"I'm just saying," Kane said, holding a tree branch out of the way so Jack and Lena could traverse the path more easily. He blinked a stray rain drop out of his eyes, looking to see if his father and Orin were close by, but they were several paces behind having a lively exchange Kane couldn't hear. Judging by his father's hand motions, it was likely an old battle story. They expected to reach Pravoka in less than an hour, just in time for sunset, despite the constant drizzle. If the map was accurate, anyway. He turned back to the mages. "It sounds ridiculous. You can't use it as a weapon? Even in defense of your life?"
Lena shook her head, idly running her hand over the hammer she carried in her belt. "I wouldn't fight back. The White Mage's Oath is very specific. 'Harm no living thing.' Our power is affected by the purity of our souls, and violence is bad for the soul. Better to die innocent."
"No, thank you. I'd rather live," said Kane. Jack chuckled quietly. The black mage hadn't joined their discussion, but seemed to be enjoying it. Kane, too, was in a better mood than he had been at the beginning of their journey, despite the wet weather. Though he'd had several conversations with the others as they walked the many miles to Pravoka, he'd spent most of his time with the two mages, who were closest to his own age. "At least I know I can count on Jack here in a fight. Right, Jack?"
"Of course," said the black mage.
"I imagine you can end a fight pretty quickly with that lightning spell of yours."
Jack shrugged. "Not exactly." He wore the gray scarf today, having lent Shipman the blue one. The fool boy hadn't even packed a cloak for the journey. Jack was no fool, however. Though mostly quiet, the tall mage had a dry wit, and he could become quite animated when he was explaining a magical theory or concept. Not an hour past, he'd tried to explain the workings of lightning to the two of them, had even called a bolt across the sky as a demonstration. As far as Kane was concerned, Jack was easily the smartest person he'd ever met.
He was less sure how he felt about Lena. Her good mood matched his own, which only seemed to confirm what his father had told him about her, but for someone who supposedly had no emotions, she certainly had strong opinions. He knew from his time with Lady Aliana that white mage philosophy was steeped in moral certitudes, but where Aliana's convictions had been tempered with age, Lena's were sharply defined. "It's fine for the two of you," she said. "You're both warriors!"
Jack huffed a muted laugh at that.
"Well, more or less," she amended. "And warriors have their place in white mage philosophy. Sometimes it is necessary to take up arms against the evils of this world. I just can't be a party to it myself."
Shipman came running back, blue scarf wrapped warmly around his neck as he tramped through the damp undergrowth toward them, looking at both Jack and Kane through narrowed eyes before turning a charming smile on the white mage. "It's worn off again," he told her.
She bent over him, hands glowing. "Alright. Let's try it once more."
They'd spent two days following the coast of the Aldean Sea, making good time even with the rain. The day after they'd camped beside the lagoon had been a clear one, and the ground had dried quickly. The weather had remained clear through the following night and half the day, but there'd been a crispness to the air hinting that it was only a matter of time before it rained again.
The rain had come with the afternoon, only a thin drizzle that hardly troubled them under the cover of the forest and had nearly stopped by now anyway, but Shipman, unprepared for the weather, had been only too happy to let Lena experiment on him with her rain repelling charm.
With the modified Protect spell reapplied, the boy ran off again. He'd spent nearly the whole journey running ahead. Despite what he had said that night by the lagoon, Shipman seemed anxious to get to his home city faster. When he was gone, Lena said, "Alright, what did you two do to him?"
"Us?" said Kane, trying not to feel guilty in front of the soul reader, though he knew full well what she meant, and it seemed just the sort of thing the white mage would disapprove of on general principle. The evening before, when it had looked as if Shipman planned to stay up asking questions all night again, Kane had been the one to suggest, quietly in Jack's ear, that perhaps another demonstration of the sleep spell was in order. It had been obvious this morning that the boy was onto them. Kane suspected Jack had lent him the scarf as a means to shut him up.
"I'm afraid I can't say," Jack said, before changing the subject by adding, "Your spell seemed to last longer that time. I think it's getting better."
"Good enough for an extremely short rainstorm," said Lena.
"Or an extremely short journey. You're too hard on yourself, my lady."
