Ashen felt the heat of his commander’s stare. He retreated to his position.
Another General, Kashun, ventured to the back to investigate the commotion. He had become a General of Combat Artistry after intensive training in the Bangor Kingdom’s Guild of Dark Arts. Though no troll could ever see a resemblance between him and the Prince, he was the younger brother. Compared to his beastly brother, he had a scrawny build but held a fierce power in the military with his ability to conjure flames and wind. He wore a midnight blue robe emblazoned with moon cycles, each representing a blood sacrifice for their god, Avero. He was proud to wear the reward of his enslaved years while his brother feasted like a fat oaf at social soirees. He felt more accomplished in perfecting his craft than in wearing his family emblems.
Kashun smacked his lips and crossed his arms. “Brother, do you not hear your trolls’ unrest? They want to know why you have halted your duties and forsaken plans to burn this forest. It is a disgraceful sight for us all!”
The soldiers fretted at the sight of another altercation between the two biggest egos in the war effort.
“Leave from me, you fly,” Prince Fragile swatted. “It is not your place to point out my flaws.”
“I point them out for the same reason a Phaenix loves to count. We both love high numbers!”
Ashen and his trolls grew anxious. These arguments usually ended in profane screaming. During one camp-out in Elfin territory, Fragile had thrown his brother through a tent and into a well. The troops had to spend hours trying to dig him out. They groaned in remembrance, as no one had been allowed to eat or rest until he was retrieved.
“You make light of this war, brother!” Fragile bared his teeth. “Lest you forget, it is I who is obliged to lead this army. You abandoned your royal status with a written oath to father!”
“Neither you, nor father, could ever persuade me to sit on a throne ‘til I die from nodding my head for bureaucrats!” Kashun retorted, storming towards Fragile, “I am much better equipped as a dark artist. As for father, are you sure he is incapable of looking at me because I am not a piece of food? He is more likely to call a roast beast his beloved child, that corpulent monster!”
Fragile turned red and his face hardened. He took a deep breath and spun around to face the soldiers waiting.
“Trolls! Valiant warriors of Bangor!” Fragile roared to the drooping men. “Did I not promise victory? Did I not say that Kalhari trolls will always conquer?”
Hope returned to the troops as they saw the fire reappear in their general’s eyes.
“Yet some of you do not believe me,” Fragile continued, peering into the eyes of every troll. “You question me like I am some beggar, or a fool who eats his own toe claws, thinking they are meat! Is that who you think I am?”
They shook their heads in unison and false disbelief. Not one, beneath a general’s status, was willing to defy their commander to his face.
Fragile turned to his brother and grinned, “You see, Kashun, trolls only listen to a real commander, not some dark artist with fancy tricks. While you and your cohorts were questioning my reasoning, I was merely analyzing the land to make sure we were headed to the right place. Every part of this invasion needs to be in sync with the prophecy and religious order. You, of all, should know that.”
“If you had an ounce of sense, dear brother, you would know that Avero desires destruction and battle!” Kashun shot back. “That is enough to merit his favor. Put away old parchments!”
Fragile snorted out of his thick ridged nose. He pulled out a platinum fencing blade, a gift from their father, and pointed it at Kashun.
“It is time, my brother, to do your fancy tricks.”
“They are not fancy tricks!” Kashun retorted, scuffing the ground. “I am the conduit for the expressions of Avero. It is his dark majesty that causes destruction through—”
“Just shut face and do it!” Fragile roared, turning to his trolls who had stopped marching. “You want these forests gone, trolls?”
They shouted in agreement.
“General Kashun, under my powerful leadership and masterful cunning, burn it all down!” He turned to his brother and whispered, “Or I will cut your hand off!”
“I hope these flames find you well, brother.”
Kashun stood in the center of the trail and closed his eyes. He reached his arms to the trees above him, on either side, and unleashed the embers flickering deep within him. A circling fire started to rise from the ground, trailing around his arms, until the flames stood on his fingertips.
