Magic's Genesis- The Grey

by Rosaire Bushey

  The giant reached out and grabbed Krieger by the shoulders and pulled him to his chest even as Haidrea, Branch, and Relin reached for weapons. The hug was strong enough where Lydria heard Krieger’s spine crack as Keldon lifted him into the air.

  Finally, he put Krieger down and turned toward three sets of hands hovering over weapons still sheathed. “I suggest you move your hands, before someone sees you and thinks you mean to kill the Knight Commander of Solwyn.” Keldon smiled as he said it and waved his hand to unseen forces behind the group. His voice was gentle and its inflection one of welcome and kindness.

  “So, what brings you here? Are you here to fight against your king, Krieger, or do you just happen to be walking about the country-side with a family of well-armed farmers?”

  Haidrea stepped forward and held forth a piece of wood wrapped in corn husks. “We bring a gift to you, Keldon, from the Governess of the Western Reaches, with her compliments.”

  Smiling widely, Keldon opened the package and his face fell. For the second time, Lydria wondered if they had made a mistake and called to Kimi to find her, the panic in her voice unmistakable.

  “Come with me and say nothing,” Keldon commanded, his voice lowered. “Do exactly as I tell you.” As they walked through the streets he said nothing more to Krieger nor any of the others and trusted that they followed his long strides. As Kimi caught up, Lydria told him to stay vigilant and nearby.

  “Commander Keldon.” It was an officer of the guard who looked to the group before turning again toward his commander.

  “Speak, sub-commander. They are no concern of yours.”

  The sub-commander spoke briefly and quietly to Keldon before saluting sharply and heading off at top speed.

  Keldon led them through the city, returning west until they reached a group of several larger but still modest homes that shared a dirt path along the back of each dwelling. The alley was full of garbage and being near the shore of the lake, stank of fish. Keldon opened the back door to one of the houses, ushering them inside.

  “I told the sub-commander that I would be busy interrogating you and that he is to tell no one. But Ahlric will be here within a few days. Please, sit while I get my wife and find you food and drink.”

  He left them in the back room of a house with only a single small window opening into the alley. Before anyone’s eyes could adjust to the shift in light, he came back, carrying no food or drink, but only a small bottle.

  “I hope this gift is well received,” he said as he presented Haidrea with a vial of blue ink.

  FORTY-SIX

  “Sire, Ahlric’s forces will be here in two days’ time, perhaps sooner.” The report was delivered by Nethyal in his even tone. That he had grown accustomed to anticipating Wynter’s questions, was evident as he nimbly shifted from fact to fact. “The people are armed and ready. There are no idle hands in the city and Sir Keldon has increased the patrols. We await only an enemy.”

  “And what role will you play when the fighting starts, Nethyal?”

  “As ever, my role is to be by your side and protect you. Should your magic incapacitate you, I will be here to see that you are safe until you have recovered.”

  “When is the last time I have required your assistance?” Wynter had changed his tone to see how his protector would react – to see if he could detect anything in the warrior’s visage that would give him cause to heed his wife’s caution. But he was disappointed if the thought he would find a sign in the Eifen’s face.

  “When you of late returned from your trip abroad having rid us of the crone Haustis.” Nethyal’s voice showed no signs of smugness or arrogance. It was in fact, true, that Wynter had asked for his assistance as he dealt with the physical pain of his burned and scarred features. True also that Nethyal had assisted him with pains that were more mental than physical through his unflinching devotion and his willingness to look Wynter in the face and not change how he interacted with him.

  “They will have no need of you on the field when Ahlric and his dogs come, my friend. I have seen to that. They will die in droves before they touch so much as a cobble within the town. You shall be by my side to watch the destruction of Ahlric’s forces. When we’re done, and I take up a residence in Bayside, I will need someone to watch over the north and rule from the Cobalt Tower.”

  “Will you not continue to rule over the north, sire?”

  “Would you not be satisfied to be a king, Nethyal?”

  “I have no desire to be anything of the sort, sire. The duties of a king would not suit me.”

  “They suit you like the clothes you wear, Nethyal. You would make a fine king. When I make my home in Bayside, you will become King of the North, bowing only to me, your emperor. No man will dare stand against me.”

  Wynter’s gift of the northern kingdom did no more to excite a response from the Eifen than did notice of dinner. “Go and send runners along the eastern and western roads to bring in any provisions that may be stranded. If crops still stand, see to it they are burned. Leave nothing for Ahlric to eat and no stone for him to hide behind.” With that order Nethyal nodded, turned and left.

  Wynter reached into a pocket and pulled from it a blue stone. He had retrieved it from the center of floor in the Cobalt Tower and now he slowly touched it to the larger stone he held. As they connected the smaller of the two melted into the larger and it reformed, the lines on its face disappeared and then returned, streaking bands of silver marking out fourteen sections on the face of the sphere.

  The pillars were almost completely opaque now and so Wynter flicked his wrist, more out of habit than necessity, and heard the satisfying crash of the doors to his throne room as they closed. Still holding the stone, Wynter walked to the end of the room and looked at the first of the Fourteen, Kelmenth, the leader of the traitors who fed information as Ahlric’s spies.

