Chapter 16: Sgian Gorm

 

Sgian Gorm: Chapter 16

“Skinner,” his first mentor faced him across a circle drawn in sand. “Skinner. Listen to me. There is nothing here for you but destruction. I know your powers. I know your strength. I know your weakness. I know how to defeat you.”

“It has been a very long time, Danalaka,” Skinner smiled, sardonic.

“Leave the field,” Danalaka pleaded.

“Perhaps you beg me to leave because you know how formidable I have become,” Skinner said casually.

“I know your—what is it you taught us to call it—heroic flaw,” Danalaka smirked. Skinner found him smarmy to the point of offensiveness.

“Yours is plainly arrogance,” Skinner scoffed.

“Yours is compassion and a pathological support of losing causes,” Danalaka spat.

“I refuse to take unpopular as synonymous to losing is all,” Skinner shrugged, seating himself gracefully on a large rock.

“The Urgatha wills it,” Danalaka saluted.

“Think for yourself, damn you,” Skinner said quietly, drawing a griffon in the sand at his feet with his short spear.

“Think?” Danalaka scoffed. “That is all you do, you pedantic fop! Think, think, think, and fail to act.”

“Better than taking wrong action for failing to think,” Skinner scraped a quick, elaborate flourish beneath his griffon in the sand.

“You must bow to the Urgatha’s will,” Danalaka’s voice had an edge of pleading now.

“Danny,” Skinner smiled wanly, his eyes full of affection. “I really do wish you could see past your loyalty to the office and see what a shrew you’re playing court-b***h for.”

“How dare you!” Danalaka struck with a reactive bolt of arcanum, which Skinner caught in the palm of his left hand and seemed to casually stuff into a pocket of his robe.

“You used to warn me of temper, Danny,” Skinner said, now drawing a pony in the sand.

“You use to have passion,” Danalaka said hotly.

“Yes,” Skinner gazed out the top of his forehead at the other sorcerer. “I still have. I simply choose not to waste it on lost causes—or arguments with zealots who refuse the truth in favor of their own ambitions.”

“What is it you’re trying so hard not to say?” Danalaka’s orbs raced, a sure sign he was gathering arcane energies for powerful spellwork.

“I used to admire you, Danalaka,” Skinner looked at him sadly now. “I thought you were a great sorcerer. I know you’re a fantastic administrator—”

“Flattery ill suits you, Skinner,” he said.

“That’s why I avoid it.” Skinner continued in the same resigned tone. “I work best in truths. Here’s one for you—or maybe three: Danalaka of Diahl is a coward, a puppet of the Scepter, and a lapdog for the Urgatha.”

“You have a funny way of attempting peace negotiations,” Danalaka checked his pockets, taking stock of what he had available for spells.

“Danny,” Skinner shook his head as though disappointed with a gifted child for doing something very thoughtless. “Quit being lazy and think for yourself. You’re a half-breed roundear. What happens when the Urgatha finds out that the other half is Vurhk? And even if she doesn’t, what happens when you succeed in killing half your heritage? Why will she not fear you? Why not turn on you? It is inevitable.”

“No,” Danalaka shook his head. He attacked. Sudden. Decisive.

Skinner stood to meet Danalaka’s attack, surprised by the physical nature of it, but not caught off guard. He brushed aside the crushing blow of the taller man’s staff, grabbed the staff and pulled, using Danalaka’s momentum to send him sprawling in the gritty sand of the canyon floor.

Danalaka rose and stabbed his staff at Skinner, muttering a malicious spell. Skinner raised his right hand, absorbing the power of the spell so it had no effect. Before Danalaka could ready another spell, Skinner reached into a small pocket and pulled out a pea-sized bandi-sphere—a pearl-like object taken from the Anandamere shelled muscles called bandis—and conjured an antimagic sphere about himself. Danalaka tested it with a powerful mage-bolt spell, but found the sphere impressively invulnerable.

“Why do you not attack me?” he asked Skinner.

“Not my style,” Skinner shrugged. “Takes more strength to resist violence than to enact it.”

“You think yourself so strong?” Danalaka’s anger flashed again.

“Not exactly,” Skinner frowned, considering carefully his own hesitance to injure his former mentor.

“So be it,” Danalaka relaxed, as though all possibility of danger had passed. “You may deal instead with my champion, Sgian Gorm.”

“Who?” Skinner tried to ask, but a bright flash signaled Danalaka’s disappearance.

“Love to know how he does that,” Skinner shook his head, frustrated at the evidence of his limits of knowledge.

W          W          W

“So,” Skinner was staring down an enormous black drastyn. “You would be Sgian Gorm? Is that what’s going on here?”

