Caladin’s Climb—Part 24 (Patreon)

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          Caladin had been expecting some kind of building, fortress or reception area. Instead, when he teleported into Setsya, he arrived in the middle of a swamp. “Hello?” he called out. Nobody answered. He studied his surroundings but saw only muddy water, moss, mushrooms, and the occasional dead or dying tree. Caladin found it strange, as he’d always heard the dryads were so diligent about protecting their forests, but here in the heart of their power the trees were dying and getting covered in mushrooms. And… it took his eyes a second to realize the massive gray lumps looming out of the murky water were actually tree-sized mushrooms. He didn’t even know they got that big.

          The platform Caladin arrived on was a raised square of stone sitting just above the mud, though covered in lichen and moss. The silver teleportation circle was barely visible beneath it all. No matter which direction he chose to walk he could see he’d have to step off that platform and start wading through mud. It was as inhospitable a location for a teleportation circle as Caladin had ever seen. It looked like it hadn’t been maintained for several decades, and the silver was tarnished nearly to black.

          Caladin cleared his throat. “I’m, uh, the representative from Philipus Haedril! Is anybody there?”

          Still no response.

          Caladin sighed. He would just have to figure this out on his own. Philipus had warned him the circle was outside the city and that he might need to walk a ways. He hadn’t been expecting so little direction. Walk a ways where? In what direction? There weren’t any signs. Not even a trail to follow! That did seem to fit with his understanding of dryads, though. They didn’t like disturbing nature. Well… so far as Caladin had read about, anyway. He’d only met the one dryad a few weeks back, and they’d barely talked.

          With no other option apparent, Caladin cast a Flight spell using aeromancy and lifted into the air. He went straight up and looked around. He couldn’t see anything resembling a city in any direction. Did dryads even have cities, he wondered? He thought back to the instructions Philipus had given him; he’d said the capital would be to be North.

          Caladin’s sense of direction wasn’t that great. By looking at the sun he could tell East from West, but picking which perpendicular direction off the East-West line would take him North and which would take him South would be a 50/50 guess. He knew a simple ferromancy spell that could remove the guesswork, so he cast it. The spell would interact with magnetic field lines in the air to indicate North. While maintaining his altitude, Caladin cast the spell and watched thin wisps of blue light waft away from him in a line. He turned in the indicated direction and started flying, swooping low to the ground so he wouldn’t miss anything. There were a few scattered trees that either hadn’t died yet or were still in the process of doing so, and hundreds more tree-sized mushrooms. He skirted just over them as he scanned the ground for signs of a large dryad settlement.

          As he flew, Caladin passed over a cluster of giant mushrooms that looked like they’d been burned to charcoal. It was a sizable chunk of the swamp and took him a minute to pass over. It seemed odd to him that even this small amount of forest could get burned down within dryad territory. On the edge of their domain near where a civil war was ongoing was one thing, but within spitting distance of their capital? It was wrong. It gave him a funny feeling he didn’t know how to process. Ominous, maybe. But he wasn’t in Setsya to admire the scenery, he was there to meet with Queen Rusalia and negotiate the formation of a new nation.

          After a few minutes of lazy gliding, Caladin reached a landmark that was impossible to miss. He didn’t even have to ask if it was the capital he was looking for, as it was obvious. There was an enormous brown mushroom growing out of the ground covered in little glowing lights that sparkled even in the daylight. The mushroom was the size of a small mountain, which he realized as he continued flying closer and it continued getting bigger. At the base of the mushroom, the ground was solid. Caladin settled down in front of it, feeling awe that something so large could even be alive.

          The upper flange of the mushroom provided a kind of roof to a large internal structure. When Caladin landed before it, a dryad stepped out from the shade to greet him. She was the myconid variety of dryad, with pale brown skin that had ridges going up and down her body. She gave Caladin a quick, precise bow. “Master Caladin,” the dryad said. “I have been expecting you. I am the honorable Grenya, steward of Queen Rusalia. I can take you to her.”

          Caladin looked over her shoulder to see if anyone else was coming out. “Where is everyone else?” Caladin asked. “I was expecting… more. Does Queen Rusalia not have a court?”

