by Philip Blood
“My kind?” I asked.
“Yes, you are a bastard son of two Sivaeral Seconds. I don’t know which of my brothers is, or was, your father. However, your mother, The White Enchantress, has been a thorn in our side. Perhaps you will be instrumental in her downfall once you have joined us.”
I turned my head, “Never heard of her.”
He smiled, and it was a wicked grin, “Years ago your mother masked her identity, going only by her title and barricading herself in her Ivory Castle. I think I finally know why she goes by the title, The White Enchantress; she has been attempting to keep your existence hidden from us. She has to be one of three of my supposedly dead sisters: Tenadeen, Mithrin or Belea. All the others are either accounted for, or under my control. I will find out which one she is soon enough when we take The White Enchantress. Our forces have been stymied by her defenses at the Ivory Castle; however, once we use you as bait perhaps we can lure The White Enchantress out and finally add her to our army.”
“Bastard or not, I will put you in your grave, again, permanently!”
He just smiled; my threats did seem kind of empty while I was tied to a post. Then he said, “You should know I am not prejudiced, I feel a Bastard will make an equally fine necromage. As one of our minions, you will be treated just like all the rest. You will finally taste true equality as one of my wife’s undead mages!”
“Just like you, hey?” I said. “She seems to have made you one of her lackeys now.”
“My soul was indeed brought back from the Ether by my wife, but instead of a dead body, my wife returned my soul to a living body, one from another mage! Of course, they must be of a lesser Tier, and their mind is destroyed, but sacrifices are necessary! They should be honored to be the vessel of a ruler!”
“Wow, would you like a little wine to go with your serving of megalomaniac?” I noted.
He frowned at me, “You are very rude for a person tied to a post.”
“Oh, I’m just warming up, Frankenfurter. Tell me, since a Second can’t alter their body, or change the body of another mage, how have you come to look like your old and terribly ugly self?”
My insults seemed to be slowly getting to him, and Medrod lost some of his smug demeanor. His answer was both defensive and angry, “Once in this vessel, my Self Image took control, and since I am the more powerful mage present, my Self Image shaped the reality of the form.”
“Ah, I see, you’ve added body theft and mind rape to child abuse; you’re quite the humanitarian, dick weed. I can’t wait to stick a sharp instrument up your ass.”
He smiled wickedly, “Even if you killed this body you would only slay the original mage. My soul would return to the Ether, and my wife would just bring my soul back. She will then place it in another mage’s body. In fact, I could have her bring me back and put into your body since you are still alive.”
“Try it, I’ll rip your soul a new one,” I promised. “So, if I kill you then your wife will bring you back, so I guess I’ll just have to kill your wife too.”
That made him glower at me. “You will be our slave forever, I will have you kill many children, in fact, I will make you kill your precious Ziny, and you will do it with glee because I command it!”
His reminder of Ziny pushed me over the edge, and I vowed if I got out of this situation I was going to have Toji and the others teach me how to use these mage powers. I’ve had enough of these pompous jerks. But, first things first, I needed to escape from Medrod so I decided to play for time, and said, “What are you going to do when daddy comes a knocking? Your Archimage seems to have snuffed you last time, I’m sure he’ll do the same this time.”
Medrod sneered, “My father, the Wizard of Abal. Everyone is so impressed with the ten Firsts like they are untouchable! They call them Archimages, but they are nothing special. I, Medrod Sivaeral, have wrested this world from the rule of my father!”
I snorted, “Sure you have.”
He scowled at me and said, “I bound my father in a special prison, where he will rot, forever, on Mystical Island.”
Well, that was news. Now I had another reason to go to Mystical Island, the man who might restore my memory was there, and I had to report what I’d stolen from The Dragon.
Then I considered Medrod: as an evil mage, Medrod was no doubt powerful, but as an inquisitor of prisoners, he was an idiot. So far he’d learned my name while I had learned I was a bastard, which meant my mother and father were Sivaeral Seconds. I’d also learned the Sivaeral Archimage was also a captive, held on Mystical Island. He had also told me how Morgain had resurrected Medrod into another mage’s body. Most interestingly, at least to me, I’d learned my mother was a person called The White Enchantress, and she was still out there, opposing return-from-the-dead Med and his Dokkalfar bitch. This goon was a veritable fountain of information, and I’d gotten it all while tied to a post! Now all I had to do was escape from said post, and kill the bastard.
“Who are your companions, and what Houses and Tiers are they?” he demanded, actually attempting to interrogate me at last.
“Manny, Moe, and Jack,” I replied pertly.
Medrod crossed his arms and said softly, “May I ask you, have you ever been tortured by a more powerful mage? I don’t think you understand what that means. If you tell me the truth now you can save yourself a lot of pain.”
I lowered my head as if giving in, and then said, “Fine then, there are three of them, the Archimage of House Friare, a Second of House Bakemono, and a Second of House Tarvos. They are going to kick your stolen ass, Bub.”
He chuckled, and then picked up a spoon from the table.
“What, are you going to spoon me to death now?” I asked sarcastically. “I told you what you wanted to know.”
