Chapter 14: Obtainment
The Mystic
"That is remarkable, Micah."
Light Spinner mussed her protege's hair. The containment spell he had cast was flawless. Light Spinner had pressed her finger into the translucent yellow cylinder with all her might, yet it had not broken, not even compressed. This was only Micah's third attempt at the spell, one which had taken Light Spinner a week of study to cast successfully, and two weeks further to cast at the same strength as Micah just had.
"Are you okay?" he asked. "Sorry, but you look… forlorn."
"I am sorry. I'm just deep in thought. Tomorrow, I will argue in front of the Guild's council again. Hopefully I can break through this time."
"If they don't want to listen to you, why keep asking? I am grateful that you are here and all, but if the Guild isn't letting you do the research you want, why not strike out on your own?"
"One day you will understand, Micah. Capability and motivation are not enough. As unpleasant as it may be, your accomplishments must be recognized by others. No, appreciated by others."
Micah rapped his finger on the containment spell at a steady rhythm. His face was furrowed into a frown.
"One day, everyone will see your abilities," he said. "You deserve it."
Light Spinner smiled behind her veil.
…
"It had better be clear to you that I was not making an idle threat, Shadow Weaver."
"I fully understand, Lord Hordak. Your orders are mine to obey, and I have ceased any efforts to hunt for Adora. Although, if I may be candid, I do not think you understand the value that will be lost if she is not returned. Even ignoring her newfound role among the Rebellion, we have raised her for well over a decade. To let the nurture I have provided and the extensive training she has undergone in our military go to waste would be a tragedy. Are you truly okay with that?"
From his throne, Hordak hissed at Shadow Weaver, baring bright red teeth that looked as though they had been painted. That miserable imp of his mimicked the expression from its perch upon his shoulder.
"You have no mind for the necessities of war, Shadow Weaver," he said with that insufferably haughty tone of his. "To unceasingly pursue an objective that is fruitless solely because you have already expended effort aiming to achieve it is foolish in the utmost."
Hordak always loved to play the role of the ruthless conqueror when speaking down to Shadow Weaver. It was a role he had long abandoned by ensconcing himself in his sanctum, yet he spoke as though the management of the Horde had not been outsourced to her and an assortment of Etherian underlings he rarely deigned to meet.
She would have loved to have stripped the arrogance from him with a few choice words, but, alas, that was too much of a risk. She knew she was secure in her position at his side as the only one with the mind and means to manage the squabbling children of the Horde, but his anger at such blatant defiance could still bring her great pain. And, of course, he could always strip the Black Garnet's powers from her.
"I concede that you and I simply have different measures of value, Lord Hordak. As I measured it, I believed that it was worth it to return Adora to us."
"A commander should not be ruled by sentiment. Perhaps you would prefer to be permanently assigned as a nurse to the suckling ones."
"I apologize, Lord Hordak. That being said, I do not think it is purely sentiment to show reluctance to discard a tool. I am reluctant to abandon implements, living or otherwise, and Adora is a most splendid one, shaped by my own hands. Thanks to my intimate understanding of her, I am aware of her great potential, and how it may be harnessed. Commanders of her caliber are most valuable, and should not be carelessly discarded. Ind-"
"Get out!"
Hordak shot from his throne. Imp leapt into the air, their wingbeats lost amid Hordak's screaming.
"Do not dare to be so presumptuous ever again, Shadow Weaver. You are not here to lecture me. I gave you your power! Do not forget that!"
Shadow Weaver slowly backed away from the throne.
"Now!"
His voice dripped with venom, and Shadow Weaver imagined his fangs as those of a snake poised to strike, hissing and rattling its tail.
She turned tail and fled the throne room as fast as her legs could carry her.
Hordak no longer ranted, but his breath seemed as loud as his screaming had been. As she turned into the corridor, she heard a pained cough, followed by the sound of flesh and metal striking the floor.
Shadow Weaver doubted that self-important megalomaniac would be around for much longer. And when he was gone, she would be the only one who could take his place. The newest generation of soldiers scarcely saw Hordak, that distant figure whose speeches were interrupted with bouts of pain and coughing, but they knew her.
The most important generation was always the next one. Their value was beyond measure.
Present Day
Bile had risen in Shadow Weaver's throat as she had watched Castaspella disappear into the ground with that strange individual from the other world. Castaspella had given a guilty look before vanishing, but at no point had she spoken on Shadow Weaver's behalf. Shadow Weaver's hands clenched with frustration as she imagined that inferior sorceress delving into the secrets of the Heart alongside that child and the absent-minded disaster of a Princess that was Entrapta. All she could hope for was the known universe not being obliterated by their irresponsible tinkering.
