by Hanna Peach
The Lightwarrior’s Protocol
Chapter 4
Alyx learnt once that it took six MirageWeavers to maintain the wards over the Seraphim city of Michaelea. With the wards activated, Michaelea doesn’t exist to the outside world. Anyone approaching would be repelled from entering the space by a deep instinct. Unless you knew Michaelea was there, you would miss it completely.
Alyx feels the familiar urge to turn away grow stronger as her and her flock fly closer to the ward’s magical skin. Her ears pop as she breaks through the mirage and the city appears.
Michaelea is set across several mountains in this mountain range, some hundred kilometers as the angel flies from the nearest mortal settlement of Saint Joseph. The larger buildings squat amongst the sloping forests like giant wooden hippos. The smaller pods hang off trees like strange growths. Over time the trees and vines of this forest have absorbed the city into their fabric.
The training fields grid across the valley flat around the curve of one side of the Great Lake which turns into a river that twists away like a blue and silver snake. This early in the morning the city is silent.
Alyx wanders from the training fields, taking an aimless way back to her pod. Symon has dismissed them with instructions to, “Rest.” She stops by the edge of the Great Lake to look out over the glassy surface, the distant hills reflected in the water.
Rest.
Alyx feels the familiar undercurrent of panic when told she has nothing to do but rest. Without any distractions the gnawing separate-ness returns to the fore. It reminds her that she feels... carved out. Hollow like the reeds of this lake.
Alyx scratches at her bloodink tattoos. She has already earned six marks, a proud feat for a warrior still so young. She wears the permanent black outlines on her left arm like badges: FireTwirler, EarthSifter, AirWhisperer, WaterBearer, Animale, and her most recent mark, DreamWalker. All are empty except for part of her DreamWalker mark and the last corner of her FireTwirler. She will have to get her FireTwirler refilled before the next patrole. Protocol.
To Alyx, bloodink tattoos feel itchy. Uncomfortable. As if the magic doesn’t like being inked on her skin. In the stillness of the early morning she can feel it now. The hum of its power. Sometimes she feels a compulsion to do things. A compulsion she is sure that doesn’t belong to her. She imagines that these uninvited compulsions belong to whoever of the Castus, the gifted Seraphim, donated the blood to create the bloodink.
Seraphim blood must always be distilled before it is used. Undistilled blood is too unpredictable. Dangerous.
Alyx’s pod is clustered along with the other lightwarrior pods on the lowest rank of the mountain, green growths shimmering and glossy with insect life.
On the inside of her pod two vines compete for dominance, one with thick succulent leaves, the other with frosty spike-like ferns. The royal blues and burnt oranges of butterflies and ladybirds shimmer and flicker through the air.
Only when she has locked her door does she pull the killer’s ring from her pocket. It is plain gold except for five engraved words in cursive script: Ani Ledodi Ve Dodi Li.
I am my beloved and my beloved is mine.
Love. This was a token of love. Alyx feels a rush of curiosity. Who would love this killer?
Alyx remembers something the Elders say about love, “Love is an unreliable way to choose a partner. The Seraphim have no use for love if we are to survive.”
Love. The sin of her parents.
Alyx hangs her warrior jacket on its hook. She unsheathes her various weapons and polishes each one before returning them onto their place on her weapons wall.
Her blades are all custom-made, a luxury for a lightwarrior. The metals of each blade blended by Ferrum, Michaelea’s best steelforger, a Castus gifted with the Alchemist. Each blade is weighted exactly for Alyx, fits perfectly into her hand like an extension of her arm, and is suited to her fighting style. Each one is a work of art. None of her friends know how she really earns the money to pay for her blades and she will never tell.
On three shelves fixed against the wall that abuts the trunk Alyx keeps her warrior blacks folded in stacks and a few rolled up Seraphim Threads: the Lightwarrior’s Protocol, A History of Seraphim Before, and The Code.
Her real treasures lay hidden.
