It would have pleased Lady Shy to see Akira forming friendships with her comrades. And it would have pleased Lady Shy to see Akira’s attraction to Dimitri grow as hard as she tried to hide it. And had Lady Shy saw the expression on Dimitri’s face when Akira decided to make the most of her feminine assets, she would have been quite satisfied.
Dimitri’s eyes had widened the first time Akira decided to practice enhancing her appearance as her mother had encouraged her to do. His heart beat faster and he had gulped before he shuttered the surprised and appreciative expression on his face. The changes Akira made to her appearance were subtle, other than what she had done to her eyes and hair which made her blue eyes startling, exotic, and almost mesmerizing. She was petite for a warrior candidate, lithe, bold and beautiful. In his mind, her eyes were a secret weapon he hoped she never turned on him until he was in a position to make them reflect a mutual passion. Her sooty thick lashes seemed longer, and when he looked deep into her eyes it was tempting to let himself be pulled into them.
He left more and more of Akira’s training to his men. It puzzled and disappointed Akira that he seemed to avoid her. She worked harder, honing her newly acquired skills until every action she made was a smooth motion, a quick dance around slower stronger opponents. Waiting for word from her mother and Dimitri to notice her, made her seek the solace of Pegasus in the stables. Little did she know Dimitri watched her and felt stupidly jealous of the horse that could nuzzle her breast and nibble treats from her hand.
She waited for word that a journey could be made to the coast when spring warmed the mountain and opened the passes. Akira asked Mage Morgan if she too could use the secret tunnel and join her mother. The mage shook his head, explaining that it was too dangerous to use the steep rocky tunnel as spring approached. And signs of spring were everywhere. Already the ice in the secret tunnel was melting leaving the tunnel impassable unless one did not mind being shredded by razor sharp rocks. The warm trickles of water that had been no match for winter’s cold, were no longer forming ice. Instead the warm trickles were melting the ice, and becoming bigger trickles. Soon the opening of the secret tunnel in the valley below would be hidden by a waterfall.
Spring was when the guardian training session would be completed. Spring would bring the time of bestowing the shields of the White Rose Order to the successful candidates. Akira longed for and dreaded the arrival of spring. Dimitri would leave the monastery in spring. She dared not ask which side of the mountain he would descend. Hope burned that she could attract his attention when free to do so as a warrior. Hope burned that he might feel some of the same angst when they were together that she felt. Some nights she told herself to harden her heart. She made herself relive every indignity that she knew a man had demonstrated in the past. She warned herself that she would be weak if she succumbed to needing a man. Then she wondered how much she could allow herself to need a man, and risk losing her new found independence and purpose
Nothing was cut and dried anymore. It had been easy when she hated men. She stood outside the opened doors of the stable, breathing in the mountain air, looking to the west. Her daily visit with Pegasus made her as restless as Pegasus. It was time to exercise him longer each day, ready him for the journey down the mountain. She longed to gallop Pegasus, clear her thoughts with the wind whipping through her hair.
Mage Morgan could not convince Akira that an oppressive weight visualization would be applicable with hand to hand combat. Mage Morgan had to practice patience with his new found daughter. Akira was stubborn as a mule sometimes, and still unwilling to treat the him as a father figure.
As much as Akira was assessed and tutored by the other mages in the mountain monastery, none could find evidence of any more magical talents in the young protégé. The mages concluded she was very fortunate as a halfling to have the power she did possess. All agreed she should concentrate and develop her one gift. All but Mage Morgan. Mage Morgan sensed there was hidden talents and gifts yet to be revealed. He argued with the other mages that it was not his own vanity resisting the fact he could have fathered a daughter with mediocre abilities. He maintained that as a father he inherently knew more about Akira than they did. Something was holding her back. He told the other mages to be patient. Patience was something he had plenty of. Something about her eyes was disturbing. Something told him Akira had another gift. To his consternation she had not mastered her levitation potential and been able to float in the air as she had done in a fevered unconscious state. It rankled that he had not tapped into and discovered what other gifts Akira possessed
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The wolves piercing eyes were fixated on the village at the bottom of the mountain. They watched the comings and goings for several weeks, carefully hunting away from the human presence. The possessed alpha wolf looked for an opportunity to get inside the village in human form. The wolves were careful, sinister, and cautious. For they did not want to be hunted themselves. They had failed to ascend the mountain. The deep snow and avalanches made it impossible. Finally, an opportunity to enter the village presented itself. The alpha wolf and his underlings found and took down a lone traveler making his way toward the village. The alpha wolf drove the other wolves away. The alpha wolf howled as its body was stretched into the form of the mage possessing him. The howl carried for miles and the men and beats who heard it felt fear.
