Absolute Power: A Portal Harem Fantasy, page 13
Mary smiled. “Finally, a good inquiry. You are going to infect them with it.”
“How?” It seemed I shouldn’t have to ask, but I did anyway.
“All you have to do is think of something you yourself are proud of. Then tear a chunk of that pride away and visualize throwing it at them. Visualize it sinking into their souls and growing, multiplying like a plague until it covers every cell of their body.” Mary smiled at me as though her instructions were normal.
“Infect them with my own pride,” I recounted. “Is that safe, though? Is there any way they could infect me back?”
“No, not that I know of. It’s never been done, anyway. Besides, most of the people you’ll have to worry about are Shadows, so they won’t react the same as humans. They lack the power of self-introspection, after all. They will get bold and loud, but soon collapse into self ruin,” she explained.
“Okay, so who am I supposed to practice this on?” I asked, instantly realizing why Mary wanted Edwin to come with us.
Mary smiled. “Me.”
“That makes zero sense.” I stepped away from the pinball machine and stared at her. “There’s no way I’m going to be able to infect you with pride.”
“Maybe not,” Mary replied, putting her hand on her hip. “But I’ll be able to tell if you could infect me, were I any other person.”
“Why don’t we just go where there are some shadows to test my skills out on?” I asked, not wanting to waste either of our times.
Mary smiled and pushed her black locks back over her shoulder. “Looks like you have a bit of pride in you after all. Learn on me, then I’ll get you a Shadow to practice on.”
I shrugged. “Okay, what do I do now? I visualize something I’m proud of in myself, then throw it at you, eh? Well, here it goes.”
I closed my eyes. There was no question about what my main source of pride was. It was my superior ability to logic my way through a problem. That was what had led me to choose the career I had. I felt the now-familiar tingling of magic bubble up in my skin and my pride swelled along with it. I was about to tear a piece off when it subsided suddenly.
I opened my eyes and looked at Mary. “That was a bit odd. My pride disappeared.”
“Try again. You are not a prideful person by nature. It may take a few tries to get the hang of it.”
I took a deep breath and tried again, holding tightly to the thoughts of my successes. Like someone had flipped a switch, a collage-type image of my life’s work appeared before me. I took the opportunity to imagine myself ripping a piece of the movie screen off.
I opened my eyes, and while I had made the physical movements of throwing something, of course, there wasn’t anything to see flying through the air. I was imagining it, or so I thought. That was until the pride ‘hit’ Mary. It struck her directly in the stomach. As though I’d launched a baseball at her gut, she doubled over and groaned.
“Oh shit,” I called out, running to her. “I didn’t know that was going to hurt you!”
Mary put a hand up to stop me from getting too close. “It’s a good thing. It means you’ve tapped into a strength. Don’t worry about me. Just give me a minute.”
I stayed put, feeling awful for hurting her, but excited that I’d accomplished what I was aiming to. Soon, Mary stood up and locked eyes with me.
“Now, spread the pride throughout my body,” she ordered.
I looked at Mary’s stomach, where the pride had hit her. There wasn’t any sign of abnormality. I opened my mouth to ask how I was to follow her instructions when a dark, orange glow showed, ever so lightly, where I had focused my attention. Keeping that glow in my mind, I closed my eyes and imagined the light enveloping nearby cells. It swallowed them whole, then spit them back out, leaving them with an orange glow all their own. As the blood cycled through Mary’s body, I directed every drop through the pride in her stomach until her veins were coursing with infected cells. When the infection had spread to every tissue that her blood oxygenated, I broke away from the image in my mind and looked at Mary.
When I saw Mary’s face had changed, I took a step back. Instead of determined and wise, she looked pissed off and impatient. It was the expression of someone irritated that a subordinate wasn’t doing as good a job as they felt they could do themselves.
“Mary?” I asked, wondering how much of herself would show through the infection.
Her eyes darted to my face. “You call this an infection? How are you ever going to defeat Kasen with this weak attempt at Sin magic? Let me show you how it’s done.”
