by Taki Drake
Now gasping for air, Corda moved on to the next pristine target. The swirling purple energy channeled by the Bardic Discipline had built up into a thick pool of moving mist and water that drew Corda like a magnet. When the young girl reached inside of herself to grasp the Magic in that repository, her whole body began to hum with chorded vibrations.
Gesturing to build the Magic Missile spell with that glorious force, Corda almost fell on her knees when the tiny projectiles went flying toward the target, light and not requiring strength to move them. At first, Corda was convinced that she had thrown the wrong spell. However, when the Bardic Discipline Magic Missile was ten feet in front of the target, five separate blasts of intense sound shredded everything around the designated objective.
Shaking and almost unable to walk, Corda took a position in front of the last target. Summoning every bit of Healing energy in her Discipline pool, the young girl threw the Magic Missile spell toward the target. Five slender darts of blue erupted from Corda’s fingertips and moved quickly toward the goal. On they flew, only to fragment in midflight after about fifteen feet.
“No,” screamed Corda, dropping on her knees to the ground. Sobs that felt ripped out of her heart made her chest ache, and her throat felt like it was being flayed. The young girl sobbed, grieving for the last vestige of the life she thought she was going to lead. She wept tears of fire, acknowledging that the successful path that she had been raised to desire would never be hers.
Finally, the tears slowed down, but her heaving chest and raw throat remained.
Moving reluctantly to get off her bruised knees, Corda struggled her way to her feet. Looking around at the singed or shattered targets, the young girl turned to leave, unsure of a destination but driven to move.
A slight motion on the edge of her peripheral vision had her turning her head to catch someone standing by the benches. With a sense of inevitability, Corda focused on Gerald standing on the sidelines, waiting for her. Flanking him were Liz, Ricee, and Keve.
Friends waiting for her, telling her with their presence that she was not alone. Corda felt a rush of feeling where she had previously had numbness. Wrapped in acceptance, support, and affection, the young woman felt the overwhelming load of her thoughts lighten as her burden was shared.
Walking into their open arms, Corda was warmed and energized by their regard.
For a while, the five friends stayed in the range and talked of lighter topics. Later on, Corda could not remember anything they talked about, but that was not the point. Finally, Gerald suggested, “I think you may want to go back to your room and rest. After all, you just got discharged from the infirmary after a pretty grim few weeks. We can meet up for supper, but please get some rest now.”
Hardening her heart to an anticipated hurt, Corda looked over at Liz and asked, “Has Argah moved out yet?”
“Yes, I am sorry, but she came and got the last of her things this morning. She made a big point about leaving you a note, but if it were mine, I would not read it.”
“I will probably read it anyway, although it will not stop the hurt.”
Gerald said softly, “There is another note waiting for you. One from me. I thought you might need something to keep you company at some point. So my note is one that does not wear out and does not become old-fashioned. That way, you can look at it when you need it.”
Corda walked the rest of the way to her room, feeling like a storm had passed, and she was standing on firm ground. I suppose I could think about this as the weather. Only after a rainstorm can we get a rainbow.
Chapter 48– When Hope has Wings
Corda had difficulty remembering the rest of her day. She had stumbled through the return to her room, feeling like she had been away for a year. Seeing the emptiness that Argah had left behind, her emotions just shut down. Crawling into bed fully dressed, the young girl had crashed into oblivion.
Sometime in the evening, Liz had almost force-fed her some soup and bread before dragging her into the shower room and getting her cleaned up. The young girl was in survival mode, just trying to get through her day.
The next morning found Corda moving a bit better. Still haunted by Argah’s abandonment, the young girl had refused to go to the cafeteria to eat and had planned on skipping a meal. But Gerald and Keve had shown up with trays of food. Laughing and teasing, Corda’s three friends were there for her, and slowly, the young girl was feeling better.
All of them had gone out for a while, leaving Corda alone in the room. She was staring at the two envelopes on her desk, one from Argah, the other from Gerald. I do not want to open either of them right now. I may never open Argah’s.
A knock on the door startled Corda, breaking her out of a reverie. Expecting a student or teacher, the young girl was shocked when she saw Matthua Washick standing with his hand raised to knock again. The tiny girl and the elderly General stood frozen, staring at each other’s faces. She stepped back and gestured for the man to enter, speechless.
She pulled out a chair for him to sit in, and the man carefully took a seat, still staring at Corda. Clearing her throat nervously, she asked, “May I get you something to drink? I have juice and water.”
Her offer broke the impasse, and Matthua rushed into speech, “I would have called, but I did not have your contact number. I am still trying to wrap my head around the fact that I have a grandchild, let alone one as accomplished as you are.”
Corda sat down on the edge of her bed, facing her visitor. The silence stretched out a little before Corda responded, “My life has changed in so many ways in a few months, that I cannot seem to get my balance. I do not want you to think that I am upset about knowing you are my grandfather. It is just that I do not know who I am anymore.”
