Exiled

by J. R. Wagner

  “Good to see you back, Sir,” he said.

  “Thank you, Nigel.”

  “Nigel?” Stuart called just as Nigel was stepping out of sight.

  “Sir?”

  “You’ll bring him in as soon as he arrives?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  “Bring who in?” Margaret asked, “have you not seen the hour?”

  “All shall be explained if you give me the opportunity,” Stuart said calmly.

  Again the room was silent. Margaret held her cup with both hands, letting the warmth circulate through her fingers.

  After another moment of awkward silence, Stuart took a deep breath and said, “I suppose you’d like to hear about my travels of late?”

  “An explanation of your sudden and unannounced hiatus would be appreciated, yes.”

  “If it wasn’t important I wouldn’t have gone, Margaret. Everything is clear to me now. I’m sure everything will be clear to you as well when I have finished.”

  “Please enlighten me then.”

  “Lately, I’ve been traveling more than my job requires, as you may have noticed.” Stuart paused, expecting Margaret to interject. When she did not, he continued.

  “I met a man named David Ogilvy at a parliament meeting last autumn. He took me to his house in Northallerton, where I met his family. We discussed matters of great interest. There was one subject that was particularly enthralling.” Again he paused and studied his wife. If she had any interest in what he was telling her, she didn’t show it. Her expression remained like stone.

  “Magic,” he said. At precisely that moment a gust of wind blew down the chimney, scattering ash from the dying fire onto the stone hearth.

  “Oh, James. Please tell me you haven’t been drawn into that cods wallop. Of all the things to be wasting your time on. Magic indeed,” she said, standing and making her way to the door.

  “Believe me, I’d have said the same thing if I were sitting in your place. Please just listen before you pass judgment.”

  She stopped, eyeing him suspiciously.

  “Please,” he said, extending his hand to the chair.

  Slowly, she moved back to her chair and perched on the very edge of the seat. She leaned in and set her teacup on the desk, knowing full well that an unprotected cup on his beloved desk would drive him mad. To her dismay, he never took his eyes off her.

  Stuart could tell from his wife’s posture that she would mentally dissect and tear apart anything he said. “After dinner on the second day of my visit, Mr. Ogilvy and I were sitting in his library discussing one of the topics from the last meeting. The parliament is planning on banning discussing anything related to magic in any government forum henceforth. I said it was perfectly logical considering it hardly comes up anymore, and when it does come up it is usually related to some inexplicable event. Ogilvy took the opposite stance. He believed the government’s origins were founded in magic. To deny its existence, which is what the government is trying to do, he said, would be denying our heritage.”

  “Rubbish,” Margaret said.

  Stuart lifted an impatient hand and continued. “Mr. Ogilvy removed an old book from his library shelf. It was covered in reptile skin and was large and cumbersome. He said the book predated the Magna Carta Libertatum by over a thousand years. Inside it spoke of powers, lands, and sorcery found nowhere in any book I’ve ever read or heard about.”

  “Found nowhere because it’s fiction.”

  Stuart continued as if she hadn’t interrupted. “It also spoke of a date in the near future that would mark the beginning of the end of their kind. The Epoch Terminus he called it. It spoke of a terrible war in which sorcerers would all but destroy themselves. I asked him where he’d acquired this book. After swearing an oath that I wouldn’t share this with anyone but you, Ogilvy told me. He said he was part of a magical council very much like the parliament. His family has sat on this council for over a hundred generations. Ogilvy said that the book passes from father to son.”

  “I asked him why none of this was common knowledge. He told me the unfaithful—the nonbelievers—pushed their magical kin and their beliefs away generations ago. They didn’t want any part of what they couldn’t understand. They were frightened of magic. They called it witchcraft, devilry, evil. The faithful, as they call themselves, were and continue to be chastised, outcast, and even murdered. History was and is being rewritten denying their very existence. A genocide of our own countrymen is happening as you and I converse. So now Mr. Ogilvy sits on both the parliament and his magical council in hopes of gaining a better understanding of the unfaithful, who now far outnumber those who believe.”

