“I wouldn’t mind taking out some of my frustrations on our loudmouthed leader here,” Xavian replied in a frigid tone.
“Is that so? Have it your way, then. You just made a terrible mistake, General.“ Arius growled.
Raz rolled his eyes dramatically. “As you are here in my home, you will abide by my decorum. I will dictate the rules of combat, or you can both go brawl bare-knuckled in the street for all I care. Are we in accord?”
Raz was a good friend to both Arius and Xavian, but he was also their Elemantic mentor and Master. Arius had heard that tone before, and there was no mistaking that they were now in the presence of their Master, not their friend. Xavian must have caught it too, because he and Arius were both quick to nod in acquiescence.
“Splendid,” he continued. “Since I was on the verge of raising you both to the rank of Master in your Elemancy training, this will suffice as your final exam. At no time during the engagement are you to use anything other than your Elemantic abilities. No hand-to-hand combat, swords, bows, or use of your other magical abilities is permitted. Savvy?”
Neither Arius nor Xavian could barely nod again to concede before Razmuson sprung into a crouch, poised on the balls of his filthy bare feet. He looked around at the meadow muttering to himself, “This won’t do. This won’t do at all.”
He clapped his hands and pressed his palms flat to the soil, and the ground began to rumble and lurch. Without warning, there was a deafening crunch, and the peaceful meadow began to transform violently before their eyes. Razor-sharp black rocks rose around them, and the pleasant perfumes produced by the flowers had been replaced by a pungent sulfuric stench.
The ground in between Arius and Xavian was veritably ripped apart as they were raised upon a dais of sharp crags facing each other some fifteen feet apart. A river of magma bubbled forth between them, and a wave of heat sprung forth so intense that both men were forced to cover their faces and step back from their respective ledges.
Razmuson casually traipsed along a path of boulders that were stacked directly in the middle of the lava river he had conjured.
“Does this suit you both?” he called over the rushing basalt, spreading his arms and turning slowly indicating the harsh landscape. “I felt like this was an apt setting since you both seem hellsbent on succumbing to some kind of prepubescent urge to pummel each other.”
“Let’s just get this over with!” Xavian bellowed in annoyance.
“Agreed!” Arius called to their master.
“Oh, very well. If I’m to watch you two act like children, I’m going to be comfortable, at the very least.”
Clapping his hands again and crouching down, Razmuson pressed his palms upon the boulder where he stood, and the chambers careened anew. In a flash, the magma became a rushing river of white capped water. Massive trees tore themselves from the earth, rocketing skyward as they replaced the harsh volcanic surroundings. After the ground settled, a lush forest stretched all around them as far as the eye could see.
Xavian stood on the opposite bank of the river from Arius and wasted no time. He clapped his hands and pressed them into the water. Javelins of ice by the dozens sprung from the rapids and flew in Arius’ direction. Arius stood his ground without flinching. He snapped his fingers and a wall of flame rose to evaporate the projectiles so they sprayed him with a scalding mist instead of turning him into a pincushion.
Xavian adjusted the attack mid-flight, and the missiles drew the water from the river, transforming the attack into a thirty foot tall wave. Going on the defensive again, Arius abandoned his blockade of fire and clapped his hands, crouching down and pressing his palms to the soil. A cocoon of earth enveloped him just in time as the wave came crashing down on his position.
Arius clapped his hands once more and conjured two more cocoons, one to either side of him of the exact same size. He was working blindly, so this was going to take all his cunning. Using the sand from the river bank and a mixture of air, he created a massive whirlwind. He sent the dust storm across the river where he estimated Xavian would be.
Arius rolled the three massive cocoons, turning them into boulders that would serve as battering rams. He heard the water of the river crashing into his arsenal of earth as he waited to feel Xavian’s Elemantic pulse. Every Elemantic had a distinctive feeling they cast out when using their abilities, and no two were the same.
It didn’t take long, as Arius could sense Xavian using his own airflow to break up the thick dust. As he did, Arius exploded forth from his entombed shield and hurled the other two boulders directly at his under-general.
