The Circle of Duty

by Owen Elgie

  “No more left. Make them shut it down NOW!” The authority in that single command rang through my mind and I knew that we had completed what we had needed to. With a single effort, I forced my head back from the map and pulled all of my attention and power with it. The effort of will was required as the casting had been pulling against me, dragging me towards the map. I blinked my eyes open and drew in a huge gulp of air I hadn’t noticed I had been missing and watched Andrea do the same, look slowly around her as our central Cascade Bridge collapsed in on itself, and she fell backwards to the floor, unconscious. She had been doing the majority of the heavy lifting so was feeling by far the most fatigue. Frederico sat slumped forward with his legs crossed and his arms hanging limply at his side. I tried to move but my head spun wildly. I couldn’t be sure if this was a signal of impending danger or whether I was as fatigued as the others. I tried to focus on the nearest detail to give my mind something to grip to and looked hard at the map casting. The stones were all still stood upright and there was still a very faint glow leaking out. I scanned through the positions and counted up the number of stones that showed the locations of our battered soldiers. We had been looking for eighteen groups of survivors.

  I finally fell onto my back with exhaustion after counting through the map. All the effort to locate our people had been aimed squarely at picking up the energy of those people still fighting. We had moved fast despite being pummeled by the enemy forces and as my eyes closed I could still hear the explosions of the still active Tayne hitting the shield, and the calls of the fighting forces as those beetle-things which had made their way through the bridges were dealt with. I held the number of lives saved in my mind and felt for the life force all around us. I could taste the conflicting emotions coming from the different people around me, relief and anger, fear and hope all vying for supremacy of the embattled troops.

  We had only been able to find and save thirteen groups.

  7

  The relaxation of unconsciousness was short-lived.

  Despite the supernatural warfare which was raging around me, I did feel that I was roused a little more roughly than was absolutely necessary.

  My blurry concentration settled on the force that was shaking me awake. I could also make out the muffled sounds of a voice shouting for my attention. It sounded like the voice was coming to me through water and that that water was getting shallower.

  Despite the almost over-whelming urge to swat the sound away and slip back into the welcome of a very deep sleep, I was still just about aware enough to realize that there was probably a very good reason behind the overly assertive attempt to bring me round.

  That awareness was compounded when a flash of pain burst across my face. I was instantly rushed to full consciousness through a cloud of receding stars and tweeting birds. Looking up while I shook my head clear, I could see Mark standing over me with his long right arm held up at his side. He was shaping to bring his heavy hand down for a second slap to rouse me. At least that explained the stinging in my chops.

  “I’m up, I’m up,” was all I could muster as signal to stop another welt across my face. I must have sounded just like a bleary eyed teenager complaining about having to get up to go to school. Judging by the flicker of a smile on Marks face, he thought the same.

  My big head chef was quick to pull me to my feet and had to steady me as my legs were still apparently made mainly of jelly.

  “Thanks mate, still a bit light-headed.” The last thing I needed was to fall on my face and knock myself out.

  “No trouble. There’s a lot of it going round.” Marks voice was as deep as ever but there was a rough croak folded in there now. I looked up at him and shook the last of the fuzziness from my head and took in the detail around me.

  Despite his easy demeanor, Mark was injured. Badly.

  There were tears and rips in his clothing and almost all of them had the irregular staining of blood pools. I could make out several points of laceration where the little beetle creatures had been much more deadly to him than they had been on the armour-plated hide of my Dragon form. He was still standing proudly upright but the pain he was feeling was easy to see. Steady lines of blood were flowing down his arms and from the damage to his torso. At a rate that would never be acceptable, pools of the spilled crimson were steadily forming at his feet.

  The last pieces of my woozy brain fell back into position and I realized what I was looking at. I had known that Mark and his team had been one of the troop teams who had been trapped by the waves of insects; my own anger at the possible loss of our troops had pushed Andrea to actually mount a rescue. Seeing him stood before me had made the very serious risks which were facing all of us fall more sharply into focus.

  Since the beginning of this fight, he had been taking on a numerically superior force in a desperate defence. That he was part of one of the teams which survived the attack said as much about his group’s ability in combat, both conventional and magical, as it did about the speed the Guardians had managed to open the bridge complex. By the looks of him, his survival hadn’t been an easy one and there had still been a great cost paid.

  “Jesus, Mark. You need a medic, now.” I started looking round the area I was stood in; trying to pick out anyone I knew who could help. I scanned past the already roused forms of Andrea and Freddy, who noticed the frustration and worry in my movements, and my eyes fell on a group of our forces huddled around sporadic patches of people. The injured and dying lay around the courtyard and what medical help could be provided was being given.

  “Come on, you need attention.” I started to move towards the medical teams but Mark didn’t follow. Andrea moved to my side as I had started to raise my voice. I turned to him and he looked down at me with steel in his eyes.

