The Dreamer Stones (74 page)

His palms were
a curious blend of darkling and human skin. Torrullin glanced at
them and then spread his hands in similar fashion. “Then why don’t
you give it a go; I swear to stand here.”

Their eyes
locked, and then, “You’re a true Immortal, Elixir. Why would I be
that stupid?”

Torrullin
studied the creature’s facial blending. “Why are you here,
Agnimus?”

“You made us.
I thought it was time to introduce ourselves.”

“Too
simplistic, Mor Feru.”

“Ah, so you
know.” Agnimus chuckled. “You seek the complicated answer?”

Torrullin
grinned. “It engages the mind.”

Agnimus swept
a bow. “Your mind I am able to respect. Where shall I begin?”

“Let me see.
You escaped the cleansing of the symbiots, you landed up in the
region of that filthy castle and found there a few darklings. A
plan formed and you gathered other stragglers to you. Then Tymall
came. Now this.”

A wry gesture.
“Elixir sees!”

“Guesswork,
actually.”

“Very good,
but one or two points require expanding. The plan formed was too
localised to have long-term impetus. Sustaining it was the greatest
issue. Darklings are short-sighted and have a ridiculously low
attention span. You see, by sheer coincidence, blind fate, I was
around when the Warlock made his exit from Digilan.”

“I don’t
believe in coincidence.”

Agnimus
grinned. “Neither do I. I investigated rumours of foul play and was
then at the right place almost at the right time … or perhaps,
looking at it from another point of view, at exactly the most
auspicious time. The Warlock opened a portal, but in his initial
confusion, he overlooked the closing. While he silenced witnesses,
I came wandering by.”

“You convinced
the draithen of Digilan to your cause in a day, an hour, whatever
it was?” Torrullin laughed. “Please!”

“They are Mor
Feru there, Elixir, and I had about ten minutes.”

“Then I envy
you your powers of persuasion.”

Agnimus
smiled. “Ah, but herein lies the beauty. I didn’t persuade them of
anything. They knew Tymall and they crowded behind him as he left.
They saw where he went and they suspected why. They already had
hate long nurtured, and they had multiplied significantly. In a
mere ten minutes I swore to ally myself to the Warlock and I
promised to open a new doorway once I knew the timing was right.
That was enough.”

Torrullin
pondered. “Three things come to mind.”

“Ask away,
Elixir.”

“One, you say
they crowded behind Tymall. He claims not to know of them, other
than in passing.”

“He didn’t
lie. They knew him, I said. I didn’t say he knew them.”

“Crowded
behind him? That’s unmistakable.”

“Not in
Digilan.”

“Ah, point
taken. Then, two, you managed to come forth with this elaborate
strategy, going on to implement it, in a few months? Tymall planned
long, even Mor Feru plan long, if only in hope.”

“Hope doesn’t
feature, but I take your point. The plan was already in place. All
I needed was an encompassing cover - your son - and I required an
army. I had almost given up on the darklings until the Warlock lit
real fire under them. Unfortunately, they answered to him more and
more and, even more unfortunately, he expended them before the time
was right. Thus, the draithen. Well, I knew I’d use them the moment
I saw them.”

“And thus you
found a way to open a portal yourself.”

“Is that your
third clarification?”

“It is.”

“You wonder
how I found the way swiftly, of course.” Agnimus laughed,
cock-sure. “I already knew!”

“And thus was
your promise to the Mor Feru not rashly made, I see. And, in
releasing them, being one of them, one with greater intelligence
and insight, they in turn promised to follow you. Clever.”

“With an added
qualification.”

“The Warlock
cloak and staff.”

Agnimus bowed.
“The whole picture.”

“No, that is
half.”

Agnimus
frowned. “What else is there?”

“You.”

“My tale?”

“Indeed. The
way I see it, in many ways you were favourable enhanced in the
symbiosis, whether from a darkling or soltakin perspective.
Sentience was gifted form and form was given much more. Why,
therefore, this vendetta?”

