Chapter V - A New Order

Things start picking up as Alagar flees from the Order of Mages and goes on the run with the Order known as the Black Mages

 

            “No, I won’t allow it.”

“We have no other choice.”

            “He can stay by himself, we know he’s capable enough” a female voice said as Alagar woke to hear two voices, which were no more than a whisper, arguing from a distance as he slowly came into consciousness.

            “We need him! Don’t you see that? We took a great enough risk just getting to him because of you. You’re just lucky you got him when you did, another minute out there and Jarvis’s mages would have overcome us. If we take another risk like that, we might not all be coming back next time, we nearly lost Darién and Sánya today, I will not put any more of our lives at more of a risk than necessary.”

Before even opening his eyes, Alagar was already examining his surroundings. He could feel the dampness of light a fog on his skin, and a cool, harsh breeze was blowing, suggesting that they had moved to higher elevation, near the Andaer Mountains perhaps. From the blackness of his eyelids he knew it must be after dark, though if it was the same day he had no idea. He could smell smoke, the smell of stew heavy in the air, and the gentle warmth of a fire close by.

“We will speak on this matter later, see” the male voice said as he nodded towards Alagar, “he wakes.”

Alagar finally opened his eyes to see the source of the male voice turning to walk away, and the same female mage that had brought him here turn towards him. Looking behind her, he saw that, as he though, there was indeed a small fire, with a black pot carefully dangling over the flames. Nighttime had fallen, and Alagar could only see a few metres radius from the fire; discerning exactly where he was at would have to wait until morning, or until he found out.

“I see you’re awake. How do you feel?” the girl asked him.

“Fine.” Alagar said groggily, “How long was I out?” Alagar noticed for the first time that, standing in the light of the fire, she looked older than he had first thought. This was not a girl of 16 or 17 but rather of 18 or 19, much closer to his own age.

“It was only this morning you were at the Order”

“Ah. Where is this place?”

This time it was the male mage who answered, “As I’m sure you have assumed we are at the foot of the Andaer Mountains, on the outermost edge. We made it here by nightfall, so we will be safe here, as I am sure they are searching for us. They aren’t going to just let us walk out of there with you so easily.”

Alagar’s head was spinning, partially from just waking up and partially from so many questions swimming through his head. Not knowing which one to ask first, he blurted out, “Who are you?” Might as well get the basics out of the way first, he thought.

The mage paused for a minute, as if she either didn’t want to tell him, or she wasn’t sure herself what to say. Finally after what was seemed like a couple minutes, she let out her breath and said “By most we are called The Morgúl. The name means Order of the Black Mages in the old tongue, which they use as a derogatory term. We are…” the other mage returned just then and threw an old, worn book at Alagar, cutting her off.

“Let him educate himself on the way. We cannot delay further. We must move now or we will never make it.”

“My name is Nária, and this is Kién, to answer the question you sought.”

“Could we save the pleasantries for later? We haven’t much time to prepare.” Kién said urgently to the girl Nária.

Nária helped Alagar off of the ground, as he was still fatigued after only woken up an hour ago, and the three of them doused the fire before continuing on. Kién lit the area with a flick of his finger, just like Kenon did when they first met, Alagar thought. As they began packing their things, only now did Alagar realized that they had been in a small recess in the face of the mountain, entirely closed in on all but one side by an enormous rock wall looming overhead; the light from the small fire that had previously been burning was far too insufficient to illuminate more than a few metres. He also heard the sound of running water somewhere in the distance, but put it out of thought for the time being.

After they had made their way to the side of the nearest wall, he found that, somehow, his belongings were laid up against the wall. The confused look on his face must have given him away, because Nária just looked from him to his equipment, smiled and shrugged.

“Go ahead” she said as her and Kién moved along the wall and disappeared around the corner onto what was probably a small ledge around the edge of it.

As he opened his pack and pulled on his tunic, he noticed that all the equipment in his bag had been cleaned, restored, or replaced entirely. Also he noted that the number of items he possessed seemed to have increased as well. He had more knives and a new dagger, and there was a new set of matching, intricately decorated armor. The set of greaves and bracers were black and made of hard leather, with designs on them that interwove and interlocked in mysterious ways and seemed to almost come to life and move under the light of the moon which had now appeared from the behind the clouds. The trousers and shirt he found were both midnight black, and the shirt was long sleeved, had a high collar, came down to mid-thigh level in length, and the shoulders were reinforced with leather that had the same patch worked designs as the rest of the armor did. The last addition was a hooded cloak, much like the ones that Alagar had seen the other mages wearing when he first saw them back at the Order. Only the hood of this one was bigger and had the same design on the crest of the head and had a single midnight blue gemstone interwoven in the center of it. With the cloak, in combination with the collar on the shirt, he could completely cover his head and face should he need to and if what Kién said was true about the Order searching for him, that might prove useful in the upcoming future. After he had changed and had finished equipping his gear and packing the rest his equipment, Alagar followed along the rock wall until he turned the corner and stepped out on to a wide cliff ledge that was carved into the side of the mountain. He found Kién standing there who had situated himself leaning against the immense rock wall that loomed over top them. Sensing his approach, Kién turned as Alagar got within a few feet of him.

