He beckoned for all the wasted power in the room to come to him, and obediently the streamers of life did come. Slowly, they crawled through the air towards him, and each one that entered him gave him back a tiny spark of life.
The effort seemed futile however-like raking leaves on a windy day-for,with every speck of energy he gathered into himself, more spilled from the gaping hole in his chest. He called and called, wishing he could scream out to the world and have it obey him, for everything was just happening far too slowly for it to make any difference. Soon, he would die.
Then he felt something cold upon his finger and with a sudden shock, all the lingering energy in the room seemed to rush in towards him. With the power of the Argum Stone to assist him, he could gather all the power he needed as simply as wishing for it. He gathered all that wayward life force into himself, healing himself, undoing the awful harm done unto his body.
The power of the ring was incredible, and with it he could call to everything-not just the fading spirits that wafted from their battered shells, but the more vital energies that hid within fleshy casings. As he called, more vibrant power came flooding into him.
The world around was still darkness to his blinded vision, but these clusters of life energy shone out to him irresistibly. He only had to direct his will towards them and they entered him one by one.
As he surveyed the courtyard, he spied a clot of shadow lingering near the doorway, clogged with blackness, and so he turned his attention away from that-for it was not worth considering. A cluster of brilliant power across the room was far more appealing and so he focussed upon that with vigour.
As he began to gather it, the spot blazed like a bonfire in a sudden wind. He turned his gaze away momentarily, for the brightness had dazzled him, but so,too,had it excited him. The more the energy blazed and struggled, the more it enticed him. The outer strips of life began unravelling and tumbling in towards him and he found that a deeper, sweeter power was hidden underneath. He drew that in as well, relishing in delight as he devoured it.
All he could think wasI can live! I can live!as he swallowed all the energy in the room.
He had forgotten the battle that had earlier waged around him and it seemed as if all the sounds of fighting had vanished,lost amongst the sound of power rushing in his ears. He knew he was still lying there on the hard stones, and that this was all some kind of fantasy that one felt just before death, but it seemed so strange and real.
A sound caught his ear and he returned his attention to that last bloom of light that had proven so nourishing. There was hardly anything of it remaining, yet it called out to him in a pained and pleading voice, calling his name and asking for him to stop. Its voice sounded familiar, but dreams had a way of making things seem confusing. After another moment, the room was silent and everything was again dark and cold and quiet, and he knew the dream had ended.
Tucked away in the darkness, Samuel felt a burning in his eyes, but for some reason he could not force himself to weep. All he wanted to do was wallow in his misery, for he now realised what he had done, and he knew what had become of Grand Master Tudor. He damned himself for being so weak and for giving in to the evil that lurked inside him. He damned himself, for it had felt so good.
‘Father!’ came the voice of a child. ‘Wake up! Get up!’
The image of a dead man, lying on a hard floor and staring-masked in blood-filled his mind. He refused to let the memories of that dark night come back to him and he pushed them from his mind as they struggled at the edge of his attention. Instead, a vast city came into view through the clouds of his dream. It wasset beside a glittering sea and surrounded by great pale walls that were beyond comparison. Cintar, it was called, and this city was the jewel of Amandia; perfect in every way and envied by every ruler who had ever come to behold it.
A seething host filled the lands around that city and they threw themselves against the walls without respite. In turn, swarms of gold and blue adorned men amassed on the walls and defended their city with arrows and stones and vats of boiling oil. Magic leapt from wall to ground and was returned in equal portion, but it seemed the battle was evenly matched. The city could not be taken, yet the invaders could not be dispelled.
Greatcarapacedbeasts lumbered across the pastures toheave themselvesat the walls, and the armies parted to make way for them. Enormousboulders flew at the beasts, but the beasts seemed resilient to everything. Then, the vision faded and the roar of the battle subsided.
‘Hello?’ came a voice and Samuel found himself standing in his room within the palace. At first, he could not tell if this was still a part of his dream or if he had actually awoken-somehow freed from his nightmares.
The Koian woman was leaning in the doorway, with guards visible at her back. She looked straight towards him, and he tried to answer back, but that image, too, faded and the Koian woman disappeared from view.
He caught flashes of her after that, standing in her room, or sitting idly in the gardens, or lying in her bed in the middle of the night. Each time, shewouldlook up, as if startled by his presence, before the scene would vanish and he would be left wandering in senseless dreams. He struggled to return to her, because for some reason he could not stop thinking about her and she was the only thing that made sense in this world of pain and anguish.
Whereat first she had confounded and annoyed him, he now found her intriguing and compelling. What he had considered to be her stubbornness and ignorance now seemed to be strength of will and innocence. Whereonce he had thought of her asalien and unsightly, he had grown to find her beautiful and fascinating.
More and more,he caught glimpses of her life in the palace and it seemed that the days were passing ever so quickly, for,every time he saw her,she was dressed differently, or the sun lay in different parts of the sky. Still, he strived as much as he could to stay by her side, for the alternative to being with her was unthinkable: the deep and silent void that lingered at the edge of his conscience, threatening to engulf him.
