Warper: Origins

by Riley Tune

  It had worked. The guards, or at least most of them, had left the palace to control the fires before they started to spread. I wished I could take credit for this, but it was Rema’s plan. A plan she had come up with ease. I wondered if she had had this plan already in her head for some other reason.

  I looked the palace over and tried to remember, from where I was, the general direction of the Emperor’s sleeping quarters. According to Rema, with all of the guards putting out fires, the remaining guards would push the Emperor and his wife to their rooms and guard them well.

  I let my eyes rest on a third floor area with seating for palace guests. I allowed my foot to step off the ledge and warped. For a split second, there was silence, and no rain.

  “What?” I said to myself as I appeared in the outside seating area. I looked around in the rain, dagger in hand. I could feel myself breathing heavily as I tried to figure out what had just happened and what I had heard.

  For a moment, for that fraction of a second when I'd warped, I'd thought I'd heard a voice before I'd reappeared. That couldn’t be possible, though, could it? I didn’t have time to worry about it now. I pocketed my dagger and ran to the wall of the palace. I looked up and, about three more floors up, I could see a window. This was the same side that I had jumped from, and looking at this wall, it was the same way that Craydon Addersfield and his partner had climbed up.

  The wall was slick from rain and my hands were just as wet. I climbed, though. One hand after the other, one foot at a time. I slowly climbed up. One story, and then I passed the second story. The seating area was already three floors up, and from there I climbed up three more levels. I was almost six floors up on a building that had, easily, ten floors. All I needed to do was be able to see inside the window, and I could warp inside.

  I was so close that I could feel my heart skip a beat. I raised my hand for the final time to grab a part of the wall that stuck out some. I was almost there—and then my hand slipped, causing me to fall, and my feet began to kick as I tried to find a secure place to put them.

  My feet continued to kick and flail as I hung on the side of the wall with one hand. I was capable of many things, but feats of strength were not one of them. I tried to pull myself up, but nothing happened. My arm began to burn as I could feel my little bit of grip slowly start to give away under the strain.

  I looked down, and had no other choice. I warped back to the ground on the rooftop seating area. I stepped back and looked at the wall once more. I could have just warped to a spot on the wall, but that would require a precisely-timed grab on my part. I knew my limits, and that wasn't going to be something I could do.

  With time running out, I began to ascend the wall again. This time up, it seemed easier than before. I didn’t slip, and the rain on the wall that got on my hands didn’t seem to hinder me at all. When I came to the window for the floor I was looking for, I immediately recognized it as the same hall I had fought the Battle Born female on.

  I peered inside, making sure I wasn’t going to have any surprises. As I had hoped, it was empty. I warped inside, reappearing a mere foot or two away from the window. My cloak was soaked, and clung to me as I tried to get some of the excess water off. I dropped my hood and checked my knives.

  If memory served me correctly, the Emperor's hall wasn’t too far. A few turns and I would be there. I moved quickly down the lit corridor, making almost no sound. As I came to the first corner, I saw two guards walk by. I clung to the wall beside me, staying as close to the shadows as possible. They didn’t seemed to have seen me, and they were moving in the opposite direction. Maybe they were the guards for the Emperor’s room and were going on a patrol.

  My hopes faded away as I came to the last turn in my trip. I stepped down the hall and recognized the door immediately. There it was—looming, tall and black. Behind those doors waited my prey, and my job would be fulfilled once it was over.

  The only problem was the ten guards standing in my way. Not only were there ten guards, but they all seemed to be from different kingdoms. Most were brandishing different weapons, and they were all looking directly at me.

  23

  I could feel the lump in my throat move as I swallowed. I took a step back for a second, foolishly hoping they hadn’t seen me, but as I took that step, they all took a small step forward. So much for that idea.

  The guards didn’t just stand in front of the door; they had a formation to them. Each guard was spread out, and placed one behind the other as they stretched down the corridor leading to the large door I needed to get inside. They were prepared for me. They were prepared to fight a Warper.

  Warpers were feared by most, and respected by some. Needless to say, you didn’t go looking for a fight with a Warper. However, some knew the secret to fighting us. Some knew that, one on one, a Warper almost always won. It was just too hard to lock us down, but with multiple opponents, in close quarters, the fight tilted out of our favor.

  One against ten was almost impossible. Because of how they were spread out, no matter where I warped to, I would be reappearing in front of another, and within arm's reach. I took a deep breath and drew my dagger. Each guard looked as if they had only one goal in life, and that was to end mine.

  I had to give the Empress credit for being original. Instead of just having guards from the palace protect the door, she had created her own personal squad. A crew that seemed comprised of guards and fighters from different regions of The Prime Sovereignty.

  I knew my life could end right here in this corridor. While the rest of my friends, Vida, Jolin, and the Thornes, were sitting comfortably in the safe house, waiting for my return and the news of the Emperor and Empress’s deaths, I could die tonight. I’d never see my mother again, or my siblings.

  Before I could think about it anymore, one guard, holding metal rod-like weapons, jumped at me. The fact that he had covered such a large distance with a single leap was amazing. As he came crashing down, so did his metal rods.

