Alya led him north of the town, along the ridge overlooking the Melrada, using a high trail they often travelled to gather herbs and berries. If anyone had noted their departure, there was not yet sign of pursuit. Once their parents noticed them missing, all in the community would be out to search; and when and if they found him . . . he could not think of that. He knew his death might be preordained but he had no desire to face it. Not before he had a chance to fight off the Lowest God. All the adults in the town had done so, surely he could. He would.
Stones crunched under Jaryn’s feet as he walked, as did a scattering of hardy wild flowers working up through the rocky path. He winced at the death his steps brought to one of the weeds he had always ignored. Shaking from the strength of its ending, he concentrated on the colors of the forest he sensed even behind closed eyes, sidestepping patches of even the dullest shades of life.
With each step, his consciousness deepened, strengthening into a bone deep awareness of imminent change. He shuddered as bumps arose on his skin, sending a cacophony of sensations running through his back, intense almost to the point of pain. At his side, Alya’s thoughts flickered between worry and fear—the intimate knowledge of her only raising his own anxiety.
I have to reject him. I must. I will.
His body undermined his silent vow with each breath of living air. Without allowing defiance, lines of silken power infused his being with colors and emotions, thoughts and impressing need. Closing off thoughts of failure, he kept moving forward hoping outright denial of the Lowest God’s power would break his strengthening hold.
They had walked for half a candle’s mark when he noticed their steps levelling off, footfalls coming down on bare rock rising from the encrusted ground rather than on loose stones. Trees fell back as they approached the crest of the ridge overlooking the split in the river that separated the town’s domain from the marshlands. As they came into the open above the flowing water, a wild blue radiance swamped his blossoming perceptions.
Yelping, Jaryn opened his eyes to find his growing awareness even clearer. A blue shadow hung on the horizon, approaching ahead of a line of crisp white clouds marching through the gold-laced sky. Stepping away from Alya, he marvelled at the brightness surrounding the one approaching, at the well of raw energy raying outward. A translucent line of blue spiralled forward until it brushed through him, bringing an infusion of calm. As the being closed on their position, the connection strengthened. Words trickled through the link, echoing silently through his thoughts.
::You’re not yet Sanrian? But I thought you one of our kin—:: It was the same voice Jaryn had heard once before.
“Kin? I don’t know you.” His words came haltingly through the blanket dulling his regular senses. He blinked as the shape of purest blue grew before his eyes: an outline of a man with the wings of a devil. Jaryn cringed backward as the glowing presence lit upon the ridge, terror fighting for precedence with the gentle calm the man exuded. He denied the encroaching emotion with all the will of Arboran. This was the one who brought change. This was the Lowest God’s messenger.
“Demon,” he shouted. As the word left his lips, his sister jumped forward, coming between him and the devil without any thought for her personal safety.
“Get away from him. You can’t have him,” she said, voice filled with tension. Highest God, please—save us. Her thoughts reverberated through his mind, even without touch, carried on the strength of her passion.
Within Jaryn’s new vision, the demon’s aura dimmed until its true shape came through, leaving only a fine mist of color shadowing its figure. Blinking, he found he could see the demon clearly: a thin, dark skinned man with deep brown eyes, short, trimmed hair and gold-veined wings.
The man stepped back to the edge of the ridge, letting Jaryn see his entire form without Alya’s blocking presence. A sleeveless shirt covered his chest, dangling ties that looked to keep material from interfering with his wings. The loose-fitting pants matched the shirt; both were of the same sapphire shade that held Jaryn’s senses captive. A shade his sister could not see, innocent as she was from the Lowest God’s taint.
“Hasn’t your family taught you anything of the Sanri? I felt your change from Lianshiavel. You’ll kill yourself if you don’t accept it.” The man’s words held a lilting burr, tinted with confidence. For a moment, Jaryn let himself be lulled by the tone of authority, forgetting everything but the onrush of energy seeping into his body from the thickening lines of light.
