Convict Fenix

by Alan Brickett

  He threw a second blast at the further gathering of beings, a ball of blue fire scintillating in more profound and lighter hues that exploded among them even as they sought to escape. He didn’t wait to see the results, charred humanoids, and others running about while set alight could wait, the real threat was the giants.

  At least until anything else showed their resilience.

  He lashed out with great gouts of flame, massive waves that beat against the giants and pushed them further back. On all sides, what little grass there was caught alight and burned briefly with a blue-white fire and then crumpled into ash.

  He stepped forward slowly, obstinately approaching the three brothers behind his sheets of fire. Instinctively he raised a shield, an orb of powerful flame that surrounded him just before a green lance of energy struck.

  The blue giant had gotten up onto his haunches, despite the terrible burns, he had summoned a trident of some brassy looking metal, and from this weapon, and he fired another lance of energy equally as ineffectually. The splashes of color were quickly joined by two others as the brothers added to the barrage with their own. The blue shield easily repelled the attacks, but he could feel how much energy was thrown behind them, impressively.

  His attacks and even his defense lacked a certain amount of finesse, a finesse that he felt he should possess, but that was locked away within his mind.

  For now, it didn’t matter, he had vast reserves of energy to utilize in this fight, and he fully intended to vent his fury on these hapless beings, as big as they were they should be able to take the punishment he was wont to dish out.

  He summoned great pillars of fire that struck up from the ground around the giants, he didn’t aim them to erupt beneath them, just throw them off balance. The columns then started to move, weaving across the ground at a sedate pace, burning high up into the air.

  They were just to create an opening, a distraction, one he worked on quickly and carefully. After he killed the weakened giant, the blue one, the other two struck back ferociously, upset at the death of their kin.

  The battle on the arrivals platform devolved into a match of powerfully flung magic that devastated a large area around it.

  **

  It was only much later that he realized just how much he had not known about the Prison and its unique properties.

  The Vitae he acquired from the multitude of corpses was of great value to him after that. But it was significantly reduced because of the efforts used to defend its originators from his wrath. Even the Vitae taken from the giant’s desiccated forms was small, they had fought very well and expended much of their Vitae in the hopes of surviving.

  After that first frantic battle, he remembered a bit about himself, already drawing together several threads and coming to realize that he should not have been so wanton in his actions. But he wasn’t going to lament events outside of his control, after all the anger had been a powerful and intense feeling, one he had not been able to put aside without the discipline his memories afforded him.

  And such power, the raw display had lent him a great deal of confidence while his memories tempered that ego with rationality.

  In that time, the Festering Warrens did not exist, the plateau that would one day house so many subservient to the Warlock was instead an estate of stone dwellings housing the giant brothers’ workforce.

  Over the intervening years, their buildings and stone homes would be dismantled for materials used by others. The giant’s home itself would then be appropriated by others and eventually fall into the hands of the Warlock to be used as the base of operations for the mines.

  Unwittingly Fenix had removed the dominant power in the area, the three brothers having run the northwestern region of the Prison for some time. Somehow, they had gathered a variety of teleport keys and then proceeded to squash out new arrivals to prevent any new competition.

  Without easy access to the arrivals area, the other beings of power had not taken much interest in competing with the giants.

  This left Fenix to explore on his own, find his way along the paths and through the mountains, along the trails and the land masses where he would one day return. And even then he had known he might be back, as his memories were recalled so too did his anger burn brightly again.

  Not overpowering him, but certainly driving him until at last, he could remember the final betrayal and all of its implications.

  If he had wanted to, Fenix could have ruled the Prison in that time, but he had no such desire. Even then, it was the need to escape driving him through the many weeks of exploration.

  He eventually got himself a teleport key, and he moved around the Prison, ranging far and wide, to determine how it worked and what he would do. And all that time, he plotted, planning his return to the cosmos outside and ultimately what he was going to do once he won his freedom.

  It was a big decision, because one course of action, the one that dominated his thoughts and desires, would likely find him dead or quickly returned to this very place. And if he were going to take that action, which he was heavily leaning toward doing, then he would need to ensure he could survive the Prison a second time over.

  He had got lucky in arrivals, conditions like that would be hard to repeat and especially if he succeeded with what he was planning, arriving in the orange would be a sure sign of trouble.

  Circumstances this time had prevailed to allow him to arrive in a hidden manner, the anonymity of the sackcloth. That, and She had allowed him to retain a lot of power; during his capture, trial and then after being sent through the vortex, it had not drained him.

  But if such a thing were to recur in the future he would likely be far less prepared, have less available energy and be marked out. He could not assume that it would be any other way.

  So arriving again in the Prison would be a problem, one that would have lethal consequences.

  Unless he could plan his way around it somehow.

  Day 215…

  He got lucky that last time, amazingly enough, when he first got to the Prison.

