by B.J. Keeton
Chapter Thirty-four
“—just not sure,” said a voice off to the left.
“What good are you then?” came a higher pitched voice from the right.
“I understand you're upset. The procedure was experimental in ways I can barely explain. Typical Blood Rites are one thing. His…” the voice on the left trailed off.
Ceril opened his eyes. Or at least he tried to. His eyelids moved about half of the distance he urged them to, and the light that streamed in was so bright that he only saw whiteness. He tried to speak, but his mouth could not form the words he wanted. He could not actually get sound to come out.
“His were what?” demanded the voice from the right.
“Complicated. And necessary. Don't forget that. Ceril’s situation is unprecedented in the order. Honestly, I’m amazed he’s not up and running by now. At this point, we shouldn’t be shocked if he doesn’t wake up at all. If he does, he might not…be his old self.”
Ceril had no idea what was going on. Why would he not be himself? What about him was unprecedented? Where was he, anyway? Who were these people?
Questions flooded his mind, but they were trapped by his unresponsive mouth. He forced his eyes wide, the light searing the nerves, but he held them open as wide as he could. He would pay for that with a headache later. The world remained unfocused. Once he had mastered his eyelids, he tried to speak again, to yell, and he finally made a sound.
To him, he said, “What do you mean? What's wrong with me?” To everyone else, he said “Mmnnnnng.”
Blurry shapes moved in from both sides of him, and Ceril thought they turned to face him.
“Did he—” said the voice to the right.
“He did. Thankfully,” said the voice from the left. “We have to determine how much damage was done, where he stands.”
“Right now?” asked the voice from the right.
“Preliminary determination is all. Awareness, muscle control, that sort of thing.”
“Okay.”
The voice from the left spoke very deliberately. “Ceril? Can you hear me?”
“Mmnnng,” Ceril said, meaning, Yes.
“Good,” said Left. “Can you see me?”
“Mmnnng.”
“I can't understand you, Ceril. Can you shake your head yes or no if you can see me?”
Ceril nodded.
“Can you move your right hand?” asked Left.
Ceril flexed his right arm, feeling the fingers clench into a fist.
“Good,” Left said. There was a slight pause, and the voice added, “What about the left one?”
Ceril flexed his left arm, again feeling the fingers clench into a fist.
What he felt and what actually happened, however, were not the same. The moment he felt his fist ball up, the figure to his left became obscured by a large, dark wave. The wave extended from Ceril’s bed, and even in his blurred vision, he saw it slam into the person on his left and push him against the room’s far wall.
Ceril heard Right say, “Are you all right, doctor?”
Doctor? Ceril thought. They found a doctor? On Jaronya?
Ceril's eyes were beginning to focus a little more, and he realized that he was no longer on Jaronya in a simple revelation: nothing around him was purple. Instead, the sterile whiteness of the room was so bright that it hurt his head. He blinked a few times and tried as hard as he could to make sense of the jumble of blurred colors to his left.
If he worked at it, Ceril could focus his eyes for a few seconds at a time. He could see Easter Harlo kneeling beside a larger form leaning against the wall. Ceril heard her say, “Doctor Saker? Answer me!” There was panic in her voice. She shook the larger figure, this Doctor Saker. Then, without warning, his vision blurred again.
Saker regained consciousness with a start and jumped to his feet. “I'm fine, Harlo. I'm fine.” He moved back toward Ceril and leaned down. He seemed to ignore whatever had happened to him, and said, “That could use a little fine-tuning, but it took. What about your left leg?”
Ceril flexed it. His toes wiggled. He even felt the big one pop.
“Good,” Saker said. “And your right one? But, wait, just hold on a second…” The man stepped back out of Ceril's field of vision. “You too, Harlo. Okay, now try, Ceril.”
Ceril wiggled the toes on his right foot, and another dark wave erupted from that side of the bed. It, too, struck the far wall, and then dissipated.