In your tongue, that is what men call me.

The drastyn’s voice was crimson and deep burgundy. It felt bloodthirsty and predatory to Skinner. The dragon itself was an amazing creature. Its main scales were so black they oil-slicked into blues and purples like a grackle’s head. Its throat and belly were the silver-to-blue-to-grey of a stormy sky. Its wings, Skinner estimated them at close to thirty yards span, were supple hide stretched over a network of spiny bones. Heavily lidded eyes added to its angular bone ridges to give it a cunning aspect, and with its mane-like ridge of bony spines, it presented as an enormously lethal beast.

“Why do you come?” Skinner’s eyes narrowed. He was standing in an exaggeratedly relaxed pose, his spear held casually over his shoulder as though it were superfluous to the scene.

I am curious about you, Sgian Gorm told him. So many times have I heard your name. The druids fear you; Danalaka fears your stick; Diahlar fears your strange philosophy. I wonder that any find aught to fear. You seem . . . not-fearsome . . . to me.

“Only those who cross me or those I love have anything to fear from me,” Skinner slammed the spear butt into the ground and took three steps to the side. “Go back to your place and let us ‘bipeds’ go about our rivalries in our own manner.”

I cannot.

“Why?” Skinner looked him in the eyes, noting the yellow-green similarity of those eyes to peridot.

Vows were made.

“Is it better to live in shame,” Skinner cocked his head in curiosity, “or die to honor a vow made in ignorance.”

Better to die for a cause than to live for nothing!

“Drastynsense!” Skinner huffed. “Life is its own purpose.”

How can such a learnéd man be such a fool?

“You’re what, three, maybe five thousand years old?” Skinner asked. “Have you been as steadfastly judgmental all that time? Can you really espouse any human cause over any other? Are not all our causes given to whimsy and fashion? Built on the science or faith of the day and adhered to beyond reason? Will they not change tomorrow? Next year? A score of years hence? Will not our present cause pass away by then and be proven false or fey?”

We do not live a year, or ten, or an hundred, hence. We live now. We live today. Today I have vowed—

“Did you?” Skinner held up his left hand, placing his right again on the spear’s haft. “Did you vow today? Or was it yesterday? And how long is that vow good? Until the present circumstance is past? Or until you make another choice?”

Do you not seek my destruction? Is it not your purpose to cease my existence and rid your precious existence of my evil?

“Evil?” Skinner coughed a bitter laugh. “I don’t exactly believe in evil, Gorm. I believe in responsibility—”

And your responsibility here is to end me . . .

Drops of saliva dripped from the drastyn’s mouth, sizzling as they digested stone at Skinner’s feet. He stepped back a pace, brandishing the spear defensively.

“My responsibility?” Skinner stammered, suddenly overwhelmed with dread and filled with awe at the magnitude of the audacity that had drawn him here.

“Well,” he stamped his foot stubbornly and spat coarsely at the dragon. “Quit that! I know what you’re doing . . .

“Hey,” Skinner’s dread gave way to curiosity. “Can you just turn that on and off? Is it voluntary?”

You vex me, Skinner! The drastyn’s voice was sharp with deadly shades of red, orange, and black. Skinner flinched slightly but willed himself to endure. Yes. I have influence over my own ambiance. None has so uncannily resisted.

“Really?” Skinner’s curiosity turned to boyish pride. “Sorry if that rubs you the wrong way.”

What’s your game, Skinner? The drastyn’s voice was more reserved now, curious as well as aggressive.

“Wizard’s Gambit,” Skinner shrugged.

That is Drastyn Gambit, Gorm’s tone was crushing in its hostility. My people created it. It is not for your feeble minds . . .

“Cut that out!” Skinner kicked a small stone into the drastyn’s left shoulder. “I’m trying to have a simple conversation here, and you keep playing the heavy. Just relax and let’s talk.”

Demanding little insect, the dark swirls in his tone struck Skinner as laughter. I could eat you in one bite, digest you with marble and obsidian.

“You eat stone?” Skinner was curious again, leaning now on the spear as though it were merely a walking stick.

Why is it that those whom you love have reason to fear you?

“Pardon,” Skinner took on a confused frown.

You said that the only ones who should fear you are those who cross you and those whom you love; why should your loved ones fear you?

“Humph!” Skinner chuckled bitterly. “Kind of misspoke myself. But look where I am; is this a safe place for loved ones?”

It’s getting safer, Gorm settled himself in sphinx pose, staring at Skinner much as a kitten might watch a butterfly.

“I don’t know about that,” Skinner shrugged. “But at least it’s interesting.