The shards of gravel from the explosion rained heavily upon Xavian, and he cursed at Arius for his guile. His ruse had almost worked, but just as the boulders were about to strike him down, Xavian clapped his hands and pressed them to the trunk of a mighty tree that was just off to his right. The topiary ripped itself from the earth and rushed in front of Xavian, its limbs acting like arms as it swept up the rock masses and hurled them back at Arius, who was sprinting in his direction.
Arius barely ducked to avoid being crushed, but the tree that Xavian had turned into his ally was bearing down upon him, swinging its mighty limbs with reckless abandon. Thinking on his feet, Arius clapped his hands and pressed them into the soft grass of the forest floor, using the groundwater to freeze the tree in its tracks. He increased the cold, and the sap within the tree exploded like it would have in the middle of the coldest winter.
Both men dove for cover as the bark combusted into shrapnel-like pieces. They came up panting from exertion just a few feet from each other and locked eyes. Razmuson’s rules be damned, the two leaders of the Gaelarian army dashed at each other, colliding as they toppled to the ground. Both Arius and Xavian were renowned Ryuken fighters, yet they rolled around grappling each other like quarreling children. Their highly skilled fighting techniques were completely forgotten in their ill-begotten anger towards each other.
After a few minutes of rolling about with neither gaining the upper hand, roots shot out from the ground and entangled them both. Raz strode up shaking his head and smirking.
“Priceless. I wish you could see how utterly ridiculous you both look.”
Arius fought against his bonds for a few seconds before giving up. He lay there winded, gulping in air. He looked to Xavian, who was flushed and looking sulkier by the moment. All his frustration and anger seemed to melt away in that moment as he realized that they did, in fact, look absurd.
“Truce?” He asked Xavian, who turned his head and considered Arius a moment before nodding.
The roots sprung off them, and Arius regained his footing and strode over to Xavian to offer a hand up. Xavian brushed it aside but clapped Arius on the shoulder goodnaturedly as he regained his footing.
“Now that that nonsense is concluded, would you mind telling me what this was all about?” Raz demanded.
Arius launched into an explanation, telling his master about the note he had received from the Circle of Seven and the fall of Axion. Xavian didn’t say a word about Spector, keeping his heartbreak and loneliness to himself.
Raz shook his head. “If it is true that Erantis hasn’t been heard from, the Circle of Seven would know the instant if one of their own had been killed. Besides, there’s been no intelligence of an invasion force along our eastern seaboard either. We would have heard something well before the city had fallen. It just doesn’t make an ounce of sense.”
“The Circle wouldn’t lie, Master,” Arius said as he shrugged.
Raz gave him a skeptical look. “They’re politicians, Arius. They lie just as easily as they breathe.”
“So how do we approach this?” Xavian inquired, finally joining in on the conversation.
“I’m no war counselor, but knowing your brother the way I do, he could be luring you into a trap. I don’t think it’s a coincidence Dregan chose the place of your births for his initial assault,” Raz added sagely. “Plus, didn’t Owenisis send you to retrieve Drago
ns Fist from Adimus?”
“That man needs to stop gossiping,” Arius said sourly, but his godfather and Raz were right. “It is true, I need Dragons Fist, and I need it badly if I have any hope of facing my brother and surviving. It appears that the time has passed, though, unfortunately. We have to meet on Dregan’s terms, whether we like it or not.”
Chapter 19
Vance dashed away, heedless as he shouldered past his master. He retched loudly in the dank hallway of the ramshackle inn that they had been called to. Dain couldn’t blame his young apprentice for his reaction. He himself grimaced in disgust before calming himself enough to enter the confines of the gore spattered room.
“Sees, I told ya, Inspector,” brayed the stout innkeeper in his barely intelligible accent.
“Indeed you did, good sir,” Dain agreed, nodding gravely. “Now, if you would mind leaving me to it?”
The innkeeper bowed deeply and waddled away without as much as a backwards glance in his haste to oblige.
