The Affairs of Dragons Pt. 6 - Training...Kind Of

 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.