The Effaced: Chapter Thirty (Patreon)

“We’re going to find my sister,” I said. “I know Zone, and she’s not going to return to her husband for a while. She’s set off an emergency banner, and he’s going to have fled to one of her safe houses. She is too.” 

Hadiya frowned. 

“I understand why you want to keep her safe, but what does she actually add to this situation? In particular, attempting to clear your name?” 

“Other than what Rhys has said, she doesn’t add much to that, but she does help with our second problem – the Arenamaster,” I said. “She’s bound to have picked up on some things, and her safe houses are all going to have supplies for her divinations.”

“You can’t expect us to just suit up and run around on your say-so,” Hadiya said. “Do you even know where she is?” 

“She has a few safe houses, but I can guess which one she went to,” I said. “I’m going.” 

“You should,” Rhys said. “I shouldn’t. Kelly, Hadiya, and I should all stay here, to try and connect with your attorney, provide alibis, and I’ll call a few people I know to see if I can get a better grip on the interaction.” 

“I’m not sticking around here,” Kelly said. “I’m going with you, Axel.” 

I flicked my eyes over him and sighed. 

“I’d prefer for you to be safe and not just run off with me,” I told Kelly. “You’re a good mind mage, especially for being so new to magic. If you want to come, I won’t stop you, but I will insist you keep yourself defended as best you can.” 

“Fine,” Kelly agreed. Rhys looked slightly uncomfortable, but didn’t argue, and Hadiya just shoved the anti-divination ward at me. 

“Stay within thirty paces of that,” she said. “Be safe, don’t take any stupid risks.” 

“I’m just nipping out, then I’ll be back with Zone. After that I need to take a nap. I’m exhausted.”

Hadiya let out a groan of appreciation, Rhys nodded in agreement, but Kelly shrugged. 

“I’m not too bad, I’m used to pulling all nighters,” he said. 

“You’ll do well in college,” I muttered under my breath before sweeping out of the room, running a trickle of aura through my coat to lighten it, then flicking a hand, shaping a spell, and lifting the anti-divination ward over one shoulder. 

“So where are we going?” Kelly asked as he shut the door behind him. 

“First,” I said, glancing over him. “Are you okay? Rhys didn’t do anything? I like him, but…” 

Though I didn’t finish my thoughts, I had to admit that I was incredibly suspicious. Rhys and Hadiya had a plan that I’d gotten tangled up in, and while getting me free would be nice, neither of them needed it in order for the tattoo plan to work. 

That didn’t translate to Kelly being pressured, but I generally trusted rich people about as far as I could throw them.

“No, nothing like that,” Kelly said. 

“Good,” I said. “Now, I want you to promise to power the ward if you think anything suspicious might be going on, and invisifield yourself at the first sign of danger. I’m good, but I’m not perfect, and I don’t want you getting hurt.” 

Kelly opened his mouth to protest, then sighed and nodded. 

“Okay, fine,” he said. “Then I’ll throw illusions at them or 

“Hopefully you won’t have to,” I said as we stepped out onto the street. I didn’t know how to drive an automobile, so walking would have to work for us, especially since I didn’t have enough money on me to hire a cab or rickshaw. 

We walked for a while, until we were getting near Zone’s grocery store, then I turned into a thin back alley with a crumbling sewer grate, and I leapt down it. I caught myself with a spell to reduce my mass paired with a metal movement spell, then turned and looked up to Kelly. 

“Come on, I’ll catch you,” I said. 

He hesitated for only a second before jumping down, and I caught him with the same spells I’d used to slow my own fall. 

The moment he landed, Kelly started looking around. 

“We’re on the other side of the cordon,” he said. “This… Is this safe?” 

“Nope,” I said. “Want to go home or back to the lab?” 

“No,” Kelly said, shaking his head. “What is this place?” 

“Nowhere, really,” I said. “Just some sunken office building. Heard a rumor that some ghouls are down here, but I don’t think the Ghoulplanes actually connect to the city. I think it’s probably just vagrants. It’s also home to one of Zone’s better stocked and defended safe houses.” 

I glanced at him as we started walking. 

“Maybe don’t –” 

“Shh!” Kelly said, eyes going wide, and he turned invisible before my eyes. A moment later, I heard his voice echoing in my head. 

“There are minds walking towards us. Want me to include you in the invisifield?” 

“No,” I said quietly, straining my ears, trying to hear them. A few seconds later, I heard the crunching of boots on the half-ruined ground coming from around a corner. 

I put my hands on my gun, lowered my stance slightly, and whispered. 

“Ward up, get behind a corner. Maybe it’s nothing, but maybe not.” 

There was no sound, which was good, because a mind mage holding a true spell to edit themselves out of the perception of someone else shouldn’t leave something as obvious as sounds as a tell, but a few moments later, I heard Kelly’s voice in my head saying he was away. 

Moments later, a squad of six turned around the corner on the far side of the now-sunken office building, a shimmering force dome over them being projected by the pair of mages in the center. Just like the ones who’d looked for me at Zone’s, there were two light gunners in the front, with heavier gunners in the back. 

“What a surprise, seeing you all here,” I said, stepping forwards, hands still on my guns. I used my split mind arch-star, focusing on the conversation with one half of my mind while I used the other to begin building magic.

I was ready to fire, but if I could get information first… 

“Mist,” one of the mages in the middle said, her voice ringing out with finality. “Turn yourself in to be returned to the Arenamaster or die here.” 

Now that was interesting. 

