by Clayton Wood
“I'm leaving for Sabin,” Darius declared. “If I'm not back in 24 hours,” he added, “...assume I'm dead.” Kyle felt the faint thrum of magic around them then, a familiar subtle vibration in his skull. Darius put one gauntleted finger on Kyle's chest. “In that case, use the spacetime bridge generator.”
“How?” Kyle asked.
“It can only be activated by you,” Darius answered. “It recognizes your unique magical fingerprint. Stream magic to it for five seconds and it will activate.”
They stood there then, Darius staring at Kyle silently, and Kyle with his eyes on Darius's feet. They said nothing for a long moment. The sun continued to drop over the horizon, sending a splash of red and purple across the feathered clouds above.
“Whatever happens,” Darius continued, “...you must never tell your father about me. No one on Earth can know about Doma...or magic.”
Kyle nodded silently. Darius reached out and placed something heavy in Kyle's hand. Kyle glanced down, seeing the rolled-up map there, the cyclindrical metallic bomb tucked within.
“No regrets,” Darius murmured.
And he was gone.
Chapter 4
Kyle yawned as he followed an elite guard out of his bedroom and into Kalibar's main suite. He'd fallen asleep soon after returning to the Tower the night before, and Ariana had made good on her promise to watch over him as he slept. She'd left before he'd been awoken by an elite guard knocking on his bedroom door, no doubt to practice weaving before her class with Master Owens.
Kyle yawned again, barely registering that he'd left Kalibar's suite and was being led down the hall to the riser at the end of it. Today was the first day of his lessons with his new Runic teacher, who apparently wanted him to wake up at five in the morning. That was far too early for learning, if you asked him. Far too early for being conscious.
Two more elite guards appeared behind Kyle, following a few steps behind him, their heavy black boots clopping sharply on the granite floor below. They all wore the signature black armor of the elite guard, a squad of highly-trained soldiers dedicated to protecting the highest-ranking government officials...and their families. Ever since Master Banar's murder, Kalibar had drastically increased Kyle's security force, and had forbidden Kyle and Ariana from venturing far from the Tower. Well, Kyle, anyway; Ariana had proven quite capable of defending herself since her...change.
Kyle yawned a third time as he stepped onto the riser with the three guards. The circular stone platform descended rapidly, eventually stopping, and the guards led Kyle down another long hallway, to a door on the left. They opened it, and motioned for Kyle to go through. He did so, finding himself in a familiar place: the Runic Archives. The Archives were a series of rooms that contained ancient tomes and magical artifacts, some over two thousand years old. The main room was huge, with dozens of rows of shelving standing over two stories tall, each overflowing with countless magical artifacts. To the left, Kyle saw the door to the Testing chamber, where Erasmus's Runics had decoded Kyle's ring. The guards led Kyle forward, to a large, rectangular table standing beside one of the many shelves. Wooden chairs surrounded the table, and in one of them sat a very old woman. Ancient, even. She was tall, or used to be; her back was a bit stooped, forcing her to crank her neck back a little just to see forward. She had curly silver hair and twinkling blue eyes, thick glasses sitting astride her nose. She nodded at Kyle.
“Morning,” she greeted, motioning for him to take a seat opposite her. “You must be Kyle,” she added. Kyle nodded, sitting down in the chair.
“Good morning,” Kyle replied.
“I'm Lee,” she stated, extending a wrinkled hand across the table. Kyle took it, shaking it gently. Her grip was strong, her skin warm and dry, and only a little creepy, as very old people's hands invariably felt.
“Nice to meet you, Master Lee,” he stated politely. Lee snorted, waving away the formality.
“Just Lee,” she insisted. “I've no patience for formality at my age,” she added. “I don't have enough time left for it. I'm practically dead, after all...or at least I look it.”
“Uh...” Kyle stammered, unable to think of any way to respond. She was distressingly accurate. Lee laughed, her raspy voice echoing throughout the chamber.
