Chapter 6

The following new characters appear in this chapter and the remainder of the story:

David Strickland

Master Wizard, President of the Council

William Rittenhouse

Master Wizard, Oldest Member of the Council, builder of the trap

James Knox

Master Wizard, Member of the Council, Master of Creatures

Taylor Peale

Master Wizard, Member of the Council, creator of the Magic-stealing creatures

Ross King

Master Wizard, Member of the Council, in charge of external security

Neville Fenton

Master Wizard, Member of the Council, in charge of internal security

Margie K resumes the narrative:

I headed back to the cell with Frank following. It was just a small room with bars covering the entrance. I could feel my Magic diminish somewhat as I neared the cell, but it never completely vanished. I was sure that someone with a lesser Talent would lose their ability to do Magic completely. The cell was locked, but I still retained more than sufficient Magic power to open the lock. Locks had never been a problem for anyone in our Clan, even the originators.

Inside we found a young man on a cot with a chain connecting his ankle to a ring on the wall. It also appeared that he had been through the ringer himself – at least once from all the cuts, bruises, and abrasions that we could see on him. He came awake as we opened the squeaky cell door and sat up staring at me in horror.

"Wh ... what do you want? I already told them everything," he squealed in terror.

"I want to know where Celeste is, and what you had to do with her being here," I demanded, as I stared into his eyes and bared my teeth.

"First off, what is your name and how do you know Celeste?" I demanded next before he had answered.

"We were friends in school before she left to study Magic. My ... my name is Kurt," he managed to get out after a few seconds.

"Where is she now?"

"The Wizard's men took her away a long time ago. They beat me up before that," he stuttered but from the low level of fear and other scents that I could detect coming from him, I was sure that he wasn't telling the whole truth.

"And just how did you know where to find Celeste?" I demanded from closer to him.

"Th ... the Wizards came to our school. They had an old picture of Celeste and wanted to know who knew her. Several of us remembered her and said that we did. They took all of us aside to question us. The others didn't know her as well as I did, and when the ... the Wizards learned that they threatened to kill my entire family if I didn't help them capture Celeste.

"They knew where she was and took me there. I was supposed to get her to lower the shiny bowl around your place. She either couldn't or wouldn't do that, but I eventually managed to lure her out of there so the Wizards could capture her. They double-crossed me and used a spell to freeze both of us and brought us here. They were really upset with me for not getting her to lower that bowl thing, and sent some of their goons in here to beat me up. Apparently they aren't able to use their Magic in here. Celeste couldn't use her's either," he finished. I could tell that wasn't the entire truth, as I could still smell that he was lying.

"I don't need Magic to get the truth out of you," I told him as I reached out, grasped the chain that ran from his ankle to the wall, and giving it a tug with my Warrior-state muscles, ripping the ring lose from its anchors in the masonry wall much to his shock.

On dropping the chain, I swung my arms in and dug my four inch claws into him just below his arm pits, after which I raised him until he was looking directly into my face, and I roared my Tiger roar in his face.

"I'll make what the Wizard's men did to you seem like a friendly pat on the back if you don't tell me the truth," I screamed into his face. I could tell that even Frank was cringing from this display of anger, while Kurt had turned as pale as a ghost.

"They didn't threaten my family," he squealed. "I don't have a family. I was sent to live with several families by the government, but they all rejected me because I kept getting into trouble with the police. I hate all of them and wouldn't have minded if the Wizards had killed all of them. Celeste and I had only gone out once, but the Wizards offered to make me rich and I took their offer, but they double-crossed me," he confessed in real terror this time. I threw him back onto the cot which nearly collapsed when he landed on it.

"That had better be the truth, or I'll be back to introduce you to my kitty, Macha," I told him.

"Macha is a large female Siberian Tiger. I don't think that you would want to meet her, she is rather hungry presently," Frank told him in a calm voice.

"I told you the truth, all of it," Kurt whimpered from the cot.

"You better hope so. If I find out it isn't, I'll lock you in there with Macha until I do get the truth," I told him, as Frank and I exited the cell. The door locked itself behind us.

"Don't leave me in here!!" Kurt begged in terror. "The Wizards will kill me for what I told you."

"You brought it on yourself," I told him, as Frank and I continued down the corridor to the large chamber to resume our search for Celeste. As we entered the chamber, I turned to Frank.

"The center corridor is the only other one where I found Celeste's scent. There are liable to be guards wherever they are keeping her. Since I can't detect her Talent, they will probably be those without any Talent or the ability to use Magic. They would be free to move about down here since the spells and the creatures wouldn't affect them. They are also sure to be armed with various weapons," I warned him before having another thought.

