Only a Glow

by Nichelle Rae

Addredoc looked frightened as I approached, then bowed his head shamefully.

  I smiled disarmingly. “Your mother told me why you acted the way you did. I forgive you. You have no reason to be ashamed.” His eyes brightened and he tried to smile, but his forehead wrinkled in pain. “Besides,” I said and gently clutched his upper arm. “You stopped Loir from taking from me what didn’t belong to him. For that, I owe you a favor.” I reached out with both hands and, not wanting to hurt him, held them just over the surface of his skin. I didn’t care anymore who saw my magic. If Hathum wanted to kill me, I was willing to make it as easy as possible.

  That awkward state of separation came to me and white fire surrounded my hands. Addredoc’s big, brown eyes went wide, no doubt at my eyes turning pure, glowing white. I watched as Addredoc’s injuries disappeared and then lowered my hands.

  I smiled at his newly healed face and realized how truly striking Addredoc was. He was younger than me but undeniably handsome! He was beautiful to a degree I found almost inconceivable for a human.

  He placed his hand on his newly restored jaw and opened his mouth a few times, testing it out. When he was satisfied it was working properly with no pain, he smiled at me. “Thank you, White Warrior.”

  His words shocked me into silence. He said my hated title so casually, as if he’d known all along what I was. How—how could that be? I spun around as a door to my left was thrown open and a monstrous form came out. It took me a moment, but I quickly realized it was Thrawyn. I stumbled backward, horrified.

  He thrust a finger toward Meddyn and shouted, “We told you it was her!”

  I cowered against a wall, clutching the large cloth to my body. My mind raced with horrible ideas and questions. The most pressing words that repeated itself repeatedly were, That was stupid, Azrel! Stupid, stupid, stupid Azrel!

  “Oh alright, Thrawyn, calm down. You’re scaring her,” Meddyn replied.

  I’d never been so confused in my life, and my confusion frightened me.

  Addredoc came forward and rested his hand gently on my upper arm. “Please don’t be afraid. We mean you no harm.”

  The tenderness of his voice seemed sincere, but I couldn’t help thinking otherwise. Had Hathum found me? Stupid, stupid Azrel! By using my magic so carelessly I’d practically invited him to come slit my throat. Now that the possibility was before me, I suddenly wasn’t so open to it.

  I looked past Addredoc to see Meddyn and Thrawyn suddenly bow to a knee. Addredoc, seeing what they were doing, quickly did the same and kneeled before me.

  “What—what’s this?” I said in a breath. “What’s going on?”

  All three rose to their feet and smiled. “It’s an honor to have you in our home, White Warrior,” Meddyn said. “We’re glad to have you returned to us.”

  I closed my eyes against the pain of being addressed formally for what I was, or what I was supposed to be. I was a failure in every aspect of this life of mine. I wasn’t worthy of any special attention, never mind worthy of anyone kneeling before me. “Please,” I said, “my name is Azrel.”

  They glanced at each other nervously as if they weren’t sure they should be calling me by my first name. “Very well, Azrel,” Meddyn said awkwardly.

  Thrawyn stepped forward and gently cupped Addredoc’s face in his hands. Tears filled the large man’s eyes as he softly ran his thumb over his son’s previously injured jaw—an injury he himself had caused. “He’s perfect,” Thrawyn said in an emotional whisper.

  My eyes went wide as Addredoc smiled and the two embraced lovingly.

  “Can you ever forgive me, my son?”

  “Father, there’s nothing to forgive. We did what we had to do to bring the White Warrior to us.”

  Thrawyn was clearly trying to keep himself from crying. “I still may never be able to forgive myself.”

  My confusion and fear exploded into anger. “What is going on?” I screamed.

  All of them jumped with fright, then bowed at the waist to me. “Forgive us for angering you, White Warrior,” Thrawyn said.

  I closed my eyes and slapped my hand to my forehead. “Please stop bowing and kneeling and treating me with this ridiculous air of respect. I don’t want it or deserve it!” They stared at me as if I were speaking another language, then glanced around at each other, confused. “Just,” I dropped my arm, “just treat me like you would any normal person.”

