by Dante King
“Feel the tightness in your tendons.” She extended her arm, palm outward.
I imitated the gesture. The tightness was there, not just the strain of muscle but the presence of the wood path within it.
“Feel it in your eyes,” she said. “They are another place where the wood path is strong, forging a connection with those tendons.”
There it was, just as she had said. Like a thread running through my body, from my eyes, down through my neck and chest, along my arm, to the palm of my hand.
“Look at the target, not at your hand. The pathway will guide itself. Tighten again, and…”
A pair of thorns shot from her hand, one after the other, and buried themselves in the target.
I concentrated on the path of wood and pushed the energy through me, straining to make it happen.
A single thorn flew from my hand and hit a tree three feet from the target.
“It worked!” I laughed out loud. “I did it!”
I tried again. This time, my aim was better, almost hitting the target.
I looked at my hand. The way the thorn had flown out, it felt as though there should have been a hole there, but the skin was untouched, just the same as before.
“You can practice more later,” Faryn said. “First, you should try the other technique.”
“The other technique?”
“Plank Pillar. The reason why you absorbed that bark bear core.”
“Show me.”
“I can’t.” She looked down at the forest floor, her smile fading. “Ever since the attack on my guild, I haven’t been able to expand my arts. I was gifted for one so young, but a 12-year-old has her limits, and that day scarred my spirit in a way that has never healed. It may always hold me back.”
“I’m sorry.” I laid a hand on her shoulder. “If you don’t want to think about this, we can stop. I can find someone else to teach me.”
“No.” She placed a hand on mine and gave me a sad smile. “I want to help. I just need you to know my boundaries.”
“Boundaries are meant to be broken.”
“Such a humorous young man.” She chuckled and brushed my cheek. “But we should get to work.”
Over the next hour, she explained the Plank Pillar technique to me. Through her description, I found another way of guiding the Vigor along the paths of wood, a technique I hadn’t seen before.
When we were done, she went to the other side of the clearing.
“Ready?” she called out.
“Ready!” I replied.
Faryn came running toward me.
I let the Vigor flow down through my legs, into the ground, and back up again.
A pillar of wooden planks burst out of the earth where I was looking, right in front of Faryn. She hit it at full speed and fell to the ground.
I rushed over, worried that I might have hurt her. Instead, I found her laughing.
“Well done,” she said as I helped her to her feet. “I’m not sure you even needed me for that.”
“Maybe not needed,” I said. “But I always want you around.”
Her smile took on a sad tilt.
“And I want to be here helping you,” she said. “But I have to get back to my duties at the guild. I’ll walk with you back to the temple, but then, we have to part ways, for now.”
That saddened me too. I was enjoying learning about the Seven Realms, but it was far more fun to learn with her than with Tolin.
Back at the Unwashed Temple, I returned to training with Tolin. He guided me as I practiced the Stinging Palm and Plank Pillar, as I strengthened the channels of the Vigor within me, and as I refined my swordsmanship. While Master Softpaw dozed on the veranda, Tolin talked at length about the culture I was now living in, giving me enough of the basics to get by.
Working for a security agency, I’d become used to learning covers and bluffing my way through the bits I didn’t know. But this wasn’t simply passing myself off as a security guard or a staff member at a corporation. It was trying to fit into an entirely different world, where almost every detail was different from my own.
Days turned into weeks and weeks into months as my training continued.
During the day, I was distracted by temple maintenance and by my lessons. Both were satisfying in their own ways. It was good to see the steady improvements to the building, as we turned it from a ramshackle ruin into a proud place of prayer. But it was even more satisfying to master my new skills and know that I was growing in power.
I dressed in simple clothes and let my hair grow out until I looked more like one of the locals. The one thing I couldn’t change was my eyes. No one else I had met since coming here had eyes of the same piercing blue.
Summer was easing into autumn, the first leaves turning brown on the trees, when master Tolin brought me the news we had been waiting for.