  I warped to the side and he missed me by inches. It looked impressive, but I had warped out of reflex, not skill. As I reappeared, the man swung a metal rod at my shin, and pain spread through my leg. It was as if I wasn’t even wearing my greaves for protection. I stumbled some as the man followed up with two more blows. I dodged them both, and turned my body to punch the man, but before I could, I heard a loud pop and felt something wrap around my wrist.

  It was a whip. A guard had grabbed my punch out of the air and stopped it.

  As I let my eyes follow the whip around my wrist and back to its owner, three things happened all in succession. The man with the metal rods hit me in the stomach at the exact same time that I felt an arrow puncture my shoulder. Before I could try to remove the arrow from my shoulder, the man with the whip jerked me to him, jumped in the air, raised his fist, and delivered it to the side of my face.

  I could feel my body spin in the air as I landed on the ground and rolled. My hands were free now, and the arrow had broken off as I found the ground. My body hurt on many levels, and pain was everywhere at once. This was the second time in only a short period of time that I had found myself losing a fight in this corridor.

  The pain in my stomach made it hard to breathe, my head was hurting, and I couldn’t even remove the arrow from my shoulder because the end had broken off.

  I pushed myself up slowly to one knee as I watched my attackers. All this, and I had only faced three of the ten. A few were even laughing to each other in the back. A guard from Pradeep pulled out another arrow and drew it in his bow, while the guard with the metal rod weapons spat on the ground.

  “This is the Warper causing so much trouble for the Empress?” He spat on the ground once more.

  Fine. I'd known it would happen someday, and I had held it off for as long as I could, but now it was me or them. Curse be damned. The time for fists had passed.

  I drew my dagger in one hand. I stood tall, trying to push the pain away, as the man twirled his rods with a smi
rk.

  “Come on, boy,” he said to me. The guard behind him was wrapping his whip up, coiling it like a snake ready to strike.

  For the first time in my life, I was ready to kill. To take a life, all of their lives, if it meant saving my own. I didn’t have Ember to protect me, and maybe I never would again. This was my fight, and mine alone.

  Dagger in hand, I warped.

  The guard from Pradeep was the first target to feel my blade. Just like a guard with a spear, he would be vulnerable up close. I reappeared behind him. I had to move fast, because the man with the whip, along with over half a dozen other guards, were behind me. I grabbed the Pradeep guard's head as I appeared and plunged my knife into his neck.

  That was it. I could feel the man’s body shake and go limp. He was dying, and the curse had started as his warm blood flowed over my hands. My blade went in so deep that my hand was against his neck, no blade in sight. As Ember had always instructed, I moved the blade slightly inside his neck and then pulled it back out. Blood poured down his body.

  I warped again to where I had once stood before his body even hit the floor.

  The guard with the whip was fast. As I reappeared, I heard the pop, and felt the snake-like whip wrap around my body. Before he could pull me down, I reached behind my back for my belt, found a throwing knife, and sent it flying to the man's face. It found its mark, right between his eyes, and it was buried handle-deep. His grip on the whip loosened as he fell.

  I tried to get the whip off of myself, but before I could, I felt a pain in my back that sent me in the direction of the normal palace guards. They swung with their swords. I warped out of their way, only to be struck again by the man with the metal rods. He was becoming a nuisance. I threw a throwing knife at him, but he knocked it away as he held his rods up across his face, making a shield for himself.

  I warped again as he advanced; this time I appeared behind one of the palace guards, and drove my dagger into his back three times, leaving it in his back the third time and using his body as a shield of my own, as his fellow guard swung at me with his sword.

  His sword found its mark as I ducked down low, and the guard I was using for a shield had his head removed by the swing of the other guard. Blood and chunks fell from where the man’s head had once been and poured over me. It was in my mouth and my eyes, but I had to keep moving.

  The second guard, still in shock from decapitating his fellow, had allowed his sword to drop some as he looked at the head on the floor. I warped, reappearing beside him and spinning as I extended my dagger on the outer arc, slashing his neck open in the process. As I spun, more blood that wasn’t mine fell on me, and I could see large guards from Kameace backing up to the door they were sent to protect.

  Six. Six guards were left. I picked up the fallen guard's sword. Sword in hand, I advanced on the man with metal rods. I wasn’t familiar with a sword as much as I was a dagger, but he didn’t know that. We clashed in the middle of the corridor, his metal rods colliding with my sword, sparks flying.

  I swung my sword and he parried it with his first metal rod, spun around and hit me in the back again with the second. I lost my footing and slashed at the man again, but he ducked under my sword, used one rod to hit me in the stomach, and as I fell over in pain, he brought another rod up from the ground, and it found its mark under my chin.

  I heard the sword in my hand fall to the ground as I was sent flying and landed on my back. He ran to me, rods in hand, as I reached for my last throwing knife. I sent it his way, but from this position I knew it was a horrible attack, one that he blocked with ease with the wave of his rod. As he blocked it, I warped from where I was on the ground, removed my other throwing knife from the whip guard's head, and warped again. I appeared behind the man with metal rods, and plunged my throwing knife into his skull. Once in his skull, I broke the handle off, leaving nothing but the blade inside.