“Don’t talk to him, brother. Back away—he wants you to give in. He’s meant to tempt you!” Jaryn stumbled as Alya pushed him backward. One look in her eyes was enough to realize her peaking fear. Her face had paled and her thoughts were jagged. “Remember Arboran!” she told him.
Ignore the colors.
Mindful of the first words she had offered upon escaping the town, he regained his balance. Whatever the Lowest God threw at him, he needed to reject it. As he stood on the ridge, power ringing through him with the promise of change and welcome, he understood why the town elders had decided death was a mercy to those touched by the Lowest God.
Accepting this would make me more than I am. More than any of us have a right to be. It would be everything I’ve been taught to abhor.
“I won’t accept your gift. I reject it. I reject you.” He stepped forward, motioning his sister aside. She cast him a worried glance, a question in her deep green eyes—which he met with a slight nod. In his vision, the glow of the Lowest God’s power continued to shine. Jaryn refused to let it affect him, refused to acknowledge the knowledge it bore of Alya’s worry changing to relief. “Go away, and take His offering with you. I am not the Lowest God’s,” he said to the winged demon.
“Oh, young one.” The man reached a hand out in placation. “The Lowest God has nothing to do with this change. What’s being done to you is a crime to the Highest Lord. Normal people can reject the Sanri, if they so choose—though most do not. You, however, will be Sanrian. What is your home to not teach you the difference? You have to accept the change.”
“You’re wrong. It’s wrong to give into the temptation to live with power. It’s our duty and responsibility to accept life’s struggles—that is the way to salvation. Arboran is the one place where people live true to the Highest Lord’s wishes.” As he spoke, the intensity of sensation growing through Jaryn multiplied, setting his limbs to shaking. Unable to hold himself up, he collapsed to his knees on a bed of moss holding court between two protruding rocks. Goosebumps rose on the backs of his arms as he realised the moss was striving to sooth his anxious nerves. He would have shifted to bare rock, but there was no strength left in his muscles, even as more and more power crested over his head.
“A rejection of the Sanri is a rejection of life. Choose to live, child. I’ll teach you of the true power of the Sanrian. Our power is a gift; we don’t live outside of the Highest Lord’s domain. I promise you.” The man made to step closer but Alya was there to block him.
“He’s already told you—he won’t accept it. Leave him alone. Isn’t it enough that Felora had to die? Do you have to take my brother’s life too?” she demanded. Her brown-black hair waved out behind her, framing her taut face with an aura Jaryn sensed should have been a bold green and not the dulled echo of color it was.
“Felora?” Confusion radiated through the man’s presence, tinted with shock.
“Don’t tell me you don’t know her—your Master stole her life too. Our elders had to give her death because of your so-named gift.”
“Another Sanrian?” A whisper this time, accompanied by the sound of the man stepping forward. Closer. Golden-laced wings folded back, their tips just brushing the ground. “How many?”
“More than our town has cared for! Felora. Dionir. Kesalri. More, I’m sure, but I’m not that old. I only know what our father and mother have shared. Except for Felora. I was there for—” Her voice broke as she took a step toward the stranger, one hand raised. “Your powers tou
ched her. The elders said they couldn’t stop it—said there was no way but the Aldraswood to keep her from giving in to the Lowest God. They said there was no way.”
Jaryn longed to offer comfort, to reach out and give aid. Her grief poured over him, bringing up tears in his eyes. Even the winged man had runnels of wetness down his cheeks.
As he watched, the aura surrounding the man deepened. Tendrils of sapphire reached out, encircling Alya. He shifted his weight, thinking to intervene, but the tendrils only brushed over his sister, faltering as if they could not match her resonance.
He smiled, relief freeing him for a moment from his sister’s emotions. “Your power won’t touch her. She’s already rejected the Lowest God.”
“I would have offered comfort,” the man said. “But your town has taken even that gift away. Sanrian are meant to heal. Yes, you may call the power use of most in Lianshiavel frivolous. The Sanrian are more than that. Only we can give healing to the sick, deepen the connections of others to the natural world, and work the most difficult magics in Lianshiavel. By rejecting the Sanri, this one has lost all access to it. All of it.”
