Chased By War

by Michael Wolff

  Sefiros Eishi: Chased By War

  The Smoke & Mirrors Saga: Book II

  Michael L. Wolff

  © Copyright Michael L. Wolff 2018

  Black Rose Writing | Texas

  © 2018 by Michael L. Wolff

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  The final approval for this literary material is granted by the author.

  First digital version

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Print ISBN: 978-1-61296-007-2

  PUBLISHED BY BLACK ROSE WRITING

  www.blackrosewriting.com

  Print edition produced in the United States of America

  Thanks for everyone who believed I could do this.

  PREVIOUSLY ON

  SEFIROS EISHI: CHASED BY FLAME

  Crippled librarian Mykel LeKym is traveling with his godfather Lazarus on a journey to the libraries of Kal Jada, seat of the Amden nation. They stop for lunch, in which Mykel receives a lesson of the Leylines, rivers of magical power that Weirwynd (magic-users) use in conjunction with shiisaa (objects of magical power) to cast spells. Lazarus relays the history of the Leylines, mourning the fact that magic is dying.

  Then they step into Kal Jada’s borders, from which things go terribly wrong. Mykel is pursued by John Jekai, a mage-slayer in the service of the Solvicar, Amden’s order of warrior-priests. Jekai harbors a malicious hatred of Mykel for reasons unknown. Afterward Mykel and Lazarus meet singer Shayna Kae. Shayna is another mystery; she knows Mykel on the spot despite the fact he’s never seen her before in his life.

  They are witness to the King’s death, and are introduced to Sutyr, an enshou (fire magic caster), Lazarus’ previous apprentice, whose real form is a red demonic knight. Afterwards, Mykel visits Caryl, a local prostitute and his lover, and spends the day with her son Wil (it is unknown if Mykel is the father).

  Everything comes to a head deep within the Kal Jada library. Mykel, Lazarus, John Jekai, and Sutyr race to find the khatar (assassin’s weapon) Ifirit. Lazarus sacrifices himself so Mykel can bond with the khatar before Sutyr. Enraged, Sutyr possesses Jekai, Caryl, and Wil in a battle to the death. Sutyr engages Mykel personally, and quickly overwhelms Mykel...only to falter when a Riftgate (time travel portal), activates and delivers Mykel to times hitherto unknown.

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  Mykel LeKym (Michael LA-Kem)

  Sefiros Cayokite (Suh-FEAR-ros KAI-yo-KAH)

  Shayna Kae (shay-NA KAY)

  John Stromgald (John STROM-GALD)

  Sylver (Silver)

  Jade Raptor (Jade RAP-tor)

  Orson (ore-SON)

  Mathias Tolrep (MAH-thigh-OS TOLL-rep)

  Robert Jekai (Robert JA-kai)

  Ronald Jekai (Ronald JA-kai)

  Sutyr (Suh-TEAR)

  Lazarus (LA-ZER-ris)

  Cardinal Omeros (Om-MER-ros)

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Previously on Sefiros Eishi: Chased By Flame

  Dramatis Personae

  PROLOGUE

  I

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  VI

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  X

  XI

  XII

  XIII

  XIV

  XV

  XVI

  XVII

  XVIII

  XIX

  XX

  XXI

  XXII

  XXIII

  XXIV

  XXV

  XXVI

  XXVII

  XXVIII

  XXIX

  XXX

  XXXI

  XXXII

  XXXIII

  XXXIV

  XXXV

  XXXVI

  XXXVII

  XXXVIII

  XXXIX

  XL

  XLI

  XLII

  XLIII

  XLIV

  XLV

  XLVI

  XLVII

  XLVIII

  XLIX

  L

  LI

  LII

  LIII

  LIV

  LV

  LVI

  LVII

  LVIII

  LIX

  LX

  LXI

  LXII

  LXIII

  LXIV

  LXV

  LXVI

  LXVII

  LXVIII

  LXIX

  LXX

  LXXI

  GLOSSARY OF TERMS

  BRW Info

  PROLOGUE

  ??? Space

  ??? Date

  ??? Realm

  The Emergency Temporal Redirection worked like a charm. One moment Sutyr was lost in a tunnel of mind-crushing, soul-wrenching hellfire, the next he was safe and sound in Muspell, his World. And only ten years previous from his battle with the boy, no less. Like a charm.

  High on ebony balconies, Sutyr surveyed Muspell. Hell incarnate. His World. His to do with any way he liked. But he saw none of it. Mykel LeKym was out there, somewhere. Sutyr knew Mykel was alive in the same way he knew his own heartbeats. In fact, Sutyr sent a mental command and smiled when his symbol took shape on his hand. It was made of yellow splinters of light, each one blazing as though they were slivers of the sun. Good. The brand Sutyr had worked upon the librarian’s arm was working. The yellow color confirmed it. Mykel was unconscious next to the Riftgate. With Ifirit. That was the first thing the symbol confirmed. So close. So close, and yet so far away.