Take everything, Avero.
The bright blazes, protruding from his hands, stayed in his palms before rising in mid-air. The bright orange spiral flew at Kashun’s command. Flaming demons blew kisses against a tree, then another tree, and then another, until the forest was dancing in fire and smoke. The smoke turned to black billows and the whole path was clouded in flickering red and black lights.
The warriors cheered.
“My trolls,” Fragile exclaimed, “soon, all of Faeria will be our smoldering pit and Phaenix will be the fuel!”
*****
Caitilin awoke to the sound of Ethan’s murmuring as he slept on his living room couch. He hadn’t regained consciousness in the past two days, since she found him in the school bus zone of his high school. Every second that passed, after their meeting, made her question why she had even bothered to visit his school. He had been very vocal that she was unwelcome in his life and his world. But when she saw blood oozing out onto the pavement from under his head, she realized what had possessed her to come back. She had been prepared to expect such stubbornness but not how to handle it to this extent.
When she had arrived at the school, she could barely sense him amidst the floods of students gathering towards buses or walking home. The dark aura surrounding Ethan pulsated towards her between the small openings of the student herds. The effects of his curse started to emanate through his pores like a foul smoke, disguising his presence. His classmates ignored any and all urges to help him as if he never existed and was now another pothole in the asphalt to be avoided. Once she found him, she wrapped his wounded head in part of her sleeve and attempted to fly him home to no avail. In a tiring effort, she dragged him back to his barely standing house.
“I told you,” she sighed, trying to relieve the weight of exhaustion.
Kioko had been waiting for her bus on the curb when she noticed her conversation boy lying on the pavement. Ethan was wedged between two buses, receiving generous amounts of vehicle smog. The senior students were walking over him en route to their cars. Before she could react to seeing the blood pouring from his scalp another figure appeared. She was a blonde woman with very soft skin, wearing a silky purple robe. The stranger sighed at the sight of Ethan and began to scoop him up and drag him. She struggled to roll the boy over and get him into a fireman’s carry. It was amusing to watch until she made eye contact with Kioko. The stranger’s mysterious ocean-blue eyes pierced Kioko and she felt a warm shudder crawl through her body. A soothing sensation of comfort filled her body for a second. The robed figure was gone and so was Ethan when Kioko opened her eyes.
On his couch, Ethan groaned, his head and face covered in Caitilin’s leaf bandages. He started squirming at the tingling sensation of the sap.
“Settle down, it’s me.” She rested her hand on his. “You had a fight with a vehicle and lost. I brought some healing herbs in case something of this sort happened. Also, the smell in here could kill us so I planted some odor-absorbing violettas. That’s why it smells like honey and sugar wine.”
Ethan recognized the voice, but his comprehension was numbed from a stinging in his eye. A migraine emerged from the back of his brain like a heavy metal drummer playing against his skull.
“I’m gonna die!” he slurred through the bandages.
“A bus stopped practically on top of you! You suffered a concussion to the head, for that I put on some Slava worms,” she consoled him, pushin
g his shoulder back down on the couch. “They produce foam that softens your skull lining and the Popo leaves are healing the gashes on your face. They secrete a lotion that increases the speed of your skin regeneration. You should be fully healed by the night. Of course, I can do nothing with your cursed hand.”
Ethan lazily nodded in agreement. A cold gust of air came through where parts of the roof used to be. He stared at the open spaces, letting corners of the sticky leaves fall into his mouth.
She pulled them away.
“You’re back?” Ethan frowned.
“As a Deaconess, you are my job.” Caitilin smiled, “Not for nothing, but you need to cut down on the snacking. You are heavier than you look.”
Ethan turned to his side and groaned, “Everything is gone!” He cried. Caitilin reminded him of his mother and it brought his immaturity to the forefront.
“Gone because of the curse.” She nodded. “Your loved ones, your luck, and the pieces of your life, everything is gone. You are a danger to everything around you. You see how important this is?” She spoke in a low whisper so sweet, caring and yet stern.
