The Lure of Fools

by Jason James King

  Beautiful arches with trailing floral designs, gazebos appearing to have been carved from single blocks of white marble, and multi-tiered fountains abounded within the secret city. But the thing that impressed Tyrus the most were the gardens.

  Flowers and trees of all kinds grew everywhere, making the smooth, white thoroughfare they now traveled a road between floral walls splotched with a rainbow of colors. The flowers weren’t wild or haphazard in their placement, but looked all to be carefully manicured, and deliberately placed. Even the smell of so many flowers, which Tyrus thought might be overwhelming, was perfectly balanced, and each whiff evoked thoughts of springtime and new life. The colors of the different plants and flowers were another wonder; reds, yellows, pinks, purples–and even some bizarre shades of blue, gold, and luminescent green–joined together as though arranged by the skill of a master painter.

  Yes, this is what Heaven would look like.

  The Allosians themselves weren’t as varied in color or appearance as were their paradisiacal gardens. All were tall–Tyrus didn’t think he’d seen any that were under six feet–with perfectly sculpted forms and pale youthful faces. Their jewel-like hair did differ in shades of purple, and even some blue, but other than that, it was difficult to tell one from another. Fortunately, they wore a variety of clothing, most loose-fitting robes, tunics, or dresses of white or purple. Aside from the sentries that now escorted them through the city, Tyrus didn’t see any with shod feet.

  Their little procession drew the attention of every passing Allosian, who stopped and gawked at them even long after they’d passed.

  That’s right, stare at the sideshow of ugly, dirty humans.

  Would it be like this for the rest of his life? Would he be put on display for these fey people to study and stare at? Were he and his companions little more than new acquisitions for some Allosian zoo?

  He wasn’t sure why he was suddenly so bitter toward these people. Perhaps it was envy of their paradise and perfection. Why did they not share these things with the rest of the world? Why leave mankind to struggle in darkness, and poverty? But, then again, he knew the legends. They had tried to help mankind once and were rewarded with being hunted to near extinction as reward for their charity.

  They were led for nearly an hour through the white streets of the city but appeared no closer to its center, and their destination–a glass dome structure built around the base of the Apeira well. Tyrus was surprised when they veered off the main road, and were escorted to a gazebo set at the top of a long flight of marble stairs. The captain of the sentries motioned for Kairah to climb the stairs, but when Tyrus tried to follow, one of the sentries placed a hand firmly on his shoulder to stop him. He glanced at Kairah and then back at the sentry captain.

  “I must insist that the council hall be off limits to your guests,” the sentry said. “It would not do to bring humans into a place where even most Allosians are not allowed.”

  Kairah turned and took a step back down. “I told you, the synod needs to hear their testimonies.”

  “And they will,” the sentry replied. “But by way of an echo stone. I will take them to a comfortable place to wait and interview them personally.”

  Kairah nodded and then turned to resume climbing the stairs. When she reached the top, she stepped into the gazebo and was surrounded by a flash of bright purple light. When the light faded, the Allosian woman was gone.

  “Slipgate,” the short, fat woman, Graelle, whispered from behind.

  The example of unmatched talis-craft that the ancient Allosians, and humans, once used to instantaneously travel from city to city was a rarity in Shaelar. The king had one which Tyrus had used a few times, but only with great solemnity and under a contingent of guards. But in Allose they were used like simple garden gates. Ironically, it was the least impressive thing about the fey city.

  He glanced at the sentry, and the man narrowed his eyes. Rasheera send that the legends of Allosian pacifism are true. Suddenly the urge to urinate renewed and pressed on his groin with terrible urgency.

  “I need to piss,” he blurted out.

  Kairah stepped down from the dais of the companion slipgate and shrugged off the brown robe the man Irvis had lent her. It was coarse, had a few holes in it, and it smelled offensive. Kairah would not address the wisest leaders of her people in such garb. She strode forward, clad only in her short, sleeveless shift, but the immodesty of the garment barely troubled her. She was with her people again, and they were not like the humans. Their passions would only be stirred if they deliberately stirred them. None would be aroused even if Kairah should walk into the synod completely naked.

