The Hammer Unfalls

4.82 River Raid

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Allowing his horse to find the path, Glim slumped in the saddle and watched the snowy trees give way to barren trunks, then glossy purple leaves and warm currents of wind. With every passing hour, Glim grew more and more convinced that Certe would catch up and crush him, to finish off the last guard of Wohn-Grab and seal his revenge for whatever had happened in the past. Yet the skies stayed clear, and no strange creatures crashed through the woods in pursuit.

His escape gave Glim small comfort. Certe seemed fixated on finding the hammer. It didn’t take much imagination for Glim to conclude what was happening behind him on Apricity Peak. Certe was most likely dismantling the fortress, stone by stone, in search of whatever the Elderkin had hidden from him. Glim thought of the ramparts reduced to rubble, and the glass house smashed to bits. By now Master Willow’s tower had certainly toppled. The labyrinthine basement would present a challenge. Even Glim had no idea how deep and wide that warren of tunnels ran. It would take Certe a long time to explore those paths, especially when he reached the granite chutes which conveyed the shuttles.

When he could no longer tolerate the saddle, Glim halted his horse, fed it some grain from the saddlebag, and curled up in a pile of everbrown needles. He took off his overcloak and draped it over himself, falling into a sleep his body could no longer keep at bay. He expected to dream, and see the faces of the dead. Or perhaps never wake again. But morning followed night, and he woke to the gentle prodding of his horse’s nose and its insistent nickering for food.

The night had been dreamless, but morning brought visions of those he’d lost. Images flickered through his mind of blood and surrender. One purpose drove Glim as tears streaked down his face: Find Master Willow. Get answers. Get his voice back. If nothing else, avenge the fortress full of people that now lay crumpled and lifeless in the snow. Confront the Mage-at-Arms who’d abandoned his post and left them all to die.

Glim rode the unfamiliar path towards the foothills, consumed in dark thoughts. He’d never been this far south. No trace of snow whitened the trees. Golden sunlight warmed his skin. Ryn had feared this moment: that Glim would reach Summerling Ridge and lose his ability to ply algidon.

He smiled grimly at the irony. No chance of that happening now. Algidon himself had awakened. And so had the flame within himself. And whatever the wind had done to him had unleashed an essentiæl power he never thought possible.

Or had it?

Fearful, but needing to know the truth, Glim dismounted and walked away from his horse. He approached a ledge overlooking the plunging slope of the trail, turned his face away, and covered it protectively with one hand. Peering through his fingers, Glim raised his other hand and snapped.

He wasn’t sure what he expected to happen. Perhaps he’d summon a flicker of flame. Or perhaps the entire mountainside would be consumed in conflagration, like the massive spears of ice he’d summoned without meaning to. But a third thing happened: nothing. Glim snapped again, without so much as a spark.

Had Certe overwhelmed his flame? Did this place have no phyr to coalesce into fire? Had Glim himself changed? He had no way to know.

More confused than he already had been, Glim mounted up and rode until he came down the slopes of the Avaunt Mountains. He heard a rumble in the distance.

At last, Certe had caught up to him. Or so he thought at first.

Glim prepared to run, or fight, but the giant kept its distance. The rumble continued, which grew to a dull roar, and finally filled his ears. The lower he rode, the louder it grew. The air became tangy and clean, filling his lungs with cool mist.

At last, emerging through a thicket of purple underbrush, Glim saw a river for the first time. There on the thawing runoff at the headwaters of the river Adversity, he stared in fascination at the churning rapids. He tossed a stick into the water, which disappeared into the violent foam. He’d never seen such fury in water before. It stirred him. In lieu of his silence, the water’s voice would become his cry.

Downriver, Glim saw movement. He looked closer and tensed up. A long, low boat with curved sides bobbed in the water. Inside it, Master Willow and Minerva paddled, sending the canoe downriver with astonishing speed. He couldn’t see the other two gardeners. They must have split up.

Glim spurred his horse, urging it to follow the canoe. The horse ran as hard as it could along the soft dirt of the riverbank. Glim could tell that, once the canoe rounded the next bend, he’d never be able to catch up to it.

He had to stop them now.

He hesitated, unsure of what to do. He had but one idea. Whatever the wind had done to engorge his essentiæ might help him now. Glim dismounted and focused. The heat of summer washed over him, here in the strange land of southern Phyria. Essentiae swarmed around him, more intently than ever before. Glim soaked the summer warmth into his body and raised his hands.

The river froze. Not part of the river. Not a skin of ice on the surface. Glim watched in fascination as the bubbling waters near him whitened and hardened, which continued up the river until the canoe froze solid in a floe of ice.

As bizarre as the frozen river seemed, the next moment puzzled Glim even more. Minerva screamed, then crumpled. He could see her lifeless eyes staring at the sky, and her hair had blanched pure white.

How? He hadn’t even touched the gardener! Only frozen the water. What in hell was happening here?

Master Willow jumped out onto the ice, skittered to the bank, and fled for the shelter of Summerling Ridge. With the sudden focus of a wolf hunting a fleeing rabbit, Glim ran after the Mage-at-Arms. At the bottom of a warm, summery dell, trapped in a hollow in a hillside ringed with tall brown trees, Master Willow turned on Glim like a cornered animal.

“I have been studying the essentiæ my whole life. Pored through every tome. Explored the fringes, hoping to find something new. The fortress at Wohn-Grab is very old, you know. Thousands of years. Did you ever wonder why? What we guarded against? I never guessed that the answer would be so literal.”

As he talked, Master Willow moved his hand towards a pouch at his hip. The second he snaked his hand inside it, an icy hand clenched around Glim's mind. Silvery light sizzled in the air between them, locking Willow’s gaze into his.

Glim heard the sickening sneer of his Master's tone in his own thoughts. It coated his mind like the greasy residue of muscheron chicane would a vial.

Glim longed to scrub it clean. He tried to scream. Tried to eject these oily thoughts from his own. Instead, he doubled over and wretched, spewing bile onto the ground.

Master Willow's mind trudged clumsily through his own. Rummaging, with the shrewdness of greed a dishonest man might employ to seek an unfair bargain at a market stall. Tossing unwanted memories aside, no matter how precious Glim found them. Willow’s disdain of his mind utterly violated Glim.

Get out! he screamed. Willow’s only reply was a sardonic snicker from somewhere within Glim’s thoughts.

No, not merely Glim’s thoughts. They're our thoughts now.

Had Glim thought those words? Or had Master Willow?

Our. Glim had unwittngly become our.

The shame and violence of Master Willow's intrusion ripped away Glim's very identity. Glim knew his mind would soon be fully open to Willow’s unconscionable prying. His sense of self thinned like wet parchment and threatened to tear away.

No.

Glim's mind somehow clamped down, trapping Master Willow's consciousness inside his own. Without knowing how, some clarity of mind had responded with a defense Glim hadn't consciously invoked.

The wind. It had to be her influence somehow. He recalled her words: You’ve no hope of surviving Certe without my help. He’d assumed she’d been the one to unleash the torrent of essentiæ, but now he wondered if this is what she’d meant.

Master Willow stiffened in surprise. Glim straightened and faced his former tutor.

Let’s see how you like it, Glim thought, watching Master Willow twitch in fear.