by P. R. Adams
“Killing is always the same.”
“We have to kill to survive. Even if we wanted to live off roots and nuts and berries, there aren’t enough.”
She bowed her head and closed her eyes. “That change nothing.”
Lonar chuckled. “Does that mean we don’t have to give her a cut of the meat?”
Riyun squinted at the glowing staff. The energies seemed to fade, then were gone. Green energy. The color of the fire at the boarding house. “You.”
Tarlayn straightened. “What?”
“The fire we shouldn’t have survived. The hooves that should have crushed Lonar’s body. You stopped it all. That staff—”
“I can’t stop everything, but I do what I can.”
The soft clatter of armor and thud of booted feet announced the arrival of the others. Javika was at the front, sword still gory. Quil was close behind, followed by Hirvok. Naru and Tawod brought up the rear.
Javika looked from Lonar to the tall grass, then to Tarlayn. “Where is Symbra?”
The old woman waved back the way she’d come. “Safe. Sleeping. The bura won’t disturb her.”
“You were supposed to watch her.”
“As I said, she is safe. Unlike your friend here, who seemed determined to get himself killed.”
Hirvok squatted beside the fallen animal, watching out of the corner of his eye as the big man smiled. “What did you think you were doing?”
Lonar seemed genuinely surprised. “Getting us dinner.”
“By trying to punch out a bull? You think we’re stupid?”
“Well, the lieutenant was running right at them.”
Riyun winced. He’d misjudged how the animals would react. They weren’t just copies of the beasts from his dimension. Even if they had been, the computers and humans behind their design could easily have changed many aspects of their behavior. After all, how many animals in his own world ever knew something as terrible as a hunter that could strike from the sky or breathe fire? Only the most pathetic of humans would do such a thing, removing the limited risks of hunting, but in this world…
“It was a bad call.” He looked away from Javika’s glare. “I’ll be more careful.”
Hirvok stood and brushed his gloves against each other. “This whole thing—chasing after this Meriscoya guy, cutting across this wide-open territory to go to a temple…” He shook his head. “You think that’s careful? Because it isn’t. It’s crazy.”
Quil crouched beside Lonar and probed the dead animal’s abdomen, knife ready for the cut. “He is right. Logically speaking, at least. This trip exposes us and costs us time. And the foraging and hunting…” The pseudo considered Lonar for a moment.
Riyun sighed. “Another oversight. I guess I should have expected that these dragons would burn the plains down. I just thought they would need food…”
“Perhaps they have some strange metabolism that allows them to live off stored calories longer.”
“Yeah. That’s possible. But there’s something you’re missing: They haven’t spotted us yet, or they would’ve attacked.”
Hirvok rolled his eyes. “So, because we’ve been lucky so far, we should count on that luck carrying on. Are you serious?”
“How many of those dragons are there? The big ones?” Riyun twisted around to Tarlayn. “How many?”
The old woman flexed her burned hand. “He has all of the most powerful under his influence.”
“The big ones are the most powerful?”
“Yes. There are thirteen, unless they have turned against each other, as they inevitably do. And the biggest—Niyalki. The one that attacked you.”
“So they might be distracted. They might be having some sort of tiff, right?”
“It happens. Even Meriscoya can’t stop that. Dragons are self-absorbed by nature. Without his influence, having even one rival nearby would lead to instant challenge by whoever claimed this area. Eventually, Niyalki will kill all rivals.”
Riyun pointed to her. “All right? We have a window of opportunity. They’re distracted. So let’s butcher these animals and move on.”
Naru stepped away from Tawod, who she’d been whispering to. “Um…” She looked embarrassed.
“What is it?” Riyun didn’t need to hear how draining their pace had been. It was a constant complaint from her and the demolitions expert. The two seemed more concerned about finding opportunities for private getaways than getting across the burned plains.
“I guess I have…” She shrugged and turned away. “Never mind. It’s nothing.”
“Wait. If you’ve got something, tell me.” Riyun looked to the rest of the team. “That goes for all of you. I may be in charge, but I don’t have all the answers. I don’t think any of us do.”
“Well—” Naru drew in a deep breath. “It’s just this strange thing you’re talking about. Them not spotting us? Maybe it’s not that the dragons are fighting each other. I guess they could be, but what if it wasn’t just because they…?” She blushed. “This sounds so stupid.”
“Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?”
“Okay. Do you know anything about these games? The ones like Zabila played?”
“Not a damn thing.”
“Well, they all have certain design elements in common. I mean, everything in entertainment draws from basic narrative structure—books, movies, games. All the things Beraga’s company does.”
Quil’s knife tore through the animal’s gut, releasing its innards. He twisted around to watch the hacker but didn’t speak.
Naru seemed to notice and almost lost her nerve. “So, this narrative structure? Maybe that’s what’s working in our favor.” The words seemed to tumble out, one on top of the other.
Riyun held a hand up to slow her down. “I’m not following you. Spell it out for me.”