          “Queen Rusalia does not bother with such customs,” Grenya replied. “This is the seat of her power. Everyone already knows. There is no need to surround herself in frivolous hangers-on.” She walked towards the base of the massive brown mushroom with the lights on it, gesturing for Caladin to follow. The lights Caladin had seen from the outside turned out to be windows. The whole interior of the giant mushroom glowed with a soft blue light. It was a living building. Grenya led Caladin inside an opening in the mushroom. The softly glowing light almost made it feel like he was still outside. “The nobles beneath her are busy governing their own lands. What purpose would it serve for them to spend their time at the Mushroom Throne?”

          “I guess none,” Caladin reluctantly agreed. “But this place seems a bit empty to me. That’s all.”

          “It is sufficiently manned,” Grenya assured him. “Dryads do not need small armies of guards to surround them at all times to feel secure. In our culture, such an act would be a sign of weakness. Rusalia is many things, but weak is not one of them.”

          “If you say so,” Caladin said. He had read a bit about dryads before and King Philipus had let him look through his library to refresh his knowledge about them before he left. Dryads were very different biologically from most other life forms. Their bodies were more like hair or fingernails than actual flesh, which meant any damage to them wasn’t lethal no matter how bad it looked. The only way to kill a dryad was to destroy their heartseed, a roughly fist-sized seed at the heart of every dryad that kept them alive. It was the only part of their bodies that they needed to protect in a fight, and it only needed to be attached to the rest of them somewhere. They could freely move it around to make it harder to find. Suffice to say, Caladin wasn’t looking forward to actually having to fight any dryads. That Rend Flesh spell that had worked so well on Fayse’s royal guard would be useless on them too due to their unique biology.

          “Your other man, Falidor, is already here if that is what you were wondering,” Grenya said while the two of them walked deeper into a series of twisting empty hallways formed by ridges of fleshy mushroom that descended from the ceiling.

          “Oh, yeah, Falidor. I almost forgot about him,” Caladin said. Falidor was some kind of emissary of Philipus’. He was the one who maintained diplomatic relations between Philipus’ loyalists and Setsya. He spoke with King Philipus’ full authority while he was away. It was the reason Caladin had expected to find a court; King Philipus had said Falidor lived in Queen Rusalia’s court. Now that he was walking through her empty halls, Caladin was realizing she didn’t have a court. Eventually, Grenya led Caladin to an open room the size of a city market with a circle ringing around the center in raised stone.

          “This is where the fight will occur, of course,” she said, gesturing towards the circle as they walked past. “It is regulation size. Just like the arena.”

          “Sorry, what fight?” Caladin asked.

          “You are King Haedril’s champion, are you not?” Grenya asked.

          “I… was given that title,” Caladin admitted. “But I didn’t come here to fight. I came here to negotiate on my King’s behalf.”

          Grenya stopped walking and looked at Caladin. She blinked. “What is it that you imagine champions do for their monarchs?”

          “Well, sure, he said there might be a fight,” Caladin said, “but the way you’re talking about it makes it seem like the whole thing is a foregone conclusion!”

          Grenya’s lips folded down in a frown, a move which caused folds to form in her rubbery skin. “You are welcome to discuss the matter with her majesty,” she said. She gestured behind Caladin. “Here she is now.”

          Caladin turned to find a small group of dryads emerging from further inside the mushroom palace. From a wide opening on the opposite end of the chamber came three dryads and an eldrin. As they got closer, Caladin noted that one of the three dryads was actually constructed entirely of metal, though it moved as naturally as an organic creature. He figured it was a magical construct there to act as a bodyguard for the queen. The other two dryads had red skin with white speckles and pale white legs. They were nearly identical.

          “Which one is the queen?” Caladin whispered to the assistant before they got within earshot. Neither of the red-speckled myconid dryads had on anything like vestments of authority. They wore the barest minimum of clothes stretched over the center of their torsos, which Caladin understood wasn’t even something they bothered doing when non-dryads weren’t around.

          “The shorter one on the left is the royal princess, Dwyra,” Grenya explained helpfully.

          The eldrin in the group threw his hands wide and gave Caladin a smile when he was a few paces distant. He wore simple white silk robes. “Caladin!” he shouted with an upward inflection at the end that made him sound friendly. “I’ve heard so much about you, it’s great to finally meet!” While the eldrin greeted Caladin, Rusalia’s assistant stepped forward to whisper something to the queen.

