The First Technomancer (6 page)

“You're from the future?”

Biting her lower lip Kheira said. “Yes, and
no. Time does not work like that for me.”

“Then you're like Blaise – “

“No... I'm not all-knowing, or omnipresent.”
Talking of The One caused her grave uneasiness. “He – It rather, is
altogether a different category of being... “ Unlike very many
organisms, she had been permitted to enter the tabernacle, to
behold The One's third, literal visage. The encounter had nearly
overwhelmed her, and caused Kheira to lose her selfdom “I'm sort of
a test run. Though there are, or shall be many of my kind, none are
like me, at least not yet.”

“Where do you begin?” Asked Merlin.

At which Kheira laughed, leaned in to kiss
his open mouth. “Earth,” she purred. “We began here. A race of
winged beings conceived by my father, and brought to fruition by my
stepmother, who as it turns out is a brilliant scientist.” She
trilled. “I really should tell Nadia that more often. She'd be
skeptical however that I have made love to 'The Merlin' and am
about to help him create his king...” The Lady of the Lake exhaled
in a pleasured sigh. “The thing is, when I've involved myself in
past, or future events, my actions become a fixed point for me. I
cannot undo my own history. As you say, I am the Lady of the Lake
and it is my job to get your king his sword!” She grinned, a halo
of light cast an angelic glow upon her features.

“Purple lightening thunders in the sky,
Stormrider comes.” Kheira sung as she and Merlin walked throughout
the marketplace. It felt good to her to have, if only for a short
time this domestic moment. Picking up an apple she continued her
song to a beat not customary for music of this time period. “In the
hall honey-wine flows, pretty ladies do pour.” She glanced over at
Merlin who proudly stood watch beside her.

Kheira had done her best to make herself not
appear so... preternatural. The humans, they might have accepted a
technomancer with strange markings on his skin, but a winged woman
would have been a bit too much to ask them to deal with. Pointedly
she had never altered her form very far away from what her
terrestrial body had once been, all her concealment’s were in fact
illusions of dress, and hairstyle, not glamors. She did not even
bother to hide the tips of her ears. The Elf girl look did after
all carry a certain sort of power over people. “King keeps watch
and the citadel does brightly glow.” She hummed, selected meat pies
for she and Merlin to share. She'd enjoy eating, her
apotheosisistic body did not require such nourishment.

“What's that song?”

“A favorite of my father's, considered a
grand ballad among my people.”

“Go on, there's a certain... ring to
it.”

Taking his hand, and the sight of the Merlin
in the company of a fetching woman did draw all sorts of glances,
Kheira continued to sing the rock balled. “Unknown to me lays our
fate, dim grows the hour in my eyes.” Truthfully fate among all
things was hardly unknown to her. “Declares the king upon his
throne. Plowshares have been wrought into shining blades.” She
paused for a breath and to look into his eyes. “Worry not, assures
his troubadour. I speak not falsely. All that is to be shall be,
the dice are cast and a Stormrider approaches, he carries with him
fate reborn. From the eastern gorge a howl wakes the beast.”

An odd, and most unexpected reproach arose
from a crowd where villagers had gathered to witness a neighbor’s
troubles, which had suddenly become a public spectacle due to the
struggle involved in the problem at hand.

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your
name. Your kingdom come, your will be done.”

Merlin cast a wary glance at his lover. “The
Bishop does not care for me – ”

“That invocation is not for your sake,
Merlin my love, look there.”

“I know that man. Carec – “

“Yes, but my love look with your other
vision.” Kheira whispered. “Don't you see it?”

The wizard gasped. “A Vril!”

Kheira nodded. Unseeable, but for those with
the right power, a broken winged shadow clung to the human Carec.
All sorts of obscenities spouted from out of its mouth and were
telephoned through the man's voice to be heard by all. The Lord's
Prayer grated on its very substance, causing it to fight harder,
even as it was being compelled to exit the lowly mortal it stole
essence from and on whose back it now clung. From what Merlin and
his lover could tell the fallen Seraph seemed diminished, its inner
light flickered, like an incandescent bulb about to blow out. “A
cast out most likely.”

“Probably,” agreed Merlin, “but its
wounded.”

