“Any one?” the boy asked.
“Whichever you like,” the man said.
The boy stood up and examined the chalices, laden with the fire’s glow. The man walked over to a shelf and plucked a bottle from it. He approached the boy with a jolly recklessness.
“Choose wisely,” he said. “They have a tendency to change your constitution.” He devilishly winked at the boy and placed the bottle down on a side table that looked like it had been cut straight from a tree.
One of the chalices was pure silver. It had a dark purple stone embedded in it. At first glance the stone looked black. The boy picked it up.
“I want this one,” he said.
“Ah,” the man said. “A true Rökkr. Not one of my children has failed to choose that one.”
“What does it mean?” the boy asked.
“That jewel is a Shadean lodestone,” the man replied. “You are attracted to the shadowlight.”
The man grabbed an ivory chalice on the other end of the mantle. It was embedded with a turquoise jewel. There was something ominous about the chalice, but the boy couldn’t figure it out under the current lighting.
“What type of lodestone is that?” he asked.
The man raised the cup and peacefully admired the jewel. “Wakan. The Ani’Yun’wiya had it right. Magic that doesn’t heal is a waste of universal energy.”
As the hearth fire illuminated the ivory chalice, the boy gasped in horror at what it was made of. The cup portion was a skull that was cut in half and turned upside down to hold the contents. The stem was made of femur. The bone pieces were fused together with silver. The base was made of two mandibles, teeth still intact.
“Is that someone you knew?” the boy asked.
“All too well,” the man replied. “You see, when I kill something, I try not to let it go to waste.”
The man savored the terror that was exuberating from his expression and flowing into the boy’s mind. He wanted the boy to know the wicked side of his goodness. Just because he was a champion of freedom, of truth, and integrity, it did not mean that he wasn’t capable of being flawlessly evil.
“Who is it?” the boy asked, then corrected himself. “Was it?”
“In good time,” the man replied. He raised his right hand and commanded the cork in the bottle to remove itself. “Kri’sha. Drewst dosstan.”
The cork smoothly twisted itself out of the bottle and hovered into the air. The man gently guided it with his hand until it set itself down onto the side table.
The man raised his hand towards the bottle and commanded it to come to him. “Ujool. Doer ulu ussa.”
The boy watched in awe as the bottle came to life and floated into the man’s grasp. He was amazed at how casually the man used magic to assist his everyday needs. He wondered if his father even remembered how to do things manually.
“Give me your cup,” the man said.
The boy handed the chalice over. The man whispered to the Shadean lodestone, “Pahntar ukt shar. Jous utka natha dro.”
He gave the silver chalice back to the boy, but now the boy felt another presence in the room, scrutinizing him from the outlying darkness.
The boy examined the chalice. “What did you say to it?”
The man poured the brandy into his ivory chalice and set the bottle down. He held the chalice with his left hand and knelt beside the hearth fire, still facing the boy.
“I told it to open your mind.” He turned back towards the fire. “I told it to show you a life.”
The boy grew concerned with how a stone would be able to show him the history of any life, whether it was the past, present, or future. He wasn’t naive. He knew for everything he gained from the dark arts, there would be a serious price to pay.
“I’d rather you tell me,” he said.
“Truth is relative,” the man replied. “Our minds have a tendency to remember things only the way in which they happened to us, the way they made us feel. It results in us inadvertently lying about what we experienced.”
The man raised his right hand towards the flame like a person trying to pet a wild animal. The fire danced enthusiastically in the reflection of his irises as their façade glowed with its unpredictable movement. He called the fire by its name and commanded it not to burn him.
“Chath,” he said. “Xun naut flamgra ussa.”
The boy stared in disbelief as the man put his hand into the flames. It was as simple as someone dipping his hand into a fountain.
The man commanded the fire to lend him its heat. “Tlu’og ussa dosst morn’lo.”