  “And let me guess, he’s recruited you for his cause. Save the freaks. How can you believe in that nonsense? The government scientists have all but explained it away. All explainable scientific phenomena.”

  “That’s exactly what I said. I wanted proof. If there truly was this magical world among our own, I wanted some evidence. Of course he knew I would ask, and he was well prepared. Behind a bookshelf was a hidden staircase, which spiraled deep into the bowels of the manor house. By torchlight we walked down the stone passage until we came to a massive room. He whispered an unfamiliar word and candles surrounding the room burst with flame. ‘Don’t worry!’ Ogilvy said. ‘That’s just the beginning.’ And indeed it was. Stuart sipped his tea.

  “Waist-high stone troughs weaved this way and that through the room. Glowing liquids of every color flowed through the troughs. He encouraged me to step close to one that was flowing a particularly vibrant shade of purple. He raised his hands over the trough and again whispered an unfamiliar word. The liquid stopped flowing from left to right and began to flow toward the center of the trough where Ogilvy’s hands hovered. The liquid pooled there until it looked as if it would spill over the edges.

  “Then it rose up out of the pool like icicles from the ground. He appeared to be siphoning it with his hands until each strand of liquid had delivered its contents into his palms. With another word and a wave of his hands, we were encased in the purple liquid. It was as if a shroud covered us. I reached my hand into the shroud, expecting it to be wet. No moisture did I feel. The energy, Margaret. I felt such energy. And then it happened.” “What happened?” Margaret asked, finding herself captivated to her own chagrin.

  “We were gone.”

  “Gone? What do you mean?” she asked.

  “We no longer stood in the musty dungeon.”

  “Then where were you?”

  “Precisely my question. ‘Where are we?’ I asked. It was bright, warm, and pleasant. Only after the purple haze cleared could I begin to fathom our location. Behind us stood mountains higher than I’d ever set eyes upon. In front of us were grasslands as far as the eye could see. Grazing animals peppered the flatlands like leaves in autumn. I’d only read of places like that in books.

  “Mr. Ogilvy said we were in Africa. I had to take him at his word, having never been there. Regardless of where we actually were, the fact was we’d gone somewhere. We’d traveled out of the dungeon by means I could not comprehend. We stayed for but a moment before he reached into his cloak, retrieved a small bag, and tossed its contents above us. Once again we were enshrouded in the purple mist. A moment later, we were back in his laboratory, as he calls it.”

  “Impossible,” Margaret said with a hint of curiosity in her voice—or perhaps it was a hint of doubt.

  “I wouldn’t have believed it had it not happened to me,” Stuart replied.

  “Perhaps the purple liquid contained some type of drug. He drugged you, and you thought you’d left the dungeon, but in reality, you didn’t travel at all.”

  “One of the many reasons why I married you my dear Margaret is that your mind is as sharp as a blade. Once I gained my footing in the dungeon—err, laboratory—and my head stopped spinning, I suggested the same thing. Ogilvy then asked me if I believed in God, and when I said I did, he asked if I had ever seen God. As you know, I hav
e not, and when I shared this information with Ogilvy, he asked, ‘Then what makes you believe?’”

  “I told him that a nonbeliever could be shown undeniable evidence that God exists and still deny his existence. Eventually, I said that faith is required. A smile crossed Ogilvy’s face, and he said, ‘So what you’re saying is that you could show me unquestionable proof of God’s existence, and if I still want to deny him, I could. However, if I were to allow for a small measure of faith then everything would fall into place. Allow yourself, Mr. Stuart, to consider the possibility that magic does indeed exist and magic will become apparent every day of your life.’

  “I couldn’t help but marvel at the parallels. We left the laboratory, and I spent another day with Mr. Ogilvy. We discussed nothing but faith, as they call it, and how the faithful were being shunned from normal society. They were being looked at as outcasts, as diseased. Magic folk are peaceful. Never in the history of the written word have the faithful ever engaged the unfaithful in open combat. It is against their laws to kill another.

