by Jason Kenyon
‘What…’ Obdo began.
‘Ye passed out,’ Farmer Belias replied. ‘I’ve bad news fer ye.’
‘Where is Sir Mage?’ Obdo asked.
‘Dead,’ Belias replied. ‘’E got ‘imself into a fight in the pub an was thrown out. Apparently ‘e wandered inter the forest an’ was caught by the demons. I think it were quick, an’ ‘e was too drunk ter really feel any pain.’
Obdo stared back. ‘Tell me this is a bad joke.’
‘Nay, lad,’ Belias replied, passing the farmhand a drink.
Obdo shook his head and pushed the tankard away. ‘No. I’m never drinking again. This is my fault. He was in no state to be left alone, I should have…’
‘What’s done is done,’ Belias said. ‘It wasnae yer fault. Was unlucky chance.’
‘No, it wasn’t,’ Obdo said. ‘Neurion was right, I am useless! I let Sir Mage die. And I was supposed to be… I mean, he was going to get better… I…’ He slumped to the floor.
‘Well, just stay right ‘ere,’ Belias said. ‘I’ve a job fer ye tomorrow evenin’, an’ yer presence there’ll be appreciated. Alright?’
‘Whatever you say,’ Obdo replied.
‘Excellent,’ Belias said with a smile.
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Plains of Desolation
Everything was darkness. A nameless shade lay in total blackness, where the only sensation was the rough, pebble-strewn ground. The shade tapped the ground and a slight echo filled the shadows. As the shade got to its indistinct feet it became steadily more aware of its body and put a hand to its face, finding a beard and longish, soft hair that was just short of brushing its shoulders. As its fingers trailed around its face it found eyes, which were screwed shut. It rubbed them and eventually they slid open.
It stood in a very small tunnel, garbed in a dull grey robe. On the floor was a small lantern that was flickering in quite a distracting fashion. The shade knelt and was about to pick up the lantern when it noticed a little scrap of paper. Looking about for anyone who might have dropped it, the shade found it was all alone. It settled down and made itself comfortable, before looking at the scrap of paper.
Ardon Forseld.
A name. Its name. Looking around again, the shade saw a handy mirror hanging from a peg on the tunnel’s wall. The shade gazed at its reflection and nodded. Ardon Forseld. That was who he was.
Sitting around here was no good. Ardon picked up the lantern and wandered down the tunnel, not bothering to look back. After maybe half an hour, he found a book. He checked again but there was not a soul close by who might have left it, so he leant down and retrieved it, his eyes narrowing as they ran over the title.
Memories.
Curious, he opened the book, and of their own accord the pages fluttered past one by one, and bit by bit Ardon remembered. His childhood, his training, work, the war, the years after the war, his time as a mage, his shaming, New Valanthas and Belias…
The book snapped shut, shrank, and popped out of existence.
So that was it, he supposed. He had died. This was the path to the Afterlife, or Oblivion, whatever lay beyond the gateway of Death. Just an empty tunnel. Not much to look forward to, really.
But onwards he went anyway, for whatever reason. If this was the end of the world, then he might as well get his bearings.
His wanderings brought him eventually to a great wooden ladder that led up into more shadows. It was like looking down into a well, and for a moment it seemed to Ardon that he was upside down on the ceiling, pointing head-first down an endless pit. Regardless of these momentary concerns he started off up the ladder and ponderously made his way up, up… onwards into a void that promised no ending. His strength wavered as sweat drenched the featureless grey clothes that were all that had warmed him in this violently cold cave. Now he felt quite the opposite, the heat of exertion burning him, and occasionally he looked back down into the blackness wondering if he would just fall down into it and that would be the end.
It was not to be so as with a sudden unpleasant wash of cold air Ardon clambered out of the hole and stood upon a mind-numbingly vast field of stone that was flat and, aside from its rough surface, entirely featureless. Overhead a starry sky, that seemed, in some absurd way, to be higher than that of Valanthas, blinked down at him.
What was there to do in this dead world but walk? Without any particular choice of direction, Ardon set out in a straight line and just carried on blankly, his lantern providing only the feeblest of warmth as the cold cut through his damp robes.
And so Ardon Forseld reached the end of the world. The ground fell away and below gaped another abyss.
