Wielder of the Flame (24 page)

The sun was low on the horizon,
casting an array of yellow and orange light across the ocean’s vast expanse,
signaling the end of the day, Kolima, however, did not quiet in the least bit.

The Gathering was still in full swing, music, dancing, magic
demonstrations, and especially the contest.

Marc, Zildjin and Sesuadra had been in the thick of the
festivities since they had awoken that morning and were about ready to head
back to the Magic Emporium, and call it a day. Marc was drinking something
sweet and tart from a mug, watching one of the many street corner magic shows.
A dark skinned sorcerer was performing elemental tricks, summoning a ball of
water, turning it to ice, melting it with a ball of fire from his other hand,
and making it all disappear with a wisp of smoke. The show was visually
interesting, but Marc put his hand up to stifle a yawn, the day’s excitement was
finally catching up to him. Sesuadra was buying a piece of roasted meat from a
nearby vendor and Zildjin’s gaze was set on two beautiful young women passing
through the crowd.

“That was nice, was it not?” Zildjin, his eyes following the
swish of the two girls’ dresses until they disappeared into the masses, said,
nudging Marc.

Zildjin had to raise his voice over the din of the
merriment.

“The show’s not over yet, but yeah, impressive I suppose,”
Marc replied, having missed what Zildjin was referring to entirely. His voice
was equally loud.

Sesuadra came over, already half finished with his leg of
meat, “Misplace something in the crowd?” he said to Zildjin.

“Huh? Mmm, something like that,” Zildjin gave up trying to
find the girls he had seen and turned his attention back to his comrades.

Marc yawned again, not holding back this time. Zildjin
followed suite, and even Sesuadra had to yawn though his mouth was full.

“Yeah, Marc said, “I’m about ready for a good night’s rest,
lets head back.”

“Agreed,” Sesuadra nodded.

“Eleanor will probably start to worry otherwise,” Zildjin
added.

As they did so the sun finally dipped behind the horizon and
the darkness of the night blanketed itself over the city with surprising
quickness. Torchlight, both natural and magical, appeared throughout the
streets in reply, brighter in the more largely crowded areas and darkest in the
small vacant alleys.

The stars in the night sky were beginning to vanish as dark
clouds began to form high above, storm clouds.

Suddenly the three friends turned at a scream in the
distance.

And then there was an explosion of magical violet fire.

The hot wind blew across the top of
the wall and around the towers of the fortress.

The red banners on the tower roofs whipped gallantly in the
breeze, fiercely displaying their colors across the deep blue sky, like
splashes of freshly spilt blood. The larger banners displayed the Terragurion
emblem, a fully armored knight of black and silver standing tall and proud, his
two arms gripped firmly to the pommel of a giant sword pointed downwards in
front of him, a kite shield with a diamond pattern lay behind the knight, and
the complete crest was surrounded by vines of thorns and crimson flowers, a
crown of thorns atop the knight’s helmet. The other banners displayed the local
city insignias in their various forms.

In the valley below lay the city of Rothk, but mostly
everyone called it Rockhollow. The stronghold where Krynn Brellek resided to
look over his lands, was built into the nearby mountain, a great network of
tunnels led to the other side of the valley where a second, though smaller
castle also overlooked the valley. The two castles made for an extremely effective
defense strategy, as a result Rockhollow had not been overrun in hundreds of
cycles.

In the main tower of the first castle was a large room with
a tall dome ceiling. The tower was the head office of the Bloodcloaks of
Rockhollow, and the main residence of Iadar, Grand Commander, and his loyal
compatriot and brother in arms, Mordan, second in command. Iadar’s reputation
for merciless adherence to the regulations both from the original founding of
the Bloodcloaks and the new rules set forth by the Krynn of Rothk, had given
him the name of
Stoneheart
, though not a single soldier in his right
mind would ever say it in his presence. The room was decorated in an
imperialistic fashion with large painted portraits of legendary Bloodcloak
legionnaires standing in full dress hanging in gold frames along the walls, and
all the dark wood furniture was swathed in red velvet filled neatly in parallel
places along the floor. There were two large desks, one wider than the other,
chairs lined up against two walls, and large shelves of books, canvases, and
scrolls. The desk tops were neatly organized with piles of parchment stacked
carefully in rows to one side with inkwells and feather quill pens on the
other. The dark marble floor, taken from the nearby mountain itself, had
recently been polished, as it regularly was, and reflected everything nicely.

