In an effort to avoid cover design, my brain decided it would finish up the current chapter in progress for the next book. It's kind of odd how the mood in the short story For a Child influenced my writing with Tole. Trip, the main character in that piece is very somber and serious. I've had to work to get Tole's snark back. It hasn't been easy, but I'm getting there.
Hope you enjoy it and comments are always welcome.
-Wayne
I sat
there inside of a circle I'd drawn in the dirt with my dagger staring at an
orcish rune I had also scribed in front of me inside of the circle. Valsh tells
me it should help me focus while I try to reach my gift. All it's done so far
is give me a fucking headache.
Every
time I stare at it another image jumps into my mind and distracts me. I've
never been able to concentrate for very long. I'm just too easily distracted. I'd
harnessed that tendency to help build situational awareness, but I've never
been able to turn it off. Consequently, my head is fucking killing me from
trying.
"GODDAMIT
VALSH! This is just not going to work! Man, I'm just not gonna be able to do
this. Every time I just start to concentrate on this rune a crescent moon keeps
popping into my mind."
I stood
up and stepped forward to leave the circle and smashed my face into the
invisible barrier. Valsh almost fell off of the log he was sitting on when he
saw that.
"Well,"
he said around choked laughter, "you can obviously raise a circle. You can
control the magic in The Bar to get where you want to go...most of the time, so
you touch magic whether you believe it or not. Break the circle with your
dagger before you break your nose."
In spite
of his confidence in my ability, I wasn't convinced. What he didn't mention was
that it had taken me the better part of a morning to be able to raise the
circle. The other side of it was that I really wasn't interested in learning
this shit. If Valsh was right, I really didn't have a choice. According to him,
once that tap is on it doesn't turn off. It would continue to open and
eventually drown me if I didn't learn to control the flow. Fuck...my...life.
"What
I do not understand," he continued, "is why the symbol isn't working.
It is a meditation technique that has been used for millennia by my
people."
I looked
him square in the eye and said, "Maybe that's the problem. You remember
how well trying to train me like you'd train a pup worked last time don't
you?"
That
brought another round of his raucous laughter as I took my dagger and broke the
circle. I picked up a dirt clod and bounced it off his rock head. He stopped
laughing for a second and then burst out even louder than before.
"You
are right, of course," he said once he calmed down. "I should have
learned then that I cannot teach you using our ways. Try it again, but this
time draw the symbol that keeps showing itself to you. I am beginning to think
that maybe it is your gift trying to tell you to do it your own way."
I walked
over to my packs and said, "After lunch. I'm starving like I've been
working out all morning. I would never have guessed that this shit would be so
much fucking work."
We spent
about an hour eating and talking. Food and water helped my headache go away, at
least until Valsh started talking about magic and his theories on exactly what
was going on with me. That put the pain right back in the old brain bucket. When I finally gave the “migraine salute” by
pinching the bridge of my nose, he stopped talking. That’s when I realized I
could feel tension in the air that wasn’t coming from me.
I looked
up to see Valsh sitting stone still and staring behind me. If I didn’t know any
better I would have thought he was afraid. Nah, not Valsh. Then I noticed he
was chanting under his breath, gathering power to himself.
“Tole. Do
not move if you wish to live,” he said as he rose and unleashed a strike at
something behind me.
Then he
sat back down with a look of complete and utter disbelief on his face. Now he
was afraid. He was sweating and his hands were shaking, so I drew my daggers
and spun.
Serilla
was there in her true form. Something in the way she was moving told me she was
getting ready to eat Valsh. I put my daggers away and started walking to her. I
heard Valsh trying to move. That was when I realized she had countered what he
had thrown at her and locked him right the fuck down. He was completely at her
mercy, and I was willing to bet that was a new sensation for him.
“Valsh.
Meet my employer,” I said gesturing to Serilla. “Serilla, this is Valsh. Please
don’t eat him.”
She
shimmered into her human form and walked towards me saying, “Are you sure,
Killer? I’ve never eaten anything like him before. He might be delicious.” She
smiled at me.
