Shadowguard

by Gama Ray Martinez

  “I’m not really part of the nobility,” Jez said.

  “True, but you are in the upper tier, and with Baron Dusan as your patron, many will treat you as if you are. More to the point, the baron pays for your tuition, and he has final approval over your classes. He’s given us a list of approved areas of study. It gives you considerable leeway, but terra magic wasn’t on it.”

  “He’s telling me what I can study?”

  “You can request approval for other areas if you wish, but given what he’s told us about what he wants for you, I doubt he’d agree to any meaningful study of terra magic.”

  Jez thought back to his father and an idea took form. How often had he complained about the weather? “What about water magic? Or maybe air.”

  “Aqua magic,” Besis corrected him, “and venta magic. They’re in the dominions of protection and destruction, respectively. Few people have an aptitude for both, but it has happened before. They weren’t on the list either, but you might have better luck with them. There are some who use them for art. He’d never consent to you being a stormmage though, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  Jez shrugged. The limitless possibilities of the Academy seemed to be vanishing rapidly. “Then what can I study?”

  “You’ll forgive me if I don’t have the entire list memorized.” Besis wrinkled his brow and thought for a second. “History, illusion, philosophy, and art, obviously. There was also literature, economics, diplomacy, music. A smattering of other subjects as well.”

  Jez suppressed the urge to sigh. Those were all subjects his father would consider useless, but his father generally considered anyone who wasn’t working with their hands to be wasting their time. Given the callouses on the protection master’s hands, Jez wondered how his father would feel about Master Besis.

  “I don’t guess it will matter until I finish my first term anyway.”

  “Most students do two or three years before they settle on an area of study. I myself jumped from one to another for six years before I settled on binding. I spread out into other areas of protection as well. I’m sure you’ll find an area you’re gifted in that the baron approves of.”

  “What if it’s fishing?” Jez asked under his breath.

  “What was that?”

  “Nothing. I’m really excited about starting tomorrow.”

  “Good. You should get some rest. We’ll be departing before first light.”

  CHAPTER 5

  The world had been born from fire. It had spun as a ball of molten rock for a time so long humans couldn’t comprehend it. Creatures wandered the fiery wastelands, the greatest of which were monstrous beings that even the worst nightmares of man would fear. The world was theirs, and they embodied fear and hatred long before there had been humans to feel such emotions, but these demons weren’t alone. Others, equally powerful, inhabited the skies, but these were beings of hope, joy, and of the anger that could not allow evil to prevail. Pure light did battle against fire and darkness. They fought for untold eons until, finally, the light overcame, banishing the fires to the deep places far beneath the surface of the world, and light was set to guard over them. After ages beyond measure, the world cooled, and the Creator brought forth water and plants. Mountains rose up from the ground, and rivers gave it life. Animals walked the surface of the earth. They flew above it, and they swam in the seas. Last of all, from earth and stone the Creator brought forth man, but as man grew and knew fear and hatred, the dark creatures began to stir.

  Jez awoke in a cold sweat. The sun shone through the windows, and he was surprised he hadn’t woken up earlier. His father had always made him wake up before dawn, and even in the six months he’d spent with the baron, he had never broken the habit. Someone was knocking at his door, and he slipped into a shirt before answering. Besis was at the door, with a pack slung over one shoulder. He had exchanged his blue robes for a plain shirt and trousers. He looked Jez up and down and frowned.

  “Well, I admit I told you to dress light, but I was expecting a little more than a shirt and undergarments.”

  Jez’s face heated up. “Sorry. You woke me up.”

  “We should’ve left two hours ago. Get dressed. The trail will be hard enough with the sun already beating down on us.”

  “Sorry,” Jez said again. He waved his hand at the ceiling. “That thing is giving me nightmares. I didn’t sleep well.”

  “What thing?”

  “The mountain.” Jez didn’t know where that answer had come from, but as soon as he said it, he knew it was true. There was something wrong about the peak.

