Page 78 of A Fractured Song

“Here.” The man smiled. “Not much on the shelves right now, but that’s what this is for.” He lifted a string of cured meat from the crate on the table. “And we’ve got plenty of avocados.”

It was a good thing they still had food from their last stop, Marieke reflected. They purchased some dried meat and avocados anyway, and filled their new, larger water bladders at the well.

By the time they left town, it was only a couple of hours before dark, and Marieke was wondering whether they’d erred in dismissing the suggestion of seeking lodging with the unknown Bessy. But the shopkeeper had told them that the first town was only a few hours’ walk into the jungle, and had assured them yet again that they would be perfectly safe as long as they stayed on the main road.

The road wasn’t difficult to find, at least. A path ran out of the town and straight into the trees, a wide space carved out around it. The opening wasn’t large enough to penetrate to the canopy—branches still curved over their heads some distance above. But trees had been felled and the ground cleared to make a straight route southward.

“Wow,” Marieke said, as they walked into the relative gloom of the jungle. “I can feel what they mean.” When Zev tilted his head in inquiry, she added, “The magic. There’s some kind of boundary enchantment on this road. It feels sophisticated.”

“Is it really enough to keep everyone on the path safe?” Zev asked. “That must involve powerful magic.”

“Agreed.” Marieke spoke absently, her senses mainly focused on assessing the enchantment. “Although powerful doesn’t always mean a large volume. It’s often more about finesse. The enchantment probably acts as a subtle deterrent rather than an actual barrier. If it’s been in place for a long time, I suppose predators have learned not to include this area intheir hunting territory. Maybe it hasn’t been tested front on much.”

“Reassuring,” Zev said dryly.

She laughed. “It’s still impressive magic. It must need regular replenishing.”

The entrance point of the jungle soon disappeared from view behind them. Marieke felt uncomfortably closed in, but she wasn’t sure how much that was due to the thick foliage visible on both sides of the path and how much to the heaviness of the air.

The presence of the magic was comforting, however. And not just the magic of the ground—which was plentiful and eager beneath her feet—but the magic of the boundary on the road. With the familiar sensation of a latent enchantment always nudging at her awareness, it was hard to remember she was in a dangerous and unpredictable environment.

As the light faded away, Marieke began to hum, summoning some of the magic that crowded under her feet. She saw Zev cast her a curious glance, but didn’t stop to explain. It took all her focus to draw up only the magic she needed. With less training, she wouldn’t have been able to prevent a veritable flood pouring through her in response to her questing songcraft, and it would have been too great a volume to successfully mold. Less was sometimes more with magic.

Once she’d drawn into herself a manipulatable amount of magic, she gave words to her song.

“Light, the darkness gently greet,

Show a path before my feet.”

Responding to her prompting, magic issued out from her and concentrated in a ball just in front of her, about the height of her face. She could feel the mass of magic before she could see it, but sure enough, it soon began to glow softly. Marieke hummed wordlessly as the magic continued to pull energyfrom the rustling leaves and dripping moisture of the surrounding jungle. Soon, she had a glowing ball of light that illuminated the road ahead.

With a final twist, she once again turned the hum into words, in an incantation of perpetual motion that was one of the basic formulas taught at the academy.

“Wow.” Zev’s eyes reflected the light of the glowing orb as he cast her an admiring look. “That’s a neat trick.”

Marieke flushed with pleasure. “It’s a very simple one, actually. You can always tell that an enchantment is a beginner one if it’s set to nursery-rhyme style words. They don’t bother with that at a more advanced level.”

“Well, it didn’t look beginner to me,” Zev said. “How did you do it?”

Marieke bit her lip, silently delighted that he was showing such an interest in her craft. “I used the magic’s inherent connection with the forces of nature. Magicisa force of nature, after all. That enchantment simply sets the magic to collect energy from natural sources and turn it into light. I don’t have the strength or training to do it with large sources of energy. But turning a gentle breeze into a source of light is no problem.”

“Amazing.” Zev was staring at the orb, admiring how it moved in tandem with their pace. “But how is it still going if you’re not still singing?”

“Oh, the last bit of my song was a perpetuation formula. A much weaker and more generic version of what’s in place with this boundary enchantment. It instructs the magic to keep doing its set task indefinitely.” She smiled at him, reveling in the feeling of him looking to her for answers. It so often felt the other way around. “It never actually is indefinite, of course. No singer can harness an infinite amount of magic at once. The task stops when it’s exhausted the volume of magic used by the singer in placing the enchantment. A group of singers workingtogether can harness a lot of magic and set up a substantial perpetuation. But just now I grabbed only a little. So I’ll need to renew the light enchantment regularly. Which is no problem, of course.”

With the bobbing ball of light for company, they continued at a good pace, chatting inconsequentially as they went further into the jungle. The sun had undoubtedly set above the canopy when the promised town came into view, but there was no noticeable drop in temperature.

Marieke came to a stop as Zev put out a hand, lightly touching her arm.

“What is it?”

“I’m just wondering if we should avoid the town,” Zev said quietly. “Maybe we should let the light die out and go around it.”

“I thought we were planning to camp there,” said Marieke.

“We were,” Zev acknowledged. “I don’t know about you, but I’m less intimidated by the jungle than I expected. Especially with your songcraft at our disposal. I’d be willing to strike out in search of the elves on our own sooner rather than later. And that being the case, I’m not sure we want to advertise our presence to the humans in here.”

Marieke frowned. Here again was Zev’s obsession with remaining inconspicuous. She didn’t relate to it, but it seemed to be deeply ingrained in his thinking.

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