Sarah’s eyes darkened. “Too many people died for that,” she said.
Silently we made our way into the courtyard. I found myself unable to stop staring at the destruction, despite being the one who’d caused it. Pieces of armor lay everywhere as if discarded, but I knew they’d held Shadows just minutes ago.
Then in the center of the courtyard, we found the bodies.
They were human, that much was certain. Or at least, they had been. Their armor was unfamiliar to me, but it was a similar black color to what the Shadows whore. But these bodies were hamburger, and blood leaked from them to spill across the white stone beneath our feet.
As soon as she saw them, Sarah spun Tess around to hide her eyes. I caught Calvin staring at the bodies with a mix of horror and fascination on his face. Despite the fact that I wanted to lose my lunch, I stepped in front of him.
“Hey, man,” I said gently. “Maybe it’s best not to stare.”
“What were humans doing in here?” he asked quietly.
“They were traitors,” Melaine snarled. “Humans in alliance with the darkness.” She spat in the direction of the corpses.
“Aye, and I’m afraid that sight will grow all the more common as the war progresses,” said Barius heavily. “Already we’ve heard reports of kingdoms besieged by Chaos that have chose to surrender. In exchange for sparing their lives, Terrence takes half of their soldiers to strengthen his own forces. So far only two cities have been unwise enough to accept the terms.”
“Maybe they were just doing what they thought was best for their people,” Sarah said quietly.
“Then they’re fools,” said Nora, Tess’ bodyguard. “Terrence will not spare their lives for long if his war is won. He’ll have no use for humans in his final campaign against True Earth. If Athorn falls, he’ll wipe out the rest of humanity within days.”
I was still having difficulty keeping my eyes off of the mangled corpses. They were the bad guys, I told myself. They were fighting with monsters. And you didn’t even know they were here. “Hey, can anyone do anything about these guys?” I asked, pointing without looking.
Sarah nodded and gestured with her hand. I heard a rumble and felt it beneath my feet. When I turned, I saw six mounds of dirt where before there had been only flat stone. But the dirt was still stained dark with their blood. I considered trying to push the blood into the dirt. It was liquid. I probably could. But I decided instead to leave it there, as a reminder to myself and others that a life wasn’t such an easy thing to take.
The distraction cleared, Greystone led us the rest of the way to the tomb’s entrance. The door already lay open, creating a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. Once we stepped inside, Blade and Greystone summoned small balls of fire to light the way, while Raven brought a ball of crackling electricity into being around her arm. The three of them gave more than enough light to navigate the short hallway. The hallway led to stairs that descended into the earth. They were similar to the stairs down which we’d found Jada’s tomb.
We entered a chamber just like Jada’s. It had the same vaulted ceiling, the same somber designs worked into the stone walls. A sarcophagus lay on the other side of the room, and on the wall above it I recognized the symbol of Mind. The same symbol that was on Tess’ belt buckle, that was on her chair in the Runehold, that had been on the pillar that chose her in the summoning circle.
“We are in the tomb of Malus,” Greystone said somberly. “And as I feared, we are already too late.”
In the center of the tomb was a short stone pedestal. Its top was gleaming white marble, with pink gemstones set into its edge.
The pedestal was empty.
TO BE CONTINUED IN…
TESS
MY NAME IS TESS HERNANDEZ, and I’m living a double life.
I was only sixteen when I acquired the power of Mind. For so long I didn’t know how to truly use my power. The others I was with seemed to be able to learn how to use their abilities so much faster than I did. I felt like a loser. The odd one out. Not too different from the rest of my life, I guess. There was a time when I truly didn’t believe that I mattered much in the fight against Chaos. A time when I doubted if I’d been the right choice for the position of Realm Keeper at all. And it was a long time before I found out how wrong I was. Before then, I just tried to stay out of the way, learning my power as much as I could. But I was always unsure of the limits to which I could take it; partly because I was afraid of the limits to which it could take me.
Which is why I was so nervous when Greystone had me poking around in Calvin’s mind.