          “Falidor, right?” Caladin asked.

          “You can just call me Fal,” Falidor said. He marched right into Caladin’s personal space and wrapped him up in a big hug. It made Caladin uncomfortable, but he kept his mouth shut. He wondered if the man was related to Philipus in some way. He also liked touching people.

          “Well, your name is about all I know about you,” Caladin said after he was released from the hug. “What’s this about a fight?”

          Falidor grabbed Caladin by the shoulder and pulled him in close enough for the two of them to speak without being overheard. “Did Philipus not warn you?” he hissed in Caladin’s ear.

          “Warn me about what? All he said was that I might have to fight someone,” Caladin whispered back.

          “That’s old news,” Falidor said. “Negotiations… broke down.” He frowned deeply. “Rusalia was gearing up to nullify our agreement and kick us off her land. A lot of forests have been hurt by the continuing conflict. She doesn’t like it one bit. I’ve had Philip breathing down my neck for weeks to get her to calm down. This is the best I could do. A contest of champions to avoid all-out war. I don’t think I need to explain to you why a two-front war would be very bad for us right now, do I?”

          “No, no. I understand,” Caladin said. The fire tornado he’d used against Fayse’s army just the other day was burning a hole in the back of his mind. Whether or not it might run rampant and burn down some forests after it was done killing enemy soldiers had never crossed his mind. He decided now was probably not a good time to bring that up. “I’m just feeling a little blind-sided here. I thought I was supposed to be negotiating, not fighting.”

          Falidor clapped Caladin on the back. “You’ll be fine, kid!” he said in a loud voice for the others to hear. “We’re good over here, your majesty!” he said, smiling in the queen’s direction.

          The red-speckled dryad eyed Caladin critically, lids narrowing. She appeared cool, confident, and in control. “This is your champion?” she asked Falidor. Her emphasis of the first word said what she thought of that.

          Falidor pushed Caladin a few steps towards the dryad queen. “This is the guy,” he said. “Archmage Caladin. Didn’t you hear? He was Necro-King Brorn’s first apprentice in living memory.”

          The queen turned her nose up. “I heard,” she said in a haughty voice. “Bold of you to steal from the man. You have my respect, I suppose, even if I find the act distasteful. I am no friend of that monster.” She looked back to Falidor, dismissing Caladin already. “If you think a thief and a charlatan is any match for Krensyl, you are in for a surprise.”

          “Krensyl?” Caladin queried.

          The queen merely turned her black eyes back to Caladin, not bothering to even twitch her neck in his direction as she answered. “My champion,” she said. “Krensyl the Unconquered.” She waved the metal construct forward. It bowed, but said nothing.

          Caladin looked a little closer at the construct as it dipped its head towards him. It looked to him like there were wooden grains standing out on the surface of the metal creature’s skin. “Wait a second,” Caladin said. “Is that… a dryad underneath that?”

          The queen didn’t deign to respond. Instead, she looked to Grenya. She replied in her queen’s stead. “Our people come in many forms,” the assistant said. “You advertise a disrespectful level of ignorance to ask such a basic question.” Rusalia sniffed and turned her head, as though the very sight of Caladin somehow offended her. The smaller dryad that had accompanied grabbed her shoulder and pulled herself up so that she could reach the queen’s ear. She whispered something, then giggled to herself. Queen Rusalia did not react.

          “Krensyl is an ironwood dryad,” Falidor whispered into Caladin’s ear from behind.

          “Ironwood?” Caladin repeated. He had barely even heard mention of the stuff in books. Dryads were so protective of the trees that some scholars argued about whether or not they were even real. The fact that they would turn out to be real, and that Caladin would then meet one, had never even occurred to him.

          “Last chance, Mr. Haelin,” Queen Rusalia said to Falidor. “Krensyl is not going to hold back just because your champion is a fool and a child.”

          “Hey!” Caladin shouted. He knew it wasn’t smart to yell at a queen, but it slipped out before he could censor himself.

          “Calm down,” Falidor said. “She is just trying to get under our skin. No dryad—ironwood or not—stands a chance against an archmage!”

