by Eric Vall
“You have a job to do,” I told him through gritted teeth. “Do your job. The kingdom doesn’t need another upheaval of the Order, they need assurance and genuine leadership. The mages have to be organized and made to focus strictly on their craft, and they need to--”
“If that is what must happen next, then so be it, but it is your job, Mason Flynt. Not mine.” Wyresus looked down his nose and straightened a few of his stacks. “Given that you rise to the occasion of all this disorder so readily, I trust you will deliver my resignation to the king post haste. He is fond of you, I believe.”
“No,” I chuckled. “I’m not delivering shit, because you’re not resigning.”
Wyresus's wiry eyebrows crinkled. “Why not?”
I considered the man surrounded by his stacks of books and sitting in his own filth, and I imagined the mess of reappointing another head of the Order within a few short months after losing the last one. With the Master closing in on Serin, and the non-magic citizens only temporarily reassured by the idea of wealth, I realized exactly what use a man like Wyresus could serve in all of this.
“Well,” I mused, and I sent the man an apologetic shrug, “because if you resign, I’ll fucking kill you.”
“But … ”
Wyresus flattened himself against the back of his chair, and he spent a good minute warring between terror and indignation before he apparently settled on idiocy.
“No,” he countered. “I put my foot down here. Too much has transpired, Mason Flynt. Too much exhaustion, too much stress. I will not continue to put up with--”
“No, no, shut the fuck up,” I ordered. “First of all, it’s Sir Mason Flynt, because the king is pretty fond of me. Second of all, I have been the one battling evil forces, and yeah, I’m currently harboring these so-called incapable mages for you, and you know what? I’m exhausted. I’m a bit stressed. So, you will remain in the position you brown-nosed your way into, and while you continue to fall short of delivering there, you’ll be working for me.”
“For you?” Wyresus scoffed. “With my credentials? You’re inebriated, Mason Flynt. You are a mere--”
“I’m gonna stop you right there,” I interrupted once more. “I offered you two choices, and none of them involved being a condescending prick. Either work for me and remain as head of the Order or … ”
I gestured to Cayla, and the princess cocked her rifle with a smirk.
“We’ll fucking kill you,” she said, and the hollow look in her icy blue eyes left no question about how much she wanted to do just that.
I nodded my approval as I crossed my arms, and then I leveled Wyresus with a deathly glare I’d perfected after the last few weeks in Nalnora.
“I-I--” the man stammered, but after his milky eyes shot between Cayla, Ruela, and me, he finally sighed heavily and slumped a few inches in his seat. “I suppose I have no choice but to accept the position, sir.”
“Good choice.” I grinned. “Moving forward, since you have your hands full, finally, I’ll be taking over training the mages you haven’t paid any attention to. Down the line, I’ll start sending you a list of mages you are allowed to interact with for the sake of enhancing their knowledge.”
“Allowed to interact with?” Wyresus asked uneasily. “D-does King Temin understand this arrangement?”
“Sure.” I shrugged. “So, what do you know about elves?”
“Elves?” he asked with some surprise. “A bit, I suppose. I have studied the history of the Nalnoran nation from the time of their elusive beginning all the way through the great wars, and then on into the siege of the Gorak Knights, followed by the era of rebirth wherein … ”
“Perfect,” I interrupted. “I’m assuming you speak Elvish then?”
“At an amateur level at best,” he chuckled with the weirdest mix of modesty and snobbery I’d ever heard.
I nodded slowly. “Good enough.”
Then I pulled a stack of aged parchment from the inner pocket of my tattered vest, and I brushed every one of Wyresus's notes to the floor before I slid the Elven scrolls across the table.
“Your new role in this Order is pretty cut and dry,” I told him. “You will not leave this room. You will not interact with anyone, and every day, from morning to night, you will work right here to translate every word of these scrolls for me.”
Wyresus furrowed his wiry brows as he unfolded the topmost parchment and scanned the strange script.
“This isn’t … Elvish?”
“No,” I admitted, “it’s ancient Elvish originating roughly five thousand years ago, but that’s your job now. I’ll be checking in on you periodically to see what you’ve accomplished and … do I need to leave the dog? Because if you think you’re gonna need some motivation, I can leave the dog. She gets kind of wild in confined spaces, but sometimes the threat of being gutted alive is exactly what it takes to get you focusing more clearly.”
I didn’t miss the fact that the man had avoided gazing directly at Ruela ever since we entered, and now he only flicked his milky eyes in her direction for a millisecond before he instinctively grabbed the nearest parchment.
“You can keep the dog,” Wyresus assured me. “I will do this work, and not leave this room.”
“And you won’t talk to anyone,” I reminded him. “Possessed or not, that door doesn’t open unless it’s a scrap of bread I have delivered for your dinner. Understood?”
“Understood,” he said with a curt nod.
I cocked a brow.
“Understood, sir,” Wyresus corrected himself.
“Good,” I slid. “Cayla, open the door.”
“We’re not gonna cut anything off him?” the princess asked in disappointment.