“I just want to be perfectly clear — this isn’t going to hurt, is it?” Calvin asked, looking at Greystone beside me. “I mean, I’m willing to take one for the team, risk it all for the cause, that kind of thing. But I’d be really happy if I don’t end up a vegetable.”
“She’s entering your mind, not trying to turn you into a legume,” Greystone shot back.
Greystone had placed Calvin across from me, about fifteen feet away. Contrary to how we usually practiced, we were outside, not in a training room. We were on a grassy field outside of Morrowdust. The city wall loomed above us, and I noticed a couple of guards staring out at us interestedly through the ramparts.
Also unusual was the fact that Greystone had called the others to observe. Usually he was adamant that we keep to our own practice rooms so we wouldn’t accidentally hurt each other as we experimented with our powers. Of course, that didn’t stop him from stationing our Runegard in the room with us. I was always nervous that I’d accidentally hurt Nora. It made me cautious. Maybe a little too cautious; I still wasn’t able to move anything bigger than a plate with any confidence.
“Lady Tess, you will need to concentrate,” Greystone said, looking over at me. “Today, your goal is to make Lord Calvin see something that does not exist.”
“Go for hair on top of grandpa’s head,” Blade called out, standing safely twenty feet away. “That hasn’t existed in centuries.”
“Quiet, Blade,” said Sarah with a voice of tired resignation.
I looked up at Greystone, one eye covered by my hair. Back then, I felt safer when my hair covered one of my eyes. It made me feel like I was half hidden from the world, which was what I liked. “Like when I make people invisible?” I squeaked back. It sets my teeth on edge even now when I think back to the days when my voice held such little volume.
“Something like that,” Greystone said. “But creating an object is much more difficult than hiding one. Lord Calvin must believe completely that the illusion is real. You must make him want to interact with it in some way. The human mind is a delicate instrument, and easily deceived. Especially his.”
“Hey!”
“You must create the object, but then it must become his own. The key is to trick his mind into believing that the falsity was its own idea in the first place.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I nodded anyway. In my opinion, it was better to go along with it than to be seen as an idiot.
“Bring it on,” Calvin said with a smile. He waved his hand in front of his face, two fingers raised above the rest. “Your Jedi mind powers will not work on me, girl. They are only for the weak-willed. Give me your best shot.”
“Her ‘best shot’ would separate every particle of your body from one another, and you would simply cease to be,” said Greystone.
Calvin’s eyes went wide at the thought. “Okay, so let’s table the ‘best shot’ idea, then,” he said. “I guess we can just stick with the mirage.”
“Now, Lady Tess, concentrate,” said Greystone. “Create an object, something only you can see, and then move it from your universe into his own.”
“His universe?” Raven asked from the side, bored as usual. “Calvin’s got his very own universe?”
Greystone ignored her, keeping his eyes focused on mine. “Begin,” he said quietly.
I concentrated. I closed my eyes, trying to think of what to create.
A thousand things flew through my mind, each more ridiculous than the last, each discarded for fear of Blade making fun of me. A phone? No, that was ridiculous, Calvin would know it was fake. A car? Even worse.
Maybe I’d make a sword. Yeah. That would be right at home here in Midrealm. But why would Calvin be interested in it? He was so obsessed with his staff, he wouldn’t want to pick up a sword for even a second.
Suddenly, I had an idea. Something so simple, it was ridiculous. But it was small. Out of the way. Something he’d barely notice.
I opened my eyes again, and everything seemed to be in a white fog. I had the same feeling I’d had the first day we came to Midrealm, when I’d activated the barrier.
“Um, is that normal?” I heard Miles say nervously. I could make out the shadowy silhouette of Greystone as he silenced him by waving a hand in his direction. But it didn’t break my concentration. We’d been practicing meditation for the past two weeks, and unlike the others, I found it relaxing to sit there and focus on nothing. So it was easy for me to tune out the deep sound of Miles’ voice.
