“We come.” Ramoth’s voice as she landed on Marcelle’s shoulder was firm, full of conviction.
Jade smiled, nodding to them and Marcelle. “Very good. Marcelle, if you’ll have the guards open a tiny crack, they’ll go from there. Don’t open the door fully; you never know if mesmer are lurking.” Looking back at her babies, she mentally commanded them, “There might be more mesmer out there. Be careful, and make sure you hide where you come out from, okay?” She saw Ramoth and Lilith’s little heads nodding, having picked up the very human gesture from her.
Nodding to Marcelle, Jade went on, “All right then. Open a tiny passage for them, then hunker down. You have enough supplies to last you at least a few days, right?”
“Of course. Thanks to your bag, we’ve got enough for weeks. Don’t worry about us too much. I’ll let the fellacai out now.” Marcelle instantly allayed her fears that they would be starved out before she could come back for them.
“That’s great. Thanks, Marcelle. I’ll see you in a few days.”
“Heaven bless.” Marcelle whispered before cutting the connection. Jade sighed, leaning on Hunter a little more. She was so tired.
Looking up at the people who took position around her, she asked quietly, “Can someone throw up some earth walls? Give us a little cover?”
“Sure, I’ve got it.” Tisha was the first to respond, and she focused, bending down to touch the earth for a more direct connection as she called on her magic. The earth started to rise, but Jade was quick to notice that she was sweating from the effort, and the walls only made it up about three feet before she stopped, panting. She looked back at Jade, confusion on her face. “I don’t understand. This isn’t something I’ve ever had problems with before.”
Jade nodded slowly before asking, “Tisha… Can you check your profile for me? Look at your stats and tell me what’s changed.”
Looking a little confused, Tisha muttered “Profile” and stared intently at the screen in front of her. It only took a few seconds for her to gasp in shock, awe, or dismay, Jade wasn’t sure which. Her expression was bleak as she looked at Jade. “You’re right, they’ve changed. My magic went down three points, and my dexterity went up one. Why would they do that?”
Sighing, Jade shook her head. “The mesmer were…” She paused, unsure if she should outline their situation so particularly, but there was no real reason to keep it from them. “They were turning you into one of them. It looks like part of that change is the stat redistribution. They were literally draining your magic, but the change hadn’t really started, so you didn’t get the boosts to strength and dexterity they most likely have. I’m sorry.”
Tisha stared dully at the ground, shaking her head. “No...it’s gone? Just like that?”
With another deep sigh, Jade looked at the others. “Everyone else check too. See what the changes are.” Her guess was that Tisha had been close to a breakthrough on dexterity as it was, and that maybe she’d lost only a little more than 2 points of magic, but that it would still show up as a lesser number even if it was whatever .99 of a stat.
“My magic is gone.” Frank’s voice sounded numb, as if he couldn’t process what he was seeing.
“Gone?” Hunter was still propping him up, so it was he who prodded Frank curiously.
Frank nodded as he stared at the air. “My magic is a zero. My strength and dexterity each went up by three.” Looking bleakly at Jade, he asked in a lost voice, “What do I do without magic?” It was a part of who he was, she knew. He’d worked so hard at his contractual and other magics, just doing his best. To have all of that taken away in an instant, on top of a week of torture…
“We’ll figure it out. It might not be permanent. I’ll help you get your magic back.” Her promise was only mildly mollifying, and she could tell those around her were forcing themselves to believe out of hope more than anything else, because it wasn’t as if there was a better way. Her help was the only glimmer of hope.
“Right. Maybe it’ll come back…” The guard’s voice was filled with disbelief, even as he tried to reassure Frank, or maybe just himself. It wasn’t helpful.
Jade cut in. “We’ll look into it more when we get back to the city. For now, can anyone else help with the fortifications? I’m not going to be able to move for a bit, so we’re going to have to wait until reinforcements arrive.”
“Oh, yeah. I can help. My magic went down, but only by a point…” One of the guards chimed in, moving to raise the walls around them. If she had to hazard a guess, it had truthfully gone down more than a point, but that was because he didn’t know his decimals. If you had an 8.99, and it went down to 7.01, it would still only show up as losing a single point.
If nothing else, she’d keep siphoning their magic stats. That would allow her to boost everyone...except Frank. 0.5% of nothing was still nothing. But hey, she hadn’t read all those cultivation novels for nothing! Maybe if she could figure out how magic worked, if it was something like power in the veins…it was obviously connected to their blood somehow, after all. Blood transfusion to get him started?
She’d have to think on it. For now, she watched as a house-like structure went up around them. It reminded her of a jail cell, to be honest. Instead of a thatched roof, it was a flat one made of dirt, but there were arrow slits all around the side to provide them protection with the ability to hit back.
Looking wearily at their setup, she nodded. “Don’t freak out when my fellacai arrive. They’ll help keep watch. For now, I think I’m going to take a nap. Wake me up if anything tries to kill us.” Once she got nods, she absently pulled out several cots so they could all rest on rotations as well. Hunter helped her balance herself to plop onto one of the cots, and she smiled wearily at him.
She was out almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.
Chapter Twelve – Cost
Jade vaguely felt the arrival of her babies, their joy at finding her coming through their connection even in her exhaustion. She smiled before she drifted completely back under again. She had no idea how much later it was when she felt their anxiety coming through the connection. As she dragged herself out of the land of slumber, she started to process the tiny voices echoing in her brain.
“Mommy! Wake up! Two tialon!” Willow’s sweet voice was etched in mild panic as Jade was sent images from her tiny baby. Obviously flying high above them, Willow’s vision showed the two large creatures stalking through the grass towards their fortification. They were staying low enough that they wouldn’t be visible to the humans inside until they were nearly upon them.
She took a moment to study the large cats. They looked like a strange mutation of the liger from home: they had a small mane, and their body was a lovely golden color that matched the wheat around them. The biggest difference that she could see was that their stripes and mane were a deep green that was becoming lighter and more golden the longer she watched. After observing them a moment longer, she realized they were using some sort of active camouflage the closer they got to the building to avoid detection.
She took one last look at the stalking beasts, determining which direction they were coming from while sending soothing thoughts to Willow. She heard several gasps as her eyes shot open and she began to sit up. She smiled at them, and though she still felt a little weary, it was much better than before. She began to stretch as she said conversationally, “We’ve got two tialon incoming from the west.”