The Circle of Duty

by Owen Elgie

  Andrea was the first one to speak.

  “It would appear that all possible avenues have been exhausted in this venture. We should return to the mansion in Wales as soon as we can to inform The Mage and the rest of The Circle of the outcome so we will be able to prepare our next line of defence. I would suggest that the site in Argentina is razed to the ground and an outpost garrison set up over the prison to allow us to at least maintain its charge.”

  “I will take The Elder back to her estate and explain what’s been taking place. They will need to have the entire estate ‘cleansed’ before we can proceed with any kind of confidence that Mr. Ward left us no more surprises.” Andrea spoke with re-discovered wintry surety. She looked at me with a hard expression and I could see that there was no chance of persuading her into any other course of action.

  Reaching for The Elder’s arm, she took a tight grip and jerked her to her side and began gathering in her power to open a Cascade Bridge. The Elder frowned at the sudden hostility and was about to protest at the treatment but Andrea gave her no chance. She snapped her grip down hard around the upper arm of The Elder and before any of us heard the scream, we could all clearly make out the crunching crack of bone.

  The Elder, as you’d expect, screamed. I think it was equal parts shock as it was pain but the end result was the same. Her knees gave way and she collapsed to the floor, her fingers raking uselessly at Andrea’s hand, trying in vain to release her grip.

  Everyone took a shocked step forward towards The Elder before stopping at the situation before them. No one knew what to do. Em was the first to re-gain control of her speech.

  “Miss Thomich. May I ask what it is that you are doing to The Elder? Has she done anything which would warrant this kind of behavior?” Her head was tilted back in that familiar canine fashion as she just took in all of the detail that was before her, trying to understand what all of the pieces of the puzzle meant. Andrea’s eyes were arctic stone but somehow now burned with a fiery anger as well. She looked hard at Em as she spoke.

  “We’ve pointed out that the estate in Argentina needs to be destroyed because of the breaches there. You accepted when I pointed out that we needed to do the same in China yet find it hard to comprehend that we have been betrayed by The Elder.”

  She was breathing deeply as she spoke, as if she was almost unable to maintain any control of her emotions. I needed to get involved but being naked in this situation is more than a little off putting.

  “There has been no proof that there has been any deception from The Elder. She doesn’t even have all of her mind yet you feel that she is to blame for a great wrong?” Em continued.

  Andrea shook The Elder just to highlight the control she had of the situation, causing a fresh scream to join the bubbling whimpers which had been coming from The Elder. I couldn’t help but wince at the fresh agony.

  “Mr. Ward was able to affect the almost total defeat of The Circle and the theft of The Drake Stone. He has been in the service of The Elder for over a thousand years and you are suggesting that The Elder had absolutely no prior knowledge of what he was truly doing? She is either complicit or she is incompetent.”

  “Andrea,” it was my turn now. I edged closer with my hands raised to highlight the fact I wasn’t going to attack her with a concealed weapon, although I had no place to conceal a weapon even if I’d wanted to.

  “The Elder has been the truest member of The Circle for the longest time and there has been nothing new which would suggest that she had done anything.” Andrea shook The Elder again.

  This was going to be tough.

  Andrea was now glaring at me with a venom I’d never have expected from her.

  “We’ve tried to do things the way you suggest. You were the one who was keen to abandon the old ways and do everything in your power to keep us from them and look at where we are now. We’ve lost everything we were looking for and are now at real risk from The Hive. The Messenger here says that you are not involved in the treachery but you have allowed it to flourish just by confusing the issues as we discover them. You need to learn the duty we all have.”

  Gobs of spittle flew from Andrea’s mouth as she spoke, more emotion in her than she was able to control.

  “HOW DARE YOU!” Now it was Em who was joining the fray, stepping beyond me and practically squaring up to Andrea.

  “Anthony has been resolute in doing what is right all of the time and has given all he can to be able to resolve the theft. How dare you go outside the rules of The Circle, the very crime you are charging others of.”

  I could feel the anger coming from the two women even without the use of magical energies. I couldn’t let us pull ourselves apart here. Gesturing at Mark for help, I edged between the two warring women and tried to ease them apart.

  “We need to stop this. It’s now we’ve got to be one team, not pull ourselves apart. Enemies on the outside remember?”

  It didn’t work.

  I was facing Em as I did my best to speak to them both but I’d made Andrea angry.

  Andrea just roared at me. Even though she was still very much human, the roar was purely that of her Dragon form. She was totally losing it.

  Letting go of The Elder, she lunged forward and swung her armoured arm at my head. I was stuck. If I turned and attempted to defend myself, then I’d have to let go of Em which would probably mean that she’d just make a bee-line for Andrea and the resulting fight would probably have one of them dead. On the other hand, if I stayed put restraining Em, then Andrea would just cave my skull in. Yes that would probably mean Em would be released and then the fight again but more importantly, it was going to mean the end of me.

  I did all I could do and braced myself for the impact, aiming to move my head at the very last minute so at least I’d try and take the impact on my shoulder. My eyes closed and I waited for my spinning head to signal the best time to dodge as much as I could.

  And I waited.

