Washington DC is 12 square miles bordered by reality.

Pre-Fall President

During the next week and a half, the pathway the expedition followed became more and more sinuous. If it were not for the Ancient road remains, finding their way across the woods might have been harder. Even then, they had to cross broad depressions, with traces of cross-road marking where Ancient fallen bridges had allowed the two ways to cross. But the oxen teams placidly obeyed their drivers, and they were still making good time. The weather helped too. Fall rains would have made the trip far worse, but August stayed mostly sunny, and the handful of cloudy days did nothing to hamper the wagons’ progress.

There were more beast attacks though, at least once every two or three days, as roaming packs of Canids noticed the intruders on their territories, or a solitary Felid thought of their oxen as being tasty prey before he realized belatedly his error. Their biggest fight was when a trio of gigantic thirty-foot wingspan birds decided to grab people. Miles tried and managed to kill one of the three with his lightning. It was hard, as he could only “aim” at the ground, and try to get the lightning strike to cross the flight path of the birds.

And expensive, as he informed Johanna after the fight.

“Five strikes and I was almost out and couldn’t do another. Each strike was costing almost as much as an hour of using the Ember Chains.”

“Same for me. Instant, powerful attacks at a range like that drain mana faster. I can do a lot of fireballs, sure, but if I were to chain throw them, I’d run dry within a few minutes,” she informed.

“You tried?”

“Not recently. Launching as many as I can in as short as I can is immensely destructive. Peter joked about burning the forest, I could probably do it. And besides, I try not to be noticeable.”

“Well, in my case, it’s those damned summer clouds. The higher they are, the more it drains me.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. More notes for the prof. Or that Society of Sorcerers of yours.”

“Technically, we’re both members. They don’t have dues, all you need is having a real sorcerous Talent.”

“I see lots of sorcerers these days. Do they know?” Miles asked, a smirk showing.

“I doubt it. You’re right, I’m the registered sorceress here,” she laughed, adding, “Do you want me to denounce you? Metal Shaper Miles Bertram, the highest number of Talents in the world today, needs to be on the front of the next edition…”

Miles laughed.

That evening, after Professor Gomez had dutifully recorded that Miles had finally lighted the Authority parchment, and Cameron Scott also activated the Level version, she sat with the scholar.

“That was a big fight today. More coincidences or?” she asked.

“Who knows? I warned you not to derive too quick conclusions. Although there is something with the progression. It does not make sense to gain, say, six Levels in fifteen years, and get a new one in three months. It could be having Talents speeds it up. Or your presence, or rather your patron’s influence. For now, what’s more interesting is how different your husband is from Peter Donnall, though.”

Tom still could not light any of the quality parchments. Peter, however, had almost immediately started to activate qualities again, beginning with Authority, Perception, and Empathy, despite having gained power later than Tom. Agility came quickly afterward, leaving only two inactive qualities.

“Tom still needed qualities for a Talent, you mean?”

“It fits the idea. And I think it means that my model of cumulative quality rather than expendable qualities is more accurate since Mr. Donnall did not seem to need any after gaining a Level.”

“We still haven’t figured out what their new Talents are. If Tom has gotten his new one yet, that is.”

“That must be a bit frustrating. For everyone else, you get to read the name of what they’re about to obtain, just before they use their parchment and get it. But for you, you need to guess.”

“Yes. At least we’ve got some ideas on names. Flaming Blade is an obvious part of my skill set, ditto for Mana Sight. Laura’s got even more names in common with the other Fixers, and that makes it easier to compare effects. But otherwise… it’s try anything and keep trying until you figure it out, and that’s way harder for Heroes than Sorcerers.”

She looked at the silhouette of the minotaur talking with Miles and sighed.

“At least now, we’re aware of when we gain power. Having Gauge Stamina to tell us when we change.”

“I agree. That one Talent does not seem that useful at a glance, but from an informational standpoint, it’s priceless. Outside of clocking the duration of an effect, it’s the only accurate – as weird as it is – measurement method we have.”

The three hunters kept their distance, following the expedition despite the discomfort of keeping up with them during the day. The fights the Tallers got into with beasts, even once a trio of Greater Beasts, only served to demonstrate how powerful those foreigners were with their dizzying array of multiple mount-skills. George guessed that they had to have lots of them, like the mythic Blaze. Although the legendary mount of his ancestor had four skills, more than any since then, he was betting that some might have as many or more.