  Meddyn swallowed heavily as if she wasn’t very fond of that idea. “Very well, let’s get you some clothes. Do you prefer dresses or pants, dear?”

  I smiled at her calling me “dear.” “I’ve never worn a dress,” I said.

  She smiled, though it seemed slightly forced. “Alright. Addredoc, get your best outfit. She’ll have it, if it’s okay with you.”

  “It will be an honor.” He walked to the hallway that I’d come from.

  “Won’t you sit and eat with us?” Thrawyn offered gentlemanly, pulling out a chair.

  I gave him a sidelong glance. I didn’t fully trust this man, this brute that had beaten his own son so severely, this man I had punched in the mouth only a few hours ago. “I’d rather you tell me why you broke your son’s face. And what was that mess with hiding in the closet?” I looked at Meddyn. “You said he was a jerk. Why is he hugging and loving the son he just beat within an inch of his life?”

  It was quiet for a moment. Then Thrawyn looked down. “That was the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do in my life.” A tear finally rolled down his cheek. Meddyn went to him and comforted him, gently wiping the tear away.

  I threw my arms out to my sides, barely hanging on to my sanity. “Then why did you?!” I cried.

  Addredoc came out of his bedroom with a set of clothes draped over one arm. “You can come into the bathing room and dress if you’d like.”

  I shook my head in confusion and disgust, then went to the bathing room again. Addredoc placed the clothes on the chair and headed back for the door. Just get dressed and get out of here, I told myself. Get to Rocksheloc, give Beldorn the necklace, and go home.

  Home? What home?

  Home to the cave.

  Amid my thoughts, I heard the door shut. I spun around and saw Addredoc facing the closed bathing room door with his arms clasped behind him. I narrowed my eyes at his back. What was he doing? My eyes moved down and suddenly I saw that he was wearing a rather dazzling sword at his belt. My brow went up. He was carrying a sword in his own house and guarding the door? Why?

  He must have felt me looking at him because he turned to gaze over his shoulder. “Everything will be explained to you.” He smiled affectionately. “I’ve waited a long time to serve you, White Warrior.”

  Right, I thought. What are you? A whole nineteen years old? I didn’t want anything explained to me. I wanted to get out of here!

  He turned to face the bathing room door again.

  I shook my head and looked around the room. My clothes were still piled in a filthy wet heap, but my weapons were separate. My brows dropped and I suddenly realized that I had left my sword vulnerable for the first time in nine years! How had I managed to do that? Had these people been Hathum’s agents, it would have…it could have…how did I do that? How could I do that? Not since the day I received it had it ever left my hand or my hip! I stared at it now on the floor, and I was completely dumbfounded. It was lying in the corner of the room on top of a beautiful purple velvet cloth with gold trim. There was also sheer white mesh wrapped around the hilt, just like I’d found when I woke up in Galad Kas after my fall into the Ambuel. My Salynn blade—Isadith’s gift—was also laid out. It rested on a smaller velvet cloth, dark red with gold trimming. Both my belt and holder were beside the weapon that belonged to it.

  I turned to glare at Addredoc’s back, needing to redirect this anger. “What’s with the white cloth around the hilt of my sword?”

  He looked over to my weapons. “It’s ancient by-spelled cloth.”

  I flinched in surprise. “Ancient magic?”
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br />   Addredoc nodded. “A few strips of it remain from your father’s time.” My eyes went wide at that! “It protects the Sword if the White Warrior gets injured, passes out, or accidentally drops it for any reason. If any hand except the White Warrior’s tries to grab it, the magic throws the person fifty feet.”

  I grit my teeth so hard my temples throbbed. “Why do you have these ancient strips of cloth?”

  “Everything will be explained to you,” he said again and faced the door.

  I tore the cloth from the hilt and watched it drop to the floor. A piece of something from my father’s time. I stared at it for a moment, longing for my father again, then began putting my clothes on.

