by BJ Hanlon
A location a couple hours north of the seaside town of Intelians. The ridge of a wide mountain ran within five miles of the rocky coast.
Edin had briefed the duke and General Oporius about the dematian king on the inland sea and about the dwarven tunnels beneath the earth. The duke listened but said there was nothing much he could do except close off the tunnel from Olangia.
Rihkar did that.
Then when it was completed, they marched toward planned location for the wall.
Edin stared at the tall trees that would soon become part of the massive wooden barrier. He had a general idea of building the wall, sort of just lining up sticks really, but he wasn’t in construction and wasn’t about to help them with that job.
And he couldn’t guard the workers. Not when there was something much more urgent that was needed. Something that mattered to him more than anything else.
Finding Arianne.
While he knew he needed to find the elves, the prophecy said so in not so many words, his attempt to convince the rest of this uneasy alliance to leave and search for the elves was more of a way to get out of this place and find Arianne. Edin knew if he just walked off, it’d break the already tenuous relationship that he now had with Sinndilo and Merik. He also didn’t know where she was, but his gut said southwest.
He was staring in that direction now, feeling that he was looking in the area where she was at that precise moment and the tears began to well. “Don’t,” he whispered as he looked away and tried to push his mind off the thought of her.
Someone bumped him and Edin looked over. Berka raised an eyebrow. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” Edin said and looked at the back of Inquisitor Merik, the first Por Fen he’d ever seen and one he’d wanted dead for so long.
Edin had no idea how he became the Inquisitor. What the succession plan was for Inquisitors, all he knew was that the previous Inquisitor, Diophin, tried to summon Edin into their command ship and ended up getting himself killed by Ashtol’s wayward strike.
That was fine by Edin. Diophin was a monster both inside and out.
The second night they camped the same way. They ate the same food and looked at the same faces. Was this what being a soldier in the army was like?
Edin spoke little and when he laid down, he tried again to see Arianne, or look through her eyes at what she was seeing, but there was nothing. His heart sank and he tried to sleep but it barely worked. That night, he got two hours of sleep, maybe.
They continued on the next morning. Edin was dragging the entire trek. After about four hours the forest simply fell away and they stood on the precipice of a treeless vale that was open for at least a mile to the south. Off to the left, he saw the sparkling dark blue ocean and the white caps. It looked so calming and peaceful at this distance. To the right was a tall and wide mountain that rose like a fat blade thrust from the earth.
“Halt,” a voice came from ahead. It was General Oporius, the mage hater. Well, one of them.
Edin didn’t blame the man. Not really. Most mundane people would kill a mage if they got the chance and had the ability.
Beyond the general was a large dirt field that in a few months’ time would be someone’s corn or wheat field.
A cottage sat on a hill a few hundred yards to the south. From here, Edin could see a couple of folks standing on a small porch.
“Duke Sinndilo, General Oporius.” A voice called out. A soldier was coming from the direction of the cottage. He stopped before the army and bowed in the Dunbilstonian fashion. “The farmer has agreed to your request.” He said and then paused. “Though they do not wish to share their home.”
“Then the duke shall seize it!” Oporius shouted.
Even In the distance, the farmers heard it and flinched.
“General, we will not do that,” Sinndilo said. “Soldier, thank them for use of their land. We’ll start near the mountain and work toward the sea.” He turned toward one of his aides. “As the units arrive send them to their assignments. We head to Intelians.”
Edin followed the retinue of the Duke, his people, as well as the Inquisitor and general as they continued on the road. The forest started up again about a mile later and somewhere in there was the town.
It took another couple of hours before the group of nearly one hundred appeared at the edge of the town.
The sea to the east was calm and looked rather cold and after a few moments of gazing upon it, he realized that the place looked familiar.
They headed down a paved road to a two-story inn. The same inn he and Arianne had stayed in nearly nine months previous. To the south, barely visible from his vantage point, Edin saw the lighthouse they hid in. The duke entered the inn first and Edin wondered if that old innkeeper was still alive or if someone else was running the place.
He waited in the shadows of the building next door with Berka and Rihkar. Off in the distance, he saw the charred remains of a house. The one they destroyed to make their escape. He wondered about the soldier they’d met in the back garden, was he with this army? Would he recognize him?
After a few moments, Berka began walking down the road as if following some unknown trail.
“Where are ya headed?” Edin called out after his friend.
“Could use a walk.”
“We just finished walking…” Edin said as Berka turned the corner of some lane.
“Hey abominations, y’all gonna defile some kiddies later?” It was the bearded big man that told Edin he’d never share a drink with him. The man was in the uniform of the duke’s personal guard. They stood outside the door of the inn about twenty feet away.
“That’s what they call nighttime,” another said. They laughed, but through it was righteous anger and possibly fear.
“Well, armless would probably need to defile with force because no one would want that, bloody cripple.” He said the last under his breath. “I’d rather be dead than a one-armed abomination.”
Edin glanced at Rihkar who just shrugged. “They’re morons.”
Rihkar chuckled and spoke loud enough for the jokers to hear. “You think I don’t know that? Fatty over there has the manhood of an ant. Not my aunt of course, she’s larger.” He pinched his thumb and forefinger close together.