He studied the charred bits and ashen remains of his house.
“Why me?” he choked out. “What have I done to deserve this?”
She brushed the hair out of his eyes. “I am trying to find that out, but for now, you need to trust me. I do not wish to hurt you and you have already hurt yourself enough. It is time to stop pretending this curse is not real. I may not be the wise men of Phaenix, but I know if you wait another minute, it could be too late. Your life is too precious.”
She stood up and put out her hand.
Ethan blinked. He barely recognized the same Caitilin that had been here before. She was taking action for his mistake.
He grabbed her hand and pulled himself up. “So you’re really some winged creature that says I have a bad curse?”
“My Daysun, Ethan! Even the blind mice of the Perkian skeptic guild have more faith than you! I do not see what is so hard to believe,” Caitilin remarked, showing her majestic wings.
“So, what’s Faeria like?” he asked half-heartedly.
“It is a paramecium!” Caitilin shone; she had practiced her speech all day. “It has mammoth forests, beautiful ravines, and grass that is always green. It is eternally summer and water does not fall from the sky in horrible torrents but rather sprinkled from the sky by the Daysun. You shall fall in love! It is a place filled with neighbors like me and everyone gets along. Faeria is a huge gift from our Daysun - a royal right of the Phaenix.”
“I think you mean paradise.” Ethan yawned, “Sounds great, will I ever see it?”
Caitilin beamed with excitement. “Phaenix science lesson: our worlds, Magi and Earth, exist simultaneously transposed on top of one another.”
“I have no clue what you’re saying.”
“Questions will be entertained after the lesson!” she countered. “Water was the first thing created as a source of life by our Daysun. But it also has properties that make it like a lobby between two doors; one just needs to know how to enter it. I will make a gateway. I must say though, you Earthians are so far behind in travel technology.”
Caitilin got up and walked into the remains of his kitchen. She grabbed a clear glass from the cupboard and turned on the sink. She filled the cup with water and swirled a small whirlpool in it with her finger. The water started to glow with a bluish tint. Ethan walked towards her, still staring at the cup.
“That’s cool,” Ethan nodded approvingly.
“The closest thing you Earthians understand are silly stories about vampires, ghosts, pixies, and other superstitions,” she continued. “Those are incorrect at best.”
“Wait a minute,” Ethan laughed. “If our worlds are on top of each other, why aren’t they crushing each other?”
“You could say they are inversely balanced.” She laughed, in remembrance of when one of the children in her tribe had asked the same question. “Your universe is hardwired to your five senses—sight, smell, et cetera. My universe has its own; although, many of your kind mistake that for ignorance or superstition—which is very far from true! We may exist in opposing realms but we need balance to thrive.”
She poured the swirling water on her palms and started to circle her hands around it. Water sprayed from her hand; a small blue bubble began to emerge.
“This is a more primitive way of exiting, but it will get the job done.” Caitilin sighed, “Although, I should warn you, that without Faerian technology, this will be a bit uncomfortable.”
She spun her hands faster and the bubble became a vacuum of water.
“How are you doing that?” Ethan’s eyes popped.
She smiled again. “There is so much you can learn.”
The bubble expanded into a clear circular frame, large enough to fit Ethan’s legs. Sharp blue, black, and white lights started to swirl around a ghostly image of a forest at the center of the bubble.
“Are you ready to go?” Caitilin asked, letting go of the sphere, which now stood as tall as a human.
“Wait,” he protested. “Will your people welcome me?”
Her smile faded and turned remorseful. “I am afraid not.”
“Think of the barrier between Magi and Earth like a delicious cream glowberry biscuit. These two worlds are the biscuits separated by a creamy interior. If a creature were to swim through the center, from one side, they would end up on the other half of the biscuit.”