At times, she seemed to feel him, and she spoke as if to him, but the words were always muffled and unintelligible. He tried to speak back to her, but the sound caught in his throat. All he could do was hover at her side and follow her as she wandered forlornly down the halls, ever shadowed by Shara and a pair of watchful Paatin guards.
She visited the Emperor at times and Samuel saw them sitting and talking in muted tones. Although they often laughed and talked pleasantly, they both seemed distracted by a longing in their hearts. When she left the Emperor’s room, she was as quiet and lonely as before.
‘I miss you so,’ he heard her say, late one night as he hovered by her bed. It seemed incredible that he could hear her voice. ‘Oh,my Love. How foolish I have been.’
He tried to reply, but he had no mouth to speak. It seemed he was only a dream within a dream, and such things could never capture the wind to craft words from their throats.
He stayed with her intermittently throughout the days and nights. He could not control the duration or the frequency of such stays and,as soon as he started to feel he was gaining a hold on this existence, everything would fade away into the distance as he was drawn back into the darkness, forever infuriating him.
She talked to him in all her quiet moments and he could not ever imagine leaving her side. She spoke often of the baby growing in her swollenbelly, and he remembered their shared moment of tenderness. All he could do was damn himself for not realising his love for her sooner and he hoped that, perhaps, this dream would end and he would wake beside her, safe and well.
‘Have you forsaken me already?’ came another voice in his dream, and he imagined Leila looking at him with sadness. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, regaining her strength and smiling once again. ‘I forgive you, Samuel. Our life together was wonderful, but all things must change eventually. Be with her…be happy. I could not wish anything but happiness for you. You know I will always love you, and I know, in your way, you will still always love me. Tha
t’s all I ever wanted. My life was short, but you made it wonderful.’
He imagined her turning softly and stepping away into the shadows,and he could feel whatseemedlike tears welling in his eyes, although they were hot and burned their way down his cheeks. Thoughts and dreams and reality had no boundaries any more, for without being able to wake, all such things had become as one.
Time seemed to pass like wandering aeons and,at times, Samuel broke from his dreams of the living and floundered more and more on the edge of waking. Less and less, he was able to visit the Koian woman and more often he found himself yelling in pain or caught in the nightmarishdeliriumof a fever. At one point, he realised he was screaming and the taste of blood was filling his throat. He scrambled to his feet and ran forward into the inky darkness only to strike his head on sheer stone, knocking himself straight back into unconsciousness. Another time, he thought he was free and escaping from the city,only to realise, as the blackness returned, that it wasbuta delusion-any images that came to him were now fantasy; only the blackness was truth.
At times, he thought he could hear a scraping, like some clawed creature pawing at him from beyond a wall, and a whispering sounded at the edge of his perception, sometimes forceful and insistent,at other times pleading and desperate. At one point, he felt that the wall around him had collapsed and that the whispering thing was now upon him, but it was all dreams and nightmares,fever and illusions. All he wanted was to return to his love, but the pain behind his face would not allow it.
He awoke more and more frequently, and it was only at these times that it was truly dark and quiet. He took such opportunities to explore his surrounds, crawling around on the hard stones and moaning for someone to help him. No one came to his aid and he could only collapse flat back onto some rags on the floor and wait for unconsciousness to takehold ofhim again. Each time, a tiny vestige of his strength returned, and soon he hoped to be able to hold onto his awareness long enough to discover what had happened to him.
He found himself surmising that he must beimmuredagain in the Queen’s catacombs, buried beneath Mount Karthma and,along with the thought,came a strange and sudden euphoria, for he realised he was fully awake.
He scrambled desperately to find the door, clawing away in all directions at the stone, only to realise that one hand was passing through air while the other met rock. Fumbling his fingers about his body, he discovered a wet stump just below his right elbow, and remembered what had happened.
Carefully, he raised his stump and explored the wound with his fingers. It had hardened and was dry in some places, but was seeping in others. Testing the extents of his prison, he felt around with his left hand held out before him, searching for the door. Eventually, he realised that he must have already made two or three circles around the chamber without finding anything. There was no door to find and the cell was scarcely large enough for him to lie in. Testing his suspicions, he ran his palm over the rocks, standing on the tips of his toes and reaching up. There was no ceiling above him that he could feel and the rocks seemed to lean in, as if narrowing inwards to form a chute.
It seemed that he was in the same cell that had been Balten’s home for so long, in the deepest recesses of the Paatin Queen’s catacombs. He was without an arm and without his ring and,even if he had either, he was separated from freedom by a mountain of magic-defying stone.
He was lucky that he had survived being thrown down into the cell in the first place, for the fall could easily have broken his neck, and lucky that he had not then bled to death as he had lain unconscious. If what had happened to Balten was any indication, he would be left without food and water until he rotted. Unless someone came to save him, he would be down here indefinitely-but all his friends had already fled the city.
The Emperor was a prisoner of the enraged Queen and the Koian woman, pregnant with his child, was in no condition to come to his aid. Was that one of his feverish delusions? Did he really love her? Now, awake and coming to terms with his predicament, he was not very sure of anything.