“I’m
sure. Why are you here?”
I heard
Valsh draw his first deep breath since this all began as she turned to me and
said, “In all truth, I was watching you through the link from our Communion. I
could tell you had not moved yet, and then I felt you touch the magic of my
world. I did not know what that meant, so I came to make sure you were
unharmed. I arrived to find you sitting and talking to that. What is that? It
is NOT of my world.”
I tried
really hard not to laugh...I swear. I didn’t do a good job, but I tried.
Serilla raised an eyebrow at me, and I got myself under control.
"That
is Valsh," I said with a flourish and a bow. "He is an orc and the
shaman to the Deep Valley Tribe of the world called Orta'ahn, and he's one of
the very few beings I've met in the multiverse that I consider a friend. We
have been through a scrape or two since my first job for him
almost...shit...two years ago. Has it been that long, Valsh?"
"It
has indeed," he said as he got to his feet. "What manner of creature
are you? I have never been at anyone's mercy like I was just now. It was a
truly memorable experience, but not one I would like to repeat."
Serilla ignored
his question and came to sit on the log beside the fire pit in our camp. I
offered her something to eat which she declined. She stared at Valsh for a few
minutes like she was still unsure whether or not to eat him. I could tell that the scrutiny was making Valsh very
uncomfortable. I tried really hard not to laugh when she would shift her body
in her seat causing Valsh to twitch a little. I tried hard, but it was just so
damned funny.
"That
does not explain why you were drawing on the magic of my world," she said.
" I knew you had the ability, but I did not know you had the knowledge to
do so."
"I
don't."
"He
does not."
Valsh and
I spoke almost in unison. I turned and shot him the finger, but I smiled while
I did it.
"That
would explain why it was so...erratic," Serilla said with a nod. "It
was like when a fledgling dragon first touches magic. What you are doing is
very dangerous."
Valsh
continued, "That is the purpose of my visit to your world. I had suspected
for some time that Tole had the ability to channel magic. I first saw him do it
during his first, job I think he calls it, for me. I tested him earlier by
feigning an attack on him when he was not expecting it. His reaction to the
attack is what caused him to reach out for your world's magic. In the heat of
combat, he pulls magic like a magnet and turns it into carnage. It is truly
something to behold."
"Horseshit,"
I said. "I trained long and hard to become what I am. Magic was not and is
not a part of it."
"No,
Killer, you are wrong," Serilla said laying her hand on my leg. "If
what I saw in our Communion is any key, magic is a big part of why you are the
way you are. It may have been dormant when you were on Terra, but it most
definitely is active now. You should learn to use it."
I put my
hand on hers. "I told you I don't want to know what you saw, and I meant
it. Still do. As far as magic goes, I'll learn enough to keep it from killing
me, but my trust is always gonna be with the fucking steel in my hand."
Serilla
looked me right in the eye and said, "That is most likely for the best. If
what I saw in our Communion is true, I do not think either of us is going to be
able to teach you how to control your gift. I think you would need to be taught
by another like you, but I have never seen anything quite like what I saw when
we joined."
This
peaked Valsh's interest. "What is this Communion you keep speaking of? How
does it let you have all of this information about Tole? What have you done to
him?"
"It's
private man," I said. "She didn't do anything to me that I didn't
want done, but suffice it to say that we know each other on a level most people
never share. We know who and what each other truly are. If she says
you guys can't teach me then you can't."
Valsh
shook his head. "I will not accept that. Your gift is dangerous. If you do
not learn to release it, you will die. I cannot allow that to happen when there
is something I could do about it."
"I
may have an idea about that," Serilla said as she stood up. "I can
teach you a pair of runes that will allow you to safely discharge all of the magic
built up in your body. The only problem is that it will drain all of your stored magic...even that in
your powered stones. You wouldn't be able to open a portal for a couple of days
and your...what did you call it...nuclear warhead won't go off if you are
killed. You will, however, be reset to start storing magic again. It's not the
best option, but it is the only one we can choose at the moment. We really need
to figure out how you came to be what you are."
