How to Make a Miracle

Chapter 4

It was around 10:00 at night when they finished traversing the Chest Valley and landed on the cliffsides right above the hulking buildings that made up the Storage facility. The flight had been easy and swift, and now they were preparing for the riskiest part of their mission.

"So shipments usually all arrive on just the single road down there and ... Luz, you're not even listening. Are you messing around on your scroll again?"

Luz waved a hand and said,

"I'm listening now, I swear– just had to update our followers about our progress."

She pressed 'send' and wound her scroll back up to stuff into her pocket, smiling at Hunter like she was perfectly attentive. He rolled his eyes.

"Right, so anyway, if we really are going with this whole 'sneak in behind somebody else' plan, we'll first need to check if this invisibility thing really works."

"One step ahead of you, buddy," King said, holding up the bottle of Invisibility potion, some of it sloshing out as he did so. Luz instructed,

"Hey, careful, King. Ok, so apply that to the sleigh and Ratworms, but make sure you spread it around nice and even, all right?"

King hopped up on the sleigh and said,

"I know, I know, this ain't my first rodeo."

He flung the potion half-hazardly, and bit by bit, the sleigh and Ratworms vanished from sight. When he'd finished, Luz walked around, making sure it was entirely covered.

"Perfect! They won't see it coming. Literally. This should be a piece of cake."

However, for some reason, Hunter didn't look quite so confident.

"Umm, I hate to be a killjoy, but . . ."

He pointed. Luz squinted, not sure what he was pointing at.

"What?"

"THAT," he said, gesturing a globe shape. Luz's eyes widened.

"OH. Oh, the storm shield. It ... huh."

King wound his arm back and then sent some of his potion sloshing upwards, trying to hit the shield. It flung through it without affecting it in any way.

"Semi-permeable membrane," Hunter muttered.

King said,

"Huh?"

He tried to reword himself.

"It, uh ... it's a type of magic barrier that lets some things through but not others. I don't think any potion is going to work on it."

Luz frowned.

"Well, shoot."

All that work to make the thing, and now it was stopping them from progressing?

"Wait, maybe I could ..."

She pulled an Invisibility glyph from her pocket and walked up to the edge of the barrier. Activating the glyph, she stuck her hand out to touch the barrier– but her hand passed through and it remained unchanged, even as Luz disappeared from sight.

"Yeah, that won't work," Luz confirmed, popping back into visibility. Hunter nodded.

"It makes sense, you'd need to make physical contact with it."

Luz sighed, staring at the magic shield with some frustration.

"How are we going to sneak in then?"

Hunter crossed his arms, expression determined.