“All right,” the doctor said, “I guess that’s good. You’re responsive, at least.”
“W-what’s…gunn…on?” Ceril managed to say.
Harlo and Saker moved where he could see them again. They stood on opposite sides of his bed, framing his field of vision. They leaned in simultaneously, and Harlo spoke first.
“Ceril,” she said, “this is going to be a little hard to talk about, but we have to, okay? Do you think you’re up for it, or should we come back after you’ve had some rest?”
Ceril nodded. “Now’s…fine.”
“Good,” she continued. “What do you remember? What is the last thing you remember?”
Ceril blinked a few times. He thought back, trying to recall anything about where he had been or what he had been doing before he had woken up in the bright white room.
Fire. He remembered that there was fire. And pain. He said, “Fire. Purple. A fight maybe. A priest. We were being burned. The J-Jaronya…Fire…everywhere.” Ceril coughed. He breathed in and out rapidly, but it became harder to breathe as he thought about it. Harlo placed her hand on his chest, and it tingled lightly. It made him feel better, and he was able to catch his breath. After a few deep lungfuls, he asked, “Swinton?”
Harlo looked at Saker, who said, “He didn't make it.”
“What?” Ceril asked. He saw Harlo flinch backward as his vision blurred again. Maybe he had yelled and expended too much energy on the emotion behind the question.
“Swinton was killed in the fire in the temple, Ceril,” Harlo said. “There was a lovely memorial service. His brother was there. That would have meant a lot to him, I think.”
“Saryn?” Ceril asked. “Chuckie?”
“They're fine, actually. Saryn’s back was burned,” Ceril tensed up, and Harlo spoke more deliberately, “but she’s fine. Chuckie was able to Conjure a shield that gave me enough time to heal her. Chuckie and I were really lucky; we barely had a scratch on us. Chuckie and Saryn have both spent a lot of time in here with you, but they stepped out just before the doctor arrived. Do you remember anything else?”
Ceril shook his head. “What…happened to me?”
“You, umm, won,” Harlo said. “If you consider this winning.”
Then, very quickly, Harlo abridged the story of what had happened to them in the temple, the aftermath of their fight, and how they had found their way back to Erlon. Ceril listened in silence.
“Are you serious?” he asked when she was finished.
Harlo nodded. “Yeah, that about covers it.”
Doctor Saker cleared his throat. “Ceril, I’d like your comments on…well, what happened in here a few moments ago.”
“I don't know what you mean.”
“How well can you see?” the doctor asked.
“Not well. I see blurs, colors. You’re both standing there, but I can't see your faces.”
“Can you see your body?”
Ceril looked down. “Yeah, but I’m as blurry as you are.”
The doctor nodded. “Ceril, the fight you had with the high priest was intense. Traumatic. You almost didn't survive. Do you remember anything about it?”
Again, Ceril thought. He remembered pain. Not much else. “Pain,” Ceril told him.
“Nothing more specific than that?”
Ceril shook his head.
“I see,” Saker said. He sighed and then reached up and combed through his hair with his fingers. “There's no easy way for me to tell you this, Ceril, so do you mind if I'm blunt?”
“
No,” said Ceril.
“The Jaronya priest severed your left arm and crushed your right leg. We had to amputate.”
Ceril closed his eyes and didn’t speak. So those waves of dark that he saw, they were…what? His new prosthetics? He lay there in silence.
“We did the only thing we could, Ceril,” Saker continued. “You were dying when you arrived. You had already bled a great deal. To be honest with you, I couldn’t believe you weren’t already dead. Apparently, your sleeve helped keep you from bleeding out entirely; however, it wasn't enough. You had simply lost too much blood for our normal procedures to help. The only thing we could do was perform your Blood Rites.”
“So…I passed?” Ceril asked. “My Rites? We did it?”
“You could say that,” the doctor said. “Your Rites weren't normal, though, Ceril. The test itself, nor your Blood Rites. The severity of your injuries prevented us from performing the typical ritual.”