I located the idea of what I wanted to create. As I watched, the white fog swirled and seemed to compact, forming the shape I held in my mind.
“Okay,” I squeaked.
Calvin looked around wide-eyed, looking up and down like he was expecting a dragon.
“Now subtly suggest he do something with the object. He must believe it is his own choice,” Greystone said.
I concentrated, looking into Calvin’s mind. I didn’t start looking into his thoughts — Greystone had told me over and over again that I wasn’t even close to ready for that. But I could see what Calvin’s eyes saw, hear what came from his ears. The senses were completely separate from thought, and I could tap into the one without even brushing against the other. I saw my creation sitting there, and I willed his hand to reach out to it. The message faded into the ether, disappearing from my mind.
I broke the connection, and the fog disappeared from the world. “Okay,” I said again.
Calvin looked around suspiciously. “Hold on,” he mumbled. “I’ll find it. Don’t tell me.” He turned all the way around, looking behind him as well as to both sides.
Suddenly he stopped, looking at a small tree to his left. “Got it!” he said proudly. He bent to scoop up a stone. “I kind of wanted to climb that tree. But not very much.” He smirked. “Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll get better. I’ve got a strong mind. Scientific method does that to a person.” His arm slung out to toss the stone at the tree.
“You need to pay better attention to your surroundings, Lord Calvin,” said Greystone with a smile that was entirely too pleased. “That tree has been there for three hundred years, very much including the twenty minutes you have been standing here.” Calvin’s smile dropped. Greystone turned to me. “Lady Tess, what was the suggestion you placed in Lord Calvin’s mind?”
I smiled weakly. “I wanted him to throw a rock at the tree.”
Calvin did a double-take. “Wait, no,” he said, confused. “That was my idea. I wanted to climb it first.”
“That’s because you are a child,” grumbled Greystone. “And Lady Tess, what object did you create in Calvin’s eye?”
I looked up at Greystone, feeling a smile tugging at the side of my mouth before I quickly looked back at the ground. “The rock,” I replied.
Calvin’s eyes shot wide. “Wha…? No way, I threw a real rock, not your fake one!”
“You definitely did not, bro,” said Blade, almost as pleased to be mocking Calvin as Greystone was. “Empty air.”
Calvin whirled and went to the tree. “It was real! I swear! Look, it’s right here!”
He stooped once more, then stood to hold out an empty palm. Sarah sighed and stepped forward, then put her palm flat against Calvin’s. He gasped and recoiled.
“Wait,” he said, dubious. “That…that was you using your rock stuff.”
“Calvin, give it up,” Miles said. “Tess got you.”
I reached within myself for the magic once again. The white fog reappeared, and I saw the rock glowing like a beacon within it. I stretched out my mind, sweeping it into nothingness.
Calvin yelped like a struck dog and leapt about a foot in the air. “Holy — ”
I turned to Miles. “What were you saying before? You said ‘is that normal?’”
Miles looked at me uncomfortably, trying to hide it behind an uneasy smile. “Uh…nothing, Tess. Just your eyes.”
Sarah put a hand on my shoulder. “They go white when you use your power,” she said nonchalantly. “It’s no big deal. It’s probably a special Mind thing, right?” she turned to Greystone for confirmation.
“It is unusual, certainly, though nothing to concern yourself with,” Greystone said with a dismissive wave. “Not all Keepers of the Mind do so, but it is not unheard of.”
“What’s different about the ones who do?” I asked, suddenly afraid. “Is there something wrong with me?”
Greystone seemed to hunch deeper into his shoulders. “There is something a little wrong with all of you,” he muttered. “Nonetheless, it is nothing to concern yourself over. On the contrary, you should be proud of the progress you have made in such a short space of time. Now come, your time here is nearing its end. Let us proceed back to the Runehold.”
The Runegard approached, each of them leading two horses — one for them, and one for us. Nora came up to me, holding out the reins to a pinto that seemed to have taken a liking to me. She smiled down at me.
