by B. T. Narro
“Tell me something, and I will answer. How difficult was it for you to destroy the curse with your spell?”
“I almost couldn’t do it.”
“Yeah.” He nodded. “I figured it was powerful. A weaker curse would’ve been destroyed by her body by now. I’m sure it wasn’t him.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because Cason was never good at curses. He doesn’t understand them just like I don’t understand them.”
“Couldn’t he have learned how to curse since you’ve known him?”
“I doubt it. You will discover as you progress that there are certain spells you are just incapable of casting. Even if you were corrupted in solitude and went down a different path, studying dteria instead of dvinia, I doubt you ever would’ve been able to curse anyone. It takes a sick kind of mind to understand how to set a curse on someone, especially a curse as powerful as that one.”
“How do they work?”
“Didn’t you hear me?” he asked as if I was dimwitted. “I already told you I don’t understand them.”
Back to his old self, I see. “You have to at least know a little something.”
He sighed. “All I know is that curses require ingredients, like an enchantment. There are rules to them that are either learned by the witch through forbidden texts, or, in the case of some witches, the rules come intuitively. Those are the most dangerous witches, and I believe that’s what we’re dealing with. Cason never cared for curses. Why would he want to slowly debilitate someone with a curse when he could decimate them with Dislodge? This witch isn’t Cason, but he or she has to be working with Cason.”
“I see.” So Cason had help from very powerful people. That had been obvious already. He had a whole secret army. It was what they had planned that was still a mystery. “Should we be worried about this witch telling Cason that we’re here?”
“I hope Cason shows up. There’s a reason he’s remained hidden, Jon. He knows he would be captured if he showed himself during the day.”
We did have guards everywhere now, and they were all loyal to the king. But I didn’t know how many loyal people Cason had.
There would be a fight one of these days. More than anything I wanted to know when and where it would happen. I couldn’t handle waiting.
“How do you know Cason at all?” I asked.
“He was a young sorcerer in Tryn at the same time that Jennava and I were there using sorcery to earn coin.”
“So he’s younger than you?”
“Yes.”
I wasn’t going to forget Cason’s face anytime soon. He looked older than Leon.
“How old are you?” I asked.
“None of your business.”
We fell silent.
“If you don’t tell me,” I cautioned, “I’m going to assume you’re much too old to be flirting with Aliana’s mother, and that’s the reason you won’t say.”
“When you get to be my age, you don’t flirt. You talk.”
“What age is that? Seventy?”
He glared at me in shock.
All right, not seventy. I tried to think about how old Cason looked. Could he have been fifty? No, he had no gray hair. But what if he’d used uF on himself like Leon and wasn’t as young as he appeared? There was no telling how old either of them were, though I had to guess both were older than thirty but younger than a hundred.
“Sixty?” I tried.
He looked ahead. “I’m not playing this game.”
“Sixty is far too old for Aliana’s young mother.”
“Drop it, Jon.”
“Tell me more about Cason then. How old is he?”
“You just want to know so you can figure out my age. I will tell you something else that might interest you if you drop this.”
“All right.”
“Out of the three sorcerers in Tryn, before the spread of dark magic, Cason was the only one eager for patronage. You might have a guess as to who recruited him.”
“Not Nykal?”
“It was Nykal, yes. There was a competition among nobles at the time to find young sorcerers in need of patronage. Nykal was young as well and desperate to get into the game, and Cason was desperate for patronage. He was an orphan and struggled to support himself before he learned a water spell to earn him coin. Jennava helped him for a while; I left him on his own. I saw how great he might be one day, and I didn’t want to encourage the competition. He was like you, Jon, with a wide range of mana and big dreams. Nykal was the one who Cason first found to fulfill these dreams.”
I didn’t care how similar Leon said we were. I knew Cason couldn’t ever have been that much like me.
“How did the patronage work?” I asked.
“The same way it does now. Most sorcerers are working for a rich family akin to the way you work for the king. The patron pays the sorcerer each week and also provides certain perquisites for the sorcerer. This could be access to rare metals for enchanting, invites to luxurious parties, or something as simple as fine wine from Korrithin. In exchange, the sorcerer has to do whatever the patron asks, or their business deal will come to an end. Most patrons make money off their sorcerers, and the sorcerers are happy to work without negotiating payment for every task they complete. It’s daunting to look for work all the time. Most people would prefer to take the jobs they’re told to take, and sorcerers are no different—except that they’ve got a bit of power to use however they want.”
“I’m surprised. I thought you would’ve rather worked by yourself.”
“I did for many years, but I’m old now. If there was no conflict in the land, I’d be working for a patron right now. Anyway, Nykal supported Cason by giving him his own home here in the capital for a year. Jennava remained friends with Cason, visiting him at times. She’d tell me about him when she came back to Tryn later.”
“Was she around the same age as him?” I wondered if there might’ve been something romantic between Jennava and Cason.