“Where are we going?” Alagar asked when he was within a few feet of him.

“Before I answer your question may I first ask one of my own?”

“Of course.” Alagar said, tightening the strap for the fighting dagger on his back.

“Why did you decide to come with us? I don’t understand it, you had absolutely no idea who we were, at the time we were kidnapping you for all you knew, and yet you seem so calm about all of this…….…why?”

Alagar took a few moments to piece together his words before answering, because frankly he thought I don’t know the answer to that myself. After a few moments he finally said, “Ever since I was enrolled in the Protogenae task force, my life has been surrounded by magic. Limited magic though; binding prisoners, catching criminals, picking locks, deflecting objects, detecting peoples’ life energy and that was the extent of it. But ever since the accident…..things have been different. A world opened up to me that I never knew existed, though I always had a feeling that it did. After I escaped the city, everywhere I went I felt like there were eyes watching me from some dark corner and I was looking for answers. I had a lead from an old friend in Merton about something on the far side of the Aelin Galein desert, something about strange anomalies in the sand he said. When I came to investigate, I was attacked by another mage, Kenon, his name was. Warring with him was a test of everything I had learned while traveling from villages that I never knew existed and that the Kingdom surely doesn’t know about, or rather, didn’t want any of the rest of the people to know about. Ever since I left Melchior, even in the most remote places on the outskirts of abandoned cities, I have felt eyes watching me everywhere I go. Yet when Nária first came in through the balcony, the feeling dissipated. Even now standing here with you there is nothing…..why?”

Kién, obviously caught off guard by an answer he clearly wasn’t expecting, repositioned himself a couple times, then giving up, started to walk along the narrow pass up into the mountains. He started speaking as soon as Alagar started following him.

“There are things about this world that most would like us to forget, many things about the Old Kingdom lost in time that we are not supposed to find: weapons and artifacts of incredible ability crafted by the Grand Master Smiths of the Old Kingdom. Some still lie in plain sight, hidden in a statue or built into the side of the building perhaps. These, however lie dormant, and the public passes them by everyday without anyone being the wiser. Most of the artifacts in plain sight however, have lost their magic forever.”

Kién stopped and scanned the mountains around us, seemingly lost in his last thought. Realizing his unconscious pause, he glanced back to make sure Alagar was still follow him, then, reassured, turned forward once again and started back up the path, continuing as though he had never stopped.

“It is the artifacts that are hidden that still retain some if not all of their former energy. These are the ones we are searching for and more than likely that’s what was causing those disturbances. We may have a chance to stop and take a look but first there are bigger things we need to worry about.”

Just then, as the path curved left around the cliff face, Nária appeared on a ledge above them, and sliding down in front of them, she dropped in front of them.

“Company” she mouthed silently as the three of them pressed themselves as close as they could against the cliff to their left.

“Hoods up” Kién ordered them, the other two immediately doing so, and as they were, Kién pulled two metal objects out of his own cloak. Each had a large, egg shaped top and three short, jagged spikes clustered together, sticking out of one end. Kién quickly slammed both of them into the rock wall on either side of their company and, ducking down, the top parts started to faintly glow. When Alagar gave Kién a quizzical look, he only pointed to the gem on the cloak of his own hood, which was different than his own; pitch black with silver swirls throughout.

“Get down” Kién said as a slight rumbling grew in the distance. Alagar looked above his head just in time to see two of the Order’s mages soaring overhead, one he thought he recognized as being Kayden but couldn’t be sure. As they scanned the area all throughout the mountain range, they sent down globes of glim fire which rained down in every corner of the mountains, exploding into a ball of bright light as it dropped to a certain altitude into the canyons and crevices. After making a few more circles around the area, they flew off and after a few minutes the light faded and the glim fire extinguished itself with a small “pop”. None of them moved for another five minutes, both Alagar and Nária waiting for a signal from Kién. Finally, as Alagar’s knees were beginning to cramp, Kién looked around once more, and then stood up. The other two did the same as Kién removed the two objects from the rock wall and the three of them started walking along the again.