“That’s only right,” his sister broke in. “We are meant to live our lives as we will, not as others would make us.” She stepped closer, blocking his view of the stranger: the Sanrian. Her eyes focused on his, impressing him with her confidence. With her courage. “Deny him. Even this demon has said it; by rejecting the power, you won’t be able to access it. Do what Felora couldn’t—reject the Lowest God.”
Jaryn raised his own hands until they covered hers. He noticed the gray shirt she was wearing had gained a tear. It was the small things he needed to focus on. Let the power ebb. Let it flow back into the ocean of the world like the sea after high tide. He could fight it down.
“It won’t get easier,” the winged man said, this time not letting Alya block his path. The demon didn’t hurt her, only pulled Jaryn out of her reach, forcing the lines of blue connecting them to stream wide open. Jaryn lost himself in the flow burning through them both. He became the man named Irek Remoan of the Sanrian.
Flying through a crisp spring air, moonlit singing through the skies. Laughter as a child played in the grass who only a candle’s mark before had lain unconscious. A yellow flag flapping over a red sandstone city carved out of a mountainside. Winged Sanrian hovering around a central table, arguing on the best way to heal the rift left by a forest fire. A bird’s eye view of the Melrada. A child in need, and a desperate desire to reach him.
Shivering, Jaryn fell out of the connection. Light rolled over him and he twisted to get out of the Sanrian’s hands. “Stay away from me,” he said as he pulled away, taking two steps toward the tree line.
Light dazzled his eyes; the world faded beneath the array of colors and sensations. A living world danced through him, harnessing him with the vibrant song of birds in flight, of the drumming of fish through the water below and the staid ancient view of trees watching the land change beneath their branches. Reds and golds, greens and yellows, bound by lines of gold and sapphire blue. Crystalline, vibrant shades, dizzying beyond anything he had every known. A sweet sensation that offered him a connection, pulling him into an embrace of life and growth, wanting—needing him.
Fumbling over a rock, he fell, mashing an elbow against the hard ground. Pain shattered over his head; not his own. Moss and grass and a beetle crushed beneath one of his boots. Struggling like a fish caught out of water, he reached for air—reached toward the one dull presence in the brilliance of the world. Alya.
She clasped his hand in her own, verbal words unheard but her thoughts begging him to live. Highest God, none should have to fight this. Why? What good is his death? What need for it? Let him live. Let him live.
Jaryn shrouded himself in her presence, remembering the times he had hid from her when it had been her duty to watch him. Her life was unattached from the auras of light breaking over him; the colors sliding off her gave him no release. Blinking, he sensed nothing of normal life—nothing of the world he knew. No foothold to deny the Lowest God and to succeed in his trial.
Felora had the right of it. The elders. Death would be a mercy.
A chill swept through him as his eyes darted around the ridge. Light. Essence. Color. A shimmering web of brightness masking all other sight. The well within him brimmed to overflowing as the Lowest God’s change hovered beyond his eyes. All he had to do was reach out for it.
No! Rising up on a last wind of physical energy, he moved forward without thought, only the intense desire to end the trial without giving in. One step. Two. The sky opened up before him where the rocky ledge ended. Standing on the precipice, colors swirling around his form, Jaryn decided.
Lowest God—I reject you.
Alya’s fear enveloped him, her thoughts turning against everything their entire town stood for. “Don’t die. I don’t want you dead. Arboran is about life!”
Thoughts touched his own, carrying with them remorse and desperation. ::Don’t give in. A rejection of the Sanri is a rejection of life. Become what you are meant to be. Live. I’ll help you.::
A rejection of the Sanri is a rejection of life. The thought resonated. How could this connection be evil? This golden connection that filled him with the glory of his surroundings from the moss at his feet to the fish in the river. Always the Lowest God was the god of evil—of dissonance—of all things granted out of place.
All in Arboran accepted the struggles and challenges of life without gifted aid. To live in the town was to reject the power, to give up the magic of the world—the Sanri—and live.