The biggest threat was their forward scout. They lucked early in spotting him as he was only starting to use one of his skills, and Helena noticed she was the only one keeping track of him as he moved ahead of the expedition, while both George and Hank couldn’t spot him. She had looked at them incredulously and then couldn’t find him again, even though she’d looked away for a mere second.

After that, they became even more careful where they made their own camp and only spied close when they were sure he was there at the Taller’s camp and not prowling around unseen. The last thing they wanted was for him to find out about them. The elders had been very insistent. They should not learn of the Mooneyed presence until their intentions could be properly assessed.

“Washington?”

“That’s what those three were talking about,” Hank said.

“Why?” Helena asked back.

“They’re looking for ‘power’. Like if they expect to get more power there. They were not specific about how.”

“Is this like the valleys of awakening? Maybe they know the Ancient city to be like those,” George mused.

“Powerful enough to awaken even a person? No one’s been there since the End. It’s far away from the Camp and way too risky to go there.”

“Less so with that expedition clearing the way. I still don’t believe how powerful they are. Even for those with what looks like known mount-skills, theirs are so much more…”

Mists whined as if he understood he was belittled by George, and Helena petted him.

“You’re good enough,” she whispered to him.

“So we follow them?” Hank asked.

“That’s what we’re here for. The elders will want to find out how they got the ability to get mount-skills,” George said.

“They are in for a surprise once we report on that one. Maybe it’s got something to do with Washington if they are looking for ‘power’ there.”

As they moved southeast, more and more ruins started to appear close to the path the expedition followed. One also had a mana plume visible from the highway, but Johanna’s group couldn’t get to the Artifact. The mana trace went straight into a small hole, going underground and they could not find access anywhere in the nearly gone building nearby. Leaving the Artifact pained Johanna, but they probably couldn’t justify the time to dig.

It would probably taunt them back when they came back, but she couldn’t do anything. Maybe there was some Talent that could be used to open up the ground, but their two Earth Shapers, Petra and Jorieke, didn’t have any applicable one, and while Swordcutter did cut anything, it wasn’t “Earthcutter”. Far too shallow.

Most of their Talents seemed geared for fighting, she’d noticed, although some could be construed as useful both outside and in combat situations, like her orbs which were both obstacles and traps, forcing enemies to change their path, and light for the camp’s evening, at least until she went to sleep and the orb stopped naturally anyway.

She wondered if it was a specific decision by the Skeleton, or if Talents naturally were mostly combat-oriented. There were enough examples like Detect Lies or Telepathy, or some of the ones listed in the Mages of America compendium to know that not every Talent was directly applicable to combat.

After all, you gained power without even fighting. Ulrich had lighted the Level parchment after a rare day without any fights.

There were also more beasts, even if they did not always attack. If she had doubted this was truly the deepest mana zone they had visited, the sheer number of Changed beasts moving around was a stark reminder of that despite the normal look of the vegetation along the Ancient highways. No wonder the wilderness close to the coast was still a source of beast waves.

“Our ancestors survived that?” she asked Miles once.

“From all accounts, they almost did not. Places like Cheat or New Sandusky were founded more than two generations after the Fall, by people coming from safer areas.”

“If historical accounts are to be believed, less than one person in a hundred made it. The ones who didn’t learn to protect themselves died quickly once the Changed beasts started coming out,” Gomez added.

Moore had never been to Washington DC, even if he once lived north a few hundred miles away. Not that he expected to recognize anything after 150 years. All he had to orient himself was the faded copies of ancient paper maps that the expedition used. And of course, no GPS.

Getting to the Potomac and following its course was a good idea on the part of Johanna. The traces of the ancient interstates were good, but not ideal, especially that close to their destination where they started to intersect in all kinds of confusing ways.

What surprised him was the abrupt transition. One moment, they were making their way across flat terrain, the concrete interstate pavement still almost intact between grasses, and the next, actual, obvious ruins. Ancient buildings, fallen but still visible, blocs of houses like the ones in the old ruins where the four had found his displaced home.

They had entered the Washington suburbs.