Twixt Heaven And Hell

by Tristan Gregory

  Balkan was silent for a moment as he considered Arric's words. "That is strange, yes... but I think you are making too much of it. Darius will be mourning Robert in his own way – privately. Besides myself, his lieutenant was the only man he called his friend. What would you do if half of what you held dear was taken from you?"

  "Are not you worried as well, then?"

  Balkan sighed and shook his head again. "No, Arric, I am not. I am sorry for his pain, but I do not worry for Darius. He is the strongest man I've ever known – a more resilient spirit could not be imagined. Give him time and he will recover even from this."

  "Alone?"

  “If that is the way he wishes it, yes. If he seeks solitude, best to let him have it.”

  Arric looked displeased not to find a twin to his own disquiet within Balkan, but he did not press the issue further.

  “If you do not worry, than I shall not either. But please, try to find him. Perhaps you can help him recover more quickly.”

  Balkan searched for an hour, combing the passages and out-of-the-way rooms of the tower, before he realized exactly where Darius would be. The road that led from gates to Crown split off into many other roads – and one of those led to the residence claimed by the late Lieutenant Robert. Balkan had nearly forgotten about it. He had to search for another hour before he found the correct house, one of the simple, small, two-storied stone domiciles that covered the hills above the barracks.

  He was surprised to hear voices within, conversing quietly. Balkan entered the small common room to find Darius and a woman sitting in woven wicker chairs that had been drawn close to a small fire set in the stove. The woman was older, her brunette hair showing streaks of gray and a heavy blanket was lain over her legs to keep away the cold.

  Both looked towards the door as Balkan walked in. Darius nodded his greeting.

  "Hello Balkan. Searched me out, have you?"

  "Others tried as well," Balkan replied. "As far as they're concerned you've been missing for three days. But who is your lovely company?"

  The woman smiled at the pleasantry.

  "This is Evelyn,” Darius said. “Evelyn, my dearest friend, Wizard Balkan.”

  Turning to Balkan again: "Evelyn was Robert's... intended."

  Balkan's face fell. "Madame, I am dearly sorry for your loss."

  She bowed her head in acknowledgment, and Balkan saw that there was a shadow of pain upon her otherwise serene face. "Thank you, Wizard Balkan."

  “I'm sure Darius has said it, but if there is anything we can do to ease your sorrow -” Balkan began, but she waved away the words with a kind smile.

  "Thank you, thank you – but I'm no young lass to be devastated by loss," she said with humor. "I lost my first husband to the War, and I wept for ages, then. Robert and I were no young lovers. I've wept for him, and reminisced with Wizard Darius, and I'll remember him fondly."

  Darius reached out a hand and laid it upon the woman's arm. "Even so, the offer stands."

  Another warm smile lit Evelyn's face, showing remnants of the youthful beauty she must have had. "Thank you both. I'll remember your kindness." She cast a glance out the window to the shadows creeping up the house nearby. "Ah, but I must be going. I'll never have any children of my own, but I live with my nephew now and he has seven – the silly man. Live is full when you have family to care for."

  Both men offered to walk her to her nephew's residence, but she refused the company. "The house is only a few steps, and if I walk in with two wizards on my arms, I'll never hear the end of it. The children will think I've become a general. I prefer some peace and quiet now and then, you know. It did my heart good to meet you, Wizard Darius, and I was pleased to meet you as well, Wizard Balkan."

  "And I you, Evelyn. Take care," said Balkan.

  Setting the blanket that had covered her onto the chair's arm, the woman gave them each another warm smile and departed, moving with a grace that age had not taken from her. Balkan moved to take the vacated seat.

  Darius was staring into the fire, his face holding some of the same serenity that Evelyn's had – but even as he watched for a brief moment, Balkan could see it start to slip. His friend may have managed to borrow some of that calm from Robert's beloved, but his friend was not done grieving yet.

  Balkan knew that serenity was not something that came easily to Darius even in the best of times.

