The Circle of Duty

by Owen Elgie

  All the other eyes in the cavern passed onto The Elder and waited. Leatherpants continued.

  “And why would you feel the need to support someone who is so blatantly incapable of delivering what is expected of him? We are all in service of The Circle in our different ways. We have all been given a role to play in the performance of our lives but we all rely on the fact that we are all pulling in the same direction. Should there be someone who is undermining what we are doing, shouldn’t we purge them from our system?”

  “I wholeheartedly agree mighty Elder but are you certain that it is Anthony who is the one working against the best interests of us all? Is it not possible that another within our number was capable of betraying us? Surely it is more likely that someone of great power and experience is more likely to have been the traitor?” Andrea dropped her gaze pointedly towards Leatherpants at the last point and everyone in the cavern saw it.

  Maintaining her focus on Leatherpants now, she continued.

  “Our Welsh Guardian is far too inexperienced to be the only suspect in this matter, do you not agree?”

  The Elder said nothing. She levelled her mask of indifference back over her features and practically turned to stone before our eyes. Leatherpants on the other hand, turned and slinked back to his position back at the side of his master. He knew that he couldn’t respond in the way he must now be burning to. He’d already been slapped back into his place so couldn’t risk opening his mouth. He had also had his master remain silent when he was being signaled out as a potential threat. In terms of honour and protocol, he’d just had his trousers pulled down and been given a very public spanking.

  I grinned at that image in my head.

  “Gathered Guardians,” called The Mage. “We require a team of you to go forth and reclaim The Drake Stone from those who have taken it from us.”

  Thunder and Lightning shot from their thrones in unison.

  “I will go for The Circle,” boomed from the pair of them, in a very odd stereo effect.

  The Mage seemed to consider the two of them as options, weighing up the possibilities of having them questing and gave his answer.

  “My most loyal servants. I thank you for being so eager to volunteer for this most important of causes but I must refuse your offer. If The Hive are truly capable of damaging us as has been suggested here today, I cannot take the risk that the charge that the two of you have here could be released in your absence. You must remain on guard here.”

  The two giants bowed to their master and settled back into their respective thrones. The Mage turned his gaze back to the group at large.

  “I’ll go Lord Mage.”

  Everyone, Guardian and retinue member alike, looked at me agog. No-one had been expecting that obviously.

  “You must want to go. You probably already know the location of The Drake Stone having been responsible for its taking.” The Elder was now using the tone of a petulant teenager rather than that of a leader of armies.

  Taking yet another steadying breath, I gave my reasons.

  “I’ve been set up as the bad guy in this whole situation despite not being involved in anything which has been levelled at me. How else can I prove to everyone that I’m not part of a big conspiracy?”

  The split second of understanding from the other Dragons was enough for The Mage to give his feelings of my offer.

  “I agree with your logic Mr. Johns. You do indeed need to show you are not responsible for this but also to find who the real enemy is. I accept you as volunteer to this cause, both to retrieve that which has been taken but to put you to the test as well.”

  “I will also go Lord Mage.” The Elder was out of her throne as she spoke to the crowd. “There must be someone to oversee this one to ensure he is not passing further secrets to the enemy. I will go to ensure that our true destination is not lost.”

  She bowed and returned to her throne.

  “Very well my friend. You will accompany Mr. Johns.”

  Great.

  Now I was stuck with the one person who was out to get me being able to work next to me as we went into who knew what. She’d already tried to have me bridged, and as far as I could work out, there was still a chance that it could still happen. Now she was going to be at my side if we got caught in a fight with nothing to stop her killing me herself and then returning my body as a terrible loss. There was no way I was going to be left alone with her.

  “I request that there be another to attend this task my lord. I would request that Andrea be allowed to be a part of this quest.”

  I flicked a furtive glance between Andrea and The Elder and hoped that The Mage would agree. Andrea looked back in much the same way but The Elder could see what I was trying to do. She simply narrowed her eyes and gave the barest hint of a nod of acknowledgement.

  “Agreed.” The Mages voice had taken on an almost casual tone with the last word. “Assemble a handful of soldiers who will be able to assist you in this undertaking and begin when you are ready. You will take the child and her replacement, Mr. Blanco, with you as well to ensure you are able perform the bridging quickly when you retrieve the stone.”

  Everyone nodded and stood as The Mage made his way back towards his throne, content that they had all the information that they could require and that they had been dismissed.

  I didn’t share their feeling of calm.

  “My lord. Won’t we have to bring the stone here to let you do the business of bridging?”

  Everyone looked at me with the all too familiar expression of casual pity they reserved for the mentally infirm member of their group. It didn’t worry me, I just hoped I’d be able to buy the maximum amount of time to find another way for this awful situation to play out. I was still clinging to the hope that I could find a way to remove the power from Maria without it killing her.

