“As I was saying,” Yenna caught her breath, “I’ve gained some understanding of two of these six colours of magic. It’s been difficult, and a little dangerous, but I believe I’m starting to get a handle on it.”

“That’s great! Magic kinda goes over my head, but it sounds like you’re doin’ great.” Eone seemed a bit distracted, her eyes occasionally flicking up to the sky. Yenna had to admit she was curious, but she wasn’t the sort to pry—she enjoyed her gossip overheard, not directly asked for.

“I’m afraid I haven’t made any progress with that book, though.” Yenna felt a bit ashamed about that, but Eone either didn’t notice or didn’t acknowledge it. “To be honest, I’ve already tried all the spells I know for opening locked or sealed things, but it resists my efforts. It might be a while before we can find out what’s inside.”

Eone nodded, as though only half-listening. “Well, keep at it. You’re a smart sort, Mage Yenna. I hear your tutoring is going well?”

“Oh, yes. My new students are quite adept. I haven’t taught such a stra– diverse group of students before, but it seems some lessons are universal. Tirk is making exceptional progress for a boy his age, though I worry his focus may wane when we get to the more technical aspects, heh.” Yenna couldn’t help but smirk—there was a significant learning curve involved in becoming a mage, exemplified by the complexity of actually crafting spells.

“Don’t you worry about Tirk. He’s got a lot going for him. Just don’t go too rough on him, yeah?” Eone finally turned and looked Yenna in the eye, the captain bearing a slightly sad expression. If Yenna had known her better, she may have felt inclined to ask what the matter was—for now, she knew that it would have to come up naturally.

As though sensing the awkward silence that followed, Chime spoke up. Eone laughed, and Yenna mentally worked through what the silupker had said—something about not working them too hard, considering they’re already carrying everyone. Yenna gave her own awkward chuckle.

“Don’t worry, Chime. You’re doing wonderfully.”

There was another awkward silence. Yenna had given her report, and she wasn’t much of a conversationalist—she realised that, despite having come on this expedition largely on a whim, she didn’t actually know very much about its leader. Everyone else seemed to respect her deeply, but the mage got the impression of someone that was a bit carefree, reined in only by her advisor Muut. Yenna opened her mouth to ask about her—who she was, where she came from, what had given her the idea to form this expedition—but the words died in her throat. After a few minutes of silence, she finally worked out a question that didn’t feel too personal, but managed to gain some ground on knowing the mysterious Captain Eone.

“So, why exactly are we going to Hilbar?” The destination had been mentioned some time ago, but Yenna had never thought to question the purpose. At the time, it had seemed just a suitably far point to begin exploring from—a gateway town on the border of a whole new nation.

Eone’s expression darkened for a moment before she managed to bring her signature grin back to her face. “There’s lots of reasons! Hilbar is a fine town, and lots of people pass through it. I was hoping to gather rumours for us to pursue while we were there.”

“I’m sorry, but—we’re heading all the way to Hilbar just to chase the potential of rumours? You would have been better off turning back to Sumadre.” The capital of Aulpre, Yenna’s home nation, was a bustling centre of commerce and learning—the amount of people who travelled through there was staggering, a fact it was known for far and wide.

Eone chewed this over for a moment before sighing. “Y’know, the rest of the crew would’ve just taken the hint that it’s a good idea to go, but… Well, I’m off to meet a friend. She sent me a letter about something happening in Milur. It may be good, it may be bad, but it will definitely be an interesting journey. You see–”

“Captaaaaain!” Eone was cut off by a distant shout, her head swinging away to see—Yenna ducked the sword-blade horn before it could chop the point off her hat. Chime began to slow down as they grew closer to Mysilia, the mereu messenger bearing down onto them from the sky. Worry was plastered over her face, and Eone’s face began to reflect it.

“Is it news from Hilbar? Is it–”

“No, Captain! There’s danger up ahead! A beast-march! The town ahead’s overrun!” Mysilia slowly floated down onto Eone’s outstretched hand, panting with exertion—it looked like she had flown at top speed to get back. The captain thought for a scant moment before putting the mereu down next to Yenna.

“Alright. Chime, get ready. EVERYONE!” Eone popped her head over the crates behind them and shouted as loud as she could. “HOLD TIGHT! WE’RE SPEEDING UP! BEAST-MARCH AHEAD!”

With that, the captain sat down, smacked her hand twice on Chime’s head and grabbed one of the sides of the board they were sitting on. Yenna, still slightly confused, held on just in time to avoid being pitched over the side. Chime lurched forward, as though the silupker’s great speed before had been a mere casual stroll—they were now truly sprinting. The world sped by at an insane blur, and Yenna counted her blessings that she already had a wind-guard in place to save them from what would have been an extraordinary blast of air.

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“What in the world is a beast-march?” Yenna cried, holding on desperately.