“What do you mean?” Ceril asked. “What is typical?”
Harlo broke in. “What had you been told about the Blood Rites before, Ceril?”
Ceril's eyes closed, and he drifted to the edge of consciousness.
“Ceril?” Doctor Saker asked.
“Sorry,” he said, “Umm, the Blood Rites are a ceremony, right? Some kind of ritual after you pass the test to become a full agent.”
Harlo nodded. “True. They are. That whole experience on Jaronya, that was the testing part of our Rites. The Blood Rites, though, are a physical change to your body to help you bond to Charonic technology. We're not told this coming in,” she said. Ceril was too far gone to notice the hint of contempt in her voice. “The Rites are painful, Ceril. Even the normal ones. They hurt a lot.”
“What happens?” Ceril asked. “Did I miss mine?”
“Yeah,” she said. “You did. Normally, they perform a ceremony, and then they drain the initiate of blood. At the same time, they transfuse into them specially-tagged nanites to replace anything that is drained.” She let that sink in for a moment and gave Ceril time to respond. When he didn’t, she said, “A Rited Charon’s entire circulatory system is nanite-based, Ceril. And yours is even more so.”
Doctor Saker said, “When we performed your Blood Rites, it was an emergency. The nanites were going to have to do more than serve as your bloodstream. They would have to take over the physical aspects of your body that were missing. Do you understand?”
Ceril shook his head. “Not…really, no.”
“It is going to take conscious effort at all times to maintain your arm and leg’s structure, Ceril. The nanites are bonded to you in a way far different than normal Blood Rites. Until today, we were honestly not sure if you would survive the process. We weren’t sure anyone could. Initial scans indicated that the nanites have clustered in your brainstem, and more recent tests show that they have begun restructuring your brain’s synapse system.”
Ceril blinked. “What?”
“It's nothing to worry about,” Doctor Saker said.
“I…don’t see that,” Ceril said.
“It’s not bad, I promise. Your body is just adapting to a new addition, and I wanted you to be aware of it. It's necessary for the nanites to function like the original organic tissue. I would assume that the restructuring may also be the cause of your blurred vision. That should correct itself within a few hours to a few days, as you use the nanotech, and it becomes more adapted to your physiology.” Saker kept talking, telling Ceril about his new body systems, but Ceril’s attention waned eventually, and he didn't hear anything the doctor was telling him.
Instead, Ceril thought about the fact that he was no longer entirely human. He thought about the dark blurs he had seen a few minutes before, the one that had knocked Saker to the wall and the one after it—the one from which Saker and Harlo had fled in advance. He was feared now. He was something new. Something different.
He looked down and concentrated on being able to see himself. His eyes did not want to focus, but he made them. Ceril was horrified. He was literally half the person he used to be. Gaping craters existed where his left arm and right leg should be. His entire right leg was gone, as though it had never existed. His body just kind of stopped at the hip. His left arm was worse. His chest was now concave, his left shoulder and a portion of his torso gone.
It took a few moments for the truth of what he was seeing to sink in. When it did, Ceril screamed. Tears welled in his eyes, and he tried to move his missing arm and leg. He felt a tingle he hadn't before, and waves of blackness exploded again. This time, luckily, Harlo and Saker were not in the way, and the nanites dissipated harmlessly.
“Where are they?” Ceril asked. He didn’t care who answered.
“Your arm and leg are gone, son,” Doctor Saker said as calmly as he could. “The arm was burned on Jaronya, I believe. Your legs were crushed—shattered, really—but we were able to repair the damage in the left one. The right one was just too…We had to amputate.”
Ceril sat in stunned silence. The doctor continued, “When you're a little stronger and more able to concentrate, you'll be able to control these nanites,” he gestured at the empty spaces on Ceril's body, “to work exactly like your old limbs. As you grow more comfortable with them, you'll be able to include them actively as you Conjure. Most of us can only do it with our blood, but you have pretty much your whole body at your disposal.”