Realising his throat was crying out from thirst, Samuel stopped down low and licked around the base of the wall for tiny droplets of water. It was hard work, but he could feel the coolness on his tongue and it tempered his thirst to some degree. His stomach was aching for food, but there was simply nothing to eat. He patted around on the floor with his remaining hand for any scraps his captors may have thrown down, but there was nothing but hard stone and grit. Not even bugs ventured around the cell, and even his magician’ssighthad failed him, leaving him in such an inky blackness that he had never thought was possible.
It was curious that his rendered arm caused no pain, for he imagined the wound should be worse. The only feeling was a deep throbbing in his bone, but the weeping end gave no sensation at all. Often, he forgot about the injury and thought he could feel his fingers wiggling on the end of his hand in the darkness, but any attempt to clasp his hands together quickly taught him thetruthof the matter. His arm was gone and it would not be returning on its own any time soon.
He slept on the hard stone and awoke whenever he imagined he heard something, but,as he sat perfectly still, cocking one ear towards the trapdoor above, there was nothing to hear. He talked to himself and murmured away in the darkness to pass the time, singing songs and humming tunes. He guessed a few more days might have passed in the meantime and the terrible realisation kept coming home to him that very shortly he would starve to death.
He rememberedthat Balten had survived by enteringintoa catatonic state,and so Samuel began by sitting in a similar position andtrying tocalm his thoughts. It proved difficult, for he felt restless and jittery-an effect of his injury and starvation, he guessed. Many times, he leapt up in a fury and roared out loud, screaming and venting his wrath towards the hatch far above him, but it did no good. He threw himself at the walls and smashed his fist against the hard stones. Hisefforts were futile and he dropped to the floor, weeping in misery. Exhausted and parched, he laid himself out on the floor and peered up through the darkness to where he imagined the exitwas.
‘I’m sorry, Leila,’ he croaked to himself. ‘I thought I would do better for you. I wasn’t strong enough. I was never strong enough. I couldn’t save anyone.’
‘Don’t worry, Samuel,’ he almost imagined her saying. ‘You did your best. She needs you now. Rest yourself a-while and save your strength. I’m sure you will make good of everything.’
After that, nothing happened, except the dark remained dark and the quiet stayed quiet for what felt like a long,longtime.
Perhaps it was his uncanny ability to recover from injury, or perhaps it was merely his inability to admit defeat, but Samuel lived. In fact, he did much more than that-he became stronger.
In his comatose state upon the floor of his cell, his mind had a complete lack of stimuli and so it turned in upon itself and began to soar. The world outside his imagination had become dark, and he could no longer reach the Koian woman beyond the confines of his cell, and so he followed the only light he could find, that which was burrowed away inside his mind. He followed the channels and rivers of energy that ran with his thoughts, carried in all directions by a compound nest of vibrant and shimmering filaments. He explored the endless landscapes inside himself: rivers and mountains and oceans of power. He found his memories and delved himself inside them, exploring the years and moments of his life and reliving all the moments of joy and sadness, love and hate.
He was running with Leila in the meadows of Tindal, marvelling at the wonder of her beauty, as she spun amongst the daisies. He was standing on lonely hilltops, moving through his stances and dancing amidst the lightning. He was in the School of Magic, laughing and joking with the Ericsbesidehim, poking them in the ribs and receiving the same back twofold. He was studying in the Great Library and watching Master Glim dictate the secrets of magic, with the friendly old teacher peering back at him over thick spectacles. He felt a flash of exhilaration as he relived watching Master Ash blasted
to ashes and he experienced the moment of triumph as he followed the sword that buried itself into the Emperor’s flesh.
Then he was young again, bound towards Cintar atop the shuddering wagon with Tulan Goodwin, hugging his knees and nervous at what would come. He relived the terror of that night as Master Ash’s witch hunters slew his family, and he saw again that incandescent vision of Ash standing in the doorway, directing the slaughter-but now Ash looked young and thin,as he would have truly been, not at all as frightening as he had been to Samuel, distorted by the memories of a child. He heard his mother’s sobs as she dragged Samuel from the house, and he saw his father’s blank expression as he lay dead upon the floor, staring at Samuelfromunder the table. Night flashed to day and he was in the markets, frolicking with Tom and the village boys, causing mischief and covered in soot from head to foot. Through the trees and valleys around his home he roamed, darting and prancing and waving his stick-sword,runningdown into Bear Valley, dipping his toes into the icy waters. Then he was playing on his mother’s rug,carried in her arms and nestled against her bosom.
Before that, everything was warm and dark and comfortable. He could still hear the voices of his mother and father nearby, along with the steady drumming beat of her heart-always present, always reassuring-a steady,rhythmic pounding that gathered his thoughts and set the rhythm by which he had set his life. Finally, it was dark and quiet again and he was racing towards some boundary, an incredible barrier of energy that required tremendous effort to penetrate. He was not afraid, for he was accompanied by a guiding spirit that would see him through, and there was a flash of light-and he was someone else.
He turned calmly to the woman beside him, for he was suddenly standing in a world that seemed entirely real. The wind was brisk on his skin, and the noise of a discontented crowd surrounded them, placed high on a stage as they were.
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