by Arlin Fehr
The streets below were relatively clean of desert sand, but a light wind stirred up the grit that was within the walls. These main arteries of Jarridon were presently void of any people, except the occasional guard in silver and red uniform.
In the courtyard of the house, a small group of men were arranged.
Inside the home, Azra stood in the foyer. Brown, stone, pillars lined the open hall, and a polished, marble, floor filled the room wall to wall. A large set of double, wooden, doors served as the entrance, while a stairway – and two doors on either side – led to the rest of the house.
Azra was talking with four people. One was a young woman with golden hair and sharp, green, eyes. She was Princess Kialandria Minna, better known simply as, Kia. She was one of the Princesses of Minna, and Azra’s niece. Kia’s hair was long, going half-way down her back. Her blue eyes were alert and keen. She was very beautiful, sought after by Princes all over the known worlds.
Kia stood a head taller than Azra. She wore silver armour, with a crest in gold on the back, and on her right shoulder. The crest was her family emblem – the royal crest – a mountain cat’s head roaring, surrounded by a band of fern leaves. Kia had a bow and quiver on her back. She was standing nervously, with her arms at her side.
She looked so young.
Next to Azra, dressed in red robes – just like he was wearing – was Jahnyz Kohv. She was a hard-looking young woman with short, brown, hair. Her eyes were grey – and while she wasn’t the most beautiful girl Azra had seen before, she was pretty in her own way. She held no weapons and had no crests on her robe.
She stood, silently... impatient.
Also speaking with Azra was John Fort. He had a dark beard, and was wearing the same red and silver armour of the guards patrolling the city walls. He had a crest too, but not the same as Kia. The soldier wore a crest of a white urrh-glass with no sand, ringed by a round vine.
The same crest was above the staircase in Azra’s house.
Azra wore a ring with that crest on a black gem stone.
He fiddled with the ring absently.
Standing next to Princess Kialandria, was a shorter woman with wavy blond hair and a round face. She wore red armour with a gold trim, and had the royal crest emblazoned on the front, and on a medium sized shield that was strapped to her back. A long sword was at her side. A dagger rested on her other side. She stood with her arms crossed, glaring at Azra.
She was Cina, protector of the Princess.
She took her job extremely seriously.
‘The attack is to happen today?’ she growled.
‘Yes. At midday,’ Azra responded.
‘And yet I and my keep still stand here?’
‘She insisted,’ Azra shrugged.
The woman looked at Kia. ‘Lady Kialandria is this true?’
‘Uncle Azra tried to get me to go home, but I refused. The roads are unsafe.’
‘We could have used the Archway milady,’ Cina pointed out grimly.
‘Cina, Lady Kia was correct not to try the Archway,’ Jahnyz interrupted, ‘if a sorcerer does, in fact, lead the enemy army, there’s no telling what curse he may have set to have prevented that. If he has his hands on a stolen focus crystal, or some other artefact, the Archway could very well be suspect.’
‘That would assume a great deal of foresight from an enemy that couldn’t even hide his plans from Azra,’ Cina grumbled. ‘If the dear Wyzard’s Apprentice can give me proof of any such risk then I may be more inclined to listen. As it stands, it is my duty to keep Princess Kia safe from harm. As an experienced solider, I know that becomes difficult when the city you’re standing in comes under attack!’
Jahnyz was about to speak but Azra put up his hand. ‘No need Jahnyz,’ he said, looking at Cina. ‘Asking my apprentice to detect a modification on the Archway is unfair. She hasn’t had that training yet, nor do I, for that matter. You’d need a master of the Energy or Void aspects to hope to detect such changes. But, more importantly, if we use the Archway to send you and my niece back home to the capitol, and the Sorcerer is a master of Energy, he may have the chance to sense the frequency of the focus crystal for the capital, being as close as he is. With most of our troops off fighting the war, do you really want a Sorcerer, with an army, having a clear path right to the King? What is your first duty?’ Azra answered for her. ‘Your first duty is to the King! Your second duty is the King’s child. Sending her back home like this would mean you may put your first duty at risk.