“Tomorrow is the testing day for entry into the Radiant Dragon Guild,” he announced over a breakfast of steamed tuna and sticky rice. We were sitting on the veranda, enjoying the warm, dry days while they lasted.
I was eager to learn more about the fire guild, even if it meant leaving the Unwashed Temple behind. I’d slowly come to appreciate the old caretaker’s dry wit, and his feline friend had become somewhat of a companion, too.
Master Softpaw leapt up onto the table and made a beeline straight for the tuna. Tolin picked the cat up and deposited him on the floor, to the sound of outraged mewling.
“Not for you.” Tolin tapped the cat on the head. “Just this bit.”
He put a generous portion of tuna down in front of Master Softpaw, who let out a happy purr before starting to feast.
“Why haven’t I been learning fire pathways if I’m going to a fire guild?” I asked.
Tolin let out an exasperated snort.
“That would have been easy,” he said. “But sometimes, the easy way isn’t the best. Teaching you the way of wood will give you an advantage that the other students don’t have.”
“But they’ll have the advantage of knowing fire.”
“The guild will teach you that.”
I gritted my teeth. One thing I’d learnt was the futility of arguing with Tolin’s twisted logic. Once he’d settled on an opinion, there was no shifting him.
“You taught me that wood is weak in the face of fire,” I said. “Wouldn’t it have been better to teach me the ways of water, so that I can face my competitors from a position of strength?”
“It’s not about setting one element against another,” Tolin said. “Again, that’s an easy way of thinking. By mastering wood and fire together, you can gain something far greater.”
I nodded and sat expectantly, eating my rice while I waited for him to explain.
“Which reminds me,” he said. “I have a gift for you.”
He took a bundle of cloth from a bag beside him and laid it on the ground. I reached out for it, and he slapped my hand.
“Clean them first,” he snapped.
I washed my fingers in the bowl of water beside the low table, dried them on my tunic, and raised an enquiring eyebrow.
“Very well,” Tolin said. “Now, you may look.”
I stood and opened up the cloth. It turned out to be several items. There were two pairs of loose gray trousers, not torn and stained like mine; four shirts in good quality cotton, gray with red and blue trim; and finally, a white silk over-robe. The robe was a thing of beauty, its front embroidered with a pair of great cats, one red and the other blue. They were more like panthers than house cats, savage yet graceful, exuding a fierce strength.
“This is…” I struggled to find the words. These clothes must be a hundred times more valuable than those Tolin himself wore, and he was giving them to me. “Thank you so much.”
“Here.” He took the robe from my hands. “Turn around.”
I did as instructed, and he helped me into the robe. It was fastened in place with a sturdy leather belt embossed with swirling gray patterns, like ash blown on the wind.
When I turned to face Tolin, there was a tear in the corner of his eye.
“These were the robes of my clan,” he said. “An ancient and proud line of which only I remain.”
“I will wear them with pride,” I said gravely.
“Kneel,” Tolin commanded.
I swept the front of the robe aside so that I wouldn’t dirty it, then did as instructed. He laid a hand on my head.
“Ethan Murphy, I adopt you into Clan Pashat,” Tolin said. “May you bring glory to its name. Rise up, Ethan Murphy lo Pashat.”
I stood. Overwhelmed by the honor Tolin was doing me and by the powerful mix of pride and sadness in his voice, I could barely look him in the eye. I just kept staring down at the magnificence of the robes, a sign of the power and wonders I had fallen into when I went tumbling off the side of a mountain. I should be dead. Instead, I was living a dream.
“Now, you look the perfect initiate.” Tolin turned away. “All ready to embarrass me at the guild.”
I suppressed a laugh at his sudden, deprecatory change of tone.
Something brushed my leg. I glanced down to see Master Softpaw peering up at the robes and purring happily. Did he dream of being one of those great cats I wore, or was he trying to talk with them? Perhaps he recognized me as one of his own now.