  The planning that had gone into his return, the foresight, it was astonishing. Fenix contemplated this even as another gust of frigid wind tried to throw him from the side of the mountain and dash his body against the unyielding stones far below.

  The cold wasn’t a problem, neither was digging into the stone what with his magical empowerment, but the wind snatched at the large satchel of equipment he had strapped to his back, and he did not want to lose it.

  Otherwise, he would have to go back to reconstruct it and start the climb once again. It had taken long enough to prepare and get here, he didn’t want to have to waste it and start over.

  His sanctuary had lived up to every promise, the contents every bit as detailed as he could have hoped for. As his memories had informed him, the Fenix of the past prepared for the Fenix of the present to have the best chance of surviving the Prison, both from arrival and all the way through to escape. Although the escape was only a possibility if he was there to read the notes he had left for himself of course.

  But since he was back again and there to read the notes, then the means of escape he had attempted the last time would work for him again. Albeit with a few modifications for what was very likely a change in the method precipitated by the previous success. After all, the Warden would have to adapt to any means of escape and therefore require Fenix to change again.

  With tiny cilia of blue fire protruding from his palm, he gripped the next frozen rock and pulled himself up. These were the highest mountains in the Prison, furthest to the north and east the frozen topped land mass was the source of the coldest air and served as a node for the overall weather system. It was also the only way to get to the lost plateau as described in the notes he had left.

  Apparently, he was the reason the plateau was lost in the first place, and not just out of whim, but part of a deliberate plan he hadn’t wanted any interference with. Fenix had expected his next visit to the Prison to b
e as short as possible, last time it had taken him years to prepare and escape, this time he wanted it done a lot more quickly, even with reckoning the time it would take to get back his memories, enough of them to make good use of the plans.

  Ambitious, and quite like him.

  It was a strange sensation, to be working at living up to the viewpoint you had of yourself in this way. With memories still returning, it was easy to think of himself as being judged worthy by another version, a better version, of himself. But he could accept it, he knew who he was and knew that he could make such elaborate plans so far in advance; such was the skill of one who could expect to escape imprisonment and seek revenge on a being like Aurelian.

  Halfway up, every shred of strength he had was used to cling to the slippery surface of the mountain, a sheer cliff that no normal man could climb. And with no other way up to the height, he needed to reach the plateau to the south. He had destroyed the teleport stone on the land mass, sundered the bridges, and even managed to push it slightly away, right to the very edge of the magical envelope that kept it aligned with the Prison creature.

  There was no easy way to get there, precisely because Fenix had not wanted anyone else to be able to get there except for the animal that would grow into the component he desired. A component that would be useful to assist his escape, and after when he was back outside. But to get there, he first had to scale the wind lashed ice-covered peak and survive the trip down.

  **

  Pressure built up around the floating Prison, waves of air pushed around by the heat and the cold that emanated from the different land masses designed expressly for that purpose. Most of the pressure resulted in winds pushing up between the diverse clumps of rock floating about.

  Magically tethered these land masses would not move from the wind, as heavy as they were it was unlikely they could be budged even with the considerable lift that sometimes ran rampant among them.

  But it did throw a considerable volume of air up in the gaps between them, enough to prevent easy flying between the different plateaus. Especially if you didn’t want to be tossed up against the top of the sphere within which the pocket dimension existed, or come falling very far down to the bottom if the Prison had drifted by beneath you. But even within this maelstrom of potentially conflicting winds, there were some areas where they were quite useful.

  On his last trip to the Prison, Fenix had not created the lost plateau from some seemingly available land mass. He had given it meticulous thought, how to hide something away so that it wouldn’t be disturbed but still allow enough space and landscape for it to evolve naturally. Some complex criteria and most of which did, in fact, require a land mass with certain specifics.

  However, there were a few available, some of which he could detach with ease and some less so.

  But ultimately, it was the ability to be able to return to the land mass at a later stage that decided it. After all, it was well and good to hide something but if you could not retrieve it then what was the use? But he had to have a way back onto the land mass, which wouldn’t be easily accessible or even well known by anyone else in the Prison.

  Which was where the winds came in.

  From the farthest point northeast, where the cold of the highest mountain peaks sucked up the air, to the upper atmosphere of the Prison, there formed very high currents. Winds of such velocity they did not disperse into flurries or the usual cyclonic tendencies until they were well on their way to the southwest. Into the wall of heat being sucked down lower, only to come back up and give rise to storms, the colder air went for miles.

  And along these currents, from the highest peak, blew a wind so far above the general air currents it could carry a good passenger the hundreds of miles necessary to make a fall, down relatively speaking, along the southern trajectory intersecting the lost plateau.

  Which was why, when the sun rose on the next day after Fenix’s hazardous climb to the highest point of the tallest peak it also glinted from the bone and hide frame of a very large kite. A kite designed for only one passenger.

