The Currents of Magic

Chapter Fifty

The rest of the night passed in a blur. The sky was dark and the wind was cold, but Meyer did not pay attention to his physical senses. He ran to the rhythm of the lifelink—to the beating which beckoned him in forward, a beacon through the darkness. And always the pulsing grew stronger—more powerful—a pounding which punctuated each moment, even as his weary legs and parched throat went unnoticed.

Meyer transitioned from walking to jogging, and then from jogging to running. His pace continued to increase, his thoughts fixated on the lifelink. He knew he could open the connection—immerse himself into the experience of the Raider wearing the other half—but he chose not to. He didn't want to lose his cadence... his tempo... He felt the beating, and he channeled it more urgently, opening his connection with the Currents, letting the power flow through him...

And then the exhaustion in his body disappeared entirely. There was no sharp pain in his back, or signs of cramping beneath his ribs; his hips did not drag from tightness in his hamstrings, and his feet were not sore. He glided over the plains, the Currents carrying him forward, to a familiar place...

But as dawn rose on the horizon, Meyer felt his grip on the Currents waning. He could still feel the lifelink directing him, yet its guidance no longer seemed to travel through his magical sense. Instead each thump of the lifelink pulsed through his entire body. He felt the weariness creeping back into his limbs, and he fixed his eyes on the ground, watching the grass slide by beneath his feet.

He was so close... Just a bit farther... Meyer didn't know why, but with each step he felt a growing urgency building inside him. He was running towards Raiders—towards danger—but if he just reached the end... Meyer rounded a small cluster of trees and lifted up his head. He took several strides before stumbling forward, and even then he could hardly believe his eyes.

Before him were the walls of Vanroc.

Home.

Meyer sprinted forward without processing the meaning—ran even as the gates came into closer view: iron bars bent and misshapen, the stone around the portcullis cracked and crumbling. Behind the walls smoke was rising, but Meyer kept running. His thoughts were a blur and his magical sense was forgotten. His emotions threatened to tear from his chest. Instead, pure adrenaline spurred his body, the only part of him which was still alive.

But as he reached the gates, even his muscles stopped working. His feet dragged, and then he stopped, his eyes sliding from the smashed entrance to the ground covered in rubble and blood. Corpses everywhere, and limbs, and guts. He felt as though in a trance as he surveyed the carnage: one man crushed between fallen stones, another with arrows protruding from his chest. There were fallen Guardsman and Raiders alike, but death looked the same upon them all: glazed eyes and pale faces.

And then the wind blew and there was a distant sound of a bird. Meyer looked up, strange figments of sentience flitting through his brain. Finally a single thought coalesced in his mind.

He was too late.

Vanroc had been overrun by Raiders.

The realization made Meyer tremble, but he felt neither fear nor rage. Shock had frozen his emotions, leaving him only with his cold, calculating thoughts. The fighting was over, but no one had yet come to clear the debris or bury the dead. The majority of the townspeople would still be hidden below in the stronghold where civilians went when the town came under attack...

And his father... Undoubtedly his father would be in the stronghold too, having retreated when the Raiders overtook the Guard.

Guided by a new force—a sense of purpose—very different than the lifelink's beating, which seemed to have faded to a feeble rhythm at the edge of his conscious, Meyer started forward. He climbed through the rubble, and walked slowly forward—or maybe it was quickly. Time seemed to have stopped as he passed through the pillaged streets of Vanroc, the smashed windows and battered doorways a surreal facade to the silent morning—to the deserted houses and burnt down buildings.