But this is no gift; this is who I am. To be without it is to die. And while his foot touched the edge of the ridge, reached out to step into empty air, he did not want to die. He wanted to live. The Highest Lord asked each child to accept the struggles and challenges of life. Of life. Not death. Not of a poison meant to shred a life from the heart of the world.
Life. Life was the challenge. With or without the gifts the Highest Lord offered.
Reject the Lowest God and accept who he was meant to be.
Jaryn placed his foot back on the ridge, savouring the sense of stone cradling his choice, giving him balance. Reaching his hands to the warm glow of the sky, he welcomed life into his soul.
Color flared up, an intense blue fire. What have I done? A single thought before the power of the world remade him in a blaze of acceptance.
He came awake surrounded by a fuzzy glow of warmth, a gentle glow that dissipated as he looked upon the world with new clarity. And saw nothing but two faces staring down, both worried: his sister’s and the demon’s. Irek’s.
Startled, Jaryn scrambled backward.
“Wait!” Alya grasped his arm, stopped him a bare handspan from the edge of the ridge overlooking the Melrada. Don’t kill yourself by accident, you toad, she vented silently.
“Toad, am I?” He relished her shocked look at his response to her thoughts, then glanced around, realising just how close he had come to giving up his life.
A shudder ran through his body and down his wings: a new sensation that brought laughter to his lips. With a nervousness he couldn’t quite grasp, Jaryn looked upon the changes wrought in a moment of desperation. A terrified scream froze in his throat. Changed! Wings of muscle and bone sheathed in a thin layer of skin, tinted with gold and copper. He wondered if he could . . .
“Of course you can fly.” Irek said quietly, “The wings are the physical manifestation of the Sanri. Our bodies take in too much of the world’s life than can be carried in a human form, even the form of a full bodied man. The wings are a symbol of our gift. Our responsibility.” He grinned. “But you can still fly.”
“Gift? Responsibility?” Jaryn repeated, caught up short by the remembrance of his duty to reject the Lowest God. He had become what all in Arboran had rejected. What he should have rejected. He struggled to stand, looking for a place to go and unable to make a choice. There were no choices left. If he went back to
the town, they would kill him. He had become one of their demons.
“No,” Alya said, her nervousness plain in her awkward movements as she came to stand before him. As she laid warm fingers on his shoulders and gazed knowingly into his eyes. “No. I saw it. I saw you. You are no demon. You did no wrong—you accepted life.”
“Accepted life, but at what cost?” he asked her. “You? Mother and Father. The town? I can’t go back now.”
She sighed, radiating a loss akin to if he had died, had plummeted over the ridge or drank the poison Felora had accepted without protest. “I know. I know, younger brother. But the Highest Lord gives us each our challenges. Yours is just a little harder than most.” She turned toward the Sanrian—the other Sanrian—Irek. “You’ll take care of him—he’s still a child, even if he doesn’t act like it sometimes.”
“If he so chooses, we’ll be glad to take him in. I would be honoured to teach him.” A tendril of blue reached out from the Sanrian, tinged with gentle welcome.
“I have a choice?”
“Always,” the man said. “The Sanrian do not all serve Lianshiavel—some have chosen their own service. None will hold you bound.”
Jaryn touched the fine skin of one wing, relishing in the excitement it sparked through his mind. Tensing at the power flowing through them, he wondered whether his decision had been the right one. Wordless music resonated through his body as his sight gained a second dimension. Irek of the Sanrian’s dark skin glowed with an intense blue, a blue as vibrant as the billowing clothing he wore. Vibrant with life.
He relaxed. Accepted. Later would be the time for questions. Time for wondering if he was damned in the Highest Lord’s eyes. Maybe one day he would accept that it was his destiny to reject the elders’ teachings, but not now. Not yet.
He looked over at his sister standing forlorn a few steps away, her eyes turned from them; tears wet her cheeks, sparkling silver in the sun. It was she who would have to explain his absence to their parents—to the town.
Children of Magic Page 13