Again the silence, but the silences held between the two of them had moved into the comfort zone rather than display any uneasiness with each other. Corda could have wept with relief at the way the older man’s manner did not push her to answer or react quickly. I like him, that has to be a good start.
The General lifted up a small box that Corda had not noticed when he came into the room. The man laid it on the table and lifted off the lid. “I have some idea and how difficult this is for you, and I thought perhaps that if I brought my box of memories over to show you that it might help you feel more connected.”
Corda’s smile was trembling, and teardrops clung to her eyelashes. Her voice was just above a whisper as she said, “Thank you for understanding. I feel like something that hurt but was familiar has been chopped off. The problem is I have nothing to replace that with.”
Reaching his hand out very carefully, the old man said, “I understand. Anybody who has ever lost anything they really cared about would understand.” He looked down at the contents of the box and said with a flush of embarrassment on his face, “The memories in here are not necessarily fancy. So hopefully, you are not expecting glitter and fancy pictures.”
Corda smiled more naturally and said, “How about you tell me about my grandmother and my father. I really want to somehow know them.”
The old man pulled out snapshots and dried flowers, talking about the wife he obviously still loved. When Corda saw the first picture of the woman, she caught her breath. She looks like me, just a little older.
Matthua was telling her, “We met when she was sixteen, and I was twenty-four. I thought she was sweet and looked forward to seeing her again, but I found out later she went home and told her father that she had met the man she was going to marry. Every day I wrote her a letter from my postings. Some days it was only a short letter, others I would write ten or fifteen pages telling her how much I missed her and what I saw around me.”
The man stared down at two bundles of letters, one tied with a dark blue ribbon, and the other bundle secured with a brilliant red cord. “She wrote me one back every day also. I kept all of hers to keep me company, and she treasured mine and slept with them under her pillow. Even now, all these years after her death, I read the
m.”
Corda’s eyes filled with tears, touched by a loving relationship that she had never envisioned before. The idea that this man had loved his wife so much and that she had returned his affection was so unlike the family that she had been raised in that she simply had no reference points.
Delving deeper into the box, Matthua brought out of a group of pictures showing a little boy that evolved into a grown man. Corda gasped, laying a gentle finger on his face, before lifting her eyes up to look at her grandfather with a question written all over her expression.
The man gave her a big smile, saying, “Yes, your eyes are just like his. That was the shocker when I went into your debriefing. The way you held your head and your features make it evident that you are your grandmother’s child. The gray eyes told me that you are my son’s and mine.”
Corda and her newly discovered grandfather were deep in conversation when Liz returned to the dormitory room. Bouncing into the room, Liz announced, “I knew there was something special going on because your bodyguard is outside grinning her face off!”
Turning toward Matthua, the energetic young woman burbled, “I am so glad that this part of the mess has gotten straightened out. Now, Corda has two grandfathers, and that is awesome. Bonpa has even adopted the rest of us, which makes things a whole bunch easier. I think he will probably regret that at some point, but right now, he seems to be having a good time.”
Spinning around, Liz grabbed Corda and hugged her roommate. Leaning over the memory, Liz was soon cheerfully commenting on family similarities and joining Corda in listening to the anecdotes that Matthua shared.
There was an alert from the Generals communications band, and he made a disappointed sound. Looking up at the two girls, he said, “I am afraid that I have to go to a meeting. This was a wonderful visit, and I hope we can have more. I would love to invite you to see the family home, and you and your friends are welcome at any time.”
Corda said, “Thank you so much for coming. Just talking to you has helped straighten things out for me a little bit.”
“Okay, you guys. I am glad the visit went really well, but neither one of you are being very practical. Give me your comm-unit, Corda’s other grandfather, and I will put in everybody’s contact number. That way you will know who we are if we call you, we promised to call you if there is a problem. If you cannot get hold of Corda, call one of us. Also, what is Corda supposed to call you? I realize that you are not very experienced at being a grandfather, but there is no time like the present for jumping in.”
Corda went off in a peal of laughter, holding her sides to keep her ribs from hurting. “Believe it or not, she is always like this. Since the only other option is to murder her, I have decided it is a feature.”
Smiling broadly, Matthua handed his comm-unit to the young woman so that she could enter in the phone numbers. While she was doing that, he said to Corda, “Vovo. Please call me Vovo.” The smile on Corda’s face was bright enough to illuminate the room.
Escorting him toward the door, Corda stopped and looked at the man with a desperate question in her eyes. When he held out his arms silently, the tiny young woman tucked herself against him and hugged him harder than he thought her slender frame could deliver.
“Vovo,” Corda whispered, and the elderly General tucked his face against the top of her head and inhaled the sweet scent of her hair. “Pequeno,” he murmured back. By the time he had walked out the door, and it had closed behind him, Liz was sobbing into a handkerchief.
“Liz, what is wrong?”
“That was so beautiful!”
When Corda sat down on the bed again and tucked a pillow against her stomach, gazing off in the distance, at first, Liz was not concerned. However, when Corda refused to go to supper and stayed in the same hunched over position on her bed, Liz decided that something else was going on.