A naked man leaned over the dead human prey. He had held the other wolves at bay to keep the clothing of the lone traveler unripped and unbloodied. He stripped the corpse of its clothes and dressed himself in them. He left the naked corpse. The two companion wolves returned cautiously from their watchful distance. The alpha wolf-man nodded consent. In seconds flesh ripped, bones crunched. The mighty hunters filled their bellies upon the cooling flesh of their human prey. Winged scavengers waited in the trees for their fair share.
The wolf mage, dressed in the dead man’s clothing, walked into the village. He went to the inn, ordered an ale and a hot meal and paid for it with coins he found in the pockets of the wool shirt he wore as if it had been made for him. Indeed, it was a good fit. He struck up a conversation with the chatty little maid, accepted her invitation to share his bed and before he pumped his body into hers, he pumped her for information. She told him all he wanted to know in a trance like state, at first willingly and then out of fear. The mage ravaged her body as a man, giving hope to the young woman that once he was sexually sated, she would escape his bed unharmed. It was not to be so.
The mage turned her face down on the bed. She expected to be penetrated and braced herself for a pain. She was spared the dreaded anticipated pain. The mage allowed the snarling wolf to emerge again. The mage’s mind clamped the wolf’s jaws shut to prevent a blood curdling howl to escape. The wolf clamped his powerful jaws on the terrified maid’s neck, shook her like deer. Her neck snapped. The skilled killer waited till the body went limp. He ate parts of her, the choicest plumpest tender parts and ignored the rest. The mage returned the wolf to a human form. This time, the pain of the transformation was stifled by burying the jaws of the beast into the flesh of the corpse.
The wolf mage cleaned himself, washing the splatters of blood from his chest neck and face, dressed again, and quietly slipped out of the room and disappeared into the night. The wolf had deserved some compensation for hosting a mage, reasoned the mage. The young mage felt no compassion for the little whore maid. She was selling her soul for money, selling out the lives of others for her own selfish desires. She was a predator that had met a stronger predator.
The mage viewed the death of the young woman as part of a cycle of nature. Larger beasts devour smaller beasts. It was the way of predators he mused. He moved through the woods silently, a shadow among the trees, his ears alert, his nose keen with the senses of the wolf he possessed. The mage soon reached the kill site where his wolf companions were sleeping. He again freed the wolf from a human form. The possession of the wolf was terminated.
~
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Far away, a young mage awoke from his trance. His companions joined hands with his and they chanted until they saw all he had seen. They decided that the baron’s daughter was as good as a prisoner in the mountain monastery. She would be going nowhere until the spring thaws. They were somewhat satisfied. One mage was not satisfied at all. “You fools. You did not lay eyes on the girl.” He slapped the young mage’s face. “Why did you not possess a raven and fly to the top of the mountain?” He glared at the other mages. “You are stupid fools. We shall tell the baron his daughter is still atop the mountain. We have no more time to waste coddling the baron. The Dark Lord has ordered us to hasten our efforts to infiltrate the surrounding kingdom.” The lesser ranked mages bowed before the powerful mage, critical of their best efforts.