Agnimus was
fixed in his expression. “You have no idea how painful it was. All
of it. First the wrenching of a soul from a dying body, followed by
eons of captivity, learning the real meaning of hate, the
unquenchable thirst for freedom, loving the darkness after a time,
despising the light in all its manifold guises. Hating the one who
captured and imprisoned you, yet hating the light more. Then,
release, only it wasn’t freedom. Bound to the one who captured you,
and you could not sever the link … you had no form! All you had was
hate.”

He drew breath
and continued. “Then came melding with a darkling, but not any
darkling, and suddenly form was terrible pain. How it hurt to be
absorbed into a vessel, especially one alien to me, and then I knew
what he was and the awful journey he made over aeons also, a time
far longer than my soul suffered in the dark. Yet we were one and
sentience rules - thus I took on his revenge also. We are now one
in every way. Vendetta, Elixir, is not even close to what this
is.”

Torrullin
inclined his head. “No.”

“Then you
understand.”

“No.”

“How can you
not? You, the one who knows what Tymall is?”

“Why take it
out on me? I did not make you into this.”

Agnimus gave a
lazy smile. Not a pretty sight. “It’s quite simple, really. You are
Vallorin, Enchanter, Dragon and now Elixir. The One. Add to that
Destroyer and I have every reason to target you.”

“Because I am
a threat?”

“That would be
part of it.”

“Enlighten
me.”

“It would be
my pleasure.”

Agnimus
sketched a bow that almost put Torrullin’s back up, but he managed
to bite down rising impatience.

“The Darak Or
allied with you and were the other alive, he would ally with you.
Translated, both evil and good bow before you. You are the master,
therefore you are the maker. Simple.”

Torrullin held
still. There was some truth in that, although the draithen had not
seen it. The creature lashed-out at what he perceived as the
greatest power - therein lay proof of vengeance - but no more than
that. Elixir, however, was, is and will be. It meant Elixir could
have created this creature in some contrary and twisted way upon
the wheel of time.

“Nothing to
say?” Agnimus taunted.

Torrullin
shrugged. “It would not pay me to point out holes in your
reasoning.”

“I know you,
Elixir, and I have at my disposal the Warlock tools. Do not presume
to regard yourself as my better.”

Torrullin
crossed his arms, bringing a finger up to stroke his chin. “I
wonder whether you would be this cocksure without those.”

The finger
gestured at the cloak and then the staff leaning against the wall
to the right. His finger returned to his chin. There was a glint in
his eyes.

Agnimus
glanced at the staff. “Are you suggesting my power lies in mere
accruements? Let me put it thus; they help with my little army. The
Mor Feru worship the Warlock symbols.”

“You do not
need them?”

It was a taunt
and Agnimus was well aware of it. He smiled. “I know you’re here to
retrieve them for Tymall.”

“Why would I
return them to my son?”

“Because you
are able to control him. The same cannot be said for me.”

“Control
Tymall? You think?”

“I know.”

“How?”

“He is not as
irretrievable as he projects.”

A lurch in a
father’s heart. “Control is more than that, Agnimus.”

“Granted.
Whatever you do or do not do with that foul-mouthed son of yours,
however, is not of my concern. Know only I won’t hand over cloak
and staff to prove I don’t need them.”

“I think
perhaps you have to prove it to yourself.” Torrullin was
unperturbed.

“I know who I
am.”

Torrullin
raised his brows. The opening he waited for. “I wonder,
draithen.”

His arms
dropped and his right arm reversed to point at the staff. An
instant later, his fingers curled about it. He could feel the
vibration within, as if things dared him to use it. He clamped the
notion down, for he did not intend to wield it. Casually he glanced
at it, and then lifted eyes to Agnimus’s unreadable features.

“It does have
power.” He sounded surprised, but it was pretence, a new taunt.

The draithen’s
eyes hooded and then his fingers came up to busy themselves at his
neck. A number of seconds ticked by in silence and then he swung
the astrological cloak from his shoulders and held it out.

“This is what
you came for. Take it.” Proof then, and it was to himself.

“Thank you,”
Torrullin said, and gripped the cloth with his left hand.

The scene
froze. A moment so new and unexpected, it came to a halt, so that
ever after it could be appreciated for what it wrought.

A tableau. An
eerie creature, humanoid, with his right hand extended. A
fair-haired man in his prime, with his left hand extended. Between
them, the cloak of arcane symbols of astrology.