Between the bottom two shelves, behind a false wall panel, is a secret compartment, a hollow cut into the tree. Her winnings, pouches full of gold, are stashed here. Mortal trinkets. Newspaper clippings showing unexplainable miracles and mortal rescues, evidence to Alyx of the Rogues that survived the last cull. Sometimes she allows herself to wonder if her parents are still alive among them.
Her hollow also holds books. Mortal books.
You can assimilate the whole content of a Thread upon running your hands over it, the thoughts from within the Thread drawing into your mind in an instant. Not like mortal books, where stories have to be plucked out, one word after another.
The Seraphim have no use for made-up stories, no use for the written word, especially not ones written by mortals. This is why every item in her compartment has been smuggled in. It is her secret.
Alyx tucks the ring into the hollow and replaces the cover. She flings herself onto her bed, a rust colored mattress of down and feathers lying on a squat platform, causing it to creak madly. She pushes her face into the cloth of her pillow.
On a quiet day with the wind just right, Alyx can hear the chink of metal coming from the training fields. She loves that sound. Which is why she hung a wind chime she made from broken blades in her window. At night Alyx is put to sleep by the sounds of clashing metal. But today the clinking blades just remind her of the training she could be doing instead of... rest.
Alyx rolls over and tries to force sleep. But when she closes her eyes her vision flashes across the darks of her lids.
The demon-girl holds her sword awkwardly away from her thin body. Her face, her demon face flickers under mortal skin - burning red eyes, scarred lime skin, horns protruding from her forehead and cheekbones.
Rage ignites like fire, curling through his blood, licking across his skin. Crying for revenge.
The demon-girl cries out as his steel finds its mark across her pale skin. His blade tasting the satisfaction of first blood. Her cry sounds high and girlish but he can hear the angry roar of the demon voice underneath it, separate but seamless like two notes of a twisted melody. She tries to fight back.
Rancid blood, oozing down her arm, smells like burning rubber. He ignores the bile that rises in his throat when the stench meets his nose. He slashes out again and again.
Her sword drops as the last of her life leaves her eyes. Her body falls.
He kicks her over to her back, kneels. And begins to cut.
Alyx sits up, a gasp falling from her lips. This killer, this Rogue, is so like the Darkened, wild and rough, without rules to temper his behavior. The memory of his raw emotions course through her as if they are her own. Her body responds to this intimacy by flushing.
This is what it feels like. To live without rules. To be Rogue.
Alyx doesn’t want to admit to herself how much he fascinates her. She doesn’t want to admit how enticing it feels to be in his body, to feel... unrestrained.
Her pod isn’t cold but Alyx shivers all the same. She doesn’t need sleep. She needs distraction.
The Alchemist
Third level magic.
The Alchemist is able to alter simple molecular structures such as most liquids and metals. The quantity or complexity of the transformation is dependent on the skill of the Seraphim in question. The Alchemist is a peculiar skill and one that is highly regarded.
When using the Alchemist bloodink the model lightwarrior should first practice changing the molecular structure of fluids. Once this manipulation is achieved progress to the conversion of fluids to solids, then finally converting solids to solids. The model lightwarrior should ultimately aim to achieve the conversion of one metal to another.
Chapter 5
The training fields are a patchwork of open platforms covered by curved roofs of thatched grass. Only lightwarriors venture here. It isn’t that the Castus or the Elders aren’t allowed here; it’s just that they never come.
The training platform is made entirely of wood, each structural piece carved to fit with precision into the nearby pieces. Even here nature has encroached, with vines threading their way up poles and twining around beams, cupping the whole structure within green fingers. Across each ceiling, ropes criss-cross randomly creating a chaotic web, an aranea for their in-air training, one of Alyx’s favorite and one she excels in thanks to her lithe size.
Within the depths of the Great Lake is the training water course, a series of Seraphim-made mazes within a large underwater structure. Alyx likes the muffled sensations of being submerged. She often spent hours underwater running the courses after training has finished.