Edin laughed.
“His lover would probably know,” Rihkar said pointing his one arm. “Hey you, carrot nose, how tiny is fatty next to you?” Rihkar turned back to Edin and smiled as the two chatty men and three more of their followers came stomping toward them like a gang of willy thugs.
Other soldiers, ones who weren’t part of this crew, looked on. Some seemed nervous, some didn’t care. Their eyes seemed to say ‘I don’t care if you die, I’m just not burying you.’
“What did you say about us?” the big man shouted in Edin’s face. “You dare insult us, you dirty abominations. I will—”
It was all he said, all he could get out. Edin was too fast. He felt the rage of not being able to search for Arianne, not being able to do what he wanted, and of being treated like a damned curse.
The world slowed for just a moment as he slugged the man across the jaw, kicked another in the gut, spun with an elbow to one’s cheek, and headbutted the fourth’s nose.
The world returned to normal and four of the five fell instantly. The fifth, a thin guy who seemed the most uncomfortable with the situation gaped looking at his friends.
Blood poured from one man’s nose while the others groaned and rolled around on the stone road.
“Do you have terrin blood too?” Rihkar asked. “If so, it’s not from my side.”
“I think we should find our own accommodations.” He said seriously.
A moment later, Sinndilo burst from the inn’s door with general in quick toe. He looked around, saw Edin and Rihkar standing over the four downed men. “What in the name of the Underworld happened! Master Yaultan?” Sinndilo said.
“Nothing to concern you, my lord,” Edin said with a soft bow. He’d l
iked Sinndilo when he first met him at the man’s psychotic brother’s estate. The new duke seemed practical and not at all wicked like his older sibling. “I believe we will find different accommodations.”
“Probably not a bad idea. A man named Dorset is inside. You may wish to talk with him before you go.”
Edin bowed again. “I will, my lord.”
Sinndilo turned to his other men. “Alright, if we’re done trying to fight each other, we’ve got to stuff four to a room here. Two on beds, two on floors.”
Merik appeared as well from the door. “Por Fen, we will stay at the church.” He turned toward Edin. “When you see your big friend, tell him I’d like him to meet me there.” He walked off as Sinndilo and Oporius came toward the big bearded man on the ground. “Arsholnol, I thought you were strong and could fight.”
“The abomination is fast, my lord.” He swallowed and Edin hoped he was swallowing blood. “Terrin fast.”
Sinndilo looked at Edin again with a raised eyebrow.
Edin shrugged but said nothing. The duke shook his head, “you surprise me.” He said and then he and everyone else went back inside inn as the Por Fen disappeared down a street a few blocks over. Only when everyone was off the street did they enter to find his old roommate.
It was much the same as it’d been on their last trip here. Stone tables with chairs flipped over, no food on the stove, and the old man standing behind the bar.
Edin walked over to him to say hi but as he approached, he saw the man didn’t recognize him. Then he thought it was probably a good thing.
In the back corner, watching the guards file past, Dorset sat with his hands beneath the table. He looked to be ready to pull the entire building down on these men should they decide to attack although Edin wasn’t certain that they knew he too was a magus.
Next to him, big as ever and with a hand engulfing his mug was Henny. They both grinned broadly when they saw Edin, then both leapt to their feet, Henny nearly toppling the marble table.
It seemed he had healed from the stabbing. Then they rushed over, their feet pounding the floor.
Henny threw his giant arms around Edin and hugged him, then let go as Edin gave Dorset a good wrist shake, then hug. Henny turned to Rihkar and his face went slack.
“Well if it ain’t a ghost from the past,” Henny said. “Rihkar Harlscot.”
Dorset tensed but Rihkar just nodded.
“Are you Hennear, the Beast from the East?”
“Beast from the East?” Edin asked.
Henny nodded with a coy smile.
“He was from Brackland and a beast,” Rihkar said but Edin gave him a blank look. “They don’t have the matches anymore?”
“Not many,” Henny said.
“Matches?”
“Fights really, some of the mundane lads on the isles used to set them up. They didn’t use weapons or anything like that. They’d use strength and technique to try and throw men to the ground and pin them. Hennear was the champion when I left.”
“We called it wrestling,” Henny said.
“I heard about those,” Dorset said. “They were banned when I was a teen, weren’t they?”
Henny nodded. “When Pharont took over, yes. He thought we mundanes shouldn’t learn to fight… we should learn to farm and sow and make weapons and finery for our betters.” He left the word hanging there with a hiss of resentment.
He meant the magi.
“So Pharont took over the Praesidium? I always hated that blotard,” Rihkar said changing the subject.
“The feeling was mutual,” Edin said. “Believe me he hated me as well, threw me in prison for a while.”
Rihkar clenched his jaw. “I’m going to kill him, that—”
“Wait, does he not know what happened?” Dorset said interrupting. “He doesn’t know about the isle?”
“Not a lot. We were looking for the Rage Stone.” Edin paused, “which the dematian king now has. I kind of forgot to catch him up and he was also unconscious for quite a few days.”
“I had my arm torched off you ungrateful little punk.” Rihkar said but there was a joviality in his voice and for some reason, Edin felt it too. He had a father.