I’d traveled to many places in my life and met all sorts of people, but I’d never felt a sense of belonging like I did here and now, in this strange world. Joining the Radiant Dragon Guild meant more months of hard work, maybe even years, without returning to Earth. Months of lumpy straw beds, of rats and fleas, of living without running water, central heating, or WiFi. Of going without all the things that made life bearable back home. Yet instead of feeling disgruntled or disappointed, I felt excited beyond words. It was all worth it, because there was something here I’d never encountered back on Earth.
There was magic.
Chapter Six
“Ethan.” The woman’s voice drifted to me out of the night, low and sensual. A familiar voice, but one I couldn’t quite place. “I’m here for you, Ethan. Are you here for me?”
Even before she reached me, my body stirred in response to her presence, the sound of her voice, the scent of her perfume, the soft padding of her footsteps across the floor. By the time she ran a finger up the inside of my thigh, my blanket was floating almost of its own accord.
I opened my eyes and looked at her. She had a fine face with sparkling eyes and fully red lips that formed a wicked smile. Purple-black hair cascaded across her shoulders and down her breasts, which were almost exposed beneath the thinnest of silk robes, its front hanging open to the waist. As I watched, she unfastened the robe and let it fall to the floor, revealing smooth white skin and a voluptuous body.
“Do you like my true form? Is it better than the Sundered Heart Sword?”
Now, I recognized the voice. It was the one I had heard from the sword high in the mountains, the voice named Nydarth. It seemed the most natural thing in the world that Nydarth’s voice should come from this woman.
“Come here.” She reached down to cup my face and drew me up the bed. “I want to feel you inside me.”
I kissed her again on the way up and grabbed hold of her breast. My tongue flicked across her nipple, and I tasted the sweet fire of her skin. Then, we were face to face, and I leaned in to kiss her, but as I did so, she faded away. The luxurious bed faded with her, and I found myself alone and erect, waking up in my small monastic cot.
I had chores to do before breakfast, including mucking out chickens, putting away laundry, and sweeping the main temple chamber. In the temple, my eyes were drawn to the shelf at the back where Nydarth’s sword had lain in my world. I remembered the sound of her voice calling to me, both on the mountainside and in the dark of the night, and I grinned at the memory of the dream. But by the time I’d finished sweeping, I had convinced myself that it was only that—a dream, not some spell cast by the sword’s sensuous female spirit, not a symptom of a mystical connection that let us bond in the heat of the night. Just a dream brought on by too much time without female company.
Of course, that wouldn’t stop me enjoying the memory. It had been a particularly vivid dream.
By the time I met Tolin on the veranda for breakfast, I was managing to keep my mind in the here and now for whole minutes at a time. I barely even thought about dream-Nydarth’s body as Tolin served us breakfast. Today, it was flatbread and scrambled eggs, with some of the eggs dropped on the floor as a sacrifice to Master Softpaw, the real ruling spirit of our temple.
“You look flushed.” Tolin winked. “Have you been polishing the temple lamp too hard?”
“You’re a sick old man; you know that, right?”
“Ha, no sicker than a young man with too much time on his hands.”
“I’m ready to head off for the guild,” I said before he could berate me further.
“Very good. Are you packed?”
I nodded. “It’s not like I have much to take with me. Clothes, sword, spare pair of sandals—that’s about it.”
“I’ll give you some food for the journey. Can’t have you turning up faint and exhausted because you don’t know how to hunt.”
“Who was it that hunted 25 wisps in a single day? Oh, that’s right. It was me.”
“And good luck living off wisp splinters. I hear they taste like rotten log.”
Master Softpaw made a leap for the table, apparently having decided that his portion of egg wasn’t enough. Even before he’d found his footing, though, I shot out a hand, grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, and deposited him unceremoniously back on the floor.
“You’re getting faster,” Tolin said. “That’s a good sign. Means the Vigor channels are strengthening. That will serve you well at the guild.”