“I still haven’t decided,” I told her, “but Aurora and the others are looking for us, and they’re coming down the stairwell now.”
Cayla immediately opened the door and stuck her head out into the hall, and after a minute, she called to the women as the clicking of their heels drew closer.
Shoshanne and Aurora entered the chamber, and when they saw Wyresus, they both glared on the spot before their noses wrinkled in disgust.
“What is that stench?” Shoshanne asked as she blocked her nose with her hand.
“This little rat,” I mumbled as I jutted a thumb in Wyresus's direction. “He’s been rotting in here for weeks.”
Aurora locked her jaw as she pulled a dagger from her sheath, but I held up a hand to stop her before she could hurl it right at the mage.
Wyresus yelped anyways and abruptly slid from his seat to cower behind the table once more.
I sighed. “Don’t you have work to do?”
While Wyresus righted himself and pretended he knew where to start with the Elven scrolls, I turned to the others.
“What have you got for me?” I asked.
“Well, I spoke with the last two healers in the infirmary,” Shoshanne began, “and it seems the others didn’t resign, they simply stopped coming to the Oculus. Neither of them knows what happened to the other three, but they were Aer Mages like me.”
“Shit,” I cursed, and Shoshanne nodded her agreement.
“They also said a few mages came in last week with a friend of theirs who was screaming in pain,” she continued. “The injured mage was a Defender and an Ignis Mage. His companions told the healers they heard him screaming in his dormitory, and when they broke the door open, he was alone on the floor, and the wall of his room had been blasted open.”
“By a Terra Mage?” Aurora asked as she listened intently.
“I would assume so,” Shoshanne replied, “but that isn’t the most interesting part. The healer confirmed his leg had been branded, and when they left to get some supplies from their store closet, they returned to find all of his companions burned alive right there in the infirmary. The Ignis Mage was gone.”
“Gods,” Aurora breathed.
“How truly terrifying,” Wyresus mused, and I shot him a firm look over my shoulder.
“I also passed a group of mages on my way to the infirmary who were in a big hurry to get out of the Oculus,” Shoshanne added.
“Three or five?” I asked.
“Five,” she responded. “How did you know?”
“They left the library around the time we arrived,” I explained. “It looks like the possessed mages are clearing out as quick as they can all of a sudden.”
“They are,” Aurora confirmed. “I spoke with a group of mages in the marketplace, and they said there was a crew of Defenders living in the dormitory across the hall from her. She was terrified of them, so she started staying with her friend in another room instead. Then this morning, she passed her old room, and the dormitory across the hall was empty. It looked like they’d cleared out pretty quickly, and from the mess they left behind, she thinks there were way more than just five of them staying in the place by the time they left.”
I rifled my hair as I considered this. “So, one branding within the Oculus that we’re sure of,” I muttered, “several Defenders already working for the Master but remaining in residence, and a woman who needs to change her plans because we’re here.”
“What woman?” Aurora asked as she furrowed her brows.
“We heard three mages in the library,” Cayla explained. “One told another they had to ‘get her out of there’ because the plans had changed because Mason was in the Oculus.”
“Who is ‘her’?” Shoshanne asked.
“No idea,” I admitted.
Then there was a flicker in the corner of my sight, and Deya abruptly appeared clutching an iron rod in her hands.
“I think I might know,” the beautiful elf admitted.
Wyresus leapt clean out of his seat at the sudden appearance, but then his jaw went slack as he braced himself against the table.
“An … an elf,” he gasped. “You’re an elf.”
“I am,” Deya said as she eyed the man with faint disgust.
“You know,” Wyresus said brightly as he picked up a slip of elven parchment, “I’m completing a project at the moment that perhaps you might be able to assist me--”
“Sit the fuck down,” I growled. “How many people did I say you were allowed to speak to?”
“None,” the mage sighed.
I nodded and immediately turned back to Deya.
“Is that what I think it is?” I demanded as I pointed to the rod in her hands.
“It is,” she said uneasily, and she handed over the branding rod for me to study.
The rune at the end was unmistakably the Master’s rune, and I stared at it for a long moment as my fingers slowly went numb.
“Where did you get this?” I finally asked.
“I stole it from a mage in the marketplace,” Deya explained.
“That’s what you were doing?” Aurora gasped as she stared in shock at the iron rod.
“Yes,” the beautiful elf responded. “I saw the handle sticking out beneath her cloak, and I recognized what it was from Dragir, so when she ducked behind a cart, I quickly followed her. I managed to slip it out of her hand by knocking her into a stack of fruit, but she knew I took it right away. She couldn’t see me, though, and then she ran for the entrance of the Oculus.”
I stared, and as I considered everything I heard, I was almost sure I knew the answer to my next question, but I asked it anyways.
“What color were the threads on the hem of her robe?” I asked.
Deya thought for a second. “Red.”
“Shit!” I cursed once more. “He sent that Ignis Mage in here to brand the mages today.”
“Gods,” Aurora said as she clutched her hair. “Of course. The Ignis Mage only had to heat the iron, the rune is already set, she could just … ”
“Go around the whole Oculus branding one after another,” Shoshanne finished for her.