“All right. In any story—especially these games—the hero has to grow and develop from challenges to be able to face the antagonist. The villain. We have to fail and fail and fail, until we’re ready to succeed. And you suffer losses. It’s how you grow. In these games, you actually have to put a mechanic in place for that to happen. A lot of them, it’s what they call levels. You accomplish a quest, you gain a level. Each time you gain a level, you get new abilities. So you go through a bunch of these quests, and then you fight a really important bad guy, and then you eventually get tough enough to fight the big bad.”
“Meriscoya.”
“Exactly. So the whole narrative structure of this game—this world we’re in—might be working to protect us until we’re actually ready to fight those dragons. And when we defeat them, we can go against him.”
It took some effort for Riyun not to snort. He really did want to hear Naru’s idea and the ideas anyone else might have. But it all sounded so absurd when she said it. “Thank you.”
She blushed even more. “I told you it sounded stupid.”
Quil turned from his butchering. “Actually, there is a graceful logic to what she said.”
The last thing Riyun could afford was to lose Quil’s rational thoughts to something as nonsensical as their fates being controlled by software. What Naru had described—the failing and trying again and failing some more… That was just life. It wasn’t some structure. It was how people lived. Most never succeeded, not truly. And there were never convenient enemies you one day became capable of defeating so you could rise up to your true rewards.
You just struggled, then one day you died.
Kozmut was a perfect example. Would there be some reward for kicking his ass one day?
No.
Riyun was going to do it, but that was simply fixing the scales.
But what if she was right? They’d already suffered losses: Lonar and Symbra. Neither seemed likely to survive.
It wasn’t productive thinking, and Riyun couldn’t afford for anyone to be distracted by it. “I’ll keep this in mind.”
The pseudo went back to cutting the flesh from the animal but stopped. “I do hope you
will consider what she’s saying. It could at least provide some explanation for some of the things that we have encountered and the way we have reached this point.”
“I’m listening. But don’t expect me to drop my guard.”
“That would be unwise.”
“Exactly. I’m getting all of us out of here, and I don’t care about some story structure and how it might determine one thing or another. We’re not giving up, and we’re not counting on providence.”
Tarlayn looked as if she’d just seen a ghost; Riyun hooked a finger to signal for her to follow him away from the others.
He stopped when he was safely out of earshot and gave the old woman a moment to speak, but all she managed to do was squint and twist her lips. It was as if she wanted to talk but had lost all facility for it.
“Hey.” He looked past her at the others to be sure the two of them could talk safely. “Hey! I need answers.”
“Answers?” Her voice shook.
“What are we up against? Dragons, this Meriscoya guy, sure. But what else? How did things get to be like this?”
“Like this?” She blinked.
It was Naru’s description of the situation. Tarlayn must have put together what it meant. “Are you okay?”
The old woman shook her head and squared her shoulders. The confidence returned to her eyes. “I am…fine. You want to know about the history of our world?”
“The relevant parts. What affects my squad and me.”
“Yes. Well, I should start with myself.”
“Please.”
“I was born a little over three hundred years ago.”
“Three hun—” She wasn’t being facetious or playful. Other than Onaths who dabbled in anti-aging technology, no one where Riyun came from lived too much beyond a century. There were hard limits to what human biology could manage. More than three?
“Don’t be surprised. With the powers available to me, I could last another century.” She held out her burned hand and studied it. “If I could endure the pain.”
“All right. So, are you born to be a wizard, or do you study to be a wizard, or…?”
“You are born to it, but to be competent requires training. In your youth, the magic awakens. With puberty, it becomes a danger. If you haven’t found a mentor by then, you are shunned as a threat to everyone.”
“That means, what—you’re coming up on three hundred years with this power?”
“Yes. Nearly three centuries as student or mentor. And in that time, I have traveled across three continents. I have seen powers rise and fall. I have served for the good, and I have destroyed the bad.”
Her confidence truly had returned, and it bordered on dangerous imperiousness. Good and bad…Riyun felt he had a decent grasp of moral living, and he could look back on his career and count only a handful of times where he honestly regretted taking a job. He was a good judge of character, but he couldn’t get a read on this old woman. Did her certainty about her actions indicate someone reckless and arrogant, or did they indicate a wisdom that came with so many years of experience?
She touched the gem embedded at the top of her staff, an emerald as big as his palm. Energy crackled around the stone, this time a similar green to her eyes. “Some years ago, I had a trio of promising prodigies. Karveau, Meriscoya, and shortly after them, Dresh. They all exhibited so much potential.”
“And?”
“And Meriscoya resented the other two. He killed Karveau and took the power from him.”
“Wait. Took the power from him? Your magic? How—?”
“Our power is in the world around us, but it is also within.” She touched her chest. “It is an energy that can be sustained and even grown with time and training. Even when we expend it, we can reclaim it eventually. And if we are twisted and evil, we can steal that power from others. We can steal their lives.”
“And that’s how this Meriscoya became this ‘dread wizard’ you mentioned? He took the power of another powerful wizard?”
“More than one. And he might have taken Dresh as well.”
“This other wizard you taught?”
