by Colt, K. J.
She looked over the crowd, which continued to grow as her test approached the end of the first hour. Ayna seemed to delight in informing each newcomer of the circumstances of the test.
Time passed slowly. The sun crept across the sky. It was nearly impossible to know how long she had been at it. Deacon knew this, and was kind enough to keep a running tally for her in the form of marks etched into the ground. His visits seemed to get further and further apart as the day progressed. By the time the daylight of the short day had waned, she had to devote all of her mind to maintaining the note. Most of her crowd retired for the night, including Ayna. The only ones that remained were Deacon, who spent the time between hourly updates writing in his book, and Myn, who stood faithfully beside her.
The night was a dark one, and cold. At some point a blanket found its way about her shoulders. It must have been Deacon, but she lacked the awareness to know when it had been placed there. She locked her eyes on the horizon. When the sun finally peeked over, she knew that she would be through. Her eyes closed without her noticing a handful of times as she slipped into some bizarre state between sleep and concentration. She wrestled them open each time to the same dark sky.
Around the fifteenth hour, the most curious thing began to happen. The spell she was casting seemed to have worked its way into the back of her mind. It was as though her consciousness had split. One part was devoted to the spell, the other was free.
“Deacon?” she managed to speak.
“Yes?” he answered. His voice was a bit slurred, as though he had begun to doze.
“I feel strange. I . . . I don’t feel that I am the one casting the spell any longer,” she said.
“Ah, yes. Your mind is becoming accustomed to casting as a whole. It is becoming second nature to you. This is a huge step toward becoming a successful wizard. Before long, the spells you use most will become reflexive in nature. Defense, healing, they will be cast in some small way on their own when needed. This skill cannot be taught; it must come with experience. What can I say? You continue to amaze,” he said.
While casting the spell now seemed to take much less conscious effort, it took no less of a toll on her strength. By the time the sky had begun to redden, she was having trouble sitting up. Her mind lacked the will to control her muscles. Myn allowed Myranda to lean on her to stay upright. The hours ticked by until, finally, Ayna awoke and fluttered down.
“Well, not much longer. How is my student?” she asked.
Myranda found that she hadn’t the will to blink her eyes, let alone answer. Even after the fire test she had not been so weary. At least then it was a lot of power over a relatively short time. This was more akin to a marathon to a sprint, and she was left with her reserves utterly drained.
“You should know better than to expect her to answer that,” Deacon said, fighting to keep his own eyes open as he etched the twenty-third mark on the ground.
The minutes passed and the crowd reformed. The tone of the note was wavering slightly as the sands of Deacon’s hourglass trickled down. As the last minute of the endurance test began, Ayna offered some advice.
“You will need to play through the elegy once. I would not lift the spell that you are casting, lest the sudden release of focus set your mind to rest. Instead, use the stream you’ve been conjuring to play the tune. And . . . begin,” She said.
Myranda pulled the notes of the song to mind and plodded her way through them. It was not a spirited performance, by any means, but neither was it incorrect. The last note rang out, prompting a deafening roar from the crowd. The approval reached Myranda’s tattered consciousness in the form of a distant whisper.
Deacon was left again with the task of bringing her to her bed, though this time with little objection from Myn, once the customary bribe of a potato was offered. Ayna deliberated over the performance, criticizing the tempo of the tune and taking full credit for the success of her pupil. As the assembled crowd lavished praise upon the fairy, Myranda was lowered to her bed and left in peace.
The black carriage lurched to a stop and General Teloran pushed the door open. By rights, this should have been her first destination, but she’d left it until last. The elf paced up the path to the church. Inside, a service was just ending, and the sparse congregation was rising to depart. When they had climbed aboard their meager transportation and left for their homes, Trigorah stepped inside, leaving the other Elites to guard the door.
“Father?” Trigorah called out.
“Enter, my child,” came his voice from his chamber.
The general stepped inside.
“If my memory serves, I am again being honored by a visit from one of our esteemed generals,” the priest said.
“I must ask you to come with me, Father,” Trigorah stated.
“Much as I would like to aid you with whatever it is you seek, I am afraid my duties here forbid my absence,” the priest assured her.
“It is not a request,” Trigorah replied coldly.
“Not a request? Have I committed some crime?” the priest asked.
“Please, come with me,” Trigorah pleaded.
She could feel something inside of her rebelling, and did all that she could to silence it.
“What have I done?” he demanded.
“You spoke with the girl, and she had the sword. I am ordered to detain all who may have touched it,” Trigorah stated.
It was the first time she’d explained herself. It was the first time she’d felt compelled to. Until now, she’d been able to separate herself from her task. Now, even while his unseeing eyes were hidden, Trigorah swore she could feel his gaze searing her.
“I refuse to believe that our just and noble army would arrest an innocent man merely for having met some woman. I cast her out! She was a sympathizer, nothing more! My faith in our people and our war remains firm!” objected the holy man. “What could that horrid girl have said or done to warrant this! What could I have possibly done!?”