Stil, she was used to her talents being neglected. She would tolerate this as she had every other insult.
Well, perhaps not every other insult.
Soon, there would be no denying her value anyway.
Bow popped into the clearing from the underbrush nearby, holding his tracker pad.
"Are you ready?" he asked coldly.
"Very much so," Shadow Weaver replied.
As she spoke, her spell began to unravel, as her concentration was taken from it. Hastily, she strengthened it with a few waves of her hand. Bow rolled his eyes at her. The audacity!
Bow touched a finger to the earpiece he wore and spoke into it.
"I've laid out all of the traps we outlined. I'll continue to look for holes in our defense, but we're fortified if they try to rush us."
A female voice came through the other end.
Bow nodded. "Roger. I'll report back soon." He tapped the piece again, turning it off.
"I hope you know what you're doing, Shadow Weaver," he said.
"You heard what that girl said about my plan," Shadow Weaver said, adding an unmistakable hurt tone to her voice. "You have clearly placed faith in the judgement of her power, and she has in turn placed her faith in me. The numbers were unambiguous, she said."
"She said she trusted this plan of yours, and nothing beyond that. Don't think for a moment you are in anyone's good graces because of it. I'm going to see if there are any places where I can prepare more of my own traps."
He vanished into the woods without letting her speak.
Shadow Weaver sighed in frustration. The boy was clearly loyal to Adora, having absorbed everything that the Princess had said of her, same as all the others.
Behind her mask, Shadow Weaver closed her eyes. For a moment, she thought of when Hordak had first handed her Adora. Then, her mind went elsewhere.
Beneath her, a magical diagram rested a mere centimeter into the soil. When she closed her eyes and ignored the sounds of the forest, she could feel it connected to her, a faint glow against her eyelids, a humming in her ears, even an ever-so-slightly sour taste on her tongue.
The construction of diagrams was one of the central methods used to perform magic in Mystacor. Every initiate cast their first spell by making a shining circle of powder on their desk. Eventually, skilled sorcerers would learn how to create such diagrams purely from their own magical energy.
One of the greatest limitations present in this form of magic was that of size. Diagrams of a great size either lasted for only the briefest moments or failed entirely. It was a dilemma that none of the great minds of Mystacor had been able to overcome, not that there had been much interest. Shadow Weaver remembered pleading with Norwyn to head a research team on the topic even before the Horde's invasion. She had been rebuffed by that stuffy seat-warmer. In the Horde, with no one to aid her in her search, she had made no progress in her studies.
Now, things had changed. The nature of magic and the Heart of Etheria had been made clear to her, and with it, her abilities had grown.
The diagram she had summoned beneath her was fragile and required her to remain fixed at its center. Its effects would only be sustained for a short while. Nonetheless, it would accomplish what it needed to. Prepared, she waited patiently. Far away, the sounds of battle began, the booming sounds rattling the forest. A tree whose leaves seemed to be made of glass made the ringing tone of a windchime.
Bow appeared again from the depths of the Whispering Woods. "We're going to begin," he said. "Dinah and Queen Glimmer have given us the go ahead. Those sorcerers are going to be hunting her down."
Shadow Weaver nodded. With one bony hand, she gestured for Bow to approach her. With an apprehensive gaze, he shuffled forward. With her other hand, Shadow Weaver reached into the folds of her robe and brought out some silver powder on one finger. In a single fluid motion, she rubbed it along Bow's forehead, leaving a faintly shining streak across it.
"That will protect you," she said.
She waited for Bow to respond, inquiring about what she had done, but he instead said nothing.
"Now we begin."
Bow gave a nod of his head so small it was nearly imperceptible and yet again vanished into the forest.
Shadow Weaver's hand reached into another hidden pocket within her robe, this time withdrawing a small glass bottle in which a small light danced like a firefly, bouncing off the edges of the container with only the faintest strength. She lifted the bottle to her face and flicked it harshly with a finger. This sent the light inside into a frenzy that made it knock into the walls of the bottle with greater energy. She gave a satisfied nod to herself. Closing a fist around the bottle, she shook it vigorously.
The bottle began to warm in her hand. As it became too hot to hold comfortably, she flung the bottle to the edge of the clearing. There, it shattered.
A blinding burst of light erupted where the bottle had landed. Faintly, her vision obscured by the afterimage, Shadow Weaver watched a pillar of light form and reach into the sky, quickly fading as the being made its way to freedom.