Unsure of what to do, the young woman noticed that the note from Gerald was still on Corda’s desk. In a flash of intuition, Liz grabbed the envelope and placed it against the pillow that Corda was still clutching.
Liz opened the door to the hallway and called back to Corda, “Hey, silly. I am going to run a couple of quick errands and will be back in about a half-hour. Ping me if you need me!” Stopping only to explain what was going on to the bodyguard in the hallway, Liz took off for the infirmary, her shadow following closely behind her.
Corda did not hear Liz at all. Lost in a revolving tornado of fragmented memories and unsettled emotions, the young girl was adrift. Tears welled up in her eyes, and all of a sudden, Corda was crying. Alone and private, she was able to just let her emotions out.
Weeping and cursing, grieving and longing, Corda dropped her control and just felt. A crinkling of paper drew her attention, and the young girl came back to the here and now to realize that she had leaned on a piece of paper on the bedspread beside her. Reaching down, she saw that it was a note to her, and the writing was Gerald’s.
I remember he said that I should open the note when I wanted company. Touching the envelope and accepting the affection that drove Gerald to leave her such a thing, Corda opened the envelope and unfolded the paper.
The first thing that she noticed was a beautifully drawn butterfly at the bottom of the page instead of a signature. Delicately tinted teals and blues filled in the spaces between silvery lines in a Magical looking drawing of a breathtaking moment.
Corda stared at the drawing feeling the whisper of a breeze under small moving wings, carrying hope and affection to her heart. The words wrapped around her like a warm hug from a friend, like supporting arms when she needed them.
The words seared into her brain. Gerald had known what the Healers were going to tell her. His message said that he could see that her path was not that of a regular Healer from the very first day they had known each other. He also told her to remember that just because she was not going down the path that had been selected for her, it did not mean that she had failed.
Reading and rereading his note, the battered-feeling young girl clung to the words where he told her that she was still a wonderful person. Insisting that her worth was not tied to her ability to Heal, he reminded her that everyone has to work with what they truly have.
The end part of the note was the part that resonated in her heart. That was where Gerald told her that no matter what Magic she had or did not, whether she was good at something or not, she would always have him. That friendship was a way of picking the family that you wanted, rather than trying to survive the one you were born to.
Her emotions spent, and her calmness renewed, Corda was sitting at her desk reading a book when Liz returned with Healer Jerroy. Fussing at her for “ill-judged” activity at the range, he refused to leave her until she had drunk a potion designed to help her sleep and heal.
Almost immediately, the headache that she had ignored was gone, leaving her feeling less tense and more serene. The warm feel of the parchment that Gerald has written his note on brought her comfort, and she looked at the message one more time.
Fingertips touching the drawing that Gerald had used a signed the note, Corda slipped into a deep and dreamless slumber. Alone in her room, the young girl rested and dreamed. In the dim light of the evening, the note appeared to glow. Fluttering its wings slowly, the silver barred blue and teal butterfly stretched its wings, brushing them across Corda’s hand like a kiss across the knuckles.
With a slight whisper of wind, the butterfly never before seen anywhere in the universe rose to fly away, stopping briefly for a last caress on the sleeping girl’s face.
Author Notes
This is the second story in the Vorcian Imperial Chronicles about Corda, the eldest girl in the Watern family of Barkin Prime. We first met Corda in the book In the Cards, where her coming of age 10th birthday was celebrated by a visit from her maternal grandmother, the Imperial Seer. The story picks up when Corda is barely 13 and is starting at the Barkin Prime Academy of Magic.
All of the Waterns have been M
aster Healers, a legacy that runs back hundreds of years. Corda does not expect to break that pattern, but the universe has different plans for her. The events that help shape the woman that will become an essential part of the Vorcian Imperium are powerful. Just like the adult that she is destined to be.
I have to say that writing Power Nexus was extremely challenging. Originally intended to be the same approximate length as In the Cards, there were so many things that needed telling in the story that it grew. And grew!
At first. I wrestled with it, trying to trim it down to fit my strategic plan. But the characters in the story mutinied and took me captive. They insisted, even demanded, that I write a deeper, richer story, one that would hopefully immerse you in the scenes and make you feel the emotions and the sensations of the people that inhabit the story.
Of course, such a crew of characters demands another book, and the sequel to this tale, Power Surge, will be following after. Hopefully, that one will not be such a difficult crew to wrangle. But, if they are, I will once again write the stories to be as long as they need to be.
Cheerfully,
Taki
Author Introduction – Taki Drake
The mixture of technology and magic is where my mind and heart live. In today's world, it mixes engineering and creativity. In the worlds of my mind, technology and magic live intertwined. I hope that you will find my stories interesting enough to be frequent visitors to where my heart beats.
I am continuing to write my stories of intertwined technology and magic. The challenges of that are fertile grounds for many story lines and series. Several of those planned for the next few months have been listed below. I am happily writing each of them, discovering new worlds, new situations and new challenges. The wonder for me is the number of readers that are enjoying my visions and tales.