“I am a general. It is your duty as a subject of the Northern Alliance to do as I tell you,” the general reminded him.
“It is in my nature to trust in the word of my fellow man, but there is no way that a general would do such a thing. Prove it to me. Generals carry a seal, do they not? Let me feel it!” he demanded.
Before she could stop herself, Trigorah found that she was undoing the fastening on her left arm, to reveal the symbol of service. Normally, she would have refused, but there was something about his words. They were spoken with such conviction, such strength. This was a man who knew what he believed to be true. There was no doubt. His faith was unshakable. The force of it permeated his every word. It was something that she had to respect. Finally she was able to reveal the gold band against her skin.
“The band awarded to me on the day of my selection as a general. The symbol of my rank, and of my loyalty to the Alliance,” she said, guiding his hand to it.
“Yes . . . yes, I see . . . That is how it is done,” he said, his voice distant. “Then you are a general after all. And you believe that it is right to take me away with you?”
“I believe it is necessary,” she replied.
“That is not what I asked,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter what is right. What must be done must be done,” she said, drawing her blade with a slow, deliberate motion to prolong its ring.
“So it must . . .” he said rising and heading toward the door. As he walked, he spoke, quietly. “That girl . . . that blasted girl . . . I hope it is worth it . . .”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
NEARLY FOUR FULL DAYS PASSED before Myranda’s eyes opened again. Deacon visited her at meal times to help her eat until she found the strength to do so on her own. With each visit, he offered another profuse apology for Ayna’s disregard for her well-being. To Myranda’s surprise, though, Deacon was not the only visitor during her recovery. When she heard the familiar tapping of a dragon’s claws on the stone floor, she assumed it was just Myn after a vis
it to Solomon or Lain.
“You bring me great pride, Myranda,” came the voice of her old instructor.
“Solomon?” Myranda said as she tried to sit up in bed.
“Lay down. I come to offer congratulations,” he said.
“I am sorry to hear that Ayna will now be ahead of you in the book of records,” she offered.
“I have no concern for records. I am pleased that I was able to aid you for a time. I see great things in your future,” he said.
“Thank you,” she said.
“One more thing before I leave you to rest. You are raising a fine dragon. Myn is as bright as any I have met,” he said.
“I am glad. Be sure to tell her that,” Myranda said.
“I have. At length. Rest well, Myranda. The worst of your training is behind you now,” Solomon said, rising to leave.
“Wait!” Myranda called out.
“Yes?” he answered, sitting once again.
“I hope you won’t mind me asking, but I have been wondering since I met you. I . . . I hope you won’t be insulted, but . . .” she fumbled.
“You wish to know about my size,” he guessed.
“Well, yes,” she said.
“There is a city on the west coast. I neither know the name, nor care to know it. Many, many centuries ago, humans there began breeding dragons for their own use. Some for size, some for strength. I was bred to be small,” he answered.
“Why?” she asked.
“It is not my place to understand the motivations of your kind,” he said. “Now rest.”
The dragon padded out. It was another week before Myranda found the strength to walk under her own power. She likely could have benefited from another day or two of rest, but the long stay in her hut was beginning to drive her mad. Deacon caught sight of her hobbling and leaning heavily on her staff and quickly scolded her. Myn kept him at bay until he fished into a pocket of his cloak and produced the standard treat. She chomped away happily as he spoke.
“Don’t push yourself! You are remarkable, but not indestructible,” he said.
“I had to get out of there. I was beginning to selna porthen,” she said.
“Selna porthen. You were losing your mind to inactivity? That is a rather unique phrase. Your language skills are improving,” Deacon said.
“I can’t help it. No one else speaks my language here. If I can’t learn to communicate with someone else, I may as well lock myself in my hut,” she said.
“I didn’t realize it was so painful to have conversations with me. If you need some time alone I can oblige,” he said, looking genuinely saddened by the comment.
“No, it isn’t that. I just like the idea of learning new languages, having new people to talk to,” she said.
“Well, let’s hear what you’ve learned,” Deacon said.
The pair walked through the village. Now and again, Deacon would point out a person and ask Myranda to translate what he or she had just said. Myn found the activity to be less than exciting and trotted off in Lain’s direction. Myranda was doing rather well at Deacon’s random tests, until an odd commotion was caused by a man running through the courtyard screaming what appeared to be nonsense. Deacon seemed particularly affected by the repeated cry.
“This is momentous! This way, quickly! Where is that book of mine!? Here, ah!” he stammered.
“I must need a bit more practice,” she said.
“Why?” he asked, fairly pulling her along.
“It sounded like ‘Hollow is twitching,’” she said.
“You are not mistaken,” he said.
“What does it mean?” she asked, as she realized that they were headed to the Elder’s quarters, along with nearly every other resident of the village.
“Do you recall the prophecy I was reading you? How it was the life’s work of Tober, our prophet? Well, all through his time here, he was constantly in search of the next thing that could enhance his already remarkable scrying skills. He drank potions, underwent treatments. Each altered his body and mind to lengthen and deepen his trances. Soon he was able to commune with the spirits for days at a time, and an army of assistants worked in shifts committing every word to writing.
