Jake's Break - Book Six of Wizards

by John Booth

  Dragons took to the air from all directions. I had to deploy magic to stop being blown over by the downdraft. Dragons fly mainly by magic, but when your wings are big enough to cover a football field even a small flap can feel like a hurricane.

  I climbed onto Fluffy’s back and we flew into the air to join them, forming a giant V with us at point.

  I looked at the mass of dragons behind me. What I needed was an inspiring phrase to get them in the mood. I considered ‘Geronimo’ which had a certain cachet to it, but it didn’t seem Welsh enough. The Welsh were not given to inspiring phrases though, so I settled for “Follow me,” and hopped to the Diamond Worlds.

  Fluffy flipped us into glim as we hovered a thousand feet above the Temple complex.

  [YOURS WILL BE THE FIRST BLOW.] Galator said.

  I had decided what I was going to do during the long sleepless night I’d just endured. There are five forbidden spells that students in the Balmack Accord are taught so they will know to never perform them. One of those was Energy Conversion, in Earth science terms it was how to convert matter to pure energy.

  I readied the spell and set it to go off in the middle of the Inner Temple. If my university ever found out about this act they would expel me; once they had stripped my powers from me.

  Very little matter was involved. I broke the bonds that bound the atoms in place and the Inner Temple became a ball of intense white light. Buildings across the grounds were battered and roofs sent flying. As the shock wave hit the outer walls I saw men fall screaming to their deaths.

  [You really are pissed off, aren’t you?] Fluffy said in a tone of thought approaching awe.

  The next moment we materialized from glim and the air was filled with a mass of diving dragons, each searching for someone to kill.

  48. Massacre

  I hopped from Fluffy’s back to the ground. Knights were staggering out of the buildings on the far side of the lake. They looked dazed and confused, and while some were carrying swords, most were without armor or shields. Hopping to just in front of the ones with swords I sent a wave of raw magic pellets at them, destroying swords and the odd piece of armor.

  Seeing their enemy up close and personal spurred a group of the men into action. They ran at me as if trying to overwhelm me with sheer force of numbers. I felt a red fog descend over my thoughts and sent waves of destruction at them, tearing them limb from limb, scattering blood and gore in all directions. I ended up splattered with their blood, warm on my face and tasting of iron.

  Some of the Knights without armor or swords were running away as fast as their legs would carry them. I readied some magic that would cut their legs off, but never got to launch it. An ancient dragon flew across their path and rained dragonfire down on them. Screams were cut short as dragonfire burns very quickly and the smell of roasting flesh assailed my senses.

  An indescribable scream came from the sky. I looked up to see an ancient majestic dragon falling in flames. Looking towards one of the mansions, I saw Knights in battle armor using alien tech to shoot at the dragons. It looked like they had already killed one.

  I hopped to a hundred feet from the men and tried to destroy their weapons with dragonfire, but their armor was enough to suck my magic from the air before it could reach them. Looking around for inspiration I spotted a massive block of stone embedded in the ground. A part of the Inner Temple I’d just destroyed. My magic picked it up and I threw it at the Knights.

  “Let your exotic-magic stop that,” I whispered as the stone hit the two men, crushing their bodies to pulp.

  [THANK YOU,] Galator thought at me as he aimed dragonfire at the Knights standing next to the crushed bodies. Their armor protected them and they screamed in defiance as his massive form flew on in search of easier targets.

  The stone trick suited my mood. I wanted to hurt these murderers every bit as much as I wanted to kill them. I wanted them to feel pain before they died.

  Remnants of the Inner Temple rose into the air around the enemy. The Knights who had just screamed defiance fell silent as the blocks of masonry floated eerily above their heads. A commander issued an order and swords pointed at me, cutting off the magic holding the stones in the air. I think the commander realized his mistake as the first stone started to fall. He started to yell out orders, but the block that crushed his skull also cut off his command.

  A few men screamed in agony until a burst of Dragonfire from above cut them off. It seems that crushing a Knight’s armor robs it of its virtue. I filed that knowledge away for future reference as I went in search of more people to kill.

  A small mansion stood virtually intact some distance from the lake. Arrows flew from slits in its sides. My attempts to stop the arrows failed so I knew they were also imbued with exotic-magic. I was beyond bow range so I was in no danger, but then, neither were they. Several dragons drenched the building in dragonfire to no avail. It was protected.

  Their exotic-magic meant my projected magic could get no closer than thirty feet or so from the building. Either they had no swords or couldn’t use them from inside the building because no attempt was being made to strip me of magic. I looked around and a humorous thought occurred to me. Well, it seemed funny at the time.

  The earth buckled up around the building to form a circular container. A wall of earth that was soon taller than the building it surrounded. I took a massive scoop of water from the lake and dropped in onto the building from above. Screams stopped as the building became hidden beneath frothing waves. Some of the defenders surfaced in the new lake I had created. Then one of the monster fish I brought along with the water discovered it was feeding time. I turned away, smirking at the screams.

  The Temple grounds were littered with bodies, many burnt, but some dismembered by the dragons. As I walked between them, a Knight got unsteadily to his feet. He had lost his helmet and I could see he was no more than fourteen years old.

