by Andrew Rowe
Her partner nodded in appreciation, withdrawing his hand, and Lydia looked to Nakane next.
“I am already shielded.” The dark haired woman raised a hand to display a ring similar to the one her brother had worn, confirming one of Lydia’s earlier suspicions. The knowledge sorceress nodded, returning to the hunt.
Aladir’s breath grew heavier as they walked. After a few minutes, Lydia glanced over her shoulder, finding Nakane assisting the Rethri paladin with walking. In spite of the girl’s brusque words, her face was showing a hint of obvious concern.
It took several more minutes before the path terminated, and her sorcerous sight was not necessary when they found their destination. A hexagon lined with tiny script had been carved into a large grey stone, and atop the stone was a yellow crystal sphere, shimmering with inner light.
Dominion essence of poison, Lydia realized, and a very powerful source of it. The sphere was the size of her fist, which would have been impressive enough for a dominion that was generally in a solid state. The Dominion of Poison was gaseous, and manipulating that much essence into a solid would be a tremendously difficult process.
Nakane brushed past Lydia, examining the tiny lettering. “A summoning ritual,” she said immediately, turning back to Lydia. “And also an exit portal. Is this the end of the glowing region?”
Lydia nodded.
“I suspected as much. So, someone came here, summoned an entity tied to the Dominion of Poison – and then commanded it to kill my brother. They left a return path through the same location the creature was summoned from.” Nakane’s lips tightened and she turned her head, examining the area.
Lydia stepped closer, dismissing her spell and examining the script. The lettering was difficult to read, but it had been scribed by a professional hand. The quality of the lettering wasn’t important to the efficacy of the ritual – in fact, the words weren’t relevant at all – but words were a useful tool for focusing, and the quality of the lettering could be a useful clue to the culprit.
Visage of venom, herein lies your prison and your escape. With your essence you are bound; complete your task and you shall be free.
After a moment of examination, Lydia reached up adjusted her spectacles. “You could be right, Lady Theas, but nothing here explicitly states that the creature is from the Dominion of Poison. In fact, I doubt it was – natives of other dominions rarely have access to sorcery aside from the plane they are native to. Whatever was summoned was both powerful enough at poison sorcery to leave a trail, and talented enough at another form of sorcery to remain undetected in your home long enough to poison your brother.”
Nakane tightened her jaw. “That’s even worse, then. What else could it have been? A powerful Esharen?”
Lydia shook her head. “I doubt that. A sorcerer trying to control an Esharen would be very foolish – Esharen adapt to sorcery too quickly.”
The ritual circle appeared to be inert, most likely having ceased to function after the summoned creature returned to it. Interesting that the sorcerer didn’t retrieve the dominion essence. Did he want someone to find it? It could be a signature for an assassin – or something left behind to obfuscate the real trail. Alternatively, the sorcerer may not have had time to retrieve it.
Slowly, the sorceress reached a gloved hand into the ritual area. No defensive measures were triggered by the intrusion, so she picked up the yellow orb. A flicker of blue on her hand indicated the activation of her Comprehensive Barrier spell reacting to the foreign essence. Dominion Essence of Poison, the spell reported, confirming her earlier hypothesis.
“Dominion of Knowledge, show me the path to the creature who shares essence with this orb.”
Nothing happened.
Nakane and Aladir looked at her expectantly, but Lydia shook her head. “Nothing. The summoned creature must have moved outside of the range of my tracking spell – perhaps back to its home dominion.”
“Well, regardless of what the creature was, it isn’t the real problem – the summoner is. This is travel sorcery of the highest possible magnitude. It’s cross-planar in scale. Not many people could manage that,” Aladir pointed out. “Can you track the summoner with your spell?”