“Come on now,” she stated, peering over her glasses at him. “My son tells me I need to make a Runic out of you before my funeral.”
“Your son?”
“What, he didn't tell you?” Lee asked. “Can't you see the resemblance?”
“Um...”
“Erasmus,” she stated, smirking at his blank expression.
“Wait, you're his...?”
“I made him, yes,” she replied. “Luckily he came out skinnier than he is now, or I'd have been buried sixty years ago,” she added with a wry smirk.
“Sorry, he didn't tell me,” Kyle apologized. Lee shrugged her frail shoulders.
“Who cares?” she replied. “Now come on, I haven't got all day. Can you rune-link?”
“What?”
“Never mind. Can you inscribe?”
“Um...”
“Do you know what a rune is?” Lee stated impatiently, drumming her fingers on the surface of the table. Kyle blushed, then nodded. “Tell me!” she commanded exasperatedly.
“A pattern made of a crystalline wire,” Kyle answered, remembering what Master Banar had taught him. “It conducts magic the same as our brains weave magic.”
“Oh good, you're not completely hopeless,” Lee grumbled. “You know about sensory runes?”
“Yes ma'am.”
“Good. And I like the manners,” Lee stated. “Never trust a woman who says she doesn't.”
“But you said...”
“Exactly,” Lee interrupted. She sat back in her chair then, sighing loudly. “So you're all theory and no application. Absolutely useless,” she spat, shaking her head in disgust. She reached up with her left hand, grabbing at thin air, and suddenly a small brown cube appeared between her fingers. Kyle's jaw dropped, and Lee chuckled.
“Oh, I'm not dead yet,” she stated. “I've got more than a few tricks up my sleeve. And I'm going to teach you as many as I can fit up yours,” she added. “Some students have longer sleeves than others,” she explained, narrowing her eyes at him. “God, I hope you're not stupid.”
“I'm not,” Kyle replied rather defensively.
“Prove it,” Lee challenged. She sat up suddenly, walking around the table to the chair at Kyle's right, sitting on it. She set the brown cube on the table. “Do what I do.” She stared at the cube then, and Kyle felt a slight vibration in his skull. He saw a faint blue light appear beneath the skin of her forehead, moving left, then arcing backward a fraction of an inch, then moving forward, then dipping downward. He followed the movements, weaving magic in his own mind, copying her pattern. She shot the pattern out toward the crystal she'd set on the table, and Kyle did the same. Two tiny blue dots appeared on the surface, then faded, leaving two orange dots behind. Lee frowned at the dots, turning a critical eye on Kyle.
“You're not supposed to do that,” she muttered.
“What?”
“You weren't supposed to be able to do that,” she clarified. “I was testing you. You were looking at my forehead the entire time,” she observed. “Can you see magic?”
“Uh...” Kyle mumbled. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to tell anyone about his gift.
“You can,” Lee deduced. “Stop being difficult,” she added crossly. “This'll be easier if you quit keeping secrets. Why haven't you told anyone?”
“I thought everyone could,” Kyle lied. Lee snorted.
“You're smarter than that,” she scolded. “Erasmus told me Kalibar developed the same gift when he received his new eyes. Have you always been able to see magic?”
Kyle hesitated, then nodded.
“That explains why you learn patterns so quickly,” she deduced. “Owens never figured you out, did he,” she added with a shake of her head. �
�Weavers!”
“What was that pattern?” Kyle asked. He'd seen Master Banar do the same thing – turning a brown crystal orange – but couldn't remember what it meant.
“The inscribing pattern,” she answered. “The most important pattern ever discovered,” she added authoritatively. “That's how we inscribe runes.”
“Can you show me again?” he requested. Lee nodded, staring at the cube again. Kyle followed the faint blue light on her forehead again, committing the pattern to memory. Then he wove it himself, casting the pattern at the cube. Another two blue dots – one from each of them – appeared on the surface, fading to orange.
