Prophecy of Light - Foretold

by RJ Crayton

  Of course, once I’d stepped in, I turned to see Pylum walking the opposite direction. I sighed as I turned to see a man sitting on the floor in the corner of the room. It wasn’t a large room, so he wasn’t that far away, but he looked different than he had before. His skin was darker now, a mahogany hue. And his face and arms were bare of glyphs. His body was pristine and unblemished. There was almost a glow about him, as if he didn’t just have a metaphorical light within, but a physical one. One that brightened him. One that made him serene. One that calmed not just him, but everyone around him.

  I was drawn to it. I walked over to him, his eyes closed in concentration, and tried to figure out what had happened to make him different. He opened his eyes and smiled at me. Pearly white teeth that shone with light. “Kadirah,” he said and motioned for me to have a seat.

  I sat, cross-legged, about two feet from him. “What happened to you?”

  His smile widened. “This is who I am at heart. Who I usually am. For Master Pylum, I took on another disposition, an ugliness that used to be of my world. It is one I shed many, many years ago, but I wear it again to assist in training.”

  I stared at him, unsure that he could even be the same mage who had attacked me. “But why would you do that to me? Surely, there are ways to train without … without what you did.”

  His expression grew solemn, and he nodded. “There are no ways to train for the darkness without facing it. Every encounter with darkness has the ability to strengthen our light or diminish it. We train in this way to determine how to strengthen our light.”

  I sighed. I still felt anger and the remnants of fear from our encounter, but it felt disconnected from him. This man was not wicked. It was easy to see that he wasn’t the same one who had chased me, unyielding in his efforts to capture me. And then I had a certain epiphany, one that sent a shock to my system. I wondered if what I was thinking were true, though. I decided to ask rather than jump to conclusions. “Why did you not answer me? Why did you simply chase?”

  He smiled at me. “You know the answer. I could see it on your face a moment ago.”

  I shook my head. I had no interest in admitting what I was thinking.

  He closed his eyes again, and began to take slow even breaths. Was he returning to his meditation? Was he not going to answer my question? I waited. He said nothing. A few minutes passed, and he still did not speak. Finally, I felt the need to break the silence. “Master Nuri.”

  He opened his eyes. “You are ready to say what is on your mind?”

  “I was hoping you would tell me.”

  He frowned. “Our mind is a very powerful tool. One of the most powerful for a mage. But a mind cannot work properly when it pretends it does not see truth. A mage can do great harm by ignoring the truth they see before them. Here, I ask that you be honest with me, and I will be honest with you.”

  I felt a pang of anger. Honesty. This was not a place of honesty. People here told me nothing. Not when I first arrived, and not even now.

  “I can feel your anger,” he said. “You can tell me what is causing this darkness within. It only grows if you do not address it.”

  I scoffed, knowing he didn’t really want to hear it. But then a part of me wanted to say it. “There is no honesty here,” I said. “Not with Pylum, and not with you. Not when you attacked me, and not when I asked you for answers and you gave me none, pretending I somehow knew the solutions but was hiding it from you.”

  He nodded. “That is fair. Let us start with honesty. I will be completely honest with you about who I am. I can show you. I can project to your mind, if you will allow it. Will you allow it?”

  I squinted at him. I remembered Pylum asking me for the same privilege when he wanted to show me his vision of Akilah capturing Nigel in the market. I wasn’t sure I could recreate it, though. Not for him.

  He shook his head as he watched me. “I suppose you cannot. Opening your mind is simple enough, but it is an act that requires some level of trust. And it may not be possible for you to do that, given your ambivalence toward me at the moment. Our minds will not align with our wishes if our hearts are not certain. You are aware of how to penetrate another person’s mind?”

  I nodded.

  “Then I open my mind to you. Seek my story and it shall unfold.”