  “Your room has no windows. You can’t even see it.”

  “No, but I know it’s there.”

  Jez took a deep breath. There was the faintest scent of sulfur in the air. He hadn’t noticed it in the dream, but thinking back, the smell had been there. The fiery creatures had reeked of it. They had been so strong, but the light beings didn’t have a choice. Such creatures didn’t belong in this world, and they had to be banished. Jez shook his head to clear away the image. Master Besis was staring at him.

  “I’m sorry. I’ll be ready in a few minutes.”

  “I’ll be downstairs. I’ll send someone for your things. Grab some food on the way out. It’ll be a long day.” He tossed Jez a water skin. “You’ll need this.”

  After four hours, Jez was convinced mules were thoroughly unpleasant creatures. Stepper, the animal Jez rode, seemed to take almost childlike glee in struggling against Jez’s instructions. Master Besis was trying not to laugh, but he wasn’t doing a very good job of it. Two other mules trailed behind them carrying supplies for the Academy. A third pulled a small cart that carried Jez’s chest. According to Besis, Tarcai, the city in the caldera of Mount Carcer, had crops and livestock of their own, but they still occasionally needed items from the outside, and Besis had agreed to pick up some things. For all their faults, the mules seemed to be doing better than Jez was. The gravel crunched underfoot and they plodded on, but the sun beat against his skin with relentless fury. The air around them shimmered with heat, and his lips cracked in the arid climate. Jez squeezed his water skin trying to find any drop, but it was as dry as the stone. He could practically feel his insides shriveling away in the heat.

  “It’s not just the sun,” Besis said as they reigned in to take a midday meal. “You’re used to the air at sea level. It’s a lot thinner here. You’ll find yourself getting tired until you get accustomed to that. On top of that, fire flows through the veins of this mountain. It gives off warmth even in the dead of winter.”

  The master pulled out a chunk of bread and some of the salted beef he’d picked up in the town. He lay a pot on the ground and cut thin slices of meat. He placed them in the pot without even bothering to light a fire. It started to smoke a few seconds later. He tossed Jez an apple and pulled another water skin out of the packs to water the mules. Jez gaped at him.

  “How many of those do you have?”

  “Quite a few.” He grinned at Jez. “We wouldn’t want the animals to dehydrate on the way up, would we?”

  “I’ve been practically dying of thirst for the past couple of hours, and you’ve had water this entire time?”

  Besis snorted and tossed Jez a skin. “You never asked, and you were hardly dying. Besides, at the rate you drank the first one, you would’ve emptied two others before the first hour was done, and it’s not good to drink so much so fast.”

  The water was warm and tasted faintly of leather, but it felt amazing going down his throat. Some of it spilled and steamed as it hit the ground. It took a concentrated effort of will for Jez to stop drinking before it was entirely empty.

  “Well, that’s fine,” Jez said, “but did you have to let me go all morning with only one?”

  “Probably not.” He tossed Jez another water skin. “Don’t drink it too quickly, and let me know if you need any more.”

  They made small talk as they ate, but Jez’s heart wasn’t in it. The heat was making
him feel sick, and he didn’t want to eat much. His eyes kept getting drawn to the flat top of the mountain. They were closer to it than they were to the bottom now. It might’ve been his imagination, but he could’ve sworn he saw a curl of smoke rising up, and for a moment, he thought the ground trembled. Besis, however, seemed not to notice, and after a few minutes, they climbed back onto their mules and continued up the path.

  Three hours and four water skins later, they climbed up on to the rim of Mount Carcer. Jez stared down into the fire mountain with wide-eyed shock. The mountain dipped down like the inside of a sphere. He could just make out the rim of Carcer on the other side. When Besis had told him about Tarcai, he’d expected a small collection of buildings with a tower in the center.

  The only thing he’d been right about was the tower.