“One day, he entered the trance, never spoke, and never left it. We still speculate on what precisely occurred that day. Some say he had spent so much time with the spirits that he left his body to join them. Others believe he asked one too many questions of a malevolent spirit and paid the ultimate price. All that is known for sure is that his body no longer contains a soul.
“We’ve taken to calling the empty shell he left behind ‘Hollow.’ It wasn’t dead, not technically. It never ate, never moved, but continued to live. We left it in his hut. No one really knew what else to do. Then, decades later, someone heard a noise. Hollow was speaking. His body remains a superb conduit to the spirit realm. In times of incredible import, the voices from beyond speak through him. The words are impossibly cryptic, but flawlessly accurate predictions,” Deacon said, lowering to a whisper as they made their way inside and took a seat on the crowded floor.
A heavy, throne-like chair was brought in by four stout young men. In the chair was a frail and ancient man dressed in a dusty, but not worn, tunic. A pair of milky white eyes stared vacantly across the room at nothing at all. His hands, gnarled like the branches of an oak, curled around the arms of the chair. When the men lowered it to the ground, others opened a chest attached to the back of the chair. Inside were chains and shackles. The shackles were clamped onto both of his ankles and wrists. The chains were attached to loops installed in the walls of the hut.
“What are the shackles for?” Myranda asked.
“Some of the spirits have never been in a body. Their actions when they find a vacant one can be unpredictable,” he said.
When the restraints were in place, the handlers retreated into the rest of the crowd. No one would venture closer than ten paces from the seat. The only sign that the man who was given so much space was even alive was the subtle twitch of his fingers every few minutes. Despite this, the scene was tense. Absolute silence was maintained as the most powerful wizards and warriors of the world watched the withered old man. Minutes passed.
Finally, the silence was broken by the rattling of chains as Hollow shifted forward. He seemed to be pulled by an unseen force in his chest, and in a flash he was suspended in the air, straining at the restraints. He drew in a breath, pained and ragged enough to be his first in years, as he lowered slowly to the ground. His legs folded limply beneath him, and he lay in a pile on the ground. Words began to flow from his mouth. It was a terrifying sound. He spoke not with one voice, but with dozens, perhaps hundreds. They formed a sort of sloppy harmony, some voices lagging, others rushing desperately through the messages. There were whispers and screams alike. Some even uttered in different languages.
All who had the means to do so wrote madly. Deacon was writing, not only with his own stylus, but with three more that moved about on the page under their own power. Myranda tried to listen, but the language was unfamiliar to her. As he spoke, Hollow’s body jerked and shifted, as though he was a marionette with different hands pulling at every string. As more time passed, his motions became more violent.
Nearly an hour passed without a moment of peace before, as suddenly as it had begun, the tumult ended. Hollow fell to the ground as though his strings had been cut. Fully half of an hour passed before all were convinced that the prophet had spoken his last for the day.
“Splendid. This has been a fruitful session,” Deacon said, marking down notes and separating blocks of text.
“Did you understand that?” Myranda asked.
“A great deal of it,” Deacon said.
The crowd was filing out of the hut. Deacon was comparing notes to those near him as the handlers began to unfasten the chains from the walls. As they did, Myranda approached Hollow. He was being loaded back into the chair. All of the chaotic life that had filled the hut was gone. She looked
with curiosity at this bizarre side effect of so many mystic procedures. His wrists looked thin and brittle as twigs, yet earlier the chains had been barely strong enough to restrain him. The eyes were disturbing. There was no hint of the previous color of his eyes, and even the pupils had clouded over. She was wondering what seeing through those eyes must be like when they slowly turned, locking onto her. Myranda shook her head, not certain if she was imagining it.
A moment later, she was on the ground and the wrinkled fingers were stretching out in the direction of the wall behind her. Three chains were still in place, but one had been removed from the wall and was still in the hands of the handler. Hollow’s arm hurled chain and man effortlessly through the air. He collided with the far wall. Five men rushed to the flailing chain and tried valiantly to reconnect it to the wall.
“Light! More than for one! Another still! Threads! Connections!” Hollow’s many voices cried.
He was reaching out for something specific, not like before. It was as though he was looking through the wall. Beyond it. The three chains were creaking at their moorings. One leg restraint broke free and lashed across the crowd. The possessed form jerked out of the air and onto the ground with earth-shattering force. He reached out toward Myranda.
“At the meeting of light, light, light! Above the darkened door! A sacrifice! A blinding ring! The elders of the crescent made equal! All is a whimper in the shadow of the white wall! Victory is a prelude. The final struggle follows!” he decreed.
There was no denying it. Myranda was the target of this last prophecy. Once it was delivered, the shell of a man fell limp once more. The handlers returned Hollow to the chair and re-secured the restraints. White-robed healers emerged from the crowd to care for the injured. The loose chain had bloodied no less than five people. When they were satisfied that Myranda was not hurt, they helped her to her feet. Deacon helped her outside.