But then the spoon changed shape into a long silver spike, which looked decidedly more lethal.
“You told me what you wanted me to believe, but you are lying, of course,” he said, and then the tip of the spike glowed red with heat.
I snorted, “No, I’m telling the complete truth, which should teach you not to mess with Santa Claus! Now let me loose or I will put you on the naughty list this year!” My words were flippant, but I was eyeing his hot spike with some concern as he got closer.
Then he slowly jabbed the spike into the left side of my chest and burned his way through my flesh and into my lung.
I screamed something unintelligible; hey, it was damned painful!
He pulled it out, but little blood flowed, the hot metal had cauterized the sides of the wound. It still burned even after it was removed, and I was having trouble breathing.
He smirked, and said, “Not so funny now, are you, Third? As a Third you cannot stop me from harming you directly. Your power is weak compared to mine.”
“Yeah, but at least my dad doesn’t want to kill me; it takes a pretty nasty kid to get a parent to do that,” I gasped.
He shoved the hot spike slowly into the top of my right thigh.
I screamed again, though this scream included some coughed up blood from my punctured lung.
“You know, I’ve decided to kill you very slowly,” I noted, but then I started to sag in my ropes, blacking out from the pain.
“We can’t have you passing out, that would stop all the fun,” he said smugly, and suddenly my body was healed.
He lifted the glowing hot spike and said brightly, “Now, shall we start again? Tell me about the mages with whom you are traveling.”
He drove the spike back into my lung again, and it hurt just as badly the second time.
After a few more punctures, I gasped, “All right, all right, I’ll tell you!”
He healed me again, and I took in a deep breath, “One of them is Nakama, a Bakemono Fifth, the other is Loretta Tarvos, a Sixth, and the last one is a Friare Sixth named, Hakly.”
He nodded, “This makes much more sense, but tell me why were mages, from three different Houses, working together with a Sivaeral Third?”
“
I told them we were going to steal the secret to creating necromages from Morgain, and each of them wanted the information for their House. I believe they each planned to kill the others once we had the information, with the winner taking the secret home to their House.”
Medrod nodded, “Now I believe you! I will leave you now, to be sent to Mystical Island where you will meet my wife, whom you shall soon learn is not as fair or cordial as you have found me to be.
"These three necromages shall accompany you. They should be sufficient to keep your power in check if they remain close by. I have also shackled your hands in a powerful manacle relic, sufficient to keep any Third bound.
"While my wife deals with your conversion, I will track down your three mage companions so we may add them to our army! Once we have them, and all of you are necromages, you will willingly help me take down your mother.”
Medrod went to the table and picked up Caliburn. “Thank you for bringing me this, it saved me the trouble of hunting down Nimue, though she will be brought into the fold soon.” He picked up the sword and belted it to his waist, and then turned back to me and smiled; “Now I, Medrod, wield the most powerful Actuality blade ever made!” Then he strode out of the room, which left me with my three necromage guards.
They soon unbound me from the post, though they kept my hands in the relic manacles. They marched me down toward the boats. I tried to make the manacles fall apart, but the relic must have been too strong for me, or perhaps I just screwed the pooch. I mean, I was pretty angry at this point, I’d gone to all the trouble of getting the sword and a fat lot of good it had done me. Worse than that, Medrod now had Caliburn.
They took me to a ship, a mighty three-masted galleon, and lashed me to the smaller fore-mast, facing forward like some ship’s figurehead.
After a few minutes, the sailors untied the ship from the dock and headed out to sea. I could see the large island ahead, Mystical Island, lair of the Island Witch, Morgain, and right where I wanted to go, though not right at this moment.
Soon we were beyond the breakwater and out into the swells, riding the four-foot seas with ease. There were several sailors around working the rigging, and of course, my three necromage babysitters, who were standing around me and keeping a sharp, if shriveled and milky white, gaze on me and the surroundings.
That’s when I saw it, a chicken. It was up near the bow, walking in the odd strutting way that chickens do, moving through the ropes and other objects stored in the fo’c’sle.
What the hell was a chicken doing in there? In fact, what was a chicken doing on Abal? Wait, this meant Hydan was here, and this was his message to get ready!
I glanced at my three captors and said, “Hey, what does it take to get a drink around here!”
I figured they would turn toward me at my outburst, just goes to show you should never think. These three bastards were as cold as, well, dead fish.
This is when I really started believing my manacles were unlocked.
When I felt one slip down my hand, I knew it was true, I was loose! And as I believed it, the manacles fell off completely.
“Hey, dry dudes, I’m escaping! I called out, and then dashed around behind the mast, while snatching out one of the belaying pins which were inserted into a rail around the base of the mast, and brandished it like a weapon.
The point wasn’t to beat three necromages senseless, though that would have been fun and very satisfying. No, the point was to get their attention on me and their backs to the bow. My histrionics did just that.
Behind them, I saw Myrka, Toji and Hydan clamor over the bow, and then they were suddenly all dressed in saeran armor. Each of them picked a necromage and made their approach.