“Don’t have them out your way? I thought we were getting lucky, not having seen any beasts on the road—shoulda known they were all gathered somewhere. It’s what we call it when a bunch of monsters all group up into a huge mob and start roving around. Causes havoc all around, out here where there’s lots of space for them to wander.” Eone’s red eyes had lost their care-free luster as she drew the curved blade she wore at her hip. The polished sheen of the sword was almost mirror-clean, delicate engravings curling along the fuller. Yenna felt her heart begin to beat loudly in her chest—she had expected to come across lone beasts, not an angry mob!

“If it’s so dangerous, why are we speeding right for it? Are we going to cut our way through?” Yenna already had a part of her mind preparing defensive enchantments.

Eone almost looked shocked that Yenna would ask. “We’re not running away! We’re going to go help them—that’s not just some little farmer’s meet-up ahead, that’s a proper town! We have the strength and wits to help them fight off the beast-march, and so we will.”

With her fate sealed, Yenna diverted all of her mental energies to preparing. A mage was only so good as her preparations, her teachers had always said, so it was time for her to catalogue her options. Foremost, her defensive spells were rather more sophisticated than her offensive ones—she had not entered a war mage’s course, after all². Her best trick right now was a warding field that enveloped the body like a suit of armour, a layer of flowing magic working to deflect physical blows. Its main limitation was that it could only prevent physical blows, though Yenna knew how to quickly swap it to defend against a specific kind of attack if needed.

There were other small contingency spells prepared, though Yenna had to admit that most of her moves were more useful on opposing mages—things like an enchantment that muffled the vocal components of spells were only useful to prevent another mage from preparing for a spell before it is cast didn’t have much benefit against mindless beasts. As almost an afterthought, Yenna dissipated several of the specifically anti-mage spells to clear up space in her mind.

“BRACE!” Eone’s shout tore Yenna out of her introspection, and she did as she was told. Fully glad was she for it, for Chime began to slide to a halt—it took all her strength to avoid being thrown off the side. Up ahead was a town, not quite as big as Yenna’s native Ulumaya but still sizable for its fairly remote location. Horrible shouts, screams and beastly noises came from within, past its broken wooden walls. Yenna gulped down her fear, a tingling of electricity along her arm reminding her what was at stake if she gave into that dread.

Eone leapt off and began barking orders as though she had practiced for this all her life.

“No time for careful unpacking! Hands, free up Chime! Narasanha, proceed ahead of us—take Mysilia! Send word if you need help.”

“As you wish, Captain.”

The exhausted mereu began to argue, but Eone scooped her up and passed her like a baton to the four-armed bodyguard. Narasanha tucked the diminutive creature into her shirt and drew her weapons before charging at breakneck pace into the city. Yenna hopped down, steadying her shaking back legs, and went to help remove the boxes from Chime’s back. Normally they would have carefully unbound the ropes, pulled the strapped-down crates off of the platforms they were seated on—instead, the hands were roughly tearing away the entire platforms.

“Yenna! I don’t mean to doubt your strength, but leave that to the hands. I need you with me—we’re going in!” Eone waved her over.

“G-Going in? Just like that?” Yenna’s eyes widened. “I’m n-not a war-mage, captain.”

“I don’t need a war-mage, I need an expert on beasts. Let’s go, no arguments.” Eone turned and began coordinating her team once more, her piece said. The plan was for everyone else to stay behind with the supplies, watched over by Muut, with Chime freed up to leverage the combat potential of being an enormous creature with a stone body. With the crew left behind, they could harbour any people rescued from the town—safe from beast attack.

Steadying her breathing, Yenna geared her mind up for combat. She silently cursed herself for not practicing her mental acceleration. The last thing she needed was to be collapsing in a fight with a wild beast—Lumale might have been happy to wait till she woke up, but an unconscious kesh would make a tasty snack for a monster. Sticking close to Eone, Yenna hoped that her spells—or the captain’s sword arm—would be enough to keep them both safe.

The pair of them passed through the gates of the town—or, more accurately, over them. Both of the heavy wooden gates had been struck to the ground, and Yenna couldn’t but wonder what kind of horrible creature had the strength to knock them off their hinges. As she considered this, a terrible shout came from around the corner of a building just ahead of them. Eone put a hand on Yenna’s shoulder to get her attention.

“Eyes up, mage! Here they come!”

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¹ - The Rockbreaker’s Chant is a working song, popularised by yolm miners long ago, having no known singular writer. Amongst Aulprean and Miluran people, it’s a common tune representing hard work and perseverance. It was common practice for miners to use slightly pointed hammers and form a line, chipping away at rocks in front of them, all swinging together. It was said that the unbreakable ‘miner’s row’ empowered all the workers to keep going, even when they were exhausted—so long as their allies could keep swinging their hammers, they could too.

² - Yenna takes great pains to insist to us that she’s just a ‘normal’ mage, not a war mage. It seems there was a cultural misunderstanding at the time—most people assume that all mages can fire off blasts of flame and the like, when this is mostly the purview of those actually trained for battle. Still, Yenna manages to prove herself quite wrong, time and again.

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