"I just realized that those places where Magic can't be used because of the spells should show up on a scan with my Magic senses," I told him.

"But how?"

"They would be places that don't appear to be there – missing locations in other words. We should be able to detect them by scanning the area on either side of the central corridor as we proceed down it," I told him but was guessing at this point.

"Doesn't that present certain problems?" Frank inquired.

"Yes, I'll not be able to do both as Macha, but can in the Warrior state, and Macha K. has nearly as good a nose as Macha does," I told him.

"I'm willing to try it if you are," he replied.

"We'll need to go very slowly to both track the scent and to do the scanning which is best done while at rest, but let us proceed," I finished, and turned toward the center corridor.

"Stay close to me and inside my wards, there may other traps set along the way. The creatures may not have been the only one," I warned him.

We moved about ten feet or so and stopped while I checked for Celeste's scent again, then scanned the walls on both sides of the corridor. Celeste's scent was still there but weaker, and I found nothing with my scans. We moved another twenty feet or so and I repeated both again.

We had moved over a hundred feet before we found anything, and what we found was trouble in the form of explosives.

"Stop!" Frank hissed frantically, as I started to move again, and I froze in place.

"There was a red light that touched the front of your ward just as you began to move," he told me. I instantly stopped time outside my wards.

"Did you see where it came from?" I asked following that.

"Yes, from low to the right on the wall," he told me.

"I'll move inside the wards to see what it is," I told him and moved inside of the frozen wards to check the wall. There was a sensor of some sort there. The front of the ward had just entered the beam from it where it was about a foot above the floor, and that was what Frank had seen.

"Very observant, thank you, Frank," I told him before turning to the left hand wall to see what the sensor was pointing to.

There on the wall, I could just make out an area that appeared to be a patch. It was about a foot wide and maybe a bit over six inches high where the beam from the sensor would hit it. I drew in air from the area near the patch and detected the faint aroma of gasses given off by explosives. It was apparently some sort of explosive device, and I had no way of knowing if it had been activated by the presence of the wards. I carefully cast a transfer spell around the patched area and sent it to the old rock quarry in the Rocky Mountains where many of my ancestors had tested their power rings. Following that, I restarted time for everything outside my wards.

"What was it?" Frank asked as I turned back to him.

"It appeared to be some sort of explosive device. I sent it to a quarry in the Rocky Mountains to be safe," I explained.

"Will it explode there?" he asked.

"I'm not sure since I couldn't detect if it had been activated, but it went to an old rock quarry, so it doesn't matter, as no one uses it," I assured him. We continued on from there at an even slower pace, now having to check for explosives also.

We had only gone another twenty-five feet or so before I sensed a void, an emptiness where there should have been rock or concrete. Celeste's scent was now stronger also. I stopped Frank to talk after casting the silence spell.

"I sensed an emptiness on the right ahead of us. Celeste's scent has also grown stronger since we passed the explosive device. I believe that they may be holding her not far ahead of us. It may be better for you to stay here in my wards while I go to check what is there," I told him.

"You won't have your Magic to protect you," he stated in a whisper, "you could be shot or killed."

"Macha K. has very fast reflexes," I assured him.

"You aren't bulletproof, not without your Magic," he continued in a slightly louder voice.

"Still, I will be better able to deal with whatever is there than if you were with me," I told him, settling the argument.

Leaving Frank inside my wards, I slipped down the corridor next to the wall after canceling the silence spell, and soon came to an opening in the wall. It was only about five feet wide and the small room behind it was lit by a low power red light. Tigers do not usually see red well as their eyes are more attuned to green, yellow and blue. Being in the Warrior state however I combined the visual abilities of both human and tiger, so I could see by the red light. What I saw was several guards lounging in front of a small cell, and Celeste's scent was very strong here.

The guards were also very lax, they had a small white light on the table where they were playing cards. It only illuminated a portion of the table so they could see the colors of the cards. Their weapons had been leaned against the wall while they were thus engaged. The Magic canceling spell was also weaker than the one at the first cell had been, and it appeared to cover just the cell with very little spill over into the guard room in front of it. This provided me with more options.

I paused to reconsider my plan of attack. My Magic was strong and the spell that I had sensed was fairly weak and restricted to the cell. I had planned to charge into the room and eliminate the four guards before rescuing Celeste, but that approach did present certain problems. It would require time to both cross the room and to eliminate all four of the guards. Time in which an alert or quick guard could grab a weapon or activate a device to alert others to our presence.