Bloodless

by Roberto Vecchi

  “What happened?” he heard a voice ask.

  He opened his eyes and saw himself kneeling in the center of a blackened circle of charred remains, the remains of the evil beings he was fighting only moments ago.

  “Intellos?” he heard a different voice ask, clearly bidding him to respond. But he did not, because he could not.

  He raised his head and attended to the two voices. He recognized them. One was from a large man. He looked as if he had been in a fight. His right eye was slightly swollen and he had a small bruise on his left cheek. But it was a fresh bruise, just beginning to swell and show its discoloration. The other voice was from a woman. She did not have any signs of battle, at least, not the visible signs of the man; however, she was breathing deeply showing her exhaustion. Her brow was laced with perspiration betraying that whatever fight the man had been in, she had joined his endeavoring. He looked behind them and saw another man, a young man on the verge of becoming a man, sitting by himself crying silently. A small girl walked over to him and sat beside him. She put her arm around him, or at least tried, but his shoulders were still too broad for her to encompass them. However, that did not stop her from trying to console him. There were other people, all of whom he recognized, gathered with them. For some reason, their numbers were important to him so he counted them. Including the little girl and himself, there was a total of thirteen.

  “Intellos,” said the man’s voice more forcefully, “Are you alright?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Yes, I am fine. What happened?”

  “I am sorry,” said the woman.

  “Sorry? What are you sorry about?” he asked.

  “Lupara. She did not make it,” said the woman.

  Lupara. He should know that name he felt. “What do you mean?” he asked for clarification.

  “Intellos,” said the man, “she was thrown into the hole before we could save her.”

  “The hole?” he asked as he looked to where the hole was. It was still glowing an ominous shade of violet and still emitted a threatening energy, but it was a passive energy now and not the active, pulsing energy he felt before. Lupara, he knew that name. Not only that, he knew that woman. Slowly, painfully, and completely, his recollection of her returned to him. He remembered the night they spent in her inn, he telling her tales of his adventures throughout his life and she, listening with the single intent to know more of him. He remembered how she aided him when her inn was attacked, how quickly she acted with a decisiveness he lacked. He remembered her soft yet resolute surety in the safety she felt with him and the safety he felt with her, a safety and trust that had proven misplaced. His eyes teared up. The woman whom he remembered as Dianali walked over to him and hugged him.

  Borinth, ever the leader, allowed only a brief display of emotion before he spoke, “We need to go. Who knows if more of them are about. And I do not like that hole. Something tells me we need to be as far away from here as possible.” He walked over to where Aglascio was sitting and still sobbing, oblivious to everything else around him, even the little girl hugging him, “Alright, up you go,” said Borinth as he picked the grief-stricken boy up and helped him stand.

  “I could not help him,” Aglascio said.

  “None of us could,” answered Borinth.

  “Why?” asked Aglascio.

  “I do not know, son. But I do know that your father would not want you crying over him here,” said the grizzled warrior as he put his hand on the young man’s shoulder. Aglascio responded by taking a deep inhalation followed by and ever deeper exhalation. “That is it, let it all out,” confirmed Borinth.

  In a moment of steel resolution, the young man surprised Borinth and said, “Teach me.”

  “What?”

  “Teach me to be like you,” he clarified.

  “You want to be a mercenary? To learn how to kill?”

  “Yes. Teach me so I can help fight whatever killed my Drahin,” he said as he wiped his tears and his nose.

  “We will talk more about this later. Now we need to go. Di, gather up the others and let us leave quickly,” he instructed. She did as he asked, but not before giving Intellos one last hug.

  Recollection returned quickly, as did his emotional link to those recollections. While they had accomplished their goal of finding and saving the women who were taken by the acolytes, it was a very somber exit from the Osin Thion in part because Borinth did not want to risk raising any further alarms, and in greater part because of the cost they had to pay. Though they both lost someone, Intellos possessed a learned ability to detach that Aglascio did not. As such, the whole way out of the castle, and for a good distance beyond, the young man could not stop his sobs. Intellos, however, benefitted from years and years of knowledge-based understanding leading to a broader understanding, and consequently, fewer tears. Even though they escaped without further incidents, the presence of evil remained with them well into the night. As such, Borinth did not call a halt until their distance from the castle was great enough that they could no longer feel the presence of the energy from the hole. When he finally did call a halt and a fire was made, it was small and provided little warmth. Combined with the thin robes they were all wearing having been stripped of their clothes, provisions, and weapons, they were grateful for the unusually warm night. Because of their conspicuous situation, Borinth ordered double watches to be set. He and Aglascio took the first watch, with Di and Intellos taking the second.