  Chapter 25 - A Horrific Start

  Akilah, Jasper and Pylum had all suggested that the mind was sacred and should not be invaded, so the idea that he was opening his up to me, seemed … I don’t know, unnatural. He had closed his eyes, I suppose in preparation for my invasion. I hesitated, wondering if this was wise.

  “It’s fine, Kady,” Master Nuri said, his eyes still closed. “There is nothing in my past that I haven’t reconciled with or am unwilling to share with you. Look.”

  I swallowed and then decided I would do it. I was curious about the mage who had accosted me and done so with such single-minded focus. I concentrated as I looked at him, focusing on knowing his story. And a moment later, I was in.

  The vision began to unfold. The first was him as a little baby. Truly an infant, surely not something he could even remember, perhaps a memory from someone else that he’d committed to his own mind. His mother was lying in a bed, in a small hut, and she was dying. Her dark skin looked pallid and she barely moved. Her breaths were shallow and her eyes seemed to be accepting of the fate that was about to befall her. A large man sat beside her, holding the babe Nuri in his arms. The man was robust in figure, much like Master Nuri is today, and he had a tear in his eye as he sat by the woman.

  She reached out to him, and stroked him. “Nuri will be great one day,” the woman croaked. “I’ve seen his future. Care for him, please.”

  The man nodded. “Of course I will, Sarai,” he said. “He’s our son. I will love him eternally.”

  “Two men will change his life,” she croaked. “They will lead him on the path to greatness. They will come for him in five years. Be ready.”

  The man grimaced, and shook his head. “Sarai,” he whispered. “Another vision?”

  She seemed to want to nod her head vigorously, but it merely nudged forward slightly, and then stopped. “My last,” she whispered. “Unclear, but the men are key. Love him, Ishmael.”

  The man nodded, and reached out and took the woman’s hand. He closed his eyes, and nodded. “I see,” he said. And then she smiled and breathed her final breath.

  Time surged forward, and I could pick out what seemed to be a happy childhood. Nuri helping his father, growing some type of grain in fields. Playing, watching the insects, appreciating nature, performing little bits of magic. And then a clear, sharp memory, of Nuri as he used a glyph to make sparkles in the sky.

  Two men walked by, saw what he was doing, and approached. The men were an odd pairing, one tall and thin with dark skin and one short and squat with olive skin. Immediately, young Nuri felt fear. He ran to his father, and the men followed. When his father saw them, he smiled as he pulled his son close to him.

  “It is you,” his father said.

  The men looked at each other inquisitively, and they introduced themselves and Iblis and Elzebub. They said they were mages heading to a school and that the boy had great talent.

  Nuri’s father nodded and smiled. “And you’d like to take my boy with you?”

  The men looked a little astonished, and nodded. Nuri’s father sighed, and let out a breath. “I knew this day would come,” he said, low. “My wife was a woman like yourselves, and our boy is, too. She had a vision of you before she died. Said you would come along. I held her hand, and the last thing she did was push the image of you two in my mind. This is meant to be, as sad as I am to see him go.”

  Nuri held tight to his father’s leg and shook his head. “No, papa,” he said. “Mama is wrong. I shouldn’t go with these men.” Part of my heart broke as I watched the vision, because I knew he was right. There was something wrong with these men. Even in this memory, I could feel it.

  But his father
looked at him and said. “Your mama saw me years before she met me. She saw you years before you came. She saw every good thing that ever happened to us. I trust in her, and you must, too. These men will shape your life, and you should go with them. It will be good, I promise you.”

  At this, the memories whirred by, the men turning out exactly as Nuri feared, cruel and hateful, yet mages. They taught him magic, and beat him mercilessly if he failed. There were visions of lashes on his back, seared skin. Glyphs burned into his flesh so he could remember them better.

  “Why? I don’t understand,” I found myself asking.

  He didn’t respond verbally. The pictures in his mind changed. A small room in the dark, and him giant, as giant as he is now, burly, strong, but more like the man I’d met in the cavern. Scary. Filled with anger, filled with rage.