  “Please…”

  I stared at him. In my mind I saw him grown and cutting the head off of an innocent girl. It was an illusion and I knew it, but here was the next generation of Knights standing before me, asking me for mercy.

  A flash of raw magic dissolved his armor. A flash of normal magic dissolved his flesh and his skeleton, red with his blood fell at my feet. His skull rolled towards me to stop at my feet.

  The battlefield was finally silent. Fires burned and black smoke laced with the stench of death drifted across the ground. It was over. The Knights were gone, obliterated from the multiverse like the cancer they were.

  The flapping of wings and a touchdown that was more slide than landing informed me that Fluffy had arrived behind me.

  [We seem to have killed everybody.] His mind cast was a little uncertain, as if he was unsure this was a good thing. [The Dragons are going. Galator asked me to thank you for the entertainment.]

  “The good people of Sanforino don’t seem to be coming to help their Knights.”

  [Would you?]

  I found myself laughing. It started off normal enough, but by the end it had a touch of hysteria in it.

  “Did we do a good thing?” I asked. It had felt good when doing it. Now doubt coursed through my mind. How many people had I killed? How many good people?

  [It was necessary.] Fluffy nudged me with his head and I put my arm around his neck.

  “They had a couple of high tech weapons. Can you imagine what they would have done if they had all had those?”

  [We would not be alive to discuss it.]

  “I feel empty. Do you feel empty?”

  Fluffy nuzzled me and it tickled.

  [They would have killed thousands of wizards and many dragons. As it was, we lost one of our elders today. I think we what we did was the lesser of those evils.]

  I smiled. “Would that look good on my tombstone?”

  [Above the name The Great Destroyer?]

  It was as if a cloud passed across the sun. I felt my smile fade.

  [Let us go home, Jake.]


  It was a good idea. I mounted Fluffy and he hopped us to the Bat Cave.

  49. Dreams And Repercussions

  I sat in the command chair of the spaceship with the hidden fleet. The little glowing girl stood next to me and the screen displayed a battle in progress. There were icons indicating planets, suns, galaxies, and universes. All but the universes were being engaged by the ships of my fleet.

  I watched as icons disappeared. The side of the screen had a tally showing threats. As icons vanished from the screen their equivalent icon on the list became greyed out. There were many more active threats than ones eliminated.

  As far as I could tell, we were losing, or at the very least, not winning fast enough.

  “The battle is going as expected,” the little girl said calmly. “All ships are being withdrawn from 175498 in preparation for its destruction.”

  “What is 175498?” I asked. It seemed I should know the answer to that question, but I couldn’t quite recall it.

  “The universe you were born in.”

  I woke up sweating. No one should have the power to destroy a universe.

  [You are disturbed. Has something happened?]

  I had been sleeping against my dragon’s neck. We used to sleep like that a lot when I was a child, but I was sure I had gone to sleep on the couch.

  “Bad dream.”

  It occurred to me that I could probe the Dragon’s race memory about the fleet.

  “I dreamed I was controlling a spaceship that was part of an automated battle fleet, nonsense of course.”

  [Such fleets exist in the multiverse. Many of the high tech worlds are fond of creating them.]

  “I must have watched too many science fiction movies.”

  [The prophecies about the Great Destroyer talk also of the Ghost Fleet.]

  “What’s a Ghost Fleet?”

  Fluffy put his head back down on the floor of the cave and sighed.

  [At the end of the war with the Diabli, the high tech worlds were rumored to be creating a fleet of immense spaceships. Before they could be used, the damaged universes collapsed from the space-time holes punched in them by the Diabli swords. The universes just vanished. We believed those universes to have been completely destroyed, until you showed otherwise. The war was over and we had won. There was no need for a new battle fleet.]

  “The Dragons never saw the fleet?”

  [The high tech worlds were secretive. The Dragons never saw anything they created for the war until they used it. There were many fleets that fought alongside the Dragons during the war, but the Ghost Fleet was rumored to be more destructive than anything that had gone before.]

  “And the prophesies say that this fleet is waiting for the Great Destroyer?”

  Fluffy chuckled and fire splattered against the far wall.

  [Nothing in prophecy is that clear. The Great Destroyer will burn the multiverse with ancient ships is about the closest you get.]

  “Wonderful. I’m going home.”

  I hopped.

  Jenny rushed to greet me as I appeared in the lounge. Merlin looked up at me from where he was playing, but didn’t come to me.

  “Are they dead? I know you won because I felt Retnor’s elation.”

  Now the anger had gone, I was left with the feeling what we’d done against the Knights was not exactly noble. One thing was for certain, I wasn’t elated about it.

  “We wiped them out.”

  “Good. They deserved it.”

  I didn’t want to talk about it, so I changed the subject.

  “How is Malcolm doing?”

  Jenny stepped away from me, her face serious.

  “He’s in some kind of mental ward in hospital. They were worried he might be a suicide risk. Most of the people who died were his relatives. He was very close to his aunts.”

  I remembered the faces of the dead old women in the church, puzzled eyes looking up at me. I sat down and looked at nothing, blanking the world out. Time passed.