‘But that said, as soon as I know how powerful, and what aspect this Sorcerer is, I’ll let you know what the best plan of action is. It’s entirely possible he isn’t skilled enough to detect the Archway in use. If that’s the case, you, Kia, and your men will be the first ones out of here.’
‘I’ll hold you too that Wyzard,’ Cina warned.
‘I am many things, one of them is a man of my word.’ Azra narrowed his eyes for a moment. ‘And don’t think of calling that into question, I get a little miffed about it.’
Kia smiled. ‘I trust you, Uncle.’
‘Against the advice of your Father I may point out,’ Azra said mockingly.
‘Father doesn’t know you as well as Mother and I do.’
Azra smiled and turned to John. ‘Tell me the situation, John.’
‘Short-handed, but ready to fight till the end. Lady Kia’s body guards are a welcome addition to our forces,’ he added, looking toward Cina.
‘If the opportunity to get the Princess out arises, we will go. Use us, but don’t rely on us.’
‘Of course, my lady.’
‘Any word from our scouts?’ Azra asked.
‘They’ve spotted the enemy forces coming against us, but weren’t able to get close enough to get us any usable numbers. The enemy hides their forces with the dunes, and everywhere we try to see them from, sandstorms kick up and limit our vision.’
‘Mahgic,’ said Azra’s apprentice.
‘Or incredibly bad luck,’ Azra said off hand.
John continued, ‘They’ll be here very soon. Our forces are ready, and we know which side they'll come from, so we focused most of our forces on that face.’
Cina spoke, ‘What if they take the walls or get a gate under their control?’
‘We have drilled a thousand times or more, if the walls are taken, we withdraw to the bazaar outside this palace. We will hold their or die by the sword.’
Cina looked at Azra. ‘What then, Wyzard?’ she asked icily
‘I am still a Baron, or did you not notice my ring?’ he shot back equally coolly, holding up his hand. ‘But, if that happens, I will personally activate the Archway and get you and Kia out of here.’
Kia looked shocked. ‘You’ll come with us right, Uncle?’
‘I’m sorry my dear. I’d stay behind to destroy the Archway so you couldn’t be followed.’
‘Surely someone else could do that?’ she asked hopefully.
‘What kind of man would I be if I left someone to do a duty I was afraid to do? Besides, other people can’t whisk themselves away in a whirlwind and fire afterward.’
‘I could,’ Jahnyz said.
‘Jahnyz, while I do not doubt your abilities, I do doubt your wisdom. If this Sorcerer is powerful, how could you hope to get past him after destroying the Archway?’
‘If he is that powerful, how would you hope to get past him, master?’ the Apprentice wondered.
‘I have a few more tricks at my disposal than you,’ Azra said flatly. ‘Now Kia, I want you to stay in the palace. Let Cina and her guards do the fighting.’
‘But my skill with the bow is second to none. You need every hand you can get,’ Kia argued.
‘I admire your spirit my dear, but I can’t go out there and fight thinking you’re in danger.’
A bell sounded from outside.
John snapped up straight and put on a helmet he had been holding at his side.
‘The enemy is here,’ he barked.
John rush
ed out the door, followed by Jahnyz. Kia and Cina stood in the lobby. Kia looked uneasy. Azra spared her one more glance before walking out the double doors and into the courtyard. John was already rushing to the walls with his remaining forces. A red flag was waving on the wall, declaring the enemy had been spotted.
Into the Storm
‘We take what is given, but we also take what we want... this is what we have learned from the desert... this is what we will teach the world!’
-The Mysterious Sorcerer Shakla, to his Zharin Raiders followers, in the months before his attack on Jarridon
JARRIDON – BAZRA DESERT – HALLI
Rushing out of his palace, toward the area where the waving flag marked the sighting of the enemy, Azra found Jahnyz waiting.
‘What am I to do master?’