  "A wonderful woman," Balkan said lightly.

  A nod from Darius and his mouth twitched into a smile. "Certainly. I shall have to see if there isn't something that can be done for her, despite what she said. She has lost two of her loves to the War – Bastion owes her some kind of comfort."

  There were a few moments of silence. Balkan did not really have anything to say – in all the time he had known Darius, his friend had never desired consolation and so Balkan did not know how to offer it. He decided that perhaps simply sitting with a friend in silence would be some modicum of comfort.

  Darius dispelled that belief when he broke the silence himself.

  "I didn't know about her until a few hours ago."

  Balkan leaned back and listened quietly, saying nothing.

  "Two years she and Robert had been together. She says they were thinking of marrying in the spring. I never knew." Darius heaved a heavy sigh. "To think I called myself his friend."

  Balkan was startled. "Come now. Even I knew Robert was a private sort of man – and I barely knew him."

  "Yes, that's true. He never spoke of himself – until he was asked," Darius finished with a sad shake of his head. "When did I ask? All too rarely."

  Balkan's shook his head. “Your regret has no foundation, Darius. Robert would think you were making too much of this. He served with the Gryphons for two years after he had found Evelyn, yes? He had done his duty to Bastion long before you met him. He had done his duty to you, and to your men.

  “If it was not duty that made him remain when he could have left with all honor, what was it then? He was your friend, and he believed in you.”

  Balkan could see his words had little impact.

  A smile appeared on Darius's face, but it was a small, bitter thing. “Robert never believed in the Gryphons as I did. I often spoke to him of the moment when we would find something – some advantage, or some hole in the enemy's defense – that would lead to a permanent change in the War. I always thought it was just over the horizon. It is why I kept my poor soldiers dashing about the lines throughout the years, spending their blood and their lives. I can see now that Robert never believed me – he didn't think the war would ever end.”

  Darius speared Balkan with another look. “He was right. I finally see it. Nothing I do matters. The War does not change. I begin to despair that we will ever know peace, here – in this world caught 'twixt Heaven and Hell.”

  Darius fell silent again, returning his gaze to the fire.

  As Balkan sat with Darius and listened to the crackling of wood in the stove, he realized that – for the first time – he was worried for his friend.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The creature in the cage had finally calmed, exhausted at last. It was fat, having feasted on the rich offering of roots and berries in the northern hills. Men trapped them by the hundreds at this time of the year, their tender meat and ample fat helping men through the cold winter.

  Balkan's eager feet brought him quickly to his door. As he walked past the kitchen he saw that his wife had guests, a pair of women he did not recognize. They were not wives of wizards, that much he knew. The number of women in Maggie's position numbered less than a dozen, and Balkan knew them all.

  He decided to leave them to their talk without interrupting. Or introducing himself. Or being noticed at all, if he could help it. There was important work to do.

  Unfortunately, his wife was far too observant to miss him carrying a live rabbit through the house.

  “And how long is that going to be here?” she asked. Her tone suggested she wanted to tell him exactly w
hat she told Kaylie whenever their daughter brought a furry rodent home: "No, you cannot keep it!"

  Balkan paused only long enough to answer.

  "Not long, not long. Sorry to interrupt."

  As he stepped away from the door, he heard his wife mutter something about 'living with a wizard,' but his mind was concerned with other things.

  Inside his study, with candles lit, he placed the cage on the desk. Also on the table were the knife, his book of runes, and a piece of potato with long white tendrils of sprout extending from the skin on one side. Though it had been cut days before, the potato was still a healthy off-white.

  Balkan sat, both hands resting on the desk. He looked at the rabbit, panting in the wooden cage, eyes wide and staring. He reached for the potato, eyes running over the rune cut into it. As he had done so many times over the past two weeks, he let magic flow into the symbol.

  His senses were focused before he began, and again he felt a familiar warmth build and dissipate. He had missed it the first time, and the second, and the third. From the fourth and each attempt thereafter, he had felt the power wielded by this one simple rune. Eventually he had recognized it. Now, he would confirm it.