  “I left with a promise from Mr. Ogilvy that he would come calling so—

  A knock at the front door interrupted Stuart’s recounting. Nigel hurried by the open doorway toward the hall. Both Margaret and Stuart listened as the large front door groaned open then closed with a bang. A quiet conversation was followed by footsteps until Nigel was standing at the doorway.

  “He is here,” said Nigel with a nervous expression. Stuart moved toward the entryway.

  “May I introduce . . . Akil Karanis.”

  Nigel stepped aside as a tall, lean man moved in from the hallway. What hair remained on his head was cropped close to his bronze skin. He wore a long goatee, which was all white but for a few strands of grey. His pleasant expression was accentuated by the bright blue of the three-piece suit he was wearing. Margaret had never seen something so bright—or so ridiculous.

  Stuart exchanged greetings in some bowing manner that Margaret could only see from behind and thought only added to the absurdity of the situation. Stuart welcomed the tall man into the room and offered him his seat behind the desk. Akil declined and stepped over to greet Margaret.

  “My sincere apologies. How rude!” Stuart said realizing his omission. “Margaret, this is Akil Karanis,” he said, sweat now beading on his forehead.

  Akil extended his hand. Margaret, being ever stubborn remained seated and only looked at the man as he attempted to greet her. Stuart stepped forward to reprimand his wife for her impropriety and Akil raised a silencing hand.

  “I imagine the conversation that preceded my entry has left you in a state of enthrallment only to be out-done by what is to follow and therefore excuse your absence of social grace,” Akil said with a smile.

  Margaret couldn’t tell if she was being insulted or compliment so she simply remained seated and said nothing. She was glad to have someone to interrupt her husband’s nonsensical storytelling. Stuart rounded the desk and sat while Akil leaned slightly against the bookshelf and looked at Stuart.

  “Where was I?” Stuart asked. “Yes, of course. Sure enough after another meeting of parliament the following winter, Mr. Ogilvy approached me again. He said there would be a gathering that very night of the magical council and he would like me to attend. I agreed. Ogilvy took me into the basement of the parliament building away from unfaithful eyes. Once again he removed the marble-size bag from his cloak and encased us in what he called transporting powder.”

  “An instant later we stood upon a grassy plateau in yet another land with which I was unfamiliar. Ruins of an ancient civilization stood nearby. Below us were mountains and valleys surrounded by clouds. Imagine being above the clouds, looking down on them. It was almost as if we were hovering above the earth.”

  “Perhaps it would be best if I took it from here,” interrupted Akil.

  “Of course,” replied Stuart.

  “Margaret, my dear,” said Akil, looking deep into her eyes. “I’m about to do something which may come as quite a shock. It may be best if you sit back in your chair.”

  Margaret nodded and slid slowly back until she was up against the rest. Akil nodded, took a step back, and extended his right hand. He muttered something neither of the others could hear, and a blue orb of light rose from the palm of her hand. Rather than scream, which is what Stuart thought Margaret would do, she sat transfixed as the orb rose and expanded. Soon the room was enveloped in the light and a new scene formed in front of them.

  Shadowed figures converged on an amphitheater of sorts in the center of the plateau. It was nothing more than rows of halfmoon-shaped stone benches with grass between them. In the center was a lectern. Ogilvy led Stuart silently to a hill overlooking the amphitheater. Nobody spoke a word until all had been seated and the sound of shuffling bodies subsided.

  Once the quiet had settled, a rather large man pried himself from his seat and hobbled to the lectern. He paused, surveying the crowd before he spoke. “As we are all aware,” the large man said, “the precariousness of our current situation continues to worsen. With each setting of the sun the Epoch Terminus draws nigh. Despite the generations of searching, we are no closer to finding the anointed one.”

  He glanced over at a man sitting on the bench across from where he stood.

