Gabriel struggled to keep all the facts straight. Focusing on just Alexandros, as his name was pronounced in Greek, and what he had done, was much easier. Born in 356 BCE to Philip II, the king of Macedonia, and his fourth wife, Olympia, Alexander was thirteen when the famous philosopher Aristotle became to be his tutor. His father was assassinated in 336 BCE, and Alexander assumed the throne. Shortly thereafter, he began a campaign of conquest through Egypt, Persia, and India. Within ten years, he had defeated all of the major armies of the known world and became the ruler of nearly every land he passed through. In 326 BCE in Hyphasis in India, his troops refused to continue fighting, and he was forced to retreat. He died three years later in 323 BCE after falling ill at a celebration. Those were the bare facts, filled in by a long list of battles in places with names like Granicus, Gaugamela, Tyre, and Issus. Gabriel found himself returning frequently to the timelines in his copy of The Time Traveler’s Pocket Guide to History.
The training went on like that for five days, practicing magic and combat skills, studying history, and preparing for the long journey. Ohin estimated that it could take as much as a week to thoroughly search each battle, which meant they could be traveling a few months. Of course, they could return to the castle when necessary, but they needed to carry provisions that would allow them to stay away for several days and nights. Apollyon was just as likely to use the imprints of a battle after it was over as while it was taking place.
Rajan and Marcus each carried a tent, one for the men and one for the women, and everyone had bedrolls and backpacks filled with beef jerky, dried fruit, cheese, bread, and water. They also each carried a small first aid kit in the event that Marcus or Akikane were not on hand to help heal injuries. Although Gabriel was making progress learning from Marcus, he was still, thanks to his days in Kumaradevi’s arena, much more proficient at creating damage in a body with Heart-Tree Magic than healing it. They also each carried several relics of the time so that if they were separated, Ohin, Akikane, or Gabriel, could get them to another location or back to the castle.
On the morning of the sixth day, they gathered in a corner of the courtyard of the Upper Ward, each appearing as though they were dressed in local ancient Greek clothes. The men were dressed as commoners, with leather sandals, skirts of wool, and loose fitting, short-sleeved cotton shirts. The women wore draping, toga-like dresses that fell off their shoulders and flowed to their ankles. Gabriel found himself trying not to notice Teresa’s soft brown shoulders. If she caught him trying not to notice, she gave no sign of it.
Elizabeth arrived to wish them well and send them off with words of inspiration. At least Gabriel hoped they would be words of inspiration. She seemed none-too-happy that morning, although he suspected this was because he was accompanying the team on the mission. He hoped she wouldn’t change her mind and try to force him to stay. She could change her mind, but he wasn’t about to change his. He saw that Nefferati was with her, as well. He had not seen her since the dinner the first night back and had assumed she had departed for her retreat already. She didn’t look very happy, either. Maybe they were back to arguing.
“I wanted to wish you all a successful mission today,” Elizabeth said. The silence of the other team members spoke to how rare an occasion it was to receive a sendoff from the head of the Council. “Take care of each other as you take care of business.”
“And don’t do anything stupid,” Nefferati added, looking directly at Gabriel.
“Well, we’ll have to change our plans now,” Rajan said under his breath. Gabriel wasn’t sure if Elizabeth or Nefferati heard him, but they both frowned just the same.
“Well, that’s it,” Elizabeth said. “Good hunting.”
“And good luck,” Nefferati said.
“Well said, well said,” Akikane said. “Now we go.” Akikane touched his sword and smiled as he gave a short wave to Elizabeth and Nefferati, a Greek coin held between his thumb and forefinger. Then the familiar blackness of time travel surrounded them, followed by the whiteness that signaled a jump through space and time.
Chapter 24: Alexander the Terrible
The Chimera Team sat in a circle around a small campfire. Gabriel sat next to Teresa, the Sword of Unmaking lying in the grass beside him. Akikane had entrusted Gabriel to carry the sword both because it would teach him responsibility and because it would mean he had access to a very powerfully imbued artifact if he needed a talisman in the event something went wrong. Gabriel usually wore it slung it over his shoulders with a strap because he was too short yet to wear it at his waist. Teresa had giggled the first time she saw him with it, but no one had said anything.
Rajan and Ohin roasted apples on sticks over the fire. As they rotated the apples in the flames, they played a game of Go, the ancient Chinese game of strategy. Players placed small black and white stones at the intersections of cross-hatched lines on a wooden board. The object of the game was to accumulate territory and eliminate your opponent’s pieces.
Watching them play, Marcus carefully sliced a roasted apple into sections with a knife, placing the pieces on a small tin camping plate. When he finished cutting, he drizzled honey over the apple slices and sprinkled a little cinnamon over them from a copper tin. Stabbing one of the apple slices with the tip of the knife, he passed the plate to Ling, who grabbed a slice and tossed it in her mouth, her eyes going wide as she spit the apple slice back into her hand, bouncing it up and down.
“Zhĭzé!” Ling exclaimed, blowing on the slice of apple. “That’s hot!”
