Guild Mage: Apprentice-Chapter 102. Skinner

Storm eels.

Liv grimaced, already thinking through all the ways this could very quickly go wrong. Professor Blackwood had described how they could release a shocking pulse into the water around them, strong enough to stun a human. Once you couldn’t move, it was an easy matter for the eels to latch on with their mouths and drag you under. If you didn’t recover use of your body before you drowned, that was it. And even if you did, at that point you were bleeding with a pack of monstrous eels chomping down on your flesh.

If she’d had more time to practice with Luc, Liv was fairly confident that she could have simply shielded them all from the attack. Gather up the shock and push it aside, or even turn it back on the eels as a counterattack.

Unfortunately, she hadn’t been able to practice - or at least, not nearly enough to feel confident that she wouldn’t actually make things worse. On top of that, there were too many witnesses. Out of everyone in the team, Liv thought that she might be able to trust Rosamund to keep a secret. But past her? They barely knew each other. Venetia, the team leader, had been actively hostile. And then there were the mercenaries. Without knowing more about who they worked for, or why they’d really come to Coral Bay, Liv couldn’t chance letting them see her use the royal word.

“Try not to fall off!” Liv called out to her team. There were eight of them, counting Wren and the journeyman. Liv made certain she had their locations fixed in her mind, and then invoked her word of power: “Celent’he Aiveh Oktō Stelim!” A flood of mana rushed out of her: seven rings on a single spell, an extravagant cost, but it needed to be done urgently, and it needed to be finished quickly.

Pillars of ice, flat at the top, rose beneath Liv and all of her teammates, lifting them up out of the salt water, high enough that the eels wouldn’t be able to reach them. “The ice is as pure as I can make it,” Liv called out to them. “It will stop the shocks from reaching you!”

Brom nearly slipped and fell, but by dropping his shield, he managed to hold on. Venetia and Isabel let loose with knives of coherent mana, which hit the waves with a succession of small splashes, and caused blooms of red blood to rise up from wounded eels. Rosamund kept her shield, but clipped her hammer to her belt, and reached out with a hand. At her incantation, the sand of the ocean floor rose up like a gaping mouth, and swallowed two of the eels, carrying them back down into the waves and, presumably, burying them far beneath the sea floor.

Bryn lashed out with a wave of her hand, and steam began to rise from the water where two of the eels had dragged under another of the mercenaries. Wren kept an arrow fitted to her bow, but seemed content to let others handle the fighting while she kept an eye on their surroundings. Liv concluded that the rest of her team had the eels essentially under control, and scanned the shallow water to see whether any of the wounded mercenaries had survived.

“Celet Ghesia,” she intoned, making a deliberate effort to lower the volume of her voice again, now that the immediate crisis seemed to be passing. She raised her left hand, clenching it into a loose fist, and lifted. A hand of ice rose out of the ocean, scooping up a wounded mercenary, who immediately began coughing up water and sucking in desperate breaths. Liv used the magical hand to gently deposit him in the mercenaries’ rowboat, and then glanced around to see if anyone else needed help.

The mercenaries, most of them panting and bleeding, hadn’t lowered their weapons. Indeed, they seemed to be waiting to find out whether the college students were going to keep right on going after dealing with the Storm Eels, and tear into them. They weren’t far wrong; only it happened with words, and not magic.

“What in the name of the trinity do you think you’re doing out so far?” Venetia yelled from her perch on top of an ice column. “Have you got even the slightest bit of magic among you? Is this your first king tide, or were you just born stupid?”

“Listen, girl,” one of the men, thick as a tree trunk and with a mustache that reminded Liv of a hound with a particularly drooping jowl, began.

“That’s journeyman, to you lot,” Venetia interrupted him. Liv took inordinate amusement out of the fact the woman’s ire was directed at someone other than her, for once. “Alright, get back to shore, now. You’re done for this tide.”

“We have a contract with Master Cartwright,” the man protested.

“Then Master Cartwright can take it up with the college,” Venetia told him. “You can be certain I’ll be making a report to Professor Jurian and the archmagus. Get your people, get your little boat, and get moving.”

The mercenary leader looked over the students, and Liv’s smile slipped away from her face. That was a look she’d seen before - in an alley in Freeport, for instance. It was the look of a man who was willing to kill everyone in front of him if only he thought that he could get away with it. He was doing the math in his head: how many of the young mages in front of him had any magic left? How much of a fight would they put up, and how many could his men take out before anyone knew what was happening?

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Liv raised her left hand, clenched it into a fist, and watched as the mercenaries' eyes all drifted over to the enormous fist of ice that mimicked her every movement. Mustache looked over to her, and she met his eyes without flinching. Go ahead, Liv urged him silently.

He looked away, and the moment of tension broke. “You heard the journeyman,” Mustache grumbled. “Pack it up.” His men set to work, but Liv thought they had a rather small catch for how far out they’d come. Once again, she wondered what they were really after.