  A rush of manna brought him from his reverie. Knowledge came to him like a whisper of fire, speeding along the channels that anchored this impossible place to the realm of in-between moments. Aeon. Sutyr grimaced. He could harden the doors with a single thought, displace her into a labyrinth of eternal twists from which there was no escape. But Aeon had a way of rising beyond impossible challenges, so Sutyr bid the doors open and the path clear.

  He didn’t turn to meet Aeon. He didn’t have to. The Fire that was his birthright told him all he needed to know. Her little collection of gathering-spells, each one meant to find and exploit weakness, crashed against the walls of his willpower, receding like the foam of ocean water against jagged rock. There was nothing to be gained
from such investigation, but habits tended to die hard.

  “Are your Gardens not enough for you, Aeon?”

  “Of course.” Sutyr felt Aeon’s core quicken at the statement. Giving up something when there was no award to be gained? Oh, the little minx hated such a trade. Sutyr did not relish the small victory. Nothing was worse than dropping one’s guard, especially around Aeon.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “So suspicious, Sutyr. Cannot one friend visit the other without an agenda?”

  “We are not friends.”

  “You wound me, Sutyr.” She came to his side at the balcony, although the world she gazed upon was completely different than the one Sutyr saw. “You close your thoughts often as of late.” Aeon glanced upward at the silence that answered – and suddenly she folded to the ground, tightening into a writhing ball of pain. “No...what are you doing?”

  Sutyr looked at her, her form suddenly turned translucent. It was a special trick of his, and one of the most guarded. His sight pierced a person’s outer shell, reduced them to a skeleton and the web of neural pathways that connected the body into a cohesive whole. He could see the chemicals that triggered thought and response, movement and emotion. And right now, Sutyr led the chemicals like a master walking his pet, directing just the right reactions to go in just the right way, to the conclusion he wanted in one simple mental command.

  FORGET.

  And Aeon forgot. From the moment she entered Muspell to right then; those few memories would forever be a blank to her. Sutyr took great pains to reduce any evidence that she had stood within these walls. The deletion of thought was so absolute that the actual memory of her purpose in coming here would be washed away. She would go her entire life without pause. That was key.

  Sutyr glanced at the vault in the far wall. Of course, it had been inevitable. It had been the axis of Aeon’s little visit. There were secrets locked in the Tartarus Vaults not meant for any eyes, secrets that if known would drive the thief to a madness eternal, but Sutyr had dared to chase those secrets. He not only touched those secrets but spirited them away. The insanity that was the vault’s counterstroke clawed at him every step of the way, but in the end Sutyr tamed the sickness, bent it to his will instead of the reverse. Now those secrets were his to wield.

  Sutyr made his way to the vault that was no ordinary vault. It was special, and its molecular structure quivered and expanded at a slight gesture from its master. There was not a piece of Muspell that was not imbued with Sutyr’s essence. He and the castle existed in part as a collective being. The effort to mold the vault was as natural as breathing.

  As Sutyr approached, the vault finished the final details with a crimson sheet of redwood that was both thin as a plane of glass and yet harder than any diamond. Happy to have served its master, the rectangular cabinet broke into individual segments and sank back into the rock from each had come. The treasure they guarded was open for all to see.

  Weapons they were, at first glance. Eight of them, as dull and ordinary as one might expect from a common blacksmith. But the appearance was a deception to fool the uninitiated. Certainly they could be used as weapons. Their destructive might was a prime reason for their captivity. Because if they were used by the wrong hands...

  That thought drove Sutyr to yet another analysis. He did not scan for Mykel, or Aeon, no. He scanned for himself. Rather his past self. Running into a past version of himself, a self that had yet to begin its assault on the nightmare castle or even hope to poison King Zephyr. The energies of time travel saturated those who had crossed those thresholds, and were enough to negate the contact of those time-displaced selves. No, the Sutyr of the past had yet to make his arrival. He was still searching for Rekka, if memory served. Good. There would be no trouble from that quarter, and masquerading as that past self would yield no destructive consequences.

  Rekka. Sutyr summoned Rekka, the butcher-meat blade, slaughterer of thousands, quenched in the blood of its victims. Oh yes, it’s appetite for destruction knew no bounds. It was a battle to even use the blade, a constant contest to see who was really in control. But as much as their ability to destroy was without question, their true function was potentially far more apocalyptic. All that was left was Ifirit. All that was left was the boy. Sutyr turned his attention towards the essential events that would lead to their next meeting.

