Discordant Harmonies 3: Measure of Resistance

Chapter Seventeen

While Géta played his flute, Asthané called up a blizzard for his musician. They stood in the field out beyond the post's shields, but well-warded under their own. He couldn't name all the Gifts that went into Géta's shields, but Esqué had told him Jalza had Bestowed quite a number of shields upon him. Esqué had given Asthané the distinct impression the Proxy had had words with the Gods, and Jalza in particular. Unable to imagine ever having the temerity to rebuke the any of the Gods himself—never mind Jalza—Asthané hadn't questioned the hint at all. He did his best not to complain to the Gods over frivolous matters, and he accepted whatever new Gifts Those whose purview he was under chose to Bestow. There was no way in all the Empire he'd do something like scold Them. It wasn't because Asthané was foolish enough to assume the Gods, who were mere Transcended beings, were omnipotent, but simply because he had no desire to pique their ire.

As Esqué had instructed, Asthané started it off at normal power level for him. Thinking to increase Géta's endurance further, he didn't weaken it for a while. As had happened previously, a small trench the width of a booted foot developed along the edge where he sensed Géta battling his will. Those trenches had gotten longer and longer over the past many weeks, and this one stretched two-thirds of the length of Asthané's weather spell in front of the boy.

He held his spell at this strength for a while longer, seeking what Esqué's infused lesson told him to look for. It took a bit of time and concentration for him to see it, primarily because he was trying not to use the Obnubilate Codicil to see it. According to the knowledge which had come with the new Gift, using the Obnubilate Codicil would do more to _obscure_ what he was looking for than aid him in discovering it. He honestly had little hope of seeing what he'd been told to look for this time, either.

Then, suddenly, it simply popped into view as he finally connected to the new Gift in the way it needed him to. One moment, he saw nothing, and the next, the vision of a pale yellow "rope" unraveling from Géta to brush against his weather spell was there. It looked, upon closer examination, more like a web. Closer to the ground, the web seemed more solid, but higher up, near the upper edge of Asthané's spell, the web thinned out a great deal. His magic wasn't passing through the openings, but the web's ends were barely containing the spell.

Without warning his musician, Asthané weakened his own spell. The moment he did, Géta's power-nullification web "dropped" into the blizzard, killing about half of it in an instant. Asthané gasped a little as he felt his power die. From where it "lay" on the ground, Géta's web of antipower stretched tendrils up, and those tendrils threw out more, until another web "covered" the open edges of Asthané's spell. Experimenting a bit, Asthané weakened his spell a little more, and those tendrils dropped as well, completely cutting his spell in half. The far end of the blizzard whirled into nothingness and the snow gathered there began to melt; Géta's spell had eradicated everything down to the soil when it landed.

Asthané ended his spell and cut the air. He rubbed his head a little as Géta played to recover, and Asthané watched as the null-spell withdrew and retracted into Géta. So the antipower was tied to Géta in a way typical power wasn't tied to the caster. True, if he cast a spell like gigantism in grass or other plants and they were chopped down or incinerated, he'd feel pain, but this was different. Géta was the entire source for his nullification magic. That was why casting the power-nullifying spell hurt him so much; he was using his own life-force to kill magic.

While Géta knelt and disassembled his flute, Asthané considered telling the boy what he'd seen. He almost did, in fact, but he stopped himself. This was something he needed to discuss with Esqué, even if his instinct was to warn Géta about what happened when the boy cast the power-nullifying spell.