  “Do not worry my Guardian. The Messenger will be able to perform the rite. She will be accompanying you to ensure everyone is able to remain focused on the task at hand,” explained the Mage as he regarded The Elder and then Andrea before turning back to me. He could see what I’d done and why I’d called for Andrea to be a part of the group. He frowned down at me and I could see his mouth open slightly, as if to say something vital, but it closed slowly before anything was uttered. His eyes remain fixed on me and the frown deepened.

  It was official. That was, of all the awful claims and events which had taken place in this mighty cavern, the most unsettling. It would appear from what he hadn’t said, that The Mage was also aware of what The Elder had been talking about earlier on when she was recounting my feelings towards another member of the group.

  The Mage returned to sit on his throne and all of the gathered Guardians bowed their heads to him. He gently returned their bow and without any form of summoning, the shards of light which had formed the sphere of power he had been called from began to reform around him, rebuilding the shell which enclosed him.

  After less than a minute it had been totally reformed and without there being any kind of ceremonial effort, it simply faded before our eyes, to reveal the now empty throne.

  Immediately he had disappeared, the magical circuit connecting all of the Guardians was broken and everyone took a deep breath as a response to the release of the invisible force none of us had been aware had been leaning on us.

  And we all looked around at each other and scrabbled against the memories which were starting to become hazy already. Whatever had just taken place had begun the process of emptying our heads of the activities of the morning. Guardians and staff alike looked around at the other members of the teams gathered for the meeting and it was clear that everyone had just had their minds infiltrated and all of the details of what had just taken place were slowly being extracted.

  We all knew that we’d been called to Egypt for a vital gathering but the whys were being plucked away. Opposite me, The Elder and Leatherpants were both sat stock still with smooth expressions where everyone else had confusion of varying de
pths. Did they remember anything? Were they just familiar with the sensation?

  “Now what?” I growled down to Mike as quietly as I could. The holes in my recollection were growing as they sucked in more of the details. By the looks of things around the chamber, everyone was doing much the same. Surely this couldn’t be the best way to conduct business of this seriousness?

  “Not really sure. From what I’ve read, we get given the records of the meeting and then we can leave.”

  That didn’t sound too bad. I could recall bits but there were already too many gaps to create a clear image. Whatever it was that had just happened here, I was reasonably certain that it couldn’t have been good.

  For the longest second imaginable I just stared around at the others in the cavern and fished through the empty spaces which was the full recollection of the time in the cavern. There was nothing of coherence there. No shards of sound or pictures for me to be able to start trying to reassemble the events of the day. It truly was as if there had been someone cast into the room with an editor’s scissors who had laid out the film of the experiences and had swiftly snip, snip snipped them all away. Pretty soon, there was going to be nothing left at all.

  From behind the mighty stone dais at the head of the assembled stone thrones, there came a briskly marching column of red robed individuals, all with their hoods covering their faces, all carrying a rolled piece of parchment. Reaching the head of the gathering, they began to split away from the column and each member started towards a specified Guardian.

  One by one, they approached the Head of House in each group and passed over the scrolls with a ceremonial bow. Mike accepted his with a bow of his own, as did most of the others. Leatherpants just snatched the scroll from the person delivering it, casting out a withering gaze which left no doubt what so ever as to the meaning. I swear he didn’t even look at what was written on it, just tossing it aside to one of his minions.

  Mike cracked the wax seal and opened out the paper, scanning quickly through the details that were enclosed within. Looking down at him, I willed him to finish quickly so he could tell me what had happened.

  “I think that you may be in a little trouble.” He was still reading but he’d obviously read enough.

  “What have I done this time?” This really was getting far too familiar.

  “You may be in a lot of trouble.” He was still reading but the details were clearly getting much worse.

  Looking at the other people in the cavern it was quick to see that they had started to come to the same conclusion as Mike had. Sideways glances of suspicion and mistrust were all that I could see from everyone. At least Andrea looked ice calm as normal. That was something I suppose.

  Mike finished reading and ran through the highlights. Accusation of treason, magical neutering and the mission to save the world. All things considered sounded about right.

  Around me, the other members of The Circle had begun to revert back to their human forms from their Guardian Dragons and were making their way back to the tunnel I’d used to get in here, and the surface above. Shrinking myself back down, I took the scroll from Mike and ran through what was written on it.

  “Is this it?” I asked while I read through the writing before me.

  “Indeed sir. Were you expecting to have something else?” Mike was maintaining the language of the dutiful servant.

  “I was expecting to see a complete record of every word, like a court record. This is just a list of the highlights. Granted, it points out that I threatened people, but still.”

  “It gets the point across though doesn’t it? We’ll get back to the estate and gets things under way for the arrival of our ‘guests’.” His tone was more conversational again and it was very relaxing. Even though I was facing what was a barely disguised death sentence, at least I wasn’t going to be marooned to resolve this on my own.

