Page 59 of Storm to Victory
He’d lost a day of memory when he’d crashed last time and been drugged out of his mind. But back then, he’d known he’d been safe the whole time.
It was an entirely different feeling, one that shook him deep to his core, to think about being kept unconscious while inthe hands of his enemies. They’d taken his clothes, strapped him to a table, and intended to take his magic all without him waking. If he hadn’t woken when he had—likely due to them underestimating how quickly he’d burn through the sedative thanks to his magic—then he very well could have died without ever regaining consciousness.
He forced himself to move, opening a cupboard and staring at the contents for several long moments before he could process what he was seeing.
Rows upon rows of empty glass jars were lined up, along with racks of empty test tubes. He slowly bent and opened the cupboard below. This one held what looked like rough facsimiles of the magical power cells used by the Alliance. The design wasn’t as refined as the ones for holding the magic of the ancient kings, but such things had been around for nearly a century for storing magic from human magicians.
Closing both of the cupboard doors, he moved to the next section over, where open shelving held more glass jars, except these were filled with a faintly yellow liquid. Most of the jars held ears that were rounded like a human’s yet the skin was a mottled green tinged faintly brown in places. A few other jars held pointed ears with skin the silvery tone of the elves.
Fieran’s stomach lurched again, and this time he couldn’t blame it on his continued nausea. “Someone was a little too inspired by the story of Ludin.”
Dacha glanced over his shoulder again, not a flicker of disgust or surprise breaking the hard look in his eyes, before he turned back to the notebook. “The penmanship is atrocious, but it seems they experimented with taking magic.”
Fieran rubbed at the pinpricks of drying blood on his chest. His magic still feltoff. “I gathered as much. Does it say how it’s possible to steal magic right from someone’s body?”
“Something about a type of ogre magic, but I would need to study this more.” Dacha closed the notebook and slid it into one of the large pockets on the front of the lab coat. At Fieran’s look, he rolled his shoulders in a hint of a shrug. “While I do not wish to preserve or study such technology or methods, we will need proof of what kind of experiments they were conducting here.”
Right. Fieran returned to searching the cupboards, drawers, and shelves. Between the two of them, he and Dacha found a few more notebooks filled with notes on the experiments. These they took, along with a jar of salve and bandages they finally located. Whether the medical supplies were there in case the “scientists” were hurt or for “experiments” that they didn’t want to kill off so quickly, Fieran didn’t know and didn’t want to know.
Fieran filled his wound with salve and wrapped it securely. While cauterizing it with Dacha’s magic had both prevented more bleeding and thoroughly sterilized the gash, the salve would aid in healing, and the bandage would keep it clean while they fought their way out of wherever they currently were.
Dacha dabbed some of the salve on each of the small poke marks on his chest, as did Fieran.
Then they were ready to venture out of this room, figure out exactly what they faced, and rescue the others.
Fieran pressed his back to the wall as Dacha unlocked and cracked the door open. After a moment, Dacha opened the door wider and motioned for Fieran to follow.
Padding barefoot in Dacha’s footsteps, Fieran crept out the door into a hallway. The white floor tiles ran here too, but the walls were painted a basic gray. Several more doors were set into the hallway while additional doors blocked both ends.
After glancing both ways, Dacha headed toward the right. He pressed his ear to the door to the next room before he opened the door.
The room must have been empty since he opened the door the rest of the way, stepping inside.
Fieran followed, taking the door from Dacha and making sure it closed softly instead of slamming closed.
This room held shelves upon shelves of magical power cells, these filled with a variety of colors of magic.
But there was something about the sense of the magic in this room. As Fieran walked along the shelves, occasionally placing his hand on a power cell, he could feel thealivenessof the magic held within. These held more than magic willingly stored by the wielder. This was the very essence of a person’s magic contained within glass and steel instead of a living body.
Another steel table sat in the center of this room while the stainless steel countertops here held microscopes and even more notebooks.
A familiar, semi-scorched pack lay on the center table. Beside it, two sets of swords gleamed in the overhead lights, the blades unmarred where they lay beside the sheaths.
Dacha strode straight for the table and picked up his swords, holding them for a long moment as if drawing strength from them.
Fieran crossed the room at a slower pace, pausing to glance at his swords before he opened the pack. Inside lay all four cases with the glass vials of juice laced with healing magic. Sticky stains and glass shards showed that several of the vials had broken in the crash, but the moss padding had preserved most of them. “It looks like they collected anything with even a hint of magic from the wreckage. Perhaps they planned to study these.”
Dacha paused in buckling on his sword sheaths, the leather straps looking rather ludicrous over the white lab coat. “Drink one of those.”
“We might need the magic for later.” Fieran didn’t reach for one of the jars. What if Pip or Uncle Edmund were hurt worse than he was?
Dacha drew one out and pressed it into Fieran’s hands. “Drink. You will need your strength for rescuing her.”
Well, he couldn’t refute that logic.
He struggled to twist the lid and break the seal, but finally he got it off. He took a sip, the sweet raspberry flavor coating his tongue, and the soothing warmth of the healing magic filtered into him. It wasn’t as strong as a direct healing, but it finally took the edge off the dizziness and pain.
He drank about half of the jar before he twisted the lid back on. He might as well make it last as long as possible. He placed the jar back in the case before he reached for his swords. “Do you see any of the packs with our clothes?”