“That was excellent!” Nora said excitedly. “Was that fast for a Realm Keeper?”
I shrugged with a small smile and put my hand on her shoulder, using it to help boost myself into the saddle. Nora, for some reason, seemed to know less about some things in Midrealm than I did. It turned out she was brand new to the Runegard, and the battle of the circle had been the first time she’d ever seen action. It shook her almost as bad as it shook me, although she had years of training to prepare for it. We ended up comforting each other through the memories of people fighting and dying, though I think it’s safe to say she comforted me a little bit more than I did her.
“I’ll bet it was very fast,” Nora said brightly. “You seem to be taking to the training very well.”
I shrugged again and dropped my voice as I slowed my horse down to fall behind the others. “I wouldn’t know. I still don’t feel like a real Realm Keeper yet.”
“Don’t be silly!” Nora exclaimed. “You just made Lord Calvin see something that wasn’t even there! I doubt Lord Greystone could pull off a trick like that.”
“I am not a Lord!” roared Greystone from the front of the column. My stomach leapt into my throat. Had he heard what I’d said? I had been trying not to let the others know my feelings. We’d just gone through hell with Miles not wanting to be here, and the group was still a little raw from it. And it wasn’t even that I didn’t want to be here. In most ways, Midrealm was a thousand times better than life back on True Earth. At least here, I didn’t have to worry about my next meal.
But if Greystone had heard everything I’d said, he didn’t pursue it further. Maybe he didn’t want to get into another argument, now that Miles seemed to have gotten over himself and was settling in nicely to his responsibilities.
Or maybe, I thought, Greystone’s not bringing it up because he knows I’m right. Maybe I’m not really a Realm Keeper.
Shut up, I thought angrily. That’s ridiculous. I could cast magic. Still, doubt had gnawed at me every single day since we’d come here. Everyone else seemed like they knew what they were doing — even Miles, despite his crisis of faith. But I felt like I was just going along with everyone, speaking when spoken to and following orders.
I realized that Calvin had pulled his horse up next to mine as we made our way through the streets of Morrowdust. “Hey,” he said hesitantly. “Good job out there. It’s…kind of painful for someone with my background to admit, but you totally got me.”
I stared at him with one eye. “Your background?” I asked timidly.
“You know. Geekdom. I know all about Jedi mind tricks and charm spells and all the rest of it. I should have been better prepared.”
I blinked. “But those are fake. This is real life.”
Calvin shook his head. “I know, right? You’d think it would be even easier.” He spurred his horse and nearly fell over as it sped up, carrying him back to the front of the group.
I just stared after him, not sure what he was talking about or how to respond. Then I noticed that my horse was drifting apart from the group, heading down a side street and toward a fruit cart just at the mouth of an alley. I whirled to see Nora was looking the other way. So I clung to the saddle horn, waiting in terror for the horse to finish its business.
A loud curse behind me was followed by the clatter of hooves and a flush of heat in my cheeks. Blade pulled up beside me, snatching the horse’s reins from my hands.
“Freaking thing!” he growled. “Doesn’t it have some kind of herd instinct or something that stops it from wandering off?”
“That’s more of a cow thing,” called Miles from the middle of the group. “Horses are a little more fear-driven and a lot more hunger-driven. He wants an apple.”
I stared at the cart where the horse had been headed before Blade pulled it to a stop. There were bushels of apples all over it. They looked red, juicy and delicious. I didn’t blame the horse at all.
Blade was looking at me like he was expecting something. “Well, you gonna ask for one?” he finally said. “They have to give it to you.”
“Oh, no,” I said, shaking my head quickly. “I don’t want to…I mean, I don’t want to be any trouble to them.”
But the owner of the cart came out from behind it at just that moment and overheard me. “My Lady!” she called out. “It would be my honor to provide for your horse!”
She snatched a bunch of them and held them in her apron, rushing up to us. She pulled two of the red fruit from the folds of cloth, then held them up for our horses, who gobbled them down eagerly.
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