That’s when Ceril started to cry. He hadn't asked for this. He didn't want this.
“Where are we?” Ceril asked when his sobs subsided.
“Erlon,” Harlo told him.
“Where on Erlon? Ennd's?”
Harlo nodded. “We're at Ennd's, yeah, but there’ve been some developments in the time you've been out, Ceril.”
“How long was I out?”
Harlo swallowed, and Doctor Saker said, “You were in a coma for three months.”
Ceril just blinked. Three months of his life, just gone. He hadn’t been dreaming, couldn’t remember a thing. It was like those months never existed because, for him, they hadn’t.
“Which is why,” the doctor continued, “we had no idea if the procedure would take. You were unconscious the whole time, and until just now, we had no indication, other than tests, of how your body was reacting to the technology.”
“But,” Ceril asked, “I’m fine?”
“Time will tell,” Saker said. “You're certainly better off than I anticipated.”
“But you're not out of the woods yet,” Harlo interjected.
Someone knocked rapidly on the door, and Saryn and Chuckie filed into the room. Saker motioned at Ceril, and their faces brightened.
“Nice to see you back in the land of the living, boss,” Chuckie said, a smile on his face.
“Ternia!” Saryn said. “You're okay!”
“Hi, guys,” Ceril said.
Doctor Saker took the opportunity to excuse himself. He shuffled some things around in his pockets before he left, and said, “I'll give you all some time to talk. Ceril, I'll be back later this evening to check on you. If you need anything at all, don't hesitate to call me.”
Ceril nodded at him as he left the room. “Yeah,” he said. “Will do.”
Saryn said, “Are you—”
Ceril nodded. “I'm fine,” he said and managed a pitiful smile.
Chuckie said, “You don't look like it, boss. You look like you've been through some kind of hell.”
Ceril chuckled a little and closed his eyes. “From…what I'm told, I just might have been.”
Chuckie smirked.
Saryn just stood there and looked at Ceril. She smiled awkwardly at him, unsure of what else to say now that he was finally awake, and then she turned her attention to Harlo. “There's some new information in Squalt's murder.”
Ceril tried to sit up, but found that even a simple task like sitting up was harder than he thought it would be. Of course, he didn’t want to slam his nanite arm and leg into his team, so he made a conscious eff
ort not to instinctively flex his amputated limbs. He couldn’t manage everything at once, so when his vision blurred, he just lay back where he was and said, “Squalt's murder?”
Everyone exchanged glances. Ceril could tell that they were uncomfortable. Saryn spoke first. She said, “When we came back to Ennd's from Jaronya, it was through Squalt's office. That was the only connection we were able to make.”
“Harlo told me. Lucky break,” Ceril said.
“When we got there, though,” she choked up for a second, “we found two bodies. One of them was Headmaster Squalt. I recognized his, umm, face. The other we were able to identify later as Nary Thralls, a new culinary arts professor here.”
“Bodies?” Ceril asked.
“Mutilated. It was brutal, Ternia”
“Who did it?”
“That's the thing,” Saryn said. “There was an intruder a few months back who did a lot of damage to the school, but they were unable to identify him. He said he was Swarley Dann's uncle. Records show that Dann didn’t actually have an uncle, but the receptionist didn't run a check when the visitor came in and just took his word for it. Because she didn’t, Dann and another student are dead.”
“Wait, what?” Ceril felt his amputated limbs begin to tingle. “Swarley’s dead?”
Saryn sighed. “Yes, Ceril. I’m sorry.”
Blackness exploded again, this time into the air. A fountain of nanites erupted, and Ceril’s friends backed quickly away from the bed. When he had once again regained control of himself, Ceril asked, “Who was the man?”
“They're not sure. Somehow, all video feeds of where he went through the school were scrambled. It’s like he was emitting his own low-level EM field.”
