Merrie Dawn

by Chris

  ~

  Elias watched the valley from the edge of a cliff, turning his ears back and forth as he listened for anything out of place. The final leg of his journey had taken him into the mountainous lands between three small human kingdoms, reason enough to concern any izzat. Humans weren't the cause of his unease, however.

  Something was wrong. Something of magic.

  Storm winds swayed the tree tops like wind-swept grass as his cloak whipped about his legs and threatened to push him over the edge. He backed a step as the wingbuds on his shoulder-blades tightened in anticipation of a flight he couldn't take.

  He caught movement a mile away; a group of mounted humans travelling through the forest. About fifty in all, most wore chain shirts and carried lances. Soldiers meant nobility, possibly even royalty in these parts. The coincidence was intriguing. He cast a near-sight spell to make the air before him work like convex glass and picked out five nobles and a small entourage among the soldiers, including a rather hefty warrior-priest judging by his dark grey robes. Half the soldiers rode ahead, lances resting in stirrups. The rest followed the nobles.

  Elias's sense of foreboding grew as he watched, although nothing suggested the humans were responsible for it. He crouched and placed his longbow behind him, the wind blowing under his cloak. It left him cold, reflecting a chill in his spirit he'd been fighting since leaving his homeland.

  The very air seemed to resonate with anticipation. It was nothing obvious, nothing aggressive, but it made him restless.

  Distant thunder echoed across the valley while dark clouds on the northern ranges shed heavy rain. The humans turned north again toward the lowlands of Fandelyon, but nothing in that direction pulled at him either. He reworked the near-sight spell to gain more detail. Four of the nobles wore a standing bear embroidered in white, while one of three girls bore a crimson wyvern embroidered in golden thread.

  As he watched the wind whipped her hood back, revealing the red hair of a clanswoman, though curly like a lowland peasant. His wingbuds tightened with a chill of recognition. He would have staggered if he'd been standing. Her soul resonated in tune with his own. It was instant recognition on a near-divine level.

  "Princess Caroline," Allyn said.

  Elias almost jumped. He stood up to cover his embarrassment. He hadn't heard his teacher approach. Why did his soul recognise hers? Had they met in a previous life?

  Allyn's emerald eyes reflected his amusement at catching his student off guard, his angular face softening. Elias wasn't sure how old his teacher was, but he was rumoured to have been there when the unicorn was slain by the faspane two hundred millennia ago. Only one unicorn remained now, his people it's guardian. If it was killed magic would fade from the world.

  If Allyn really was as old as everyone said, the years should have bought wisdom, yet most of the time he acted like a curious teenager.

  "She bears a royal wyvern on her cloak," said Allyn.

  "So does every soldier and both maids. She could be a noble come to marry one of Fandelyon's princes." His wingbuds tightened as he watched her. "I recognise her soul Allyn. There's no attraction," he added a little too quickly. The girl was human, after all. "Merely recognition."

  Allyn raised an eyebrow as if he'd heard the lie. "Perhaps she was once born an izzen? If so, she's fallen a long way. Whatever relationship you had must have resolved itself in a previous lifetime if it's mere recognition you feel."

  Elias wasn't sure he wanted to voice his next concern. "Yet still, could we be… soulmates? I wouldn't know what that feels like."

  "If I were to guess, I'd say your soul is very new, so it's unlikely. Most soulmates know each other for many lifetimes before taking the eternal commitment."

  "You think my soul's new? Aren't new souls usually born among mortal creatures?"

  "Most people are born with a history. It's as if they've come to their new lives knowing they should be doing something, but clueless about what that might be. You're waiting for something, not chasing something, which suggests newness."

  "My grandparents are soulmates. Could that have something to do with it?"

  "Like?"

  "Resonance from them? I don't know. Did they tell you how they came to bind themselves to each other?"

  Allyn's narrow eyes watched the valley. "No, but their souls are old. Ancient. They were soulmates in previous lifetimes."

