Kanos had been on an extended trip, shopping the farmer’s market of Avoway — his own town was squeezed into decrepit conditions in just two weeks. Biron spoke, “My wife said the people could barely walk. They threw up even water. The entire village spiraled into a… a doomed state quickly. It looked like an illness she said. It was her dying breath. I was away too, like you. I had to track the galli fish, they were swimming too deep. I had to move downstream for nearly a month. I was not here. I did not help… I did nothing. What in Avi do we do now? It’s all gone. I’ve been wandering around for days — all I do is ache.”
Kanos belted out, “Biron, if what you say is true, then my days here are about to set afire. I have to see.” He heaved a huge and gasping sob, “I have to see…”
Kanos reached out and clasped Biron’s sleeve. “I have to find these people. I will crush their lives within my hands. Tell me who they are.”
Biron said, “The Onpier, they said, a traveling magus arrived. They welcomed him. They said it was the study of cures and that an illness was spreading through the region. He had the documents and seals. He pretended to study the people for a solid week. More magi arrived. It was a ruse. A lie. They took them in with lies. They were a dark brood and reeled them in like a fish. The whole town willingly took their spell. They let them do it. It was to prevent the illness they said. They were made slaves, Kanos. They could not rebel; their minds were gone. She said all they could feel was terror. They controlled their minds with stricken emotions.”
5.
The memory of Biron’s tale still seared Kanos, every word. As he traveled the Dunbak Plains, he often saw Biron’s sad round face. Even with Saaverin pushed into his past, memories of his tattered village shattered Kanos’ heart with every thought connected to his past life. When images of carnage of his friends and family came to mind, he diverted his thoughts the best he could. He grew prone to grinding moods of rage.
As such thoughts plagued him, he often tasted real blood as he chewed his inner lip — a nervous habit born of the quest. The copper flavor in his mouth that came from the chewing did not scare him or repulse his taste buds. He grew to like the taste. Kanos knew this was unwell. He tried to stop, but sometimes he did not notice. He squeezed the handle of his blade or clenched his jaw, but in the depths of memory, he began to chew.
As miles of the Dunbak Plains disappeared behind Kanos, as the clear waters of the Gian River soothed him and yielded large toothed magovy fish with the strike of his swift arrows — Kanos began to sense something from the field of energy that surrounded his very skin.
The ability to sense such things came to Kanos in his younger days; at the age of 16, he saw the blazing sunset set the sky aglow as he sat beneath a tree thinking of the world and feeling everything he knew to be. As the sun crossed the cloud line and sent the horizon into flaming orange, Kanos felt his heart unwind and reach around him.
He saw the tiny lines, the energy of projection, and the visceral feel of reality around him. It was not a special trick, just something within him that reached outward.
For weeks, he sought to reproduce the experience, and with much effort he began to have the ability at will. Though the skill never changed or widened with time, it was just a way of seeing something.
Over years, Kanos began to realize there was a greater depth to Avios, beyond the speech of common folk. He could sensationalize something, as though the energy was trying urge him to understand.
He realized he could read the world. It was an ability which the world of mages was still not commonly aware.
While others his age developed their path of life, some to the smith school, some to the university, some to the skills of crafting — others went into the field of battle, and some to the enhanced study of alchemy to learn the cures, or to the field of warfare through strategy and advanced study of the martial arts.
Kanos was never quite sure what path to follow, and in his teenage years, he became a jack-of-all-trades. He was agile and was able to craft weapons, and trained himself in the martial arts just for a sense of personal challenge. He was smart and bookish but didn’t want to work indoors. He began to take part in a unique field of agriculture, tilling and pulling, inventing and maintaining a growing flat for some of the finer foods in the land. He had a natural touch.
Kanos’ first journey into the array of battle came on the very day his wife lay dead before him. The very moment he saw his first child crushed by the work of spells and pierced by filthy hands. As he held the small body of his lifeless young son and saw his body dry and dim, Kanos’ muscles clenched in primal desperation. As he found his daughter impaled below the ribs by a sorcerer’s thin, narrow metal spire, his mind lapped with primal rage.
On that day, Kanos felt his life erupt. His skilled hands sought destruction, and his enlivened skills pushed outward as though with endless extendibility. As he gazed upon his fallen loves and saw his fallen wife laid on the ground, Kanos fought to remain aware of himself and refrain from passing out. His consciousness was choked. He coughed on his own spit and fumed from the center of his being, heaving air as adrenaline soaked his every fiber. He walked down his village’s central path. He stepped long and awkward, heaving and nearly gasping with each breath. He plodded through every building that he passed, and every room within. He felt the tepid spell around the first two sorcerers that he found. He saw their hidden eyes, and the self-adulation that reeked upon them.
Kanos grabbed his long triangular farmer’s blade and in full swing, whacked and splayed their torsos open as they stood, while he lavished in their screams. He gawked over the spurting blood of prodigious fools whose bodies gaped gore in long deep rows.