“I don’t see why I should go back to her. I’m not a child, not like her currently kidnapped child. How’s she doing, by the way?” 

One of the heavy gunners shifted, clearly uncomfortable, and I let a smirk plaster across my face. 

“Who’d she rent you from? You’re not Concrete Crown, nor Contractor, and you just blew up the White Rooms, so you’re not them. Who, then?” 

“He’s resisting arrest,” the woman who’d spoken already said. “Kill him.” 

“Leah, we–” the gunner who’d been uncertain said, but the other five opened fire. 

I snapped my hands out and released all of the spells I’d been building throughout the conversation. 

I reduced the mass of my bullet to zero to let it slip through the dome, then immediately reverted it back to normal as it struck Leah in the knee. My second bullet ripped through the other mage’s leg, and I infused my fourth arch-star into my metal spells, allowing them to bypass the anti-tampering magic on them. 

All four of the guns fell apart. I could have tried to get them to fire on their allies, but I didn’t need to, and while I wasn’t afraid to kill them if I had to, I didn’t need to. Plus, it would mean I couldn’t get information. 

Instead, the handguns and battle wands the first group had held turned to slag, while the heavier guns broke into chunks and hit the ground. 

I re-holstered my guns and looked over the group, beginning to build more spells in the back of my mind. 

“Go ahead and tend to your mages,” I told them. “Who do you actually work for, though? I feel like you should at least tell me that, given I didn’t just kill you all.” 

“Like you could have,” one of the front gunners who’s pistol I slagged said, and I rolled my eyes, then ripped the button out of their trousers, causing them to fall down. 

It was a juvenile prank, the kind of trick that I’d seen a few party boys in college try to pull, but in this case, it got the message across quite well. 

They were under my power. I could humiliate or kill them as I wished. 

The one who’d looked uncomfortable when I’d talked about Arenamaster’s kidnapping of children stepped forwards. 

“I’m June,” he said. “We’re from the Red Eagles, a Saxum-based private military corporation. We fought in the Saxum war, but now we’re for hire. The Arenamaster contracted the Red Eagles for a series of eight terror attacks across the city, as well as the capture of Zone and Mist.” 

“June!” the other heavy gunner said, sounding scandalized. 

“Eight?” I asked.

“The first was the privateering of a war airship without the original owner being aware, and the second was the attack on the White Rooms,” June said. “The third was burning down the grocery store and sweeping the non-cordoned undercity around it, killing anyone we encountered while we searched for Zone’s safe room. We haven’t been instructed on the others.”

“Why did you frame me for the killing of Senator Ermonte?” I asked. 

June frowned.

“We didn’t. Or if we did, it wasn’t us mercs. It was higher up in the corporation.”

I studied June’s face, and I thought I believed him. Torture and threats was a terrible way to get information, because people told you whatever they thought would result in the least punishment for them, not what was the most accurate statement. More torture worsened the problem, not improved it. 

I nodded to June.

“Get out of here. Take your mages and head back to Saxum. Trust me, you don’t want to be in the city while the Arenamaster is pulling her plans.”

June gulped and nodded, and the other heavy gunner, who had been bandaging the mage’s wounds, looked up at me.

“Thank you,” she said. “I know how much easier it is to kill than to disable. There are two more groups roaming the underground, as well as Firefright.”

“Thank you,” I said.

The group only took a few moments to evacuate, moving with professional poise, and I relaxed. A moment later, Kelly appeared next to me.

“I don’t think they were lying,” he said, and I nodded my agreement.

“Me neither. Keep your mind sense active. The element of surprise helped me, and the fact they were willing to talk. The others might not be.”

I paused for a second. 

“No, actually. Don’t move, because I just remembered something. I want you to shove the mind sense spell into your head, and I want you to do it hard.” 

“What?” 

“Trust me,” I said. “I know Zone’s wards. They’ll react to your spell. Cram it in your head and don’t let it out and keep it powered until you feel the power cost vanish.” 

That was a lie, but I was trying to put pressure on him. 

One of the second arch-stars was known as the sensory arch-star, and it was one of the semi-common options. While splitting your focus, like mine, was extremely useful and common as well, being able to sense something you had a strong connection to – like metal for me, or minds for Kelly – was useful. If nothing else, it saved on aura needed to keep a sensory spell running. 

“What?!”

“Do it!” I said, trying to not sound angry, but encouraging. I wanted to put pressure on him, but I didn’t want to upset him. “I learned to do it as a kid. You can do it.” 

“Casting inside the body is weird and hard.” 

“Nah, that’s just what people say, just do it.” 

I was lying about me doing it as a kid, and lying about it not being hard, but ironically, that was helpful. It was common for people to get into their own brain when it came to making arch-stars. 

You just needed to be backed into a corner where you had to do it, and the arch-star would form, or else practice it enough that it formed naturally, at least for the first two arch-stars. Most people could form those fine, and a second arch-star was a requirement to graduate from many mage colleges. The third and fourth stars were much harder, and forming the fifth was almost impossible, but Kelly was still only on his second star, so it should be fairly easy for him.

Given how Kelly seemed to use a sensory spell and output detachment instead of the usual mind link, I was betting he had plenty of practice with the sensory spell, even if not with the technique of making it a part of him. 

Kelly stared at me, clearly straining, and I nodded. 

“Come on, you can do it. Trust me. And if not, well, we probably won’t blow up. Probably.” 

Kelly’s eyes widened, and then his purple aura exploded out around him as a second arch-star bloomed to life overhead.