  For a long time after imprisoning them in the pillars, Wynter considered if they might have been more useful had he fed inaccurate information to them to report to Ahlric. But, after sitting in this room day after day and especially after his fight with Haustis, he was certain their captivity was the right choice.

  The ice in the first pillar was almost entirely blue – so blue in fact, it was almost black and only by holding his hand against the ice could he impregnate it with enough light to see the man inside. Today he could only see the man’s eyes.

  “Are you scared now?” Wynter asked out loud. “You’ve had a front-row seat to the growth of an empire, and now I’m going to give you what you’ve wanted all this time – I’m going to give you your freedom.”

  Wynter held the blue sphere in his left hand and pressed it over his head against the ice. As he was somehow sure it would, a piece detached from the sphere and moved its way through the ice to embed itself in the forehead of the man inside. The result was immediate – an intense flash of light that caused even Wynter to flinch.

  The light burned his skin anew and racked his body with pain such as he had never felt. Every fiber of his being, from his hair to his guts was on fire, but he never let go of the pillar and he never lost sight of his vision.

  When the light faded Wynter could feel the sphere reshape itself and knew that when next he looked only thirteen segments would remain.

  Thirteen of the pillars remained blue with a window to the face of the man or woman inside. The first pillar, however, had changed. It now stood emerald green and the man inside would be all but invisible to any who did not know he was there. So well did his skin now blend with the ice that Wynter was only sure he existed when Kelmenth opened his eyes.

  The eyes were larger than human eyes and they blinked three times before they stayed open. Wynter saw then the long, thin, vertical pupil that convinced him he had succeeded. A collar of blue scales encircled the creature’s neck and shone like a beacon, pulsing like a heartbeat for several minutes until it eventually slowed and dimmed. Taking a step back, the only thing that suggested the green pillar was more than it
seemed was the now steady but dimming glow of the blue collar.

  Wynter was tired, but he was out of time. He needed to complete the Fourteen, so he went from pillar to pillar repeating the process, calling on his wife to help him endure the worst of the pain, and never relenting as he looked into the eyes of each of the condemned and promised them freedom before instilling his power into the ice and giving birth to the beasts of Haustis’ nightmare.

  Finally, he returned to Kelmenth. The creature inside the pillar was much smaller than the beast he had fought in the spirit world. It was a young creature shaped from the form of the man inside, but it would grow, Wynter knew, to rival the beast he fought.

  Where fourteen pillars of blue ice had stood, the room was now awash in color. Four green, four blue, and six red pillars, each reflecting a small dim blue glow from within. The colors were meaningless to Wynter, it was the creatures he coveted.

  “Do you hear me?”

  “What have you done?” The voice in Wynter’s head was so much different than that of his wife. It pulsed with life and a vibrancy the dead woman’s voice did not possess. It was nearly tangible in his mind, a thing he could reach out and touch.

  “I’ve freed you. Soon you will leave your ice prisons and join me as I sweep aside the armies of this world like the pathetic fools they are. We will be kings of all we survey.”

  “You are merely asking us to exchange an ice prison for another prison of your making.”

  “I have fought the mother of all your kind in the spirit world and emerged victorious. I have created you in this world. I am your maker and you will do as I say.”

  FORTY-SEVEN

  The relief on everyone’s face was immediate – even Keldon breathed more easily realizing he was among friends. “My wife goes to gather another who will be crucial to our task,” Keldon said. “When they return, we will make our plans.”

  With the need for secrecy removed, Lydria removed the disguises and Keldon was momentarily caught off guard. Krieger smiled to put his friend at ease and Keldon looked at them all again for the first time.

  He looked to Relin and Haidrea before speaking. “I’m afraid my friends, that we will have no time for proper introductions; though it seems there are stories that could be told that would last us through even the long winter of the north. Our mission must be completed tonight, before Ahlric’s forces arrive in numbers.”

  While they waited for Keldon’s wife, he explained that the situation in Solwyn was not what most in the community believed. Keldon realized it almost immediately and had seen in Grettune a person who shared his concern for the people and recognized the danger Wynter represented.

  “My former lord was not a good man, nor was he fair to his people, however, he fell well short of wholesale slaughter, which is what Wynter proposes for all who live in Solwyn, although they do not know it. Wynter’s power is great, and there is no denying what he has done and what he is capable of, but we believe his ability to fight an army is more than even he can accomplish. Malai and our friend have been discussing a plan that would end Wynter’s threat to us – but we are only three and would be hard pressed to succeed – yet still, we will try. Your arrival gives me hope that we might tax Wynter’s power so much that we can defeat him and negotiate on more peaceful terms with Ahlric.”

  While they waited, Keldon told them of the purge at the arena the previous year and how he and Malai had married, how she was widowed, and how it was apparent even then, that crossing Wynter meant almost certain death – unless you were one of the Fourteen, who, rumor had it, were not dead at all.

  “The people flocked to Wynter’s banner because there is freedom here. To anyone who has lived under the rule of lords who tax heavily, pay poorly, and laugh at the idea of free men – for them, this is the best they have ever seen.” Keldon barely paused as he constructed his tale of the perfect society. “Wynter has everyone working, and everyone eats from the same plate. We all have shelter of our own making, we all have food of our own tilling and hunting; most have more than they would have ever dreamed possible before.”