I had zero time to move, defend myself, or speak. Mary raised a hand towards me, opened her mouth, and screamed. If it had been possible, I would’ve expected my blood to curdle at the sound that escaped her throat. It was my turn to be hit in the gut by an invisible object. I doubled over and gasped for the air that had just been knocked out of me.
When my breath returned and I could look up, Mary was standing over me, glowering with her eyes but wearing a smug smile of satisfaction on her face. Her expression did nothing but piss me off. I stood up, and I noticed I felt normal. While Mary’s face indicated that she had done something to hurt me, I felt fine.
That’s when I realized that by infecting Mary with pride, I’d over inflated her sense of ability. She was so certain that she could infect me ‘better’ that she couldn’t concentrate on her technique properly or even consider the right sin to try to infect me with. Then, in her arrogance, she now stood so close that all it took was one quick shove to the shoulders to throw her swiftly on her back.
I stepped over her, kneeled down, and pinned her arms to the ground. She shook her head and her face returned to normal.
“Not bad,” she said with a smile.
“Are you… you?” I asked, not wanting to fall for some trick.
“Yeah, it’s me,” she laughed. “That’s the best I could do as far as letting myself be ‘infected’. It never lasts very long.”
I chuckled. “It was enough to show me what I’d be up against though. You looked like a crazy person.”
Mary rolled her eyes, and I realized what I’d said. “My apologies. World’s worst choice of words.”
“You’re telling me. Do yourself a favor and don’t say that in front of Callie or Blair,” Mary said, glancing at her arms which were still pinned.
I released her and stood up, offering my hand to help her up. “What was the deal with you and Callie earlier, by the way? She’s never seemed like one to ‘pull rank’, even being the goddess that she is.”
Mary shrugged as she brushed herself off. “Don’t worry about me and Callie. Every now and then, I get a little too eager, and it does me some good to be reminded that we don’t have endless resources. I was out of line with Callie. She did exactly what she needed to, which was take Edwin with her to get you outfitted. Especially since we will have to go hunting soon.”
“Hunting? What does one hunt around here?” I asked, not remembering seeing a single animal.
“Dinner. We hunt dinner,” Mary laughed. “We only go out about one time per week. There are certain places around the city where animals gather. We wouldn’t hunt at all, but we still need protein.”
Everything in me wanted to launch into a speech about plant-based proteins, but I held back. I was a meat-eater, anyway. Why would I care if someone else wanted meat as their source of protein? I shook my head to drive the thought away. That’s when I noticed that it wasn’t the first time my mind had wandered further than I’d planned.
“Hey, I have a question for you,” I said to Mary. “Does this place affect your ability to focus?”
Mary started walking towards the arcade door. “Not that I’ve noticed. Why?”
“No reason, really,” I answered. “I’ve just caught myself daydreaming a bit more than normal since I’ve been here.”
“Oh, that,” Mary said, shrugging. “That’s not unusual for visitors here. Our psychic footprint is a bit different here than in other worlds. Right now, what would normally be balanced is missing half of itself.”
“So, we can go crazy, even though Callie has protected this place?” I was instantly concerned.
“No, not crazy,” Mary was quick to reassure me. “Normally, your psyche and emotions work together. With Cadence gone, your emotions are more inclined to direct your thinking. That’s why you may find yourself lost in memories or day dreams. Whatever you feel triggers a thought or memory that is associated with that feeling.”
“How strong does this tendency to daydream get?” I asked, slight panic welling up.
“Not to worry, it doesn’t go beyond the most innocent of quick thoughts here and there,” Mary said. “You’ll learn to recognize when it’s happening and snap right out of it. It’s not a danger to you, I promise.”
I followed Mary out of the arcade and glanced around the street. “Wait,” I said, stopping her. “Is that all? I throw some pride at you, and that’s all the training?”
“Without Edwin, I can’t show you much more,” Mary said. “The most important part, however, is you have proven you can do it. Once you infect someone, the rest is finesse, really. The tricky part is getting them to surrender to save their pride, instead of kill themselves to prove it. That’s a lesson we will need Edwin for, though.”