"It's already ideal for city life," Kane put in. "Short trips between buildings and the like. I would have loved such a thing on guard patrol." A flash of the blue scarf between the trees indicated that the boy was rapidly outpacing them, so he called, "Hey, Shipman! Don't get too far ahead!"
"I won't!" the boy called back.
Lena snorted. "I'm not sure I believe that."
Kane sighed. "I'll go after him. You two stay in sight of my father and Orin."
"Afraid we'll lose them?" Jack asked.
"They have the map, remember? I'm more afraid they'll lose us." He sped up, forcing his way through the trees. His hood fell back, as it had many times that day, so he righted it again. The old, brown cloak was too small for him now, but only just. It had been a gift from his mother years ago and he never seemed to get around to finding a replacement.
"Shipman!" he called again as he neared the boy. "Slow down, would you?"
"Look! Look! It's the city wall! We're almost there!"
He was right. Through the thinning forest, Kane saw a corner of stone, rain-slick and shimmering in the evening light. He looked up, and up farther still. "Gods," he breathed. "It's huge!" He moved closer, coming clear of the trees at last. The wall loomed over him.
"Isn't it great? It's bigger than Cornelia's wall by a lot!"
Kane stood looking up at the impressive stone facade, at the rising cloud over the top of the wall. Smoke? He couldn't be sure in the twilight. He looked down at Shipman, then past him toward the harbor with the docks on one side and the shipyard on the other.
He started in surprise. There was a ship in the harbor that he had seen once before, the bulging eyes on its ugly figurehead visible even from this distance.
"Come on!" said Shipman, about to run off again.
Kane grabbed his shoulder, stopping him.
"Ow!" the boy cried. "What'd you do that for?"
This close to the wall, Kane was sure he smelled smoke. "Wait for the others," he said.
Shipman grumbled, but obeyed. Kane listened to the sounds carrying over the wall. Were they merely the sounds of a bustling city, or were they the sounds of battle?
The rain had ceased when his companions came out of the woods together a few minutes later, his father mid-lecture about Pravoka's economy. "Used to be a world-renowned shipyard, but-"
Kane stopped him with a gesture, pointing toward the harbor.
Lord Redden muttered a curse. "The Sahagin Prince."
"The what?" Shipman asked.
"The foulest pirate ship that ever menaced Cornelian shores," Orin said.
"They must have been trapped in the Aldean Sea when that quake closed the pass," Redden said.
"Maybe they come in peace?" Lena said, sounding hopeful.
The noises within the walls grew louder, shouting and the unmistakeable clash of weapons.
"I doubt that," said Kane.
"Kane," Jack said, looking up at the massive wall. "I think I've figured out what it is we're meant to do in Pravoka."
Kane punched him in the arm.
"Is there any way inside other than the front gate, boy?" said his father.
They turned to Shipman, but he was gone. Kane saw a small figure in a blue scarf disappearing around the corner of the city wall. Lord Orin sped after him.
"Quick!" Lord Redden said, breaking into a run.
Kane dropped his pack beside the wall - he could go back for it later. Right now, speed was the important thing. He passed his father, then the monk, but Shipman had a substantial lead. There was no sign of the boy when Kane reached the harbor. He sped through the wide gap in the wall that led into the city, and then there was nowhere to go but forward.
When he'd been younger, educated alongside the princess, his tutors had told him about Pravoka's Grand Canal. It not only surrounded the city but ran up the middle, dividing it in two, the homes and shops on either side only accessible from a single cross-street after a long walk down the Baldesion Bridge, which extended from the city entrance all the way to the back wall. In the slanted light of the sunset, the bridge seemed to Kane to go on forever. He could see Shipman far ahead of him, turning left at the distant cross-street, running quick as an imp. Kane pushed after him, though his lungs ached by now.
He saw something that stopped him at the center of the bridge, at the intersection with the cross-street. A small green lawn occupied the space, like a park or a garden, and in it, a guard in a blue uniform lay in a pool of blood. It was only by chance that he saw the man move, reaching toward Kane before he could run by. His father and Orin hadn't noticed, passing him in their hurry to reach Shipman, but Kane couldn't run from that, couldn't leave a fellow guard alone and injured.
