Meta Gods War 3 by B. Miles (the ebook reader txt) 📕

into the evening. A guard member named Miks stood a few feet away, trying to be as invisible as possible. He was a young man, stubble on his cheeks and chin, bags under his eyes, and fluffy dark hair. Cam gave him a nod and kept going with Theus by his side.

“Those guards don’t let you go anywhere alone,” Theus said.

“It’s their job,” Cam said. “I could ditch them, but Arter would throw a fit and blame the poor bastards. So I let them follow along most of the time.”

“That’s nice of you.” Theus gave him a tight smile.

Cam watched his friend closely for a second then gestured with his head. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go for a walk.”

Theus hesitated. “Is that an order?”

“It’s a request, friend to friend.”

“Fine,” he said. “Not like anything fun’s happening in here.”

They stepped out of the tent together and walked into the cool night. Miks hung a respectful distance away as Cam led Theus through the camp, going slowly.

Fires were banked and dying. Tents rustled with bodies. Snores came from canvas. Some men were still awake, those that couldn’t sleep, those that didn’t need it. The night people, the dreamers and insomniacs, staring up at the star filled heavens and wondering what’s beyond their world. Cam nodded to them, made small gestures toward them, but never spoke.

Speaking would break the illusion that they were all alone.

Cam took Theus away from the camp then, toward Felin’s outpost. He slipped between a spread of trees and came to a slow stop near a large, half-broken boulder.

“What are we doing out here?” Theus asked.

“I thought we could try something.” Cam turned to Theus. “One more lesson before tomorrow.”

Theus groaned. “Cam, I’ve been meditating every spare second. I’ve been trying to picture those images you told me about, and I haven’t made anything. I haven’t felt anything. I just—”

“Hold on,” Cam said. “I’m not going to make you meditate. And I’m not going to kick you.”

Theus grinned. “Promise?”

“Promise. No kicking tonight.”

He laughed. “All right. Fine.” He walked over to the boulder and leaned next to Cam. “What are we doing then?”

Miks lingered nearby, arms crossed, back against a tree trunk, wreathed in darkness.

“I want to show you.” Cam reached out a hand and summoned a small amount of flame. It flickered into being just above his palm, floating in the air, no bigger than a candle.

“I’m not impressed,” Theus said. “You’ve done bigger.”

Cam smiled. “I’ve been thinking a lot lately about magic,” he said. “About where it comes from.”

“Yeah? And what do you think?”

“I don’t know any more now than I did before this all started,” Cam said.

“Useful.”

“But I did think of something that might help.” Cam closed his fist and extinguished the flame. “Remember the first day I used magic?”

“When we were fighting for our lives,” Theus said. “Near that bend in the river.”

“Our backs were to the stream and the wolves were spilling through the trees. I thought we were all dead. I mean, we were losing, and we would’ve been dead if it weren’t for the Elves.”

“That’s when you met Miuri.”

“Yeah, it is.” Cam smiled at the fond memory of Miuri pulling him into the trees. “But I touched the priori before that, when I was still desperate. I think you might need a little push, Theus, something to make you see past the veil of all this and find the thing that’s beyond it all.”

“Cryptic,” he said.

“I just mean, magic’s lingering out there…” Cam stretched out a hand, fingers curling in the air. “It’s always there. I can almost feel it. When you feel it, you’ll understand what I mean.”

Theus was quiet for a moment, his eyes focused on something far off. “Remember when we were kids and we’d play fight with Key?” he asked.

“Of course,” Cam said. “Key would kick your ass.”

“She kicked all our asses. But back then we were just… I don’t know. It felt so much easier, so much freer. And now?”

“Now people depend on us.”

“The weight’s a lot. I’m just a General, I don’t even know how you feel.”

“Some days it’s hard,” Cam said. “Some days, I’m doing whatever I have to do. On those days, I’m not thinking.”

“Not thinking,” Theus echoed. “Must be nice.”

“You need to try it,” Cam said. “That’s when the magic’s easiest to find, when my mind isn’t doing a thousand things at once. When it’s slow and quiet, when I’m slow and quiet, I can feel the magic pulsing at the edges of my awareness.”

“Do you feel it now?”

“I feel it,” Cam said. “And you will too.”

“I’m starting to think I won’t.”

“You will. It took me years. You’ll touch it in days.”

Theus smiled but there was no joy. “You want me to find it during the fighting, don’t you?”

“I’m going to assign you to the front lines,” Cam said. “I want you to lead the center.”

Theus sucked in a deep breath. The center was the most important part of the army. In theory, if a wing fell, the army could swing to the side and reform, or at least make a fighting retreat. But if the center couldn’t hold, the whole army would be broken into pieces and whittled away to nothing.

Cam knew he was giving a big responsibility to Theus. He also knew his friend could handle it. They were closer than brothers once, before all this madness started, back when they were still children in the village.

Now they’d drifted apart. Cam had his girls and Theus was just a minor player, only in the game at all because of Cam.

But Theus was capable. He was shrewd and strong, one of the best fighters to come out of Medlar in generations, second only to Cam.

Cam needed this. He needed Theus to step up and do something big. Part of him thought this would be the push Theus needed to finally break through whatever barrier was holding him back.

This would be the shove he needed to find magic.

“I’ll do what I have to