Princess

“It worked,” I breathed as Arnya’s hair started to grow brighter and brighter, until it was a luminous green almost too bright to look at. Without a word, she kicked off the ground. That was the best way to describe what I saw—it was like she were jumping off a ledge, only she ascended straight into the air. One would expect her to fall, but in her wake a trail of ice appeared from thin air, strong enough to support her weight.

She kept leaping higher into the air, crystallizing ice from nowhere to form a series of platforms. She wasn’t flying in the same way the other sorcerer was, exactly, but it was still miraculous. She could do all that with no training and no experience?

My wonder at watching Arnya was cut short by a sudden pain in my left arm. I looked down to see a long, thin cut was spurting blood. And this was actually spurting, like out of a fire hose. I was no doctor, but I knew basic biology and there was no way such a thin cut should have shot that much blood. The scientist part of my brain (not that I was focused on that right now) speculated that this strengthening potion also sped up my heartrate and increased bloodflow to compensate.

Before I could react in more than stupor at the sight of my own blood, a thin blade flashed out from behind me, delivering a similar cut to my right arm, which also began blasting blood. Whoever was attacking me was behind. On instinct I kicked backward, but my foot felt only air. I spun around, putting my back to the wall, to come face to face with the Grand Hunter, who had backed up to ten feet away.

“Your arrogance will be your downfall, alchemist,” he said matter-of-factly in a gravelly voice that cut through the noise around of battle. He brandished his two thin swords, both dripping with my blood. Over his shoulder, I could see Gwyn, who had been fighting him before, was now desperately trying to hold back three opponents.

I grabbed a sword from a nearby body, but I accidentally gripped it too hard and snapped the hilt. The Grand Hunter used my momentary distraction to leap in and deliver another thin slice. I knew my skin was hard enough to deflect direct hits, so he must be trying to wear me down.

He said “I have slain scores of alchemists. I know all your tricks better than you do. Why not surrender?” I stared at him incredulously as he explained “one way or another, you die. But if you surrender, you may save the lives of the guards.”

“And Arnya?” I spat.

I couldn’t see expressions behind the mask, but I heard the disgust in his voice as he answered “she is now a sorcerer. Of course, she must also die.”

I screamed in rage and charged him, wildly swinging my fists. He nimbly dodged to the side, using the flat of one blade to redirect my strike while giving me another thin cut, this one on my leg. Again, it didn’t hurt much, but the blood spilled like a dam bursting its banks. He fell back, putting space between us before I could strike back.

This wasn’t working; I needed a new trick. I reached the pocket where I had stashed the rest of the potions. My hand went right through the bottom and out the other side. Now that I looked, I saw a few smashed vials on the ground where I had stood originally. The Grand Hunter must have sliced my pocket to deprive me of additional potions as his very first move, even before cutting my hand. I cursed. He used this momentary distraction, too, to lunge in and score two more cuts, dodging out again before I reacted. I cursed again; he really did know how to fight alchemists.

This fight wasn’t all bad, though. I saw over the Hunter’s shoulder that the sorcerer had stopped blasting the defenders with her fire. Good. Arnya must be distracting her. That meant I was safe to do something crazy.

I turned and sprinted into the castle as fast as my enhanced legs could carry me. Behind me I heard the Grand Hunter’s metal boots as he gave chase.

***

Arnya sprang through the sky, exulting in this new sensation. All her life, she had felt like she was missing something, like something held her back from her true potential. Sure, she was faster and stronger than any human and most dogmen, but she knew she could be better if she could just tap into that internal wellspring of power. Now, she drank from it deeply, and the world bent to her wishes.

The sorcerer flung two blasts of fire at her. At a thought—no, on instinct—ice appeared from nowhere, boiling to steam as they blocked the flames. She leapt forward through the cloud of steam in a flying lunge would have shattered a building had it struck one.

The enemy sorcerer dodged with a blast of flame that propel her backward, where she hovered in midair. Arnya raised her sword again prepared to strike, but the woman spoke.

“You will burn out soon,” she said. Her voice was oddly musical.

Arnya hesitated just a second before pushing off an ice platform to speed toward the woman. She struck with her sword in an overhand cleave, but the woman caught it. Her hands flared red, and the sword began to glow like it was in the blacksmith’s furnace once again. With a thought, Arnya reinforced the metal with ice more solid than steel, then pushed down, trying to force the blade onto her opponent’s head.

The sorcerer didn’t resist, instead using Arnya’s strength to do a mid-air somersault and descend, putting distance between them again. Before Arnya could charge again the woman blasted upward with a wall of fire, forcing Arnya upward. This time, the woman charged at Arnya, blazing so hot that she forced her to ascend further into the sky.

The two hung in the heavens far enough up that those below were just specks. Then the real battle started.

Blasts of fire larger than the castle were met with equally large walls of ice. Arnya conjured hundreds of icicles in the air around the woman, so cold that they wouldn’t melt to fire, and sent them in as a swarm of lethal projectiles. The sorcerer covered one foot in white-hot flames and performed a great whirling kick that sent the frozen spikes flying. She followed that up with a pair of fiery whips that snatched away Arnya’s sword and sent it plummeting. With a thought, Arnya conjured a sword of ice in her hands. She spent a moment wrapping it with denser and denser ice until it was stronger than the steel of a real sword.

The sorcerer launched another blast of fire, which Arnya parried. She used the moment to spring in close enough to use sword techniques. The sorcerer drew a small sword from her waist, but a few exchanges of blows showed she wasn’t nearly as skilled as Arnya in swordplay. Still, Arnya wasn’t used to fighting in three dimensions, so the woman kept retreating lower and lower, preventing Arnya from striking the finishing blow.

They separated for a moment, now no more than twice as high as the castle walls. Arnya said “with your power, mighty sorcerer, you could raze this castle alone. Why work with the Witch Hunters?”

She replied in that musical voice “my people swore long ago not to injure humans. In this battle I have ensured none were harmed by me, and even that is a bending of the oath.”

“You’re an elf, then.” She had guessed that from the overwhelming strength of the woman’s sorcery, but it was good to have confirmation.

Instead of answering, she said “you know not how to restrain your sorcery, do you, Princess Arnya? Of course not. You ought not have the ability to use sorcery. Unlike an elf, your reserves are finite. Vast, yes, with the purity of your blood, but…finite. If you continue to fight as you have, you shall permanently cripple your sorcery.”

“Why are you in the human realms, working with such filth as the Witch Hunters, elf?” Arnya asked again.

“I am here for you.” Without warning, she flew closer to Arnya, using a series of fireballs to cover her movement. But either she was getting weaker as the fight progressed or she was afraid of using her full power this close to the humans on the ground, because this fire was far weaker than before. Arnya deflected them with quick strikes of her icy sword and counterattacked with a fierce lunge toward her head. The elf bent back in the nick of time, and Arnya felt just a slight catch as her sword sliced the woman’s mask.

The sorcerer righted herself in midair as the two sides of her damaged mask slowly slid away, revealing her face.

She was undoubtedly an elf, with an inhumanly graceful elegance to her features. More than that, her hair was greener than Arnya’s, and it glowed so blindingly bright it was a wonder it hadn’t shown through the material of her mask. But upon one glance at her face, Arnya couldn’t help but let out a gasp.

She had never met this woman before, but her features were unmistakable. She looked remarkably like the face Arnya saw in the mirror every day. This could only be a family resemblance, and the only member of her family this could be was…

“Grandmother?”