  “Cup of tea, love.” Jenny placed the cup on the coffee table. She must have gone off to make it when I sat down.

  “Should we go and visit? I might be able to help him.”

  Jenny frowned. “Give him a few days. It might make him worse to see you.”

  The doorbell rang. Jenny rushed off to answer it.

  “It’s Bronwyn.” Jenny stepped to the side to let her into the room.

  “I’m so sorry. I would never… if I had known.” Bronwyn looked distressed, but I wasn’t fooled for a second.

  “You do what is best for you, for Tydan. You always do. I was healing Dren and you wanted that more than anything else. He is one of your soldiers, in your charge, and he mattered much more to you than Silvia.”

  Bronwyn looked taken aback and close to tears. She might have said something more, but Merlin had left his toys and stood in front of her, the picture of a child’s righteous anger.

  “Go ‘way, Bron. Never come back.”

  Tears slid down Bronwyn’s face.

  Morgana hopped into the room, hovering above Merlin.

  “Go ‘way,” she screamed.

  It was too much for Bronwyn, she hopped.

  “Kids, that was very rude,” Jenny said

  “Deserved it,” Merlin and Morgana said simultaneously. Morgana disappeared.

  “Jake, tell your son.”

  “I kind of agree with him.”

  “Men, you’re all hopeless.”

  Jenny stomped out of the room leaving Merlin and me to stare at each other.

  “I tried my best,” I told him.

  He nodded, but he turned away and went back to his toys. He was playing with bricks, but not like normal kids do. Each brick changed as he picked it up, becoming part of a complex city scape. When he put the brick with the ones he had already changed it seemed to come alive. I swear I could hear city noises, helicopters and cars honking horns.

  I went back to staring at nothing.

  50. Ghost Fleet

  “Since she has learned to hop she has become impossible,” Esmeralda told me as soon as I arrived in the Palace. “And I blame you that she hopped into a battle.”

  “Merlin called her,” I pointed out in what I thought was a reasonable defense.

  “And he is your son. Morgana is the heir to the Heir and should not be subject to such risks, especially at her age. She is still a baby.”

  Despite Esmeralda’s words I heard the pride beneath them. No doubt all of the subjects of the Kingdom of Salice were now aware that Morgana had rescued her half-brother from the Knights of Justice. It was perfect propaganda and the Doran’s didn’t rule Salice just because they were good people.

  “What do you want me to do about it?”

  Esmeralda waved her hands about. “You are the all-powerful wizard, the Great Destroyer. Surely you can use your magic to stop her using hers.”

  “She is more likely to respond to her mother’s commands.”

  A half-smile played over Esmeralda’s lips.

  “She has told me she cannot obey me. That lives would be put at risk if she did.”

  “Think what she will be like when she’s older. She scares the hell out of me already. She should be playing with dolls and learning her letters.”

  I saw the gears shift in Esmeralda from worried mother into proud parent.

  “They act twice their age because their link means they learn twice as fast. And she is a Doran. We are all clever.”

  “I could put an anti-hop spell over her and she would crack it a week, a month at most. I’d rather save it till when it’s important.”

  Esmeralda understood at once and put an arm around me. “Some of the Doran wisdom must have rubbed off on you. Now tell me why you have come.”

  “Can’t a man visit his wife and child?”

  “He can, but I sense you have an ulterior motive.”

  Which was true. However, I’d been neglecting Esmeralda and Salice, and I needed to spend more time here. I put that thought aside f
or the moment and got down to business.

  She mused over the problem for several minutes before she spoke.

  “You must visit this Ghost Fleet again and assess its capability. A weapon of unknown potential could get you killed. You fear its power as much as you lust after it, which is why you are dreaming of it.”

  “It’s that simple? I just need to know what the fleet can do and the dreams will stop?”

  Esmeralda kissed me lightly on the cheek.

  “The burden of power is not so easily lifted. But at least your uncertainty will be ended.”

  “I’ll come back soon,” I promised and hopped to Betty.

  Betty handed me Freyja as I arrived.

  “Hold her while I make her meal.”

  “Is your mother around?” I looked around warily.

  “She went shopping when it was clear you were coming. You want to know if you are becoming the Great Destroyer. What do you think? You killed all those people at the Temple. Women and children were fried in dragonfire, if not blown to pieces while praying for peace and a happy life. What kind of man does that make you?”

  Well, that cleared the air. I watched Betty warm Freyja’s food and put it on a tray. She took Freyja from my arms and put her in a high chair.

  Freyja was already smiling and I saw her anticipate her mother actions, opening her mouth before Betty put the spoon in the dish. It must be strange to know what the future holds, even if only for a few seconds ahead.

  “I was angry,” I told her. “I don’t believe I had the choice to capture them and then prosecute the guilty ones.”

  “You’ll never know that now, will you?”

  I conceded the point. One of us could never know all the alternative futures and the other could rarely be persuaded to speak of them.

  Freyja was eating her meal like she was starving. At this rate she’d be finished in less than a minute. Betty finished feeding her before she decided to say anything more. She exhaled slowly as if preparing herself.

  “You took the least worst choice. This time.”