“That’s odd,” Ceril said. “Who does that?” Do I do that now? Now that I’m a machine?
“Yeah, it is. That’s what I was talking about there being a break in the murder. Turns out, there was a feed from Squalt's office that picks up some time after Thralls was murdered. I have it on my tablet, but so far no one on the team has been able to identify him. I was on my way to take it to Roman and the others aboard the Sigil when I stopped by here.
“So the Sigil's connected again?” Ceril asked.
“For the time being,” Harlo chimed in. “Some kind of quick-fix, but Roman doesn’t think it’ll hold. Anyway, Jaronya was how they were testing us to make sure we could handle the Blood Rites and deserved to be Charons.”
“And Swinton?” Ceril asked, pain in his voice.
“According to Roman, there are often more deaths than that. He says that our team was lucky.”
Ceril's looked down at himself. “We were lucky?”
“I know,” Harlo said. “It's hard to believe.”
“Yeah,” Ceril said. “Can we see the feed, Saryn?”
“Sure, I guess,” she said. She rummaged through her pack and pulled out her tablet. She swiped at it a few times and tapped a few more, and eventually the screen lit up with a monochrome video of Squalt's office.
After a few minutes of watching, Ceril began to sob.
“Ceril,” Harlo said. “Are you okay? What is it?”
Ceril just kept weeping.
“He's had a hard day,” Harlo said. “We should probably go.”
“No,” Ceril said. “Don't.” He paused, sobbed a couple more times, and took a deep breath before continuing. “Can you run the video back, Saryn? Maybe pause it on a good shot of the killer's face?”
“I think so,” she said. She tapped the screen a few times and held the tablet in front of Ceril's face. “Is that clear enough?”
Ceril nodded, and he began to sob again.
Chuckie asked quietly, “You know who that is, don't you, boss?”
Ceril said nothing. Eventually, he swallowed hard and coughed. He took a deep breath. “It’s my grandfather,” he said. “Gramps killed those people.”
“I don’t think I heard you right, boss.”
“That man. In the video,” Ceril said. “He’s my grandfather.”
“I think I’m missing something here, boss.”
“I don’t know a lot. Roman told me before we left that Gramps used to be a Charon. His name is Damien Vennar—”
“Vennar?” Saryn asked. “Like—”
“Yeah,” Ceril said. “He’s that Vennar. The hero, the myth, the technomage they wrote stories about thousands of years ago…”
“Wasn’t Vennar like a good guy, though?” Chuckie asked. “No offense to your grand-daddy, but that video don’t show a real nice guy.”
Ceril used his good arm to wipe his eyes before the tears could roll down his cheeks. “He was. In the stories, he was. Is. I don’t know what’s going on in the video. Roman said that Gramps somehow sabotaged the Sigil a long time ago, that he did it to get back at the other technomages somehow.”
“That old guy looks familiar, though,” Chuckie said. “I’ve seen him somewhere before, I think.”
“Where?” Harlo asked. “I was thinking the same thing, but I can’t place it.”
“I don’t mean to change the subject,” Ceril asked, “but have you guys heard anything else about the Untouchable?”
“Only what the Gatekeeper said,” Saryn told him.
“That’s it!” Chuckie said. “Your granddaddy looks like the Gatekeeper in the temple! That’s where I’ve seen him before!”
“Now that you mention it,” Saryn said, “he kind of does. How odd.”
“Yeah,” chimed in Harlo. “I could see it.”
“Who’s the Gatekeeper?” Ceril asked. “Why does he look like Gramps?”
“He’s a hologram like the Archive,” Saryn replied. “He controlled the Instance portal in the temple. And, to answer your other question, he actually did mention the Untouchable.”
Ceril raised his head off the pillow a bit and cocked an eyebrow up. “He did?”
“He said the Untouchable’s last known location was,” she paused and looked at the tablet, “in Ternia. It was a long time ago, I know, but…Ceril, I don’t mean to be…”
“It’s okay, Saryn.”
