The Lure of Fools

by Jason James King

  Euphoria like nothing he’d ever known swept him away. He shuddered, moaning softly as a torrent of energy flooded into him. He could feel the well now, feel its depth. It went all the way down into the heart of the planet, connecting it to a churning mass of power so vast Jove felt as though he were contemplating the depths of the ocean itself.

  He called several more of his tendrils into existence and thrust them all at the glowing amethyst. More Apeiron flowed into him, and he began to laugh from the sheer joy of it. He continued walking toward the well, and upon reaching it, pressed his whole body against its crystalline surface. The amount of life he was drinking multiplied exponentially. Now he was standing in the ocean, drinking it as it flowed over him. It was supreme ecstasy.

  Raelen helped Gryyth to stand. The Ursaj roared as the pain of his scorched front made him stumble. “Perhaps you ought to stay here, and I’ll bring Brother Yimin up.”

  Gryyth nodded, his eyes shut as he breathed slow and deep. Raelen glanced at the servant girl–Maely was her name. She was sitting on the roof’s surface, arms wrapped around her legs and her cheek resting on her knees.

  Who was she? Not an actual palace servant, of that Raelen was certain. He was about to ask her when the Apeira well rising behind them dimmed. It actually had gone dark for a heartbeat. It flickered again, making the purple light of the roof shift, and reminding Raelen of a sputtering candle.

  “That’s not possible,” he said.

  Maely looked up at him. Her eyes were red, and she looked beyond exhausted. Poor girl.

  Raelen stared at the Apeira well for a long moment and gasped as cracks begin to spider web across its surface.

  “Something’s wrong.”

  What happened next chilled Raelen to the core. The purple-crystal monolith began to sway back and forth and since the palace was deliberately built around the well, it rocked the building. Fine cracks snaked their way across the roof’s surface, and Raelen lurched forward as the tower swayed.

  “We need to get back down into the palace,” he said.

  They were met on their way down the tower by Raelen’s honor guard who’d finally managed to catch up to him. The captain blustered a dozen self-deprecating apologies upon seeing him, but Raelen dismissed his concerns with a casual wave. It wasn’t the soldier’s fault they couldn’t keep pace with him when he was tapping Gryyth’s strength and speed.

  “What’s happening, captain? Why is the palace shaking?”

  The captain shook his helmeted head. “I don’t know, my prince. But everyone is in an uproar. People are shouting things about the end of the world, and saying that Rasheera’s judgment has come upon us.”

  A particularly violent tremor made the chandeliers’ above sway. One even dropped a light talis, which shattered on the floor off to Raelen’s right. “Captain, sound the call. We are evacuating the palace.”

  The hall shook. Graelle snapped her head back, craning her neck to stare at the ceiling. The ornate, glass chandeliers were swaying. Not a gentle back and forth either, but a full pendulum-like swing. She looked down at Irvis, who was cradling Ezra’s lifeless body, and sobbing. She gently tapped him on the shoulder.

  “Irvis,” she said.

  He looked up at her and scrubbed the sleeve of his robe across his nose. “I couldn’t heal him.”

  Graelle shot a glance at the mass of Rikujo enforcers all round them. They were staring at the ceiling too, all looking nervous. “Something’s wrong.” As soon as the words left her lips, the entire corridor lurched. Several of the enforcers cried out in surprise as they stumbled, some bracing themselves against the wall to keep from falling. Graelle herself nearly fell on her rump, but Irvis quickly stood and caught her.

  A clang drew her attention to the floor. Ezra’s body had rolled, the shifting of the ground so violent it had caused the sword to dislodge from his chest. Jekaran sat, frozen with green eyes staring blankly. The tilting hallway moved him physically, but he didn’t so much as flinch.

  “Look!” Mulladin shouted.

  Graelle glanced to the wall and saw cracks forming. Dust fell from the ceiling, and the floor lurched again. “We have to go!” She said to Irvis.

  He nodded and bent down to pick up Ezra, but she laid a hand on his arm to stop him. “Leave him,” she said gently.

  Irvis stared at her for a long moment before nodding.

  Then the lights went out.