“The Bishop looks to have the matter in
hand.” Kheira grabbed hold of Merlin as he moved to act. “The
prayer is doing its work. Let the priest exorcise that demon.”

“But I can help.”

“To be a demon slayer is not why you're
here.” Kheira's voice became small, meant for only his ears. “For
what you desire to do, to make here in this land, you cannot afford
to run afoul of the Church. Let them do the work which they were
intended for.” She added. You need the bishop and his priesthood,
because they must legitimize what you create. Your king needs be
anointed by God to rule. Your magic has its place,” she nodded at
the bishop who poured holy water onto Carec. “Demon slaying is his
job.”

Merlin relented. For no other but Kheira
would he have backed down.

They had planned a day to lounge about
Dozmary Pool, neither Kheira, nor Merlin were in a rush to be gone
from each others company. In all the galaxy Kheira had told her
Technomancer, he was perhaps the one being which she could relate
to.

At Dozmary Pool's shoreline they made a
shocking discovery.

“Oh, my God!” Exclaimed Kheira.

“A tree?”

Not just any tree. The geode-seed had grown
into a behemoth, which cast its nacreous trunk and branches,
covered in metallic leafage high into the sky to create a natural
dome with its canopy over the lake. Energy, pulled from the Earth's
core reached for the sky under the great tree's pearl bark. “There
haven't been such trees on this planet since...” She hesitated.
“The Garden of Eden.” Kheira turned to look at her lover, awe in
her dark eyes. “It's a Sefirot Tree, part of the tree of life,
these millennium forests are claimed to hold aloft crystalline Vril
cities afloat in the vault of heaven.” She licked her lips. “This
is a piece of Araboth here on Earth.”

“Look, writing.”

Kheira followed Merlin's gaze to a wall of
Hebrew letters which had been made part of the tree.

“Let he who stands in fellowship, ”Merlin and
Kheira simultaneously read the chivalric code engraved upon the
holy tree. “Pledge his blood, and sacred honor before this mighty
ring. His heart to valor, his blade to defend the helpless, and his
wrath to undo the wicked.”

“Summon your father.” Kheira insisted.

Merlin nodded, quickly he cast a summoning
circle. Iblis Jinn would not like it. The confines of such a
magical device served to only remind him of what sort of limited
being by nature he was, unlike his own sire, Shaitan could only be
in one place at a time.

“How may I be of help Abaddon – “ Confined to
the borders of the circle, not able to cross over the threshold,
Iblis Jinn stared at Kheira. His expression, enough to make it
clear that he understood her to be a different sort of creature.
“You're unusual... ” Kheira's beingness however did not hold his
attention for very long, upward the Lord of Darkness set his gaze
as he realized he stood beneath the canopy of a Sefirot Tree, lower
jaw open in bewilderment. “What is that doing here?” He pointed at
the branches. “The last time any Sefirot grew upon this world, they
were from twelve seeds I gave to the Annunaki to wall the garden
where they fashioned mankind.” To be absolutely clear on the point
Shaitan informed. “All such megafolia are now extinct on this
planet.”

Consumed by the Sefirot puzzlement Iblis Jinn
failed to notice, or pay much mind to Kheira as she moved closer to
his prison of a summoning circle. “It’s also dying.” Shaitan told
his son, he could see it in the roots, which had begun to uproot.
Shimmering leaves fell as if Autumn had arrived. “All that power to
grow, and it will soon wither.”

“A message from Blaise – “

Kheira ripped the hilt from Shaitan's belt,
she lit the lightening-blade. A greenish tinged monofilament raised
above her head.

Iblis Jinn and Merlin turned to look upon her
in astonishment.

“Kheira.” Merlin asked. “What are you
doing?”

Iblis Jinn did not move. Not that he could
have broken the circle, though, nothing prevented the girl from
entering, as she had just proved. The Lady of the Lake easily might
have killed him where he stood nearly immobilized, bound. A blade
such as what Kheira had stolen, among a handful of weapons which
were able to inflict lethal damage upon a Vril. “You're girlfriend
plays at a dangerous game my son. That blade is rightfully
mine.”

“He'd never have surrendered the sword
willingly Merlin.” Kheira assured him. This moment had been written
in history. “Now, I am Ikraan's,” alluring, she smiled. “Excuse me,
Caliburn's appointed guardian.” She glared at Shaitan. “No my Lord
Iblis, I reclaim my father's blade.”

