Chased By Flame

by Michael Wolff

  Now and again there was a cage instead of a noose. A child’s face was scrunched up against bars made hot by the blanket of coals slipped into the cage’s floor. Though the child’s face bore the burning marks of a bar-pattern, the coals still laughed with the chuckle of a hungry flame. The welter of long sticks revealed it was a famed pastime for children to poke and prod at the hapless criminal. If they were criminals to begin with. The King’s justice took odd turns when a wounded pride was involved. Or a woman. Or drink. Or all rolled up into one.

  “Defenders of the realm,” Lazarus grunted. “Look at them now. Just bullies with blades.”

  Mykel remained silent. What were those Solvicars looking for?

  . . .

  John Jekai arrived at the Solvicar encampment in the valley some distance away from the Cerulean. Vulcan’s Valley, it was called. The ancient god Vulcan fell from heaven when he dared to free his mother Juno from the machinations of Jove, his stepfather. The valley was formed from the terrific impact. Jekai gritted his teeth. LeKym surged from memory. LeKym! That fool! For too long the grief the librarian placed upon him was denied vengeance. Jekai forced himself to calm. Now was not the time for anger. He had to be strong.

  The sights of the camp made Jekai twitch. It was a pain not to see his brothers in full regalia. He cursed the necessity of hiding their golden-hooded cloaks. Jekai felt, just as his brothers, naked without it. The cloaks were a symbol of their dedication, but only a fool would pause at the misfortune of clinging too closely to the cloth. Ravenkin retreated into hiding the instant there was a whisper of gold fiber nowadays. Even the eye-patch covering the hole of his left eye, was a siren to all those who loved the dark. Fate, it seemed, was not without a sense of irony.

  Rolled up on his back, Jekai’s cloak was higher in rank than his brothers. His was the black of lieutenant, with lines of gold framing the fabric. It was a part of his manner. Men named him Mageslayer for his services in the holy cause. Dozens, hundreds of Weirwynd, quailed in fear to find the black-hooded void staring down upon them, the brown-gold spark cold and judging. Even the barest mention of his cloak was enough for Weirwynd to shiver. Jekai smiled with pleasure as he thought upon the horror of Weirwynd faces as they found his one eye their last sight before being swallowed by the eternal dark.

  The slap of fist to heart broke his reverie. Jekai could feel the loyalty radiate from the men. Loyalty not to him, but to the cause. He was but an instrument of God’s will. To God went all the glory. The men knew it, of course. It didn’t stop the eternal admiration, nor did it stop them from building a fortress in all but name. Idle hands were the devil’s work, and so the fortress was forged from the valley’s walls. Jekai did not care. A secret pain made everything dull and dingy and gray. He could not find a day when her image came to him, from a doorway or laughter or a whisper on the wind. He was only half a man without her.

  Jekai knew only one way to evade the past. His room was well-stocked with decanters. Yet even with the fiercest scotch, she had a way of creeping up on him. She would have made a beautiful bride. A mother, too. He remembered his heart throbbing with so much joy he wanted to shout it to the rooftops. A son! John Stromgald was going to have a son!

  Jekai snatched a glass and poured another brandy. Stromgald. John Stromgald. That man was dead. A pathetic shadow of a man rooted too much in the glamour of emotion. He died as she did, when her body became cold in his fingers, and her eyes dull with death. Pain lanced through him; he’d broken the glass blindly. Even now, the shards imbedded in his palm oozed beads of blood, plopping upon the plain wool carpets. LeKym. Orson was right. LeKym was a cripple. A treacherous cripple with the same demented mind. Were it not for LeKym, she would be alive. They would be married. LeKym killed her. LeKym killed their unborn child. LeKym with the lying, pitiful face.

  I should go there now. I should find him and cleave the head from his shoulders. Jekai laughed as he imagined the cripple’s eyes forever wide in fear. I will stuff his head and mount it on the mantle. Or perhaps turn him to stone. Great a many were the magicks of nature. There were limitless possibilities.

  Jekai snapped the fantasy off. It would do no good to pollute the coming grounds with thoughts of rancor. She deserved better than that.