  Looking around, all I could do was take stock of the mess I now found myself. The Mage had vanished to wherever he’d come from and I’d been left in a situation where I just knew that nothing good was going to happen, even if I was successful in what we were about to do.

  “In for a penny...”

  20

  The gathering of Guardians were quick to leave the cavern as soon as the meeting was declared over. The Messenger and her guards all vanished the same way they always did after confirming to The Elder, Andrea and myself that we would all be meeting at my estate to start out on our quest to retrieve The Drake Stone.

  The Elder was quick to leave after them all and headed directly back to her estate to, as she put it, prepare what would be needed for such a task. Andrea and I both opened Cascade Bridges to our own estates and sent our teams back to start preparations of their own. Mike had reassured me that he would make certain everything was in readiness for the arrival of everyone else and that I shouldn’t worry myself. He also took the still whimpering form of Maria and her gathered people, including Franco the Hairy, back to Wales with him. He’d worked out immediately that I’d want to have her as close to me as I could manage. The thought of her being ‘cared for’ by The Elder before we started out was, quite frankly, a terrifying thought.

  Finally, everyone had headed out to their destinations, leaving Andrea and I as the only two still within the mighty pyramid. We stood in the low light of the tunnel mouth and the awkward silence returned.

  All memories from the gathering below us were now gone completely. We had utterly lost all of the detail of the cavern as well as the meeting we’d been involved in. Functionally speaking, I felt that I’d just arrived and hadn’t moved beyond the tunnel mouth.

  Looking at her face it was clear, even to me, that whatever it had been that had been winding her up was still there despite all of the fun and games from the cavern below. At least it looked as if she wasn’t quite as angry as she had been.

  She eventually went first.

  “You still have a great deal to learn.” He voice was one of the disappointed teacher after the pupil had done something wildly ridiculous despite knowing they shouldn’t. Just the tone I wouldn’t appreciate.

  “What do you mean by that? I must have been the picture of restraint in there. No-one died did they?” I had tried to keep the belligerent tone out of my voice but, again, I’d missed by some distance. Andrea folded her arms and squared her stance towards me.

  “You just never stop and think do you? All you see is the effect that any set of circumstances will have on you. You don’t, for a second think how anything you do or say will affect anyone else. It’s always just about you.”

  Her tone built in ferocity as she crashed through the sentence until, when she finished, there was a deep chill to the air and, I swear, it was snowing a little. She quickly re-gathered her composure and stared at me. It looked like she was preparing herself for a fight.

  That made me stop and think.

  Did I just go off the deep end when the mood took me and to hell with the consequences? I had to keep calmer. Let people notice just how controlled I was.

  “From what I read, I tried to get my point across in there when I was being attacked by people who I thought were a part of the same struggle as I was.” Temper still in check.

  “Besides, it would appear that we were ending up with the slaughter of a child as a viable option. That will never be acceptable to me.” My own temperature had risen through the sentence as well until I’d snarled the final word and the temperature in the cavern had been taken well above the searing heat we had felt when we had first arrived in Egypt. Any frost, snow or ice which Andrea had created as a physical effect of her anger, was quickly melted away.

  I straightened my own countenance and quickly gathered in my own flapping feelings.

  We both looked at each other, then at the floor.

  “Anthony.” Andrea was speaking to me but didn’t take her gaze from the sand covered floor beneath us.

  “We are a part of a massive machine which controls the enemy leaders and fights
off attacks around the world.” She raised her gaze and met mine.

  “I know, I know” was all I could think to say. I was getting very tired of being reminded of the position I held in The Circle, how vitally important we all were and how we must put the strength of the whole above all else. Andrea could see that in my face.

  “You have been told the same point over and over again and by the look on your face you’ve heard it more times than you’d care to think about.” She reached out and touched my hand. “The problem is you don’t seem to be listening to what is being said. All you seem to want to do is rage against the machine. Haven’t you ever stopped to think that the only reason you keep hearing the same comments is that you keep doing the same things which creates the need to remind you of who you are.”

  We both looked at each other and I tried to think clearly about what kept happening to me. I was always butting my head up against the processes that were built all around me. I’d been so obsessed with making sure that everything happened in the way I thought was acceptable I’d not been paying attention to what was actually going on around me.

  “You have to be more subtle with how you go about your dealings with the other members of The Circle. We are a very strong, good group but strength can also cause rigidity. You’ve fought within the confines of us before but this mission will be as much a test of your ability as a soldier, but also as a member of The Circle. We will both be judged by the outcome of this mission so you must be more careful. Trying to smash through obstacles won’t work. You have to be more, persuasive.”

  She’d made sense, as always. Yet again I’d been a little too enthusiastic in my comments. I nodded to her and showed my understanding, accepting that I was going to be under the microscope even more than usual.

  “Is that all I need to do to keep safe? Just make certain I say the right thing to the right people?” I nudged her in an attempt to lighten the mood.