  An obsidian spire rose up over its surroundings, but it was too far to tell for certain how big it was. Far from a small cluster of buildings, the surrounding city was a sprawling metropolis. People filled the streets, and buildings ranged from the size of small houses to large manors. Beyond the city was a large swath of green, presumably where the farmland was. There were a few patches of plant life in Tarcai itself. Other than that, the city was uniform black, but it shimmered in the light of the setting sun.

  “What makes it do that?”

  “Most of the buildings are overlaid with obsidian. People here don’t have very many options to make their homes look nice, so they do whatever they can.”

  “You mean people actually live here?” Jez asked. “I mean I thought it was just the Academy.”

  “The Academy has some two hundred students. A good portion of them are wealthy. In fact, it’s one of the greatest concentrations of wealth for a hundred leagues in any direction. Enterprising merchants take advantage of that to provide the luxuries these youths are used to.”

  “But it’s inside a fire mountain.”

  Besis smirked. “That never stopped a merchant from trying to make a few coins.”

  “How big is all this?” Jez waved his hand at the city below.

  “The caldera is four miles across.”

  “Where is the Academy?”

  “At the base of the tower. Shall we go?”

  CHAPTER 6

  The day had started to cool by the time they went down into the city. People crowded the streets going from one shop to another. Some sold foods, cloth, or other mundane items. Others, however displayed crystals or dried herbs. Once Jez saw books with strange runes on them like those Baron Dusan had displayed. Even more than in Hiranta, the people of Tarcai made way for Master Besis. It was a stark contrast to how the people of Randak reacted to Dusan. The baron had called the looks the people gave him signs of respect, but to Jez, many had seemed more like fear. Here, people stared openly, and pointed, their faces showing their obvious pleasure at seeing him. One little boy, heedless of the important figure, ran out from the crowd. He bumped into Master Besis, and fell back. The boy, no older than three, looked up at the master and whimpered. A few seconds later, his mother came running after him. Besis picked him up and handed him to the woman with a smile. The woman thanked him for several long moments before Besis put a hand on her shoulder. She looked at him with wide eyes, but there was no fear on her face. She was beaming. Besis nodded at her and continued to walk.

  The street led to an open gate in a wall surrounding the Academy grounds. The buildings inside seemed to shimmer a little more. They were the same blocky style as those in the city, unlike the single storied ones outside though, these each had at least two floors, and when he looked closely, he saw a faint rune carved on a large building to his left. People of all ages, some as young as Jez and others with wrinkled faces and stooped postures, moved through the streets. Most on the left wore green robes. On the right, they wore blue, though there were plenty of other robes as well.

  “The main streets mark district boundaries,” Besis said when Jez asked. “There are seven districts, each devoted to a different dominion, beasts on the left and protection on the right. The next term won’t start for another three weeks, so you’ll have time to settle in. Has the baron had you awakened?”

  “Awakened?”

  “You’re going to study illusion and presumably other schools of magic. You need to be awakened before you can do that.” Jez shook his head, and Besis shrugged. “Well, we can get that taken care of before the start of the term.”

  “It doesn’t look like anyone else here is just waiting for the term to start,” Jez said, glancing at all the robed students hustling about. One girl in blue saw Master Besis and approached to speak, but Besis shook his head. The student frowned and turned away.

  “We’re at the end of a term right now, and exams are keeping everyone busy. A few, like Cinatra,” he nodded at the departing student, “always try to make excuses for not being ready.”

  “You think she’ll fail then?”

  Besis shook his head. “Actually, she’s rather gifted. If she would only realize that, she’d have an easier time of it.”

  “And you give all these people their exams?”

  Besis shrugged. “I’m the protection master, but I let my adjutants issue all but the advanced binding tests, and even those are relatively straightforward. I summon a spirit and unleash it on the student. If they bind it they pass. If they don’t, well...”

  He let it hang for a second, and it was only when Jez gaped at him that a grin split his face.

  “Only joking, my young friend. My tests are a bit more complex than that, but my preparations were done days ago. If you ever study binding, I’ll show you.”

  “If Master Dusan approves, you mean.”