  Deep into the camp Jekai descended. For others it was a tangle of passages, crossing and re-crossing. Jekai knew every nook and cranny, though he wished otherwise. The directions were branded upon his memory; torturing him with brief glimpses of faces and voice, the smell of blood wetting the stone beneath. Even after ten years, he could find no defense against the memory twisting into his heart.

  A spot of green flickered on the horizon. Jekai hurried to the spot, fighting the memories of his last arrival in this place. He did not know he was holding his breath until he spent his lungs upon the greenery. Here, and only here, did the land spring to life. The golden tear in particular was highly sought by the criminal underworld, as the flower could heal any injury; sustain the bearer for hundreds of years. If the campsite stories held true.

  The brutality of triggered memories forced the young Solvicar to his knees, dashed upon the reef-stones of despair. No. Be strong. For her. Get up. Get up! A Jekai does not falter. The oath meant little at the moment. He clung to the gravestone like a raft beaten upon an angry storm. His body shuddered with breathes of crimson lightning. “I found him. I finally found him.”

  Her form appeared in his mind, so vivid she was almost real. “Good. At last I will be avenged.”

  “Yes. I promise.”

  “You always speak of the promise. And yet year after year you do nothing. Do not give me words. Give me action!”

  “I will. Soon.”

  “Soon? Soon? What other appointments demand your time? Your Weirwynd purge? Your service in that pathetic order of yours? Or is it your foster-father?”

  “Father placed me in charge of the troops in his absence. I cannot abandon the men.”

  “The men? Your “brothers?” You place your pitiful band higher than I? I thought you loved me.”

  “I do love you—”

  “Then get onto your oath! The next time we meet... well, let us just say that my patience is thin.”

  The trance ended like a pricked bubble. Jekai made sure his return took a path that had a wide berth to any random soldier. Mystery was his armor; the passion that wove a spell of victory over others. Without it, he was just a man.

  No. Jekai delved into the honor of his path for strength. The truth was that he was so much more, for the black-and-gold cloak that mantled his shoulders was of the mage-slayer. His was the most important duty of all. To destroy the heretics wielding magic. Magic was power, and power corrupted. Even me. At least now he was using magic against magic. It was his calling; the path God had set him to walk.

  Just as God was showing him a new path, right this moment.

  It can’t be... could it be... Yes. Jekai had begged God for this chance for ten years. He did not ask why the chance was given now, after all the pain and sacrifice. No. His was not to question, only to follow. That was all he needed.

  III

  For the second time in a day Mykel waited alone in the cart. Lazarus had gone off some fool mission for tubers and roots to add to the horse feed. Healthy for them, came the old man’s litany. A man who does not keep his health is a man quick in danger of a spiraling ruin. Horses were no less. Then he had turned a corner and vanished into the trees, leaving Mykel to his thoughts.

  I’d make a great Weirwynd. In his mind he saw himself standing on a mountain of defeated enemies. And the people. They were cheering. They were clapping and jumping with glee. Men pumped their fists in undisguised adoration. Women shivered and swooned when his eyes pierced their very souls. Their applause was an el
ixir to him. He basked in their worship. Everything was perfect.

  Then the crashing ripped him from the fantasy. Recognition perked his head up, like an eagle sensing its prey. He knew that sound. That was the crash of steel against steel, a deadly symphony of brutality and grace. At least, that was what the books described them. Curiosity tugged at him halfway through a farm. An old dog snored on the porch, and the smell of roasted pork told the young librarian of an early dinner. Only there wasn’t a family to enjoy it. The cries of children pulled him like iron to lodestone.

  The crashing grew closer. Quietly Mykel turned a corner, and the crafters of the song of steel were not a yard away. Mykel was rooted to the ground at the snicker-snap of the blades. Slowly it dawned on him that the weeping that drew him onward was a pair of children burying their faces into an older woman’s skirts. A mother and her children; the man obviously the father. Then it occurred to the librarian that it was not a good idea to stand in the open. Mykel ran within the barn, found a mound of dry hay and dived into it. It itched, of course, but Mykel was not about to worry about small details. Besides, he was in a position where he could see the battle, and the combatants could not see him. He hoped.