  That was a marked difference between her race and the other inhabitants of Shaelar. Allosian breeding was a careful, planned, and official process. Mates were chosen based on their strengths and traits, and then reported to the College of Disciplines for preparation, finally performing the act while being monitored to ensure conception. Even her parents, though mated for life, never undertook physical intimacy outside of the strict Allosian breeding protocol. No passion, no spontaneity, just cold, deliberate eugenics.

  That’s boring, Aeva said.

  And you would have us pattern our procreation after the reckless violent practices of humans? They rape and kill because they cannot control their passions.

  It isn’t always like that, Aeva said.

  Kairah scoffed. Most humans–primarily men–had significant trouble controlling their urges, particularly in the realm of sex. Kairah had faced such men when she first left Allose.

  They would have done the same thing to me as they did to my mother.

  An explosion of raw, hateful rage flared to life inside her chest. She clenched her jaw and for an infinitesimal moment, she wanted to lash out with her magic–kill the humans who wanted to rape her by immolating them with a column of fire as hot as her hate. Another residual effect of my channeling Moriora. She drew in several steadying breaths.

  Jekaran isn’t like that, Aeva said.

  Kairah stopped walking. Aeva was right. Jekaran was an anomaly–a human who wasn’t completely driven by lust or selfishness. He’d come to her rescue when those men tried to take her. She had been a stranger to him, but he risked his life to save her, even though she actually hadn’t needed saving. And that hadn’t been the only time. He’d fought to protect her in Imaris, and then slaughtered hundreds of human soldiers trying to bar his way to rescue her when she was an unconscious captive in Taris.

  And yet, though tainted, he still chooses life, Aeva said. He is still good.

  “What?” Kairah answered Aeva aloud.

  He has Moriora in his blood.

  “Aeva, how can you possibly know that?”

  His eyes are green.

  “Lady Kairah?”

  Kairah glanced toward the voice and found a white-robed Allosian man approaching her. Behind him was a colossal domed building, at least a thousand feet tall, made entirely of colored glass. As large as the building was, it was nothing compared to the crystal obelisk that rose out of the dome’s center–the Mother Shard. The glowing crystalline formation had a circumference measured in miles, and its distant peak disappeared in the clouds above.

  Kairah nodded to the chamberlain. “The synod received my message?”

  The man scrutinized her state of undress, but with a neutral look, not one of lust as she’d so often received from human males. “Yes,” he finally said.

  “And they will see me?”

  The chamberlain flashed a smile. “You were successful in arresting their attention, my lady.”

  Kairah nodded, and strode toward the dome building and its open arched doorway. She stopped when the chamberlain said, “Might I fetch you a dress before we enter the council chamber, Lady Kairah?”

  “This cannot wait,” she said, and then continued forward.

  Aeva giggled, but Kairah was too disturbed by what the Spirit lily had said about Jekaran to appreciate the flower’s childish humor
.

  Jekaran has Moriora in his blood.

  Something was different about Aeva. The Spirit lily had been acting strange ever since the day Kairah first left Allose. She had knowledge of things she shouldn’t, and often spoke with wisdom that eclipsed that of any ancient sage. A quick sifting through Kairah’s memories brought back more odd encounters with her sentient flower, though they’d been far less frequent over the last eight decades.

  One particular memory stood out; the time Jenoc had brought her back to Allose from the village where her parents were murdered. After being healed and tended to, she found herself alone in her garden with Aeva. That’s when she’d believed the flower was channeling the spirit of her dead mother, and so gave it her mother’s name. Why had she thought the Spirit lily was her mother?

  Because she had said it was, Kairah suddenly remembered.

  She’d been sobbing and inconsolable when the gentle touch of the Spirit lily’s mind reached out to her. Kairah remembered the warmth and comfort Aeva had radiated, and asked the flower what its name was.