  After I’d dressed in the satin sliver pants and the silk white shirt, I suddenly remembered the necklace. It was in the pocket of my filthy pants. I glanced at Addredoc to be sure he wasn’t looking, then quietly went to the smelly pile of wet clothes. Picking each item up with two fingers, I finally got to my pants. I shoved my hand into the right pocket and sighed with relief as I felt the cold, hard, metal chain. I pulled it out and studied it. The orange glow of the gem had slightly dimmed. I had to hurry and get on my way. I shoved the necklace into my new pants pocket and tied the sliver satin sash around my waist, then pulled on the shiny black boots that came up to my mid-shin. I looked ready to go to a ball rather than out traveling through rain and mud.

  “Addredoc,” I said, “I’m leaving tonight, and these are very fine clothes. I’d hate to ruin them during my travels in this weather. Do you want to get me some others?”

  “Not at all. The White Warrior deserves the best, and I’m honored you are wearing mine.”

  I was about to remind him, loudly, that I’d told him not to treat me with any extra respect, when my eyes settled on my weapons again. “Why were my weapons laid out on velvet cloths? Are they magically enhanced, too?”

  “The White Warrior’s weapons, especially the White Sword of Goodness, must always be handled with the greatest care and respect.” He sounded like he was reciting from a rulebook. “That Sword is the source of everything you are, everything Good in the world.”

  That was it! My mind and body exploded with madness. I’d left this sword completely vulnerable and unguarded! My father never would have done that, but I did! He was the White Warrior! He should be here now doing this! But no! He was taken away from me by the very thing we were charged to protect!

  Before I could rein in my rage, I dropped to my knees, grabbed two fistfuls of my hair and screamed, “Stop treating me this way! I hate what I am! I hate it! I don’t deserve respect! I deserve death!” I pulled harder on my hair, enduring the pain I was causing myself. “I wish the sword had never been passed to me! I don’t want it! It’s destroyed my life! I hate my magic! I hate it!!!”

  Addredoc was on his knees in front of me, trying to release the grip I had on my hair. I heard the door burst open and two sets of feet come running in. I didn’t care! I pulled harder on my hair, hoping I might rip my skull in half!

  Then voices came to my ears. Voices came, but words didn’t. They were talking so loud I couldn’t help but listen. It was words, but words in the Ancient, Ancient Salynnian speech!

  “What is wrong with her?”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. She just started screaming!”

  When the three of them realized I was looking at them in astonishment, they drew nearer and started speaking in the common tongue.

  “Azrel, are you alright?” Meddyn asked.

  “You—you were all speaking in…in the Ancient Salynn language. How do you know it? Not even the oldest generation of Salynns today knows that language. It died over 3,000 years ago.”

  They exchanged glances before looking back at me. “Please come into the dine room and eat. We will explain everything,” Thrawyn offered.

  Addredoc gently helped me stand and guided me over to my weapons. I heavily got to one knee, as if the weight of the world were on my back. I picked up my Salynn sheath and strapped it to my left thigh, then inserted my blade. I dropped that knee to the floor, picked up my belt and secured it around my hips. I grasped the hilt of my sword and glared at it in all its hateful beauty. I roughly thrust it into my white scabbard with a grunt, then followed them into the dine room and plopped into a chair.

  “May I serve supper, or do you wish to talk first?” Meddyn asked.

  “I don’t care,” I said in a really uncaring tone. “It’s your house. Do whatever you want.”

  She stared at me for a moment, then glanced up at the other two. “Sit down,” she said in Ancient Salynnian. They all looked rather nervous now. They probably weren’t expecting to deal with this—a White Warrior who hated her magic with every fiber of her being.

  Addredoc sat next to me while Thrawyn sat across from me. Meddy hurried to and from the kitchen, bringing numerous items of food to the table. When all the food was on the table, she sat herself next to Thrawyn and began serving each of us.

  I looked at the two adults across the table. “Alright, explain. And please be quick about it because I need to go.” I didn’t even glance at my plate of food, even though I was famished.

  “As you wish,” Thrawyn said and looked at his wife, who nodded. Thrawyn looked at Addredoc, who also nodded. They closed their eyes, and suddenly a red light began to shimmer around each of them. I watched in astonishment as they changed from their overworked human forms into the graceful beauty of Salynns.

