The Dreamer's Curse (Book 2) Read online

  Decker put his boot back into the stirrup. “Looks like they have the scent. Gid, Hinun, you sure? Yes? Then lead on.”

  As soon as the stallion moved, Decker’s weight pressed back into her a little more, although he kept such a good posture that she didn’t feel squashed. Conversely, she felt reassured by the closeness, as she didn’t feel comfortable up here at all. Considering that she flew about in the air on a regular basis, the height from on top of a horse shouldn’t bother her at all. This rationale didn’t help her an ounce. She eyed the distance to the ground and fought an uneasy coil that wrapped around the base of her spine.

  The wolves couldn’t go too fast without risking losing the trail, of course, which limited their pace to a trot. At this speed, they left the village fairly quickly, exchanging cobbled streets for packed dirt that softened their hoof beats slightly.

  The highways at this midnight hour were completely deserted, the only light coming from the half-moon in the sky. Both wolves and horse must have known the road ahead well, as their pace didn’t falter. Sevana felt the slight chill of night air along her exposed skin and fervently hoped that the thick jacket she wore would be enough to combat the cold. She hadn’t grabbed a cloak for fear that it would prevent her from easily accessing either her magic pouch or her weapons.

  “Alright, explain,” Decker ordered without turning his head.

  “Not much to tell,” she admitted morosely. “Master said a thief with good magic ability tried to levitate the box with the gadgick out of his window. The magic woke Master up, he tried to grab the box, the magician used it as a weapon to hit him in the head, and then he broke the window getting the box out quickly. Master never saw his face or got a look outside. He kept saying thieves, though, so for some reason he thinks there’s more than one person.”

  “Maybe he heard multiple people run away?” Decker suggested.

  A plausible theory, and likely the answer. Sevana hadn’t thought to question it until just now.

  “But how did they know about the gadgick to steal it?” Decker asked in true confusion. “You just got it out of the fountain this afternoon!”

  “What, are you joking? Bel and Aren classified this thing as a national emergency. We had multiple people from all over come to help us, even if only short term, and then leave again. Rumors, I’m sure, spread like wildfire about this thing.” If anything, she should have realized that thieves would likely target it and taken precautionary measures. After all, she had thieves that tried to raid her mountain on a consistent basis. Wouldn’t an ancient, powerful artifact be a more attractive lure? She mentally kicked herself for the oversight.

  Decker let out a groan. “You’re right. So, a magician thief. Or a magician that thieves hired for this one job. Is that common practice?”

  “More common than I care for. The black market adores anything magical, and the higher quality it is, the easier it is to sell. The gadgick will fetch a pretty penny if they can get it to the right dealer.”

  “And, ah, why do you know so much about this?”

  “The first year I was in business, I didn’t have any anti-theft protections up and some fools raided my storeroom. It was quite the adventure getting everything back.” The original thieves had paid for the stupidity as well. She’d made sure of that.

  “So you’ve dealt with this before.”

  “I’ve never had to track someone down in the middle of the night before, but yes.”

  “If it came down to a fight between us and them, then…?” he trailed off, glancing over his shoulder at her. Why he bothered, she had no idea. In the pale moonlight and with trees shadowing the road, she could barely see anything at all.

  “A silly question, Decker. Of course I would turn them all into toads.”

  For some reason, this made him smile. “Of course. What was I thinking?”

  “More importantly, how fast do you think we can catch up with them?”

  “Now, that I can’t tell you. It depends on where they’re going. Right now, we’re heading straight north, but that can’t last long. This road dead ends and forks off in two different directions—west toward Kindin or east toward the coast. The coast offers them a quick escape route to Belen, one that will be hard for us to immediately follow as we don’t have a ship on hand.”

  Sevana would bet her left hand the thieves would choose to go to Belen. It boasted one of the largest black markets in the world. In fact, it was there that she had found most of her stolen goods years ago. But they might well choose to go into Kindin instead, as it offered its own variety of markets, so she shouldn’t be too hasty in making assumptions.