  No, she shook her head, I asked, “Who are you?”

  The Spirit lily had responded, ‘I am your mother’, after which Kairah began to call it Aeva–her mother’s name.

  Aeva! Kairah called. Aeva were you listening to my thoughts?

  Silence.

  Aeva! Why did you tell me you were my mother?

  “Lady Kairah, student of the College of Disciplines, and descended daughter of the Oracle Jatyra,” the chamberlain announced.

  The next thing Kairah knew, she was standing in the center of a titanic coliseum-like amphitheater with hundreds of faces peering down at her from circular tiers of seating. Standing at an ivory podium twenty feet above the coliseum floor was the synod’s Speaker.

  Kannic was his name, and he was one of the oldest living Allosians in Shaelar–a man well into his fourth century by all accounts. Though, as was typical with Kairah’s people, he looked to be a man in his late twenties, handsome, and in perfect physical condition.

  “The synod recognizes Lady Kairah, and anxiously requests her to elaborate on her most unusual message.”

  Suddenly Kairah’s state of undress began to bother her. I have been spending too much time with humans, she thought.

  She slowly turned about, glancing around the massive coliseum at the hundreds of members of the Allosian synod. She opened her mouth but stalled when she caught sight of a woman standing at the very top of the tiered seating. Unlike the other Allosian women in the chamber, she had her head shaved and wore flowing robes of deep green. She wore rings on every one of her fingers, and multiple earrings running up the edge of her ears–all talises?

  It was Allose’s chief Oracle, Shivara.

  Though descended from oracular heritage herself, Kairah had never met the mysterious woman. She, of course, had a permanent seat among the synod, but rarely attended. She was as old as Kannic, if not older, and was something of a recluse; preferring to stay in her tower dealing with the outside world through the handful of apprentice oracles who served her. Kairah herself planned one day to apprentice with the woman for a century or so to draw out her power. Now that wasn’t necessary–not that Kairah had any idea how to invoke or direct her gift for seeing fate.

  As she stared up at Shivara, their eyes met, and for a moment it was if the two of them were the only souls in the entire chamber.

  What have you seen, child? An unfamiliar woman’s voice asked her telepathically.

  “Lady Kairah,” Kannic prodded.

  Kairah shook herself from the trance, and turned back to face Kannic. “Six days ago the Aeose at Taris, the place the humans now call Aiested, went dark and shattered into discolored shards.”

  A round of gasps, followed by a low murmur of comments bounced around the chamber. Kairah paused only a moment to relish the effect of her announcement before continuing, “Doubtless you perceived the psychic wave its destruction produced?”

  “It was as loud as thunder,” one of the council members said.

  “And as bright as an exploding star,” another added.

  “You are witness to this?” Kannic asked.

  Kairah nodded. “Myself, and thousands of humans, four of whom I have brought with me.” She thought she caught some scandalized huffs from several members of the synod. “They, along with a Vorakk witness, are giving statements to the captain of the peacekeeper patrol that escorted us into the city; statements that will corroborate my claim.”

  “How did this happen?” a woman called out. “Nothing can destroy an Aeose.”

  “The other magic can.” Instead of the cacophony of questions and challenges Kairah expected to erupt at her revelation, the entire synod fell silent. It was unnerving.

  “The other magic is a myth,” Kannic said. “There is no power but Apeiron.”

  “My brother believed in it. You are all aware of his views in regards to humanity and its right to exist in Shaelar. Well, Jenoc tried to summon the other magic to use as a weapon to purge humanity from our land. But something went wrong, and a monster was created; a human vessel that wields Moriora like we can wield Apeiron.”

  “Moriora?” one of the council members asked.

  Kairah turned toward the voice. She wasn’t sure who’d asked the question because the voice sounded like it could’ve belonged to either a male or female. “It is the name of the other magic.”

  “This is absurd!” another member of the synod shouted.