“I’m not talking about ages. Stop asking, or I’ll shut up right now. The only reason I’m telling you anything is because we’re walking back to the castle and we might as well talk about our enemy, but only if you don’t piss me off. You don’t need to know what he was like back then to see what he’s like now. He’s completely lost it to dteria.”
“Fine. What happened after Nykal recruited him?”
“He trained for a while, but then he started dabbling with dteria. When Nykal found out, he told Cason to stop using it or he would have Cason arrested. Cason disappeared soon after that. Jennava didn’t find him anywhere. We both looked for a while. We thought we might fix him before it was too late, but we eventually gave up and I lost touch with Jennava for a while. She must’ve reconnected with Cason in Koluk not long ago and convinced him that she, too, was a dark mage now. It was through her help that we knew about his plan. I’m sure he wants her dead more than anyone.”
“Were they romantically involved when they were younger?”
“Perhaps,” Leon said. “And perhaps again later. It might be something Jennava used to gain his trust.”
I didn’t know much about Jennava, but I was still shocked to hear this. It did give me a clue about Cason’s age, however. If he and Jennava were involved when they were younger, she couldn’t have been too much older than him. She had gray hair now, but there was a youthful spark in her eyes. I didn’t put her over fifty.
Or perhaps she could’ve been much older than Cason when they were involved the first time? Maybe this wasn’t much of a clue after all. I knew so little about Jennava.
“So Jennava met Nykal when all of this started with Cason?” I asked.
“She was probably introduced, but she never got to know him personally. I didn’t get to know him either. Not until recently.”
I thought about all of this in the silence that followed. It was a simpler time back before Cason became powerful. If he’d really had similarities to how I was now, I wondered what his dream
s used to be. Probably the same as mine. He wanted to be as strong as he could. But why would he start using dteria? I never would’ve by choice. I didn’t understand the temptation.
But then I realized something.
“I’m assuming Cason doesn’t have access to dvinia?”
“No. I’m pretty sure the highest frequency he can reach is your natural frequency.”
uF. Now it all makes sense. It was easy to forget that even powerful sorcerers like Cason might not be able to reach the notes high enough to cast with dvinia because an extremely high frequency of mana was required.
I was pretty sure it was the same with Eslenda, the elf who lived in Curdith Forest. She was an illusionist, like Cason, and extremely powerful with erto. If she knew how to use dvinia, I would’ve seen it from her, or maybe even felt it.
“You said he has a wide range,” I commented. “How low can he reach?”
“Certainly to ordia, but you must’ve figured that already because you’ve seen his illusion. I don’t know how much lower he can go past ordia.”
“Could he know the earth?”
“He might.”
“So he can sense people like Aliana can. That’s going to make it extremely hard to catch him.”
“We will find a way.”
I could see the castle ahead, just a few streets away. Something else jumped into my head as I wondered about this witch working with Cason.
“Pamela told me something about the curse before you arrived.”
“What?”
“She said it felt like she could pass out without warning, but she hadn’t done so except once. I’m wondering—”
“If the witch could make her pass out at will.”
“Yes.”
“I’m not sure. All I can tell you is that a curse is a form of mana that stays active within a person’s body.”
That made me curious about something else. “Is all mana within our body? Because it feels to be right outside my skin when I focus on it.”
“It exists inside and out. Anyway, we know that mana can be controlled, and a curse is a form of mana. It’s for that reason I said the witch could have removed the curse long ago but didn’t care to do it.”
“I thought you said a curse is like enchanting.”
“Enchanting gone horribly wrong, yes.”
“But enchanters can’t do anything to an enchant after it is completed.”
Leon shrugged. “Different rules. If you believe in the demigods, you might want to thank Airinold for that. He gave up a lot more of his power to create dteria than Nijja did to create ordia.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in the demigods.”
“I believe in some aspects to the stories, like the ones that make sense. Dteria is stronger than any other magical art. There’s probably a reason for it.”
And the simplest reason is the most likely to be correct. It was something I believed, and it sounded like Leon did as well.
I supposed that meant I believed demigods were real.
I suddenly recognized the man walking toward us. Leon put out his arm protectively across my chest as he stepped in front of me.
“Stay behind me, Jon.”
Cason, with his dark hair and dark cloak, looked almost friendly as he grinned. “Leon. It has been a long time. I’m surprised you still recognize me.”
“It’s the stink of your mana that told me it was you. What have you done to yourself, Cason?”
Cason frowned. “Chosen the winning side. You and Jon could as well. It would be as easy as convincing the king to leave his castle for me. I promise two things to you, old friend: No one will be hurt if you join me, but many will die if you don’t.”
“You hope to be king?”
“No, that role is reserved for someone else.”
The people on the street around us started to murmur as many stopped to stare. I heard Cason’s name among the whispers. Soon, everyone was hurrying away from us but a few who seemed too interested in watching to leave.
The castle was close, but not close enough for anyone there to hear me if I shouted. Cason had waited here for us, most likely. There might be a trap. I looked around, but the street was just about empty.
“You’re going to bring about the destruction of many lives,” Leon said, his voice cold. “But you can stop this. You’re the only one who has the choice to end this without death. Come with me to the castle and let’s negotiate with Nykal.”