  Iblis, the taller man, sat beside him and spoke softly. “I can feel your anger, Nuri,” he said. “This is good. This is just. It fuels you, and it should fuel you.”

  Nuri shook his head, and managed, somehow to calm himself a little. “I don’t like it. I feel this all the time. We hurt mages, good mages, and for what?”

  “For strength,” Iblis said. “We are mages, and as we crush others, our power increases. There are those who believe in weakness and light, and they try to make others weak like them. But that is not what we believe. We believe that only the strongest survive, that we must crush those beneath us, to rise to the top.”

  Nuri nodded, but he didn’t look as if he believed.

  “If this were wrong, then your mother wouldn’t have told your father to let you come with us.”

  He nodded again, and I felt the crush to his soul. The feeling of betrayal that his parents had doomed him to a life of anger and hostility. He hated her. He hated her more than anything.

  “That is good,” Iblis said. “Very good. Feel the anger, use it. Hurt those who have done you wrong.”

  And then the scene changed and I saw Nuri on the hunt, attacking young mages, beating them, making them submit to his power, doing to them what had been done to them. I flinched at the memory, and he seemed to understand my disgust. The scene moved quicker, a sped-up version of the events, ones where the cries of pain were silent, but I could still see the hostile actions.

  Another scene came, one where Nuri returns to the little hut where his father had lived and finds him alone and old and withered. When the man, now stooped from age, sees his son, he smiles with joy and runs to greet him, but Nuri holds out an arm to stop the old man.

  “Son,” the father says, his voice unsteady. “What is wrong? What has happened to you?” He looks over Nuri with a keen eye, and a touch of fear creases his face. “Did you leave those men, son? Surely this is not what your mother foresaw.”

  Nuri, bitterness on his lips, spat at his father. “I have stayed with these men, just as she foresaw. Do you not like what you see, father?”

  The old man took a step closer to him and looked, his eyes wide and filled with sorrow. He shook his head. “This cannot be,” he said, finally, and he held out his hand to his son. “I don’t know if you’re like your mama with what she could do with other people’s minds, but if you can, look into mine. Touch my hand and look into mine.”

  Nuri scoffed and slapped his father’s hand away. “I need no touch to see into your mind,” and he delved into his father’s mind. He delved in and saw what his father was trying to show him. It was a memory, a memory of his mother when she was pregnant. His mother’s belly was large and round and she smiled and said to her husband, “Look Ishmael, look what I see.” She had taken her husband’s hand and pushed the image into his mind. It was the image of Master Nuri as he is now, here at Hakari Ahet. He was smiling and serene, and there was a student with him, one who looked up at him, and said, “Master Nuri, thank you. You have helped me find my light, one I have sought so hard to find.”

  Nuri was so shocked that he left his father’s mind. He shook his head. “I don’t understand,” he said.

  His father bit his lower lip, and tears started to roll down his cheeks. “All I’ve wanted for you is that son, that serenity I’ve seen, that kindness, you teaching students to be kind. I don’t know what those men did, but they were supposed to lead you there.”

  Nuri felt the anger in him at his father for trusting when he shouldn’t have. The anger was so overwhelming, even in this memory. “You didn’t even check on me.”

  His father, tears running down his cheek, kneeled on the ground, and said, “I had faith in Sarai. Everything she’d said had come to pass,” he said, and he wept openly. Nuri just watched, his own feelings fluctuating from anger to sorrow. Finally his father looked up and said. “I have failed you, and I have failed her. You must kill me, son. That is the only way you may have justice.”

  And Nuri looked down at his father and nodded. He raised his foot to kick him, to release all the anger and pain, and vengeance he owed his father, yet he found he could not lower his foot to stomp his head. His own mind had searched his father’s and found only sorrow, memories of the man, year after year waiting for his son’s return, the sorrow of being alone, the sorrow of missing his wife, the sorrow being set aside because he knew he had done the right thing for his son. For all those years, his father had been confident in his choice, believing it right. Yet it hadn’t been.