The Pravokan couldn't have been much older than Kane. He had a thin build, his too-large uniform hanging loose around the heavy gash in his stomach. Kane knelt beside him, looking for something to staunch the bleeding, but he knew the injured man would die without white magic. "Father! Wait!" Kane called, but the two older men were already gone.
A small hand on his arm pushed him gently but firmly away. Lena had arrived, her hands already glowing with white magic as she moved in beside the man. Jack stood panting behind her, leaning on his staff, looking back toward the city's entrance. "More coming," said the black mage, trying to catch his breath. "We saw them on the ship. We need to go."
"Can we move him?" Kane asked.
"Not yet," said Lena.
"Hide…" said the man on the ground.
Lena still worked her healing spell. "Don't try to speak," she said, eyes distant, seeing things in the aether that Kane couldn't see.
The man shook his head, trying feebly to push her away, looking right at Kane as he said, "Hide… the white mage…"
"Have the pirates done something to the white mages here?" Kane asked.
The guard nodded, breathing too hard to speak again.
Lena shook her head. "I will hide after I've helped you and not a moment before. Now hold still."
She wouldn't fight back, Kane thought. If the pirates came for the white mages… They could all be dead already, he realized. It didn't bear thinking about. Kane looked across the canal, toward the fighting in the town's western sector. He could hear it, louder now inside the city walls. A few fires burned, but without enthusiasm, as the stone buildings and the day's rain didn't leave them much to work with. A dozen guards should have been able to hold this bridge against an army… What happened here?
"Kane," said Jack. He pointed back the way they came in, toward the four figures striding determinedly up the bridge. Three were armed with swords but the one in the lead, as tall as Jack but broader than Kane, with tattoos covering his thick, bare arms, wielded a wicked-looking axe.
"How's it coming, Lena?" Kane asked.
"Not yet," she said absently, still casting. The prone Pravokan guard's eyes were tightly closed now, as if the healing were causing him more pain that it relieved.
"Well," said the tattooed man when he reached them, eyeing Lena with a satisfied smirk. "And here we were off to the cathedral to pick up another one. Nice of you to bring her all the way out here for us, fellas. If you two step away from the white mage, there's no need for you to get hurt."
"She's not going anywhere with you," said Jack, gripping his staff in front of him. The corona lit his eyes, white and sparking as it had when he'd demonstrated lightning for Kane and Lena a few hours before.
The four pirates muttered at the sight. Kane heard one say, "A real black mage!" before turning and running back toward the harbor. Yes! thought Kane, waiting for a lightning bolt to strike.
Instead, the tattooed man said to the other two, "Kill the black mage first."
The pirates rushed forward, quickly closing the distance between them. Kane had just enough time to get between Jack and the tattooed man, blocking the man's axe with his sword as Jack ran across the green lawn, leading the other two pirates away. Kane didn't even know if the mage could handle two at once, but the tattooed man, bigger and stronger than Kane, demanded his attention now.
The big man swung the heavy axe in broad arcs, easily dodged. It didn't take Kane long to figure out that his opponent relied on his size more than any skill with his weapon. Kane thought he could have defeated the man without much effort simply by letting him wear himself out, if not for the frantic voice in the back of his mind telling him he needed to hurry for Jack's sake. He stepped back, coming closer to the bridge railing as he ducked the axe once more.
Farther down the bridge, a lightning bolt speared down from the calm sky with a noise like a roaring beast. Just a little longer, Jack… Kane was still focused on his axe-wielding opponent when one of the other pirates came rushing back, heading straight toward him. There was no sign of the black mage. He needed to finish this fight quickly if he didn't want to be outnumbered. He struck at the tattooed man's hands, hoping to force him to drop the axe, but the pirate twisted his weapon at the last minute. Kane's blade clanged uselessly off the axe handle, sending a painful shock wave up his wrist. He staggered back with a cry of pain. The other pirate was nearly upon him…
Except the charging pirate ran past him as though he wasn't there. By the time Kane realized the man was after the distracted white mage, it was too late to stop him. "Lena, move!" he shouted over his shoulder. The tattooed pirate swung his axe again; Kane dodged left, swiping at the man's face with his elbow, hearing a crunch as he broke the man's nose. The other man roared, dropping the axe as both hands flew to his bloody face. When he stumbled back against the bridge railing, it was only a small effort for Kane to push him over the side into the canal below.