  Shaking his head, Balkan corrected his thoughts with the ruthlessness of a man who valued accuracy in all things. He might confirm it. If his experiment did not yield the results he predicted, then he would have to acknowledge a mistake on his own part, and keep searching for the true answer to the puzzle before him.

  He moved the cage closer to himself, dragging it over the desk. The vibration startled the rabbit from whatever sleep or trance of fear it had been in, and it began to jitter and kick at the cage once again. Balkan waited patiently for it to settle down again. From within his robe he took a few dandelion leaves, long and green, though now slightly rumpled. The rabbit was mistrustful at first, eying the proffered snack suspiciously. Hunger won out, and it began to munch, keeping its mouth far from where Balkan's fingers held the greens.

  With his other hand Balkan took up the knife. He looked at the animal with a guilty expression. "I'm sorry about this, little one," he said.

  With a jerk of his hand, he stabbed the rabbit in the haunch.

  This time it took a substantial amount of time for the rabbit to calm. Balkan had already put down the knife, and standing he moved away from the desk and cage, hoping the space would help the animal settle. With magic he examined it – the frantic activity, the heart beating furiously. The wound Balkan had given was not deep. Balkan didn't think it would have any trouble recovering on its own, even in the wild.

  His own heart was beating rapidly as well, as it always did before a major experiment. Despite his attempts to be skeptical, Balkan knew. He knew what would happen. He knew he was right, and he knew just how incredible this new breakthrough would be.

  Stretching forth his hand, Balkan fixed the warmth from the rune firmly in his mind, and with his own power brought it forth. The same magic that flowed from the Angel's symbol now flowed from him, a subtle power. Even as he worked, his senses focused on the caged animal.

  As his magic flowed through it, the rabbit calmed still further. Heart and lungs slowed their frantic pace – even an animal knew that only good could come from this. When he was done, Balkan examined the creature again. There was blood upon the fur, still fresh – but no more spilled. The wound was gone.

  Healed.

  In the silence, a tear sprang to Balkan's eye. A strange serenity had taken hold of his mind, a feeling he had not experienced since he had first lain with his wife. For the first time in many years, there were no thoughts, no questions, no concerns. There was only peace and wonder, and a sense that things would soon change for the better.

  "We are, all of us, Angels," he breathed.

  Balkan burst from his study, letting the door hang open and leaving the lights burning behind him. The window at the end of the hall was shuttered, and no light shown beyond the slats – as always while he worked, time passed him by entirely unheeded.

  His calm was gone now; excitement filled him. Balkan needed to tell someone of his work, and he could think of no-one better to share it with than his wife.

  He wanted to shout through the house to find her, but by he knew Kaylie would be asleep, and it would not do to wake her. He found Maggie in the sitting room, re-hemming one of Kaylie's dresses to account for their daughter's most recent growth.

  She looked up from her work when he walked in. "There you are! Kaylie tried to say goodnight, but you ignored our knocking at the door."

  Maggie was on the verge of being cross with him. Kaylie was old enough to accept her father's quirks without hurt feelings, and so his wife needn't scold him quite as much. Balkan winced a bit in apology, but moved wordlessly across the room to stand before her. Reaching down to grasp her shoulders, he pulled her up and into his arms, startling her. Soon she relaxed into the embrace, laughing.

  "What has gotten into you?"

  "Nothing!" He murmured into her hair. "It was there all along, that's the wonder of it."

  His wife pulled away to look him in the eye. Her smile reflected his own, though her face was puzzled.

  "Dearest, you needn't try to be cryptic. What is it?"