  "I thought they were newly bound in this lifetime?"

  "Queen Sellendria once told me she knew your grandfather was her soulmate the moment they saw each other in their youth. Their souls have history."

  That didn't help. "Despite my apparent newness, is it still possible I could have a soulmate from a previous life? I must have been born before to be izzen in this life."

  "When the Gods create a new soul, they create it from the essence of life itself, drawn from the Void. Sometimes though they create twin souls - a single soul divided into two. Perhaps you've seen your soul's twin?"

  "Twins?" Elias pushed hair back from his face. The Gods had a sense of irony if his soul's twin was human. Best to change the subject. "Perhaps the girl down there's not Princess Caroline. Maybe she's clan born and on her way to marry one of the King's sons? A treaty of some sort?"

  "Fandelyon's heirs are barely fifteen. They won't be marrying for a few years yet. That's got to be their older sister."

  "But-"

  "Most nobles this side of the Temern Straight are blonde, the descendants of the invasion thousands of years ago. The clans arrived from the same sinking continent, but they took to the mountains and stayed apart, fighting fiercely for their independence. You know the King married a woman of clannish descent. Queen Lynn. That has be their eldest daughter."

  "If our souls are twinned, the Gods have a wicked sense of humour. I can feel the connection pulling at me, even at this distance."

  "Then you should avoid her. If you bind yourselves together, you'll die when she dies."

  He'd already considered that. It scared him more than anything else ever had, even the prospect of his upcoming test. Shifting forces touched him again, teasing him toward the valley. Like earlier, it felt magical. "Something's not right."

  "Really?" Allyn asked with feigned innocence. "If you figure it out, come and tell me. I'm going to finish my meal."

  "You know? What is it?"

  The wind pushed Allyn's long pale hair back, revealing high cheekbones and a sharp jawline. He grinned, acting the teenager again. "You need the practice. Don't forget your wards."

  "Why not just tell me?"

  Allyn gave the question serious consideration before answering. "I suspect the Gods are paying close attention to events here, most likely manipulating our Realm to deliver new elements into their game. I can sense Quala Umitha stirring against the edges of our Realm as our reality bends under their influence."

  "The course of the future is being altered? Now? Could it be Noramgaell?" The thought made his heart start pounding. Fear or anticipation?

  "Perhaps. The final battle between the Gods is closing in. Only Marnier du Shae and Marak du Tren remain in the contest, though the others will be attempting to exert influence and gain concessions for their followers."

  "So it's not a coincidence that I've just found my soul's twin?"

  Allyn shrugged. "Seek your own answers. I have none."

  As Allyn left, Elias sent his magical senses questing so fast it made him giddy. He paused to re-orientate himself, before forming a magical net over the entire area and sending his Sight into it. When his vision adjusted he saw magic, life itself, illuminating the world. Wherever it pooled, magical creatures congregated like animals around a waterhole.

  Elias adjusted the net to screen out the natural magics, looking for subtler energies. Human auras glowed dully, while further back along the road heavy patches of magical energy clung to the ground like mist.

  Were the faspane up to something? He and Allyn had seen far t
oo many signs of their mortal cousins. He searched again, but each time he came close to pinpointing the magic's source, it slipped away as if never there.

  Curious, he reworked the net to resonate against directed energy. Between one breath and the next, his net illuminated with power. He stiffened and cried out as sparks showered the air around him and his chest cramped. He fell gasping to his knees, the icy wind blowing his cloak over his head. He gulped for air and fought down the initial power flow, but another surge tore control from his grasp.

  Like mist before the wind, the barriers between this world and the Higher Realm wavered. His vision twisted in nauseating slowness as he beheld the edges of Quala Umitha, a vision of eternity only a God's mind could fully encompass and influence. To Elias, it was a revelation of infinite possibilities bound within the Fey Realm.

  Billions of probabilities hit his overextended mind, each a potential future. He tried to force the visions away, but they changed again and again until he could barely tell them apart; an unbearable wall of pain.

