The Circle of Duty

by Owen Elgie

  But had she been that successful?

  “What about Freddy?” I shot at Mike as the thought hit me, shuffling myself up on the pillows as I did.

  Mike looked blank. There was no emotion in his face as he regarded my face.

  “Frederico wasn't as lucky as the rest of you. His injuries were much more severe. Indeed some think too severe to survive.”

  That lack of anything emotional remained bolted to each and every syllable as he spoke and he continued to speak as if there was nothing more to be added to his original statement. I wasn't looking for him to give me a grisly breakdown of the exact extent of his injuries but surely there needed to be more than just 'he will most likely die'. Freddy had been a very green (in terms of experience and colour) member of our team and he had been under my command – roughly at least. I slumped back into the bed.

  The Elder broke the silence.

  ”Frederico understood all of the expectations he had on his shoulders. He, as a Guardian of The Circle, was more than willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to be able to protect the prison that he was charged with defending.”

  Her voice carried no forceful aggression, no need to dominate, only a granite surety. Looking at her, I could see that she had her eyes closed and she was relaxed back into the voluminous pillows of her hospital bed. She continued with her eyes closed.

  “We are all links in a great chain. None of us is more valuable than the next and all of us are gifted the chance to be a saviour to the human race. Not one of us would turn away from the chance to be the saviour of the human race – not even you.” Her last syllable was accompanied by a weighty silence. Looking around the room, I could see that each and every person within was transfixed by her words. Andrea, who was still in the same position she had been when she regained consciousness, looked on intently with only her eyeballs showing the level of attention she was paying. All of the medical staff stood spellbound by her words, not moving in any way.

  This time, Leatherpants broke the silence.

  “Indeed my lady. Soon enough we will know if our Guardian has survived or if we are required to re-forge the strength of what The Circle truly is.” He nodded deeply towards the bed bound form of The Elder. She, with her eyes still closed, made a shallow nod and the point seemed to have been ratified.

  I nudged Mike and as he turned to me I asked in the most efficient / erudite manner I could muster, “Huh?”

  “The next Awakening.” he informed me, again in a very matter of fact fashion.

  Of course. If Freddy did die there would be a weakness in who we all were. With the latest Guardian fallen, the power of the Dragon would pass to the next person in line. Despite my best efforts to keep the whole issue business like in my mind it still meant that the previous Guardian had died. That of course meant that I would have to return here to take part in another ceremony I could truly do without, all the time being reminded that I was the one responsible for failures which had led us to this point.

  Suddenly being the one that everyone knew was a ‘winner’ seemed to be the weightiest part of my position. I’d seen nothing but losses since I had completed my first fight.

  Laying back in my bed, I happily let the pillows and soft blankets absorb me. I wanted to be enveloped by the welcoming feel and smell of warm bedding and push all of the death away. I wanted to pull the covers over my head and shut myself away from everything.

  I was tired and I wanted to go home.

  9

  Thankfully, I didn't have to wait much longer to get my wish.

  The three of us were quickly deemed fit to be discharged by whoever was the head of the medical facility we were staying in. Leatherpants had been doing his best to hurry things along so he could take The Elder home and away from the presence of such low creatures as Mike and I. I don't think his efforts were responsible for the decision to let us all leave but you can never be sure with people like him, can you? The Elder was the first of us to leave but we were soon all making our way from the shared infirmary, surrounded in turn by the gathered throng of our personal retinues.

  The Elder travelled amidst a bristling cloud of fabrics and metals. All of her armed and armoured guards locked into a protective shell surrounding her and the tiny woman was spirited from the facility under maximum security.

  Andrea had a fraction of the people to see to her but still seemed to exude the same level of almost royal concern. Through all of her preparations she didn’t once look in my direction, instead feeling content to give me a solid view of her back. Looks like everything that had happened had even made Andrea wary of me. Soon, she too was whisked from the infirmary and back to her estate in northern Russia. She did, though, flick a single glance at me through the gathered troops as she left.

  Or at least I think she did.

  I deliberately took the longest to prepare myself for my departure. Indeed, I didn’t start gathering together my belongings until all of the others had left. It took me roughly three minutes to put together my possessions in a leather case which had been left at the side of the bed. I hadn’t brought any change of clothes or toothbrush when I’d brought my forces down from Wales. I’d just opened up a bridge and we had all trooped through. Everything I had used up to now had been a loaner from Freddy’s estate. I couldn’t even leave any of it there. Everyone had looked aghast when I’d suggested it and Mike had had to politely explain the requirements of etiquette. Again.

  Finally we were set and the least impressive of the Guardians supporters groups, just Mike and I, left the infirmary where I had been recovering and headed out towards the exterior of the estate.

  Before we left, a bustling nurse gave us a rundown of important points to remember. It was the last piece of information which threw a spanner in the works somewhat.

  “We can't use a Cascade Bridge? How are we supposed to get home if we can't open a way there?” I tried to prevent the petulant child tone from touching my voice but there was no way of being sure I was successful.