  Tyrus grabbed Hort’s beefy forearm to steady himself. What in the holy name of the goddess is happening? Everything was shaking, and now the talises lining the corridor and hanging from the chandelier had gone dark, as if they’d lost their charge. Fortunately, a connecting corridor must’ve faced the outer palace wall because he could see light in the distance. That corridor would have windows.

  Once his eyes adjusted, he saw Jekaran sitting on the ground only a dozen paces away. Apparently, Hort had seen the same, for the big mercenary was already moving toward the boy.

  “Get him!” he said, anyway.

  As they fumbled their way in the dark, pushing through Ezra’s soldiers–how had the man gotten Rikujo thieves to help him?–Tyrus’s foot caught something metal. He would’ve tripped had he not been holding fast to Hort. The object rang as his foot caused it to slide away. Jekaran’s sword talis?

  Fortunately, it felt like Tyrus had tripped on the cross guard and not the sharp blade. The way the boy was able to tear through armor and bodies, Tyrus didn’t doubt the thing would’ve taken his toes off.

  He was about to order Hort to stop so he could retrieve it, but another dark shape beat him to it. “Halt!” Tyrus shouted, but the figure had already vanished into the darkness. Well, it didn’t matter now, at least not as much as rescuing Kybon’s son.

  They reached him, and Hort leaned down and scooped up the lean teenager. He immediately began moving toward the distant light of the connecting corridor.

  “Where’s Jek?” a voice shouted.

  Tyrus just about didn’t answer, but his conscience made him call back, “I have him! We’re heading out!”

  Hort stumbled only once as they groped along the wall, and Tyrus didn’t want to consider what it might’ve been that tripped the big man. The floor was already wet and sticky, and he had kicked aside a severed head by accident. At least that’s what it’d felt like. Had Jekaran really killed so many soldiers? If the king discovered he’d helped the boy escape, the noose next to Jekaran’s would be his. But was the king even alive? He’d heard the soldiers shouting accusations at Jekaran as they fought, disturbing accusations.

  That doesn’t matter right now, he told himself, pushing the panic down.

  They moved more quickly as the hallway began to lighten, and Tyrus felt a wash of relief when they turned the corner into a corridor lined on one side with tall windows. The grey light of a newborn dawn filtered in through the glass, revealing a wide marble floor that was clean of corpses and blood. Tyrus tried to ignore the squishing his boots made as he moved into the light, and refused to look down lest he see bloody footprints. That might make him vomit–again.

  “Hey!” someone shouted.

  Tyrus glanced back to see Jekaran’s simple friend pointing at him with a ringed finger. Was it a talis? Who would give a simpleton a talis? Especially a weapon talis. Nothing happened, however, and the big youth looked confused.

  “I’m trying to help him escape!” Tyrus snapped.

  A Rasheeran monk standing behind and to the side of the simpleton furrowed his brow as he stared at him. “Why?” he asked. “Why would…”

  The room tilted hard to the side toward the tall, ornate palace windows. One of Ezra’s Rikujo thugs actually exploded through a pane of glass, screaming as he fell. Tyrus himself slammed into the outer wall. The glass panes of the other windows exploded and shattered as a large rent in the outer wall opened up above them.

  “Divine Mother!” Tyrus breathed out.

  The black-clad Rikujo soldiers broke into a panicked flight in all directio
ns. Some disappeared into the darkness behind them; others slid and stumbled as they ran on ahead. Apparently, with Ezra dead, they no longer felt any loyalty to Jekaran. Nor did they obey the monk and his chubby woman friend when they called after them.

  The quake subsided, and Tyrus was able to regain his footing. Blood trickled from his nose, and he wiped it with the sleeve of his robe. He’d hit the wall face first and from the pain of it likely broke his nose.

  “We need to get out of here!” he snapped at the chubby monk. He winced as the movement hurt his nose, and his voice came out more nasally than usual. Yes, definitely broken.

  The monk shared a look with his woman friend, and she nodded. Tyrus looked to Hort, who still held Jekaran’s limp form in his arms. The boy looked as though he were dead, but his eyes were open, and he was clearly blinking and breathing. Rasheera send he is not like this forever.