“Could your grandfather be the Untouchable?”
“No,” Ceril said quickly. Then he thought about the video he had seen and said, “Maybe. I hope not. I don’t know. I…” His voice trailed off.
Ceril closed his eyes and clenched his teeth. He dropped back onto his pillow and began to gather himself. He felt betrayed and angry, sad, disappointed, and more than a little sickened by his grandfather. He focused on how he felt about the old man. In seconds, he was no longer an amputee, as shimmering black replicas of his missing limbs materialized.
“Ceril,” Harlo said. “You need to be careful. I don’t think you’re ready for that kind of—”
“I think I can manage,” Ceril said. He wiggled his toes, bent his knee, and pushed himself up off the pillow. Then the limbs disappeared as he lost concentration, and he collapsed again.
“See?” Harlo said.
“I’m fine,” Ceril countered. But he wasn’t. He was getting dizzy and the edges of his vision were fading to black. He spoke faster as he fought unconsciousness. “I promise. Saryn, I need any reports on Untouchable attacks since Squalt was killed. I have a hunch that those attacks really picked up, and I need to see a pattern to make sure. If the Gatekeeper said there was something in Ternia, then that’s where we need to be. Part of our job was finding a connection to the Untouchable, and if you’re right, and Gramps is the Untouchable, then I’m the best connection to the Untouchable we’ve got.”
“You can’t put yourself through this,” Harlo said. “Saryn, talk some sense into him.”
“She’s right, Ternia. This isn’t your fight right now. Maybe it was. Maybe it will be, but right now, you have more to worry about.”
“No,” Ceril said. “He killed Swarley, Saryn. He was the only friend I had before I went aboard the Sigil. I don’t know what’s going on, but I have to find out. I want to know—I need to know—why the
man who raised me lied to me every day of my life.”
“You don’t know that,” Saryn said. “You don’t know that’s your Gramps on that video. You just need to calm down for a while and get better.”
The blackness was filling his vision more rapidly now. “Even if he’s not the Untouchable, he’s at least Vennar. He still lied to me. Maybe he’s not a killer or a terrorist. Maybe he’s just a ten-thousand-year-old Charon,” Ceril said and laughed, but even it was weak, and he had to force himself to continue. “Either way, he is something that isn’t my technophobic Gramps. And, right now, I don’t even know who I am anymore, much less who he is.” He flexed his left arm, and the nanites congealed into a fist, then dissipated again. “I just have to find that out, okay?”
“Okay,” the three of them said at the same time.
“Thank you,” he said. With that, Ceril lay his head down and closed his eyes. He fell asleep instantly.
When he woke up the next day, the world had changed.
Epilogue
Damien Vennar remembered when Ferran had not been so…ruined. He wondered if anyone had even bothered to repair any of the sandstone buildings in the past five hundred years. The streets were dusty and badly damaged, their cracked stones preventing anything but foot travel.
The twin suns beat down on Ferran worse than anywhere else Damien had ever been. He had been spoiled by so many years in Ternia. This kind of heat was going to take some getting used to. The streets were packed with people, and no one seemed to care who they bumped into as they rushed about. Merchants had tents lining both sides of the streets, and Damien picked a tent, seemingly at random. He weaved through the throng of pedestrians and stood in front of what appeared to be a jewelry vendor.
“Hello there,” Damien said.
“Oh, hi!” The merchant replied. His voice was higher-pitched than Damien would have expected for such a burly man. “What can I do for you today? I know! You’re looking for the perfect stone for a perfect lady! Try this!” He reached for a braided necklace with a large, orange stone as a pendant. “Perfect, no?”
“It’s lovely,” Damien said. “But I’m not here to buy jewelry.”
The merchant’s smile faded. Without the smile, his face was much more menacing. “Then I don’t think I can help you. Move along, if you would.”