It is too early for the other lightwarriors to be here. Alyx soaks in the quiet as she wraps a thick dark strap around each hand. At the side of a platform, she pounds her fists into one of the drop-sacks in a hypnotic rhythm. Beat, beat. Beat, beat.
Slowly her discomfort eases, her mind quiets and he is forgotten. Beat, beat.
...curling through his blood, licking across his skin...
He is almost forgotten.
Alyx hears a stifled sniff. She isn’t alone. She glances around, wiping the sweat off her brow with the back of her hand. “Who’s there?”
“It’s just me Alyx,” says a voice from above. Alyx looks up to find Passar, another flock member, sitting hunched on one of the cords of rope in the aranea.
“Passar, what are you doing up there?” Alyx pushes herself up off the ground. She sees him rub his face and realizes too late that he is wiping away tears. She hesitates, wondering if he will welcome her intrusion. But it’s too late to turn away.
Alyx clears her throat. She floats to a rope near him and seats herself on it, pretending not to notice his swollen eyes. She focuses instead on the tiny caterpillar that is making its way across a nearby rope.
“What are you doing up here?”
“We...” his voice shakes, “we used to sit up here, Elijah and I. Before training. We’d sit up here and talk. Just talk.”
As Passar speaks he twists a misshaped piece of metal in his fingers encased within an elaborate open metal-work cuff. Passar sees Alyx looking at it.
“Elijah was always tinkering with things, metal mostly. He was obsessed with metals. He was a low-skill Alchemist, you know. But he was Destined as a lightwarrior. His bloodline was too diluted for them to ever accept him as a Castus.” Passar caressed the cuff with his thumb. “I rescued it from his pod after he... before they stripped it. Looks like he finally got the mixture right.”
“What is it?”
“It’s a magical pick.”
“A what?”
Passar pushes the cuff into Alyx’s palm. It is cold and surprisingly light.
“See for yourself.” He nods towards something across the platform.
Alyx turns her head. An enclosed bench runs part way along the edge of the platform into which wooden weapons are thrown after practice. Next to this bench a wide row of cases holds swords, knifes, staffs... real weapons with real blades although blunted from use. A magical shield locks away the weapons, the shield only retracting by the command of the keye. Only flock leaders hold keyes, bullet-like charms on the end of chains strung around their necks.
Alyx turns back to Passar. “Seriously?”
He nods.
She flies down off the ropes and lands in front of the case of weapons. “What do I do?”
“Put the cuff on and stick your hand in.”
She gives the cuff a look. A magical pick? Really? She looks around to make sure there is no one watching. She slips the cuff around her wrist then flexes her fingers out towards the case. There is a crackling and snapping noise. Small green sparks fly from the pick. A glow ripples out across the surface of the case in a widening ring and the shield disappears behind it, as if it is sweeping the magic away with it.
Her fingers go straight into the case. Her mouth drops open. “Impossible.”
“Elijah was incredibly smart.”
Alyx withdraws her hand. As the tip of her middle finger pulls away from the shield there is a sucking noise and the green ripple closes in on itself. Alyx touches the shield with her other hand. Solid.
She flies back up to her place beside Passar. “How does it work?”
“I’m not sure. Something about the combination of metals short-circuits the magic in the shield when it is close enough. At least that’s what I understood when Elijah tried to explain it to me.”
“Does it affect the shield long term or leave behind a trace or anything?”
“He didn’t think it would.”
Alyx pulls the cuff off her wrist and holds it out to Passar.
“You keep it,” he says. “Elijah would have wanted you to have it. I have another one.”
“Really?”
“You were one of the few here he truly felt comfortable around.”
Alyx nods, slips the cuff back onto her wrist. Passar’s eyes glaze over again and he stares into the distance. Alyx slips her hand onto his shoulder. “It’s going to be okay.”
“I just... I can’t believe he’s gone.”