We started walking back to the skyscraper when another question popped up. “Why do you think Sin magic would be better used on Blair?”
Mary’s shoulders tensed a little. “It wouldn’t require you to short-circuit her brain in order to coax her into a state under which you’d be able to control her. Those infected with Pride are very susceptible to suggestion, as long as the suggestion seems to prop them up on a pedestal. You could have Blair do whatever you needed her to, including discard her Pride and return to normal, if you presented it correctly to her.”
I hadn’t thought of the person infected being able to cast out their own sin, but it made sense. Still, I didn’t like the idea of using Sin magic on Blair. In fact, the one thing I wanted to do at that moment is get to Blair and figure out exactly what was going on in her mind. I didn’t care what I had to do, I was going to convince the others that she wasn’t a Shadow.
It would just be really nice if I had her help to do so.
16
Mary and I returned to the fourth floor room, and Blair was there. Her eyes met mine as we walked in, and I knew instantly something was different about her. Her gaze was still as intense as ever, but I saw something behind her concentration that resembled a spark of hope. I wanted to stop Mary and point it out to her, but I didn’t. It would take more than a glance she hadn’t seen for me to convince her that Blair wasn’t a Shadow.
Callie was sitting with Blair at the long conference table and looked up when we entered. “How did it go?”
“Much simpler than I thought it would,” I answered. “I think I’ve seen too many movies depicting magic as being extremely difficult and maybe that has skewed my perception of how easy it can be.”
“That seems like a logical thought process,” Callie replied. “Are you ready to go hunting?”
“Right now?” I asked, having taken Mary’s mention of ‘hunting soon’ to mean ‘hunting later’.
“Yes. The light is good. We’ll have enough time to get out, find our mark, and return before dark. If we get a move on, there may even be enough time for Edwin to dress it out in time to serve for dinner tonight,” Callie said as she stood up.
“Okay, sure,” I replied. “Where are we going?”
Callie looked at Blair. “South corridor?”
Blair nodded once.
“South corridor it is. We haven’t hunted there in a while so the animals shouldn’t be too skittish,” Callie said. “Hudson, your gear is there, in the corner.”
I followed Callie’s gaze to the corner of the room behind me. A row of three duffle bags sat in a line, all stuffed full. I glanced back to Callie. “What do I need to bring?”
“Your weapons, the ties to get our prey back here, and yourself,” she replied.
Mary took a seat at the table, folded her hands in her lap, and smiled.
“Are you bringing that smile hunting with us?” I asked when I caught her expression.
“No,” she giggled. “I’m relatively useless on a hunt. I will stay here and tend to the garden. There is some replanting to do.”
I turned to Callie and asked, “is it just you and me then?”
“Blair will come with us,” Callie answered. “She was a skilled hunter before all this, but now, one look from her and most animals freeze for a moment in fear. I haven’t figured out why yet, but it comes in handy.”
Something occurred to me I hadn’t thought of previously. “Callie, can’t you see into Blair’s mind?”
“Not anymore.” Callie’s eyes dropped to the floor. “The last time I tried, hoping to create comforting scenes and memories for her, I hit a psychic wall I’d never experienced before. We haven’t had time, or a chance, to figure out why. I can see into the minds of everyone in this world except hers.”
Callie’s inability to help comfort Blair obviously saddened her. It made more sense that Callie would think Blair was a Shadow, or on her way to being one, if she hadn’t been able to see what I saw when I was inside Blair’s mind.
I pushed back the urge to request a little time with Blair before the hunt. As much as I wanted to know more about her condition, daylight was on a ticking clock. Instead, I went to my duffle bags and unzipped the first one. The first thing I saw were my chakrams. They were strapped to a belt that, when I picked it up, was considerably lighter than it looked. As I strapped the belt on, a faint yellow light caught my eye. At closer inspection, it was coming from the stones in the hair clip my mother had given me. I looked up at Callie, angling my belt so she could see the clip.