Merlin's brows went up. “Vretil, the holy
register is your father?”

“In a manner of speaking my love.” Backing
toward the lake she explained to Merlin. “And I do love you, never
doubt that. This brief moment, I shall treasure it, use it to gain
strength.” She decided to tell him her secret. “In another time,
another place, I am a prisoner, of an Ancient One, Jajdag-Al-Sul. I
cannot escape that fate, but I can hold onto this memory to see me
through until I am set free.” Kheira promised.
“
We shall be together once more. When the time is
right.” Out onto the water's surface she stepped. “Bring your king
here, if I think him worthy I shall present this blade to him to
rule.” Almost as an afterthought she added. “But if I don't, think
him worthy that is, I shall slay him.”

Blade still lit, Kheira lowered herself into
Dozmary Pool's water, ripples took on an aspect of her otherworldly
glow as her arm, holding the lightening-blade's ornate hilt sunk
below the surface. The sword's illumination distributed light
across the lake like a glass sheet, under-lit by florescent bulbs
and soon faded away.

“Cavorting with none-linear creatures
now?”

“I – ah...” Merlin appeared crestfallen. In
his mind he had already planned a long, happy life together with
Kheira. “Never met anyone like her before.”

Merlin broke the summoning circle.

Shaitan placed a consolatory hand on his
child's shoulder. “You'll see her again. Find your king, and she'll
return to this place.” Iblis gestured at the dying Sefirot Tree.
“That will soon be falling down, oh but does it bring back
memories. They were days of glory! When the worlds were young. My
clutch and I used to fly between limbs like that. We'd learn to
duel on such branches, hide, and strike like lightening!”

One day, while standing nearby Dozmary Pool
lost to his thoughts, Merlin caught sight of a man, a warrior to be
sure by his stocky build, with a ruddy complexion, Roman blood in
his veins no doubt. Brown haired, blue eyed, the newcomer was a
spectacular fellow, filled with a perceptible vitality. He carried
with him a bag of tools, which he dropped at his feet in a clunk
and had set about to hew the lumber of the fallen Sefirot Tree.

That had been twelve days ago, in that time,
a most wonderful thing happened.

Not a throne, or chair of power, the man had
carved a table, round, and to accompany that table, humble barrel
chairs. Incised upon the table, this time in Latin, on its inner
most ring, the chivalric code which had been written in Hebrew upon
the tree.

“A fabulous thing you've created here.”

The woodworker acknowledged the wizard.
“You're the one they call Merlin.”

“I am.”
Here it is
, he thought,
I've worked so hard for this, and here it has come to be
.
While Merlin had been engrossed in the woodworker's twelve day
miracle Vrroch had reported to him that tragedy had befallen
Vortigern. The Supreme Warlord, and all his family had been burned
to death in a massive fire at his castle. The land was without a
ruler. “And you mighty woodworker. What might I call you by?”

“Uther,” said the woodworker. “Uther
Pendragon.”

Merlin grinned. Wild eyed.
Uther
, a
solid name for an upstanding King. He would not need to pull the
sword from the stone, for construction of this table had been
Uther's divine task. Moreover, now it was clear to the wizard that
Uther Pendragon had been appointed by The One to be king over all
Britannia. What else could have been the message of the Sefirot
Tree? “Vortigern is dead Uther Pendragon. It falls to you to bring
the rest of the nobles in line. Go claim your crown.”

“Me?” Uther asked. “I am but a humble
soldier.”

“No, you are king.” Merlin asserted, yet
amended. “Or will be. First you must rein the nobles in. Even now
they quarrel, have begun to combat one another. A strong man can
bring them to his cause. Do this and I shall bestow on you a weapon
unlike any which you've wielded to help unite the kingdom, and heal
the land.”

Pendragon bowed, went to take up his arms,
and to become a king.

[August 5, 1914. Belgium, The Battle Of
Liege]

Here it all collapsed, this was not just
merely a war, mankind had engaged in the slaughter of his fellow
men since almost from the moment they were created. No, this salvo,
this opening engagement of World War I, triggered by a bullet which
had felled Archduke Franz Ferdinand meant something more, a loss of
innocence.