“I don’t think I will. I’m looking for someone.”
“Aren’t we all? I am not in the business of someone. I sell stones, necklaces, and rings. If this someone you are looking for is one of those, we can do business.” He put the orange-stoned necklace back in its place. “If not, I don’t think I can help you.”
“Now why don’t I think that’s the truth?” Damien said. He reached for a ring. It was a simple piece, a carved band of stone with a tiny black gemstone embedded in one spot. He slid it on his finger. “I like this one.”
“That one is ten rejans.”
Damien scowled. “You’re a thief. This is worth four rejans at most.”
“Move along, old man,” the merchant said. “But put my ring down first.”
“I’m looking for a man named Derin Sarnt.” That was the name Squalt had given him at Ennd’s. Damien had double-checked that information with the dead headmaster’s tablet, too. That much lined up, at least. “I was friends with his grandfather,” Damien lied. “I’d like to catch up with the family. It’s been a long time.”
“You’re older than you look, then. But I still can’t help you.” He nodded toward the ring. “Seven rejans, and that’s as low as I can go.”
Damien placed the hand with the ring on the merchant’s table, and then looked up at him. “I’ll tell you what,” Damien said. “You tell me where I can find Derin Sarnt, and you won’t run into any unfortunate accidents on your way home today.”
“Are you threatening me, my friend?” The merchant crossed his arms and threw his head back to laugh. He guffawed, and looked directly at Damien. “You will leave my tent. Right now. And I will not call the constable and tell him how you tried to steal that ring from me.”
Damien smiled. “The constable. How precious.”
“You do know what the punishment for stealing in Ferran is, don’t you?” The merchant placed his hand over Damien’s, which still rested on the table. “Your hands. Both of them. They are cut off with a white-hot blade and given to you. You wear them around your neck for the next year. By the time that year is up, your hands have rotted away to almost nothing, and you have witnessed the whole thing.” He looked Damien directly in the eye. “Do not threaten me, old man.”
Before the merchant could pull his hand away, Damien had flipped his hand over and grabbed the merchant’s wrist. “That sounds very fitting,” Damien said. “Thank you for the idea.” In his other hand, Damien summoned his new Flameblade, the prize he had won by killing Gilbert Squalt. As it appeared in Damien’s hand, the Flameblade’s green-purple aura flared. Even in the bright desert sun, the merchant could see the color around the suddenly-there weapon.
“Derin Sarnt?” the merchant said. “I-I do know him!”
Damien maneuvered the merchant’s arm onto the table. The burly man struggled, but he couldn’t break Damien’s grip. When he was in position, Damien placed the tip of the Flameblade against the man’s wrist and held it there. “I think right now would be the best time for you to tell me where to find Derin Sarnt.”
“I-I can show you!”
Damien pressed the tip of the blade into his skin. The merchant screamed. “You will tell me.”
“S-sure! Sure! Go down the street here and take a left. Go maybe, maybe, three blocks? And on your left should be Sarnt’s restaurant. I can’t remember the name. It’s the one with the black door. You can’t miss it!”
“And you’re certain this is where I can find this man?”
The merchant nodded over and over again. “Yes, yes! I promise!”
“And if you’re lying?”
“I’m not! I swear!”
Damien cocked his head to the side, then said, “Maybe. But I can’t be sure of that right now.” He rammed the Flameblade down through the man’s wrist and into the display table. The hand came off cleanly, and no blood spilled. The merchant screeched in pain. Damien glared at him. “If you are lying to me, I will return. And I can assure you, my friend, this hand is nothing compared to what you will lose if that happens.”
The Flameblade disappeared and the light around the small tent went back to normal. Damien took the man’s ring off his finger and placed it back on the display. “I’ll have to think about the ring. I like it. I may be back for it.”
Then he walked away from the tent and disappeared into the crowd on the street.
