The Circle of Duty

by Owen Elgie

  Mike casually took in all of the details of the surroundings as he moved through the crowd and settled himself at my side. He too was wearing a suit of armour but it was more lightweight that mine. It was still very much the medieval suit but there was a much greater feel of modern tactical gear. Smaller plates and less additional shielding had made him look more akin to a stripped down version of Iron Man than the knight of old the rest of us looked like. He carried the helmet under his arm and just looked at ease in the battle kit.

  “Excellent flourish at the end there bach. I’d have given you a 9.5 for artistic impression.” His voice was low to avoid anyone else hearing the jibe. I smiled under the helm and replied with a very Anglo-Saxon word of my own, again trying my best to not be over heard. After all, there were ladies present.

  “What’s the problem? Why did you stop? Aside from the cliff that is?” I tried to snap back to the business end of things and do my best not to embarrass myself with any questions.

  The three ladies all remained looking out over the edge.

  “The entrance tower to the realm of the Tayne is gone.” Andrea’s voice was slightly muffled by the helm she was wearing but it was still clear that this turn of events was an issue.

  “Gone? Gone where?”

  Em turned to face me and began to explain the details.

  “We opened the bridges to this location because it would have allowed a clear path direct to the tower entrance portal to the Tayne’s nest. There has always been a black stone tower at the edge of this cliff which will lead down to the catacombs below but as you can see, the tower and all of the settlements which have surrounded it have been destroyed.” She dropped her eyes to the ground as she finished her explanation, showing that she had been affected by the details. Was she sad? I thought that she’d levelled out again following the events in my estate but it would appear that there were still a few little bumps in her mental fabric.

  “So this will make the entry a little harder and we’re up against the clock.” I nodded in mock sage wisdom as I interpreted her meaning.

  The Elder spoke this time but still didn’t turn to face me as she spoke, the calm tranquility still wrapped around her voice.

  “We will have to adapt our plans but that is not the concern. The tower has been destroyed but so have all of the surrounding settlements. All of the Tayne guards which were based here and who surrounded the tower entrance are now missing and all the signs of their existence would appear to have been wiped clean. Did you not feel that there was perhaps too much open space for a Mexican jungle when you cleared the Cascade Bridge?” She’d spoken in a very level tone, adding no emotion of any kind to the details she’d given. She hadn’t needed to. They had said enough by themselves.

  Looking back up the route we’d just followed I could see now that the edges of the wooded areas were showing the signs of coming into contact with a great heat. Whatever had been here had been caught in the blast of such an immense torrent that everything within whatever beam had done the damage had simply been vaporized. There was singeing and scorch marks on the trees and bushes beyond that but this had been a focused amount of energy, very little spilling beyond the intended target. Now I’d noticed the signs, I could make out the barest odor of smoky burning, the final remnants of the attack.

  Whatever had done this had started from practically where we had jumped in. There was a clear wall of trees which were untouched by the devastation to show where it had started. It had just surged through everything ahead of it and demolished the tower as well. It wasn’t a huge comfort to take but still, looking down I could make out that whatever it had been it hadn’t destroyed everything. At least the ants were still marching around our feet.

  “What did this?” It was a comment more to myself than one expecting an answer but Mike responded.

  “Whatever it was, it’s certainly far more powerful than anything we’ve seen from The Hive short of their masters and they’re all secure. I don’t know?” it may have been Mike who’d said it but as soon as he’d finished speaking I knew it was something everyone was feeling.

  No-one knew what had done this.

  Andrea turned and spoke to every member of our forces who had come with us, her voice carrying with a familiar authority.

  “Our plan remains the same, warriors of The Circle. We now have a hazardous descent into the catacombs of the Tayne but there is no early warning system as you can see. When we arrive in the tunnels below we will continue on as we have planned to the Queen.”

  Body by body, our soldiers executed a tactical extraction from their hastily filled vantage points and formed up ahead of us. The ordered lines of troops all nodded as one. Either they hadn’t been aware of the details or they just didn’t see it as big as a concern as I did. Just focus on the job at hand Anthony.

  Rolling my shoulders under the armour against the tension already bunching into my muscles, I took stock.

  “How do we get down there now? I don’t think flying us all down is viable if our Dragons are at risk. Any other options?” I felt my question was valid but Mike smiled back at me.

  “You have a grappling hook in the right gauntlet of your armour. Magic after all.”

  I looked at my hand but couldn’t see anything remarkable which was going to give away the presence.

  “Great. How does that work?”

  Mike didn’t answer. He didn’t have time. Instead I was given a beautiful demonstration from every soldier with us as they followed Em as she leapt from the cliff edge, turned to face the edge as she fell and punched out a massive piton of energy into the rock. I could feel the vibrations caused by the anchoring of all of the magic through my feet as everyone gave themselves over to gravity.

  Andrea and The Elder joined them, creating their own thump, thump of impact.