  Fenix dismantled and carried the paraglider up the mountain to be reassembled for a whooping call and leap that was caught up by this high wind and launching him up over the Prison.

  It was a goodly distance, he had to fly high enough to come down in competing winds but still far enough to cover half the distance from north to south. The notes he had left for himself were detailed on the subject and described much of the stresses involved in constructing the massive kite and the magic he would need to employ to guide it while also holding it together. As audacious as it was ambitious, the plan called for his superior conditioning just to survive the attempt.

  The frame wobbled, creaked, and fought at the tethers binding it, the hide flapped in some places, the bitter cold was kept at bay by only his magical prowess. The wind had so much force he could barely direct his flight at all, but barely was good enough. With blasts of superheated air to cause disruptions when necessary and a vigilant eye at the scenery spread out below him, Fenix flew his makeshift vehicle over the landscape and angled down to glide toward the lost plateau.

  He landed later that same day, the sheer speed of the winds had carried him so quickly that even with the lack of oxygen so high up, and an average being would have perished from the lashing currents sucking the air right out of his lungs.

  Only prodigious stamina and endurance had won him out over the harsh conditions, not enough for a smooth landing as told by the furrow of earth he left with the giant kite crashed into the grassland, but enough that he was relatively unharmed.

  The lost plateau had mesas thrusting up from the surrounding dry land; much of the moisture on this side was carried over to the rest of the Prison. Grass grew near to the small streams and the large lake in the distance, which he had seen while hurtling toward the ground when he left the high winds. Without the lift provided by the air pressure wave so high up the flight quickly devolved into a controlled fall, sometimes gliding, more often just about falling straight down.

  But now he was here, and ready to complete the next stage of a plan started a few decades before. He had to hunt down the creature that he had placed on the plateau so long ago, the one set up to grow into adulthood and provide him a specific component Fenix needed to complete crafting the bow from the plans he had left for himself.

  **

  The beast stood nineteen feet high at the shoulder, a ridged back of prominent bone spikes surrounded by a covering fur.

  Each strand a solid metallic orange color that ended in a tip of blue, the hide covered in the shiny wave was tight on the bones and musculature of a very athletic creature. With four legs, each tipped by three clawed toes and a long, spiny tail, it was every inch the predator.

  What had really interested Fenix though was the magical nature of the beast and it's head. Shaped like a hammerhead the beast’s skull formed a dense bone core around an opening for the mouth set with equally sided jaws.

  The eyes of the creature were set back behind the skull, four of them with different spectrums along the visible wavelength.

  The reason for the eyes and shape of the skull was because the beast was able to hunt at range.

  The metallic fur absorbed sunlight and other energy near constantly, funneling it through the strands and into the nervous system and bones. While some of the energy was used as sustenance, the creature still needed to eat actual matter, proteins and other nutrients like vitamins and minerals, for growing, healing material, and so on.

  It did not survive on energy alone but was able to utilize it.

  From his notes, it seemed Fenix had come across the beast’s dead parents and found the egg for this one, which he had warmed and hatched to grow up on the lost plateau. Whatever had sent its parents to the Prison hadn’t stopped them breeding, but the growth cycle of the beast was slow, enough so that it shouldn’t outgrow its purpose within a few decades and that mattered in the timing of his plans.

  An e
ntire land mass dedicated to the safe rearing of this creature.

  The animal, if it could be called an animal, was able to concentrate energy from absorption and fire off a bolt from within its mouth through the skull piece. He knew this because he had seen the parents do so while protecting themselves before they were defeated. He had studied their bones afterward to be sure. What had clued him in to even do so was that the bones stayed healthy and vibrant even after the usual process of the Prison upon a death.

  Fenix was delighted to find the beast in the grasslands only a few days after landing, and it had grown to adult size just perfect for his needs. Its skull was bent like a bow, although straighter; he would shape it further, and the strings he had prepared on his previous visit would pull the sides in.

  It would be a longbow, a bit taller than he was even when bent, and the magical result, when enhanced by thaumaturgy and other magical effects congruent with its natural properties, would make for a superior weapon.

  Apparently, one he was really going to need.

  Loping along at an easy forty miles an hour the majestic creature glinted a burnished bronze from the midday sun of the prison’s fake orb. The long three toes on each foot gave it a bounce to each footfall that quickly propelled it along.

  It ran nonchalantly, just about exerting itself and capable of so much more. That it was a superior specimen much like himself was what prompted Fenix to introduce himself.

  He unmasked his scent once he had sprinted ahead of its projected route along a gulley between two of the mesas. A quick series of jumps down to the sandy ground below and he waited there for it. Sure that it would notice him and decide for itself whether it would come up to him or not, its reaction would tell him a lot about its relative level of intelligence.

  It came to him, seemingly without any adjustment of its pace, it arrived in a few minutes and slowed to a jagged walk and then a gentle stop about thirty feet away. Close enough for either of them to strike, but not so close as to make it that easy.