“What’d you expect,” Marcus said with a laugh. “It’s a roasted apple. They tend to be warm.”
“You could have warned me,” Ling said as she took a wary bite from the slice of roasted apple and passed the plate to Sema, who carefully took a piece with her fingers.
“I’ll blow on the next ones to cool them down for you,” Marcus said as he grinned and bit into the apple slice skewered by the tip of his knife blade.
“It’s interesting how much Apollyon and Alexander resemble each other,” Gabriel said, blowing on a piece of roasted apple as he passed the plate to Akikane. They had been watching the two on battlefield after battlefield for several weeks now and Gabriel had noticed how much Cyril, as Apollyon was called then, modeled himself on his leader, Alexander. The two even looked a little alike.
“He’s a little more dangerous than Alexander the Great,” Ling mumbled, apple in her mouth. “And his copies of himself are a more dangerous army than Alexander ever hoped to command.”
“Can he really manage to get the copies of himself to follow with the same devotion of his mages?” Rajan asked as he stared into the fire. “Will his philosophy of power work as well on a group of copies as it does on other Malignancy Mages?” They had repeatedly debated this question around the evening campfires.
Every night the same questions came up and they went through them again. Ohin promoted it as a means of looking for pieces of information and ideas they may have missed. They all knew that once they found and severed the branches of time Apollyon was using to create copies of himself, it would only signal the beginning of a new battle, not the end of the war.
“It’s hardly a philosophy,” Sema said.
“Balderdash is more like it,” Marcus added as he sliced another apple.
“Let’s look at it again for weaknesses,” Ohin said. He always encouraged them to look for weaknesses as part of creating a long-term strategy. He and Akikane had begun insisting that they play games like Go and Chess to develop their sense of strategy. Rajan had added Chaturanga, the Indian precursor to chess that up to four people could play. Ohin placed another white stone on the Go board and looked up. “Gabriel, why don’t you summarize Apollyon’s philosophy for us?”
“Do we need to go through it again?” Teresa asked, licking honey from her fingers.
“Of course, of course,” Akikane said. “Each time we look at the puzzle, more pieces will begin to fit together.” He smiled at Gabriel as he t
ook another bite of roasted apple.
“Right,” Gabriel said as he swallowed a chunk of apple. He had heard and recited the philosophy before. “Apollyon’s basic philosophy is that mages exist to rule over non-mages, and in particular to rule the whole of the Primary Continuum and use it for their glory. Or for his glory, since he wants to rule the mages. He seems influenced by the late 19th century German philosopher, Fredrick Nietzsche, and his idea of an Übermensch, or Over Man, or Super Man. Essentially, the strong are strong for a reason, and they should rule the weak. And the strongest should rule them all.”
“A bit of a condensation,” Rajan said.
“I thought I was supposed to be brief,” Gabriel said. “Apollyon believes he can become something that has never existed, someone more powerful than anyone in all of history.” Gabriel paused for a moment as he realized that thought was similar to something Vicaquirao had told him about himself. Gabriel was something that had never existed and was destined to become more powerful than anyone in or out of history. How was he similar to Apollyon? Was that what Vicaquirao had been hinting at? It was unsettling to consider.
He pushed the thought aside as he continued, hoping the others had not noticed his pause in speech. “Anyway, Apollyon believes that mages should unite under his leadership and rule the people of all the alternate realities and that they should break The Great Barrier in 2012 so they can rule the future. And I remember something now. Vicaquirao was reading a book by Nietzsche when he had me captive at that cabin. It may have been coincidence, but maybe not. Maybe Apollyon got his philosophy in part from Vicaquirao.”
“Or maybe that’s what the slippery devil wants us to think,” Sema said.
“Maybe,” Ohin said. “But good to know. This is why we go through it again and again.”
“Yes, yes,” Akikane said. “Little pieces that help reveal the whole.”
“Assuming we’re not seeing exactly what Vicaquirao wants us to see,” Ling said.
“Very possible, very possible,” Akikane said with his usual smile.
“Instructive for us,” Rajan said, “that Nietzsche also wrote ‘He who fights against monsters should see to it that he does not become a monster in the process. And when you stare persistently into an abyss, the abyss also stares into you.’”
“I’ve seen the abyss,” Teresa said. “It’s overrated.”
“What else?” Sema asked, looking at Gabriel as she began a game of chess with Teresa.
“Apollyon wants to rule over the Grace Mages, as well,” Gabriel said, taking another piece of apple to cover the discomfort of the thought. “He believes that Grace Mages are essential to the balance of the universe, but they must be subservient to the Malignancy Mages, similar to Vicaquirao’s idea that dark and light must balance each other. Except Apollyon doesn’t believe in balance. He believes that balance creates stagnation, and that only from destruction can new creativity arise.”
“Bad complexity theory,” Teresa said, moving a white pawn. “Too much stability and structure, and your system is too rigid to allow creativity. You need just enough chaos to stay on the edge of creativity, but too much and everything falls apart. He’s not looking to create new levels of complexity, he looking to destroy and dominate what there is.”