  “See. Easy. See you at the bottom.” He’d replaced his helmet as he’d spoken and cast himself off the cliff edge, practically swan diving his way down. I thought that I’d have given him a 9.0. I felt the impact of his magical tether through the soles of my feet as he fell and now found myself alone.

  No point being scared. Taking a steadying breath I hurled myself from the cliff and into the emptiness of thin air.

  When you freefall, there is a split second where you seem to be suspended in the void, untouched by the pull of gravity. In that snapshot of reality, you can embrace the purest wonder of the world. Flight. As a Dragon, I’d held that moment for far longer than it would have been possible for a man without the aid of hang gliding equipment and it was liberating in ways I could never have expected. This, though, was not in any way the same.

  That split second as a Dragon could last for minutes. That split second as a man encased in metal didn’t even last a split second, I swear.

  Reaching out my arm I willed as much power as I could into the casting of whatever facility was in the gauntlet and fired out a flapping magical rope which smashed into the rock face and held firm. The success made me catch in my mind just what a risk I’d just taken but thankfully it didn’t stay long. First issue resolved but now I was acutely aware that the ground was rushing up to meet me. I may have been able to fire off my magical piton but I was still falling at the mercy of gravity.

  And I panicked just a little bit.

  All of the others were settled happily on the ground and were moving about freely, obviously none the worse for the drop but I had no clue what to do next. This was going to sting a little.

  If I’d thought a little about what to do to slow me down I could have dragged together some power and moulded it in some way to be able to do some good. All I could do was just flail my arms and jibber as I scrabbled around my mind for options and none presented themselves. My Dragon was all I had. I knew that we were meant to be approaching with at least some level of stealth and that any call I made for my Dragon energy was fraught with the danger of having it back fire in who knew which way but as an alternative to the impending pancake, the risk was w
orth it.

  Closing my eyes and picturing my altered form in my head, my concentration fluttering as the wind rushed past my face and the ground surged up to meet me, I was about to split myself from the suit of armour when I was quickly yet gently eased from my descent.

  The rope of magic pulled tight and the weight was carried all over the armour without placing too much stress on any single part of my body and almost all of the speed of my fall was removed.

  I landed cleanly next to the others in the dusty ground at the base of the cliff and the magical rope simply dissipated from above me, leaving me with my right arm reached to the sky above, almost asking the teacher to pick me.

  “See. Told you it was easy.” Mike’s voice held a sliver of a giggle at my arrival and it made me snap my arm down to my side. I straightened my posture and strode purposefully towards him. Leatherpants remained fixed in his position at the mouth of the Tayne nest and watched me intently.

  The rest of the group were already making their way down what remained of the stairway within the tower and into the subterranean world of the Tayne. Each member of our assault party was bristling with Magical force and implicit menace as they swiftly made their way down. Em was at the head of the advancing column, with The Mage and Andrea evenly spaced amongst the soldiers. I nodded to Mike and we took up our place within our forces. Leatherpants was the last to start the decent. Maybe he was starting to feel the exposure his skin suit represented so didn’t want to be first into the fight. Business dress really wasn’t a good choice for military action.

  The stone cut pathway spiraled down at the edge of the tunnel walls. The depth of the shaft was peppered with areas where the stone walls had been removed leaving behind openings onto the world below the surface. The bright sunlight from above poured into the abyssal darkness but only penetrated into the area directly below the opening to the outside world. The deeper we went, the heavier the murk became until we reached the bottom and found ourselves in much cooler air and a landscape of whispering shadows, holding the threat of any form of concealment. Looking beyond the space we were stood in gave us no further clue as to what was going on.

  The Elder, Andrea and Em all stood in the centre of the pool of muted sunlight as all of our troops repeated their deployment movements from the top of the cliff and melted away into the surrounding area. Mike and I strode towards the three ladies and waited. Leatherpants was quick to join us, slipping soundlessly behind our group, able to hear what could be said but without making his presence felt within the inner circle. Mark took up a stance a little further back from the centre than Leatherpants but was stood directly opposite him. He obviously didn’t trust him either.

  “Where to then ladies?” I tried to maintain a level of relaxation in my tone but that was more down to the fact that I was more than a little apprehensive about the whole situation. There was now an eerie hollow to every sound that skittered across the darkness, giving off the impression of a deserted tomb. Despite this, I scanned every inch of the space we were in for any sign of something which was likely to reach out and start causing havoc. The three ladies didn’t bite at my casual comment, obviously feeling similar tension.

  “Where are the guards?” Andrea was in the same stance as I was, looking in all directions at once. So was Em. The Elder was still her newly serene self but she was still at a loss to explain the absence of Tayne to at least be near us.

  “Where are any of them?” The Elder added. “There isn’t a single Tayne nearby is there Mr. Johns?” All eyes of the group swung to me. I didn’t know. I couldn’t see any further than anyone else so what did The Elder mean?

  “Can you feel any threat from the area we stand in? Can your Dragon senses feel any impending attack?”

