by Sam Ferguson
“How can you possibly know that?” the warlock hissed.
Cyrus sneered wickedly. “Because the shade was still looking for it.”
The warlock reached up and pulled his hood back to reveal a face of sharp, angular features. A long, thin, pointed nose sat between prominent cheekbones over a narrow mouth. The thin lips stretched into a smile and the warlock’s eyes seemed to sparkle.
“Then finish it, Cyrus. Find him and kill him.”
“I will. I have no doubt that I will be able to find him again.” With this Cyrus paused for a moment, considering his next words. “I came to warn you about Severin, but you should also be made aware that Kyra is more powerful than you had first thought. Much more so. Also, there is a tribunal at the academy. I was invited to give my testimony of what happened, but I am not to be there when she receives her final judgment. You should be aware that there are priests from Valtuu Temple. They will be able to see what she is.”
The warlock reached up and stroked his pointy chin.
“If they expel her, it would be easy to bring her into our fold. Then again, if the priests were to condemn her, that might complicate things.”
Cyrus nodded his agreement. “If she were condemned, then she would be exiled. She would become hunted.”
“Your task remains the same regardless,” the warlock asserted. “Find Severin and kill him. If the girl is allowed to stay, then forge her into an ally for us. If she is exiled, then either ensure she will go so far away as to never interfere with us, or kill her.”
“What of the dragon?” Cyrus asked. “I am not sure how, but he has grown and matured far beyond what he should have been able to in these last few months. He is the size of a dragon that is twenty or thirty years old. His fighting is rudimentary, but he has tremendous power and he is fiercely loyal to her.”
The warlock dismissed the concern with a flick of his hand. “The dragon does not concern me. Given enough time, Nagar’s Blight will consume his soul. Just be sure not to make an enemy out of him and let the curse do what it will on its own.”
Cyrus nodded and then turned to leave.
“As soon as she is healed, I will resume training with her and we will find Severin.”
CHAPTER 17
Kyra sat in a wide chair with her left foot propped up on a plush footstool. The headmaster sat behind his desk twiddling his thumbs, considering everything he had just heard. Three priests from the temple sat in chairs at the headmaster’s left. Kyra’s father sat in the chair next to her. The room was silent. The sconces flickered their light and the shadows danced around the room.
“Are you quite certain in what you see?” the headmaster asked one of the priests.
The priest nodded and continued looking at Kyra. The girl studied the priest, finding it rather unnerving that they asserted they could see anything of such a nature as what they claimed. All three of them had eyes that were cloudy and gray, void of all color and motionless.
The priest on the far right stood and pointed at Kyra. “As you know Headmaster, we do not see the way others see. We see the aura of a person, or that of any living creature, including plants. This is how we found the students responsible for attacking the young first-year Apprentice of the Sword in his sleep. This is also how we convicted their instructor of instigating the attack.” The priest moved close and knelt next to Kyra. He wasn’t old by the look of him, perhaps twenty, and yet he appeared to be the ranking priest among the three, despite the fact that the others both appeared older than he did, with wrinkles on their faces and one with graying hair.
“I can see the confusion in your aura,” the priest told her. “You should know that your fiancé had nothing to do with the attack on your friend Kathair. We questioned him as well and found him to be entirely innocent of any wrongdoing.”
Kyra knew for certain that the priest had in fact been telling the truth. As hard as it was for her to comprehend what this meant, she understood that the priest would not lie. As she thought on what he had just told the room a few moments ago, she remembered something that the shade had said.
“The vampire that imprisoned my mother, what was his name?” Kyra asked.
The priest stepped back and let the headmaster answer the question.
The headmaster cleared his throat and then spoke the name, “Bhaltair.”
Kyra nodded and looked to the man that she had thought of as her father. It was a strange feeling. Just before encountering the shade, she had essentially begun distancing herself from her father, but now that she learned he was not her father, she wanted him back. Much better to be fathered by a coward than sired by a vampire.
Lord Caspen slapped his hands to his knees and rose to his feet.
“You do what you want,” he said. “Whether she is expelled or not is not of my concern anymore. That thing is not my daughter.” Lord Caspen turned abruptly and left the room before the headmaster had a chance to say anything in reply. The door slammed and Kyra startled in her chair.
The words ‘that thing’ echoed over and over in her mind, threatening to tear her soul apart.
The young priest was quick to return to her side. He placed a hand upon her knee and the other upon her right forearm.
“Young Kyra, look at me,” he pleaded. “It is better to know the truth than to hide in shadow. Had we not informed you of your heritage, you would have a more difficult time later in your life. Because you share blood with the vampire, you will have impulses that are against the laws of nature. You will not thirst for blood, for that is separate and a special curse that one vampire must choose to give to another being. But, there will be other things that will trouble you, and if you at least know they are coming, then you can fight them and conquer those impulses before they become a problem.” He patted her leg and turned back to one of the older priests.
The older priest nodded his head in agreement and spoke.