He looked down into the chalice and observed the brandy. As it began to form bubbles and steam, he pulled his hand away from the fire. He set the cup down on the side table and motioned to the boy. The boy wearily knelt beside his father, uncertain of what he was supposed to do.
“Are you familiar with equipoise?” the man asked.
The boy shook his head. “It’s forbidden.”
“Most call it magic,” the man said. “As though it’s some sort of lost art form that must be learned through ancient sages. But it’s not. It’s merely symmetry, oneness, harmony, and affinity. It’s as simple as being present. Everyone can do it. Some are simply more in tune with it than others.”
“Why is it so rare to see it practiced?” the boy asked.
“Because we live in a world of fools,” the man replied. “The self-proclaimed master magi are no different than the peasants they protect their secrets from. They’d have you join the Order of M’elzar and seduce you with the promise of embarking on the path to providence. Were you foolish enough to be swept up by their enthusiastic recognition and their perverse encouragement, you might be tricked into believing that you were one of them and that you tread on the road to enlightenment. But you don’t, and if you accept their counsel, you never shall.”
“But what if I excel?” the boy asked. “What if I exceed their expectations?
The man cracked a depraved smile. “The M’elzar magi faithfully appeased the last king in the same manner. Look at where it got them. I’dome en’i An Keryms.”
“The Night of the Long Swords,” the boy responded.
“It pleases me to know that your mother taught you real history,” the man replied. “Understand me well, child. Those who abet evil may eventually become its greatest ally, but the greatest ally of evil is always the greatest threat to its power. The greatest threat to power is always the one that gets disposed of first.”
The boy was nervous. He wanted to be able to use equipoise, but he was scared of the consequences and more so, he was scared of his father.
The boy’s voice quaked. “Are there other societies besides the Order of M’elzar that can help me to master equipoise?”
The man slowly but definitively shook his head. “Not unless you would like to find yourself on the path of slavery. It’s even worse if you’re talented.”
“If I’m talented?” the boy asked.
The man thought of an analogy. “Do you kill your own food?”
“Yes, sir,” the boy replied.
“Good lad,” the man said. “Have you tasted the difference in meat, between an animal that knew it was going to die and an animal that didn’t?”
The boy soberly nodded. “I’ve missed my mark before. I tracked an elk for six hours before it died. The adrenaline ruined the meat.”
The man gestured in agreement. “The best-groomed animals provide the best tasting meat. When it comes time for me to harvest one of my domesticated animals, I lure the animal away from its herd with an exquisite meal. A farmer does the same as he lures his sheep to the slaughter. The ruling class does the same as it frightens its population with staged bloodshed, and then corals them towards tranquility by offering a solution that tricks them into exchanging freedom for security. The Knights Lerretheur does the same with their paladins, who think they’re scouring the earth on a witch hunt, destroying evil abroad, but all they’re really doing is destroying the
freethinkers and the people whose ideas disrupt the ruling class’ status quo. The Order of M’elzar does the same with its magi. To kill something when it least expects it yields the best bounty.”
The boy tried to figure out how the man was relating this to the practice of magic. “So then, to learn equipoise, I must avoid those who try to harvest my potential?”
The man was impressed. “To become a master of equipoise, you must avoid anyone who tries to lead you altogether, including me. We’ve recently come out of an age of division where, for centuries, they have broken us down so that we wouldn’t know how to be in balance with each other or with nature.”
The boy tried to conceal his judgment.
“Don’t confuse me with some flower-picking wood elf,” the man responded. However abrasive he came across, he was extremely intuitive, and there was always a purpose behind the way he did things. “Hold your hand out like this.”
The boy emulated the man and held his hand out to the flames. He could feel the fire starting to burn his skin. He took his hand away.
“Command it not to burn you,” the man said.
“I don’t speak Shadean,” the boy responded.
“The name of the fire is Chath,” the man continued. “Call it.”
The boy looked at the hearth fire as though it were another person he was meeting for the first time. “Chath.”
