The Guardians of Zoone by Lee Edward Fodi

Author:Lee Edward Fodi
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2019-12-04T00:00:00+00:00

18

Hunters of Magic

They set out early the next morning, all of them irritable after another night on the hard ground—all of them except Scoot, who didn’t require sleep, and Tug, who didn’t seem to care where he snoozed.

“The hills are flattening out,” Aunt Temperance observed an hour into their trek. “The trees have been harvested here, too, but the stumps are thinner. They must be a different variety.”

“How fascinating,” Fidget remarked sarcastically. “Look, everyone. This type of dead tree is different than the other dead trees.”

“She’s just trying to point out that the landscape is changing,” Ozzie said.

Fidget snorted. “And I’m just trying to point out it doesn’t matter.”

“It mattered to the trees,” Tug chimed in.

That put an end to the argument, and Ozzie was left alone with his thoughts. They weren’t exactly good ones. With every step, they were getting closer to Ru-Valdune, the place he had heard so much about from Cho. The place where the captain had lost his fingers. Gotten his scar. And been expelled by his clan. Ozzie could sense that these things were on Cho’s mind, too. The normally jovial captain didn’t utter a word until they arrived at a wide and roaring river, late in the morning.

“The boundary between Untaar and Ru-Valdune,” Cho said grimly.

Ozzie stared at the bleak landscape on the other side of the river. Ru-Valdune looked like a desert, sparsely covered with trees, scrub vegetation, and towering rock formations that jutted upward like crooked bones.

“Did the motos get their claws on it already?” Ozzie wondered.

Cho gave him a mirthless smile. “It’s not the motos’ doing, lad. Rocks and cacti: That’s Ru-Valdune. We’ll follow the river north, to Yo-Kando. We can safely pass through its mountain valleys, then snake back down to the Land of Thrak. That’s where we’ll find a doorway out of the wild lands.”

“Wouldn’t it be quicker to cross here?” Ozzie asked.

Cho emphatically shook his head. “Ru-Valdune is too dangerous.”

“It can’t be more dangerous than Moton,” Fidget argued.

“That’s the territory of the Nedra across the river,” Cho said with a passionate gesture. “If their sabermage—”

“Sabermage?” Aunt Temperance cut in.

“The member of the clan who hunts magic,” Ozzie explained.

“He will smell your magic,” Cho told her.

Aunt Temperance stiffened. “I don’t have any magic.”

“I can smell it,” Cho insisted. “On you, on Ozzie—all of you.”

“Cho,” Ozzie began, “why—”

“I can’t tell you why,” the captain said with an uncharacteristic hint of frustration in his voice. “Just that I can smell it. And if I can, so will the Nedra’s sabermage.”

Aunt Temperance crossed her arms. “Can’t you negotiate our way across?”

“I am Y’Orrick,” Cho said quietly. “Banished.”

“Why?”

Ozzie groaned at her bluntness. “I’ve told you before, Aunt T. Cho abandoned the ways of the Nedra. They think a sabermage gets his magic by stealing it from others.”

“Oh,” Aunt Temperance said, slowly comprehending. “What you really mean is by killing them. The sabermage would kill us.” She narrowed her gaze at Cho. “Your people are barbarians!”

“No, they’re not,” Fidget spoke up. “Most of the Valdune clans changed their customs eons ago.

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