“Now,” Lee stated, flipping the cube over so that an unmarred brown facet faced upward. “Weave the fire pattern.” Kyle complied, weaving a thread of magic clockwise in a full circle, then bringing it backward, then forward, then sending it outward in front of him. He attached a small magic stream to the pattern, and a tiny red flame appeared in the air a foot in front of him. Lee reached into the air with her right hand, plucking a sheet of paper – again out of thin air – and a pencil. She drew a symbol then:
“What's that?” Kyle asked.
“The fire pattern,” Lee explained. “In standard Runic notation. The thing at the top is a nose,” she continued. “...telling us we're looking down at someone's head. The dot in the middle is the center of the mind, the circle represents the first part of the pattern. The dark dot at the start of the circle marks where one starts weaving. The next two lines represent the next steps...sending magic backward, then forward.”
“I get it,” Kyle said.
“You'd better,” Lee replied. “That's the easy part. Now if the pattern was drawn like this...”
“...then the thing at the left is the nose, and we're looking at a person's head from the side. The left side, of course.”
“Okay,” Kyle said.
“So now you know how to read standard Runic notation,” she stated. “It gets complicated, but there's time for that later. We need to make you useful...pay attention.” She stared at the cube, lowering her head to it, and a blue dot appeared on its surface. It vanished below the cube's surface, then returned, then vanished, then returned again, slightly to the left.
“I've inscribed the fire pattern into the cube,” Lee explained. “I traced the inscribing pattern like this...”
“So the top of the drawing is the top of the cube,” Kyle guessed. Lee nodded.
“The end of the pattern extends all the way to the surface,” Lee continued. “That's important; it forces the pattern to be expressed outward, at the top of the cube. Now, stream magic to the cube,” she ordered. Kyle complied, and a small flame appeared a fraction of an inch above the cube's surface.
“That's it?” Kyle asked. “That's easy!”
“I make it look easy, honey,” Lee retorted. “We're just getting started. Now, did anyone ever explain to you how magic works?”
“Uh, yeah,” Kyle replied. “It changes matter and energy,” he added. Lee rolled her eyes.
“Oh brother,” she groaned, shaking her head in despair. “Have we got a long way to go!”
* * *
Ariana stepped out of the Tower lobby's massive double-doors, feeling warm sunlight strike her skin. Whereas before she would have found such a sensation pleasant, her body no longer required warmth, and it was now a neutral sensation. She did enjoy the relative silence of the outdoors, however; ever since she'd been reborn, her senses had been remarkably enhanced. While indoors, she could easily hear people talking behind closed doors, even from a floor above or below. She could even hear sounds that she'd never heard before...sounds too high or low in pitch for normal people to hear. The constant sounds of talking, footsteps, and other noise became overwhelming after a while, and it was nice to get outside to avoid them.
She closed her eyes for a moment, hearing birds chirping far in the distance, and the clatter of countless footsteps as Runic and Weaver students made their way from their dormitories toward the Tower for their classes. She was early for her class with Master Owens, as usual. She typically requested that they have class outside, much to Kalibar's consternation, and far away from the dormitories and the Tower. It was easier to focus in the outdoors.
She opened her eyes then, walking down one of the many cobblestone paths leading from the Tower to the campus beyond. She spotted a bird flying far above the Tower; even from four hundred feet away, she could spot the small brown mouse clutched in the bird's talons, wriggling helplessly in its cruel grasp. In addition to her hearing, her vision had improved tremendously since her rebirth. She also had much improved night vision, starlight being more than adequate to see full color. It'd taken a while to get used to, but now she couldn't remember what it had been like not to see and hear like this. She found it strange how quickly her mind had adapted to her new way of being.
She continued down the cobblestone path, her black boots clicking on the stone below, ignoring the occasional stares from the students passing by. She was still painfully self-conscious of her looks, knowing that she appeared deathly pale to others. She'd still had blood in her veins when she'd been revived, but without her heart beating, it had sat in her legs, leaving them an awful purple color. She'd insisted that it be drained, and when Kalibar had refused, she'd gotten Darius to help her. She'd thought about wearing makeup to cover her paleness, but decided against it after one try. She'd left the makeup on everything she'd touched, and it'd been a constant pain to reapply. After that day, she'd decided to stop trying to fit in, hoping that others would eventually just get used to her.