          “Are you really going to maintain this farce?” Queen Rusalia demanded. “The boy is no archmage. They do not exist. If you make him fight, he will die. Krensyl cannot be beat.”

          Caladin took a step forward. He wanted to wipe that smug look off the dryad queen’s face. Falidor put a hand on his shoulder and held him back. “No,” he said in a low voice. “You don’t need to prove yourself here. It’s better if she underestimates you. Save it for the fight.”

          “Fine,” Caladin said. He backed off, but he didn’t calm down.

          “We can begin immediately,” Queen Rusalia said. “Or, you can concede now and save yourself a humiliating death. I expect King Haedril to fulfill my demands though.”

          Caladin didn’t even know what those “demands” were. They didn’t matter. “Not a chance,” he growled.

          Falidor gave Caladin a smack on the shoulder and laughed. “Kid’s got fire,” he said. “I’ll give him that. Just maybe tone down the attitude for her majesty, eh, Cally?”

          “Tell her that,” Caladin said, staring down the dryad queen. She turned away and dismissed Caladin with a disdainful flick of her wrist.

          Falidor led Caladin across the arena to the opposite side of the circle. “Not all royals can be as warm-hearted as Philip,” he lamented while they walked. “Most of them are like that. Actually, no. If ego and a brusque attitude were the worst most royals got up to, I actually think they’d be pretty tolerable.”

          “Well, maybe I can do something about that ego,” Caladin said.

          At Falidor’s instruction, Caladin took his starting position at the edge of the massive circle opposite the cluster of dryads across the way. The ironwood dryad, Krensyl, mirrored Caladin’s positioning on her side. The brown myconid dryad that had greeted Caladin when he arrived, Grenya, walked across the intervening space, stopping at the center. She moved her hands in a series of precise motions, then spoke out with a voice that had been magically enhanced. “We are gathered here today to witness this match between the champions of Queen Rusalia and King Haedril. This fight will be to the death. To prevent any trickery, all witnesses will be using the spell True Sight. Should Champion Caladin win, Queen Rusalia will agree to recognize the sovereign nation of Haedenia. Should Champion Krensyl win, King Haedril will agree to renounce his claim of independence, swear his undying fealty to the Mushroom Throne, and pay an immediate tribute of no less than one hundred human slaves. Are these terms agreeable to all parties?”

          “They are,” Queen Rusalia called out from her side.

          “They are,” Falidor echoed.

          “Wait, what’s this about slaves?” Caladin asked Falidor. “What slaves?”

          “Not now,” Falidor said.

          “If not now, when?” Caladin demanded. “If I die it will be too late.”

          “The tribute doesn’t matter because you aren’t going to lose,” Falidor said. “But if you must know… King Haedril will be forced to turn over a small village of humans to the mercy of the Setsyan Queen. Worry not. She doesn’t have a use for them; she will most likely offer to sell them back to Philipus for a price.

          “Village of huma—”

          “Champion Caladin!” Grenya projected in her unnaturally loud voice. “Are you unwilling to continue?”

          “If you back out now, we lose by default,” Falidor reminded him in a concerned tone.

          Caladin grunted in frustration. He wanted to confirm if his family’s village would be the one turned over to the queen in the event he was defeated. Falidor was right: if he just focused on winning, it wouldn’t matter. “No,” he called back to the dryad acting as announcer. “I’ll fight.”

          “Good,” Grenya nodded. “Then we can continue.” She walked back to her side of the arena, to stand next to her queen, then raised one arm up high. “The match will begin when I lower my hand,” she announced. “Contestants, get ready—”

          “Wait, wait!” Caladin called out.

          “What?” Grenya asked, her hand held still.

          “What are the terms of the match? All you said was that it was a fight to the death.”

          “It is,” Grenya confirmed. “What do you not understand? If you are concerned about surrendering early, it is your opponent’s discretion if your surrender will be accepted or not. Your only chance to back away with your life is before the match starts.”

          “No, not that,” Caladin said. “The ring. Why is there a ring on the ground? Do we have to stay inside it?”

          “No,” Grenya answered.

          “Then why is it there?”

