Wizard's Blood [Part Two]

by Bob Blink

  “Logic said it had to, and there was really no other choice. You were within hours, perhaps less if Iach-Iss is correct, of dying.” Shyar said this matter-of-factly, but Jolan could sense the magnitude of the concern she had felt placing him inside the Box and then having to go off leaving him there alone.

  “That is a marvelous device,” Iach-Iss said in his increasingly familiar rumble. In the thousands of years I have been on Gaea, I have never seen the like of it. Even we have yet to find a means of creating a true stasis chamber. When this is over, I would love to examine it in greater detail.”

  “But how did I get here?” Jolan asked.

  Shyar explained how they had come to the concealed entrance that she had been unable to pass through, but which Asari had been able to enter easily. She explained her concern when Asari disappeared inside and was gone for almost half a day before returning.

  “Why could Asari pass through?” Jolan asked.

  “Dragon-friend,” rumbled Den-Orok. “It is surprising the blood held for so long.”

  Jolan was confused and it showed on his face.

  Iach-Iss smiled. “In times long past, there were a few humans with whom we formed a special bond. There was something in their brains that allowed for a special kind of communication. You have probably already sensed we are telepathic. For those special few, we could communicate over long distances in such a manner, and we could sense each other’s existence. Asari appears to be a descendent of one of these, and while his ability is very much degraded, once the nodule was triggered, he was able to sense our existence, even if he didn’t really understand it at the time.”

  “What would have triggered his ability?” Jolan asked.

  “From our discussion, we think the teleportation your staff exposed you to must have been responsible. The staffs are not simple objects of magic, but were jointly created using some of our technology. The ability to teleport was one such aspect.”

  There were questions being raised that Jolan wanted to probe, but he wasn’t sure where to start. The dragons referred to technology rather than magic. There was something there he needed to understand. The medical lab he had been in until just a short time ago had clearly been an example of highly developed technology and not magic of some sort. The dragons were different than he’d thought for so long. Another thing was nagging at the back of his mind.

  “Earlier you said something about explaining what had been done and if I might want something undone. Why would I want you to modify anything? You apparently saved my life.”

  “Sometimes we are unable to limit ourselves. That was one of the reasons things went so bad in the past, but we will talk of that later. When I was examining you I found you had one of the nodules in your brain. They were rare even in times past, but they marked the truly unique mages and wizards. Yours was essentially switched off for some reason, perhaps because you grew up on Earth, where the power is all but nonexistent. As part of your treatment I simply had the medi-table feed the appropriate signals to start it up once again. It will take some time, perhaps a couple of years to fully develop.”

  Jolan wasn’t sure what this meant or whether he was happy about it or not. “What will it do?”

  “Well,” rumbled Iach-Iss. “As your people like to measure these things, it will allow you to advance to your true potential. From the size of the nodule and the few I have examined in the past, I would estimate you will eventually develop into a level fifteen or greater mage.”

  “Fifteen!” Jolan exclaimed with a start. “I’ve never heard of a mage of that level. I thought ten or eleven was a high as one could go.”

  “There were not many, but they had incredible power. It is one reason so much damage was done during the wars, and why they were able to inflict so much damage on us despite our advanced technology.”

  Jolan was still trying to understand the implications of what he was being told. He certainly couldn’t ask to have the possibility undone, especially since they might need every powerful mage they could find if this war was to be won, but he wasn’t sure he felt comfortable with someday having such power.

  “You have referred to technology several times. From what I have seen in the hour or so I have been conscious, you appear to be more technologically advanced than Earth. It appears you have technology that exceeds anything that I have detected in our review of many of the old records. How does that fit in with your magic?”

  “Our technology is different than that of the people of Gaea from the period you have been studying. Also, as I suspect you are starting to realize, we have no magical power. Our capabilities lie in a far superior technology.”

  “And you are not native to Gaea?” Jolan asked, the suspicion that had been forming in his mind finding voice.

  Off to one side Den-Orok nodded. He rumbled to Shyar, “You said he was a smart one.”

  “That is correct,” Iach-Iss agreed. “We came to Gaea many thousands of years ago, and we are not native to this world. We came here from the far side of the Galaxy, but encountered problems and were forced to find a world to set down on. Our sensors indicated that we may have crossed more than spatial boundaries during the anomaly, which is partially born out by some disturbing differences in some of the fundamental natural constants. Once here, we realized our ship was far more badly damaged than we had originally suspected. We lacked the means to make the needed repairs and would never be able to return home.”

  “We were shocked to find a world where the locals relied upon those with an unusual ability to tap an unseen source of power to accomplish many tasks that would normally be performed by machine. The reliance on this power had severely limited their normal development. At that time, they were very disorganized, and many of the groups fought against each other. We tried to help. For a while it seemed we made significant progress, but in the end, it all fell apart.”

  “What you describe must have taken a very long time.”

  “We are a long lived race, and we have learned to extend our normal span significantly. We have been on Gaea more than ten thousand of the local years.”