“We meant what we said. We have searched your aura and found no ill intent. There is nothing in your character that suggests you will ever be anything but an honorable person. Therefore, we are recommending that you be allowed to stay at Kuldiga Academy. If you can tame the unnatural impulses thrust upon you by your blood, then you will be a mighty asset to the Middle Kingdom. You will have abilities that no other sorcerer or sorceress would ever be able to control. At fourteen you have already fought a shade. That much tells us your heart is in the right place. We know the attack was motivated by vengeance. Our gift of sight is such that we can see through the platitudes and lies that Cyrus gave the other masters here at the Academy. However, we have no interest in speaking with him. We feel confident that his lies were invented only to protect you and your dragon.”
Kyra sucked in a breath and went rigid. They had not mentioned Leatherback before, and neither had she. Someone had broken the secret.
Before she could fret much more, the young priest patted her arm and spoke to her again.
“No one has betrayed you,” he assured her. “In a person’s aura we can see their thoughts and emotions. It isn’t exactly reading a mind, but we can read the heart. We saw a few signs that led us to believe you have been harboring a dragon. Now, in the Middle Kingdom that is a grave offense. However, the priests of Valtuu Temple have a different opinion on the matter. You see, our order was founded by the Ancients - the Father of the Ancients to be precise. We know that dragons are not inherently evil, but that they suffer from a curse. We know that you are fighting this curse, and so far the dragon has shown no signs of the taint. If he did, we would be able to detect its presence even in your aura because of how close you are to him. You see, when a dragon bonds to a human, they exchange a portion of their energy with the human. It was very easy for us to see.”
The priest pursed his lips anxiously and glanced back to the others behind him. Kyra watched the exchange and wondered what it was he wanted to tell her. The two older priests sat stoic and reserved, while he fidgeted with his thumb, tapping it against Kyra’s fo
rearm.
Finally he opened his mouth and shook his head as he spoke. “I have to tell you, that the sheer fact that there is a dragon in the Middle Kingdom that is not tainted by the curse is a miracle! We haven’t seen anything like this before, and so we have taken a special interest in both you and the dragon.”
One of the older priests cleared his throat, perhaps signaling the younger one to better control his tongue. The younger one paused for a moment, but then looked up and smiled at her. Even though she could not read any signs of emotion in the young man’s gray eyes, she sensed that his smile was warm and as genuine as any expression she had ever seen.
“We spoke with the headmaster. Everything will work out alright, you’ll see.”
Again the older priest with the gray hair cleared his throat. He then glanced to the headmaster anxiously.
The headmaster rapped his knuckles on his desk and stood slowly. The young priest moved back to his chair and sat down respectfully.
“Kyra Caspen,” the headmaster began. “After discussing the matter with the priests over the last week, I have been persuaded by those with more experience and authority in these matters that it will be of benefit to the future security of the Middle Kingdom to help you continue to work with this dragon. Therefore, it is the decision of this tribunal that there is nothing in your conduct, except of course the unfortunate event with Lady Priscilla, that merits any sort of punishment. Furthermore, this tribunal has decided that in so much as the dragon acted only to destroy the shade, which is a much greater enemy to the Middle Kingdom than a hatchling, there is no need to expose the dragon’s existence at this point. If you will agree to allow the priests to visit with the dragon on a periodic basis to ensure that the taint has not found its way to his heart, he will never be spoken of again.
“Additionally, as your father has now abandoned you, you will be accepted as a ward of Kuldiga Academy. This means that I will allow you to stay here full-time until your graduation. Master Orres will be made known of your half blood and given the opportunity to break the betrothal if he so wishes, but that is a matter between you and him now. That is all, you may go.”
Kyra nodded and then looked up to the headmaster. “I have a request of my own,” she said. The headmaster narrowed his eyes on her and folded his arms. “Lord Caspen is not my father. I no longer wish to hold his name. From this point on, my name is Kyra Dimwater. I will take my mother’s maiden name and carry that.”
The headmaster nodded his agreement. “Very well, Miss Dimwater, you are most welcome here at Kuldiga Academy. Just make sure not to fling any more people into walls, and if you ever find another shade or shadowfiend, please take at least two instructors with you before you hunt it down.”
Kyra smiled and nodded her head. “Of course.”
“Good. Then return to your room. Please allow the priests to assist you so that you do not further damage your bones. Once you are healed you will resume your studies, and I am expecting great things from you in the future.” The headmaster then turned to the three priests at his left. “As for the three of you, I will hold you responsible for Miss Dimwater’s Dragon.”
Dimwater’s Demons
By
Sam Ferguson
Chapter 1
Feberik Orres pulled short on the reins and his horse slowed to a lazy pace. A servant was out front of the manor, chopping wood and tossing it onto a careless pile. As Feberik approached, another two servants emerged from the manor and grabbed wood, stacking it into their arms and hustling it inside.
Feberik’s horse nickered and the servants looked up at him curiously.
“The master isn’t seeing visitors today,” one of them called out.
Feberik smiled and slid off his horse. He was an imposing young man by any measure. Wide shoulders, a barrel-like chest, arms thicker than most men’s legs, and a voice deep and stern enough to wake the dead during normal conversation. Even without his sword, he likely would have scared the three servants up close, but as it was, the large claymore was currently resting in a harness upon his meaty back, the handle sticking up a few inches over his head and the point dangling just above his ankles. The servants kept glancing from Feberik’s chest to the sword over his back, not sure where the threat was going to come from.