Lydia frowned. “No, it doesn’t work like that. It only traces connections between essence. Some of the caster’s essence would have been in the ritual area while it was active, but there wouldn’t be enough left to trace now that it’s inert. This sphere shares essence with the summoned creature, not the sorcerer. If we could find the summoned creature and it still has an active spell effect from the sorcerer, I could potentially trace that – but finding the summoned creature could be as or more difficult. As you said, there are only a limited number of people who could have accomplished this. We should investigate them directly first.”
“Hartigan has the resources for something on this scale.” Nakane raised a finger to her chin. “Or Shalvinar Vorinthal, maybe. Or Erik Tarren, if the old coot is even alive. Or,” she turned her head toward Aladir, “Ulandir Ta’thyriel.”
The Rethri paladin returned Nakane’s gaze, and then looked away into the distance.
“Yes,” he replied. “My father could have done this.”
Chapter III – Taelien I – Cutting In
Blades flashed in the morning light. Taelien caught the first two against the edge of his own weapon, knocking them out of the way with a forceful parry, even as he side-stepped to dodge the third incoming sword.
There was no time for a riposte – not even a moment to increase his distance. His first attacker’s two short swords moved in fluid union, tracing unrelenting lines toward any spot he left vulnerable. His second opponent had a longer blade, matching his own, and she skillfully harried him with probing strikes to prevent any counter attacks.
It was an unfair fight. Exactly the type of fight he preferred.
Shift. At his command, his weapon’s mass shifted toward the tip, even as he swung it directly toward the female fighter’s torso. She parried, just as he had anticipated, but the altered weapon carried a harder impact than she had been prepared for. She fell back a step – not much, but maybe enough...
Taelien swept his sword in a downward arc at the man with two swords, meeting another parry, but shoving with enough strength to push the shorter blade backward and impact the man’s arm. The swordsman grunted, dropping the sword he had been carrying in that hand.
A blade swept in front of Taelien’s face, almost too fast to register. He took a step back reflexively, raising his sword to defend against the follow through.
“Stop,” instructed a gruff voice. “Rotate.”
Taelien sighed, lowering his blade and turning to where Herod was sitting in the otherwise empty stands. The older man sat with his right hand settled near his hip, near where a sword’s grip might have once been. In spite of being many years retired, he still sat with his back perfectly straight, his grey hair cropped close to his head and his beard trimmed short enough to make him look refined, rather than aged. His civilian garb never seemed to quite fit his well-muscled form.
The metal sorcerer wasn’t sure what rank Herod had held as a paladin while he served, but based on the way the other paladins looked at him, Taelien assumed it must have once been substantial. While most retired paladins found a civilian occupation or settled down with their families, Herod was omnipresent on the training fields, haunting them like a spirit of the past age. When Herod issued an order, even full paladins were quick to comply.
“Why?” Taelien asked the older man. “I didn’t get hit.”
“Only because I checked my swing, silly. Wouldn’t want to ruin that pretty face of yours.” Velas stepped closer and tapped a gauntleted hand against his helmet, her blue eyes somehow managing to display her smirk even with the rest of her face obscured.
Taelien batted her hand away playfully, shaking his head. “You never could have gotten that close if I wasn’t wearing this stupid helmet. It ruins my peripheral vision.”
&
nbsp; Herod stood up, folding his arms. “If you want to take idiotic risks on the battlefield, I can’t stop you. While you’re training, however, I have an obligation to keep your ‘pretty face’ intact. Now, you did have a pretty good defense there for a while, but you have a tendency to trade hits as soon as you see an opening. That’s not acceptable in general, and it’s an even worse strategy in a two versus one scenario.”
“Trading hits is fine when one hit from me is like five hits from anyone else,” Taelien mumbled, quiet enough for his sparring partners to hear, but hopefully not loud enough for Herod.
“So you keep telling us.” Velas lifted her sword in one hand, leaning it against her shoulder, and cracked the fingers of her other hand against her armor. “Let’s take that theory to a barrier bout some time and see if you can back it up.”