  The man fell, and so did his metal rods. As they clanged on the ground and rolled away, I allowed myself a moment to rest against the wall. I was hurt, had a bleeding shoulder, and was covered in blood that wasn’t mine, but I was alive. I looked at the handle in my hand. I had really liked my throwing knives, and now I was one short. I would have to get a new set if I made it out of this.

  I stood up and turned to the Kameace guards.

  They said nothing, but held their clubs up to their sides. I collected my other weapons and removed some of the blood from my face.

  “Do you really want to die here tonight? Alone in a corridor far from your homes? From your families?”

  The guards looked at each other.

  “Step aside,” I said. “Return to your Kingdom, and you won't have to die tonight.”

  Nothing happened as they tried to figure out what to. I exhaled, and threw a throwing knife at them, purposefully missing and finding my mark at the door behind them. They lowered their clubs and began to move. “Leave your weapons,” I said calmly, and they did. They placed them on the floor at their feet and slowly walked away, watching me, as if they thought I still would attack.

  I slowly walked to the door. I was actually limping more than walking, but this was it. I ignored the pain in my stomach, my back, and tried not to think about the arrow inside my shoulder. I came to the door and tried the knob.

  It was locked. I dropped to one knee, and, as before, peered through the keyhole and warped inside.

  24

  I ran full speed down the entrance hall and found the two separate rooms again. For some reason, I expected both the Empress and Emperor to be standing behind the door, waiting for me. That would have been too easy, though.

  I checked the Empress’ room first, since she seemed to be the one running everything. It was empty, but in disarray. Her bed looked as if somebody had been recently sleeping in it, and she had clothes all over the place.

  “No, no, no,” I said as I ran to the second room.

  As I came in, someone inside jumped.

  It was the Emperor, or whoever had been changed into the Emperor.

  “So, finally come to kill me, have you?” he said as he slowly turned and looked at me. It was different. I had seen Vida change before, so I knew the level of skill Changelings possessed, but this man looked like the Emperor. He looked like the Emperor before him, and he looked like the first Anavor Nal. Same short blond hair. The same brown eyes. Except, now, he didn’t have the same dominating posture. I would have never noticed it had I not known the truth, but all accounts said that before his first death, the Emperor was ruthless, and killed with no regard to life.

  He was truly a beast, but when he had returned, he had seemed more controlled, and his wife, the Empress, had helped him. Helped him control, with intelligence. She was the true ruler all along. These men were just puppets. I had begun to guess that she was the creator of The Battle Born, too. I didn’t know how, but she had to have been behind those things as well.

  “She’s gone, you know,” the man said as he sat down on his bed. “When she heard the noise outside, she left through a secret passage in her room. You just missed her, actually.” He seemed so calm. He spoke to me, a person covered in blood, dagger drawn, as if we were old friends.

  He rubbed his hand over the bed slightly. “You know, she never even allowed me to sleep in this room. Apparently she and the first Emperor didn’t share a bed, yet she never allowed the room to be used after.”

  “Where is she going?” I asked him.

  “I’m not sure,” he said with a shrug.

  I didn’t want to kill him. I know it was the contract, but he wasn’t the person doing these things. The abductions, the killing, the secrets about people beyond the water. It was all the Empress.

  “Where is the passageway?” I asked him as I moved to turn.

  “I’m not sure about that either, but it leads to the main hall.”

  Good, I thought to myself. I knew where that was and how to get there. I even had an idea about a shortcut. I turned away from him and began
to exit the room.

  “Wait,” he said from the bed as he stretched his hand up. It wasn’t a command—more so a plea. “Kill me. Please.”

  I looked at him. His eyes were glossy and red now as a tear rolled down his face.

  “I was a normal man once. A palace worker, actually. I had a wife, and five children. All girls.” He said this last part with a smile as he wiped his face. “When the Emperor before me died, it was around the time that I was begging other palace workers for food, yolars, and any type of help. The Empress knew, and offered me a way to support my family.”

  The more he wiped his face, the more the tears ran down. His voice was broken now and his face was distorted as he tried to talk through the pain. He gasped for his breath.

  “She said all I had to do was agree to play the part, and my family would be well taken care of and given a home in Pradeep. So I agreed. I told my wife everything and made her swear not to tell.

  “I wasn’t allowed to see them, so I wrote them letters. Almost every day. Then, one day, I began to notice that the letters I received from her didn’t sound right. The words on the paper were words my wife would never use. People here believed me to be the true Emperor. A reborn immortal. They feared me, and did what I asked with no questions. So, in secret, I sent people to search for my family. It was then that I found out they never made it to Pradeep.”

  I could feel my breath hitch as I turned away from him slightly.

  “She had them killed. All of them. Almost as soon as I was changed.” The Emperor rocked a little as he began to sob. “When I confronted her, she didn’t deny it. She told me the rest of my family would meet the same fate if I didn’t play the role. She said she would kill anybody who shared a hint of my blood.” He shook his head. “I was a coward. So please—end this and allow me to see my family again with The Keeper.”