  And waited.

  When I finally opened my eyes and risked turning around, still holding Em back from the fight, Andrea was stood with her arm raised in attack but now it was held in place by Mark, high above her head. She was struggling against the grip but was having very little luck.

  Turning back to Em, I shoved her hard away from the conflict and ordered her to remain out of it. She didn’t look happy but at least she listened, bowing her understanding even though her eyes glinted with purple fire.

  Turning back, Mark still held Andrea firmly in place. The Elder was still crumpled on the floor just behind them cradling her crushed arm, doing her best to remain motionless to both reduce pain and avoid drawing attention to herself.

  Andrea struggled but had no effect on her captor. To highlight the point, Mark lifted Andrea from the floor by her arm and brought her to his eye level.

  “My lady,” he spoke, no hint of emotion in his words, “This is my ‘no’ face. Stop your violence.”

  She shook her head as if to free herself from the effects of a clouding of her mind then just stared daggers at me.

  “Get your animal to let me down.” Her voice was frozen solid and there was no doubt that she meant every ice covered syllable, the same purple fire glint showing in her eyes as was in Em’s.

  But it wasn’t exactly the same.

  It wasn’t in her eyes like it had been with Em. It was only in one and it wasn’t even in that. That purple fire was coming from the side of her nose, merely reflecting the light onto her eye.

  As I stood in the gathering gloom, rubbing at the back of my neck, an important piece of a puzzle I hadn’t really known was there, stared me in the face and suddenly I understood so much of the what’s and the how’s.

  That glow. That fiery power wasn’t coming from Andrea or Em. It was The Drake Stone.

  What the Tayne Queen had said about her supposed savior rubbing crystals on her subjects screamed its relevance. How the hell had I missed it? That was how Leatherpants had been able to reach out and
control the Tayne. Through The Drake Stone pieces he’d inserted into them. That glow was coming from The Drake Stone, a piece of which had been embedded in all of us and it was the power of that stone which was being used to twist us.

  That was how we’d been attacked and drained of our powers. That was how we’d been manipulated by Leatherpants. He’d stolen the Drake Stone and had split it into the tiniest fragments and placed them on all of us. That was how he’d done it all to us. He’d been able to use his position to do all the damage without having to resort to the more traditional fighting. I didn’t know the specifics of how he’d been able to do it but he’d had the free run of everywhere within The Circle for so long he would have been able to do it at any point.

  Thinking hard back through the details of everything which had been taking place, that same glow of power, the tiniest of all signals of the true cause of our problems, was clear for all to see. It was only now, in the stygian depths of the realm of the Tayne, that the tiny ember was able to burn so obviously. Every time Em had behaved in a strange way, every time her persona had changed, she’d been in the presence of the warping power of a Guardian who was silently being attacked.

  I’d figured it out.

  Now all I had to do was talk Andrea down.

  Edging slowly forward I signaled to Mark to lower her down but I could see that he was still ready for action, just in case she decided to lunge forwards.

  “Andrea.” My hands were far from me, exaggerating my already wide stance. “This isn’t you. You’re being controlled from outside.” She snarled at me but didn’t attack.

  “We’ve known that we’ve been on the receiving end of some kind of magical attack during the whole of this but I think I’ve just worked out how they’ve been doing it.”

  Her lips were peeled back to reveal a furious, snarling set of teeth but she still hadn’t attacked me.

  “We’ve all been expecting there to have needed to be some kind of physical contact to be able to take the power from one being and give it to another. That’s what happened to me when I was fighting Tyus and The Zarrulent. But there has been physical contact with all of us without us even knowing it.” I pointed slowly at her face as a way of highlighting what I meant.

  “You’ve got to admit that you’re acting very strangely, not like you usually do. Add to that, there’s a tiny glow coming from your face. That glow has been coming from everyone when they’ve started to behave in a way that was beyond what they should have been doing. That same purple colour is what comes from the Drake Stone. That was why Leatherpants could control all of the Tayne and I’ll bet that’s why there was that beam of purple light before his Dragon construct fell. The power was broken free after I hit him and the crystal fragment was broken.”

  I risked a look at The Elder on the floor and then back to Andrea. Both were considering what I had just said. I could only hope that they were going to agree with my logic.

  “If that is the case my Lord,” Mark was still looking hard at Andrea but was speaking to me. “Should we not remove the piece of crystal?”

  “Good idea. We need to take the pieces out from all of us.”

  Now The Elder chimed in, her voice shaken but still determined. “But how do we determine who it is who has been affected in this way?”

  Despite the fact it had come from our amnesiac compatriot, the clearest example of someone who had been affected, it was a good question. It was a fair bet that the sharp pain I’d felt during every incidence of my own power being drained from me had been caused by the presence of the crystal shard and I could clearly make out where it was on Andrea but how were we going to check everyone else?

  “I can determine this fact.” Em spoke from behind me and walked forward to take up a place beside me.