“Exactly what I was going to say,” Gabriel said, grinning at Teresa.
“That raises the question then,” Rajan said, “do we need someone like Apollyon to add chaos to our system?”
“Not bloody likely,” Marcus said.
“There’s plenty of chaos in the Continuum without his help,” Ling said.
“Or the opposite question,” Gabriel said. The others looked at him quizzically.
“Just so, just so,” Akikane said, smiling at Gabriel again.
“What do you mean?” Sema asked.
“Is the Council too rigid, too stable, to be creative enough to defeat the Malignancy Mages?” Gabriel asked. It wasn’t a question he really wanted an answer to.
“Good question,” Ohin said.
“We’d better bloody well hope not,” Marcus said.
“But there’s a better question,” Teresa said.
“I didn’t want to ask it,” Gabriel said.
“What question?” Ling said.
“Are we too rigid to be creative enough to defeat Apollyon?” Gabriel said.
“Exactly, exactly,” Akikane said. “Can we use the chaos he causes to creatively defeat him?” Everyone was silent for a moment, their eyes meeting over the flames of the fire.
“I think we can,” Gabriel said. He wasn’t entirely sure he believed it, but he knew someone needed to say it and since he had posed the question, it seemed like his responsibility.
“Good answer, Gabriel,” Sema said with a nod of her head.
“And a good answer to end on,” Ohin said. “Who would like to entertain us tonight?”
“Oh, I’ve got something,” Marcus said, gently using his tongue to remove the honey from the tip of his knife. Every night they traded turns around the campfire, reciting poetry and telling stories. Ohin would play his wooden flute, and Rajan would do magic tricks. Not real magic, but tricks of sleight-of-hand. Teresa found it terribly amusing and ironic. She often entertained by doing wildly complicated mathematical computations in her head. Rajan usually protested that they had no way of knowing if she was giving the right answer or not, since she was the only math genius present. Teresa would chide Rajan that it wasn’t her fault he couldn’t count beyond ten without taking his shoes off.
“This evening,” Marcus began as he took a sip from a wineskin to clear his throat, “I thought we might enjoy a little Shakespeare. A little something to stir the hearts in the face of our obstacles. A little speech from Henry the Fifth, I’m sure you’ve heard once or twice.” Marcus stood before the fire and coughed once before he began to recite.
“If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.”
As Gabriel listened to Marcus reciting the words, playing out the part of Henry the Fifth inspiring his troops, his thoughts turned back to Apollyon, as they always did. The Malignant True Mage was likely placing the copies of himself at different moments in history where the great atrocities that took place would give him more combined power than any mage had ever held. Linked together, he and his army of copies might hold sufficient power to break through The Great Barrier of Probability that kept Time Mages from moving any further into the future than October 28, 2012 CE.
He had probably created several dozen copies already. How could they defeat dozens of versions of Apollyon linked together through time? One at a time, he thought to himself. Slowly, slowly, as Akikane was fond of saying about his training. And how far could that training take him? And how fast? And as he gained mastery of all six magics, and as he gained more power than any mage had held before, would that power tempt him the way it so obviously tempted Apollyon? He had to hope not, but how could he know?
He was on a path to becoming something he might not even recognize as himself when he was finished. How could he remain true to who he was? He knew he would not truly know until it was too late to change what he had become. Gabriel returned his attention to Marcus, hoping to forget his questions for a few moments.
“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think
themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.”
Those seated around the campfire burst into applause as Marcus finished reciting.
The bald man blushed and bowed slightly.
“Wonderful,” Sema said as Marcus sat beside her.
“It’s the words, not the man who speaks them,” Marcus said, grabbing the wineskin and taking a quick swig.
“It’s the man who speaks them that gives them life,” Sema corrected.
“Thank you,” Marcus said, patting Sema’s hand. “Who’s next?” he asked as he turned to the others around the fire.
“Flute, flute, flute,” Teresa began to chant as she clapped her hands. Rajan copied her first and the others quickly joined in, even Akikane. Gabriel noticed that it was Ohin’s turn to seem embarrassed as he pulled his wooded flute from his leather satchel and settled in to play.
“Any requests?” Ohin said, licking his lips as he settled the mouthpiece on them.
“The Girl I Left Behind Me,” Marcus called.
“Maybe we can convince Ling to sing,” Rajan said, poking Ling.
“I hardly know the words,” Ling demurred.
“Balderdash,” Marcus said. “You never forget anything. You’re like an elephant without a trunk.”
“Isn’t she though?” Teresa teased.
“Oh, all right,” Ling said, clearing her throat as Ohin began the tune. Ling waited for the intro and then began to sing in a voice so sweet and lush that it had taken Gabriel completely by surprise the first time he had heard it weeks ago. There were many things that he had imagined Ling being able to do, but singing Irish folk songs was not one of them.
The Wizard of Time (Book 1) Page 28