‘Well then, Ardon Forseld,’ said a voice. ‘Nothing is left. Jump, there’s nothing else for you.’
Ardon looked down, kneeling to get a better view. To just jump seemed a pretty stupid course of action, and a bit of a weak way to end things after surviving everything else. He shook his head and stepped up and away from the abyss.
‘Then you have a life worth going back to,’ the voice said. ‘Good. We can work with this.’ An ethereal stairway appeared over the abyss, leading to a doorway. ‘Step through, Forseld, and you need not be alone any longer.’
Ardon glanced back at the empty plain and nodded. ‘Very well,’ he said, and he crossed the stairway without another pause.
And fell flat on his face. On the plus side it was a nice, comfortable carpet. Rising to his feet, he took in his latest surroundings. It appeared that the doorway had dumped him in a mansion of some sort, or someplace well-furnished at the least. To judge from the golden statues and curious relics and artefacts on display, whoever owned this place was rich, and something of an art fan. That or someone intellectual.
Ardon eyed himself in one of very many grand mirrors that adorned the varnished oak walls. No longer was he grey-haired, but instead the brown-haired thirty-year-old handyman of before the old war. He blinked and then jumped as he saw another figure behind him, who had most certainly not been there before.
It was an old-ish man in black and gold robes, looking rather grand indeed.
‘It’s me!’ Ardon said.
‘Indeed so, knave!’ Archimegadon said. He frowned and seized Ardon’s grey robes, giving them a cursory inspection before pushing himself away. ‘Tush, what utter filth is this I am wearing? You are a disgrace, sir!’
Ardon glared. ‘You are dead. That part of me is gone, thankfully.’
‘I am rather disappointed,’ Archimegadon said, ‘that I have taken the word of a treacherous mage intent on killing almost the entire world as valid and accurate.’
‘Delarian intends to help save Valanthas,’ Ardon said. ‘Much as I hate to say it, I think he may have a point.’
‘Balls,’ Archimegadon said. ‘Nonsense. Piffle. You have been splendidly hoodwinked, old bean. Had you paid attention to Lord Bartell, you might have noticed he plans to kill anyone and everyone who does not fit in with his worldview, regardless of whether they deserve it or not. But Bartell is driven by a bitterness that grows with each day, much like you, and indeed I, are driven. You, for the wagons, and him, as he is endlessly overshadowed in his own mind, and, yes, in reality too. He has high standards and falls short of his own expectations. His closest friend, Delarian, is renowned as a greater hero, and Akarith never granted him her heart.’
‘What do I care about any of this?’ Ardon asked with a shrug.
‘Tush, for one who lectures me,’ Archimegadon said, ‘you are displaying the very arrogance for which you despise me. It matters to you, old chap, because Bartell has turned his unforgiving eye on his new people. I assure you, he will find them lacking. And they will die for it. Are you willing to sit around moping like some bloody prat while everyone dies in your place?’
‘I am not moping,’ Ardon replied. ‘But I must atone.’
‘For what, you ass?’
‘For conning the people of Valanthas!’ Ardon replied. ‘Your fault!’
‘Balls, it was a pe
rfectly good business,’ Archimegadon said. ‘Sort of. Well, perhaps a tiny bit silly, but hey.’
‘But hey?’ Ardon asked. ‘Is that all you can manage?’
Archimegadon strode up to Ardon and prodded him in the centre of his chest. ‘You overcharged some people, yes. And indeed pretended a certain amount of competence you lacked. But tush! I think I am rather splendid.’
‘You are not,’ Ardon said. ‘I was not. It is better this way.’
‘You have let Delarian outwit you!’ Archimegadon said. ‘It is time you woke up! Bartell and Delarian… Belias and his master… they all need to be stopped. And I do not trust anyone to do it better than myself.’
‘Then you are still in the grip of delusions,’ Ardon said. ‘Go away.’
‘Briefly,’ Archimegadon said with a touch of smugness. ‘First, though, here’s a place to go.’ The mage pointed and a pair of doors swung open, revealing only shadows. ‘That should be some fun.’ He stuck a thumb out in the direction of the main doors. ‘Failing that, you can pop back to New Valanthas, where Delarian’s spell will take hold again. Up to you.’