  “No other trails they can choose?”

  “Oh, this place is riddled with game trails. It depends on how well they know the area, how prepared they are for pursuit. I would think that if they knew about the gadgick, they’d know who was tasked with taking care of it.” He sounded grim. “I imagine that everyone knew the Artifactor prodigy, Sevana Warren, had been sent here by the king to deal with this situation. In their shoes, I’d do a lot of preparation to handle you before I ever came to steal the gadgick.”

  She growled wordlessly. Decker’s logic was impeccable in this case and she couldn’t disagree with any part of it. In their shoes, she’d likely have several traps and at least one bolt hole, if it came to that, to evade their pursuit. With the magician they had, they might very well be able to escape detection by her, depending on how skillfully they worked their magic.

  Only one thing really weighed in her favor: she had a pair of Illeyanic wolves tracking them down. That magician might be able to camouflage things to where she couldn’t magically detect them, and he might be able to cover their tracks at a certain point to where even Decker couldn’t follow, but he probably hadn’t taken the wolves into account. It would be another task completely to throw them off the scent. Or so she hoped, anyway.

  They kept riding at a ground-eating trot that made miles pass under them. With only glimpses of the moon overhead, and no clock on her, she couldn’t say how much time had passed. Her aching backside firmly maintained that it had been at least a decade since she’d climbed on board. Grimacing at the discomfort, she tried to grip the horse’s sides with her legs and readjust her position. This did and didn’t succeed. “There’s no way to tell if we’re catching up, is there?”

  “Not until we actually catch sight of them,” Decker confirmed. He turned his head slightly toward her. “You’re fidgeting. Getting sore?”

  “I’m not used to riding a horse.” She decided to leave it at that.

  “Well, with all of those magical flying devices you have, I suppose that makes sense,” he allowed. “Bear with it. We’re making good headway, I think. In fact, I’ll be surprised if we don’t catch them by dawn.”

  “And, ah, how far away is dawn?”

  “A good three hours yet.”

  So they’d already been riding like this for two hours? She thunked her head against his back and groaned. And she had to put up with this for another three hours?

  “You’ll survive,” he assured her drolly.

  Probably. “I’m taking every ounce of my discomfort out on those thieves’ hides.”

  “I won’t stop you,” he promised in dark humor.

  Up ahead of them, the wolves slowed to a walk and then stopped altogether, their noses up in the air and pointing to an area off the road that looked to be dense with virgin forest. They stopped as well, the horse blowing out a sigh of relief to finally have a chance to catch his breath. Sevana put her hands on Decker’s shoulders and used him to lever herself up so she could properly see. “Hinun? What are you sensing?”

  The wolf let out a long whine, taking two cautious steps toward the side of the road.

  “What?” Decker looked at his own wolf, who didn’t seem to know what to think of the situation. “You’re not smelling what he is?”

  “It’s probably not a scent at all,” Sevana said absently, her eyes straining to se
e in the dark. “Hinun is sensitive to magic after living with an Artifactor for so many years. I think I’m seeing what he sensed. It’s faint, but there’s an aura of magic over this area.”

  “A trap?”

  “Off the road?” she countered. “I would think you’d put the trap on the road. But I really can’t tell from this distance. I barely see it at all.”

  He stiffened his arm and gave her something to balance with as she slid off the horse. Hinun looked uneasy about this thing, whatever it was, so she trod cautiously. The wolf might not understand magic the way they did, but he certainly had good instincts about it. If he didn’t trust it, she wouldn’t either. She came up to stand at his side, drawing first a crystal that emitted a soft glow of light so she could have a proper view of the area. It lit up everything in a pale yellow, throwing things into a sharp chiaroscuro of shading and light.