  “There are more injured than me who need more help. I am needed as part of this fight.” He stuck his jaw out to prove he was resolute as he looked down at me and finished his thought with, “This is my ‘no’ face”.

  “You are badly injured and need to be restored to, aside from full strength, to full health. I don’t expect people to die for nothing.” I tried to stop short of jutting out my own jaw. By the look on Marks face, I wasn’t as successful as I had hoped.

  “If I fall here today, if we all do, as long as we can maintain the prison, then we could never die for nothing”. His jaw was still out, but now it was joined by his massive chest, all puffed full of pride.

  This seemed to be the central pin to a difference of opinion I had been having since I was first introduced to the clandestine world of The Circle. Everyone I had met in ‘my’ estate and those of the other Guardians seemed far too keen to throw themselves off the nearest good cause. They all viewed themselves as having an almost divine calling to defend the world from the forces of darkness. To the point that everyone I spoke with looked at me with confusion and, what I interpreted as, pity for not wanting to dive into the jaws of doom at the first opportunity. Don’t get me wrong, I believe that everyone in the world would happily give up their life for the right cause, whatever that may be for them, the protection of their family, defence of their country, to see Wales win the Rugby World Cup, the serious things.

  The issue I had was that everyone who was involved in this world seemed to take virtuous sacrifice as being the correct move in any situation. From what I could see, Mark was willing to die from his injuries because he thought he was doing the ‘right thing’. He viewed the cause as being bigger than himself. I could see his logic but he saw his position as that of Red Leader in the first Star Wars film (the proper ones, not the prequels). He was falling to his death after his engines had been destroyed but he knew that there was no more that could be done. He had given his all and he knew his ship was going to give one last poke in the eye as it crashed.

  As far as I could see, Mark was simply refusing medical help so others could receive attention, regardless of whether they were in the same danger of death as he was. Saving others was the cause Mark
was preparing to swan dive from. The only crumb of comfort I had was he was at least trying to joke about it.

  I didn’t have time for this.

  “You are getting medical attention. NOW!” ordered Andrea.

  My frustration at his lack of action to his own health was boiling over but Andrea beat me to the punch.

  She had roared out at him that he needed medical help and despite her human form, her voice had been that of the Dragon she could become. She roared her position clearly and there was no mistaking that she was expecting her order to be followed.

  In a gesture which would have manifested as a dive for cover in anyone else, Marks eyes twitched at the explosion of sound. Despite everything Mark was in terms of magical ability, elevated position in the estate back in Wales or sheer brute force, he was scared of Andrea. Not because of the Dragon element of who she was but because he saw her as being his superior and not because of any reason other than he seemed to be programmed to defer to the person who was socially above him.

  There was the slightest nod from him and he started to move towards the medics.

  I watched him go and sighed as he went.

  The second big issue I had with The Circle as a group was that there were far too rigid boundaries between the different levels of the group. It smacked of “a place for everyone and everyone in their place”. Mark, and indeed everyone, was duty bound to follow the orders of those people above them. Free thought was a very rare thing indeed. I had started to drill into that dogma from the very first day I had been welcomed into this group. I had seen some success too.

  Mark, Mike Christian, my Head of House, and a few other senior members of the estate staff had started to call me Anthony rather than sir. Not all the time mind, just on random occasions. It did look they were all trying the new skill out for size, where and when to use it. None of them could ever be described as being comfortable with the situation but my hope was to make small changes which grew.

  The down side to the first faltering steps into a new realm of perceived freedom was they were starting to get used to not doing what I told them all of the time.

  I stood next to Andrea amidst the melee of people around the courtyard as we watched my giant general finally receive the medical attention he was so desperately in need of, thinking that maybe there was something to this obeying orders caper. Maybe The Circle was having an effect on me too?

  That line of thought would have to wait.

  We were both quickly snapped back to the danger of the continuing attack which was still raging around our position. Explosions of sound were still booming out as Tayne after Tayne blasted into our shield wall but now, as the sun had finally retreated below the horizon and pulled all of the daylight with it, we were all greeted by a diffuse burst of colour spreading through the magical shield to accompany each explosion.

  Our own teams of troops were lending their own talents to the light show which was raging overhead. Our defenders were casting skywards, lance after lance of magical energy of all different colours to repair the cracks which were opening up. We were being bathed in a stunning showering rainbow of magical aura as the ebb and flow of defense and attack took place above us. Move and enchanted counter move flashed across the early night sky as more and more breaches of our defences opened up and were quickly sealed.

  Despite the peril we were all in, there in the warm night air, under a screen of crackling fireworks of sorcery, I looked at Andrea and couldn’t help myself. As the bright sparks of hue played across her face, despite the deep concern and palpable worry on her face, all I could feel was the need to whisk her away from everything. The thought of spending time with her in an environment where we wouldn’t be in mortal danger every second was an appealing prospect, not only for the lack of danger but also for the chance to crack the puzzle that she was to me. She blew hot and cold with me all of the time so I would have loved to understand exactly what was going through her mind.