Ardon glared. ‘Out of curiosity,’ he said, moving away from the exit and towards the shady room. ‘Anyway, it’s just a room, not like I’ll get stuck in there or anything.’
Archimegadon chuckled and disappeared.
‘Good riddance,’ Ardon said. ‘Stupid man.’
Well, nothing else for it, he supposed. Without glancing at the door to New Valanthas he stepped through the doorway and onto a wooden floor. He raised his gaze and saw two horses, and then torn fields where birds preyed on the dead. He was standing on the old wagon, in the Valanthas of thirty years ago.
‘Not here,’ Ardon said.
‘So if you were a hero,’ Berus asked behind him, ‘what name would you choose?’
‘I would be the great Archidon!’ a somewhat familiar figure to Ardon’s right replied. It was, of course, himself. With all these copies of himself cropping up, he was starting to feel like he was the fake. ‘Saviour of the downtrodden, hero of the weak.’
‘Yeah, sure you would be,’ said a female voice, and Ardon felt stabbed as he watched a young woman giggle at his past self. ‘You’d get them all to line up and pay you tribute!’
The old Ardon smirked. ‘Well, you know, Kalissa… the niceties must be observed after all.’
‘Anyway, if you took on that sort of name,’ Kalissa said, ‘we’d have to call you Archie instead. That’s way too long to remember.’
Archie threw a humorous look at Berus. ‘You have trouble with three syllables?’
‘Oh shush,’ she said. ‘You know what I meant, Archie.’
‘Show some respect,’ Archie said.
‘We will when you do, Archie, old boy,’ Berus said.
‘Hmph, you can hush too,’ Archie said. ‘I tell you, my name shall be spoken o’er the land! Why, even kings shall quake in awe.’
‘Only at the size of your head,’ Berus said.
‘I shall be forced to smite you both for your insolence, of course,’ Archie said, nodding. ‘Alright?’
‘Whatever you say, Archie,’ Kalissa replied with a grin.
The real Ardon stumbled backwards and fell on his backside, and found that he was sitting in that corridor (and thus the nice, soft carpet had once again spared him too much discomfort). The scene ahead of him seemed to be sucked into the horizon until the doors he’d walked through reappeared. Archimegadon was there as well, this time sitting on a small chair as though he was upon a grand throne. The old mage smiled mockingly down at him.
‘Back so soon?’ Archimegadon asked.
‘I don’t want to see any more.’
‘Tush,’ Archimegadon said. ‘A frivolous memory, hardly something to fear.’
‘That time is long gone,’ Ardon said. ‘Long may it remain there.’
‘You cannot keep pretending huge segments of your life never happened,’ Archimegadon said.
‘Maybe not,’ Ardon said. ‘But I see no reason to dwell on them.’
‘Don’t fool yourself into thinking you never think about them,’ Archimegadon said. ‘I know, after all, being as I am you.’
‘You are not!’ Ardon said. ‘Now be useful and tell me what the hell is going on here!’
‘You cast a spell, old bean,’ Archimegadon said. ‘Something of an accident, but rather fortuitous bearing in mind you were about to be savaged.’
‘And..?’
‘And you ended up in here,’ Archimegadon replied. ‘The old, true Mage Academy.’
‘Not Orgus Alhamis’s..?’
‘Nope. The true one before the necromancer destroyed it,’ Archimegadon replied. ‘A hive of magical activity before, it is now a deserted magical death trap. You managed to cast a rather shaky teleport spell, and the staff which is bound to you managed to direct your lack of aim here. I believe it has knowledge of this place, which presumably dates it back to the old, old days of Valanthas, when this Academy was actually in business.’
‘Get on with it.’
‘Hmph.’ Archimegadon spread his arms. ‘This whole place is deserted, and a sole gatekeeper remains to prevent entry. Not much she could do about you, mind. The place will play on your mind and your memories. It may interest you to know that it was in studying this place that Sen devised the spell he ruined me with.’
‘So what’s the point in me being here?’ Ardon asked. ‘I may as well just leave.’
‘Ah, but if you want true peace of mind, old bean,’ Archimegadon replied, ‘you must confront your mind. Delarian’s spell allows no space for thought, and quite deliberately. So do you want to fix yourself, or continue to be useless?’