  Hmmmm, something looked strange about this. Very strange. The trees directly in front of her, exposed to strong mage light, looked flat, almost two-dimensional. The trees off to either side looked like exact duplicates, something she hadn’t been able to see until she stood this close. One, two, three…five trees were mirages based on some of the surrounding trees.

  “This area isn’t real,” she said, outlining it with her free hand. “It’s either a trap meant for us to fall into or a bolt hole for them to hide in. I can’t tell which.”

  Decker dismounted as well, one hand resting on the sword hilt belted at his side. “Which one are you inclined to think it is?”

  “A trap,” she said frankly, not taking her eyes away. Something about this didn’t look quite right, not compared to the skill she’d already seen from this magician. In fact, part of the spell seemed to be…leaking? “Gid doesn’t smell them going into there, right? Hinun doesn’t seem to be either, he just sensed the magic. And the way this is set up is almost shoddy, in a sense. Like they had designed it to where it would have just enough of a magical presence that I would detect it.”

  “And come in close enough to fall into it,” Decker finished darkly. “Well, well, they are clever, aren’t they.”

  “Not clever enough to outsmart a wolf, thank mercy. But they certainly caught something.” She rubbed at her chin and stared harder. Now that she saw the spell, she could see through it to a certain extent, although the inky darkness kept the details hidden.

  “Something?” Decker parroted, peering into the woods himself.

  A piercing cry split the night air, the sound like an angry bird of prey calling out in challenge.

  “Ah…was that…?”

  “A griffin,” Sevana confirmed for him. “At least, I’m seeing a large body with wings and it certainly looks like a griffin.”

  “Those idiots trapped a griffin in there?” he demanded incredulously.

  “Likely not on purpose. Traps like this are devilishly hard to set because you can only set it to trap a certain amount of creatures or races before you hit a limit. He likely set it to entrap beings with sentient intelligence, as that’s the easiest way to mark humans apart from animals. Griffins are intelligent enough to fall into that bracket.”

  Decker looked unnerved by this, as well he should be. Griffins did not have a natural propensity for being benevolent toward humankind to begin with. They wouldn’t attack humans without provocation, but they weren’t inclined to get along with them either. You had to win a griffin’s respect first before ever trying to deal with them, and that was challenging.

  While this situation had ‘danger’ written all over it, it also came with a great deal of opportunity. She rocked back on her heels and thought about it. “Decker, how far are we away from that split in the road?”

  “About a half-hour or so, why?”

  “And are there game trails that can get us ahead of them, if we know which way they went?”

  “Well, of course, but it’s impossible to know…” he trailed off as he picked up on where these questions led. “You think you can get him to cooperate with us if you free him?”

  “I don’t see the harm in trying.” She shrugged. “If he’s not in the mood to bargain, I’ll contact Sarsen and have him come up and undo the trap. It won’t hurt our flying friend in there to be trapped for a day or so.”

  Decker shifted from one foot to the other, ill at ease. “I heard griffins are hard to deal with.”

  “That’s an understatement. But I think I have the right motivation for him to cooperate at the moment.” Rooting through her bag, she found a vocal wand and put it to her throat, projecting her voice to a more audible pitch. “Honorable griffin. I am Sevana Warran, an Artifactor.”

  The thrashing on the other side of the trees abruptly stopped. “Artifactor?”

  “Indeed. I am in pursuit of the men that set this trap and ensnared you. They are evil and we wish to punish them.”

  “Then free me. Undo their work.”

  “I certainly am willing to, but my efforts come at a price. Will you aid us in hunting them down? I will consider it a fair deal if you do.”

  A weighty silence descended as he mulled this over. Finally, he responded, “What do you wish of me?”

  “It won’t take long,” she promised. “Let me ride on your back and see if I can spot them in the air. If we know which road they took, we’ll know how to get ahead of them and can catch them sooner.”

  Another weighty silence before he capitulated with ill grace, “Fine. Undo this wretched spell.”

  She grinned in victory.