  “And what is the price you must pay for this paradise?” Krieger was unimpressed with Keldon’s description no matter how good it sounded. Doubtless he had heard it before and knew how it ended.

  “The price we pay is unknown to most. All members of the community are trained with some weapon,” Keldon continued. “Everyone knows that when invaders come, we will all have to fight. And, of itself, this is no bad thing. People should fight for what they have; to protect it if needs be. But the walls, the training, all of it is just for show. We may slow Ahlric’s advance. We may even stop him for a time. But there is no outcome other than total and utter ruin for the people here. But they are so happy with their present lot in life, that they fail to see the map on which is played the larger game. Most in Solwyn are ready to die to be thought worthy of the Fourteen.”

  “These fourteen you mention, is it true they volunteered?” Branch could not help but show his skepticism of the claim and yet, there was something in his manner that seemed to Lydria like he admired their spirit.

  “I know only what I’ve been told, and if you ask a market full of people how they came to be, you will hear but one answer – that they begged the king to allow them the honor of supporting his reign.”

  “What of Wynter? All men have a weakness. What is his?” Relin wanted to move the conversation to things that might help them kill the wielder king.

  “He speaks to himself like there is another person nearby.” Lydria’s voice escaped her, but Keldon nodded his assent surprised to find she was aware of his eccentric habit.

  “This is true. How do you know it?” The large man sat with the rest of them but still towered over them, the shapes of his legs and arms visible through the tight mail mesh that enveloped them. Only on his chest did Keldon currently wear heavy plate armor and it rose and lowered smoothly with his breathing as he waited for an answer. Lydria told him of the short time she had spent in Wynter’s company and as she finished the door opened, and they listened to footsteps approaching.

  It was Malai, and she whispered quickly into the ear of her husband.

  “I will need to go back to the barracks. Malai will tell you all she has said to me, and soon you must make your way to the castle. We may yet meet there.” With an enormous hand, Keldon drew his wife to his side and kissed her, before inclining his head to the company and making his own way out the front door.

  Malai looked at everyone and sat down. She was not a delicate woman, but she was not hard either. She was pretty, Lydria thought, with short, dark hair and distinct cheeks. She was carrying a short sword like many women of the town, but she had chosen to continue wearing a dress. When she saw Lydria staring, she offered that as wife of the knight commander, she had a certain role to play in the town as well as her husband, and that it would never do to try to maintain that role in breeches.

  Still, Malai smiled and seemed to spend an especially long time looking at Haidrea. Her eyes dropped somewhat as she did so, but eventually she drew herself up, and relayed the plan.

  “There are so few of us there isn’t much we can do. Some of you are known by Wynter,” she looked to Lydria and questioningly to Krieger, who nodded his agreement, “and some of you may be known by others in the king’s court. Know this, Wynter is the only enemy in the castle. It has been his habit of late to make a trip outside and around the perimeter of the town – for reasons we do not know,” she said. “He has not made that trip today, but from Keldon and others we know that he has taxed himself heavily.

  “He was in a fight in the spring; a fight that has left him scarred and ravaged. The blue collar around his neck is untouched, but his face and arms are red as if burned by fire. How he stands the pain, we are not sure, but he does. He continues his plans to build his castle anew from the inside, with wood and stone, and this we find curious as the Fourteen Pillars stand strong. Keldon has said that it is because he wi
shes his castle to be more comfortable. But that cannot be true. From the moment he raised it from the ground, the castle and the Pillars have been his pride.

  “It has been hinted at, however, that the Fourteen are no more. When I first arrived in Solwyn, I witnessed the Fourteen – each encased in a perfectly clear pillar of ice. You could see their eyes and you would swear they were alive. However, no one can see them now. The pillars have taken their own colors.”

  “Malai, what will the people do if they discover our mission?” Krieger’s question was asked, Lydria was sure, so that everyone would be aware of the dangers of the mission.

  “They will kill us – if we are lucky. If we are not lucky, they will take us to Wynter.”

  FORTY-EIGHT

  Wynter sat upon his throne motionless. He could move, of that he was certain, but the effort it took to finish the Fourteen was more than he expected, and so he was not displeased to see Nethyal. Despite the late hour he carried no lantern – the short night with a large moon took on the aspect of early morning. He carried, however, a plate of food and a skin of water and Wynter realized how hungry he was.

  As he entered the room, the only suggestion Nethyal made that something might be amiss was a single, quick glance at the pillars. He accepted the color change without question.

  “Are you well, my king?” Nethyal’s pace did not increase to more quickly be with his sovereign nor did his tone take on any hint of concern. It was a question Nethyal had asked so many times as to be a formality now and Wynter smiled at the man’s consistency.

  “I am, tired and nothing more.” Wynter sat up in his throne, but the effort was far more difficult than he was willing to admit. “Do we have word from our scouts?”

  Nethyal set the food down on small table he moved to Wynter’s side from its position behind the throne. The water skin he handed directly to Wynter and indicated that he should drink.