  Thrawyn’s black hair now fell perfectly straight to rest between his shoulder blades, the top part held at the back of his head by a thin pearl and gold barrette. His thin mustache was gone, and his face was far more clear and youthful. His build became more slender and his gray eyes brighter. Meddy’s ash blonde hair fell smooth and shiny all the way down her back to her bottom, the top of her hair also pulled back behind her head and held in place by a far more elaborate pearl barrette. She now wore a silk, light blue, floor length gown that shimmered. The sleeves were made of a white sheer material and belled out to fall nearly to her knees. Addredoc didn’t change at all. He was still beautiful and handsome, only now with the Red Sallybreath Flowers; Meddy and Thrawyn sported them, too.

  I didn’t have to think very hard about where Red Flowered Salynns lived. It was only the largest mountain cluster in Casdanarus, a realm called Godel. It was a Humount realm, probably the oldest one in all the land.

  Humounts were a mix race of Salynns and humans. In ancient times, even before my father existed, they left their homelands to mine the majestic and mysterious mountains. Humounts were likely the ones who found the cavern with the healing gems and eventually led to their near extinction. The Humounts mined mountains for centuries, building grand and beautiful cities within them. Rocksheloc was also a Humount realm, but the Salynns of that land had Blue-Violet Sallybreath Flowers: blue petals with violet centers.

  When a Salynn decided he or she wanted to become a Humount and live in the mountains, a magic user was summoned (and paid a handsome fortune) to change the color of their Sallybreath Flowers to whatever color the community was they wanted to live among. It cost mounds of gold because the magic user, usually a Wizard in those ancient times, would cast a spell that cost the Wizard some amount of his or her power. The power lost from that spell was power the Wizard could never regain. Lost power meant a permanent weakness for the magic user, since a magic user’s existence, their very life, was based solely on their magic’s energy.

  But magic users in ancient times were far, far more powerful than the deluded power of today’s magic users. The high demand of Humounts wanting to change the color of their flowers eventually, through the generations, diluted the power of all magic users. As weakened magic users passed their weakened gifts to their offspring, and their offspring also used their power to change Sallybreath Flowers, the whole force of magic in the world diluted. What would cause an ancient magician a barely noticeable drain of power, would probably takeaway half o
f the life force of a magic user today.

  That was why the ancient magic in those white strips of cloth around my sword’s hilt were so astounding! Ancient magic was something of legends, hardly fathomable by today’s wizards and magic users!

  “Well,” was all I could manage. What baffled me was why these three Salynns were here in Narcatertus. Narcatertus was notorious for its prejudice against Salynns, and Godel was so far away to the southeast. “Okay. So, what does being very, very far from your homeland have to do with you beating up your son?”

  “I knew your father, Azrel.”

  My blood ran cold. Then I made a strange squeaking noise in my throat. I tried to take a breath but an invisible fist cut off my air. Thrawyn knew my father?

  “We fought together in the Nameless War.”

  The invisible fist closed tighter around my throat. Had he been there the day, the very day my father fled? If so, why was he talking to me? Why was he bathing me and feeding me? “Do you…did you…well, ho…how do you…” I bumbled.

  Thrawyn reached across the table and rested his hand over mine. “I believe he was the bravest man on that battlefield.”

  I looked up at his face, stunned and shocked, studying him for what seemed like an eternity. Was he serious? After all the hateful things written about my father, the White Warrior, someone was actually speaking fondly of him? Someone who saw him leave the battlefield? Someone who was there? And this person was reaching across a table and holding my hand, and smiling at me? He didn’t hate my father? I thought everyone hated my father!

  The tears burst forth, and I lowered my forehead to the table. I wondered what my father would do if he knew these three Salynns still thought highly of him. Maybe he wouldn’t have hated himself so much. Maybe he wouldn’t have felt so alone. My shoulders shook with sobs, and I tried my best not to be loud and hysterical.

  Addredoc gently pulled me up from the table and against his chest. I eagerly wrapped my arms around his back as he held me close. The feel of a solid touch was comforting. But what made the touch better was that it was from someone who should hate me and my father, the White Warrior, but didn’t. He knew what I was and still lovingly embraced me.