The rage made Kanos rigid as he stood there above their flinching limbs; the fire within him was overarching. He shook his head side to side and showed his teeth and made horrible sounds, venting the outpour of beastliness that riveted within him. He felt his horrible power wrap around his bones and fill his limbs. The energy he always knew as passive seemed to excite and manifest the sensation of sparks around him. He felt the great power of energy surge around his skin.
Kanos turned and barreled down the village street. He saw another man, a sorcerer’s aid who saw Kanos first and began to run.
Kanos reached to his side and grabbed his clutching knife; he threw that knife in a peculiar way — it sailed a low and fearsome line, and at the end of a flight far too long, the blade arced upward and hit the back of the young man’s neck, buried to the hilt.
Kanos knew it was an amazing feat, but had no desire to register the awe. The village was covered, every square foot, and Kanos knew his search must not stop. With a deep, suspended state of mind, he walked back to the bodies of his wife and children and buried them one by one. He rounded up some things for travel, lit a flame at his own front door, and he watched his house burn down to the ground.
As Kanos walked away from a life he could never return to, he plodded each step, knowing his death was eminent in the fiery chase of enemies that might not all be found.
Kanos knew deep within that as the days rolled forward, he would live and die a warrior and nothing else until the deed was done. In that single afternoon, Kanos the farmer changed into a machine of total vengeance, the state of which began to pull a deeper, greater magic.
6.
When Kanos left his town, he moved along a path created not by himself, but by his awareness of energy.
He was slowly pulled by a void of clarity that came from the fleeing paths of those who killed his family — their ties to his fate could not be shed.
The fields of magic showed Kanos nothing directly, but gave him a living sense of the history of time and space itself. He felt the trails of animosity and hardship, just as he felt the paths of good. This skill was the magic of travelers, and in the hands of scouts and trackers, it could lead to as much lethality as the strongest magic of death.
Kanos felt his ruptured existence and sensed the worst and mo
st horrible chords. Of the sorcerers who were at his village, he followed the vilest trails.
That trail took him over countless miles and many mountains. Kanos knew Saaverin was beguiled by at least a few people who lived in the town itself. He set out on his first trek of vengeance and followed his sense directly to the cavern-built mansion of Sovorious of Ageron.
Sovorious was not known to be a terrible man at all, but he was an odd man of business and a magistrate of the region. He was a person Kanos did not like by nature, but the man had his purposes.
Kanos took himself to the man’s front door. He stood at the finely carved dark wood panels and eyed the ornate spires of polished wood that lined the entire façade — the mountainside cavern seemed ominous but warm. Kanos took hold of the huge wooden pounders and knocked again and again, 30 times then 50 times. He did not stop.
Sovorious opened the door with magic alone as he stood, arms wide, cloak outspread, and the air of magic riveting its cloth.
Kanos revved and bellowed inside, the thirst for the life of his wife and children howled from his being. His chest heaved and arms grew rigid. His eyes peeled so far open he looked like another man.
Soverious already knew this was a fight to the death, and his virulent magic powers were charged and spiraling about. He was merely poised for timing.
Kanos took one step forward — then another.
Two steps more, and Sovorious let loose a brutal torrent that shattered the windows of his own house.
The air pummeled itself and set out a squeal of molecular discomfort as a riptide of brokenness poured towards Kanos, who had no place to hide.
Kanos took that hit without turning his head.
He stood and stared at Sovorious eye to eye as his own body was given a horrible shock.
Kanos felt not only pain, but serious relief as his adrenaline discharged and let his muscles finally ease for a moment.
A man could easily be killed by that energy, and Kanos could have been killed quite fast… but he was not.
Kanos took another step, and another, as Sovorious pulled his energy to charge while he altered his demeanor and began to set up his next discharge.
Kanos reached to his side and pulled the long-handled blade of battle taken from his town. He turned and gathered the momentum of a full body spin. He spun the blade around his hand as it swirled at speeds unnatural. Kanos sent the blade flying end-over-end at Sovorious who had no magic to stop such a thing.
Sovorious’ eyes registered surprise — he never saw a man-made object move in such a way. Sovorious let fly his magical charge to dodge the blade; his spell was loosed and missed Kanos far to the left.
Kanos took one step, then another, then finally ran.
Sovorious had no place to go, and he didn’t even try, as Kanos flew through the air and kicked the center of his chest with such impact the breaking of ribs was audible.
Kanos landed and pulled two small blades from his side and stabbed Sovorious deep in both abdominal sides.
As Sovorious had no breath and barely held his fleeting life, he locked eyes with Kanos one last time and breathed out special words…
“Vadiertok… battlemage... magic and blades. ” His face was wide open; he slowly smiled and nodded, and fell to the ground.
Kanos loomed above Sovorious who heaved from the chest as he struggled to speak. His guttural voice said clearly, “Wherever they are, they will track your fate. They will watch you and find your heart, as they found mine.”
Sovorious could barely speak but managed to utter, “If you spare my daughter, I will say more…”
Kanos glared and finally nodded, “I have no intent to kill a child.”
Sovorious pointed to a desk covered in papers and said, “The letters are in a code, and the code is tucked inside the lining of my cape.” His bloodied hands slowly fumbled with the fabric.