  It was an eerily quiet night. The moon was a sliver and was barely visible between the intermittent cloud cover. There was a gentle southernly breeze that promised the return of spring after the harshness of winter had worn away. It was not winter yet, but it was certainly approaching. Although this night was unseasonably warm, a boon all of them were grateful for, it was not without chill. But it was not a chill of body and bones, rather, it was a chill of change. If there had been any doubt before, with the incidence of what happened at the Osin Thion, that doubt had been removed. Evil was indeed imbuing its influence into Avendia, and its influence was growing. As the Grand Wizard, Intellos had been at the center of protecting Avendia from many insurgences of evil, but this time it was different. Not since the days of The Unyielding had there been an attempt to change the very essence of their land and reality. The energy emitted from the hole had been proof enough of that goal. Yet, even in the times of The Unyielding, there was a centralized and exposed aspect of evil at the helm of its ship of destruction that did not hide itself or its intent. However, although he was certain all of the events of these recent times were being coordinated by a centralized power, that power chose to conduct its symphony of destruction from behind the scenes.

  “Grand Wizard, Intellos?” asked a small voice pulling him away from his silent contemplation.

  “Oh. Hello Anaria. What are you doing awake at this hour? You should be fast asleep,” he asked with a warm smile.

  “I do not sleep much,” she said as her eyes grew distant the way eyes much older than hers sometimes did when they were gripped by inner reflection. “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Of course, little one,” he answered.

  “Did you love her?” she asked.

  “What?” he responded, surprised by her observation. “Who?”

  “The woman who was,” she started, but let her clarifying statement trail away with the faint breeze.

  “Yes,” answered Intellos after a moment of consideration, more to concentrate on the prevention of his tears that the formulation of an appropriate response. “Yes, I supposed I did, in a way.”

  “I am sorry,” said Anaria as she lowered her head.

  “You have nothing to be sorry about, little one,” he said.

  She walked over to him and sat down. “It is just,” she said, pausing briefly, “sometimes I see things, and those things come true. But I did not see her.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked.

  “Well, they do not always come true, only the ones I scribble,” she said.<
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  “What things? Do you write them all down,” he asked, now very curious.

  “No, not all of them. Only the things I hear in my head,” she answered.

  “Anaria, what things do you hear in your head?”

  “I saw you, even after they took your power, surrounded by a golden sun, like it was shining from inside you. But you were not a wizard anymore. When I saw that in my head, I made that scribble for you. The one you tried to give back to me.”

  “Anaria, how did you know I would be here. I mean, how did you know I would be at the Osin Thion? And how did you get there?”

  “I saw you there in my head when you were surrounded by the sun. Grand Wizard Esthinor sent me there to help someone he called Xonyos, but I never met him. I only met Lord Artus and his assistant, Broggen Bagorin,” explained Anaria.

  “I think Lord Artus and Xonyos were the same person. Well, that is to say Lord Artus is who we saw before their ceremony and Xonyos is what we saw during the ceremony and after. Anaria, how long have you been having these visions?” he asked her.

  “Ever since I got to The University,” she said.

  “Does Esthinor know you have them?”

  “No, only you do.”

  “Let us keep it that way, for now,” he said. “Tell me, what were you helping Broggen with? He was the man I saw you with, right?”

  “Yes. Mostly, he was teaching me how to draw shapes and other designs. But I did not like those,” she answered.

  “Can you draw me one of the designs he taught you,” he asked her.

  “Do I have to? I really do not like them. They did not feel right,” she asked.

  “Please, for me. I think it is very important,” he said.

  After looking around for a moment, Anaria picked up a small stick and began drawing different shapes and lines on the ground in front of them. Because it was very dim, Intellos did not see it right away, but after she had completed the complex design, he saw that it was the same as the one he and his companions were standing in during the ceremony.

  “Anaria, did either Lord Artus or Broggen tell you what this design was for?” he asked her.

  “Yes, they said it was for a gate,” she said.

  “A gate? A gate to where?” he asked her.

  “I do not know,” she answered as she wiped her design away. After a moment of silence, she asked him, “Do you want to see another scribble?”

  “Yes, Yes I do,” he said smiling broadly. Though he did see her still as one of his students, in light of their most recent discussion, his interest in her scribbles was broadened beyond that of teacher and pupil.

  She reached into the small pocket in her robes and pulled out a small piece of paper. She unfolded it slowly saying, “I drew this right before I left home to go to the university.”