  Jolan leaned back stunned. Ten thousand years! Given time, they could learn the whole history of Gaea, and answers to many of the questions that had gone unanswered. The means to defeat the wizards were probably waiting inside the two dragons that sat so casually across the table from him, although they had admitted that many of their number had perished at the hands of wizards, and perhaps mages, during the war. Yet those men of power had been far more capable than those that lived today. It was something to pursue, but he felt himself getting ahead of things. They had been telling him how he had been retrieved and brought here.

  “You said Asari has an innate ability to communicate with you. How come he was never able to do so if you have been awake for several months? For that matter, how is it you can speak the current language, since it didn’t exist when you apparently went into some kind of suspended state?”

  “Asari’s ability is much degraded. We could sense that he and a small handfull of others, still exist in the world, but none retain the ability to communicate. We might be able to fix that, but that is for later. Since none could communicate back with us, we had thought it best to simply remain unknown to the current world. There are only two of us left after all, and there seemed little we could offer any longer. Of course, when Asari walked into the compound triggering all sorts of alarms, the situation changed. For one thing, in Asari’s case the pull was strong enough to bring him here on an impossibly long journey to find something that he could only sense was important.”

  Iach-Iss paused and Den-Orok continued.

  “We were able to scan the records that have been gathered while we were asleep to get a sense of what has been happening in the world. We obviously were far less effective in ridding the world of a certain strain of wizard than we thought. The rise of those in Ale’ald is a clear throw back to the ones we fought before. As for the language, our system had tracked the mu
tation over the years and was able to give us a mental update to the current standard.”

  “They have a system that allows them to see what is happening anywhere in the Settled Lands,” Shyar explained. She had obviously had some of this conversation before. “I was able to see right up to the door of Cheurt’s castle. They are making changes there again.”

  “Satellites?” Jolan asked.

  “Of course,” Iach-Iss replied. “We installed several thousand of them to allow a complete coverage many thousands of years ago.”

  “Several thousand? And they are operating after all this time unattended?”

  “Why would they not?” rumbled Den-Orok. “They are simple devices well able to look after themselves.”

  “These allow you to gather pictures of the world below?”

  “Video and much more. They link together in an almost living sense to perform a variety of tasks.”

  Jolan sensed the explanation for a number of small mysteries at hand.

  “Would their satellites provide input to a set of monitors that allow one to track movements through the wilderness areas in the Land of Giants?”

  Iach-Iss nodded. “A primitive application, but a means of watching over some of the wilderness enthusiasts was requested. They sometimes were able to get themselves lost or in trouble. I had forgotten we had set that up. You must have seen it from your question.”

  “Asari’s father found it. I couldn’t see how it might work or what it was for.”

  “He might have been drawn to it,” Den-Orok said. “Since Asari has the ability to sense us, his father might have as well. Sometimes the ability lies dormant for several generations until triggered, but then it is foremost for a time.”

  Once again the possibilities and many questions were taking Jolan away from where he had been heading.

  “What happened when Asari suddenly showed up here?”

  “Needless to say we were quite surprised. We had our attention focused on the lands far from here. Nothing on this world can penetrate the barrier we set up, so there was little reason to be concerned. The only exceptions were ourselves, of course, and those few we considered Dragonfriends, but we were certain that none were anywhere close. This is not a particularly hospitable part of the world to humans.” Iach-Iss looked meaningfully at Jolan.

  “Asari’s unexpected penetration of the barrier forced us to suddenly consider our possible courses of action. We allowed him to explore, while we sampled his mind to find out who and what he was. It didn’t take long to realize that he, Shyar, and yourself deserved our help.”

  “We were a bit concerned what response our appearance might cause him, but when he “found” us it was as if he expected us all the time,” Den-Orok said. “He was a bit careful, but he didn’t show the fear and panic we had come to expect by those that first encountered us.”

  “By that time we already knew Shyar was waiting outside, and were able to probe her mind as well,” Iach-Iss continued. “We liked what we saw, and allowed Asari to escort her inside. We had thought to exchange histories a bit and then proceed, but both were extremely concerned that we immediately try and do something about you. From what we had learned from their minds it appeared that you would keep quite safely until we were ready, but you are an impulsive race. Must have something to do with the shortness of your existence. So we set out to get you back here. From the description of what had happened and a small sample of Asari’s blood the cause of your predicament was known.”

  “We traveled in a skimmer,” Asari said enthusiastically. “It’s even more fun than the airplanes from Earth.”

  Den-Orok waved a claw. “They are a simple anti-gravity based device. They are fine for short travels on the planet. We often used them to get between here and what you call Angon. One can hover or travel at significant altitude. With Shyar pointing the way, it only took a short time to locate your storage box, retrieve it and return here to the medical area. We had everything ready, and when we took you out of the box, we simply slipped you into the waiting chamber and let the system go to work. We have repaired humans in the past, and Iach-Iss always had a fine touch for directing the Logicmind to adjust for your physiology.”