  “We can all use the energies in individual shards to highlight the pieces of the stone that are in all of you and locate their whereabouts. I would also suggest that it is not just the Guardians who have been affected in this way.” Her voice was calm again but I swear I could pick up on some primal force of nature roaring from inside her. My mind was suddenly filled with amazing images of challenging her and battling with her hand to hand, tooth and claw, of tearing her clothes off as she did the same to me. I could just feel the deepest animal heat from her.

  “My Lord. We must move quickly before you are lost to the effects of this devilry.” Mark was speaking loudly and was edging himself and Andrea in my direction. Shaking my head I pushed the vivid pictures of Em away from my mind’s eye and did my best to focus. I could only hope it had been the expression on my face that had alerted him to the rising Fire power in me rather than anything else more ‘apparent’ which had been rising.

  “Mike,” I called to my Head of House. “Can you hold Andrea securely while Mark completes what needs to be done to The Elder and me?”

  Ghosting next to me, he replied in the affirmative, and in a blur was behind Andrea, gripping her tightly to hold her in place. A coronal discharge ringed them as she fought against him and he poured all of the power he had at his disposal into keeping her from unravelling completely. Both their white hair reacted to the static and began to come alive.

  I relaxed slightly but ran to Mark. I waved my hand at the back of my neck, hurriedly signaling where I thought the fragment of crystal was.

  “I could feel the pain here and I’ve had this incredible need to scratch the area since the last attack in Argentina. None of us ever noticed there being an issue because Leatherpants was only taking small pieces. It was only when he was removing my Dragon energy that it hurt. Must have been too much to control. Be as gentle as you can but cut the thing out of me.”

  Mark didn’t wait.

  Andrea screeched out against Mike but just couldn’t break free of him. He’d bound her arms to her side and hugged her close to him, giving her no chance to maneuver. Even as Mark set himself, I could see the strain on Mike’s face as he chanted all the magic he had to contain a Guardian. My own anger was rising fast at the image so Mark was running out of time.

  My focus on Andrea was broken by the sharp pain of field surgery. His blade was terrifyingly sharp, and without any pressure, slipped easily into my neck. The sudden pain kicked at my anger and it rose faster.

  “Hurry it up,” I said through gritted teeth, “I’m losing it.”

  The red in my vision grew and I could almost taste the Dragon roar building.

  But in an instant, that anger was gone.

  My vision returned to normal and the rising monster was returned back within me. The power of my Dragon was back under my sole control, leaving me safe in the knowledge that my mind wasn’t being messed with. The pain in my neck remained as a sign of what had just been done but I was now free of the warping control of Leatherpants and The Drake Stone.

  “I have it my Lord,” stated Mark from behind me.

  I took a steadying breath to truly savor the feeling of being free of the uncertainty but as I blew it out, before I was even able to turn to thank Mark, still surrounded in the dark by the other worldly shrieking of Andrea and the danger of our situation, still unsure of what the next step was going to be, my mind swarmed with a nauseating tidal wave of images and sounds and I was driven to my knees under the weight of what I was experiencing.

  “ANTHONY!” Even from within my mental prison, I could hear the violent call of Em as I collapsed and I could make out the indistinct sound of her footsteps coming closer.

  Before she could arrive at my side, despite everything that Mike had been doing, Andrea broke free, throwing him off like a discarded jacket to crash away from her and releasing herself to recommence her violence against anyone she wanted but which was far too clear was going to mean me.

  “What happened? What did your servant do to you?” Em was in my ear now. Her voice was again twisted to her own anger, a response to what was still coming from Andrea no doubt but she sounded so far away, like she was calling to me from across a great valley. I was doin
g my best to hold myself together but as each second passed, my mind just continued to fill with contradictions on my memories. I shook my head against the effects but I was being confronted by my very own spot the difference competition as situation after situation was replayed but with some subtle, some more blatant, variations. Our walk through the estate in Argentina changed details throughout, the time spent in my own mansion became different, as did almost every memory in my head. My head filled with hundreds of new pictures, all feeling like the shared memories I’d seen before. They had all come through the eyes of the Guardian but so many of them, despite having me involved, felt like they had come from someone else.

  I hadn’t registered what was going on around me, I hadn’t been able, but I could assume that the noises I could hear were as Andrea roared and smashed into Em, and then them both crashing away from me. They screamed and I could make out the sounds of magical energy being discharged and of metallic crunching sounds as they fought against each other with a ferocity that, despite not being able to truly witness the details, I was glad wasn’t being aimed at me.

  Then as fast as it had hit me, the maelstrom of memory started to slowly become rigid. There were empty voids in my mind but I was already able to see a clearer outline of the wider truth. All of the confusion about what was happening just collapsed away. I stood up as quickly as I could and took in as much of the detail of what was taking place. The memories I had of two of almost everything, including my time with Andrea at my flat.

  “Mark. I need you and Hairy over there to subdue Andrea and do the same surgery on her as you did on me. The fragment of stone is here.” I gestured to the side of the bridge of my nose to give him a place to start.

  “And you?” He queried back.

  “I’m going to stop Em before she kills Andrea.”

  We attacked in unison, but with more noise than actual malice. Andrea and Em remained locked in something which could loosely be called a wrestling grapple when we approached them and they were, happily, taken utterly by surprise.