The magical energy emitted by its escape was nearly harmless, but also massive in quantity. Not a single sorcerer worth their salt would fail to notice it.
It was not thirty seconds later when the first sorcerer appeared, tumbling from an ornate Mystacor Gate that appeared in mid-air. As soon as she appeared, Shadow Weaver activated the diagram beneath her feet.
The sorcerer's feet touched the ground, and she instantly froze, falling like a stone statue to the ground, legs bent and arms held out at her sides.
Another sorcerer materialized from a white diagram that appeared on the ground. As soon as he was summoned, he too froze.
Of course, Horde Prime's army never would have been foolish enough to dispatch their sorcerers to the location without others standing back to provide assistance a short distance away.
It was unfortunate for them that the spell covered a far greater distance than they ever could have imagined.
Most sorcerers lacked the ability to transport themselves with such ease, even over short distances, and these less powerful individuals came on foot. The loss of communications with the scouts would no doubt be reported to them, and they would approach cautiously. Oblivious to the possibility of a diagram reaching nearly a half-mile from the epicenter of what they were being sent to investigate, they would fall too.
For a short time, Shadow Weaver cancelled the spell. A few seconds turned into a minute, each heartbeat both agonizing and intoxicating. When she heard the sounds of spells slicing apart the brush, she reactivated it.
Every time someone fell to her trap, Shadow Weaver felt it, a thump like a heartbeat reverberating through her. She was nearly brought to her knees by the sensation of dozens of sorcerers collapsing when her spell again came alive, fixed as though afflicted with rigor mortis. Those whose feet had not been touching the ground when she had activated the spell might have lasted long enough before freezing for looks of shock to have crept onto their faces, looks which would now be fixed for the next several days.
The full might of Mystacor was helpless against her. She wished Norwyn could have been there in front of her, on his knees. She imagined him witnessing what she could now do. This is what you refused to seek, you foolish old sod, she imagined herself saying.
A laugh left her throat, low pitched and rich like a mulled wine.
She had no doubt that the Horde would now be sending flying drones. That was not her concern. Bow and Entrapta had rigged his tracking pad to detect the signals emitted by them, and he would shoot them down as they approached.
A few stray individuals fell along the edge of the diagram.
Thump, thump, thump.
Clones of Horde Prime appeared within Shadow Weaver's eyesight, beamed from the starships above the planet.
Thump, thump, thump .
Then everything was still.
The diagram was nearly spent. Shadow Weaver deactivated the spell with a thought and turned her efforts to replenishing its source. She took the magic of Etheria itself, straight from the air and ground, and molded it to that purpose. Since observing the strange siphoning that had occurred earlier in the day, her technique had only become stronger and more capable.
Her worth was beyond dispute.
A circle appeared on the ground twenty or so feet in front of Shadow Weaver, a distorted diamond at its center.
Dark magic.
Could it be?
From a dark purple flame, King Micah appeared.
Shadow Weaver reactivated her spell.
He did not fall.
The possessed king looked upon his former teacher with an arrogant smirk. Most of the clones Shadow Weaver had seen were expressionless, only moved to emotion by panic or pain, but the expression on his face was unmistakable.
Micah took a step forward. Still, he did not collapse. As he lifted his foot again, Shadow Weaver saw. Diagrams had been placed on the underside of his feet, made of pulsing dark magic. Through them, Shadow Weaver's spell could not reach.
His stride was slow, mocking her with its leisure.
Shadow Weaver stepped from the center of the diagram. It was nothing but a handicap now.
Reaching upwards, Shadow Weaver lifted her mask from her face. She discarded it with a dismissive throw.
A flicker of recognition passed in Micah's green eyes; Shadow Weaver was certain. The pace of his walk was broken for a split second, while Shadow Weaver summoned shields in her hands. By the time she had finished, Micah's face had once again molden into a mask of resentment.
"Hello, Light Spinner," he said.
A serpentine shadow erupted from the umbra behind him, launching itself at Shadow Weaver. Its fangs sank into the shield she brought in front of it, the impact jarring her arm. Behind her raised barriers. she saw more of those snakes appearing from Micah's shadow. They struck one after the other.
Shadow Weaver brought up her shields to protect herself, blocking each bite from the snakes.
Thump, thump, thump
The attacks were unceasing, yet she could tell that Micah was holding back, only attacking with one snake at a time. He was toying with her, holding back his assault.
The attacks stopped.
An arrow had been halted in the air a short ways away from Micah, gripped by tendrils of shadow. As she watched, a net erupted from the arrowhead, and Micah lunged to one side to avoid it. Shadow Weaver blasted dark energy at him, but he dodged with similar ease.