I kept dancing around, waving my belaying pin like a baton at a pep rally, and hooting at them, in fact, in the spirit of my cheerleader diversion I used an old Looney Tunes line which popped into my head, “Rick’em Rack’em, Rick’em Rack’em sis boom bah, Bugs Bunny, Bugs Bunny, rah, rah, rah!”
This puzzled the necromages so much they didn’t even see the knives coming, and two of them were dispatched by Toji and Myrka. Hydan just grabbed his by the collar and seat of his pants, then pitched him over the railing and into the ocean.
I smiled grimly at Hydan, Myrka, and Toji, and then I snarled, “Let’s take this ship!”
This turned out to be fairly easy, we just charged up the deck toward the stern where short stairs led up to the poop deck. Two sailors tried to get in our way, but Hydan turned them into snogfish, and they were soon flopping around on the deck.
In three bounds I was up onto the raised poop deck and said, “Captain, if you would like to avoid the fate of your unhappy sailors below, and remain standing on feet, you will surrender this vessel to us!”
He gaped at me for a moment, but when Hydan turned another seaman into a flopping snogfish, the captain capitulated. The ship was ours. Hydan turned the flopping fish back into sailors.
“What course,” the Captain asked with a dark scowl.
Hydan had picked up a bottle of booze from somewhere; it had one of those net bottoms on it. He raised it and said, “Like your pirates from Earth, I say, yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of scum!”
I let it go, for all I knew it was a bottle of scum.
Chapter Fourteen
There walks a lady we all know.
-Led Zeppelin
Mystical Island was off in the distance. I could see it had a rocky shoreline, though there were a few inlets to small sandy beaches. There was also a breakwater off to the north side, and according to our captain, this was where we were originally headed.
Hydan and the others had just explained how they had managed to fight their way through the necromages and then try to find me. They had come upon signs of my battle, but after that, they had to retreat. Then they created a passage back to the forest and left it open, before making a new passage through to the coast side of the wall, and then resealing it after they had gone through. They hoped their pursuers would think they fled back into the forest.
From their hidden position they eventually saw me being led down to the docks, so they slipped into the water, attached themselves to the ship and just waited until we were out at sea to make their move.
My anger was still smoldering; I really wanted to kill Medrod and his evil wife. They had taken Ziny, and they would pay. The image of her pleading face as she was taken away from me haunted my thoughts.
I suddenly asked Toji, “Can you teach me how to protect myself, and how to use my powers?”
Toji answered, “Certainly, but it is going to take time."
I nodded and looked back toward the shore. The problem was that Ziny didn't have time. She wasn't on this ship, but she was already, or would soon be, with Morgain, where that bitch would start turning her to a necromage. But we couldn't just fight our way in, not yet. I needed some practice with my powers.
Then I had an idea, "You," I said, pointing to a sailor, "You will take a message to Morgain for me. I want you to tell her I will be coming soon to rescue Ziny. If the girl is hurt, in any way, I will have no reason to come. But if they keep Ziny alive and undamaged, in a short time I will come with my mage friends, which will give them a chance to recapture us."
When the sailor could repeat what I'd said, I had him hit the water and start swimming for Mystical Island. I figured we would be well away before he arrived.
Then I had the captain set sail away from Mystical Island.
I went back over to Toji and said, "OK, let's get started on my powers."
He nodded and said, "The first thing you need is a way to stop another mage, which begins with creating a clear Self Image. This gives your subconscious reality something to work with.”
“What do you mean; is this 'Self Image' about how I look?”
Toji tilted his head back and forth as he replied, “Partly, yes, but I’m not referring to your looks, in this case, subconscious reality is much more. It also means your magical protections,
your view of reality around your body. You have to set up your Self Image so your subconscious reality will work to keep it that way, and stop severe harm.”
“Oh, and what does that do for me?”
“Well, your subconscious reality will keep things, like arrows and bullets, from reaching you and changing what you think of as your Self Image. Those harmful things attempt to change your Self Image, so when they get close your subconscious reality uses your magic to thwart any harmful things from reaching you.”
“Is that like Caliburn?” I asked.
“The result is similar, but subconscious reality requires a mage, not an artifact. When an attacker strikes you with their weapon, your subconscious reality can change it into something else automatically. With Caliburn drawn, an opposing mage’s magically created items could not remain real, but with subconscious reality your mind can change anything harmful which comes near you if you have the power. You are limited by your own level of power. So, for example, if Medrod was your opponent, as a Third, your subconscious reality might not be able to maintain your Self Image, where the very powerful artifact, called Caliburn, is capable of dealing with a Second’s power.”
“Damn it, and now Medrod has Caliburn!”
Toji nodded.
“Great. So I can’t fight Medrod?”
Toji shrugged, “There are ways for a Third to kill a Second, a powerful relic can help, though it will break down eventually in the presence of a Second’s power, or if he uses Caliburn. From what you told me, that’s what happened to his relic, Caliburn eventually overcame its power.”
I digested his words and said, “You’ll have to tell me more about relics in a moment, perhaps one of those can help me deal with Medrod, but before you explain relics further, can you start by teaching me to have these subconscious reality protections?”