“I know.”
“It happened so suddenly. I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”
It happened only a few weeks ago while Elijah was on patrole. Despite the lightwarriors being trained so well, it happened. The Seraphim’s healing powers can heal so many wounds. But not all.
Elijah had belonged to a different warrior-flock. The night it happened he left for patrole, like any other night, like any other patrole. Before the dawn came, his body had been carried back but he was gone. Elijah had been cremated the next day in a small Mourning Ceremony.
Alyx remembers the heat of the fire on her face, the dark outline of Elijah’s body within the flames as he disappeared to ashes.
Ashes and dust.
After the Ceremony it was as if the cloak of a heavy winter had fallen upon the city. No one sang or spoke too loudly for the remainder of the day. Even the birds knew to stay silent. It was a stark reminder to them all that they were no longer immortal. Two days later, another lightwarrior fell.
Passar’s bottom lip is trembling. “Sometimes when I first wake up I forget that he’s gone and for a few moments, a few amazing moments, I believe he’s still alive.”
“I know.” Alyx cringes. She isn’t being helpful. Elysia is good with situations like this, not her.
“Where do you think he’s gone?”
“I don’t know.”
And none of the Elders can say with certainty either. Before it didn’t matter when the physical body died, the Seraphim were immortal. After, no one can say what happens. Now, the dead don't return.
Chapter 6
“So, the body was exactly how you envisioned it?” When Tii’la speaks, her voice betrays her disbelief.
“Yes, exactly how I envisioned it.” It hasn’t even been a day since Symon reported her vision to the Elders but already the news has spread throughout the lightwarrior camp like hellfire. Alyx had tried to avoid their questions but they gathered around her as they waited for the call to signal the start of afternoon training. Maybe she shouldn’t have come here.
“Alyxandria.” Alyx smiles at the sight of Jovanna flying down to her from over the heads of the lightwarriors. Jovanna is another flock leader, a lightwarrior of about forty winters who had trained with Alyx’s mother under Symon when they were younglings.
Jovanna has the aura of a lioness, proud, regal, and with a sleeping fierceness. And yet... there is something sad, almost haunting about her eyes. Jovanna insists on calling Alyx by her full name. Always. “It is what your parent’s named you so it is what I will call you,
” Jovanna had said to Alyx once. Because it is Jovanna, Alyx lets her get away with it.
Jovanna touches down before Alyx, the crowd moving back to give her room. “I have been meaning to congratulate you on your DreamWeaver mark. A second level magic. It’s an honor for someone so young.” Jovanna clasps Alyx in a tight hug. In her ear Alyx hears, “Your parents would have been proud.”
Her heart warms. Coming from Jovanna these words hold extra weight.
“What are you doing at training?” Jovanna asks. “I was sure that your flock was marked for rest.”
“Something I wanted to talk to you about. Would you mind if I trained with your flock this afternoon?”
Jovanna cocks her head in what appears to be amusement. “What have you done to anger Symon now?”
“Nothing, I promise. I just thought I could get in some extra training.”
Jovanna watches Alyx closely for a few more moments then nods, a little smile at her lips. “If only all warriors were as dedicated. Of course, join my flock for this afternoon. Perhaps you can shame them into exerting some actual effort. If you’ll excuse me, I must speak with Leader Torac before we commence.”
Alyx watches Jovanna fly off. Around the fields other warrior-flocks are gathering on the platforms.
“So have you seen any more visions since?” Tii’la asks.
Before Alyx can answer a voice rings out over their heads. “You don’t actually believe her, do you?”
Alyx stiffens. A small murmur stirs in the Seraphim around her like a wind across wheat fields. Her accuser presses forward to face her.
Yael. He may have been handsome, rugged perhaps a better description, if it not for his whip-lipped snarl and the constant roll of anger behind his glare.
A few more lightwarriors are hustled out of the way as Do’hann and Stantanople, two other warriors of Yael’s flock, also step forward.