  At first he saw bits and pieces. A black cloak, fringed with gold, flaring like a banner in the wind. A slender katana, flicking in and out like a silver snake. A number of accessories upon the cloaked man. The other man, fat as a pig, the balls of azure flame at his fingertips growing desperate and dim. Mykel narrowed his eyes. Magic. The mental manipulation of physical phenomenon. It was too vivid, too real to be false. Caught up in his fancies Mykel did not see the killing blow. He went pale; he could see the loser through the stack, blood oozing ever outward in a pool. The winner was nowhere to be seen.

  Too late he heard a thump behind him. Before Mykel could think of moving an iron grip closed on the neck, forcing him down upon wobbling legs. Stand up, you damn cripple! Do you wanted to be skewered like a dog? From a dwindling strength did the young librarian force himself upright. He wobbled as though drunk, but at least he would face death like a man.

  A boot flattened him to the ground. Anger came too late; the katana whipped down to kiss Mykel’s neck. The librarian froze, knowing words would only bulge the flesh along the blade. It took all of his will to gaze upon the face of his captor and not shrink away. The gold-fringed black hood hid shape and shade of the face, revealing only a hole of thick shadow, pierced with an unearthly yellow glow. Mykel found himself in fear of that spark, even more so than the hatred pulsing from the gold-framed void.

  “LeKym.”

  His tongue clove to the roof of his mouth. Nausea and fear destroyed all rhyme and reason. How do you know my name? Within the hood’s darkness there was a tightening of muscle. He was annoyed. Mykel could sense it through the darkness. Again the voice of bones like kindling cracking. “Where is your master?”

  “Right here.”

  The sudden voice lifted the katana a few precious inches. Mykel scrambled from the steel’s arc until his fingers scraped against the wooden staircase. At the barn’s mouth stood Lazarus, his wide, arrowhead-bladed khatars gleaming in the sunlight. “Only a coward would bait the dragon with its young.”

  The katana whipped in two circles. The whistling wind spoke of the cloaked man’s confidence more than any smile. “I’ve been waiting for this day. The legendary Lazarus. It will be a real pleasure, killing you.”

  “Grunts like you are a waste of my time, Jekai.”

  Jekai twitched as though stung. “How do you know my name?”

  “You should have been more careful, John. Your crusade has not been a silent one. Now your quarry hides from you.” At the last Lazarus leaned back with knees bent, one khatar like an arrow towards Jekai, the second a scant few inches from his cheek: a retelling of a classic daggerman’s stance. The slight smile Lazarus wore marked his casual indifference. It was clear that Lazarus saw Jekai nothing less than a cockroach, that the battle was already done. With an animalistic scream Jekai erupted to the attack.

  As enraged as Jekai was, he saved enough wit to enter the flow of precise attacks. A layman’s eyes would see only a furious exchange of blurring steel. To one familiar with the art of weapons, however, it was an exchange of strikes, attack flowing into attack. Katas. It was a wonder to watch.

  Jekai pressed the attack. Bloody Sunset. Sun’s Searing Touch. Pale Moon Rises over a Black Lake.

  Lazarus shoved Jekai away; from his first step his khatars came alive. Hunting by Moonlight. The Weeping Rose. Blinding Mist. A casual flick of the wrist deflected the slim katana aside. Two back flips, and the Solvicar snatched the katana from mid-air, and then suddenly he was at Lazarus’ side, pushing for a stalemate.

  Lazarus would have none of it, parrying in full to make the Vicar stumble. The hood slipped back, showing a hawk-eyed face, crowned with a slim layer of black that hugged his scalp, with whispers of black tracing the cheeks to end in a goatee. Mykel started. It was not the intense hatred roiling in the man’s gaze that gave him pause. It was his eye. The singular eye. It was a wooden brown mixed with gold; the black pupil orbiting the eye’s length. An actual, moving pupil. Mykel knew the mark. It was the mark of a jord, master of the earth.

  “Bastard!” roared the Solvicar. Berserker’s Fury. Corrupting Hate. Rancor’s Venom.

  Lazarus was unfazed. Wyvern’s Dive. Circling the Prey. Harnessed Arrogance.