  A single vision cut through the others; a man standing beside a pool of rippling silver – the Silver Well containing the Power of Ages. Phoenix, Marak du Tren's Champion, held a ball of liquid power from the pool.

  This was a prophecy. If today's events failed to lay a new course Phoenix would gain dominance over the Silver Well. The prospect was even more terrifying than the faspane invading his homeland.

  Drawing on all his strength, Elias desperately constructed a ward to act as a block between his mind and Quala Umitha. Although the pain eased and his senses cleared he could feel the power mounting on the other side.

  He opened his eyes, shoulders tight with tension. He had to survive and warn Allyn. Trembling as power trickled through his ward, he yelled and slashed at the link with all his remaining power, crossing his forearms as he invoked a desperate warding.

  Lightning born of twisted magic struck and threw him hard against a tree. Energies arced about him, and then dissipated into the ground.

  Chapter 2

  Elias groaned and gingerly stretched his bruised limbs as the breeze ruffled his hair. The air stank of burned wood and lightning. It could have easily stank of his own burned flesh if he'd been less lucky. The pine where he'd been standing still smoked, its side charred. Several coin-sized patches of glazed rock provided evidence of the power he'd unwittingly unleashed.

  There was too much magical resonance to detect anything else. He couldn't even sense Quala Umitha. Hopefully it had withdrawn back into the Fey Realm where it belonged. Head pounding and his bottom lip sore from where he'd bitten it, he stood and focused his thoughts before sending another net out, this time fully warded against a backlash.

  He found the mist-like energy again, slightly stronger where the humans were, though still spread wide and difficult to centre on. He'd missed the obvious. "You idiot," he muttered to himself. He'd missed it because it was impossible, or should be.

  He finally recognised an unconscious energy dispersal, all that prevented a latent sorcerer's power from building into something dangerous.

  It didn't make sense. There was enough energy being dispersed for two or three novice izzen, and no creature had that much power, particularly not a human. They'd lost their magic when they'd lost their immortality, or so the legends went. It would take hundreds of humans, thousands perhaps, to produce that much latent magic.

  He released his net, running his fingers through his hair as the implications sank in. The significance of it so close to Noramgaell had unsettling consequences. The final battle between the Goddess of Healing, Marnier du Shae, and the Paladin of War, Marak du Tren, must be closer than Allyn thought. One of the Gods had gambled a lot on a single human by investing them with so much power.

  Still mulling the implications, he picked up his ghostwood longbow and followed Allyn's barely discernible tracks to a sheltered copse of trees, the wind there hardly strong enough to tousle his hair.

  "Setting wards against unexpected surges isn't such an issue anymore, I take it?" Allyn asked with a disarming grin. Despite the criticism, Elias saw concern and relief in the sorcerer's eyes.

  "You knew," he said. "There's a human down there with more magic than even you and I possess together."

  Allyn gave a slow nod. "As unlikely as that seems."

  "What the seers said about Noramgaell is true then? The Gods really are drawing humans into conflict." A rune-carved ghostwood staff lay on the ground beside their packs. Allyn casually picked it up as he stood, but Elias read suppressed excitement. He should have taken more notice of his teacher before.

  "With training, someone in that party could be very powerful." Childlike eagerness coloured Allyn's voice, making him seem as young as his features. "The faspane have aligned with Marak du Tren whether they know it or not. Someone down there could be the key to tipping this war toward Marnier du Shae."

  "We can't go after the human," Elias said. "The faspane are too close and their wizard will have noticed the magical resonance."

  Allyn gave Elias a hard look he hadn't seen since his early tutelage. "The decision's mine, not yours."

  "The Queen and Council gave us both a task. Investigating humans isn't it."

  Allyn's hard look melted into a grin. "I suspect the Gods are laughing at you just now, daring you to ignore their influence."

  "The faspane…"

  "Have no real chance of finding us. They'll be seeking the human too, which is as good a reason as any to interfere."