“Much more spry than I would have given him credit for,” Dain noted. “Vance, if you’re quite done reintroducing yourself to your breakfast, I’ll be needing my kit.”
Vance was a gangly lout, not quite into his twenties. His dull brown hair was already thinning, and his voice cracked when he became overly excited. He was terribly vapid, and he was always trying Dain‘s patience. In short, he was the last person he would have chosen as an apprentice.
A fresh bout of gagging was his response to having his kit brought in. Dain halfheartedly cursed his wife for making him take on their nephew as a would-be Inspector. A dying wish of her sister, she had called it. Family was the most important thing to Dain, so he was obligated to do so. His kit could wait, so instead he grabbed the only tools he had to hand, placing his bifocals on the tip of his nose and pulling on his gloves.
The metallic stench of blood permeated the room, and the sickly sweet fetor of decaying flesh momentarily threatened to have him join Vance out in the hall. He reached into his coat pocket to pull out his lucky handkerchief that his wife had given him for his birthday years and years ago. He covered his mouth breathing in its lovely aroma. He had a habit of spraying it with her favorite perfume, so whenever he missed her too terribly, or had need for comfort he would pull forth the cloth and inhale deeply.
Dain had been an Inspector for well over thirty years, and he had never seen anything quite this ghastly before. On the bed lay a mangled middle-aged woman, and immediately his heart sank. Every time he encountered a female victim, his mind always pictured his wife, his five daughters, or his many granddaughters in their place. The familiar sensation of bile rising in his throat at such a scene began, and he had to force himself to concentrate at the task at hand instead of dwelling on that abysmal thought.
As he drew closer, he noted just how grizzly this murder had truly been. The poor woman’s breasts had been sliced from her chest, and she had been scalped as well. Both of her eyes had been gouged out, leaving scarlet streaks streaming down her cheeks. In this shoddy light, it looked almost like she could have ruined her makeup by crying. If all that wasn’t bad enough, dozens of deep lacerations covered her naked body from head to toe, as if someone had wildly hacked at her with some kind of machete or sword. The sheets, he noted, had once been white or cream colored and were now almost maroon.
Dain felt a tap upon his right shoulder, and he nearly jumped out of his skin from fright. He spun wildly, only to find Vance there looking wide eyed with dread himself.
“Jenukai’s Wings! You scared the living shit out of me, nephew!”
Vance jumped also, still looking pale.
“S-s-s-sorry sir, but I brought you your k-k-k-k-kit,” he stuttered, handing out Dain’s satchel of utensils in his trembling hands.
Dain recovered quickly and moderated his tone as well as his accelerated breathing and heart rate would allow. He was, after all, responsible for Vance’s training, and it was up to him to be a strong example. He tucked away his handkerchief and put a steadying hand on the young man’s shoulder.
“That’s quite alright, lad. Remember, this won’t be the last murder that you encounter with me. Once you’re a full Inspector, there’s no telling what you will run into on your own. So you see, it’s vastly important that you witness things like this while you’re being trained so you can keep your composure later on. I cannot stress the value of having a level head in circumstances such as these.”
He looked Vance in the eyes to see if any of this was registering to him, but received only a glazed over expression that he was all too accustomed to while trying to impart knowledge on the simpleton. He felt his annoyance spike, but he stifled it before it could get the better of him. Sighing, and wondering why he bothered, Dain all but snatched his kit and turned back to the crime scene.
“I don’t want you following me about, constantly underfoot, do you hear? Be a good boy and stand out in the hallway and within earshot should I need you. This will take a while, I’m afraid.”
Barely an inch of the tattered carpeting had escaped being splattered by blood, so he chose his steps carefully as he went and placed his kit on an ottoman, which sat in a small sitting area opposite of the bedchamber. It was the only piece of furniture in the room that had avoided the carnage.