  Besis inclined his head. “Yes, there is that.”

  Before Jez could say anything else, his nostrils flared to the overpowering scent of sulfur. His eyes locked on the nearest building. Besis went silent and followed his gaze. He said something, but it seemed far away, and Jez’s attention was locked on the building. He took a step toward it, and Besis put a hand on his shoulder. Jez looked at him. He seemed to be saying something about the purpose of the building, but the exact words escaped him. All of Jez’s attention was focused beyond the wall. There was something inside, something that didn’t belong. Its presence spoke into the depth of Jez’s soul, and it spoke the language of fear. Jez shook himself free of the master’s grasp. Besis tried to reach for him, but then, the screaming started.

  The main door of the building was flung open, and three people practically tripped over each other trying to get out. A crack ran up the wall, glowing fiery orange. One of the students spotted Master Besis and ran toward him, but before he was halfway there, the wall exploded outward. A shower of dust and stone rushed out from the hole, covering everyone within twenty yards and forming a cloud of blackness. People screamed. One boy in green turned into a bird and flew away. A pang of terror ran through Jez, but it was a distant thing, more like a memory or a dream than an actual emotion. The student running toward them fell to the ground, shouting in terror.

  The cloud roared so loud the ground shook. Some people nearby screamed that the mountain was erupting, but somehow, Jez knew that wasn’t the case. A second later, his suspicions were confirmed as the smoke congealed into a winged figure wreathed in flame. It stood at least ten feet tall. Bone spikes jutted from its arms and legs. Its face was covered in scales and a pair of curved horns came from its head. Fire billowed from its nostrils with every breath, and a forked tongue flickered from its mouth. Its skin looked like the same black stone as the rest of the city. Burning cracks ran up and down its body which constantly spurted fire and smoke. Twin flames burned where its eyes should be. It took a step forward and began bringing a flaming foot down on the fallen student. The boy, perhaps two years older than Jez himself, shrieked in terror.

  Jez didn’t think. He just threw his arms forward. Energy surged through him. Raw force rushed at the creature, distorting the air. It crashed into the beast’s leg and the cr
eature came down hard on the ground several feet away from the fallen student. Cracks spread out from the point of impact. One made its way under the student who yelped and rolled out of the way. Master Besis gaped at Jez and lowered his arms. Some distant part of Jez’s mind recognized that the master had been about to do the same thing Jez did. Jez had simply been quicker. He had known this creature was coming.

  The creature, the phobos, though he didn’t know how he knew the name, had already gotten to its feet. It took a step toward them. Jez made two quick circular motions with his left hand and one with his right. Lights rushed at the creature, splashing against the middle of its chest. It spread out and formed a wide circle. The fear in Jez vanished, and others around him began to regain their composure. They were still afraid, but it was no longer the supernatural fear the monster had been giving off.

  The phobos turned its gaze to Jez. It reached for him, but his fingers danced in complex patterns his eyes couldn’t follow. A thin strand of light shot forward from his hand, expanding as it moved toward the creature. It wrapped itself around the demon’s claws and forced its hand to the side of its body. Another did the same to the other claw. Strand after strand shot from Jez’s hand as he wove incomprehensible patterns in the air. A few seconds later, the phobos was covered in web-like strands of power, as a fly caught by a spider. It tried to move, but the bindings held it fast. It toppled forward, shrinking as it did. By the time it reached the ground, it was the size of a doll that fit in the palm of his hand. Jez let out a breath, and his legs collapsed out from under him. Instantly, Master Besis was at his side. He helped Jez to his feet and scooped up the imprisoned phobos.

  “How did you...” Besis began, but he looked around. A crowd had formed and was pointing at them. “Never mind. Let’s discuss this in my office.” He turned to one of the nearby students and waved at the broken building. “Get Liandra to fix this. Tell her if she can have it done before moonrise, she’ll have a perfect mark on her exam. I want to see whoever is responsible for that thing escaping in two hours. Can you walk, Jezreel?”