“The Radiant Dragon Guild is going to be like a school, right?” I said. “Lots of lessons in the philosophy of the path and how to channel. A bit of physical education to keep us in shape. Maybe split us into houses so that we’ll compete with each other for the magicians’ house cup.”
The idea of going back to school was a little frustrating, but I knew it was something I could do. I’d raced through high school at an accelerated pace, leaving for university at the age of 14. I might be the oldest kid in the class this time, but I wouldn’t be there for long.
Tolin rolled his eyes. “Where do you come up with this nonsense? No, it’s not like a school. It’s more like a military training camp, turning you into the toughest, strongest, most powerful Augmenters in the land. Radiant Dragon might not be highly rated by the other guilds, but it will still be a tough experience. You’ll have to work damn hard to get through it.”
He took a bite out of his breakfast and sat glaring at me, chewing with exaggerated effect. Whatever response he wanted, I didn’t give it. I just wrapped some of my own eggs in a flatbread and got on with eating.
“Ethan, are you ready?” a familiar voice asked as Faryn entered the room. She had come to guide me on my journey to her guild.
“Almost,” I said through a mouthful of eggs. I hurried to finish eating, then got up to go.
Tolin held up a hand, and I paused for a moment.
“Do well,” he said. “Make our clan proud.”
Faryn and I left the Unwashed Temple behind and made for the Radiant Dragon Guild House. As we journeyed, we swapped jokes, made up stories together, and talked about our lives. I told her a lot about how things were back on Earth, though she didn’t believe half of it. Sometimes, we would stop to spar by the side of the road, keeping up my practice with both my sword and my Augmenting. Other times, she would pause to teach me about the plants we passed or to take samples of them. They were a subject for which she had an unquenchable fascination.
“I don’t believe you,” I said one day, as we were walking a dirt track between paddy fields. “You don’t look more than 30, 32 tops.”
“Honestly, I’m 117,” she said.
“Women must age a lot be
tter in the Seven Realms, then,” I said. “No one back home would have skin as fine as yours by the time they reached 40.”
She laughed and blushed. “It’s an elven thing. We live longer than humans, and most of that time is spent in our prime. Old age only comes in the last few decades.”
“Still, you look amazing for a woman of any age. And that hair…”
“We should stop and get some sparring in,” she said abruptly. “We might not get another chance before we reach the guild.”
I almost laughed at that. By then, it was a familiar pattern. She was happy enough to flirt for a while, but before things went any further, she would find a way to cut me off and blow off steam. It seemed that Faryn felt safer with swords and spells than with compliments and kisses.
Late on the third day, we reached the guild house. Even to my inexperienced eye, it was clear when we were getting close. Statues appeared at bends in the winding road, depictions of men and women who Faryn told me were previous guild masters. Dusk was falling and, as we came further up the road, we saw statues holding flaming brands to illuminate the route. As we crested a final rise, I found myself standing upon a rocky plateau, the whole area lit by a giant pillar of flame that emerged from a hole in the ground. Beyond it was the guild house itself.
“I know it’s humble by guild house standards,” Faryn said. “But it’s home.”
“Humble?” I muttered, incredulous.
The place was amazing. It looked like a fortress out of a martial arts movie, with layered towers looming above forbidding walls, curved roofs above balconies patrolled by armed guards, and symbols painted 12 feet tall across the front.
“This pales in comparison to the Guild House of Resplendent Tears. That house is carved from solid ice,” Faryn said. “And I heard that there’s one in the mountains where the walls drip with liquid rock.”
We walked around the pillar of fire and approached the guild’s gates. Now that I was past the initial moment of wonder, I started seeing signs of the relatively low status of the guild. The rope hinges of the gates were frayed and the paintwork had peeled in places. There had clearly been time for some repairs and maintenance, but not enough to give the place its full glory. I hoped that this wasn’t why Tolin had made me do so much handiwork—so that I could become a glorified janitor here.