          Grenya looked over at her queen, arm still held up high. The queen whispered something to her assistant. “The ring is there,” Grenya answered, “because that is how these things are done.”

          “So I don’t have to stay inside it?” Caladin asked.

          “It is not a requirement, no,” Grenya answered, after reading the shake of her queen’s head. “But if you stop fighting and flee, we will consider that a surrender.”

          “I’m not going to run away,” Caladin called back. “Why do you keep saying that?”

          The queen whispered lengthy instructions to the assistant that was still holding one arm high in the sky. Grenya nodded that she understood, then said, “You will attempt to flee, because you are a con man. We have called your bluff by agreeing to this match. If your king thought I-my queen, could be persuaded to cede land to him on the basis of fanciful rumors he helped spread, it is going to cost him his figurehead.”

          Caladin barked out a laugh. “Oh, it’s no bluff,” he said. “Perhaps you should be asking your champion if she wants to drop out.”

          Queen Rusalia smirked. She nodded her head at Genya. The brown myconid dryad brought her hand down like a hammer. “Begin!” she shouted.

          Krensyl launched across the intervening space as though she’d been fired out of a trebuchet. Somehow, she didn’t even need to pick up speed naturally. Caladin barely stepped into the circle before a ton of iron came barreling at him in a blur. He inscribed a basic armamancy spell, causing a shimmering wall of light to spring up between them. The enemy slammed into the wall with a shockwave that Caladin could feel in his bones despite being sheltered from a direct blast. A spiderweb of white cracks formed in Caladin’s wall, but it just managed to hold.

          “Armamancy,” Queen Rusalia commented from the sidelines. “I was expecting illusions.” Caladin really wanted to shut her up.

          Krensyl was somehow undamaged from the violent crash. A creature of flesh would have undoubtedly been splattered into a slurry of guts had it hit Caladin’s barrier with such force. She didn’t even have to shake off the attack before she was back to rushing around Caladin’s wall with unimaginable speed, launching with near instant acceleration in defiance of the constraints of physics.

          Iron, Caladin thought, her biggest strength and weakness. It gave her weight and strength but had a glaring vulnerability. As she came around the wall of his barrier, Caladin inscribed a rune for Manipulate Metal, a ferromancy spell that would be able to puppeteer her body. He hit her with the spell as she came barreling forward, commanding her body to halt and lift harmlessly into the air.

          Krensyl wobbled slightly and kept going. That was it. Caladin’s spell had failed, it barely even slowed her down. She was coming at him fast and his armamancy barrier was out of position. Caladin tried knocking her out of the way with a Telekinesis spell. This time she slowed for a second, as though sticking in honey, then Caladin’s spell collapsed, and she kept going. Either she was incredibly strong, or she was using some kind of magic to overpower Caladin’s own. There was no time to figure out which, she was flying towards Caladin’s location fist first. Caladin used a vocomancy spell to teleport out of the way.

          Pop.

          Caladin hit the ground and slid to a stop. He’d reappeared on the opposite end of the arena’s circle, nearer to Queen Rusalia. Despite teleporting, he felt a sharp pain at the center of his chest. He rubbed at it, realizing how close he’d just come to being impaled. Across the way, Krensyl stopped and turned ninety degrees to charge after Caladin. She took to the air this time, leaping over the fading remains of his initial armamancy wall and continuing to sail forward without touching the ground. It was impossible! Caladin knew of no magic that would allow flight so fast and precise for such a heavy body! But cursing at the impossibility of the assault would do nothing to save his life. He was in it and had to think his way out.

          If defending was near impossible, Caladin reasoned he should go on the offensive. That was a bit of a problem, though, considering her heartseed was encased in solid iron. With the way she was just shrugging off any attacks he threw at her, anything strong enough to pierce her body would take more time than she’d take to close the distance between them and rip Caladin’s head off. She drew close and Caladin had to pop again to the other side of the arena. Queen Rusalia began to cackle in delight. “Run away!” she called. “Keep running! See what it gets you.”