– The Phaenix Quantum Interworld Travel in Layman Terms
V: The Places You Have Come to Dread the Most
A castle made of gold and ivory stone floated above the coast of Faeria. Serene waves lapped against its base and reflected their movements in the stained glass domes atop the castle towers. A limestone village of sunbrick houses rested just beyond the shore. Its affluent neighborhood of golden-green houses buzzed in the political affairs of Faeria. The comfortable-class Phaenix frequented the market to buy, sell, and barter their wares. Marvelous tents displayed smorgasbords of fine quality beads, leather, and wood products that aided their pursuits of potential luxury.
Residents in the castle’s marble war room didn’t have time to gaze out and observe the sprout children in a game of catch the stick. They were trapped behind colorful windows fearing the inevitability of war. Though the breeze was cool; the room was thick with tension and animosity.
“The East Forest was taken,” Budgeron said solemnly.
Budgeron was Faeria’s Master of Defense. Although he was short for a Phaenix, he had the confidence of a mammoth-sized warrior. He lived in his highly decorated combat uniform, to remind those around him of Faeria’s victories. The pendulum of success had swung in his favor since he was young. He became a Master General in the Faerian army shortly after graduating from his Readying House. Then, the Magistral promoted him to his current status after he had won a series of battles against Elfin Raiders.
With the Queen’s highest recommendation, Budgeron now held the security of the entire nation. Since receiving news of the attack on the East Forest, Budgeron was left shaken and angry. Beside him were the Royal Majesty’s priestly politicians—wing kissers—looking for a comfy job of authority. Having to listen to any of their suggestions was underwhelming and nauseating.
Budgeron looked around the hard moss table, decorated in golden vines, at the other members of the Magistral. They were bewildered, uncomfortable, and had only novice military strategy at their disposal. Their previous wars had ended after one skirmish which resulted in the annihilation of their enemies and glorious victory. Since then, the Magistral believed they were the favored race.
“Master of Defense,” an older Phaenix with stern eyebrows asked, “what transgression have we committed to be subject to this invasion? I cannot determine any reason why the Daysun would allow this.”
Trenton, just because you are the spiritual advisor of all political ventures, it does not entitle you to a conversation about our Day
sun’s favor! Budgeron thought.
He bit his tongue as rubbed his temples with the hilt of his sword.
Not all battles can be decided on divinity and good behavior!
Budgeron tensed his brow and tried to rid his contempt with the old Phaenix. He understood his position to uphold the kotoma of the tribes, but it was difficult to start every meeting with the same interjections.
“If we go to war, other nations will lose respect for our way of life!” An advisor with a brutal scar on his face spoke up, “They see us as a peace-loving nation with a code of holiness. If word gets out that we are savagely fighting for our land, we will be viewed as the weaker race. We should be mindful of our image to our neighbors if we are to struggle through battle.”
Oh Greeves, ‘the diplomatic advisor,’ you always try to find the middle ground and the easiest way to mend a nasty situation. You would rather have the whole world think well of you than go to war with their contempt.
“What do you suppose we do then,” Budgeron grimaced, “as we are being systematically exterminated?”
“I find it best if we negotiate with them,” Greeves replied casually. “Have them buy some of our land and then negotiate our holy code. The Kalhari do listen if we allow money to come into the situation.”
“Negotiate?!” Budgeron pounded on the table and stood up. “They burned our forests! We might as well let them harvest our sprouts! This is not time for friendly contracts. We have never held a friendly contract with Bangor. The only difference now, is some general from their slimy pit has the courage to lay a finger on this blessed land!”
Greeves slumped out of his royal posture and pursed his thin lips.
“Let me sum this up for you so we are on the same page,” Budgeron folded his hands and stared at them. “Four nights ago, a battalion of trained Kalhari warriors trampled the East Forest. Only one messenger made it out alive so that we might have this conversation. Over the past three days, Her Majesty the Queen and I have been keeping tabs on their movements. They seem to be transfixed on annihilation and destruction of our land, which shows us that they have no purpose other than to wipe us off the map. I can safely say that negotiations are off.
The Boy and His Curse Page 5