  A particularly violent thunder crack broke that chain of thought.

  Andrea and I, and all of the people who had been running around us, were forced to take a steadying step as the ground shook under the latest hammer blow that The Hive unleashed.

  “How are they doing that?” I asked mainly to myself but also hoping that Andrea would have at least some idea. The Tayne had been such a miniscule threat in the past, I was at a loss to explain how they had suddenly become the potent threat they currently were.

  Andrea closed her eyes and furrowed her brow in concentration. She tilted her head slightly and began to chew on the inside of her cheek. The effort of whatever she was doing was easy to see as she battled against some unseen foe.

  Through clenched teeth she started her response.

  “I can feel their power. They’re coming.” The sentence was forced as she continued to struggle but her emphasis on the word power showed that she was almost in awe of what was baring down on us. I tried to reach out with my own senses, fumbling mentally for the clues Andrea was picking up on.

  I got nothing but a pain in my forehead. It would appear that I was still very inexperienced in terms of mental control. It was something I had only really started to use in the last three weeks. I could sense the broiling rage, confusion or determination in Freddy but other uses of my newest skill seemed to be beyond me.

  Breaking my own attempts at expanding my senses and looking back to Andrea, I found her scanning the horizon beyond the shield wall. Her eyes were darting back and forth, hunting for any impending danger.

  The expression on her face was enough to sell it to me. She looked truly worried.

  “Freddy. We need to get everyone ready for the next attack. The shield will be coming down.”

  I’d barely finished my call when Frederico flashed to my side. He was breathing deeply and looked almost to be too ready for the attack. He was only just holding onto his transformation. He was still just in his human form, but he was currently stood at roughly fifteen feet tall and had the starting of armour plates forming all over his body. His skin was changing colour, his face was starting to distort, to widen his mouth and lengthen his snout and he had started to form the early shapes of his wings.

  It was easy for me; it was pretty easy for anyone, to tell he was taking this attack personally.

  “I’ll kill them all! Bring them to me and I’ll laugh as their forces break at my hand!” The basso roar as he spoke rattled our chests and his Dragon form burst into being, snarling wildly as he took up his stance for battle, planting his feet and digging his clawed feet into the stony ground while spreading his wings in much the same way as a cobra might spread its hood, a clear signal of impending danger.

  He was still calling out his defiance to the darkness when the wild spinning in my head cranked up and almost knocked me off my feet.

  I staggered to my left and fought for control over the huge sensation which was threatening to tip me from my feet. The dizziness had burst from nowhere with such a force that it made me forget where I was for a fraction of a second.

  Freddy’s call from above me maintained the grip on the here and now.

  He was still booming out to the night, and the hordes of invaders who were massing within, that he would never stop resisting them when the spinning in my head made sense.

  As early warning systems go, mine wasn’t going to rank up there with best. Yes it could warn me of impending danger but it did so by putting my mind into a blender.

  Andrea must have picked up on the sensation I was going through alongside what The Hive unleashed.

  She wrapped a steel cable like grip around me to keep me controlled as she pulled me to the ground and started to call to Freddy to get down.

  Everything was too late.

  Above us, there came an almighty explosion as the latest Tayne suicide force smashed into the shield wall. The sound of the collision was accompanied by a sun-bright flash which must have spread throughout the valley and potentially beyond.

 
As we all blinked the flash burn from our eyes, we were greeted with the image of the shield wall being threaded through with tendrils of icy white fingers. The matrix of power which had been standing between the entry to the Argentinean Hive prison and those who would seek to breach it, was almost freezing before our eyes.

  In the space of no more than five heartbeats, the whole dome of power was transformed into an icy shell.

  The next Tayne impact laid us all open to attack.

  With an almighty thunder clap, another impact hit the shield wall. The effect was instant.

  The newly brittle surface of the magical boundary cracked and shattered.

  As every member of The Circle forces who were gathered around the entrance to the ancient prison watched, the dome of supernatural energy which had stood above them for generations shattered into a billion small pieces and with an in rushing of warm air, cascaded slowly down around our ears.

  Tiny pieces of crystalline energy floated down like the constituent parts of a bright snow storm and dissipated into nothing as they hit every surface below them, their energy fizzing away as a strangled whimper of light and sound.

  Around us all, the faces of all of the troops gathered within the boundary shield became awash with looks of confusion and fear. Each and every face had written upon it the utter lack of comprehension of seeing something which was considered a constant, an unending force, a symbol of permanence, broken before their eyes and laid bare.

  In all of the conflict which had been raging throughout the world between The Circle and The Hive, no-one had ever seen anything like this. Their faces said it all.

  The Hive were winning.

  But they didn’t stop there. As our whole force caught its breath at the surprise of the attack, our enemies drove home their advantage.

  Andrea and I hit the stone floor of the ancient citadel with her still calling out to Freddy to drop as the main cause of my sudden spinning head revealed itself.