"I figured there was someone else out there," he said with a grin. "I am a little surprised at the effort you put into rescuing the old hag."
Bow's figure retreated deeper into the woods and Micah rushed after. Shadow Weaver breathed a sigh of relief, only to realize that the shadowy snakes were renewing their assault, attacking with greater ferocity even as the source of their shadow grew more distant. Shadow Weaver expanded her shields, grunting as the impacts against them shook her arms.
Thump, thump, thump .
The shadowy beasts twisted around her shields and she stumbled backwards. She sent out blasts of sorcerous energy, dispersing her assailants only for them to reform a second later. She poured more magic, both dark and light, from herself, wreathing her body in flames that danced purple and gold.
A snake's bite latched onto her shoulder and she lifted an arm up and backwards, her shield severing it at the neck. The body flopped like a fish out of water for a second before the head grew back, hissing as loudly as a burst of thunder.
She needed to erect a proper shield around her entire being. Something to buy just enough time to prepare a counterattack. Shadow Weaver readied herself, preparing the dome of dark energy that would protect her for a short while, when the assault stilled again.
The snakes dissipated as Micah tumbled through them, two arrows narrowly sailing past him. In one hand, he grasped Bow's tracking pad.
"Grab the tracking pad," Shadow Weaver heard Bow yell. "He's trying to take it!"
It took Shadow Weaver only a second to overcome her shock, and she reached for Bow's tracking pad with an outstretched hand. Micah's lips twisted into a snarl as he saw her reaching for it, and something he held in his other hand smashed into her face, shattering with the blow.
It was her mask.
Shadow Weaver howled in pain and fell backwards.
Micah was back on his feet in a flash, hurling blasts of energy at Bow, while assaulting him with the serpentine beings that erupted from his shadow like smoke from a fire lit on damp wood. Bow weaved around the attacks with remarkable skill, but it was clear he was unable to get close. A torrent of spells protected Micah like a hurricane.
"Glimmer, I need you now!" he screamed into his earpiece.
The Queen appeared as Shadow Weaver pulled herself back to her feet. Her eyes widened as she saw Micah, who met her gaze with a mocking smile. Sparkling magic blasts met the darkness surrounding Micah, joined by arrows from Bow and Shadow Weaver's magic.
"He's going to escape any second," Glimmer shouted.
In that moment, Bow froze, not from fear or surprise, but from a spell that had formed on the ground beneath him, coating him with a bubbling purple liquid. Dark Paralysis. He had been in the midst of notching one of his arrows.
Shadow Weaver took the moment to look beneath her own feet. Fortunately, no such spell was being cast there. She attacked with renewed vigor.
Glimmer and Shadow Weaver's magic buffeted Micah's shield, yet its strength did not weaken. Writhing snakes lashed out at Shadow Weaver and Glimmer while the chaotic maelstrom of dark magic held firm.
Inside, Micah was smiling.
Finally, a blast of Glimmer's magic made it through Micah's protection. He stumbled, the storm around him stilling.
Nonetheless, he avoided the swing of Glimmer's staff to his nape.
Shadow Weaver attacked with a blast of her own, sending the sorcerer sprawling backwards from his nearly complete teleportation circle, still holding the tracking pad.
"I should not have abandoned you. That was a failure on my part. I never should have left behind someone I put so much time into teaching. It was always my greatest regret."
Glimmer and Shadow Weaver blasted the one-time King of Mystacor with attack after attack. Glimmer prepared her staff for another swing.
"Perhaps that moment was when you learned to tolerate abandonment," Shadow Weaver said as the final blow approached Micah's neck.
Something happened to Micah's face then. It twisted, not into the mocking visage she had seen earlier, but something else, something coursing with pain and hurt. For a moment, Shadow Weaver halted her assault in shock.
A kick from Micah's leg struck Glimmer's staff. The strike deflected and the enfilade of spells halted, he rushed back towards the incomplete teleportation circle. Burying her shock, Shadow Weaver turned to attack him, but Micah had regained his bearings, planted his feet in the crescent and that cyclone of dark magic protected him once again. The teleportation circle was completed, and Micah vanished in the same manner in which he had appeared.
Glimmer stared at Shadow Weaver with almost as much distaste as Micah had earlier. Her hands gripped her staff so tightly that her knucklebones could be seen through her skin.
A call came through Glimmer's earpiece, urgent and desperate.
Glimmer vanished to respond to it.
Alone in the clearing with only the still-immobile Bow and the frozen Horde troops for company, the enormity of what had happened sunk into Shadow Weaver. The portal was no longer safe.