“The gemstones that are woven into our hoods”, Kién began to explain to Alagar, “react to the energy emitted by these devices. The energy that those two were dropping as they flew by was for tracking. It’s specifically designed to react to the magic energy that runs through a person’s body and each person shows up as a burning ball of magical light, according to their level of capability. The three of us would no doubt show up like a bright blue flair to them up there, but these” he said, gesturing to the two strange looking devices he was returning to his sack, “these create a disruptive energy that cancels theirs out. The problem with them is that they only cover a short radius, unless you are lucky enough to acquire a Renstone. A Renstone is an extremely rare type of gemstone that is not only void of defects, but is so pure that magic is actually enhanced through them, allowing a direct flow from the source and amplifying it to a wider radius. That’s how we were able to avoid them seeing us.”

“If these stones are so rare, how did you wind up with three of them? Each of us has one.” Alagar asked.

“That’s what you’re about to find out” Nária said as the mountain ledge ended and the sound of running water grew to a deafening roar. The mountain path opened up into another plateau similar to the one they had just came from, but more than half of this one was open to the surrounding mountains and also much larger. Directly opposite them was a hill that sloped down to meet a river that was only a few metres wide, just above where the water was sent plummeting down over an extremely large waterfall.  Well, this must be the source of the water I heard Alagar thought. As they moved across the plateau, Alagar looked down over the edge to where the water was falling down into the darkness and realized he could not see the bottom, only faintly make out the crash of water over rocks somewhere far below through the mist and into the darkness of the deep canyon. Nária broke into a clean stride as she bounded ahead of them as dawn approached and the mountain was beginning to light up in the early morning. The sun made patterns of light dance across the cliff face as it reflected off of the dew and spray from the falls. The crisp morning air combined with the moisture in the air made them shiver as they started down the hill on the opposite side.  When they reached the bottom, each of them stopped to fill their canteen from the rushing stream. After all three were done, the path turned to the left and followed the river upstream. They had gone to more than a few steps when they heard a loud explosion echoing from somewhere behind them, down inside the canyon.

“What was that?” Alagar asked, not in fear as much as a concerned wonder. The truth was he felt a sort of safety with Kién and Nária. For the first time since he fled the city and gave everything up, it seemed as though some pieces at least had been filled in.

“It’s nothing, let’s keep moving” Nária said, but she could not keep all of the fear out of her voice. Alagar noticed the slightest bit of panic leak through her mental defenses, and he knew by the look in her eye what was going on.

“There’s something’s coming for us, isn’t there?”

“We need to get to the end of this canyon; the jagged rocks and crevices there will give us cover.”

Just then another explosion sounded, this time much more violent and closer. The rocks beneath their feet shook with a violent tremor, causing them to brace themselves against the canyon wall to their left.

“Move!” Kién shouted.

They broke into a dead run, Nária in front, then Alagar and Kién in the rear. They followed the path beside the river as it twisted and winded around the rocks and the ground slowly became steeper and steeper. Just as Nária had said, the cliffs came into view as they turned the next bend, giant jagged rocks protruding out into the air, towering above their heads. The rock walls on either side of them slanted inward, making less and less of the sky visible until they merged into the dagger-like mountain side. The mountain loomed above them as they closed the distance between them and the small path that started winding up the cliffs. The source of the river fell from somewhere up inside the mountain, falling down from another waterfall, then flowed out of an opening from an underground cavern that lay gaping open like a sea monster, stalactites hanging from the ceiling like teeth. The path split in two, one went up and around the river opening into the mountains, the other was carved out of the inside wall of the cavern until it sloped drastically up until it was out of view.

“Which way is it?” Nária shouted back to Kién over the sound of the waterfall.

Kién stopped for a moment and seemed to listen, for what though Alagar could not be sure.

“The right one, into the cavern” Kién said, moving past both of them to take the lead.

“But we’ll be trapped if we go in there!” Nária protested.