“Mason, we got here just in time,” Cayla told me. “What if we had arrived an hour later? Or tomorrow?”
I shook my head and tried not to imagine it. I passed dozens of mages in the streets today, and not one of them was armed for an attack. They moved together, which was smart, but depending on their own abilities, it wouldn’t be enough. All it took was three seconds of searing pain, and the branding iron in my hands would decide their fate.
I took a deep breath as I tried to think of anything I could do to protect the underground city, but the expansive cavern and the multitude of mages were truly a nest waiting to be raided by the Master at his next opportunity.
“Godsdamnit,” I finally sighed. “We have to get to work. The Oculus needs a formidable line of defense, and we need to train these mages fast.”
“He’s gonna finally do his job then?” Aurora asked with a livid glance toward Wyresus.
“He’s got a new job,” I told her as I waved a dismissive hand. “We’re training them. Let’s get to King Temin and let him know what the situation is like, and then we’ll book it back to Magehill and start scheduling the training sessions so Kurna can get the word out fast. Did anyone get any names of suspected leaders?”
Shoshanne and Aurora both nodded as they pulled out torn bits of parchment to hand them over. The seven names were scrawled hastily, and I brought them over to the table to show them to Wyresus.
“Recognize these names?” I asked.
Wyresus furrowed his brows. “Ahh, yes,” he said with a faint smile. “Talented mages, very impressive. I promoted them myself, and they’ll do the Order quite proud I believe.”
There wasn’t much I could do beyond let the rage wash over me as I looked down on the head of the Order, so I snatched the slips of parchment back and pocketed them without a word.
“We’re leaving,” I announced through gritted teeth.
The women nodded their agreement as we turned for the door, but Wyresus cleared his throat behind me before he spoke up.
“Now, am I to believe that I am under your protection at this point and therefore fully entitled to request a few guards be posted at my door with those weapons of yours in hand?”
I locked my jaw to a painful degree as Cayla’s grip tightened on her rifle, and when I headed back to the desk, Wyresus shrank another inch in his seat under my gaze.
“I will give you one guard,” I informed him in a low voice, “and post him right here in the corner to watch your every move. He’ll be the male version of Yvette just to make sure you fully absorb how fucked you’ve left this Order, and when he drowns you while he’s giggling and telling you how grateful you should be, I still want you to focus on your work. Got it?”
Chapter 11
Two guards of King Temin’s castle led us directly to the great hall where the lords were gathered once more to discuss the trade route between Orebane and Illaria.
I caught Temin’s eye as we entered and gestured him over, and once he announced a twenty-minute recess to the court, he swiftly joined us and motioned for us to follow him to a more private side chamber.
The king offered the gilded seats in the chamber to my women before he took his place at a large ornate table, and I sat opposite him.
“I gather from the looks on all of your faces that you do not have good news for me,” King Temin guessed.
“In some respects,” I admitted. “We’ve spoken with the mages in Falmount Rift and have just come from the Oculus.”
“Falmount Rift?” the King asked in confusion.
“That’s the name of the town at Magehill, sir,” I quickly explained. “The mages have been expanding the place because it’s the safest area for them at present. We interceded just in time to stop a mass branding at the Oculus only this morning, and from the looks of it, we’ll need to heighten security there if you’re going to avoid an incident like this in the future. The Master isn’t going to leave a nest like that alone.”
“Gods,” the King breathed as
he stared in disbelief. “Then the Master has targeted the Order entirely.”
“I believe so,” I continued. “The mages there are living in constant fear and have taken to travelling in groups in the hopes of avoiding an attack, but they need more than that. We need to arm them for close range assaults, because once their powers fail to counter the Defenders’, this will be their last resort in avoiding the brandings.”
“The Defenders?” the king said in alarm.
“Yes, sir,” I replied. “So far, our list of suspects is comprised solely of Defenders Wyresus has promoted since he took over as head of the Order, but he’s also failed to continue training the younger mages. This makes them much more vulnerable to an attack by the Defenders who have already been branded with the Master’s rune.”
“Has Wyresus been working for the Master all this time?” Temin asked next, and I could see his nerves were winding themselves into a knot at the thought.
“No, sir,” I assured him. “Wyresus isn’t working for anyone. He’s been hiding in the cellars below the library and wishes to resign from his post.”
Temin flushed with fury, and the vein on the side of his temple began to pulse.
“Resign?” he growled. “At this time?”
“Don’t worry, he won’t be resigning,” I said with half a smirk. “I’ve made arrangements for him to pass his time down there more sufficiently, and for now, he’ll remain as the head of the Order to ensure the citizens of Serin have some semblance of order and security.”
Temin let out a heavy sigh of relief, but his cheeks remained flushed with agitation.
“Thank you, Defender Flynt,” he said as he furrowed his brow. “At least I can trust you to keep that coward in place. But what of the mages? What will we do?”
“I’ve arranged for training sessions to take place at Falmount Rift, but I don’t have enough weapons to arm every mage in the Oculus, so I’ll be working on building a line of defense for the next week or so.”