The man they called Stoneheart sighed heavily and leaned
back in his chair behind the large desk where he worked most of the time now.
He and Mordan had been born and raised Bloodcloaks, they believed in the Noble
Kingdom and swore with their lives to protect its ways. Back in the day of the
Marauders war, Iadar had led a strong force of powerful, trained, soldiers into
battle. But that was many cycles ago. Now all they did was sit in their office
mostly seeing to the bureaucratic nonsense that only old men could attend to.
Iadar was a big man, heavily muscled for his age. His uniform was similar to
the apparel worn by all Bloodcloaks, except his tunic was emblazoned with a sword,
shield, glove, and helm, signifying his superior rank. His carefully cared for
big dark beard only had streaks of grey and white at the side, showing he had
not given up the fight against time just yet.

The other man, Mordan, just five cycles younger, was
similarly dressed, though his tunic did not have the helm in the symbol. Mordan
was second in command, and back in the Marauder Wars, had loyally fought side
by side with his captain and friend, Iadar. It was in those same battles in
which Mordan had lost his right eye, over which he now wore a dark red eye
patch, and Iadar had been wounded in his shield arm.

The room was usually busy with soldiers bringing in reports
and following up on archival duties but the day had been mostly quiet and dull.
It was just him and Mordan in the main headquarters that day.

It was why they both looked up in surprise as the double
doors leading into the room burst open suddenly. A soldier entered the room, a
low ranking footsoldier by the lack of symbol on his chest. The assistant, a
short woman clothed all in dark muted robes, looked terrified and very
apologetic at the sudden entrance of the stranger. He was dirty and travel
worn. But he did not hesitate to cross the newly polished floor.

“What is the meaning of this?” Iadar stood up from his desk,
outraged at the lack of courtesy shown. There was a specific order to seeing
them in the headquarters. The chief assistant was supposed to quietly knock and
wait for approval before opening the door. Instead she had allowed this soldier
to come straight in.

“Officers, forgive the intrusion, but I have a message which
cannot wait.” The man said.

The assistant bowed her head apologetically and closed the
doors quietly, separating her from them.

Iadar pushed the chair away from the desk and strode towards
the moving soldier, meeting him halfway in the room. Mordan was still standing
by his desk until Iadar waved him over.

Stoneheart glared at the young man, ready to make the kids
life miserable for as long as his breaking of protocol would allow. Inside,
Iadar was happy to finally let off some steam through discipline and
punishment.

“How dare you,” Iadar began, “who gave the order to come
bursting into headquarters with a message like this?”

The young man looked scared but was struggling to hide it.

“You did, sir, both of you did.”

The footsoldier held the sealed parchment before him as if
it was the only thing separating him from physical harm.

Iadar snatched it from his shaking hand.

He glanced down at the seal, an official mark of the Bloodcloaks
lay there, and broke it.

“What nonsense do you speak?” Mordan had finally reached
them, and glared at the young man.

“It is written in the official assignments under your
command,” The soldier stammered, “Any message containing information about—”

Iadar rose his hand to silence the soldier. Then Mordan
shook his head to command the footsoldier to leave. The young man gave a bow
and strode quickly out of the room, closing the doors behind him.

A look between anger and pleasure came over Iadar’s face.

He handed the parchment to Mordan, having already read it.

“Alert the others,” Iadar told his friend.

Mordan only needed to glance at the parchment to know what
to do.

They could finally begin the search again.

He
had resurfaced.

Kilik Dualis.

Laura felt herself hurtling through,
what is it, air?

Something.

Then she landed with a thud against hard dirt and grass.

Her breath escaped upon impact, leaving her gasping for air.

She struggled for a moment, trying to draw breath. She
blinked and clawed at the air around her, fighting off the monsters who were
trying to eat her,
who had eaten Carlata.

The dark was all around her, oppressive, overwhelming.

She finally found air and filled her lungs with it.

Rushing water sounded somewhere nearby.

She stood, wheezing, forcing, and pulling the air into her
lungs.

She stumbled in the dark, trying to steady herself.

Suddenly she felt the floor beneath her give way, she heard
the sound of falling rocks all around her.

Her body tumbled against dirt and stone, downward on a steep
slope.

She grabbed at the darkness around her finding nothing solid
to stop her fall.

Something, a tree branch, tore at her robes, ripping off her
mantel and part of her right sleeve.

Then she hit her head and her body stopped, motionless on
hard earth.

A slowly bobbing light flittered
before her, waking her.