“We have to risk it; we can’t risk outrunning it through the mountains”

“Risk outrunning WHAT?” Alagar shouted, but Kién ignored him and moved onto the path inside the cave. The path sloped drastically upwards until it curved to the center and around the back wall of the cave, behind the falling water. The path ended at the other side of the waterfall, and Kién motioned them stop and back up as he got a running start the length of the waterfall. He jumped and kicked off the opposite wall and propelled himself onto a ledge above their heads. Nária motioned for Alagar to go next and he just barely made it to the cliff where Kién was waiting against the back wall of the ledge that was only a few meters deep. At first, Nária followed Alagar gracefully up then wall but landed right on the edge, where the rock directly under her gave out. As she fell backwards towards the waterfall, she closed her eyes and waited for the impact of the cold water and to feel the force of the waterfall crashing down on top of her. She braced for the impact of the cold water when she felt her arm jerk to a halt, pulling it from her shoulder as the rest of her body reluctantly obeyed. She opened her eyes to see Alagar over the edge of the cliff, just barely holding her forearm as she hung above the deep pool of water below. Her eyes were wide with fear as Alagar felt his muscles straining against her weight hanging over the cliff. Slowly he pulled her back onto the cliff until they both fell backwards and landed in front of Kién.

“Get back to the wall” he whispered, “slowly”.

They both moved very carefully to the back of the cave and almost immediately they felt another huge quake in the ground, knocking the three of them into the back wall. Another loud explosion sounded, and Alagar swore that he could see a flash of light and bits of rock flying into the river from somewhere just down the path. A loud beating sound grew almost instantaneously from what was just the sound of wind. Alagar knew the sound at once, wings beating the air, he thought. Then from around the corner, a shadow flew over the river so fast that if he had blinked he would have missed it. If flew above the river and straight up the cliff and just a fraction of a second later a huge gust of air cut through the water, creating giant waves that splashed out to either shore and shook the entire mountain as it flew by.

It can’t be thought Alagar, knowing well what it was, but not knowing how to believe it.

They waited in dead silence for any slight hint of a sound. Though it felt like hours, only a few seconds past before an enormous figure came crashing down from above just outside the cave, sending a huge wave of water inside the cave and drenching the three of them. A pool of water collected in the back of the ledge they were on in a slight dip that came almost up to their knees.

Just outside the cavern they could see the shadow of an enormous creature. Kién motioned for them to slowly crouch down in the water. As they did, Alagar felt his feet slip on the wet rock and fall backwards, making a small splash in the water. He felt a hand quickly cover his mouth as the creature reared backwards at the sound and without warning sent a bright flash of light and immense heat forward as the cavern was filled with bright golden flames. The water sizzled and hissed as the flames evaporated the waterfall and roared upward past the opening of the ledge and continued upwards. Covering their faces and getting as far down in the water as possible, the three of them waited until the flames stopped. Slamming its jaws shut, the creature entered the cave and coming into view just over the ledge was an enormous, scaled head of a gold dragon. Its eyes probed the inside of the cave and shimmered like melted glass, its scales reflecting a blinding gold light from the sun. As the dragon swung its head examining every inch of the cave, the waterfall began to fall again, crashing down upon its head. Just before its head was level with the ledge, it began receding, as it turned around and left the cave with a whoosh, sending a new wave across the water then disappearing into the sky.

They waited there until they became numb from the coldness of the water, and waited until darkness had fallen until they dared move from the ledge. Stiff from the wait, they slowly lowered themselves from the ledge and back onto the pathway behind the waterfall. Kién motioned them to stay while he slid silently down the path and searched the sky and surrounding area from the mouth of the cave before motioning Alagar and Nária to come as well.

“We need to find a place to camp for the night, as we cannot risk lighting a fire now,” Kién said as they moved out into the night beyond the opening of the cave.

“I thought they had all been extinct since the end of the old kingdom?” Alagar asked as they climbed the other path that led into the mountains above.

“A few still roam these mountains, hiding deep in the canyons where even the sun’s light dare not reach. Gold dragons are one of the most deadly and territorial of all of them, and that one must have sensed the energy from the glim fire that those mages dropped into the canyon. We’re extremely lucky because honestly, I didn’t think that would work. Fooling a dragon is unheard of; they can taste you scent from miles away and see beyond what any other creature is capable of. I just don’t understand….we should be dead in the back of that cave right now.”

“Do not question why we have been gifted as we have, we’re still alive and that’s all that matters,” Nária said as they reached a plateau on the upper side of the river canyon. They walked a short distance around the mountain side and found a small opening that dropped down to another small cavern hidden underneath the surface they were standing on.

“We’ll stay here tonight,” Kién said as the three of them silently dropped down to the floor. They unpacked their gear, took off all their wet clothes and hung them to dry in the darkness as they crawled into their sleeping sacks and slept at the rear of the cavern. Just before he fell asleep, Alagar saw a shadow fly in the opposite direction overhead and back down into the canyon.

Reviews

[Legendary Catfoot]

This chapter was well worth the wait.

It's very professional, the way it's written.