‘Now look!’ Ardon said. ‘You are beginning to annoy me.’
‘Splendid! Well, ready for the next flight of fancy?’
‘No.’
‘Too bad.’ Archimegadon grabbed Ardon and dragged him with surprising strength over to another door. ‘Here will do fine.’
The mage shoved Ardon and with a flash of coloured dots Ardon found himself in a little office, and before him an Ardon was standing in front of a little round man who was seated quite cosily behind an ornate desk. This Ardon was clearly close to the same age as the one in the previous vision, but great frown lines marred his face, and there were flecks of grey in his brown hair.
‘Whatever are you here for, Master Forseld?’ the little man asked with an air of impatience.
‘I came to collect my pay,’ Ardon replied. ‘As arranged for wagon-running.’
‘Oh, no,’ the man said. ‘No, you won’t be getting paid, heavens no! The war was trying on us all, there’s nothing spare.’
‘I know it was trying,’ Ardon said. ‘I spent my last reserves making the final deliveries. I have very little at all left.’
‘Don’t we all?’
Both Ardons looked around the fine office, opulent down to the jewelled gold rings on the man’s fingers. ‘Apparently not,’ the Ardon of the past replied.
The man made a loud huffing noise. ‘Really, you didn’t actually think we could afford to pay every layabout who sat on a wagon whipping horses all day? Oh, no, no, no, Master Forseld. Much must be rebuilt, you’ll just have to go and earn money properly.’
‘I would say,’ Ardon said, ‘that serving the country on the front lines would count. Where were you, eh?’
‘Now, that really is not the issue,’ the little official replied. ‘It’s not like you were a soldier anyway. There’s no money here for you. You shall just have to beg elsewhere.’
With a shiver of disgust the real Ardon backed out of the scene and bumped into Archimegadon.
‘Anything fun?’ the mage asked.
‘Nothing I didn’t already know,’ Ardon replied. ‘What is the point of all this?’
‘Everything and nothing,’ Archimegadon replied. ‘Now shoo. More doors await.’
‘If this place is a death trap, why keep me here?’ Ardon asked.
‘Ah,’ Archimegadon replied, ‘but it is you who is keeping you here.’
Ardon balled his right hand into a fist. ‘I would incinerate you if I could,’ he said.
‘Excellent!’ Archimegadon said. ‘Now then, let’s have a peek in… there!’ He pointed and another set of doors swung open.
‘And if I am no longer interested in them?’ Ardon asked.
‘Then the way to New Valanthas awaits you!’ Archimegadon replied. ‘Ready?’
‘I need no help crossing a doorway!’ Ardon said.
‘Splendid.’
It was no familiar scene that greeted Ardon this time, but total, suffocating darkness. He felt as though he had indeed fallen into that abyss, and yet his feet seemed to be touching firm ground. He saw a vague figure appear in the distance and strode towards it. The figure was a tall, severe fellow with a wild expression that bordered on madness.
‘Archimegadon,’ Sen Delarian said. ‘You are a disgrace… a disappointment to the order.’
‘What was I to do?’ Ardon asked. ‘I paid you all the money I managed to scrounge back after the war, and you taught me nothing. Yet all the same I managed to make a name for myself… not great everywhere, but it was more than you did for me.’
‘Lies, all you ever say are lies,’ Delarian said, shaking his head in pity.
‘I do not,’ Ardon said. ‘You just don’t like to hear…’
‘Lies,’ Delarian repeated.
‘Silence!’ Ardon said. ‘You claim to be so good and nice, yet for years you ran those mage schools and profited from them without doing a thing to improve them. And now you want to murder people to make up for your failure. The disappointment here is you.’
The spectre of Delarian faded into smoke, but the silence that followed was short-lived.
‘Ardon Forseld,’ Lord Bartell said behind Ardon, and Ardon whirled to face his enemy. ‘Conman and trickster. Half-wit. Easily deceived. Brainless.’ He raised a fist and tightened it, as though throttling some invisible creature. ‘Pathetic. Such an amusement to cast aside. I only regret not killing you, and yet to see you grovel and cower is so… heartening.’
‘Go away,’ Ardon said.