  I

  Mevos Prime

  Septias 23rd, 2201 AD (Anno Domini Calendar)

  It started like any other day. Rays of sunlight poured into the room from a frameless window, followed by the crow of the rooster. Shayna rose, dressed, scrubbed her teeth with a salted brush. Stepping from her chamber she joined the ongoing river of girls flowing through the maze-like corridors. The girls were all the same age, and wore the same clothes as Shayna: brown robes with a hood. Simple. Plain. Dull.

  Line by line the girls entered a cavernous chamber meant as a cathedral and classroom. There were no chairs of any kind. The girls, once set in long rows, fell to their knees upon the stone. A great deal of them winced at the pressure. There was only so much the knee could take. A time too long, a time too many, and the bone disintegrated. Shayna had seen such women more than one occasion, rising only to drop as though she had no legs at all.

  Silence rang through the chamber at the advent of a woman climbing to an altar. Even those in the back knew her by her auburn hair. Braided into a long tail, her hair adopted a pendulum-like swing as she walked. Whispers chased details around the collective body. Samantha, whose deeds made tales across many a bonfire, even to this day. Samantha, the recluse that chose a life of hermitage rather than a life of schooling. Her ancestor was the first Companion of Queen Anna The Righteous, first of the Mace bloodline.

  She was...young. Three hundred and fifty years and she still retained the glow of youth, kept so by spells so delicate and intricate their execution became the stuff of legends. The gossip should have stopped there, but underneath the rumors were dark, ugly ribbons of deceit. The same spells that kept her young were forged with pacts that obliterated the soul to hear, to cough blood at a mere word. Her mother was a versi; her father, a Myrrh. Shayna knew her only by reputation, and that reputation had her one not to tolerate the gibbering of wagging tongues.

  “Companions.” Her voice, soft as silk and hard as steel, filled the room with a commanding presence. “For over three hundred years, the Companions have been aside the Mace Throne. Ours is a humble role. Kings and queens play the games of politics, with their servants as their pawns. For such a duty, one must be tempered like steel, hardened to an unbreakable metal. We, their confidants, act so that their steel does not become them. We stand aside them to remind them of the person within.

  “It is my great honor, then, to announce this message. Christina Lansplex, daughter of Phillip, is to be wed to Amden’s Royal Family. She will need a Companion, and by the gods she will have one!” A breath, to let the news sink in. Then, Samantha delivered a terse farewell and returned to the shadows that were her home.

  Suffice to say the silence did not last long. Sound exploded from the room, a thousand tongues describing their disbelief, a thousand dreams given life by their hope. A full minute was dedicated to their words. Then rang a bell, and six women came to the dais. Their habits dark, their faces long with irritation, they needed no introduction. The Six Apprentices of Samantha. They were the backbone of the Companions. With short, harsh words they dismissed the giggling girls from the room. In the distance, another bell sounded; immediately the churning river of girls shifted in perfect unison towards a chamber twice that of the meeting halls. The rituals of gathering food and seat were flawless. The girls ate with painful precision. No word was to be spoken during the meal, yet hushed whispers snaked from lip to lip all the same.

  “Can
you believe it? The Princess is coming! That means a Companion will be chosen!”

  “Chosen? What do you mean?”

  “What do you mean? I mean one Companion—one of us—will be chosen to be at the Princess’ side. How can you not know that?”

  “What can you expect? She’s only a first-year novice.”

  “How will the choosing be decided?”

  “Why, a test will be given.”

  “What kind of test?”

  “Well, it’s very hard, and...uh...only the strongest will prevail.”

  A tick of silence. “You don’t know what the test is about, do you?”

  “Why I never! How dare you insult me!”

  “A fourth-year acolyte. You’d think she would have known that.”

  After the midday meal Shayna returned to her chamber. It was sparse, like all novice rooms. A table and a three-legged stool complimented the bed snug in the corner. Nowhere were pictures of family, mementos of siblings, nothing. To be accepted into the Companions was to be purged of the bonds outside the circle.

  Books were her only comfort, yet too often she would speed through them, making the return to said book a dull and lifeless experience. She had already read every book in the library, and the librarians who ran it were quick to note that their library was the biggest in the entire world.

  The bell rang twice an hour later. Shayna sighed. The twilight of her daily rituals was coming full circle. The training grounds. It was whispered that Samantha’s ancestor herself trained on the grass from which the chamber was built. By royal law no foot save for the blueblood would grace the grass. Yet there was not a blueblood, with fists and steel, who could move Samantha or her acolytes. None of them even came close.

  The arms-master, a woman cursed with a male physique, shouted commands that were so twisted with a barbarous accent that no one really knew what the hell she was talking about. Pointing this flaw out was in vain. No one wanted to tell her that her voice sounded like a cat being slaughtered. Especially when the one in question stood three feet above you and favored a club big enough to rattle every tooth in your head. So everybody just nodded and smiled, which made the instructor nod and smile, making her safe in her deception. It was the way of things.