The young mage was exhausted from his possession of the wolf. His face reflected the disappointment he felt at being criticized. It surprised him how physically drained he felt and when he arose from his chair, he needed to urinate. He excused himself and went outside to empty himself. He wondered how many days he had been in the trance. Adjusting his robe to relieve himself his eyes widened as they looked down. The blood splatters on his groin frightened him and excited him at the same time. Animal possession was more than he expected it to be. It would be easy to fall to the lure of hunting, the lure of the immense feeling of power, the god like feeling of watching the life fade from eyes wide with fear as the neck of a victim snapped between powerful animal jaws. Any more experiments with possessing animals would depend on how quickly he recovered his strength he decided. He consoled himself with that feeling of predator power. The powerful mage was unfair with his criticism. He had followed orders, not made the plan. He touched his face where the older mage, Morpheus, had slapped him. He fingered the welts on his face. His lips curled. He snarled like a wolf.
Alas, the young mage waking with a dangerous thirst for power never got a chance to experiment with shifting. The older mages who had strengthened him with loans of their own powers sucked back their powers from him as he slept to regain his strength. They drained him of his life force while he was weak. Drained him until he was a thin shell that shattered to dust when the old mages clapped their hands to signal the end of their power and life draining incantation and spell. He never woke. The older mages felt safer. The balance of power among them remained as it had been, safely divided. The young mage should not have enjoyed his task so much. It made him a threat to be eliminated. It would please the Dark Lord that they punished one of their own, if Morpheus was to report to the Dark Lord of their ineptitude. And so it was again that stronger predators had killed a weaker one. The young mage’s soul was keenly appreciating the irony as his soul drifted to a dark hole that was sucking the last of his essence into the heart of the Dark Master.
Baron Rolfe was informed of Akira’s last known whereabouts by his council of mages. The baron ‘s bloodshot beady eyes narrowed. He called for a map and called for his hunters. It would be a difficult journey but there was a chance when the passes were cleared of snow and ice he could skirt the mountains and be on the side of the mountain Akira would have to descend to get to her mother’s people. He rubbed his hands in anticipation. The troublesome prodigal daughter would be brought home. No girl would make a fool of him he vowed. Perhaps then he could silence the voices that laughed at him and made him look suspiciously at the servants. Their lips were not moving but his ears heard the laughter and snide remarks.
The voices followed him everywhere. Beads of sweat would form upon his forehead for he knew those around him could not hear them. The stupid fools were deaf and thought him drunk when he asked who laughed. He no longer asked who laughed, for he worried they would soon think him mad, and try to usurp him. The sons he boasted about now seemed like vultures waiting for him to die so they could divide the spoils of his estate amongst themselves. His complexion was no longer just ruddy. There was a yellow cast beneath his skin. The whites of his bloodshot eyes were jaundiced looking.
The ruthless baron now slept with his dogs on his bed instead of a wench. The dogs would get blamed for the urine soaked bedding. The servants knew the truth, but wisely cursed the dogs when they refreshed his bedding. Finding Akira would put everything right he told himself as he demanded another bottle of wine.
The servants hurried to give him his bottle for the evening. With any luck, the miserable unpredictable tyrant would pass out for the evening. Rolfe refused to drink from a goblet anymore. Only a cork sealed bottle was acceptable, less chance of an enemy in his household trying to slip poison into his drink. A feeling of impending doom had him in its grip and it had grown stronger every day after Akira had disappeared. Perhaps she is a witch, he thought. Had his own daughter cursed him? Or was his late wife’s ghost trying to drive him mad? The baron was a sick and evil man looking for remedy. He decided Akira was the remedy. That was where the loss of his control had started, with the damned girl. That would be his salvation. The damned girl placed in a locked cell would restore his pride, his authority. With that belief in his diseased brain he passed out. His dogs climbed off the bed and curled in front of the fire hearth. Even his dogs wanted nothing to do with him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The monks of the monastery untied the small note tied to the leg of the latest pigeon to arrive at the lofty summit. The note confirmed what they could observe from their vantage point on a clear and sunny spring day. What was spring like weather far below them was yet to be enjoyed atop the mountain. The last icy grip of winter was slipping fast. The veil of white the mountain wore was becoming shorter and shorter. The pass would soon be passable.