“Oh, yes,” Callie said as she put a bow over her back. “Edwin thought it would be a nice gesture to send a keepsake with you. He is a big believer in luck and finds personal trinkets comforting.”
“That was nice of him,” I said, happy he’d done it. “Remind me to thank him when he gets here.”
“He’s not coming with us. He is prepping for the slaughter,” Blair’s voice rang out from directly behind me, making me jump.
I spun around to see her, sword drawn, inspecting the handle. It was the loudest I’d heard her speak. “That makes sense,” I said lamely.
She nodded once at me, and I didn’t see anger, or bitterness, or the desire to pulverize me in her eyes. The hope I thought I’d seen earlier had vanished, but she still wasn’t the same as before I’d entered her mind and short-circuited her brain.
“Ready to go?” Callie said after strapping a quiver over her shoulder.
“You’re going to have to tell me. I have my weapons, I have the rope you mentioned. Do I need anything else?” I asked.
“That should do it,” she replied.
Blair led the three of us to the elevator, and in moments, I was back on the streets outside the building. The sun was high in the sky but moving quickly. Time passed differently in Slanos, and I understood why at that moment. The sun was moving rapidly through the sky, but it did so in an arched path that circled the horizon instead of arching directly over it. It reminded me of how the sun moves in Alaska in the summer, sometimes staving off darkness for a full twenty-four hours.
Without a word, Blair took the lead. I brought up the rear as we headed to the end of the block and turned left to go around the building. We walked in silence. Blair and Callie continually looked all around us, their watchfulness never-ending. I didn’t know if they were only looking for animals or if there was a threat I should be aware of so I quickened my step and tapped Callie on the shoulder.
“Should I be looking for something specific?” I asked.
“Not yet,” she whispered back. “Animals don’t tend to come this far into the city, and we’ve never had a Shadow make it this far either, but there’s no reason to get lazy about vigilance.”
I nodded my head and fell back to walk behind her again. I joined the women in keeping a watchful eye around us as we marched down the middle of the street. I assumed we were headed south, since that’s where Blair said we should hunt, but I had no idea how far south we’d need to go. While I wanted to ask, I also didn’t wish to break the silence in the air.
We walked three blocks, then five, then ten. The city had thinned out, and we were headed into a residential area. The houses were simple, and each had a decent-sized plot of land around them. The lawns were brown, the flower pots were full of decayed foliage, and a gray pallor overshadowed what I imagined was a once-beautiful neighborhood.
It wasn’t until we’d walked another four blocks that Blair put her hand up to signal us to stop. Callie and I stepped up beside her and froze. Blair pointed a finger directly in front of us.
Just ahead, no further than thirty yards away, was a small gathering of three animals. I didn’t have any idea what they were, but they were apparently something that could be eaten. They stood approximately three-foot tall on four legs that seemed too skinny to hold up their fat, round, multi-colored bodies. Their heads were tiny compared to their torsos, and huge ears stood up straight off the top of their skulls. Their eyes were on each side of their faces, very much like a deer, and they appeared just as skittish as a deer as well.
Very slowly, Blair crouched down, crossing her sword out in front her. She looked at Callie, who followed suit while silently pulling her bow off her body and over her head. Callie reached back and slowly pulled an arrow from her quiver and began lining up on the bow to take a shot.
I remained standing, looking around. I was having a hard time believing that this was the hunt that three people had to go on. If Callie’s arrow was true, she’d drop one of the strange beasts, the other two would likely run away, and we’d haul our kill back. That didn’t seem like much of a hunt at all.
My eyes darted back and forth, looking for a danger that perhaps the women saw that I didn’t. The animals stood just beyond the last houses before a field stretched out behind them, and there weren’t any other signs of life to either side of them. I examined the strange beasts. Maybe they had a hidden danger that would make them a difficult kill for some reason, yet found nothing. I crouched down, about to ask Callie why she made the hunt sound difficult when the animal in the middle took a few steps to its right. My vision immediately focused on the space behind it. The field that stretched out was clear, but I caught sight of a figure standing just outside the row of trees on the other side.