‘Need you ask? Go and help our forces with whatever Mahgic you can.’
‘Yes master,’ Jahnyz said with a quick bow, before rushing off in pursuit of John Fort, the Captain of the Guard.
‘Why here? Why my city?’ Azra said to himself softly.
He recalled the words of Ahaki, telling him that his enemy made no efforts to mask his movements, and then reflected on the reports of the scouts, telling of sandstorms any time they got close.
Things weren’t adding up.
Azra stood still, and closed his eyes, calling up his Mahgical know how. He focused his thoughts, and then opened his eyes again. He looked around. He was a few feet in front of his body. His body was still standing perfectly still, but now a thin silver line extended from his forehead to where his vision was coming from.
He thought, and found himself on the walls looking out over the desert sands. One of the roads from his city stretched off to the side, lined by grass and shrubs to keep the sand from encroaching over it. That particular road lead to the south, towards the mountains that bordered the Bazra Desert, and on to the rest of the kingdom. It was only a few day’s travel before one began to see something other than the hot burning sands of the Bazra.
In the distance, a cloud of sand was blowing towards them.
Azra thought, and found himself closer to the cloud.
Another thought and he was closer still, this time capable of making out bodies in the cloud. The sands blew sharply around them, but didn’t touch them, kept away by an unseen force.
Azra knew what kind of force that would be.
The Raiders wore dusty robes and head coverings, of such a colour as to blend in with the sand of the desert. At their head, sitting atop a large, black, lizard, sat a being unlike any Azra had seen before.
Mounted atop the black lizard, a human shape, with a snake-head rode forward. The creature wore some dusty robes, but its scaly black arms were visible from its ill-fitting clothes. The being looked right at Azra, and smiled a strange smile, flicking its forked tongue out.
Before he could react, Azra found himself slammed back into his body.
He was momentarily winded from the force of the blow.
He looked down at his hands and found them shaking.
He cursed under his breath and ran for the walls.
He made good time towards the gate house, and saw guards clustering atop the wall. A few them had bows out, with an arrow notched, but without the string pulled back; just waiting.
Azra entered the gate house and ran up the stairs to the top of the wall. He found Jahnyz in the house, in the middle of a spell.
He stood by and waited for her to finish.
She looked up at him, and asked, ‘Shouldn’t you be back at the palace, Master?’
‘You’re going to need my help on this one Jahnyz,’ Azra frowned.
*
OUTSIDE JARRIDON – BAZRA DESERT – HALLI
‘Lord Shakla, the city of Jarridon is in sight,’ said a bowed Raider to the tall snake-man on the broad back of the huge, black, lizard.
The leader of the Raiders, Amahl, dressed in the sandy wraps and robes of his people, looked to the serpentine Sorcerer above him.
Shakla looked down at Amahl. His desert wraps hid his face, revealing only his icy blue eyes.
‘Sssound the attack,’ the lizard man hissed.
‘Yes Lord.’
The Raider rushed away from the Sorcerer, towards his companions. They all scattered to the dunes, hiding behind them, making their way towards the city.
Shakla closed his reptilian eyes, and the sandstorm intensified, engulfing the whole of the city before him.
*
JARRIDON – BAZRA DESERT – HALLI
Azra shielded his eyes with his hand, and peered into the gloom.
‘This blasted storm is going to kill some of our advantage sir!’ John shouted at him over the howling of the wind.
‘And probably some of our men,’ Azra grumbled back. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Just don’t put yourself in danger sir.’
‘You worry about keeping your men alive.’
‘With all due respect, we’ve been over this.’
‘And I still haven’t agreed to your point of view.’
‘Now may not be the best time to be having this old argument, Milord.’
‘John, I’m inclined to agree with you this time,’ Azra smiled, as he walked towards one of the towers and took shelter inside. He leaned up against the wall by the door and made an effort to calm his nerves.
I haven’t been this tense since the Wyzardry tests. Who is this sorcerer to have me so on edge?