“Good,” the man said. “Now, when you speak these words, do not merely utter them aloud. Address the fire. Unite with it so that it won’t burn you. Say it like you mean it. ‘Xun naut flamgra ussa’.”
“Chath,” the boy said. “Xun naut flamgra ussa.”
The man remained silent. He watched to see what the boy would do next. The boy ran his hand through the flames. After a few painless swipes, he let his hand remain in the fire. He was bewildered at how the flame gracefully danced around his hand, respectfully avoiding his flesh. He looked at his smiling father. He grabbed the empty silver chalice and held it to the man.
“Pour it yourself,” the man said.
“What’s its name?” the boy asked. After the man told him what to say, the boy took his hand out of the fire and aimed it towards the bottle. “Ujool. Doer ulu ussa.”
The bottle gracefully floated into the boy’s grasp. He started to get the hang of it, like a child learning how to walk. He poured the brandy into his chalice and set the bottle down. He put his hand back into the fire and waited patiently for the brandy in his chalice to heat up. Nothing happened. He turned to his father.
“How did you heat the brandy?” he asked.
“Harmony,” the man replied. “You must unite with it. Command the fire to lend you its heat. ‘Tlu’og ussa dosst morn’lo’.”
“Very well,” the boy said. “Chath. Tlu’og ussa dosst morn’lo.”
“Good,” the man responded. “Envision the flame’s heat as your own, transferring into the chalice.”
The boy felt himself gaining sympathy from the hearth fire. He felt the exciting, tingly sensation flooding his body as he acquired its energy. He looked at the chalice and felt the silver warming up.
“Now,” the man continued. “Focus on the brandy. You do not want the chalice to burn you.”
The boy stared into the brandy as though it were a wishing well.
“Think of the temperature that you’d want it to be in your mouth,” the man said.
The boy thought of the jasmine tea with cardamom and thistle that his mother made for him. He imagined how its body felt as the liquid caressed his tongue and the way its spirit soothed his soul at just the right temperature. The brandy heated itself up to match that.
The boy took his hand out of the fire and turned to his father. The man raised his cup to welcome his son’s new gift, to toast that equipoise was the business of a man.
“Faer zhah lil chaon del nesst.” He clinked his ivory chalice with the boy’s silver one and took a swig of his warm brandy. “Ah, I surprise myself sometimes.”
The boy grew frightened as he watched his father’s eyes ignite with shadowlight. The silver-purple glow of his irises looked as though a spectral entity had just possessed his body.
“Your turn,” the man said. “Take your place amongst us and bid farewell to the eye of light, along with its illusory gods of slavery.”
The boy was scared to trust his father. The man projected omnipotence and his answers were eloquently laden with rhetorical labyrinths. But the boy had come too far to turn back. He was physically and spiritually closer to the other side. He raised the chalice to his lips and paused for a moment to see if his father would react. The man’s expression gave away nothing. The wavelengths of his energetic signature were impenetrable.
The boy tilted the cup towards his mouth and took in the warm brandy. It tasted like rich coffee, maple sugar and chocolate, all on fire. As it gushed down his throat and into his stomach, a prickly sensation flooded through every vein in his body. As the drink flowed its way into his brain, the boy felt lightheaded. His surroundings grew static.
The unseen orbs of aether that make up all matter appeared in their visible form and stood still. The boy wasn’t ready to die. He felt so hollow, so incomplete. He couldn’t even call the existence that he was parting with a life.
He was paralyzed by the concoction but emotions ran wildly through his mind, and he felt cheated that the journey of his life would end in an empty room with an enigmatic and disengaged man that he knew to be his father, but by blood only.
As the boy neared death, the static orbs of ether excited and ran amok wilder than the snowflakes outside. The orbs formed in the shapes of men. They were faceless, dark purple entities. Some appeared like warriors and others like priests and magi. They stood guard around the man and calmly observed the boy experiencing his descent into umbra. The boy felt himself losing his balance and slowly drifting into the weightlessness of falling backwards.