“You know who I am?” Feberik asked in his thunderous voice.
One of the servants dropped his armload of wood and dashed into the manor. The other two stayed in place.
The servant with the axe, a younger man with a decent build and thick arms, though nowhere near as thick as Feberik’s, tossed the axe down and moved to stand in front of Feberik.
“The master isn’t entertaining any visitors. He’s in mourning.”
Feberik looked up to the window of the southern parlor, a room he had been in only the summer before to discuss Kyra’s dowry. Now he saw it filled with people. Men and women were mixing about in the room, and appeared to be drinking and making themselves merry with a bit of dancing as well.
The large man turned and looked over at the stables. There were many extra horses there today, and it appeared as though at least one coach was parked around the back of the building, for Feberik could see one of the oversized wheels from where he stood.
“I didn’t realize mourning went hand in hand with parties,” Feberik said sourly.
“My master won’t tolerate an intrusion,” the servant said as he reached up and placed a hand on Feberik’s chest.
Feberik felt a sweltering heat rise up through his neck and head. His fists clenched, almost involuntarily. For weeks the man had debated whether to come to Caspen Manor. He had wanted to wait for the appropriate amount of time before paying a visit to Kyra’s father, even convincing the administration at Kuldiga Academy to allow Kyra to continue living at the school through the summer term on good faith until Lord Caspen, still her legal guardian, was out of mourning and in the right frame of mind to make proper, legal arrangements for her year-round accommodations. Now he felt the fool for caring enough about the worm to worry about timing.
Though the academy had sent over the necessary paperwork three times to formalize the decision to make Kyra a ward of the school since the day Lord Caspen had verbally disowned Kyra as his child, the man had never returned the signed documents. Now Feberik was here both as a representative of the school, tasked with getting the necessary signatures, and as a man who had a personal contract to settle with Lord Caspen. By the terms of the betrothal contract that had been agreed to the last time Feberik was here at the manor, he already had legal standing as an in-law, until such time as Lord Caspen might dissolve the contract and formally disown Kyra. Feberik intended to do what he could today to convince Lord Caspen that he had acted rashly that day in the headmaster’s office, using the leverage of his own agreement with the man to convince him to fulfill his obligations. Now he felt his own temper beginning to get the better of him.
Feberik reached out in one swift move with his left arm. He yanked the servant forward and off to the side to land in the dirt. The young man crashed into the ground and pushed up, shaking the dust from his face.
“I’m going inside,” Feberik said. He had only to eye the last remaining servant to dissolve any resolution that man may have had to fight. The servant dropped his armload of wood and backed away, holding his hands up in the air.
“Don’t want any trouble,” the servant said quickly.
Feberik marched to the front steps leading up to the wide porch. No sooner had he stepped upon the first stair than the front doors opened and a trio of armed spearmen emerged, with the first servant right behind them.
“That’s him! That’s him!” The servant was already closing the door behind the guards as he pointed Feberik out to them.
“The master isn’t seeing visitors today,” the first guard said as they formed a line in front of the door and stamped their spears upon the porch.
“What about his daughter’s fiancé?” Feberik asked as he continued
up the stairs. He sized up the guards. They were not knights. By the looks of their simple chainmail sleeves sticking out from under their tan tunics they were nothing more than mercenaries hired on by Lord Caspen. Caspen Manor had never been large enough to warrant a standing army before, nor had Feberik ever seen any guards on the premises.
The middle guard was the largest, but even he was nowhere near as large as Feberik, except in height. The other two were several inches under six feet, and Feberik was confident he could convince all three of them to let him in easily enough. At that moment, a small voice entered his mind and asked if it was the right thing to do. He knew he could force his way in, but should he?
Fate helped him decide when one of the guests opened the window to the parlor off to the left. Feberik looked over just as a busty woman with too much rouge on her cheeks leaned out and shouted at the guards.
“Trounce that louse! Go on, let’s have us a show!” She was waving a drink in her hand. A man leaned out behind her, wrapping one arm around her waist and smiling blissfully at Feberik.
“I’ve got five gold on the guards,” the man called out.
Out from the window came the boisterous laughter and music from inside the parlor.
That was it. Feberik’s rage boiled beyond what he could control.
He stormed up the steps and socked the middle guard dead in the nose. The man flew back, blood trailing out of his nose and mouth, and crashed into the door before sliding down to his rump.
The guard on the right leveled his spear, but Feberik was not only strong and large, he was fast. With blinding speed, his right arm shot out and he seized the spear, pulling it out and causing the guard to stumble. Then he reached out with his left so he had both hands on the weapon. He spun mightily and the guard sailed out over the steps and fell to the ground in a heap.
The last guard rushed in, but Feberik spun out of the way, stuck the spear he was holding down in front of the guard’s feet, and let gravity handle the rest. The third guard tripped and flailed wildly before slamming into his comrade at the bottom of the steps. The two connected first with their heads, and they both hardly moved afterwards.