“Yes. She disappeared not long after Karveau’s death. I had asked her to stand with me against Meriscoya.”
“You’ve fought him for a while?”
“Many years. I’ve tried many ways.”
“No luck, huh?”
“With Dresh, I had hope. Perhaps she fled in fear.”
“But you don’t think she fled.”
The old wizard bowed her head. “No.”
“And you don’t think he killed her.”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“It’s possible she might have fallen in with him. And if she has, then this world has no hope at all.”
25
After a few days, the plains gave way to a slightly hillier region. The soil turned darker, the plants more diversified and hardy, coming back from the dragon-born fires with a vengeance. Their leaves and the occasional clumps of grass were a dark green, often with jagged edges. When the winds blew, they carried a variety of fragrances—sweet, pungent, sharp, soothing. Berries and other fruits still survived in places, although not many. Most of the plant life would be years recovering, but Riyun found himself enjoying the tasty treats they dug out of the ground or picked from thick and stubborn vines.
Even with the meat to sustain them and fruits and nuts to add variety, he worried about Lonar and Symbra. The big man was wearing down again, but this time he was showing no sign of an upswing. And one of Symbra’s burn wounds was infected, turning dark and weeping a foul pus. Quil had become agitated, an unnatural state for him. He accepted Tarlayn’s assistance while scowling at her herbal remedies and powders when she wasn’t looking.
Would he be so skeptical if he believed she was as old she claimed to be?
Dragons or not, they traveled in the light of day, favoring the warmth of the sunlight and counting on the limited cover to hide them from the flying threats. They also moved in relative silence, always alert for any sound that might announce the approach of an enemy.
Midway through their fourth day since reaching the hills, Riyun spotted Javika sprinting back toward them from her scouting position. He didn’t need to wave the others down. There was limited cover among the twisted and blasted trees and the scorched rocks that jutted from the dark ground.
He dropped beneath a cracked trunk that grew parallel to the ground. Vines and fungus tangled around the handful of branches that hadn’t burned away, providing some concealment.
It wasn’t enough to hide them from Javika. She slowed more than one hundred feet out.
No threat, then. He rolled out from under the tree. “What is it?”
She stopped, panting. She was too fit to be winded unless she’d panicked. She doubled over, hands resting on thighs, then finally caught her breath. “The temple.” She straightened and pointed the way she’d come, toward a distant high hill. “Gone.”
Tarlayn rose from behind the small boulder she’d used for cover. “Gone? The temple is immortal.”
“Your immortal temple is gone. All that remains are blasted stone walls.”
The old wizard dropped back into the same sort of state she’d fallen into after they’d slaughtered the bura on the plains. She seemed on the verge of collapse. This time, she recovered quickly, straightening and throwing back her head. “Take us.”
Riyun nodded, and they all fell in behind the Biwali warrior. He abandoned the idea of maintaining a good distance from her, settling just behind her and to her left. “Anything up there?”
“Part of the wall. Some of the hill sparkles like glass.”
Glass. Superheated silica. Had the dragons given the place special attention? “Any chance someone might have found a hiding place nearby? A cave?”
“There are no caves.”
No survivors, then.
Had Tarlayn been counting on someone? Had she grown close to someone there in her long
life? It certainly seemed personal for her. He scanned the sky, which was gray where the sun didn’t shine through. Fall was rushing toward winter. Would spring bring with it rebirth, or would it all end in winter?
The world hardly felt like fantasy, much less wholesale fantasy. He was still trying to make sense of the idea that this was some sort of playground for people. What sort of people? How could they find it in any way alluring?
It didn’t take long for him to spot the glint of sunlight on glass. A wind slowly picked up the closer they drew to the base of the hill. From top to bottom, it was black. The dragons had burned everything down to the soil, exposing rock in many places, turning patches slick and shiny with their fire. It was a tough climb, the ground unreliable and dangerous in parts. Twice, glass shattered beneath his boots with a loud crinkle. He lost sight of the walls the second he started up the slope, but a little past the midpoint those walls came into view again.
The segments of walls…
Exactly as Javika had said, nothing truly remained. The illusion of walls became the reality of crumpled stone piles and sections that seemed determined to defy gravity.
Tarlayn moved stiffly along the front of the structure until she reached a section where the piles weren’t as high. “The main gate.” Her voice was fragile and soft as a feather.
Riyun helped her over the rubble, then helped Hirvok with Symbra. Lonar brushed away assistance, dripping sweat and gasping.
They gathered in a relatively open space that must have been a courtyard before. Some of the sections that seemed to be standing walls turned out to be remnants of stone buildings. The largest of those had been a rectangular structure that still held a basic shape thanks to a sturdy foundation and thick walls within and out. The highest of those reached at least twenty feet.
How large had this place been, and what had it taken for the dragons to do this?
The old wizard stopped in front of a stone partition with an arch in it. “The western door. The wood was so thick, it could withstand a battering ram.” She placed a hand on where she must have imagined the door would be. “The magic here…”
Riyun quietly moved to her side. “These dragons, you said they had a power of their own, power enough to not fear Meriscoya.”