Without hesitation, the man swooped in and cradled the boy by the back of his neck. With his free hand, the man grasped the silver chalice and protected its contents. He looked deep into his son’s open eyes as they emanated the silver-purple glow of shadowlight.
“Take in the darkness, son,” the man said. “Don’t fight it. Breathe it. Allow it to flourish within you. Allow yourself to become darker than the blackest night, for that is what shall make you good. That is what makes you a Rökkr.”
The boy felt his soul traveling elsewhere. He knew his life here was over. He heard his father utter something.
“Mir pholor,” the man said. “Udos kyorl tu’fyr tresk’ris.”
Though he didn’t speak Shadean, the boy could understand what his father said perfectly, as though it were Caliphian tongue.
“Hold on,” the man said. “We wait between worlds.”
CHAPTER 2
The Morning of a War
TO THE UNTRAINED EYE, it was a grand spectacle. The air ignited and shot off in different directions like wayward fireworks. The aether sparkled around her and chimed in the wind. The shimmers of light defied common knowledge and then returned to the caster. To the disciplined eye, it was nothing more than a failed spell.
Olwyn fell to her knees. She trembled with fatigue. Her despair evoked a soundless cry that stole her breath away. She was named after the goddess of flowers and the season of spring, but her body felt like winter’s wilt. Hot tears of misfortune cooled like glacier melt as they flowed from the summit of her celestial blue eyes to the valleys of her rosy cheeks. She looked back to the north one last time at the kingdom from which she fled.
Burning torches illuminated the distant city walls of Maebelfry, the nation’s capital. Olwyn wondered how something that bred such oppression and inequality could look so beautiful from afar. Perhaps everything looked beautiful when blanketed by the deep dark of night.
Crownspire, the kingdom’s eastern neighbor, unashamedly displayed its vibrant glory to compete for the night’s affection. Further north, the Grimridge Mountains ascended
to the heavens. Their snowy caps glinted in the moonlight.
The wind captured Olwyn’s strong blonde hair and danced with it, revealing her strikingly attractive Nordic Elfin features. Strands of it stuck to her sweaty forehead and teary face.
As she stared vacantly out at the horizon, her temple throbbed to the drumbeat of her heart. A soft murmur came from the bundle of flesh that she carried near her bosom.
Olwyn lifted the wrapping to uncover the face of a baby boy, still stained with the blood of his birth. His demeanor was calm. He raised his bitty hand, not even half the size of his mother’s index finger, and took hold of it. His touch melted her worries away. Olwyn tucked the baby’s hand back beneath the wrapping. A warm sensation flooded her body. Joy painted a fresh coat of warm, soothing tears over the cold streams on her cheeks. She fled the city shortly after she gave birth. She pressed her shaky fingers to her lips and kneeled back in relief. Her breaths were deep and gratifying.
“No son of mine shall ever know Drudgekreath,” she said. “You shall grow up far away from the Royal Family and their prison promises.”
Olwyn studied the baby’s hypnotic gaze. His irises were phantom in color. At first glance, Olwyn thought they were a translucent reddish-brown, similar to his father’s red irises. But as she looked closer, she discovered that their pigments were the color of sunsets.
“Your eyes burn brighter than all of Crownspire,” she said. “I shall name you Aithein. Shadowlight. Do you like it?”
A noise of approval escaped from the depths of Aithein’s belly. His little hand beckoned her the best it could.
Olwyn gently pressed her lips upon his forehead. “I agree.”
______________________________
HOURS PASSED. THE WIND chased twilight westward across the great territory of the Caliphian Steppe. Olwyn knew about the different kingdoms that existed at its far reaches. Most of the races that inhabited Caliphweald shared a mutual interest in preserving the steppe and the sovereignty of each culture, but the Western World had grown so corrupt with greed and consumption that it was forced to do what every empire does before it wastes, exhausts, and finally murders itself. It had to divide and conquer everything it could.
The Tale of Onora: The Boy and the Peddler of Death Page 3