“He can.” Landen had picked up his second sword and wandered close enough to chat, stretching out the arm that Taelien had hit. Their swords were metal, but with blunted edges, and a heavy layer of padding wrapped around the blades for training purposes. Even with the padding, the swords still had the potential for deadly swings, so each of them was wearing a full suit of armor for their practice. “He beat Myros in the arena, remember?”
Velas scoffed. “Not quite how I remember it.”
“Quit flirting down there, otherwise I’ll reset all three of you the hard way,” Herod snapped. Taelien glanced at his companions, and the three of them quickly retreated. The other trainees referred to Herod as ‘old as the city walls and twice as strong’. While the retired paladin didn’t look quite three thousand years old, Taelien had seen enough demonstrations of the man’s skill to consider the latter claim to be a possibility.
Their starting positions were the three points of a chalk-drawn triangle within a larger circle. It allowed the three to start at equal distances, and the circle represented the full bounds of their fighting area. The current activity was a two versus one exercise. A single hit to a non-vital location was treated as a wound to that body part – thus, Landen had dropped his sword when Taelien had managed to tap his arm. A strike to the torso or head was a kill, and the killer would be the target for the next round.
Taelien raised his sword over his heart, offering Velas the traditional salute of the Paladins of Tae’os. Velas returned his gesture.
“Begin.”
Taelien charged. Hardly a surprise, given his proclivity for utilizing that strategy, but his sword was still weighted toward the blade and that favored an offensive strategy.
Velas took the Teris Low-Blade stance, a low stance designed for defense. A sound strategy against two opponents, but Taelien considered it a delaying tactic. The only way to “win” was to eliminate all opposition.
He raised his blade above his head into the Sae’lien Slaying Form. This would theoretically force Velas to move further to block, since her sword was starting out in a low position.
Taelien swept his sword toward her head just as he came into range. She ducked the swing, quickly stepping forward and slamming a shoulder into his chest, knocking him backward. Startled, Taelien barely raised his arm quickly enough to block the dagger she had drawn with her left hand, and it glanced off his bracer – a hit.
He grudgingly released his “wounded” right hand from his sword, then kicked Velas in the chest and sent her stumbling backward, nearly out of the ring. Before his sword hit the ground, he kicked the hilt back upward, catching it with his left hand.
Then something hit Velas in the chest, and toppled to the floor.
There was a moment of silence.
“A throwing dagger, Landen?” Velas turned to the other swordsman, who removed his helmet, shrugged, and gave her a sheepish grin.
“Gotta have some way of evening the odds against monsters like you two.”
Monsters? Taelien frowned, shaking his head. Bah, he didn’t mean anything by it.
He sheathed his sword, removing his own helmet brushing a lock of sweat-drenched black hair out of his eyes. “Water break?”
“Only if you can get it on the way to your class,” Herod projected from the stands. “You’ve got ten minutes until history lessons start.”
“Gods, why didn’t you warn us?” Velas complained, removing her own helmet. She was off and sprinting the next moment and Herod emitted a thunderous belly laugh.
“Guess we’d better follow her,” Taelien mumbled, taking off into a run.
“Don’t we always,” Landen murmured in reply.
***
Eight months had passed since Taelien had made the trek to Velthryn. Lydia had set the pair of them up as caravan guards, which had helped Taelien replenish his sorely wounded funds. The sorceress had also finally retrieved the meager belongings that Taelien had carried when he had been arrested in Orlyn, but those didn’t amount to much, anyway.
By the time they had reached the legendary city, the swordsman felt like he had learned its entire history. Lydia practically glowed whenever she talked about her home, regaling him with tales of the city withstanding assaults from the Xixian Empire, the armies of Daesmodin, and numerous other foes.
As it turned out, Lydia was a more entertaining way to learn about the city than history class. Unfortunately, she also hadn’t covered every detail a prospective Paladin of Tae’os was expected to know.
And thus, three days a week, Taelien Salaris, who had battled false gods and sorcerers in their own domains, sat among children in the mandatory study of Velthryn’s past.