  The spell didn’t take much to dismantle. Spells that camouflaged didn’t take a lot of power—that’s how they were able to evade magical detection in the first place, by using more natural power and less of the human element. But that also meant that if push came to shove, any magician worth their salt could break it easily. All Sevana did was switch wands to one with more power in it, and with a sharp slashing movement, commanded, “KLAK NE FOLE!”

  The trap dissolved as if it had never been there, revealing a small clearing instead of the line of trees that had been there before. The griffin lost no time in leaping free of the clearing and landing on the road, coming in close enough that he spooked both wolves and the stallion. The wolves quickly backed up, coming in closer to their respective humans in a clearly defensive posture. The stallion just jerked at his reins, trying to leave the area altogether. But most animals would when faced with an angry predator their own size.

  The griffin didn’t appear to either notice or care about their reactions. He just shook himself from head to tail, wings flaring as if he had been locked in a cage instead of a clearing. Sevana pursed her lips in a silent whistle. My, my, my, what an amazing specimen. In her mage light, his eyes shone like polished glass, and even under all those glossy golden feathers she could see muscles ripple and contract as he moved. He looked to be a young adult, old enough to have his full body, but just barely. It could explain why he fell for the trap, as well. He didn’t have the experience yet to recognize when an area looked suspicious.

  After another full-body shake, he looked at her squarely. “Well, Artifactor, climb on. I wish to get this over with.”

  “And, ah, how do you propose that I stay on?” she asked him. After all, she didn’t have a saddle or anything like that, and she’d seen griffins fly before. They could put falling stars to shame with their speed.

  “That is your business.”

  Right. Obviously she wouldn’t get any help from that quarter. Shaking her head, she reached in her bag and pulled out two charms, which she stuck on the inside of her thighs. She put the mage light away at the same time, as it would interfere with his night vision and give away their position up in the air.

  “Um, Sevana?”

  “I’ll be fine,” she assured Decker, hoping she didn’t lie. She looked the griffin over with a calculating eye and decided to sit at the base of his neck, right in front of his wings. It seemed the best spot, anyway. With a bit of a running start, she hopped up onto her stomach—wh
y did he have to be so tall?—and swung both legs around so that she could sit up properly. His feathers felt smooth and prickly at the same time, depending on where she gripped, but she found a likely spot to hang on to. As soon as she did, she activated the charms on her legs, which gripped tightly to his sides. Thank all mercy she had sticking charms in the bag. Hopefully they would be adequate to the job at hand.

  Settled, she directed, “We need to fly north.”

  Without a word, he spread his wings, and with a few running steps, took off into the air. Air blasted her in the face, whipping a few strands of hair out of her braid to slap her in the face. She didn’t dare lift even one hand to drag them free. It felt as if she barely had a secure perch on his back. Sticking charms or no sticking charms, if she made it to the ground in one piece, it’d be a miracle.

  The air up here felt far colder, and at the speed they flew, it felt like icicles formed inside of her lungs. She kept her mouth closed as much as she could and breathed through her nose, but it didn’t seem to help much.

  “Where?”

  Peering downward, she tried to see the ground. It looked like nothing more than pitch darkness to her, most of it semi-bristly. “We’re looking for a group of men travelling fast.”

  The griffin didn’t respond, just took off in a short dive that brought them closer to the ground, speeding them ahead. Sevana had to trust his eyes, as she couldn’t see a single thing, but a griffin’s night vision should be able to see every mouse as it moved down there.

  He did one slow, lazy circle, and then stopped in midair, hovering with gentle beats of his wings. “I see nothing.”

  She blinked. “Nothing at all?”

  “There are no humans down there,” he confirmed darkly. “Woman, you are sure of the direction?”

  “The wolves were the ones tracking their scent. I didn’t detect any magic that would have confused them.” She pondered that for a moment. “I suspect they have a bolt hole of some sort prepared to evade our pursuit. It’s apparently closer than I would have guessed. How far can you see?”