  Kairah turned to face that voice, this time definitely a male. “I have seen it. I fought it in Taris, but it overcame me, and then destroyed the Apeira well.”

  “What do you mean you fought it?” Kannic demanded.

  “I cast several spells from The Second Discipline at the creature, but it either absorbed them or stole the life-force of nearby humans to heal itself. I only escaped by the aid of a Vorakk shaman. For some reason, Moriora’s vessel couldn’t absorb the shaman’s magic.”

  “Vorakk do not have magic,” a woman from the third seating tier called out. She had amethyst hair so light that it looked almost pink. “They are little more than animals–barely even sentient.”

  Kairah ground her teeth. Had she ever been as deliberately ignorant as this woman? Hot anger blossomed in her chest, and she wrestled it back into submission before daring to answer the woman’s challenge.

  “I have also witnessed the use of the Vorakk power. As I said, it saved my life.”

  “How did this Moriora vessel destroy Taris’s Aeose?” Kannic cut in, effectively preempting the brewing argument.

  “It attached itself to the Apeira well and fed on the Apeiron inside. After that, the Aeose shattered, raining down enormous shards that had turned an emerald color onto the palace.” Kairah continued to glare at the pink haired woman.

  “The palace was destroyed?”

  “Utterly.”

  “And did you see the vessel leave the palace?” Kannic asked.

  Kairah shifted her gaze back to the Speaker. “I did not.”

  Kannic exhaled and nodded. “Such a thing would have killed an Allosian. If the legends and what you tell us is true, and if the other magic is the opposite of Apeiron as you claim, it would stand to reason that this creature would be of comparable durability to one of us. Therefore, would it not be safe to assume that it died in the destruction of the Taris palace?”

  Kairah’s heart started to race. “Speaker Kannic, I do not think it safe to assume anything about―”

  “You said it could be hurt, did you not?”

  “Well, yes, but―”

  “If the palace collapsed on it, and you did not see it reemerge, then it must have been killed.”

  The synod’s orderly quiet shattered into hundreds of overlapping comments and conversations, which for the most part, sounded as though they sustained Kannic’s theory.

  What! This hadn’t been the reaction Kairah expected and she began to panic. “A darkness now covers Taris!”

>   Kannic touched a glass globe fixed to the top of his podium, and a deep gong echoed throughout the chamber signaling for the assembly to fall silent.

  “What is this you say, Lady Kairah?”

  “Clouds of impenetrable black rain down emerald-colored lightning onto the city and any who venture there. This lightning has the same life withering effect as the power wielded by Moriora’s vessel. And when I attempted to scry the area, I saw only a void.”

  “Perhaps a residual effect?” a baritone voice put forth.

  “Apeiron does not linger outside of an Aeose,” someone else argued.

  “Absolutely fascinating,” another said.

  How could her people not see the danger? How could they be so ready to dismiss this threat as though it were an academic experiment, the consequences of which were but subjects for study? She’d heard the creature when it crossed from the material world to the ethereal sphere, and it had been laughing, not dying.

  They choose blindness, Aeva sent.

  “There is no question…” Kannic said in a loud voice, and the synod fell quiet once more. “…that the matter requires further investigation.” He looked down at Kairah. “We shall make it a priority to dispatch an expedition of scholars and peacekeepers to study this phenomenon.”

  Murmurs again cascaded throughout the assembly.

  They covered their crime, Aeva said.

  “But now, Lady Kairah, the council must ask you to divulge the whereabouts of your brother. He has missed several days of teaching at the College of Disciplines. If what you say is accurate about his experiments with the other magic, then he will need to be brought before this body for interrogation and judgment.”

  Jenoc’s angry, burned face flashed before Kairah’s mind. You are as dead to me as father and mother, his voice echoed in her memory. Thus far, she’d made a deliberate effort not to think about Jenoc, because the pain of his betrayal was almost more than she could bear.

  It is I who betrayed him. Kairah had seen the incredulous hurt in her brother’s remaining eye after she’d attacked him on top of the palace in Aiested.