“I’ll have your name,” Venetia said. “For my report.”

“Skinner,” the man with the mustache said. “Bill Skinner.”

Liv watched them until they had their rowboat back at the second sandbar - far enough distant she was fairly certain they weren’t going to turn around and launch a surprise attack. She glanced over to Wren, and saw the hunter had never put her nocked arrow back in the quiver.

“What rusting idiots,” Venetia said. “They’re lucky we were here to haul their bacon out of the fire. You can put us all down now, Brodbeck.”

Liv blinked, and looked over her teammates while she used up her stored waste heat to melt their columns. None of them looked at all like they were watching for an ambush. Had they completely missed what just happened - or had she imagined it?

With a splash, Wren tromped over, holding her bow up above the water to keep the waxed string dry. “None of them have ever been in a real fight before,” she murmured. “Duels don’t teach you everything.”

“I didn’t imagine it, then,” Liv said, hopping from her own column into the palm of her frozen hand. She used it to carry herself closer to the reef, which was half exposed to open air by the king tide.

“Watch yourself, there,” Venetia called over. “Don’t get too close. I can see the Flowering Urchins from here.”

“I’m just making certain they didn’t leave anything behind,” Liv said. In truth, she was trying to see what they’d been after, but the reef was an explosion of life and color of a kind nearly entirely unfamiliar to her. Professor Blackwood’s dead, broken bits of coral were all well and good for class discussion, but the dizzying variety of plants, coral shapes, and flashing schools of fish before her was too much to take in at a glance.

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Liv chanced a glance back over her shoulder, and saw that the journeyman had the others gathering up the slain Storm Eels. They made a good soup, from what Liv understood. While everyone else was distracted, she twisted the handle of her wand to extend it into a sword of adamant ice, and then, perched on her magical hand, leaned over and slashed an ‘x’ shape into the coral. She felt a slight twinge of guilt at the thought of hurting something that was alive, but she wanted to be able to find this part of the reef again.

“Everything looks fine over here,” Liv said, melting the sword, and turned her hand about so that she could ride it back to the others. Then, she unfurled the fingers, slipped back out into the warm water, and sunk the ice beneath the waves, where it would be gone soon enough.

“Right. I imagine everyone’s tapped out after that, and we’ve got a good haul,” Venetia said. “Back to shore it is.”

Liv almost spoke up to let the journeyman know that she had enough mana left for another fight or two, but decided there was no need to advertise that at the moment. Over her first few weeks at Coral Bay, word had gotten around that Liv could hold a lot of mana, but most people still seemed to underestimate just what that meant.

They made their way back over the three sandbars at a slightly different angle, covering some of the ground the mercenaries had neglected on their own route. There were plenty of clams, mussels and oysters to dig up, and Liv ended up pulling the hem of her linen shirt out of her breeches to use as a kind of sack, piling up shellfish on the fabric and wrapping them into a sort of bundle in front of her. It exposed her back and belly for everyone to see, but the fact the other girls were doing the same thing made it a bit easier to stand.

By the time they’d got back to the beach, she realized that Venetia had been right to turn them back. Brom and Sawyer used their hammers to crack their way through a few of the smaller crabs, and the journeyman had held back enough on the way out to provide finishing blows with her blades of mana.

On the strand, piles of crabs, eels, lobsters and sharks had been tossed up, with crossbow bolts sticking out of them. Townsfolk sorted the carcasses, separating what could be eaten from what was, like the reef crabs, toxic. The first and second year students remained on watch above them, behind the wooden barricades on wheels.

Venetia led them to a series of enchanted storage barrels; Liv recognized the runes worked into the wood as the work of her own family, and couldn’t help but reach out a hand to touch the wood after she’d emptied her own load. It was like touching a piece of Kelthelis.

Their team’s barrels were labelled with their names, so that when the sorting was done they’d each receive their share of pay. From her lessons in Guild Law and History, Liv knew that half the value would go to the local noble - in this case, the college. From what was left, Venetia got a double share as team leader, and all of them would get first opportunity to purchase anything they wanted out of the haul. Liv wasn’t interested in the meat, but if there were any pearls in those oysters, she intended to get one.

“Alright, over to the healers,” Venetia commanded. “Everyone needs to be checked over.” Liv turned away from the ocean; a team was already heading out to replace them, and she knew the rotation would continue until the king tide had passed, and the shore was safe again.

Arjun was one of the people manning the medical station, so Liv and Rosamund headed right for him, with Wren trailing behind. He wrinkled his nose as they approached. “You both stink like fish guts and blood,” he complained.

“That’s a nice thing to say to two ladies,” Rosamund teased him, and Liv laughed.

“It’s true though,” she said, picking at her ruined linen shirt. “I can’t wait to get back to High Hall and get clean again.”

“Injuries?” Arjun asked, and though all three of them shook their heads, he checked them over anyway. If any other young man at the college had run their hands over her legs, arms, and sides, Liv would have felt self conscious, but her dark-haired friend had such a cold, matter of fact way about it that he might as well have been inspecting a lame horse.