Putting Vance out of his mind, it was second nature for Dain to immediately fall into his element. He had caught hundreds of thieves and more than a dozen murderers during his time as an Inspector. He took an immense amount of pride in how successful he had been during his career, but he had never taken a case to heart. However, the sheer brutality of this butchering made him seethe. At no time in over three decades of working in his field had he ever wanted so badly to catch someone and make them pay for their crime as he did now. Whoever had committed this atrocity was going to hang. His face began to heat and his blood started to boil. Before long, he was nearly hyperventilating with an anger he didn’t know he was capable of.
Knowing he couldn’t conduct his investigation in a rage, Dain closed his eyes tightly. He began to whistle his favorite tune and pictured himself in his favorite place, at his kitchen table with his family surrounding him. His breathing immediately evened out, and he felt completely at ease. His eyes sprang open, and with grim determination, he set to work.
Opening his bag, he pulled out and donned his leather apron, squinting as he sifted through his items. He painstakingly selected the proper tools, chemicals, and powders he would need to begin his investigation. Soon the ottoman looked nothing short of a tiny alchemical workstation.
In one vial, he had a concoction brewed that would let him know if there was other people’s blood in the room besides the victim’s. Another vial held a solution that would detect ejaculate, and another still held a chemical that would show within the blood exactly how long ago the murder had occurred. Every chemical in every vial was Dain’s own personal invention.
Walking over to inspect the corpse, he caught a glimpse of himself in the blood-spattered mirror by the washstand. Sometimes he hardly recognized the old man that stared back at him. All that was left of his hair stood out in white patches just above his ears. A wrinkled bald head covered in liver spots matched his furrowed brow and his bushy white eyebrows. His bifocals clung precariously to a bulbous nose that had been broken far too many times. His handle barred mustache was equally as white and displayed the only thing from his youth that remained to him anymore, his firm jaw line. A protruding belly bulged through the apron, spilling out over his waistline and he walked hunched over because of a bad back.
“Jenukai’s Wings, you’ve gotten fat,” he grumbled at himself, pressing his knuckles to his spine.
Taking a pair of tongs from a pocket of his apron and a small evidence bag from another, he began to peel away the sheets of the bedding that were sticking to the unfortunate woman. As he removed the linens, he noticed for the first time something that made his heart rise into his throat. He lifted from the bed not sheets tha
t had become blood stained, but rather the scarlet robe of a woman dedicated to the Healer guild. He never remembered how he got there, but Dain had joined Vance in the hall where he too saw his breakfast for the second time that morning.
It was many hours later when Dain trudged down the cobblestone street that led to his home and office. His heart was heavy, and his body ached all over. He had dismissed Vance directly after discovering that the victim had been a Healer, and it was almost twilight by the time he had bagged her up and had her sent to her sisters. With their expansive knowledge on the human body, they would be able to perform a much more detailed autopsy than he ever could.
Nevertheless, their Head Mistress had questioned him intently, but he had little in the way of answers this early in the investigation to give to her. The only thought that kept coursing through his mind was what kind of depraved bastard could do that to a Healer. They were pillars of the entire world. They had done away with disease and were a blessed gift that had been bestowed on humanity.
Dain was in such a stupor contemplating the day’s events that he didn’t notice the pair of people standing on his stairs leading to his office and apartment.
“Good evening, Master Dain,” said in his smoothly cool voice.
Dain blinked several times before he registered his protégé Cyus leaning casually on his railing. With him was his apprentice Loren, a beautifully exotic woman. Her tanned skin and her almond shaped eyes were a stunning contrast to her master. She dyed her thick hair dark, and it blew across her lithe neck and slender shoulders as the wind began to pick up. That gust filled his nostrils with the smell of a promised rainstorm.
Cyus had deep-set eyes that missed nothing. He was a darkly handsome young man; his midnight hair was dreadlocked and pulled into a ponytail that hung into the middle of his back. His black overcoat was the epitome of what was considered to be in fashion. Its bold silver buckles and its cufflinks probably cost as much as his entire house. His black suit pants were crisply pressed, and he carried a cane that had a stone for his handhold; Dain knew the crystal contained a rosebud at its center made out of Loren’s crystallized blood. Loren, as per usual, dressed to match him.
Dragons of Destiny Page 19