“I will walk into the castle when it is clear. Jon, it is a surprise to see you walking.”
I didn’t reply.
“Leon, did you somehow learn to extend your range of mana to lF, or is Jon here just full of surprises?”
Leon whispered to me, “He can heal himself like you can, probably even better. No injury will last.”
“What?” Cason said as he playfully put his hand to his ear. “I can’t hear you.” He casually came toward us as if to listen.
Leon lifted his hands and formed a sphere of fire. Ripples of heat rose up, distorting the sneer on Cason’s face.
“So your decision has been made to fight?”
“You’re sick from dteria!” Leon yelled. “Smiling like a damn fool. I know what it feels like, Cason. You have to resist the urge to use it. If you refrain long enough, your mind will return to normal.”
“This goes far beyond dteria. I’m not surprised that you haven’t figured it out by now. You’ve always been dense.”
“Last chance, Cason.” Leon widened the girth of his hovering fireball. The heat made me wince as I squinted to study our enemy’s eyes. If a trap was in place, Cason would be the first to look in its direction.
I was shocked when, instead, he soared into the air. Cason soon started to come down over us. Leon hurled his fireball up at Cason, but Cason must’ve made a shield of dteria. Leon’s fire washed over the clear energy, sizzling yellow and orange. It continued to burn, revealing a cluster of dteria that suddenly came at our heads with incredible speed.
“Move!” Leon yelled.
I dove as I heard the spell strike the ground between us with a thud. Dust rose up as I got to my feet.
Cason was about to crash down, but an upward swing of momentum gave him a soft landing. He motioned like he was throwing something at me, and another cluster of dteria sped at my chest like a hurled stone.
I fell backward to avoid it. Unfortunately, it struck Leon behind me. It looked like he’d caught a massive steel ball as he was taken off his feet and rolled along the dirt road.
I got up and faced Cason. Neither of us had a weapon, it seemed. Again, I looked around. He couldn’t be here alone. Or was he just that confident?
No, I caught sight of one man coming around the chimney of a roof. He had a sword, a weapon I desperately wanted in my own hands. I looked across the street the other way and saw someone else hopping down from another roof. This man had a long staff. I wasn’t sure if it might be enchanted to enhance his ability somehow or if it was just a melee weapon. Either way, they were quickly surrounding us.
I saw one woman who still had not fled yet. “Get the guards!” I yelled to her.
She didn’t move, just gaped at me.
“Go!” I tried again.
I flinched as something fast moved in front of me. A cluster of clear energy smacked the woman hard enough to toss her into the wall of a building. She fell and did not move.
Cason laughed like a madman, a clear effect of the dteria. “You must see now that it is pointless to stand against me!”
Leon was getting back up with a groan. “Do you even hear yourself? Your mind is completely lost to the dark magic. And more importantly, you sound like an idiot!”
Cason showed gritted teeth as he motioned like he was throwing something at Leon. Another cluster of dteria flew at Leon faster than any man could toss a stone. Leon flicked his hand. A wall of water appeared in front of him.
The clear energy of dteria blasted the water, splashing Leon as he walk
ed through unfazed. The rest of the water fell as a wall of fire quickly took its place.
Leon pushed out his hands and the fire obeyed, morphing into a spear as Leon commanded it at Cason. But the warlock absorbed the fire with another shell of dteria, the flames streaking over the energy to give it color and shape.
Leon was not deterred, shooting a second spear of fire right after the first. But Cason blocked this one in the same way.
I did not stay still any longer to see what happened with the third spear of fire. It seemed that Leon was the target, not me, as the swordsman and staff-holder closed in behind him.
I sprinted to the fallen woman. She wasn’t moving. I didn’t take the time to see if she was dead, readying Heal and casting it as I cupped the back of her head. I felt my mana find the slight crack to her skull just as I started to notice her blood on my hands.
The spell drained my stamina, but soon her eyes popped open. She looked afraid and lurched away.
“Get the guards!” I said as she fell down trying to get up and run away from me.
She looked back at me.
“The guards!” I said again.
“I will!”
I turned back to see Leon expelling all three enemies with a gust of wind that even knocked me down a good ten yards away.
I had figured Leon was powerful, but this was something else.
“It’s a damn trap!” Leon yelled as he ran toward me.
“You’re just now figuring that out?”
“Get to the castle! There’s bound to be more.”
We hadn’t sprinted more than a few paces before Cason flew down in front of us. Leon cursed him.
“Can’t ever beat me fairly, just like in the past,” Leon taunted. “You know what, Cason? I always thought you were a weak-willed idiot, but I never told you because you were always whining about how hard your life was, and I didn’t think you could handle the truth. Clearly, I should’ve told you a long time ago because you’re obviously too stupid to have figured it out for yourself. People like you should not use dteria, ever! You can’t handle it, just like you couldn’t handle being alone. You’re so weak and stupid, you couldn’t even tell that Jennava doesn’t give a shit about you anymore!”