She sighed, staring at the backs of her hands, at the faint web of blue veins there. They were thin, empty as they were, but she still found them ugly. She had them on her face, too; she often wondered how Kyle could possibly find her attractive now, but he didn't seem to mind, for which she was grateful. She smiled, picturing his face, that sweet smile of his, and his expressive brown eyes. He was the best thing that had ever happened to her. He'd saved her from the Arena, and from the Dead Man, and had risked his life to protect her. He'd been the one to insist that Darius bring her back to life. And despite her terrible strength, her ugly skin and veins, and the icy coldness of her flesh, for some reason he still wanted to be with her.
Ariana veered off the path, spotting a large grassy field to her right. This was where she and Master Owens always met. Again, she was early, so he wasn't there yet. Never sleeping meant spending eight hours every night waiting for the world to wake up; she couldn't help coming early, eager to start her day.
She spotted her favorite tree, and walked up to it, sitting with her back to the trunk. The tree's branches swayed slightly in the breeze, its green leaves rustling pleasantly above her head. It wasn't long before she spotted Master Owens walking out of the double-doors of the Tower, still a mile or so away, continuing down the cobblestone path toward her. Even from such a long distance, she could see his black robes rippling in the breeze, his brown eyes staring off into space. He was clearly lost in thought; she wondered idly about what. She followed his slow stroll down the path, and after a long while, he reached the tree where she sat. He stopped before her, giving her a warm smile.
“Good morning,” he greeted, extending a hand. Ariana stood up and shook it, feeling the powerful pulse of blood in the artery at the base of his thumb. If she concentrated, she could even hear his heartbeat. “Are you ready to spar?” he asked.
“Yes Master Owens,” she replied. They'd been sparring several times a day ever since her revival, supposedly to help her improve her skills. But they both knew the real reason behind the matches; with Ariana having the Dead Man's shard in her brain, Kalibar had ordered a thorough study of its capabilities. For, in addition to keeping her alive, the shard had an extraordinary number of automatic magical defenses programmed into it. Anyone attempting to attack her would trigger these defenses, and Master Owens' job was to catalog them...and attempt to find a way to defeat them. In doi
ng so, Kalibar hoped to gain the upper hand against the Chosen, and against Xanos. Of course, her adoptive father had taken great care to ensure that no one – other than himself, Erasmus, Darius, Kyle, and Owens – knew the true source of her power. The Council would not be pleased to know that a Chosen existed among them.
“Good,” Owens replied. “Grand Weaver Kalibar should be here soon,” he added. Ariana nodded; her father had been attending her sparring matches recently, eager to learn how to combat her shard. He hadn’t sparred with her yet though…and even the thought of facing Kalibar made her uneasy. “Let's get started, shall we?” Owens stated.
Ariana smiled back nervously, taking a step backward. Master Owens was the second-best Battle-Weaver in the Empire, with only Kalibar consistently able to defeat him. But even Owens' considerable talents had been sorely tested by Ariana's shard. He'd won all of their matches handily...up to the point of the finishing blow. It was then that the crystal in her forehead had unleashed a new surprise to counter him, each and every time.
“Ready?” Master Owens said, his eyes narrowing slightly. “Begin!”
Ariana tensed up, backpedaling away from her teacher. She saw gravity shields shimmer to life around Owens in multiple layers, saw another gravity field appear instantly to Owens' left. The Weaver slid rapidly toward it, a fireball appearing between his hands in front of his chest, shooting outward at her before she could so much as blink. Ariana felt her shard react, magic weaving impossibly fast in the center of her forehead. A dozen gravity shields appeared around her like the layers of an onion.
The fireball bounced harmlessly off of her shields, fiery punk splattering on the grass below.