  Jekai met the last blow of the Arrogance with his katana reversed. The impact sent a shower of sparks spraying to either side of the warriors. It should have sent Lazarus stumbling, ripe for the beheading. A parry, followed by a backhand splitting the Solvicar’s scalp. Ah yes. An opening. The steel cried out in rapid succession. Every breath was put towards the offensive.

  Dervish of Ashes. The River Styx Roils. Moth to Flame.

  Jekai snarled. Maiden’s Tears. Devil’s Laughter. Faith of Iron.

  Not a step was made by either of them. Only their wrists moved, the weapons clashing faster and faster.

  Hunger of Flame. Haze of Mirage. Sand Slips between the Fingers.

  Hawk and Mouse. Withering Roses. The Grave Welcomes Its Master.

  Starving Quicksand. Blossom of Hellfire. Ixion’s Wheel.

  Lazarus gestured, and Jekai’s katana flipped through the air to disappear amidst wheat stalks. Jekai launched a punch, but too late. A sweep of the leg took care of his attack, and the khatar suddenly inches from his neck rooted Jekai to the ground.

  “I will not see you again. Not ever. If I even hear your name in a bar, or a brothel, or anywhere, at any time, I will come after you. No matter the consequence. I will find you and I will break you. Are we clear?”

  Poison radiated from the Solvicar’s eye, but nodded. When at last Lazarus’ khatar left his neck, Jekai scrambled to a hidden horse on to the far side of the barn. With a savage yell and a slap that could only be a riding quirt, the Solvicar vanished.

  “I’m sorry, Lysa. I am so sorry.”

  Lysa slapped Lazarus across the face. “Ten years, Lazarus. Ten years of hiding. We were opening a pottery shop. Then you request an audience. He’s dead because of you.” She twisted away to bury her tears into her children’s embrace. “Go away.”

  “There are positions within my household. You would be very well taken care of.”

  The mother looked ready for another slap, and then calmed herself with a look at her children. Concern trumped the seething need for revenge. They loaded all the supplies they could carry into a carriage, plain old oak from plain old trees.

  “Once you arrive go to the matron named Laura. She will be waiting for you. Give her this note --” Lazarus fished a piece of parchment from his cloak -- Mykel had naught seen him write anything; it was as
if he carried such parchments should fate decide to cross his path with such difficulties -- and handed it to Lysa’s wary hands. “She will know what to do.” A pause of uncertainty. Mykel felt as though an arrow had pierced his heart. Lazarus was never flustered. “I am sorry, Lysa.”

  He completed his apology with something wondrous. Green flame issued from Lazarus’ open palms, flame that twisted and widened into a pair of green-flamed stallions. Within two steps family, horses and carriage faded into the horizon. So the rumors are true, Mykel thought. He can use magic.

  Then something even more impossible happened. Lazarus dropped to his knees, his body shaking from heaving sobs. “Lazarus?” Mykel never thought to see this. Lazarus, weak as any man? He had always been an invincible sentinel, one step closer to godhead than other mortals. He’s just a man. “Lazarus, are you—” Of course he’s not okay. He’s not heaving for amusement, now is he? “I mean, is there anything I can—” What? What are you going to do? Wave a magic wand to make everything better? Finally, he made as to support the old man to his feet, but Lazarus shook him away. For long moments he teetered, then mastered himself.

  “I’m too old for this.” A stunned glance fixed rage to the old man’s face. “What are you looking at?”

  “Nothing. Nothing, sir.”

  “You haven’t seen an old man fall before?”

  “You’re... You’re Lazarus. You’re not old.”

  A sharp bark of laughter erupted from his lips. Mykel was surprised how much the laugh gave him relief. It was easy to forget the man was flesh and bone, just like the rest of humanity.

  Thus the travel continued.

  IV

  Farms creeped into view, appearing sporadically on the road, limp and slouched over. Pens bore more weeds than crops, and the farmers in the fields were few and far between. A surprising thing in itself; from the detailed labors he’d read Mykel knew farming was a never-ending profession. Still, there was an oddness teasing his sight. The farmers were doing chores that no longer needed doing. Wood stacked up along houses till the chips touched shingles, and haystacks rose in golden peaks higher than they had a right to in this weather. The air had an alien feel to it, as if the road, laid down since the Friech conquest in 456, had suddenly changed. Yes, definitely changed. But into what?