          Again. Caladin really wanted to put the queen in her place. His opponent pivoted again, no expression on her face, not a sound uttered. As soon as Caladin moved, she turned in a new direction and charged forward. He knew he had to think of something and fast. His mana wouldn’t last forever. The fact that her body was flying in a way he was sure was impossible, and that it also happened to be made of metal seemed too unlikely to be a coincidence. Caladin latched onto that thought and followed it wherever it led him. Iron. Flying. Ferromancy? Controlled flight? Was it possible she was levitating her own body with ferromancy? It should have been impossible for a wizard to lift themselves with magic like that, but Caladin couldn’t ignore the evidence of his own eyes. Caladin had to decide if every theory he’d read about self-induced magical levitation was wrong, or if something else was going on. Maybe he was just looking at things backwards. She could be using ferromancy on something metal beneath her to levitate her metal body. That seemed more likely than breaking the laws of magic. Now Caladin had about one second to figure out how to stop it.

          The first step, he realized, was to confirm his theory. He cast a stronger version of the ferromancy compass spell he’d used earlier to detect magnetic fields in an area. Lines of blue light shot out of Caladin’s outstretched hand. They flew forward and arranged themselves around Krensyl’s flying form, extending to the ground in waves. That was it. That confirmed it. Caladin had to pop once more to the other side of the arena to keep his distance. He checked his mana bars. Two were already completely drained and he hadn’t even figured out a means of harming his enemy. Not a good sign.

          Caladin could see the lines of magnetic fields extending from Krensyl’s floating body to the ground. That meant she was pushing off something beneath her. She must have arranged to have metal buried under the dirt before the match started. Unfair, and unsportsmanlike, but with the fate of potentially two nations in the balance Caladin somehow didn’t think that would be a fact anyone remembered when his metallic opponent dispatched him. They would just borrow from the legacy he’d been trying to build to heighten the fame of this “Krensyl the Mute Cheater”.

          If she was going to cheat, she was going to need more than one simple trick to beat Caladin. Her magic had so far shrugged off the other spells he threw at her, but if she was using ferromancy to fly around, that meant Caladin could use ferromancy to ground her. He didn’t try targeting her directly, like he had before, clearly her leverage in that sort of tug-of-war would give her the advantage. Instead, Caladin went after the magnetic field itself. Magnetic fields were floating, invisible things in the air. Easily disrupted. He created waves of his own, out of sync with hers with a customized ferromancy spell and targeted the magnetic field his earlier spell had revealed.

          Krensyl had been flying straight at Caladin when he turned off her magnet spell. She dropped to the dirt and tumbled forward like a ragdoll before sliding to a stop at Caladin’s feet.

          “Ha!” Caladin crowed triumphantly. “I figured out your little trick.”

          Krensyl said nothing back. In fact, she didn’t even move. Her shiny metal eyes stared vacantly at the ceiling of the chamber. Unblinking. Dead to the world.

          Caladin nudged her with his foot, looking up at the assistant he assumed would be acting as a judge. “Umm, I think she’s dead,” he said. “Does that mean I win?”

          Queen Rusalia sneered, her confident smirk not leaving her face.

          “Krensyl is not dead,” Grenya announced.

          Caladin rubbed the side of his head. “Sure, I guess I’ll destroy her heartseed if you guys want. But I don’t have to. You can just call the match, your majesty.”

          “Oh, you think you’ve won, archmage?” the queen asked. “I admit, I did not think you were the real deal, but do not think that means you will win this contest. It is far from over. Very far.”

          “What are you talking about?” Caladin demanded. He gestured out at the limp body of Krensyl. “Your champion is down. She’s not even moving. I dismantled her magic. I’ve won. You think I’m not going to figure out how to crack her chest open and get to the gooey center?”

          Queen Rusalia laughed some more. “Is that what you think?” she said. “You underestimate me and my champion. Dryads can take many forms, young archmage. Many forms.”

          The way she stressed that last word made Caladin think she was hinting at something greater. But what? All he saw was a limp opponent sprawled out in the dirt before him. She hadn’t moved a hair since he dismantled her spell. It was almost like she was a puppet whose strings had been… cut…

          Caladin’s eyes went wide. “Oh, shi—”

          He stumbled as the ground beneath his feet rumbled. Thick cords of iron sprang from the dirt and wrapped around Caladin’s ankles. Roots. Ironwood roots. She was beneath him the whole time!

          The roots squeezed Caladin’s legs. Bones cracked. He screamed.

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