Kane turned in time to see the other pirate striking at Lena with one meaty fist, but the blow never landed. It slammed into a Protect spell with such force that the pirate bellowed in agony, clutching at his broken hand.
"Not yet!" Lena said, her usually gentle voice gritty. She hadn't even flinched.
At just that moment, Jack reappeared, boots pounding as he ran, and tackled the screaming pirate to the ground. His hat and staff were gone, as was the corona around his eyes, which made it easier for Kane to read the anger there. When the mage raised his fist against the fallen pirate, Kane caught his arm. "Sleep spell!" he blurted out. "Jack! Don't! The man's already beaten - just use the sleep spell."
The mage struggled against Kane's grip for only a moment, but then the spell flared behind his eyes and the man beneath him slumped into unconsciousness. Jack stood, shaking Kane off, and went to lean on the bridge railing in an apparent effort to regain his composure.
"That spell…"
Kane turned. It was the Pravokan guard who had spoken. He was pale, shivering as though he'd stood out on a cold night, but his eyes were alert. Lena sat back, the glow fading from her hands. The man's wound was closed now but still looked painful. "You're out of danger," she said. "I'm sorry I can't heal you fully, but that's all you can handle for now. Your body needs rest."
"That spell," the guard repeated. "I've seen it before. You're a black mage?"
"I mean you no harm," Jack said, quickly. He didn't even turn around, his shoulders slumped as though he was ashamed of the anger he'd displayed.
The Pravokan shook his head. "Not worried about that. The pirates… I think they're using the same spell."
That seemed to revive the mage. "What do you mean?" said Jack, turning to regard the Pravokan warily.
"Just before shift change, we got word that someone had laid siege to the white mage's cathedral. The day captain led his best men over there, but all of them fell into some sort of enchanted sleep. That was when the pirates attacked."
"And there weren't enough guards left to hold the bridge," Kane finished for him.
The guard nodded. "Night squad is all that's left."
Kane looked toward Jack, who nodded. "I can fix this."
"Alright," said Kane. "How do we get to the cathedral?"
"Eastern sector. Straight down that street, last building on the left," said the guard.
"You're not well enough to fight," Lena said to the guard. "Do you have somewhere you can go? Somewhere safe?"
"My sister lives near here."
"You should go with him, my lady," said the black mage.
Lena shook her head. "If the other white mages are in danger, my place is with them."
Kane heard Sarah's voice in his head: You have to protect them, the others. "She stays with us," he said. Jack began to argue, but Kane cut him off. "You heard what that pirate said. They're taking white mages. I can't protect her if I'm not with her. Besides, if this works, we'll have the whole of the Pravokan guard's day squad at our backs. We'll be the safest people in the city."
Jack pinched the bridge of his nose, something Kane was learning to recognize as a sign of frustration from the mage, and wandered off.
"Jack!" Lena said. "Where are you going?"
"To find my staff," he called back. "I suspect I'll need it."
Author's Note: Maybe you haven't noticed, but all of my chapters are named after songs from FF soundtracks. I've been replaying FF1 as I write this story and when I arrived in Pravoka and saw that great big bridge running through the middle of town, I literally squeed. The excuse to name a chapter after my (hands-down) all time favorite Final Fantasy song? Yes, please.
Unfortunately, the bridge complicates matters. What I remembered in my head as "City, overrun by pirates, rescued by Warriors of Light", a rather simple headline that only needed one chapter to report, became "Walled city with moat and amazing defensive bridge still overrun by pirates; police baffled." I spent like three weeks trying to figure out how they did it. I hope you like what I came up with (in the next chapter).
Regarding the song title: I know FFV gets a lot of negative press, but it's one of my favorite FF games. The Big Bridge battle was epic. It was iconic. If you ask me to sum up the entire Final Fantasy series in one phrase, I'm going to say, "Clash on the Big Bridge."