Cast in Balefire: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Mage Craft Series Book 4) by SM Reine

Author:SM Reine [Reine, SM]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Red Iris Books
Published: 2016-10-20T22:00:00+00:00

17

Sinead McGrath opened a ley line to whisk Benjamin all the way around the world, but he still needed a helicopter to reach Dilmun. The angels had somehow redirected ley lines so that none overlapped the city, so it was a heck of a commute.

Benjamin had risked poking one of Rylie’s connections for transportation. Nobody else had been willing to risk entering angel territory in a flying machine. One flare of ethereal magic would knock them out of the sky like a fly under a swatter. “But I’ve got wards,” the pilot said cheerfully. Isidora looked roughly ninety years old, though she was nimble climbing into the seat and buckling in. “Better than the best wards on the market!”

“That’s really impressive.” Benjamin couldn’t tell they were there. Some mundanes could still see magic, but he wasn’t even one of those types. He was mundane as mundane could be.

Isidora was happy to narrate everything that they saw on the way to Dilmun. “That used to be a human city. That one too.” She was pointing at lumpier piles of rock far below the bubble of the chopper’s windshield. “It’s amazing how fast nature reclaims the places humanity leaves behind.”

Benjamin leaned forward far enough to see between his toes. The indicated cities sprawled throughout two sections of a canyon, above and below. He wouldn’t have noticed their existence if Isidora hadn’t pointed them out. They were buried under collapsed rock and dust. “Why’d they abandon them?”

“Because of the angels,” Isidora said. “Because the gods wanted them quarantined, but not too quarantined.”

“Are you a triadist?” They were a movement that believed in three gods with a heavy hand in designing the world that they lived in.

Isidora winked. “I’m a realist.” She wheeled them around a few degrees, and Dilmun swung into view.

“Oh my gods,” Benjamin said.

The gleaming city was perched atop a teetering plateau a kilometer above the rest of the Earth. An inverted triangle of rock balanced on its point, while its base lifted glass towers toward the sun. Dilmun was almost transparent. It looked more like a heat mirage than a proper city.

Isidora laughed. “Now you see why I risk flying out here every time I get an excuse!”

The chopper responded by shuddering. An instant of freefall made Benjamin taste acid.

Then they were moving up again, tilting drastically to reach the elevation of Dilmun. Isidora hummed to herself as she piloted a serpentine path toward the city. “I’m dodging ethereal energy, by the way. There are barf bags under the seat if it’s getting you mixed up in the guts!”

Benjamin clenched his fists atop his knees, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m fine.”

He didn’t open his eyes again until the helicopter touched down.

The door slid open.

Isidora hadn’t landed them in the actual city. She’d somehow landed on a narrow platform carved into Dilmun’s pillar. “This is as close as I can get you! And I’m not getting out, so have a nice walk, all right? Hang onto the rope.” Isidora pointed at the rock face nearest Benjamin’s side of the chopper.

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