Sovorious stared into the abyss, and as his breath wavered, he finally said, “Battlemage… you can use the special blade — those sorcerers and beasts are brutal… no friends of mine. They had leverage over my family, so I took their gold and avoided death. Pull the candelabra from the wall… inside the hull, there is a blade.”
Kanos walked to the wall and dislodged the large brass object and pulled out the blade — the red crystal shined like no other thing, as though light came from inside. A paper scroll was inside the hull as well — it was a letter that read:
“The enchantment of Anoak is worked into the crystal of this blade. It is a Brakkish spellwork that is coming alive again. Sovorious, whoever bears this blade will also be borne of this blade. It is unknown magic for your study alone. Do not feel compelled to bear the enchantment over your own free will. I believe the spell to be quite strong — the reason I do not want it anymore.”
Kanos felt the blade in hand, and the handle seemed to tuck quite closely inside his closed fist. He squeezed its perfect grip with his calloused hand. He spun the huge dagger with great skill. He saw Sovorious staring intently.
Sovorious said meekly, “Throw the blade… show me what you do, battlemage.”
Kanos looked into his dying eyes as Sovorious lay on the ground. “ It is the last thing you will see.” Kanos reeled back his hand and sent the blade loose into air. It sailed like a supernatural object across the room. The blade lingered above the floor as it glided and sped across the ground. As Soverious’ eyes peeled open, the blade impaled the side of his skull, flipping his face to gaze out beyond the front door as his forehead slowly spurted blood.
7.
Kanos roved through Sovorious’ mansion and poured over the papers on the desk using the code from the cape. He let Sovorious lie on the huge red rug as he grew cold and stiff.
The birds began to find the many shattered window openings. One large raven felt unthreatened by Kanos and flew in to find the corpse of Sovorious and begin to dine.
Kanos gathered some things and translated a few of the discoveries to a smaller sheet of paper. He took all the papers and the coded swatch of cape and placed them in a huge brass capsule that he buried in the yard.
Kanos sprayed Sovorious with grain alcohol and let the bottle crash into shards against the floor. As he walked away, a match was lit by his hand, and the tiny flame dropped to the floor.
Kanos breathed the scent of the burning corpse of Sovorious, a wretched smell but satisfying. He felt the clutching inside him loosen a little as the mansion burned and crumbled from inside.
Kanos opened up his senses and began to follow the field of energy once again. He sensed the worst chord among his many paths and plodded forward down the rocky range and waded straight into the Biale River. With no reserve, he pulled himself straight across the flowing water.
As Kanos prepared to sleep, his clothes hung to dry. He scanned his new papers and began to sense a truth in Sovorious’ writings.
There were nine minds involved in the network of spells that overtook Saaverin. Sovorious was not one of them. Kanos’ slaying had only just begun. Nine more makers of slaves had to be taken whole — nine more mercenaries of the dark arts — nine more fools who would devour a village without the foresight to know their vile acts would sculpt a warrior to hunt them down.
8.
Kanos slowly made his way to the break in the next mountain pass. He lumbered for a way forward, and with many miles of navigation, such a pathway could not be found.
Kanos felt the way forward was an eminent pass through the mountains. He began to search his energy to find a way forward. He remained calm and composed and reached out with everything inside him.
Kanos began to manifest a spell — a skill that he did not truly hold. He felt a need to rise, to climb with great ability. He began to raise the energy within him. The faint network of webs around him began to pull and charge. He stood up, much lighter than before, feeling each step with great ease.
The mountain wall was daunting, but Kanos did not hesitate — he reached for a hold. His hand clasped the rock, and
his body easily swung around. He began to climb with great precision, his body light and agile. He never climbed rock walls before, but he conjured a way forward — and the energy within him seemed a great enhancement.
Kanos made his way up a mountainside that no man climbs because the way is impossible.
When he stood at the huge ridge peak, he gazed across the distant lands. He felt the network within him tug and pull, and to the left, just beside the setting sun, there was a way forward that must be crossed.
Kanos set out again and plodded down the mountainside; he found himself in a shadowy ridge between the mountains. As he made headway, he saw a distant glow — it was a small enchanting green light with a yellow lantern posted against the cliffside wall.
He knew the set of mountain ridges held people who were both good and bad, but he took a chance and walked straight towards the light. Kanos approached the carved rock doorway and wandered in to the sounds of conversation and warmth — it was a wayfarer’s bar. He eyed the crowd, who eyed him back. He nodded, and they calmed. The bar was long, and a couple travelers sat alongside it. He approached and sat down.
The bartender wore rugged garments with crafted embellishments. His kind eyes seemed to punctuate his short brown beard. The man approached Kanos, “A drink might settle your restless energy, friend.”
Kanos nodded and said, “Millet ale will do...”
The barkeep nodded, and drew a glass of the cheap, rich ale. He asked Kanos, “Would you like some bread and stew?”
Kanos nodded and dug out a silver abbon, a thick, large silver coin taken from Sovorious’s own pocket.
The bartender said, “It will be hard to make change for such a large piece.”
Mages of Avios 2. Battlemage Page 2