“And so, when the tides of Vyrek Sul’s armies pressed close against our gates, Edrick Theas deployed a final defense. Can anyone tell me what that defense was?”
Taelien was pretty certain he knew the answer to that particular question, but he remained seated out of habit. A Rethri teenager a few seats to his left stood first.
“The Kalsiris Barrier, sir,” the boy said, a slight nervous stammer in his tone. “A spell that protects the whole city, powered by three towers built just outside. It’s named after his son.”
“Very good, Tirith.”
The class continued much as many others had, with Taelien paying as close of attention as he could to the mostly dry material. Velas and Landen sat nearby, the former writing something – or, more likely, drawing something – in her journal.
At first, he was mildly bothered by her constant displays of wealth, but he eventually discovered that paper just wasn’t as rare or expensive in Velthryn as he was used to. He wasn’t quite sure why – he suspected some sorcerer had discovered a spell for conjuring paper directly from the Plane of Nature, but he hadn’t had sufficient interest to investigate the issue directly.
“Now, how many of you are planning to take the Trials of Unyielding Steel next week?”
The question snapped Taelien out of his wandering thoughts. Landen and Velas stood up, so he did the same.
Landen and Velas had arrived in Velthryn a few months after Taelien had, the former having come at Lydia’s invitation. They were both former members of the Queensguard of Orlyn, and Lydia had correctly guessed that they would be robbed of their jobs after the coronation of the new king, Byron. The sorceress had explained to Taelien that Byron had (potentially legitimate) concerns that the Queensguard might have been compromised by Donovan Meiyer, his political enemy, and that they would most likely all be dismissed and replaced.
Regardless, Taelien had been thrilled when Landen had arrived. The two had developed a fast friendship during their time in Orlyn, and Landen was one of the few trainees that could keep up with him.
Velas had been a pleasant surprise. A close friend of Landen’s from the Queensguard, Taelien had expected her to be competent in a fight, comparable to the other Queensguard he had fought with. She was nearly as tall as Taelien, with long blonde hair and an athletic physique.
Velas had quickly corrected two of these misconceptions.
She was not merely “competent” in a fight. Their first match had been a near-disaster from Taelien’s p
erspective, where she had literally thrown him out of the ring when he lowered his guard. After that, he had looked at the young woman in a very different light.
Second, she threw herself into combat with a manic joy that he had only seen in one other place – his mirror image.
A few other students stood along with them.
The first were a pair of Rethri twins, one male and one female, but largely indistinct from one another in appearance due to their voluminous robes. The most obvious difference between the pair was their eyes – the female, Terras, had burning red eyes, and Lysen’s eyes were ice blue. Taelien would have guessed them at a couple years his junior by their appearance, but they both had gone through their Dominion Bonding ritual, which made it near impossible to tell.
Finally, the last man stood slowly, not out of apathy, but rather out of what Taelien had quickly learned was a form of calculated drama. He stretched his well-muscled arms over his head, yawning lightly enough to border between tiredness and mockery.
Taelien was well acquainted with pride – he possessed a fair bit of it himself – but Keldyn Andys was a merchant of the stuff. The first in generations to possess the Gifts of Aendaryn, Keldyn was well-known to be a prodigy with a blade and capable of utilizing techniques long relegated to fanciful Tarren tales. He never lowered himself to direct challenges, of course – his displays were almost always against stationary targets, and in front of a large and endearing audience.
Keldyn was also notable for looking at Taelien with nearly palpable detest. It was clear from every glance, every interaction. The reasons why seemed obvious; Keldyn seemed to have formed his self-image around being chosen by Aendaryn himself to be a symbol for their generation. This probably was working wonderfully until Taelien arrived at the city gates, wearing the sacred sword of the gods on his hip and accompanied by a returning hero – Lydia Scryer – who sang praises about how Taelien had triumphed over a pantheon of false gods.