  This time, when The Elder questioned me concerning a point that everyone else had deemed should have been the most obvious for all to understand, there was no callous rebuke or barbed comment concerning my ineptitude. This time it was just a question. One which was framed as coming from the caring teacher rather than the brutal task master.

  And it worked.

  My head wasn’t spinning so there was nothing my Dragon was picking up as a threat. That didn’t mean there wasn’t something waiting to attack but it did show that my senses, as they were, were giving me the all clear.

  “Nothing” I breathed and let my tension levels drop a couple of notches. “So, as I said, where to?”

  “There is something very strange at work here.” Andrea was still scanning every direction at once, doing her best to look nonchalant but not quite managing it. The Elder may have been happy to trust my Dragon instincts but it would appear that Andrea still needed a little more convincing. I couldn’t blame her, what with everything that had been going on, I wasn’t sure I trusted my Dragon sense either.

  There was no sound coming from anywhere around us, the cool air was still and there was no sign of any movement from anyone or anything.

  “Should we just continue on with our mission my lady?”

  Leatherpants had spoken, clearly aiming his words at The Elder, but had remained casually looking around at any and all information that he could find. Casual step after casual step, he paced around the stone strewn area and just took everything in. His hands were held easily behind his back and there was an almost unnatural ease to his actions.

  “I think that that would be the most appropriate course of action given what we can see here.” The Elder was still speaking with that now familiar calmly even tone, any of the usual contempt for everyone else now a thing of the past. There didn’t seem to be any further need to comment. Whatever had taken place here, we’d missed it and whatever it had been looked to have removed all of the enemy for us. We’d still need to keep our wits about us but all signs up to now were pointing to us being relatively in the clear.

  “Onwards to the Queen it is then.” Decision made, I was just keen to get the ball rolling so we could get out of here. Yet another underground stronghold wasn’t my idea of a holiday location.

  Without calling out to the assorted troops around the area we were stood, The Elder signaled with one hand and all of the troops just filtered forward and as one we all started on our way into the darkness, The Elder leading the way with Leatherpants close to her side, the rest of us following on without another word.

  My first impression of the realm of The Tayne was that it looked very similar to the Mines of Moria from Lord of the Rings. The film version. That won all the Oscars. Not the cartoon. It was clear that The Tayne had been making use of a natural underground space rather than having had it excavated to their needs, but there were also a great many ragged structures intermittently spaced, oddly shaped and all ancient. Blocky building after blocky building huddled close to its neighbor, working as hard as they could not to draw any attention to themselves. There was a dusty coverage to the floor as we walked, either kicked up as a result of the collapse of the black stone tower or as a side effect of years of feet eroding away at the rock.

  Our column of troops moved quickly but carefully through the cavernous area, each step heading us deeper and deeper into the murk. A number of our group cast light magic into the air and we were surrounded by a diffuse haze. We needed to be able to see where we were going but couldn’t risk attracting too much attention to ourselves. As our route took us near to any of these tumbledown structures, a pod of our guards peeled away from the rest of us and performed a sweep, all the time on high alert. You see this sort of thing on the news and in films but nothing can compare to seeing it enacted in the real world by heavily armed and armoured soldiers who are there to protect you.

  We slipped past hamlet after hamlet, all deserted and looking as if they had been that way for a great length of time. Each time the soldiers returned from their scouting of a building with nothing to add, no signs of any kind of life beyond the insects that make the subterranean world their home, no signal that anyone or anything had been there for a very long time, there was a palp
able increase in tension. Already, the original plan we’d been working with was seeming to be obsolete. We’d planned for warfare and instead we were being greeted by a walk through a museum. There was nothing to see, nothing to confront as we made our way onwards but we still seemed to be taking longer than expected. The light that had been pouring down from the ruined tower entry was waning at an almost supersonic rate, leaving us truly in the depths of night.

  “What the hell are we missing?” I was whispering as best I could to Mike who was still at my side. This couldn’t be this easy.

  “This is supposed to be a struggle, supposed to be a fight for all concerned but here we are, walking through the outskirts of their home without there being any signs of life let alone resistance. You got any ideas about this?

  Mike shrugged.

  “Sorry bach. I’m as mystified as you are. I’m still keeping an eye out but so far, this is shaping up to be nothing more than a training hike. About time we had some good luck.”

  The way things had been going, I didn’t believe we could have this much luck.

  I needed to know more.

  I picked the speed up and headed for The Elder, passing Andrea and Em but knowing that they would have followed close behind, for no other reason than to see what I was about to do. Passing by The Elder and Leatherpants I turned and positioned myself directly ahead of them, forcing them to stop or walk into me. Thankfully they stopped.

  “What do you want now?” Leatherpants very nearly kept the contempt out of his tone. “My Lord” he finished the sentence as an afterthought, knowing that he couldn’t yell at me for fear of upsetting the rules of order. The Elder remained utterly blank to the question, still calm beyond words.