They did not
touch physically, but the intrinsic magic in the ancient material
connected them as if they indeed were. As if they cleaved skin to
skin from head to toe.

The scene
unfroze as a huge blue flame enveloped the cloak, searing hot, with
the sound of a blaze out of control.

Both snatched
hands away and the material fluttered to the floor. There it
writhed and burned like a thing alive and then simply vanished.
Both stared at it, and when it had gone, turned those same eyes on
each other.

Torrullin
cursed aloud. His right hand was burning! He opened his fingers in
reflex as the staff similarly erupted into blue flame … and
vanished.

A lengthy
silence ensued. Deep as the pits of uncertainty.

“Well, I
didn’t really care for them.” Agnimus’s voice was strained.

Torrullin
inhaled and released. “That was the disintegration of power, where
two equal talents of opposite ideals connect to nullify the
instrument of connection.”

“Strange,
though, for you are not wholly the Light, Elixir.”

Torrullin’s
silvery eyes bored into the draithen’s two different orbs. “Which
can only mean you are not wholly in the Dark.” He stepped closer.
“The disintegration we experienced is Valla, Agnimus. Not Valleur -
Valla
. Are you aware of that?”

Agnimus
stepped back. “Impossible.”

Torrullin
shrugged and moved away. Pacing the dust, he said, “The Q’lin’la
long speculated Nemisin formed the darklings. He was …”

“I know. First
Vallorin.”

“First
Vallorin and first Enchanter. A man of extraordinary power, and
alone with it. The Q’lin’la were already hidden, the Dragon Neolone
…”

“In symbiosis
with him. His duality came from that.”

“Right.
Therefore Enchanter, therefore alone. Tell me, did Tymall tell you?
Or did you read it somewhere during your years of research?”

The draithen
discovered those silver eyes had speared him again. He frowned,
finding he was unable to dissemble. “I just know.”

Torrullin
sighed. “Only Vallas can
just know
.”

Agnimus’s gaze
hurtled downward and he stared at the space where the cloak had
burned away into the ether. “Kinfire?”

“Trebac.
Yes.”

“How?”

“You carry
part of Nemisin.”

“No.”

“Yes. You feel
it now.”

“No, he only
made it possible. He created vengeful sprites, yes, but the Drinic
made us tangible.”

Drinic.
Doorway seekers. Torrullin shivered as it fell into place.

“One Drinic,”
Agnimus went on, “is regarded as the true father of darklings. His
name was Ocil, he fathered us by gathering together the floating
spirits and miasmas.”

“He didn’t
create from nothing. He gathered together floating spirits and
miasmas, did he? Created by Nemisin.”

Silence.

“How did Ocil
manage to give form to miasma?”

“The arcane
symbols they used in seeking the shift to the Afterlife. More than
that I do not know.”

“How many were
formed before you?”

Agnimus was
silent and then, “I was the first success.”

Torrullin
pinched his nose. “Not just any darkling, you said. Now I see why.
It hurt to shift from floating spirit, without sentience, into what
was then an experimental form. You could feel the pain …”

“Agony,”
Agnimus snapped, “such as you can never imagine.”

“You could
feel, yet could not reason out why. How terrible.”

“How
compassionate you are, Elixir.” A sarcastic snarl. “Aeons went by,
as darkling, on the darak path, doing the things we darklings do,
but without ever understanding the why or even fathoming gain,
reward, pleasure. We just were.”

Torrullin had
a hand raised. “I hear that - now hear this. The Drinic were not
sorcerers, they were Afterlife fanatics. An exception, possibly,
was your Ocil. He dabbled and then became addicted to the game. We
both understand how that is. Yet I put to you, he was a novice and
ignorant of the great feats. He stumbled into something and became
entranced. It has happened, dabbling giving rise to something
unique. Ocil failed at first, yet could not let failure lie. What,
I ask, did he need to make it work? He had method, what was
missing?”

“How do you
know he failed?”

“If you are
the first success, there was failure. What was missing,
Agnimus?”

A sigh. “He
needed a spirit with sufficient recognition of the gift to follow.
He needed a spirit that desired success from him, and saw new
possibilities.”