A mild tingling was dancing on the skin of his palms, as he pushed his thoughts away. Azra clenched and unclenched his fists. The tingle was still there.
He shook his head and took a deep breath.
He stood still and concentrated. The tingle moved from his palms to his whole hand and then advanced up his arm. Soon his whole body tingled as though a mild charge was passing through it. It grew stronger and stronger until his body felt as though it was burning from the inside out.
With his power at an apex, he focused it into a whirlwind centred by the courtyard of his palace. The howling winds outside changed tone for a moment, and momentarily the sands got worse. Then the whirlwind died, and with it, so too went the Mahgic fuelling the winds of the sandstorm. Azra’s whirlwind had been imbued with a nullifying Mahgic.
Outside the walls, shouts indicated that the enemy was now visible.
*
OUTSIDE JARRIDON – BAZRA DESERT – HALLI
Shakla blinked against the sudden return of direct sunlight, his sandstorm shattered by a counter spell from within the city. It had been tremendously powerful, the effects of it having easily shattered the enchantments he had placed on his Raider army. Of course that also meant that whoever the Mahgic user within the city was, he had also destroyed any enchantments placed on the defenders.
They were on equal footing for the time being.
The city’s defenders had the walls – which would complicate things – but his raiders were more numerous, and blended in with the desert lands easily. Their true numbers would be hard to discern for some time.
But they still needed to take the walls.
Shakla hoped that the now clear sky wouldn’t betray the second group of Raiders working their way around the city to the far wall, which was less well defended now.
To help things along, he began to reweave the enchantments on his own forces.
Fire and Mahgic
‘What have you heard of this, Mahgic power... is it like Dorash at all?’
-Midrianda Zhet, a Verin Warrior in the First Galaxy, within the Loute Empire, speaking candidly with a young Paltian named, Dykyn
JARRIDON – BAZRA DESERT – HALLI
The door to the guard tower burst open and Jahnyz rushed in.
‘Master, did you feel that? An anti-Mahgic blast. It’s completely wiped out all the enchantments I placed on our men!’
Azra’s face tightened, and he said, ‘That was me.’
‘A warning would be appreciated next time!’ the girl s
aid tersely.
‘You know I don’t always have the best of control over my spells,’ Azra retorted
‘No, it’s another one of your many irritating failings. You’ve told me countless times, the energy just comes to you on its own and you have to channel it into a spell immediately or risk a greater calamity. It amazes me you ever became a Wyzard.’
Azra took a deep breath, and he countered, ‘You chose me for your master.’
‘I was drawn by the ferocity of your Mahgic. If I had known it came from something that couldn’t be controlled – let alone taught – I may have chosen differently.’
‘ENOUGH!’ Azra snapped. ‘Bickering will not win this day. Go and remake your enchantments. Leave me be, or so help me, if we live, I will see to it you never get the chance to take the tests!’
Looking angry, but resigned, Jahnyz left the tower, slamming the door behind her.
Azra ran his hand through his hair, and leaned against the wall. His body had a lingering numbness to it – a side effect of the power of his last spell. It would fade in a myno... it always did, but he didn’t have the luxury of just sitting around and waiting.
He opened the door to the tower and stepped out.
Guards on the wall were standing alert and ready. The ones with bows fired into the desert below, aiming at the figures that occasionally stuck out from behind the nearby dunes. As the figures inched closer, there was less and less cover for them, but their numbers seemed to be growing by the myno. Already, the garrison was outnumbered. However, they still held the wall, which gave them a clear advantage over the attackers.
The garrison was also made up of professional soldiers, trained since recruitment, in the art of war, and equipped with the best equipment Azra could afford to give them. The Raiders, however, had whatever equipment they had managed to loot or pillage during their generations of living in the Bazra Wastes. They also knew of war, but of a different kind. There’s was the war like the sandstorm – blow in with unstoppable fierceness, passing over any defence to get what they want, and sow confusion in their wake, only to blow away shortly after.