  “Come on!” Tyrus said as he took the lead. “I believe this floor connects to the palace lobby.”

  Kairah fell to her knees. The creature, The Vessel, was syphoning not only from the Apeira well, but from every Aeose around him, including the ones in her blood. Drawing directly from the well somehow augmented his power, turning him into a vortex that sucked in all Apeiron. Kairah strained in resistance, and it was all she could do to hold onto the Apeiron inside of her

  This is what happened to the land in my vision. Taris or Aiested, would soon become a city of bones with blackened ground scrubbed of all life. On top of that, Jenoc had succeeded in setting the stage for another talis war. The humans were doomed. Perhaps all life on Shaelar was doomed. She had failed.

  Kairah! Aeva called. You need to get up! Leave that place!

  “I cannot,” she whispered. “I do not have the strength.”

  Her grip on her Apeiron store slipped, and she gasped as she felt a quarter of her energy immediately drain away. Flexing her will, she was able to staunch the bleeding and instinctively reached out to tap the well to replace the energy.

  Nothing happened.

  The creature was drinking in all of the well’s Apeiron. She looked up at the crystal monolith. It was shaking, causing the ceiling that surrounded it at the top to crack and rain dust and stone. Kairah could also see large cracks forming in the well itself, around which the amethyst colored crystal was slowly changing color–darkening to an emerald green. Like the broken well in my vision.

  “Fey girl get up, rok!”

  Karak materialized in front of her. He was breathing hard, hand cradling his right side. He extended his other arm toward her and Kairah was surprised to see that it ended in a burnt stump. The Vorakk shaman had lost his hand. She reached up and gripped his stump, using it as leverage to stand. She braced herself to lose more Apeiron, but that didn’t happen. Why?

  Dozens of small glowing orbs swirled around her. Occasionally one would be pulled away, as if sucked toward the creature feeding on the well, but then it would come flying back as if spit out.

  “What are they?” she gasped.

  The lizard man flashed a toothy smile, though it looked strained. “Spirits, aka.”

  Spirits? That’s right, Karak had said that before. But what exactly were they and how were they shielding Kairah from the all-consuming leech that was Moriora’s vessel?

  Kairah followed Karak as he ran toward the chamber’s exit. Fortunately, the creature didn’t try to stop them. Just as she was about to leave the room, Kairah glanced back to get one last look at the monster. He was little more than a dark shape in a swirling storm of purple light now, but she thought she could hear wild laughter. And she didn’t just hear it with her ears. It somehow also resonated with her psychic senses. What did that mean?

  “We go, rok!” Karak hissed.

  Kairah turned away and joined the lizard man in a sprint out of the chamber.

  “Kairah!” a familiar voice called out.

  Kairah slowed and glanced to her right where she found the human named Irvis jogging toward her, and he was not alone. A plump woman, a young male, a short nobleman, and a muscular soldier carrying–Jekaran!

  “Stupid human boy dead aka?” Karak asked.

  Was he dead? He didn’t move, and his eyes were glassy like those of a corpse. But he was blinking, and if Kairah looked close enough, she could see that he was breathing. Relief swept away her mounting dread.

  The idea of Jekaran dying had threatened to break something inside of her. That was confusing. She respected all life, and mourned for its destruction, especially the destruction of intelligent creatures, but this feeling was different. Why was she more concerned for his life than that of other humans? “Is he hurt?” she asked.

  Irvis glanced at Jekaran and shook his head. “Something is wrong to be sure, but it’s an injury to the mind.” Tears leaked from the chubby monk’s eyes which Kairah just noticed were red. “He killed his uncle.”

  Before Kairah could process that, the room shook, and a large piece of stone ceiling crashed down on the staircase below.

  “We need to go!” The short, balding man shouted.

  Kairah nodded, and they all raced down the stairs. Irvis tripped, but was caught by the plump woman who steadied him before giving him quick a peck on the cheek. They left the staircase just in time to avoid another chunk of ceiling.