The monks, mages, guardians and soon to be new guardians and members of the Order of the White Rose were all feeling the anticipation of a new season, new arrivals, and sad but hopeful departures full of purpose, with assignments to be carried out through the various kingdoms surrounding the mountain home that protected the mages and healers; mages and healers and great thinkers were often persecuted for being what they were. The powerful thinkers among the monks, the academicians and philosophers, wondered how the world could function without magic, without healers and without a society to restore balances of power when power hungry kings, queens and even emperors failed to find and maintain a measure of stability. When men and women with gifts from ancient heritages that may have been other worldly were feared by those without the same gifts, fear and jealousy were often the precursor of persecution. And sometimes the fear was justified when those with bloodlines with gifts used those same gifts for dark purposes.
Great debates, long debates, were made possible from passing time in isolation. Atop the lofty mountain one could not easily escape or ignore the problems at hand. The isolation kept those training and learning any of the arts undistracted while the people below were less likely to worry about fighting while trying to survive the winters. Winter cooled the efforts of those stirring up trouble by making travel more difficult. Preparing for winters busied idle hands and minds. With spring coming, it was time to plant more seeds of reason and tolerance among the population below.
Akira felt the anticipation. She felt hope. She felt strong. Her mother had sent word on wings that she had found refuge with family, and instructed her daughter to travel down the mountain when the passes were open. Lady Shy’s short message came with a caution. Akira would need to travel with Dimitri. Other terse messages carried on wings warned Lady Shy that Baron Rolfe was on the hunt and taking the long way around the mountains. Akira was to accept the hospitality of Dimitri and his household until mother and a contingent of soldiers could provide safety, and with luck, send the Baron back from whence he came, alive or dead. Preferably dead. Finding out that Lady Shy was not dead would make him even more dangerous than a rattling snake. His poison needed an antidote delivered by sword or arrow.
~
Lady Shy had been content to slip away, annul her marriage, and let sleeping dogs lie. Had her soon to be ex-husband staye
d on his own side of the mountain range and continued his miserable life making other people miserable, she would have disappeared quietly with her daughter and moved forward with her life. However, a most surprising message from her youngest son, Benjamin, meant for Akira if she had found refuge with her family, warned of the renewed hunt for Akira.
Despite the warning, Lady Shy’s heart had been lifted to new heights. Her sons’ cared for their younger sister. Cared enough to try warn Akira. She wept with joy, dried her tears, and enlisted her family to protect her daughter. Strong men, gathered arms to turn back the raging monster who had stolen away the daughter of Suraj, away and do her daughter, Akira, harm.
With the truth of her own circumstances finally exposed, Lady Shy had no difficulty raising a small army. If the fates were kind enough to make up for their earlier indifference to her suffering, justice would be soon dispensed and Akira would never have to look over her shoulder again.
Lady Shy smiled as she imagined the look of shock Rolfe’s face would have if he were to meet Akira now. Akira would be unrecognizable as the cowed and quiet daughter. Morgan sent reports regularly of Akira’s transformation into a spirited and disciplined warrior. Akira had earned her white shield, and had a small rose tattoo inked onto her shoulder in black. According to Morgan, her daughter was no longer a vulnerable young woman. But alone, she would be no match for the evil of Rolfe backed by a contingent of ruthless hunters. Lady Shy lit a candle and a sweet incense stick, invoking the fates to help her. She dared to believe that this new turn of events was reward for her years of suffering.
~
While Lady Shy invoked the gods of her people, Akira stood atop the rock wall of the mountain refuge and looked into the distance. Her unbound hair danced about, whipping in the wind. Her high cheekbones, pinkened by the wind, matched the rosy hue of her lips. Her blue eyes sparkled with pride. She was standing shoulder to shoulder with her comrades in arms pledging allegiance to the White Rose Order before the world below, to the gods above and to each other. She had not been compelled to do so. She could have declined the responsibility, but it was not in her heart to do so. Akira felt grateful. A dream had come true. With skills to protect herself, with acceptance from men, yes men, as an equal, Akira felt her life was about to start fresh. It would have been wrong in her mind to use those skills to protect only herself.
Akira Rises Page 20