It was a gentle light, soothing, comforting.

She began to stir.

She felt something heavy on top of her, rough, the bark of a
tree, a tree branch.

So heavy.

Something moved and the weight lifted off of her. As the
weight lifted, the light around her increased tremendously and she lifted her
arm to shield her, shying away from the brightness.

She slowly opened her eyes.

She lay on a small rocky cliff ledge. The ground was far
below her, mind numbingly far. She was not afraid of heights but the fear of
her situation overtook her for a moment.

She scrambled backwards until she was as far away from the
ledge as she could be.

It was daytime, early morning by the position of the sun.

She looked around. The cliff she was on overlooked a
partially wooded valley surrounded on three sides by mountains. Near the edge
of the valley were two smaller mountains shaped like long thin pillars
thrusting upwards towards the sky.

A city was built into the two pillars with massive bridges
linking both mountains together. A large structure was formed into the middle
of the mass of bridges, like a third small city in the space separating the
mountains. A river came through the empty space between the two mountains as
well, tumbling down into an incredible, voluminous waterfall, down into the
valley below.

She had heard of this place, the ruins of Zheund.

It was a breathtaking sight if not for her circumstances.

Her head hurt and her stomach grumbled. She felt her head
and felt dried and crusted blood there. A sharp pain shocked her at the touch
of the wound. How long had she been out?

Her hands were shaking. She clasped them together but she
couldn’t make them stop. Her heart was pounding in her ears. She closed her
eyes to try and slow her breathing, but the faces of the
sickly-pus-filled-sore-ridden-people trying to eat her flashed through her
mind.

She opened her eyes again.

How did I get here?

She did not know where the ruins of Zheund were exactly, but
what she remembered it was somewhere deep in the Wildlands.

She sat for a long time, thinking, trying to calm herself.

She thought of the grass dolls she practiced moving with her
mind and she quickly realized.

I moved myself!

She didn’t know how she did it exactly, but she had escaped.
She had thought desperately that she needed to get out, to get somewhere safe,
and just before she thought she was going to die, she did just that.

I escaped! I can not only move objects, but I can move
myself!

She looked around,
so much for escaping.
She chided
herself. She would have to work more on her power so something like this
wouldn’t happen again.

She looked up at where she had fallen. She remembered stumbling
in the dark and falling. If she would have moved any further, she would not be
alive.

She tried to climb up the rock but to no avail.

She sat down and wanted to cry. Doyenne Carlata being
dragged through the door flashed through her mind, and her screams, she could
still hear her screams.

Stop it!
She told herself,
This is not going to
get you anywhere, you have to think, you have to do something!

She crawled to the edge and peeked over.

It was an impossible climb down.

She sighed.

Then she changed her line of thinking.

Not impossible for me.

She looked down and visualized herself there.

She closed her eyes and thought
take me there, I am
there, I am down there right now, I am moving, I am walking, I am THERE!

She opened her eyes, nothing.

She closed them and tried again. Her stomach growled and her
head was pounding.

She searched her mind for the magic, the key to the
transportation. She had done it several times before, with small grass dolls,
and she had just moved herself, out of Sulendald. She could do it again, she
had to.

I am sliding down, down the cliff, and then I am there at
the bottom looking up. I am moving, I am jumping, I am THERE!

Nothing.

Then she thought again—
I am jumping—

And she knew what she had to do.

She stood up, still looking down.

She took a deep breath, and another, then three in quick
succession, blowing them out with a whoosh of air.

Come on Laura,
she encouraged herself,
you can do
this. You can do it!

She bent her knees.

And vaulted off the edge of the cliff with all her might.

NOW!!!

She screamed to herself.

Nothing happened.

Terror seized her.

She had made a mistake, she couldn’t do it. She wasn’t able
to move herself twice in a row.

NOOOOWWW!!!

She felt herself wink away in an instant, there was a
whooshing sound through her ears and she felt herself suddenly appear, not too
far from the ground.

But still not very close.

She fell the rest of the short way and hit the ground with a
powerful smack.

Her head felt like it split open. She rolled over, she
couldn’t breathe again. Blue and white sparkling stars clouded her vision,
flashing angrily at her.

She felt herself blacking out again.

Then the light reappeared before her, bobbing gently.

She struggled to focus on it.

It drew closer.

She finally found her breath again, just enough to gasp.

The light was emanating from a small exquisite being with
wings, floating above her head.

It was a Fae One.