“Would you mind terribly if I asked a bit more about you? Other than rocks, what diet do you prefer?”

Same as you, most likely. I very much enjoy kulu, deer, antelope, and guweg. Never cared for fish, though. Griffon’s good in its season. This last was said in a tone shaded a curious, deep-shadowed mauve.

“My friends from the Sunset Cliffs might not be so happy to hear about that,” Skinner said sternly, a grudging smirk competing for face time with his paternal scowl.

I smelled the two of you long before . . . You, though. You I did not recognize. Strange. I have not heard your sorcery, either. If you are worthy of the respect—fear, actually—of Diahl, why have I not discerned your use and magnitude of power.

“Oh, that,” Skinner shrugged, smiling affably. “Could be that I’m just that good. Or, and I think this more likely, it’s because I’ve used my wits more than my sorcery since we came here. Most can’t discern the winds as we do—did you know that?”

I did not know until this moment that any biped could discern the arcane rhythms. There was a growing sense of respect in the drastyn’s tone, but Skinner was conflicted over whether this was a good thing or not.

“I’m in quite a perilous position,” he told Gorm. “You see, if I play my hand and show the truth of my power, it could go either way. Could be you’re impressed enough to walk away in mutual respect and just as mutual disagreement on politics. Or you’re impressed enough to take me as a threat and feel the compulsion to defend your territory.

“Quite a dilemma, wouldn’t you say?” He gazed directly into the dragon’s eyes, sensing Gorm’s subtle attempts at invasion and just as subtly brushing him away.

Brazen of you to proclaim it aloud.

“So . . .” Skinner put the spear over his shoulders crossways and held it with both hands draped over the shaft, looking like a farmer resting his hoe to converse with a beast of burden. “How can we resolve this thing without stupidity, violence, and your inevitable death?”

My death? The drastyn laughed heartily now, taken aback by Skinner’s bravado.

“My spear is crusted with a particularly nasty concoction—”

Do you think your simple poison will more than annoy me? Could you be so foolish?

“Oh, no. You don’t understand,” Skinner pulled the spear down to his waist as though ready to lunge with it. “It’s not a poison—exactly. It’s merely an anesthetic.

“I poke you with this, see,” he motioned with the spear. “And you go to sleep. While you’re asleep, I do whatever I think is necessary for my survival.”

Why have you not done so, then? The drastyn’s tone was still humorous, but now tinged with caution and curiosity.

“Because,” Skinner scowled, lowering the spear and letting his shoulders sag. “I love beauty, history, wonder . . . and loathe violence among sentients.”

And yet you slew Tang Jin Dun. The statement was factual, unaccusatory.

“And regretted it every waking moment since,” Skinner nodded.

Did you slay him in his sleep?

“No,” Skinner shook his head.

When Skinner told him the story, Gorm said, For this tale I will concede the Vurhk to you. No sadder tale, and yet none so filled with hope. When next we meet, though, we must contend to one’s death—if not both as you and Dun.

“Death?” Skinner was perplexed. “I killed him.”

And he ended your manifestation in the Vale; do you not know of assimilation, summons, and disincorporation?

“Disincorporation?” Skinner looked at him blankly.

An Outer must be summoned to the Vale—

“I was not summoned,” Skinner said, half questioning.

Kurtney summoned you to punish you for Dun’s death, Gorm told him. I am uncertain of your original advent; that story is strange to me. But it is certain as the Drastyn Moon that you disincorporated to fend off death at the end of your battle with Dun.

But this is curious to me: that you were not dismissed from the Vale at the time of Kurtney’s assimilation. The Law of Summons should have seen you returned whence you were summoned.

“Perhaps Kurtney did not summon me,” Skinner said darkly. “Perhaps he called and I came because I wished to be punished.”

That, too, is a very curious thing.

“So,” Skinner sighed. “We’re agreed? You leave the Vurhk until we meet again. What will you do?”

I shall banish myself to the Drastyn Moon, Gorm rose suddenly and leapt into the sky, spreading his wings and shooting impossibly fast into the distance.

“What’s the Drastyn Moon?” Skinner asked the twilight, watching Sgian Gorm fly higher with each passing moment.

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[TLK]

“So,” Skinner sighed. “We’re agreed? You leave the Vurhk until we meet again. What will you do?”
I shall banish myself to the Drastyn Moon, Gorm rose suddenly and leapt into the sky, spreading his wings and shooting impossibly fast into the distance.
“What’s the Drastyn Moon?” Skinner asked the twilight, watching Sgian Gorm fly higher with each passing moment.

All these alien names are quite tiring...