“Always heard the Harlscot clan were fighters, especially within their family,” Dorset said. “But Pharont is dead, Casitas is now the FAE.”
“He is damn near calling himself king.” Said Henny.
“There goes my idea.” Rihkar said. “You know you could’ve told me when I brought it up in the convocation,” he said looking at Edin.
“What plan?” Dorset asked. “What convocation?”
“After the Battle of the Northlands,” Rihkar said, looking at Edin. “It’s what the men are calling it.”
“There was a battle? Wait where’s Yechill?”
“I don’t know.” He sighed, “there’s a lot I have to tell you, and a lot I have to figure out.”
It was then that they got ales from the innkeeper. Many ales and eventually Berka rejoined them.
Edin recounted the last few weeks or so. He spoke of the journey over the tundra, the wyrm, the dwarven city, and the Rage Stone. It culminated with the battle a few nights previous and the death of the thunderwyrm.
“So you’re now a tosoria, too?” Dorset said. “This is insane!”
“Wait, what?” Said Berka.
Edin opened his mouth but Rihkar cut him off. “Berky,” he said, it was a nickname Edin remembered. Something this uncle of his used to call his friend. “Edin is not a normal magus.”
“I could’ve told you all that, I have known him his entire life.” He said matter-of-factly.
Edin began to smile, but he knew where this was going. A worry began to grow in him, something he’d denied for a long time.
He had five of the six. Spirit, water, lightning, wind, and now fire. One more remained for him to become it.
The last was the talent over the earth. The talent the two magi in front of him had which struck him as odd. Was it a coincidence that they were both terestio?
“He does not have just one magus talent.”
“I knew that, there was the water on the beach when we met the Foci. A glasorio,” Berka said, “and a philios. When the crillio attacked, I remember the culrian and the shaft of light. I remember being unable to move or think straight but I remembered it. That blasted cat’s attack ruined me for so long…”
Edin saw tears beginning to form in Berka’s eyes and he threw a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.
“We’d both be dead if you weren’t an…” A half a moment passed before he looked up and stared into Edin’s eyes. “I wouldn’t have met El and I like her and you.”
“I like you too buddy,” Edin said.
Berka looked at Dorset and Rihkar. “I’m sorry to both of you as well. I’m sorry I ever joined the Por Fen. I’ve lost faith in the gods. They can all die and go to the underworld for all I care.” He growled.
“Don’t say that,” Rihkar said quickly. “It’s not the gods who wrote the Book of Truth, it was man, more aptly, mundane man.”
“I do not care. I’ve fought the dematians. It doesn’t matter if you’re mundane or mage. Those demons are here to wipe us all out and we need to end this. Kill every one of those beasts and hopefully save our world.”
“I agree,” Edin said.
“So wait, where were we?” Dorset said. “I’m so lost— the Por Fen are now our allies? I saw some of them outside, another in here though he barely looked at me.”
“Yes,” Edin said. “For now, and I believe Rihkar was trying to tell Berka that I am the Ecta Mastrino.”
“The what?” Berka said as Dorset started to grin.
“Ecta Mastrino,” Rihkar said. “The one destined to hold all of the talents. Like Vestor. The first mage.”
“Vestor wasn’t a mage, the Book…” then Berka began to laugh, a soft chuckle at first but it grew. He wiped tears from his eyes as he looked around at the others.
No one else
was laughing, they were all looking at him like he was a nut.
Edin caught his eye and nodded. He understood what Berka was going through, his belief system was being shattered, the Por Fen were based on a lie. The lie that said Vestor was mundane and not the mage that he truly was. At least Edin hoped that is what he was realizing.
“Vestor wasn’t a mage.” Berka chuckled. “He helped defeat the magi that summoned the wyrms and other monsters of old.”
“Rihkar just told you, your Book of Truth was written by man,” Edin shook his head. “The one you’ve read is one of lies. I’ve seen one from more than a thousand years ago. A copy that tells the truth.”
“Any from before the purges were lies, it was the powerful mages stomping on the mundane. That’s why Vestor had the real Book hidden in the shadows for so long. That’s why the normal people had to wait until we, I mean they, had a weapon to combat magi lies and corruption and evil.” He looked at Edin, his face aghast as if thinking, why would you even believe something so stupid as this.
“It isn’t.” Said Dorset, “remember, I’m a scholar, I have seen communications, I have seen letters written by your Great Duke Restican and other threats he’d made if his demands weren’t met.”
“It’s lies.” Said Berka but then he looked down at the froth on his ale. Or whatever was left of the froth.
After a few minutes of all of them staring at their ales, all of them not wanting to interrupt Berka’s meditation, Henny said “so you’ve got five talents now—”
“Wait,” Berka interjected again, his mind seeming to come back after the quiet period. “I’ve heard of magi with two talents, none have ever had more than that.”
Rihkar said, “you didn’t see the wall of flames during the battle?”
“What wall?” Berka asked raising an eyebrow.
Edin held out his hand and felt the energy in the room, he let it flow into him for a moment.
Rihkar leaned closer. “Let it flow through you, be the water in the gutter.”