  “Coupled with the approach of the Epoch Terminus,” he continued, “and our lack of preparation, the unfaithful continue to push us away. They’ve managed to convince each new generation that our ways are nothing but fairy tales . . . smoke and mirrors. So blind are they to reality that they’re willing to ignore history itself. Humanity was set back nearly 1500 years when the early Anglo-Saxons invaded Britain so long ago and we were powerless to do anything as the uncultured pagan barbarians destroyed the advanced civilization we’d created. Why? Because our laws forbade open war against the unfaithful.”

  “We gather,” the man said, “to ensure our survival. The threat is real. The Epoch Terminus will arrive while our generation is in power. If we have not deciphered the clues left by The Seer and located the anointed one we all shall perish. I believe at the hands of the unfaithful. I believe that is the end The Seer did not detail.

  “We run, we hide, yet every one of us has the power to turn and fight. We are superior. The unfaithful are no match for our powers. Every one of us can influence, control, and some of us can even kill with mere words. Yet we continue to cower. The time for diplomacy has passed. We must act or we will fall. Not one among us wants his children growing up in exile.”

  More fervent applause followed this statement. He shuffled back to his seat as another man stood. Tall, thin, and agile, he looked the opposite of his predecessor. It was Akil Karanis. He did not hesitate to begin speaking.

  “Not one among us wants our children growing up at war. In that, we are no different than the so-called unfaithful. Our knowledge and tolerance obligates us to act for the good of all humanity. Not solely for the good of our own kind. We are all humans. We are all brothers. Wielding a power simply because one posses it would be the epitome of ignorance,” Akil said.

  “Because we have an understanding of magic we are bound by our laws to protect those who are ignorant. Not destroy them. There are ways to co-exist without violence. For centuries the unfaithful have been at war between themselves because of differences in their own beliefs. We have not intervened. Yes, much was lost with the Celts. In the end they were given a choice and chose to fend for themselves just as we chose to leave. Today, they are frightened of us. They do not remember when we lived in peace side-by-side. Men fear what they do not understand regardless of their beliefs. Rather than keep to ourselves let us allow them understanding and abate their fears.”

  A small bald man in the front row stood. “Lest you forget, Akil, that too is against our laws.” The man squeaked, sitting as quickly as he stood.

  “A law this counsel created centuries ago. Perhaps it is time to amend our laws.”

  The fat man who originally spoke quickly stood
.

  “If we change any of our laws it should be to allow us to retaliate against those who persecute us, not educate them. Remember they want us dead,” he shouted.

  “You assume much, Alvero, with your statements. Nowhere in The Seer’s recounting of the events leading to the Epoch Terminus is there mention of a war between faithful and unfaithful. Inaccurate generalities won’t solve our problems. This is no time to take action in haste. There are ways to live in peace, and we are bound to seek them, not ignore them by taking an easier road. We have been outcasts since the beginning of history. Because those who don’t believe are taking formal actions against us now is no reason to destroy them. Let them write us out of their history. We have our own historians, our own history. The higher road is ours to take.”

  “Now, the reason we gather is not to express our dissatisfaction of our relationship with our fellow man. We need not waste another minute discussing it. As I said, The Seer declared nothing of the sort. The Epoch Terminus approaches as Alvaro has mentioned. My search continues. I believe I am close to deciphering the last of the criteria. I request of the counsel that all resources available to it be at my disposal in order to once and for all find he who The Seer spoke of. Time runs swiftly.”

  The man removed an ornate pocket watch from his robes, opened the lid and shook his head with a concerned expression as he returned to his seat. Three others stood and moved to the lectern. The tallest of the three, a woman with straight black hair reaching past her waist, was the first to speak.

  “We have heard from our party leaders. It is apparent a rift exists.

  The man next to her picked up where she left off. “I fear indecision may cost lives.”

  The third, a woman spoke. “This is no time for impulse. We must find the anointed one or we all shall perish.

  “Akil, we grant you the authority to command the resources of the counsel. You have one rotation. May all speed and grace be with you,” the tall woman said.

  Akil stood and bowed. The fat man jumped to his feet. “It was this fool who unleashed that monster upon us and you’ll give him the authority to continue his nonsensical efforts?” he screamed, jowls shaking.