  Nuri set his foot on the ground, then reached a hand out to help his father up. And with that, there was a change. Nuri knew his old life was behind him. He was going to set off to find this place his mother had seen. This place that would bring him peace and serenity. That was the life he wanted.

  That seemed to be all the relevant details, as the visions stopped, and there was just nothingness. That was what Master Nuri had wanted to share with me. As I left his mind, I felt sorrow for him. His father, even though it was done in love, had abandoned him to wicked people. He’d endured so much.

  “Do not feel sorrow for me,” he said. “Every experience has taught me a valuable lesson. I have made peace with these things long ago.”

  I nodded. His face was the picture of serenity. He was the picture of the gentle giant of story books. Yet he wasn’t a story. He was real.

  “Why do you think I said nothing to you?”

  I swallowed. He wasn’t forgetful either. He wouldn’t let me get away with it. “Because that’s my fear with my uncle,” I finally admitted. “I don’t understand why he left the temple, or why he turned to moon magic. And I’m afraid I’ll never get a true answer, that he will seek to destroy me without telling me why or …” I paused not sure I could say the rest. “Or that I will actually destroy him without learning why it all happened.”

  He nodded, smiled. “We feel better when we admit our fears, Kadirah,” he said, his voice velvety and calming, like a cup of warm tea. “And if you do not learn what drives your uncle, does it matter? Or is it enough to know that you have returned the Talisman of Elpida from the hands of someone who seeks destruction with it?”

  I shook my head. “But without understanding him, how can I know that he seeks destruction?”

  He raised an eyebrow. “So far, what has his quest wrought? Your mother’s death, your hiding with your aunt, the kidnapping of your friend, the attempted kidnapping of a young boy. Have any of these things suggested he has desires other than destruction?”

  No. The answer was simple. Yet it wasn’t. “My returned memories are confusing me.”

  “He loved you,” he said.

  I nodded.

  “My father loved me,” he said.

  I swallowed. That had been clear, but his father’s love hadn’t stopped his father from doing something that had hurt Nuri terribly.

  “Your feelings for uncle will not go away,” he admitted. “My feelings for my father didn’t either. For a long time, I felt immense anger at his choice. But I reconciled his actions in mind. For you, if you are to face your uncle, you must reconcile the contradictions within your mind. Your magic is very go
od, better than most I’ve seen. But unless you have the desire to accomplish our goal, you will fail.”

  It sounded harsh, but it didn’t sound like a criticism. It was just a statement of fact to him.

  “How do I get to that place where our goals align, where I can be sure that hurting—no, you said honesty — killing my uncle is for the best? That it’s the right thing to do? It feels like darkness, and not light. You didn’t kill your father.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I did not kill him,” he said. “Though our story is different, and he did not wield the power of your uncle. Still, your point is apt. You have asked the most important question you can, Kadirah. The answer is one we will explore in the next few days. That is, if you wish to train more with me.”

  I grimaced. “By train, do you mean in mountain caverns?”

  He chuckled. “No,” he said. “By train, I mean being like we are now. Chatting, exercising our mind, watching memories of your uncle so you can better understand him and his motivations.”

  “Memories of my uncle?”

  “Yes,” he said. “There are things you should know. If you are willing to let me share them with you.”

  “You knew my uncle?”

  He nodded. “I knew Zygam very well. He was a good friend to me.”

  I stared, a bit shocked that he had been my uncle’s friend. “I thought he was a loner.”

  “As was I,” he said. “Zygam appreciated the perils of loneliness, even if he could not quite overcome them himself.” He sighed, as if he were remembering a painful moment. Then he blew out. “It’s getting late. I should let you go for the time being. If you’re willing, we can train tomorrow morning, and I’ll tell you about your uncle.”

  I nodded vigorously. “I am willing.”