I gave
her a look that said not to dig any deeper into that right now, so she got us
both sticks to write in the dirt with and set about trying to teach the dullest
kid in class. Luckily, the runes weren't hard to learn, and the process was
simple. I just had to put my feet in water, one hand on each rune, and brace
for impact. Apparently, it's gonna hurt
like a bitch. Oh well, life is pain right?
While we
were talking, five men stepped out of the forest into the clearing where I had
made camp. From the looks of them they were highwaymen and probably looking for
an easy target.
The
largest and obviously the leader of this band of merry men stepped forward.
"Well, well, well, look at what we have here fellas. A woman, a tiny
little man, and their pet...um whatever it is. They obviously didn't know that
there is a tax to travel in our forest. I guess we'll just have to see if they
have anything of value...and if not, maybe take a little sport with the
woman."
Serilla
could have cooked them where they stood, and I'm pretty sure Valsh could have
as well. The two of them exchanged a glance and Valsh acted cowed and slunk
over to sit behind Serilla. She just touched her chest with her fingertips and
said, "Please don't hurt us." Then she looked at me, and I knew they
expected me to handle this. She wanted to see me fight.
I got up
and drew my blades and looking at Serilla said, "Fine. Be that way, but
this is gonna cost you extra." She gave me a nod and a smile.
As I
walked towards the men, they all had a look on their faces that told me that
they didn't regard me as a threat. Two of them exchanged punches to the
shoulder, pointed at me and started to laugh.
Right, those fuckers die last.
I ran my
threat assessment as I walked across the clearing. They were all taller than
me. The smallest was probably four inches taller and at least twenty pounds
heavier, and it just went up from there. One of the laughers had a cloudy eye
with a scar through it. Right, bad peripheral vision. The rest of them looked
relatively healthy.
As I got
closer they broke into a circle around me. I loved it when they do that because
it hinders their ability to work as a team. I could feel the adrenaline slam
home into my brain and suddenly my opponents' movements looked like they were
in slow motion.
When the
circle closed, the leader glanced to his side to say something to one of his
men, so I charged him while his head was turned. I had to jump to reach my
target, but I put the dagger in my right hand up through his chin and into his
brain. Turns out there was one in his head because his eye rolled back and he
crumpled to the ground like a rag doll as I landed from my small jump.
Once
both of my feet were on the ground I pivoted right and gut stabbed the next man
with the dagger in my left thrusting it up and into his heart. The look of
shock on his face matched the expression of so many others in my past.
I could
hear the man to the leader's right charging so I turned and threw the dagger in
my right hand. It didn't penetrate his chest, but I didn’t need it to. It
caused him to turn his body to avoid being hit, and that opened up the inside
of his thigh and that let me put my other dagger into the artery there. I made
sure to slice as I withdrew the blade. He stumbled. I shoved him on past me and
moved to retrieve my thrown dagger.
That just
left laughing boys who were standing stock still with their mouths wide open.
They glanced at each other and turned to run.
Oh, I don't fucking think so. You don't get
to threaten me and run away.
I set off
at a sprint, and the landscape around me blurred as I ran. I caught them both
before they'd taken three steps. When the gap between us closed I thrust with
both daggers, taking each man in the back just between the fourth and fifth
ribs. The pulse from their hearts traveled down my blades tell me the strikes
had punctured them. We ran maybe two more steps in unison before they faltered
and fell forward.
I knelt
down and wiped my blades on their leather vests and spit on the ground between them. I turned back to see Valsh and Serilla both looking at me like they'd
just seen a ghost.
"See?
What did I tell you?" Valsh asked. "Is it not something to behold?
That small human definitely has the heart of an orc!"
"You
mean dragon. I felt it. I felt when he touched his gift. I have never seen
anyone or anything move that fast." Serilla's words were almost a purr.
"Killer, I owe you an apology for trying to talk you into letting me
release you from our bargain. Asking you not to be what you are would be like
asking the sun not to rise."
"Whatever,"
I said. "I'm hungry again though."
I sat down and finished off the rest of the meat on the carcass over the
fire. I had to admit though; my headache was gone.