  "Interfering would be reckless." Curious, Elias walked back to the cliff, hoping to discover more. Allyn followed. The wind was picking up with the fast-approaching storm.

  "The feeling of being drawn to the valley is far stronger than your connection to your soul's twin, isn't it?" Allyn asked. "I feel it too."

  "All I'm sure is that there's war and death surrounding at least one person there, probably all of them. If we get involved it could cost us our lives." Not that Noramgaell or even his upcoming test offered better prospects.

  "Are you planning on living forever?"

  "Yes."

  Allyn grinned as if he'd just heard idiocy. "We're immortal, not eternal."

  "You're so ridiculously old you can hardly comment on such issues."

  "Yet I'm still not eternal."

  It wasn't an argument he was likely to win. "The power I felt from the latent was different compared to our own kind. Raw."

  "Someone down there has been touched by one of the Gods, and I don't mean as a Divine Servant. Marnier du Shae has upset the balance and so the other Gods are taking advantage of their freedom to act."

  "Marnier du Shae can only be responding to Marak du Tren's gift of eternal life which was given to Phoenix."

  "For which we've helped the shivras create the Sword of the Sun. No. The Gods act through us, they cannot affect anything directly. It would have taken Marnia du Shae millennia to invest that much power into a single human. She's been very subtle. Most likely, the other Gods have just found out."

  "Perhaps there's a new alliance between Gods?"

  Allyn's ears lifted as if he hadn't considered that. "You saw something within Quala Umitha, didn't you?"

  Elias nodded his head. "Phoenix at the Silver Well. He intends to master its power."

  "Then we must find the human Marnier du Shae favours before the faspane can kill him or her. They may be the key to stopping Phoenix."

  "It has to be Princess Caroline. The coincidence is too convenient otherwise."

  "I agree."

  Elias sighed. "You're going to defy Queen and Council and go after her, aren't you?"

  "Of course."

  Why did Elias always feel like the adult? "We're supposed to meet Dobbin, not investigate latent human sorcerers. And don't even consider invoking my bond to you. We have a sacred duty to Queen and Council."

  "Then I suggest you break the bond. You've been capable for years."


  "Our laws demand the bond remain so long as you're my teacher."

  "Then act like a student and respect my decision."

  "But…"

  "We'll meet Dobbin in plenty of time. This will only take an hour or two."

  Heavy grey clouds moved across the valley, mottling the forest with patches of sunlight. Something glinted within the trees north of the nobles' party. Elias cast his near-sight spell and picked out a man wearing chain mail and a plain white tabard darting through a clearing. A mile ahead of Princess Caroline's retinue there were more glints of chain mail and halberds on both sides of the road. They greatly outnumbered the forty soldiers guarding her.

  "Ambush," he murmured.

  Allyn frowned as he cast the same spell, squinting through the slight distortion. "I estimate a hundred men." He grinned and slapped Elias on the back, almost toppling him over the edge. "Let's see what's going on."

  Elias grabbed the sorcerer's cloak. "That's a battle you're about to drag us into."

  Allyn glanced at Elias's hand on his cloak as if amused. "And?"

  Elias let go and Allyn walked away. Back at the clearing Elias watched restlessly as Allyn gathered the remains of his meal into his backpack. Elias crouched before Allyn. "Don't do this. Please. It's dangerous."

  "Of course it's dangerous, but it's also exciting, isn't it? We'll get to Dobbin's cabin soon enough and we can provide plenty of distractions if the faspane show up."

  Elias could almost feel divine will pulling at him. "But…"

  "I only want to see what's going on."

  "Why do I doubt that?"

  Allyn grinned. "Because humans with great power don't exist, and that human's got far too much for any race, mortal or otherwise," he said. He stood and slung his backpack across his shoulder and picked up his staff. "Follow or not. If not, I'll see you at Dobbin's cabin."

  "One exists," Elias said under his breath. He almost felt his fate tangling with a Gods-determined misadventure. "Promise me we're not getting involved. Allyn?"