  She extended her hand toward him and his pulse slightly quickened becoming more noticeable. He took the paper and felt his heartbeat deepen and intensify, as if it knew something was happening, or going to happen. As he righted the paper, and saw what she had scribbled, all of his questions regarding his summons to the cavern of Lacorion were answered. Could it be? He looked up to her and saw her smiling back obviously aware that he was pleased. He looked back to the scribble and laughed out loud. Her ink and papers that she had dropped to the ground when she first arrived to his class, her inclusion into times and situations he never thought she would be included in, and even the word she used to describe her drawings all pointed to the realization he was having now. How could he have been so blinded not to notice before? In the gravity of events since The Book of All, he failed to see what was right in front of him so many months ago. He had even gone so far as to question how he was ever able to complete the task set before him when it appeared he had been stripped of every resource he needed to complete it. But now, staring right back at him in the face were the same cryptic letters he saw in the cavern. And though he could not still read them, he did not have to because he knew what words they formed: The Scribe.

  “I am glad you like it!” she exclaimed as his laughing subsided.

  “Anaria, do you know what this says?” he asked.

  “No, but I knew it was for you,” she said.

  “Little one, you have provided me with exactly what I was looking for. Perhaps this battle is not decided yet. Perhaps we have time yet to counter what evils have been set to motion,” he said as he stood up.

  “What are you going to do?” she asked as she stood mimicking him.

  “Come, we have somewhere to go,” he said.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “I have something to show you,” he said as he went to wake Borinth.

  Togaru

  (Lesson)

  When God created The Five as the physical representations of the governing dynamics essential to sustain His creation, He breathed into them all they would need to maintain the working order of things in their respective spheres of influence. His Immortal Spirit, He bestowed into the golden manifestation of The First. To this aspect, He gave all intents of unhindered and perfect identities removed from influence; for in this perfect physical manifestation, nothing could alter the purity and potentials it contained. Although all else around it could and would change, The First would forever embody the perfect condition of Immortality and spiritual existence, the seed of true, authentic identity. Hence, His Will was given shape.

  From there, God looked within and saw His essence of time, for to exist is to be within time. Yet, He was time’s perfect Master able to both exist within time, yet not be subjected to its innate nature. And because of that, He was time. So, He extended that facet of His identity and created The Second. With a holy resonance of the truest blue, beyond what blue could be defined as, he fashioned the physical manifestation of time in the same manner he would when he would create the heavens and earth, from His Will.

  But one cannot exist within time without existing within a physically governed, dynamic viscera. Seeing that He was present everywhere even before there was a where, and knowing he would be present no matter where the where would be, He innately knew, as much as He could not be defined by it, regardless of its size, He was it – Space. Reaching into His creative will once again, he pulled forth the blank, empty, and endless canvass upon which he would fashion his creation and formed yet another perfect physical manifestation of His identity. In the absence of all, this creation of utter white was lacking the color of The First and The Second, but that is not to say it was any less striking. So, God breathed, and The Third became.

  Seeing the framework had been created, He now began to focus upon the subjects of His creation, for one cannot be a creator unless one creates objects; and those objects must exist within the canvass. But things cannot exist righteously unless there are laws and orders for them to successfully follow as a consequence of cause and effect. So, He exhaled again and painted not just the world, nor than animals, nor the plants, nor even its people but the very laws governing all of His natural painting. Seeing there was yet another innate aspect to His Identity, He formed The Forth as the expression of the natural Order of all things mortal inside of His creation. And with the order of mortality, He manifested a composite green made from every green such that it was impossible to be interpreted as anything but life itself.

  With each masterful stroke of his Will upon the canvass of Space, he flowed in a complete expression greater than comprehension itself. For nothing can comprehend The Master except for The Master because all else existed beneath It, only hoping to equal Its marvelous expression. And then He knew there needed to be The Fifth. One last and final physical representation of His boundless and perfect Identity. So, with a brilliantly red final stroke, he gave life to the final aspect of his identity as the limitless and individual Expression of everything He created.

  Thus, they were five; Eclesthina the Red, Molorok the Green, Xendara the White, Oross the Blue, and Lacorion the Gold.

  Only one other time
since they all became had they convened. Not even when God created the rains to drown His creation and start again, did they gather to discuss whether or not they should intervene. They watched king after king preside over the various nations that rose from His original two. And the more they watched, the more remorseful they became. They were not to directly interfere with the inner workings of the mortal realm. They were meant only to exist and maintain the condition of existence, and not to influence His children in any way. When taken together, all the identities and aspects of God defined immortal love, a perfect love whose reflection necessitated the act of separate wills. It was not that God consciously gave free will to all those He created, rather it was an effect of all that He was. And He was nothing except Love. Pure, untarnished, unblemished, infallible, and unrestricted Love, He existed as much for them as they did for Him; for the balance of loving is to be loved. And yet, He was not loved. At least He was not loved as He should have been, as The Five did. And so, the world became unbalanced, unhinged, and disconnected from the utter surety He and his Dragon kin knew. Because of that, the world fell. Yet, all things that fall, rise again. Therefore, in its place, rose a darkened silhouette of what should have been, what could have been, and what may never be.