  “While we waited for you to recover, quite long actually since you were badly infected, we spent the four days getting to know a bit about each other. It appears we might have to take a hand in this once again, although I must warn you with only the two of us, and our abilities sadly very much reduced, I am not certain how effective we will be. We had expected to die in the chambers. It is clear none from our world will ever be coming for us. Our resources are all but depleted, and the surviving war scout ships are somewhat damaged from the last encounters.”

  “It didn’t help matters that you provided their most effective wizard with one of Grout-Lannnu’s devices, altered to make it even more of a problem,” Den-Orok grumbled. “We told him he shouldn’t experiment with methods of melding our technology with the local magic, but the engineer in him couldn’t leave it alone. As a result he built those infernal adapters, which were unpredictable and which caused the death of a number of our original crew. It would have been better if the last of the devices had been left unfound. There were only two that we hadn’t recovered and destroyed, and now this wizard Cheurt has one of them.”

  Chapter 173

  After they finished eating the two dragons left to allow the three friends a chance to reunite properly. Since they were telepathic, Jolan assumed the dragons could have listened to whatever they talked about, but he also sensed that doing so would violate a sense of propriety that the dragons seemed to have. He was certain their conversations would be private, not that they had anything to discuss that would have mattered.

  Jolan watched as the two dragons ambled off. He wondered at the word that popped into his mind, but after Shyar spoke he felt it had been an appropriate observation.

  “They are old and discouraged,” she said after they had been alone for a few minutes.

  Jolan looked at her with the question clear on his face.

  “Think about it,” she said. “They have been stranded on Gaea for thousands of years. Iach-Iss has said they have pushed even their technology for extending their lives beyond what was considered possible. Now what do they have? They have heard nothing from their home world in all that time. The Nexus is some kind of communicator that interacted with the magic of Gaea. You should talk with them about that. They think they understand why there has been no response, but if they are correct it means they will never contact home. It is also remotely possible that something happened to the home worlds, and that bothers them. It has been a long time even measured in their lifespan terms after all.”

  She paused briefly then continued. “All of their friends and mates are gone. They started out as thirty-three adventurers long ago. Once they were trapped here, they tried to bring a world from the edge of savagery. For a time it seemed to have worked, but things fell apart on them, and they ended up fighting and being killed by the very people they tried to help for so long. Now there are only the two of them, alone and aging, with no hope for the future. They had expected to die in the suspension chambers, and now they are facing what seems like a continuation of the battles they had thought finished at great cost. To them, since they have been asleep all the time, it is essentially only a couple of weeks since the last war and since they bade farewell to the rest of their friends.”

  “What happened to the others?”

  “Only eight of them survived the wars. Some of their own actions doomed many of them. That was why Iach-Iss was so unhappy to learn about your amplifier amulet. Apparently that experiment cost them dearly once the wars began. Five of the survivors elected to go back to their ship which is in space. Den-Orok says it was a suicide flight. Most of the scout ships were badly enough damaged that it was uncertain if they would make it back to the ship. Even if they reached it, over the years they had depleted its supplies and reserves so that there was
not enough to keep them alive very long, even in suspension. Basically, the five had chosen to die. They had nothing left to live for.”

  “Three remained behind?”

  Shyar nodded.

  “Sams-Ough died in the suspension chamber,” Asari explained. “They found him when they woke a while back. Apparently it wasn’t a big surprise. He had been badly wounded in the last battle. More than even the medi-table could handle given how the dragons had aged. Since none of them had expected to wake up, it hadn’t mattered so much at the time.”

  Jolan shook his head. It was indeed a sad tale, and here they were again hoping to impose on the last of the dragons to try and help them once again. It didn’t seem right, yet without something, all of Gaea might yet fall to the wizards.

  “Iach-Iss said they don’t have magic. All the time I have been on Gaea I have heard how dragon magic was different, and they say it doesn’t even exist.”

  “Their magic is their technology,” Shyar said. “They can do things we have never considered even with our ability with the power. No wonder it appeared different. They appear to understand our magic quite well. The unexpected melding of their communicator with the power fields of Gaea to produce the Nexus prompted them to begin a detailed study of how the magic works.”

  “We have no right to ask them for more,” Jolan said after a moment. “We should ask what we can do for them and leave them in peace.”

  Asari shook his head. “They have already decided to help us. We don’t need to ask. Once they understood the situation they decided they hadn’t finished their task from before. Iach-Iss says it is fortunate that there are very few with any real power. They were badly battered at the end and even their almost indestructible ships were falling apart after repeated abuse from high level wizards. He was unhappy when he learned of the triads. They were what almost turned the war into a total victory for the wizards.”

  “Have you made some kind of plan while I was out? I still haven’t properly expressed my gratitude to everyone for bringing me through. It sounds like it was a very close thing, although I feel like none of it happened.”