‘The manchineel tree,’ he said, pointing at its branches. ‘Burn its wood and the smoke will blind you. Stand beneath it when it rains and just one drop will blister your skin. Orcs coat their javelins in its sap to make the wound fester. They even tie runaway gremlins to the trunks for a slow death. Worse than burning, some say. The fruit is known as the death apple.’ He pointed at the large green berries that hung from its branches. ‘You can guess what happens if you eat one.’
There were many more revelations that afternoon. He showed them which woods would burn with the least smoke, so as not to signal their presence. He gathered sword grass with leaves so sharp that you could shave with them, the fleshy blades not unlike the spikes that lined Seraph’s Barkling’s back. There were even thorny vines that could be used as a rope-saw, so sharp and sturdy were the teeth of each spike.
Finally, Jeffrey held up diagrams of three new spell symbols. One, the leaf-shaped growth spell, could grow a seed into a plant within a few minutes, though none tried it out as Jeffrey warned them that the mana required was substantial.
The next symbol was a twisted line, which Jeffrey called the tangle spell. It would tighten and secure any knot or, by etching the inversion of the symbol, loosen it. The uses were limited, but Fletcher enjoyed testing it out on the lacing of Seraph’s boots when he wasn’t looking, much to the others’ amusement. More than anything, Fletcher was relieved to see that Genevieve and Rory treated him well enough, apparently having forgiven him for the transgressions of the year before.
The final symbol was perhaps the most exciting – one that Jeffrey described as the ice spell, found within the carcass of a Polarion. Shaped in the crisscross of a simplified snowflake, it sent out a gust of frost that took hold of all it touched.
‘A godsend in this heat,’ Malik proclaimed, blasting the nearest pool of water. The surface crackled and froze solid, the moisture in the air between falling to the ground in a haze of icy flakes.
‘A bit too powerful to cool yourself down with,’ he declared with disappointment, ‘but I’ll be adding ice to my coconut water from now on.’
Fletcher wondered why the spells had been kept a secret for so long, for they would be useful to all battlemages. Perhaps they were Electra’s only bargaining chips, and she had used them to allow Jeffrey to continue her research behind enemy lines.
Once the teams had tested the ice spell, it was Sergeant Musher’s turn to demonstrate his knowledge. This was just as well, for the sky had darkened and the first stars were twinkling in the night sky. They settled in, huddling close as the heat of the day faded, leaving only the jungle’s moisture to seep the cold into their bones.
Musher’s voice washed over them in the darkness, describing the constellations and which directions they would take the follower. The Elven Arrow, pointing due north, or Corwin’s Sceptre, which pointed east.
Nestled between the warmth of his friends, Fletcher dreamed.
27
Athena pawed at the baby’s feet, careful to keep her claws retracted. He gurgled and watched her with wide, dark eyes.
‘Athena! What have I told you about playing with the baby? He’s barely old enough to sit up.’ The voice was soft and pure, coming from above.
Tresses of blond hair descended over the child as hands lifted him out of the crib. Athena looked up from the bedsheets and took in the blue eyes of a noblewoman. She was smiling, despite the crinkle of a frown between her delicate eyebrows.
‘Edmund,’ the noblewoman called. ‘Would you get this silly Gryphowl out of the crib?’
‘I’m sorry, Alice, I wasn’t paying attention. There’s a house on fire in Raleightown. You can see it from the window.’
There were hurried footsteps and a man strode into view, beckoning Alice to follow him. Like Alice, he wore no more than a night shirt, open at the chest. His hair was swarthy and black, with a thick growth of stubble coating the lower half of his face.
Athena clambered out of the crib and settled on its wooden rail. The two nobles were huddled by the window of the nursery, watching a faint glow in the distance.
‘Is it the baker or the blacksmiths?’ Alice asked, squinting.
‘Neither, they’re both on the east side of the village. Wait … what’s that?’
Athena sensed a pulse of sudden alarm from her master. There was a faint scream, cut short as quickly as it had begun.
She fluttered on to Edmund’s shoulder and looked closer through the glass. The lawn of the manor house was neatly manicured, the edges lit by flickering lanterns. On the horizon, the flames of a burning village rose higher. Then, like the rising tide, a wave of grey appeared in the darkness.
‘Heaven help us,’ Edmund whispered.
They loped out of the gloom like a pack of wolves. Scores of orcs – lean, muscular giants with hunched shoulders and heavy brows, puffing great gouts of steaming breath in the chill night air. The short tusks jutting from their lower lips gleamed white in the lantern light, and they held their clubs and axes aloft as they ran. Athena could almost hear the thunder of their feet, yet the orcs did not howl or bellow, hoping to catch the occupants unaware.