  The nurse looked up at me, trying to hold the tough professional expression on his face but he wasn't having much luck. Fear of his perceived superior wasn't so much bleeding out as it was gushing around the edges of the poorly applied mask. In fact, I think he was actually shaking a little.

  “I'm very sorry sir, but following on from the effects of the working that was the cause of your stay with us here, heavy magics of the kind which will bring the Cascade into existence are likely to be violently unstable at best but potentially fatal at worst. The Elder was very certain that it would be too dangerous for someone as inexperienced as yourself. I can only apologise again my Lord but you will have to take a plane back to your estate.”

  He was definitely shaking now. His brown eyes pleaded with me to accept what he was saying. I thought about the need to travel back to Wales 'the old fashioned way' and the out and out pain in the bum that was going to be but I couldn't leave him panicking any longer, he looked like he was going to have a heart attack. Besides, it was The Elder who’d pushed the importance of my slow travelling to him. Infusing my voice with all the regal authority I could muster I gripped him lightly on the shoulder and let him relax.

  “Thank you for your help and advice. My team and I are in your debt for the information which will have probably saved our lives. Until the next time.”

  Mike also thanked the young nurse who, judging by his expression, hadn't been expecting anything as positive as that for the knowledge that it was going to take hours instead of seconds to return home. He looked back and forth between us for a handful of startled seconds and then, straightening his posture, he puffed himself up as large as he could.

  “It is my honour to serve my Lord,” he stated forcefully and bowed theatrically at the waist, sweeping down to the floor before he stood tall, turned and strode from the corridor we had been holding the conversation in.

  “You see? Correct decorum can have a very strong effect on people. Just be glad we have planes these
days, travelling back from here by sailing ship would have been just a little bit worse,” Mike whispered as the nurse vanished from sight.

  “Decorum nothing Mike. The important part of what I said to him wasn't the fancy bit; it was the bit where I thanked him for what he'd told me. He now feels valued for what he said and he is. No-one should feel that they are simply there to be shouted at.”

  Mike just looked at me but he was working it through in his mind. I'd been trying to encourage the feeling in the people in my estate that there wasn't the raging need to bow and scrape all of the time but it was a slow job of getting them to remember what I was saying on that topic. The requirements to treat all your 'colleagues' as being human beings first was a tough skill to learn. Everyone was having to untie years of social knotting regarding the way to treat people but I would not have everyone scared of me simply because I was the one with the wings.

  “Hang on.” I stopped Mike as we were turning to walk down the corridor.

  “Why can’t any one of the other Guardians just open up a bridge for us? Surely they can do that?”

  Mike shrugged ever so slightly.

  “Because The Elder has instructed everyone not to.”

  My mouth dropped open but luckily I was so surprised by the detail that I didn’t erupt immediately. Mike was quick to recognize that he had to carry on with his explanation fast.

  “She told everyone that it was a part of your on-going training but with a very clear understanding that there was no reprieve for anyone who did help.”

  I hated her but listening to that detail made perfect sense of the situation. That must have been why the nurse had been so utterly terrified of speaking with me concerning my travel arrangements. He’d thought that he was going to get both barrels from a Fire Dragon.

  Looks like I’d barely started to unpick that social knotting.

  “Come on then,” I sighed, rubbing at my neck as a tension began to tighten the muscles, all the while knowing that we had to get going. “Let's see if we can arrange a flight back to the UK in the next week.”

  Mike walked steadily along beside me. “Week? We'll be airborne within the hour.”

  Apparently, I'm not the only one with wings.

  It hadn't ever occurred to me that without me being at the estate back in Wales, there had been no-one to actually open the bridge to bring Mike here quickly. I’d seen too often that members of my mighty order are a little ‘funny’ about offering help to the servants. I think Andrea was probably the only one who would have come to Mike’s aid but she was unconscious with me. As I'd been lying unconscious in Argentina, he'd been forced to make his way to the other end of the world another way.

  The small airfield was located roughly twenty miles from the estate and we had been driven there by a man whose neck was wider than his head. He’d sat in the driver’s seat of the giant Mercedes Benz and waited for us to climb in. He hadn’t acknowledged us in any way for the duration of the journey.

  In no time at all he had brought us smoothly onto the tarmac of the runway, past gated checkpoints and barriered roadways without even slowing down. The car swung steadily up to the ladder which led up to the open hatch and stopped perfectly to allow me to simply step from the interior of the car onto the bottom rung of the ladder. My last contact with terra firma in Argentina seems to have been back in the estate.

  The door was coolly opened from the outside by a uniformed member of the ground crew and my path was clear before me.

  Before I left I aimed a comment towards the driver.

  “Thank you for getting us here so quickly Mr…?” Again, I wanted to make sure the person who had been working for me didn’t carry that feeling of terror just because of my perceived elevated station. Ahead of me he shrugged and looked like he was trying to turn slightly, though I could only imagine that his massive neck was making that an almost impossible task.