  It crashed through the marble stairs and sent up a cloud of dust and debris. The thick pillars of ivory colored stone cracked and shook, and one fell across their path like some enormous stone tree. Karak helped Kairah up onto the fallen pillar and over, and then did the same for the rest of the company.

  They continued running, through a large courtyard and past the palace wall. Kairah looked back at the Apeira well rising out of the top of the palace. It no longer glowed purple, and shards sloughed off and fell into the palace below. Kairah had been taught in the College of Disciplines that while you could chip pieces away from an Aeose to create talises, they would regenerate what was taken and so were virtually indestructible. That, apparently, was a falsehood. This well was dying, and something told Kairah that if she couldn’t find some way to stop the monster leeching off it, more would follow.

  Raelen, Gryyth, the girl Maely, and a mixed group of two dozen soldiers and palace servants slowed to a halt. The hall ahead was clogged with chunks of stone, many of them too large for Raelen to move even with his enhanced strength–which he no longer had. His transference band, though still full of Apeiron had suddenly stopped functioning. Something had drained away its charge, and so his strength was now no greater than that of any other soldier. Gryyth might be able to clear away enough of the rubble for them to pass, but with serious burns covering his chest, arms, and neck, he was in no condition to try.

  “Back!” Raelen ordered.

  The group turned to double back when the hall lurched and a green shard of crystal, the size of a house, crashed through the ceiling creating a crystalline wall that cut off their retreat.

  `“No!” Maely cried out.

  “What now, cub?” Gryyth panted.

  Raelen looked about feeling helpless. They were trapped, entombed alive, though that state would change soon enough. There were windows lining the outer wall of the corridor, but they were still on the upper levels of the palace, hundreds of feet from the ground. Raelen moved to one of the windows. Its stained glass panes were gone, leaving behind only tiny shards poking out from a gnarled metal frame. He looked down. They were on the east side of the palace, the window overlooking the royal gardens and the aqueduct!

  It ran underneath the gardens opening at the top to act as a decorative pond. A wall enclosed the garden to keep children and animals from falling into the water, its placid surface concealing a surprising depth and deadly undertow. Raelen glanced back at Gryyth. The bear-man’s blue eyes told Raelen that he’d guessed his thought. He looked back down at the pond. From this height, it would be tricky, but he could manage it. What other choice do we have?

  “We’re going to have to jump.”

 
The servants in the group broke into frightened protests. To their credit, Raelen’s soldiers remained stoic and grim. They understood.

  “It’s our only chance now,” Raelen shouted over the chatter. They fell silent and he made sure to stare into as many of their faces as he could. “We jump, or we die.” He turned, stepped up onto the window sill and drew in a deep breath. “I’ll go first. If I make it, then follow me.”

  “But your highness…” one of his men protested.

  “We can’t let you…” another began.

  Raelen didn’t give them time to stop him. He let go of the frame and launched himself into empty space. The wind whipping his face stole his breath and stung his eyes producing cold tears. His stomach lurched and the roaring of air in his ears felt like it would deafen him. Then he was under water desperately working to swim back up to the surface.

  The undertow caught him, and he was pulled down into the dark pipe that was the aqueduct. He was vaguely aware of more splashdowns, but couldn’t see who it was that had followed him. Raelen’s lungs burned, and he clenched his jaw in an effort to keep his traitorous reflexes from forcing open his mouth to gasp for breath.

  He fought his lungs, lack of oxygen making panic overrule his thinking. He sucked in for a breath but instead inhaled cold water. Raelen’s mind became muddled, and he tried to cough but that only let more water in. He was drowning.

  Someone grabbed him around the middle and began towing him quickly in a direction that might’ve been up, he wasn’t sure. A heartbeat later, he felt cold air sting his face, and he vomited. Water spewed from his nose and mouth as he exploded into a fit of uncontrollable coughing. He was blinded by a combination of cold water and choking spasms. He felt a hand patting his back.

  Gryyth? No, the hand was too small.

  Finally his coughing subsided and he found himself lying on his stomach on wet stone. The girl, Maely, was kneeling next to him. Her short hair was sticking to her face and her servant’s dress was completely soaked.