End of Book One
To Be Continued in
Lineage
The Technomage Archive, Book Two
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About the Author
B.J. KEETON is a writer, teacher, and runner. When he isn't trying to think of a way to trick Fox into putting Firefly back on the air, he is either writing science fiction, watching an obscene amount of genre television, or looking for new ways to integrate fitness into his geektastic lifestyle.
Kickstarter acknowledgements
I cannot even begin to express how thankful I am for all the support my friends, family, and online communities have offered me. Especially you fine folks who donated to the Kickstarter campaign. If not for you folks, Birthright would never have become the book it is. So thank you. Thank you bunches. This book is just as much yours as it is mine.
Kickstarter Backers – Archive Level
The Tidwells
Kickstarter Backers – Charon Level
K. Jespersen
Kickstarter Backers – Agent+ Level
Michael Birke – [email protected]
Kenneth Blankenberg – https://www.99269282.com
John Ayers – https://www.fx2k.net
Andrew Karnani
Miriam Halbrooks
Kickstarter Backers – Agent Level
Cathie B. Ayers – https://www.facebook.com/WoodmenLodge1115
Barry Rich – https://blehwithbarry.com
Colin Wetherbee – https://www.colinwetherbee.com
Adam – https://safesharkhosting.com
Ethic – https://KillTenRats.com
Kristen "Aurelis" Trzonkowski - https://epicslantpress.com
Dane Nielsen – https://thewrittentale.com
Ava G. Nielsen – https://www.joy2day.org
Margaret M. St. John
Craig Smith
Josef Prchal
Alexandre
Robin Holland
Brett Wilson
Kickstarter Backers
Apprentice Level
Andrew Nielsen - https://www.agreenmushroom.com
Andrew Parran – https://www.fark.com
Michael A. Keefe – https://CasualAggro.wordpress.com
Mandy Kilinskis – https://twitter.com/imamandajulius
Tesh – https://tishtoshtesh.wordpress.com
Mike Mertens – https://www.facebook.com/michael.mertens
Maria Coffey – https://www.twitter.com/BloodyGneisha
Stacy Stipes – https://www.wildboarinn.net
@grimnir_ – https://grimnir.me
Brent Schaffrick
C. Shuy
Brian Koehler
Matt Cupp
Paul Prestidge
T. D. Kelly
Brian LaShomb
Magentawolf
Rin Seilhan
Kickstarter Backers – Recruit Level
Gordon McLachlan – https://blog.weflyspitfires.com
Nerni Gnome – https://www.nerniandfriends.com
Pewter – https://www.decodingdragons.com
Even Skjervold - https://www.facebook.com/ClemsonBrewCrew
Wilhelm Arcturus – https://tagn.wordpress.com
Gareth "Gazimoff" Harmer – https://www.gazimoff.com
Flávia Denise – https://www.flaviadenise.com
Lyrania – https://www.lyrania.co.uk
Robert Triveri II - https://www.fictionpress.com/u/311059/
Victor Barreiro Jr. – https://www.gamesandgeekery.com
Matthew Ferris – https://www.twitter.com/Matthew_Ferris
Jonathan Ardua Doyle – https://www.twitter.com/ardua
Faith Holland – https://www.cfaithholland.com
CMcKane – https://www.annuarychit.com
Stephenie Sheung – https://mmogamerchick.wordpress.com
Brian Ruth
Jacob "Jondare" Madsen
Mario B
Erinina Marie Ness
Zach Bertram
Kickstarter Backers – Student+ Level
Adam "Ferrel" Trzonkowski – https://www.epicslantpress.com
Lewis Dix – https://www.crashaddict.com
Matt R. McLean – https://www.mattplanet.net
Rachel Palmarozzi
Kickstarter Backers – Student Level
Sir Frederick "The Cool Guy" Aaron Forker
Paul Melancon
Emily Rose Clayton
Shawn Richardson
Sabrina Norton
Wes & Jess Kinslow
Norman J. LaFave