  “Perez, Sir.” His voice was much more high pitched that I had been expecting.

  “Thank you Mr. Perez. Until next time.” I left no more preamble and climbed from the car and into the plane with Mike following closely behind.

  Climbing aboard your very own private jet is a very strange event. Especially when you didn't know that you had your very own private jet.

  As I climbed on board I was amazed by the sheer opulence of the interior of the plane. The dark wood and beautiful smell of leather. The plush carpeting and antique looking fixtures and fittings. The plane looked like it was similar to something Tony Stark would be flying around in but this one was the truly top of the line version. Iron Man wishes his plane was this good.

  Ahead of us was a retinue of immaculately dressed cabin crew, waiting to answer the calls of their passengers no matter how severe or outlandish. The three women and two men were standing as if they had been starched at least twice as much as their uniforms.

  Not sure what to do next, I nodded to them all and declared into the silence, “Carry on,” and made my way to the nearest seat available.

  My words were apparently the key for the starch team to burst into life. They almost behaved like pieces of shrapnel from within an explosion, each rushing forwards in slightly different directions to attend to my each and every need.

  Mike allowed himself to be settled fluidly into his seat and looked perfectly at ease with the whole situation of being waited on hand and foot. I was not so receptive.

  I was surrounded by three fluttering people who seemed to be hell bent on making me comfortable, regardless if I wanted them to do it or not. I had pillows being tucked behind my head and under my legs by one as another adjusted my seat to have it fall into a half recline while the third placed a drink in one hand and a TV remote control in the other.

  “Is this pillow to your liking my Lord?”

  “Is this the correct drink for you my Lord?”

  “Would you like us to adjust the cabin temperature for you my Lord?”

  “Which channel would you like to watch on the flight my Lord?”

  “We also have DVD’s and Blu-rays should you so desire. You do like Start Wars do you not?”

  “Would you like to change seat?”

  “Is there anything we can do for you before take-off?”

  All of these questions and it felt like a hundred more that I didn’t catch washed over me in a tsunami of good intentions. Their good wishes were quickly translated to being a stifling wave of cloying sweetness.

  Fingers were pulling at me and each face seemed to be leaning closer and closer, each trying to make certain that every whim or wish of mine could be dealt with, potentially even before I had recognized that I had had it. The ever crowding group of rictus grins became forcefully claustrophobic as the seconds dragged by.

  Eventually, it was all too much for me.

  “PLEASE, WILL YOU ALL LEAVE ME ALONE!” boomed through the cabin in a growling rumble and startled every single person into both stillness and silence, including Mike.

  Each and every one of the faces which surrounded me looked as if they would shatter and crack due to the force of the rebuke. They all swayed before me with such a deep fear carved onto their features that it immediately started to cool me down.

  Everyone slowly edged away from me, all looking as if they were trying to put as much distance between themselves and a very angry animal. That thought was quick to have all of the previous flash of anger drain away from me. But no-one else knew that.

  Amidst the almost palpable atmosphere, Mike slowly but purposefully stood and easily addressed the cabin.

  “I believe that my Lord has had a very taxing day and wishes us to all return to Wales as soon as possible. He is tired and would like the journey to take as little time as possible. Please see to it that we are delayed no longer than we have to be.”

  His words rang with the confidence and authority of someone who was perfectly at ease within the confines of his position. It made me feel worse.

  “I have had a very hard time that I w
ish to return home from. I am eager to be at my own estate. Please understand that I am not angry with you.” I was trying to repair the damage that my outburst had done but judging by the looks on the faces of the cabin crew, even the ones who hadn’t been dealing with me directly, my efforts had fallen a long way short of the mark.

  “Please leave us and let us know when we are about to take off. We will call for you when we need you.” Mike’s voice again had the calm authority ringing through it that seemed to fit the situation that all of the crew were expecting. They each nodded toward him in a curt and worried fashion and hurried away towards the cockpit or the tail of the plane and seemed to vanish into the very seems of the vehicle.

  Mike and I were quickly left alone in our outrageously comfortable leather seats within the confines of the flying mansion. The only sound that accompanied us was that of the idling aircraft, clicks and cracks as it sat waiting on the runway.

  Mike spoke first.

  “Just relax bach. We’ll be home soon.”

  I shook my head at what had just happened.

  Mike watched and waited. He didn’t have to wait long.

  “This whole lifestyle seems to be designed to brutalise someone. I’m just tired of being the one who doesn’t understand where I’m supposed to be.” Mike said nothing and let me continue.

  “I don’t want to be the one who is feared just because. I also don’t want to fear just because either. Everyone I speak with seems to be either expecting me to tear them apart for smelling a certain way or expecting to tear me apart because I had the sheer brass effrontery to look them in the eye.” I stared straight ahead as I spoke without focusing on any of the details of what was around me.