Even when Rosamund teased him: “Watch where those hands are going!”: he just shrugged and went right on about his business.

“You’re all fine,” Arjun declared, after inspecting Wren last. “Go get dry and warm up by the fire. Have something to eat. Your next rotation will come soon enough.”

Behind the barricades, the enchanted barrels for storing shellfish and the rest of the catch, and the medical stations, bonfires had been lit, with camp chairs set up around them and trestle tables from which first years were spooning great helpings of hot chowder into bread bowls. Liv, Rosamund and Wren were each given a thick towel and sent into line. Soon enough, they were seated around one of the fires, across from Venetia and the rest of their team, filling their bellies with fresh-caught, mana rich seafood.

Liv was just tearing hunks of bread off her bowl when Cade made his way over with a slate and chalk. He caught her eye and smiled, but it was to her team leader that he addressed himself. “Good catch,” he told Venetia. “Lots of meat to be sold. There was even one small pearl in one of the oysters.” He turned the slate around and tapped a finger against it.

Venetia looked at the share price for a moment, and then nodded. “Not bad. And we’ll get out at least once more, I think,” she said, taking a moment to look out at the bay and judge the tide. “Anyone want to buy the pearl? I’ve got my own,” she said, and tapped the lobes of her ears, each pierced and carrying a black pearl set in silver.

“I would,” Liv said. She stretched her legs out casually, so that Cade would be able to see her bare calves.

Cade turned to her and nodded. “I’ll have it set aside; once we know what your total share is, we’ll see whether you cover it all, or if you have to pay a bit to make up the difference. Come find me once the tide is done; I’ll be at Professor Blackstone’s station.”

On his way past her he paused, leaned down, and lowered his voice. “And after you’ve had a chance to get cleaned up, I’ll take you out to dinner to celebrate your first tide.” Liv grinned, and nodded.

☙

The prospect of not only hot water at High Hall, but also a clean, warm change of clothes, and dinner after, carried Liv through the rest of the tide. By the time her team was judged warm and rested enough to go back out, the tide was coming in. The third sandbar and the reef were too deep to reach - Liv judged she could have swum it, but the prospect of fighting while treading water didn’t appeal.

Still, they brought back another good haul, if not quite equal to their first outing, and Liv was able to take a small black pearl, still salty and wet from its time in the sea, back to High Hall with her. She’d only had to kick in a gold piece to make up the price, and they’d found a second pearl, as well. On the spur of the moment, she’d bought that one for Rosamund, recalling that her friend hadn’t declared a single enchanted item before their duel.

The hot water at High Hall was just as decadently wonderful as Liv had been anticipating, and afterward Thora had helped her dress. “You should let me come with you, m’lady,” the maid said, tying off the laces on Liv’s bodice. “It’s not fitting for you to be alone with him so much, and you unwed still.”

“No one cares here,” Liv told her. “When last we went to dinner, every table on the roof was filled with a couple, and none of them had chaperones. Now, go get yourself some dinner, and don’t worry about me.” The last thing she wanted was Thora waiting upstairs when she returned at the end of the night.

Dressed in one of her nicer dresses - this one in blue trimmed with black - Liv met Cade downstairs feeling an entirely new woman. Rather than sandy, salt encrusted, and exhausted, she felt fresh and pretty. Over dinner and wine at the Crab and Gull, he answered her questions about what assisting Professor Blackwood in the sorting involved.

“In all truth, I’m lucky he’s taken me on,” Cade admitted. “Most people in my position would probably be heading home by now, since I won’t be joining the guild. I do a lot of the work his journeymen do, except without the rank.”

“Did you stay just for me?” Liv asked him, unable to keep a smile from her face. The wine went very well with her butter-drenched lobster, and she’d very much come to enjoy these private moments with him.

“Perhaps I did,” Cade answered.

On the way back to High Hall, she couldn’t stop smiling. The confrontation with Skinner and his mercenaries was going to be trouble, but they’d avoided a fight, and it was trouble for tomorrow. She’d give Venetia time to make a report, and then have her own private conversation with Master Jurian. In the meantime, she’d gotten a taste of what it would be like to cull a rift with adequate numbers and support, for once, and compared to what happened in Whitehill it was a relief. At no point had she felt like she was actually in danger, things were so well organized, and she’d come away from it with a beautiful pearl to do: something with.

When she’d reached the door to her shared sitting room, Liv wasn’t ready for the night to end. Cade kissed her there, the taste of wine on both their tongues mingling, and this time when he put a hand on her thigh, she didn’t remove his hand. When they both came up for air, rather than let him leave, she took his hand and tugged him through the shared space and into her own bedchamber.

After all, she reasoned, this was Coral Bay, not Whitehill. And Matthew and Triss had seemed perfectly fine.

Neither Liv nor Cade went to sleep until quite late that night.