  "All along we thought there was some fundamental difference, some indefinable thing that was absent from us. We were wrong, love. Who can blame us? Who would think there is so little to separate us? Since they began their lessons, there were spells we could not work, feats that we could not duplicate. And the power... that gulf yet remains. Perhaps that was the only difference all along. I cannot - "

  Maggie's smile did not falter as he husband spoke, though Balkan's explanation – as always – left much to be desired. She turned in place, setting needles, thread, and dress back onto the chair. Turning back, she placed both hands over his mouth, silencing him.

  "Balkan. What are you talking about?" she asked in a gentle voice.

  He reached up and peeled her hands from his mouth. “Angels and men, my love. We are not so different.”

  Maggie still looked confused. Balkan again opened his mouth to explain properly. This was not a question of understanding magic – when she understood what had him in such a rambling state she would be as excited as he, and he to share that joy with her.

  Before he spoke, there was a sharp, insistent rap upon the door. Husband and wife looked to the hallway. It was late, nearly midnight. What visitor could have come? Balkan's next thought was that some emergency had cropped up – though of all the wizards who might be needed in an urgent situation, he was near the bottom of the list. Few emergencies had need of his particular skills.

  When Balkan reached the door – with Maggie only a step behind – the person outside had already begun a second round of harsh knocking. The heavy ash portal swung open to reveal Geralt. Far from looked worried or alarmed, he looked eager.

  "Geralt?" Balkan greeted the man. "Why out so late?"

  Balkan then noticed his friend was carrying some cloth-covered object in both hands. Its size and perfectly round-shape left doubt over what it was – but why would Geralt bring one here?

  "Balkan! I have something very exciting to show you. May I come in?" he asked, already limping up the brace of steps to the door. Balkan moved aside to let his friend enter. Geralt nodded his greeting to Maggie as well, his normally charming manners apparently forgotten in his haste.

  "Of course. I have something to show you as well, as long as you're here," Balkan said.

  "I insist I go first. I think my news may prove more important than yours."

  "Very well," Balkan said with a wry smile. "But I'll be expecting an apology from you for saying that."

  "Must you do this so late?" Maggie said with a hint of exasperation in her voice, even as she moved to let Geralt further into the hall.

  Balkan and Geralt cringed as one. "I am sorry, Magdalene," the visitor said. "But it really is quite urgent."

  "Mind you keep your voices down," she said
as Geralt led her and her husband to their own kitchen. His rolling gait was hurried as he carried his parcel carefully with both hands. In the kitchen, he removed the cloth, revealing Balkan's first impression to be correct. Geralt held a globe. Bunching the cloth up upon the table, the wizard used it as a base to hold the crystal orb steady.

  "I've discovered something very valuable about the globes, Balkan." Geralt said even as he activated the sphere. Balkan was close enough to see that a face coalesced within nearly immediately. Someone on the other end had been waiting.

  "You've been experimenting with globes?" Balkan asked. "Arric permitted this?"

  Geralt glanced at Balkan, but did not answer. His eyes flicked to the door. "Maggie!"

  She paused, startled, where she had been about to return to the sitting room.

  Geralt smiled, showing a bit of his usual charm. "Stay, please. This may concern you as well."

  Balkan lifted an eyebrow. "Oh? Now I am intrigued. What have you got?”

  "Watch," was the answer.

  Balkan waited a moment, noting with some puzzlement that Geralt's hands, placed flat upon the table, seemed to be trembling, belying his serene posture.

  Balkan was about to ask about it when Geralt's face lost all trace of smile, assuming an expression that was all hard concentration. Somehow, it looked nothing like Balkan's friend.

  "I have him here. Begin."

  ***

  It was full dark now. For nearly an hour Darius had stood at a window in the tower, shutters thrown open despite the cold. He had watched as the sun sank through the clouds and behind the mountains, turning the few high, thin clouds into orange and yellow sheets of flame. It had been a sight of such stunning beauty that Darius was lifted a bit from the deep depression that – he now acknowledged – had hold of him.

  Acknowledgment, however, had not been enough to remedy him. He could admit the shroud that lay over his heart, but he could seemingly do little to lift it. He drifted through the days, taking little note of them.